The Start of Something New

“How does one get back to Jesus…truly? I would take that. Blog soon?”

I’ve been pondering this question for the last few days.

The question was inspired by a discussion on a Facebook group for former Bill Gothard students. I had asked these precious people to tell me why they chose to walk away from Christianity and/or the church…or why they chose to stay. They opened their hearts to me…so very honestly. Many of them left Gothard’s organization just to be re-injured by a normal church where they thought they were safe. The hurt is real. And so are the questions, frustration, confusion, anger, and sadness.

After all the talk, it seemed like we boiled down to three types of survivors. Some of us had left Christianity completely. Some of us had been able to separate Jesus from the abusive religion we experienced but struggled with the corporate church. Some of us recognized the mess within the church, but knowing it wasn’t Jesus, were trying to stick it out.

Here’s the thing. You don’t have to be raised in a Christian cult to fit into one of these categories. There is plenty of broken, legalistic, irrelevant Christianity within the “normal” church. There are plenty of people who have been hurt and left…who didn’t get their questions answered and left…who felt it was an empty religion and left… Look at the statistics! (The Barna Group has a bunch of great research.)

People aren’t leaving the American church because it’s facing persecution for being like Jesus. (Please hear my sarcasm.)

The fancy mega churches with their coffee bars, bands, lights, and fog machines have the same problem as the tiny, traditional, conservative, KJV only churches. In the midst of our own ideas, beliefs, and traditions we have lost sight of the One who made us Christian in the first place.

If Jesus showed up on a Sunday morning, would anyone even recognize him? The religious people missed him last time…

How do we fix this? Where do we even start? It feels so overwhelming.

The first step is to acknowledge the problems…not ignore them…not pretend they don’t exist…not blame the people who are hurt. And the next step is to reconsider Jesus and reinterpret the Bible, God and all of our Christianity through Him.

Over the next few days (and maybe even weeks) I’m going to be pondering some things…wrestling with them…honestly. Please feel free to ask questions and get involved in the discussion. It’s something we need to talk about.