James Malm Humiliates COG's By Having Best Feast Site EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

James Malm held one of the COG's greatest Feast's ever!  Medford, Oregon will NEVER be the same again.  The citizens of Medford have had a mighty witness at the awesome power of God in doing dramatic things for his CHOSEN remnant.

Forget the UCG, LCG, and even COGWA's Legionnaires disease ridden Feast site, they cannot stand in comparison to Malm's site.  They cower in envy.  They have all been humiliated beyond their imaginations.

Malm announced today that he had 16 people in attendance!  Shocking, I know!

Several persons wanting to attend the Feast in Medford bowed out at the last moment due to the distance and expense.  This resulted in a cozy close knit assembly of sixteen persons, observing a deeply spiritual Feast together.

Even GCI's Feast site in Monrovia garners 4-5 times that amount.

Malm promises even greater things next year, even a a tastefully decorated building!

This Feast was a pioneer shake down, first time event for us;  and much has been learned that will be used to upgrade the meeting site/s at our next Feast.

We are already planning for a more central location, a much larger attendance, simple yet tasteful site décor  and streaming web casts next year.

Yes, God is performing a mighty work once again.  Nations will be reached and the little flock will become rulers of the universe.  Rebellious sinners will be whipped into obedience, Saturday restaurant eaters severely punished and mixed fabric wearers stripped naked.  Truly, great things are ahead for the Church of God.

Dennis Muses: Head Usher said it BEST...

 

 

"I'll Take That Under Advisement..."

 

My Currently 97 year old father had a life long habit, when told he HAD to do or HAD to believe something of saying the above to such "shoulds" and "musts."  He'd say it to the doctor when told what he had to do or needed done.  He'd say it to those he worked for who had great ideas for him that he must or should do.  He'd say it to COG ministers who came and went through our home church in Rochester, NY where he was an elder for years before he wrote Joe Tkach Jr to thank him for emptying his church of members and signed it, "M. T. Hall" which I occasionally use in honor of his snark and abilities to set emotional and common sense boundaries.

 

My dad once mentioned to Dave Pack in Spokesman Club , when Dave was chiding all for not memorizing their scripture cards, that  "these men here work all week and have families. They don't always have the time to just memorize scriptures."  Of course this offended Dave who told my dad he would see him during the break.  Dad said, "no you won't," which is another form of "I'll take that under advisement..."   Love ya dad!

 

Whats with the good folk who follow and swallow everything a Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry or Ron Weinland (and many others) dish out as truth complete with all the shoulds and musts of having to believe and act on it all?  What kind of folk actually do "send it in" or close out a 401 K, sell a home, or send in "extra" monies to a Dave Pack to build a physical plant in an age where online learning is a much easier and less expensive way to go?  What kind of common sense does a Dave Pack have who must realize now he can't ask for it all to be sent in more than once?  Pulling big triggers, as he demands, can't happen often.

 

 

 For that matter, what kind of folk put up with, "When we go to the Place of Safety," (as if I had this all correctly understood for you)  or "I am an Apostle" (because I just made myself one),  "I am a prophet" (because I say so),  "I am spoken of by the minor prophet Haggai and I am Joshua," (because I have worn you out with analogies)," or "I am one of the Two Witnesses and my wife is the other one"?

 

I cannot say it or explain it any better than Mr. Head Usher did recently in his response to a recent entry on the ten qualities resilient human beings seem to have. 

 

 

Head Usher Noted:

 

 

"A healthy identity is actually a boundary issue."

"Who has the right to define your identity and tell you who you are? Does god have the right to define you? If you're a xian, it's hard to argue otherwise. Do "god's true representatives on earth" have the right to define you? You can see where this is going – downhill fast."

 

COG folk and all fundamentalists habitually believe that others have this right.  Being authentic as themselves seems to never cross their minds or if it does, they have a perpetual stomach ache keeping it at bay.  Every week they get redefined by others as noted, be it by the God of others who in print said this or that, by the characters in the Bible who are said to have said this or that and by the minister who decides whatever God or the characters who are said to have said this or that really meant in his opinion, which you better take as Gospel.

 

Whatever you get out of the Bible or from the sermon, you are NEVER to get the idea you can take it all under advisement.  Of course you can but that would rob the church and minister of their perceived and often phony authority over your life and views.

 

In reality, one can't help but be themselves, but in the Churches of God, every effort is made to crush that reality either by thinking it is some kind of sin to be oneself or having a more sinister motive of shaping sincere members into mere followers of a clever man and HIS ideas of how it all is.

 

 

 "Xianity doesn't have to make unreasonable demands, but it always has the power to make unreasonable demands seem reasonable"

 

Can anyone argue with this?  Making unreasonable demands seem reasonable...   That is what Gerald Waterhouse made a career out of.  Telling stories and weaving tales that were plainly unreasonable, and while he did MANY KNEW IT BUT SAID NOTHING, and making it SEEM reasonable.  Dave Pack is a weaver of such tales as well along with Flurry and Weinland.  Others qualify but are bit players.

 

For example, did going to Petra in Jordan as a safe place to be during the end of the age seem reasonable?  Does it still?  "Let's flee America where everything near and dear to me exists and go be safe in the Middle East?  What kind of shit for brains thought that one up?  "God will protect us."  Really?  In the last 50 years how much protection has God given beyond that which is just the luck of the draw or life at its worst?  I buried a lot of children in my day "whose Angels do watch over them."

 

Anyone who does not question their church or addled headed minister on his concept of a place of safety needs to have THEIR head examined.  Whatever happened to "hide me in the grave until thy wrath be past?"  Works for me.  It might be nice if you researched whether the "Exodus" and the children of Israel wandering 40 years in the wilderness where their shoes did not wear out, they had plenty of boring food and some water but the first group was ultimately forbidden to make it and destined to die there, ever actually happened, before you make too big an analogy or adopt of a belief on what "God" will do for you in Petra. 

 

Dave Pack is said to have decided, after seeing how tourist ridden Petra is, the Place of Safety is a few miles away from there.  What a jerk.  The whole idea is a massive boundary of common sense violation and excellent example of the unreasonable sounding reasonable.

 

 

It's a bad COG member mental habit.  Stop it!

 

 

I certainly hope that should the day arise when someone who feels they can habitually violate your boundries and common sense utters the words, "It's time to flee.., " you will take it under advisement.

 

 

" Xianity is a dangerous thing in the wrong hands. In the hands of abusive cult leaders like Armstrongism's ministurds, it will make unhealthy demands on everyone. You've got to have a strong sense of yourself to repel the onslaught."

 

 

Gosh I hate that term "Minis-turds"!  LOL.   Oh well...I was one until I wasn't.  Most COG members who are the wheat sifted out from the chaff , as I am sure they are told, have NO STRONG SENSE OF WHO THEY ARE.  They have a strong sense of who Dave Pack , Gerald Flurry or Ron Weinland says or said they are.  Around here those who follow and attend Bob Jones University are called Jonesers.  Ask a kid who he or she is and they will tell you, "I attend Bob Jones."  They have no clue that is not the answer to the question.  Thus we have the titles "Armstrongists," "Packsters," "Weinlanders," "Flurryites," and ......  "minis-turds."

 

 

However, I have come a long way personally and I am now just me.  I wish all COG "members" the same end results..

 

"People raised in abusive homes don't notice the onslaught."

 

 

This is the absolute truth.  While I was not raised in such a home or environment, I am sure one gets used to drama and the strange and weird (where have I heard those terms before?) get to sounding normal.  Yelling and swearing are "normal."  Anger and control are "normal."  "If you say so," or "Because I said so," seems normal.  None of it is of course. 

 

I suppose in my own growing up , where common sense seemed a daily occurrence, accounts for my own sense of "that's stupid," that for a time I suppressed when young and caught up in the church and all it's drama.  After all, the Bible is full of the same kind of COG drama the Church provided so it must be "normal."  It must be me...

 

"They've already been conditioned to perceive the unreasonable as reasonable, and to accept the unacceptable."

 

 

I can add nothing to this statement. Read it 100 times.

 

 

" Boundary violations are normal for them."

 

See last comment...

 

 

Look at me...Stop it!

 

Those of you who lurk here from the three worst examples of boundary violation in the Churches of God...Pack-Flurry-Weinland  (Larry-Moe-Curly?)  wake up.  It's ok to doubt the fantastic theories and scriptural weavings you hear every week about your ministers role in the universe and your part in funding it all.  It's ok to doubt the false concept of "The Place of Safety" as being safe at all or even what the Bible is saying for any "end time" folk.  Remember, when those words were originally spoken they were not for YOU or US. They were for THEM.  You really don't have to "send it in" and your doubts, cautions or common sense musings are NONE of these fake ministers business.

 

 

 

  Someone like Dave Pack spends months wearing folk down to believe the unbelievable and find the unreasonable to be reasonable and then you ALL end up looking like fools as he readjusts the "truth" so the circus can go on... 

 

 

 

 Ron Weinland still has followers he manipulates from prison.  The man has never once hinted at he may have done something wrong or inappropriate with the monies sent in.  Gerald Flurry thinks he is spoken of in Malachi and Bob Thiel, who has the theological insights,  teaching skills and  charisma of an Ewok, wants you to believe he is both a prophet AND heads the only true church of God on earth.  That is nuts!  He wants you to accept the unreasonable as very reasonable.  If you do, no one can help you.  You simply do not understand the Bible or yourself. 

 

Thank you Head Usher.   Your wisdom was born of an unreasonable childhood no doubt and experience in the Church of God.  However, your reasonable conclusions should cut the lurkers here and those who have still attached themselves to unreasonable men who violate common sense boundaries for a living and making the scriptures mean what they NEVER could mean,  to the bone...

 

 

Seat Gyrating used as a cure for mental illness

 

 

I'd say , as Dave Pack said,  it should make folk   "gyrate in your seats...",  but that is too much information for me to handle without laughing out loud imagining things I should not be imagining.  I can see being glued to my seat (not by Dave Pack's sermons however), but gyrating?   No...

 

...so you should take that gyrating thing under advisement.

 

 

 

 

 



Dennis Muses: We're not our story...

Bouncing Trumps Splat

Not to be preechy or stray from typical postings but if one is going to have a story to tell, and everyone has one,  we may as well choose to have confidence in our observations,  trust in our personal sense of what is right and fair and a personal authenticity that those who claim we must see and filter life's meaning through their eyes would have to get through first.

 

Remember:  If your head is telling you one thing and your stomach is telling you something else,  your stomach is telling you the truth....

 

“At the heart of resilience is a belief in oneself—yet also a belief in something larger than oneself.
Resilient people do not let adversity define them. They find resilience by moving towards a goal beyond themselves, transcending pain and grief by perceiving bad times as a temporary state of affairs… It’s possible to strengthen your inner self and your belief in yourself, to define yourself as capable and competent. It’s possible to fortify your psyche. It’s possible to develop a sense of mastery.”

 

http://www.wakingtimes.com/2013/09/26/10-traits-emotionally-resilient-people/

 

 10 Traits of Emotionally Resilient People:

1. They know their boundaries. Resilient people understand that there is a separation between who they are at their core and the cause of theirtemporary suffering. The stress/trauma might play a part in their story but it does not overtake their permanent identity.


2. They keep good company. Resilient people tend to seek out and surround themselves with other resilient people, whether just for fun or when there’s a need for support. Supportive people give us the space to grieve and work through our emotions. They know how to listen and when to offer just enough encouragement without trying to solve all of our problems with their advice. Good supporters know how to just be with adversity—calming us rather than frustrating us.


3. They cultivate self-awareness. Being ‘blissfully unaware’ can get us through a bad day but it’s not a very wise long-term strategy. Self-awareness helps us get in touch with our psychological/physiological needs—knowing what we need, what we don’t need, and when it’s time to reach out for some extra help. The self-aware are good at listening to the subtle cues their body and their mood are sending.
On the other hand, a prideful stubbornness without emotional flexibility or self-awareness can make us emotional glaciers: Always trying to be strong in order to stay afloat, yet prone to massive stress fractures when we experience an unexpected change in our environment.


4. They practice acceptance. Pain is painful, stress is stressful, and healing takes time. When we’re in it, we want the pain to go away. When we’re outside it, we want to take away the pain of those who we see suffering. Yet resilient people understand that stress/pain is a part of living that ebbs and flows. As hard as it is in the moment, it’s better to come to terms with the truth of the pain than to ignore it, repress it, or deny it. Acceptance is not about giving up and letting the stress take over, it’s about leaning in to experience the full range of emotions and trusting that we will bounce back.

5. They’re willing to sit in silence. We are masters of distraction: T.V., overeating, abusing drugs, risky behavior, gossip, etc. We all react differently to stress and trauma. Some of us shut down and some of us ramp up. Somewhere in the middle there is mindfulness– being in the presence of the moment without judgment or avoidance. It takes practice, but it’s one of the purest and most ancient forms of healing and resilience-building.


6. They don’t have to have all the answers. The psyche has its own built-in protective mechanisms that help us regulate stress. When we try hard to find the answers to difficult questions in the face to traumatic events, that trying too hard can block the answers from arising naturally in their own due time. We can find strength in knowing that it’s okay to not have it all figured out right now and trusting that we will gradually find peace and knowing when our mind-body-soul is ready.


7. They have a menu of self-care habits. They have a mental list (perhaps even a physical list) of good habits that support them when they need it most. We can all become self-care spotters in our life—noticing those things that recharge our batteries and fill our cup. In part two of this resilience blog series, my guest Karen Horneffer-Ginter, author of Full Cup, Thirsty Spirit: Nourishing the Soul When Life’s Just Too Much, shares her 25 ideas for cultivating resilience. Her blog just might inspire you to create your own self-care menu. Karen has taken the menu idea a step further by designing a self-care poster that serves as visual inspiration to nourish the soul when life’s just too much.


8. They enlist their team. The most resilient among us know how to reach out for help. They know who will serve as a listening ear and, let’s be honest, who won’t! Our team of supporters helps us reflect back what they see when we’re too immersed in overwhelm to witness our own coping.
We can all learn how to be better supporters on other people’s team. In this L.A. Times article, “How not to say the wrong thing”, psychologist Susan Silk and co-author Barry Goldman help readers develop a strategy for effectively supporting others and proactively seeking the support we need for ourselves. Remember, it’s okay to communicate to our supporters what is and isn’t helpful feedback/support for our needs.


9. They consider the possibilities. We can train ourselves to ask which parts of our current story are permanent and which can possibly change.Can this situation be looked at in a different way that I haven’t been considering? This helps us maintain a realistic understanding that the present situation is being colored by our current interpretation. Our interpretations of our stories will always change as we grow and mature. Knowing that today’s interpretation can and will change, gives us the faith and hope that things can feel better tomorrow.


10. They get out of their head. When we’re in the midst of stress and overwhelm, our thoughts can swirl with dizzying speed and disconnectedness. We can find reprieve by getting the thoughts out of our head and onto our paper. As Dr. James Pennebaker wrote in his book Writing to Heal:

“People who engage in expressive writing report feeling happier and less negative than before writing. Similarly, reports of depressive symptoms, rumination, and general anxiety tend to drop in the weeks and months after writing about emotional upheavals.”"

Amen... 



Another Reader Says "Get Over It!"

A reader responds to a post Another Restored Church of God "minister" Has His "Eyes Anointed" But By What?

I am one of Mr Gene Zhorne's several former daughters-in-law. The poor man suffered a difficult, unfair and abusive childhood. He was not compassionate or very loving with his sons, in my experience of him, probably because he didn't know how to be. While I repudiate all things WCG, I have to suggest that even the Jesus of whom you speak did not disrespectfully vilify other people. I don't love Mr Zhorne, and I am not writing this to defend him. I haven't spoken to the man in many years. But I would like to suggest that your accusatory website makes you as bad as you accuse him and Pack and that whole ilk to be. "Let him who be innocent cast the first stone." If you truly were a loving person, you'd presumably devote your energy to a more noble cause than this hate-mongering website. Get over it - the "church" damaged all of us who were "second generation" and probably our parents too. It will be to your great credit if you allow this post to be published.  Wendy

Satan Shuts Down COGWA Feast Site With Legionnaires Outbreak

It seems that God did not place his protection on the COG group that was meeting in St Augustine Florida this year.  There is an outbreak of Legionnaires disease that has shut down a hotel, sent several members to the hospital, and caused the cancellation of services.  Checking Google I found that COGWA had a feast site there this year.

Health officials said the affected person was attending a conference in the St. Augustine area and is now receiving medical care.  News4Jax.com

ABC News article:  Legionnaires' disease being investigated in St. Johns County

James Malm's Uber-legalistic Rules and Regulations Have Become "Burdensome and an Endurance" That Has Left Some Members "Weak"

James Malm's absurd and unnecessary strict rules and regulations in regards to sabbath keeping has created a "burdensome" environment for many in his little group that deal with health issues.

A Malmite acolyte says:

I have been reading your writings. I no longer go to restaurants on the Sabbath or “get out of the house ”

My question is this. During back to back Sabbaths, one can read so much, study so much and listen to sermons so much. How can we pass the time and still keep the Sabbath holy. The Sabbath has become more of a burden & endurance rather than joy. Eating warmed up & cold foods has left me weak with blood sugar levels unstable. This has caused me to not feel well all day long and my spiritual condition has been suffering. ” and Not man for the Sabbath.”

This is not a leading question with an agenda. I really grapple with this. Your help would be deeply appreciated.

Malm responds with this:

I apologize for the delayed response, I have been very busy.

Being a diabetic for over 20 years I know all about blood sugar issues. All you need do is eat another biscuit or piece of bread, you can also have one or two cookies or heat water for a coffee or tea and have hot drink with a teaspoon of honey.

There is nothing limiting your intake, maybe you should prepare more food for the Sabbath.

If you are alone for Sabbath, maybe loneliness after being used to a large meeting is more the issue. For that, we must get close to God and wait patiently on him. For most of history from the first century and BEFORE Moses the people of God were mainly stand alone individuals or families. Remember Noah?

I suggest that you seek a medical opinion if your blood sugar issue persists.
It is also very good to have a walk to clear the mind from sitting around too long.
One of the reasons for the day dragging can be in being alone; when we are meeting with like-minded persons the time can go quickly.

Malm's asinine response is totally unnecessary because if he truly was a "new covenant" Christian, which he is not, then he would know that Saturday keeping and "kosher" eating is not a requirement. If his acolytes realized that then their days of worship would be days filled with joy and feasting.  Instead damnable rules and laws kill that joy.

Malm continues with this:

In terms of study it is important to understand that study is not merely reading. It is far better to read only a small portion and have a good think on it after praying for understanding.

When approaching something new I read all the material on the same subject, then pray for understanding and the take a walk or rest; after which I reread the material and carefully think it out, often repeating this cycle.

I also find that if I still do not have clarity it can be good to go on to something else for a few weeks and them revisit the problem issue. This gives the mind time to digest the new thing.

We don’t need to spend the whole day buried in the Book reading and burning our eyes; we must accompany reading with prayer and much time in thought, and it is extremely helpful to have like minded friends to gain from each others insights and to discuss these things with.

Part of the problem of boredom is that habits take awhile to change to something new, and due to the fact that people are taught to be dependent in these church groups, and not to really think for themselves so it is a struggle in the beginning. 

The Malmites STILL cannot think for themselves.  They have to continually ask Malm what is opinion is on different subjects.  Malm's opinions are just that, OPINIONS, which are totally irrelevant in the long run

One more point is our own situation. If we are working very hard through the week we will often be very tired by Sabbath and look forward to a much needed rest and spiritual recharge.

If we are not very active through the week we are not so much physically in need of rest on Sabbath. If anyone in not very active it would be a good idea to get active, even if it is only a daily long walk. I know about the handicapped and many of them can still do something within their limitations and such activity will contribute to their overall wellbeing of body and mind.

How To Save An Athiest

I never in my wildest dreams would have imagined I would become an atheist.  Growing up in a Christian church/cult, as a pastor’s son, I was certain I was destined for the ministry or something “important” in God’s Big Plan because I was also a member of God’s “one and only true church.” I never questioned my salvation. And when my faith in God went away and I became an atheist, I never worried about my salvation either. In fact, I am quite confident that if there is a God and a “Final Judgement,” I will pass God’s entry requirements for Eternal Life with flying colors.  But the standards that I believe one must meet in order to attain the “ultimate reward” of eternal life have changed dramatically. I know it may seem odd having an atheist tell you he knows how to gain salvation, but stick with me — your “higher power” may be revealing “new truth” that you need to hear.

In the church/cult that I was raised in (the Worldwide Church of God aka Armstrongism), we thought we were God’s “elect” — the ones chosen to “spread the gospel.” And what was that gospel?  It wasn’t the traditional gospel of evangelical Christians. In fact, we scoffed at the idea that all you had to do was believe Jesus Christ died for your sins to be saved. How silly! We knew better than that!  God expected “his people” to not just profess faith in Christ and become baptized, you had to also keep the Saturday Sabbath by resting and not working, you had to observe the Old Testament holy days, keep the Jewish food laws (even though we weren’t Jewish) which meant no pork, bacon, lobster, crab, catfish, etc. We were require to tithe 20-30% of our gross income every year and send in donations (offerings) on top of it.  No Christmas, Easter, Halloween or birthday celebrations — those were all of Satan’s world. Medical intervention was seen as wrong and a lack of faith, particularly in the early years of the church. People let their children and loved ones die from curable illnesses because they believed God would be displeased if they looked to doctors for help.  The list of crazy rules goes on and on and on. The sacrifices people made in our church to be “okay with God” — to gain salvation and eternal life were significant — far greater than your everyday church-goer.  The sacrifices people made in our church would be unimaginable to most. Relatively few in this world have worked harder or sacrificed more for their salvation than the members of our church.

But then our church changed. And the changes were so fundamental and so unprecedented, even outside “cult-watching groups” and Christian leaders declared the transformation historical, unprecedented.  No cult or church has ever done what our church did. In one fell swoop, the church tossed most all of its beliefs out as “legalism” and “unnecessary” for salvation  The new leader of our church who had been handed the reigns by the founder before his passing, implemented these fundamental changes in 1995. While outside groups praised the WCG for transforming from a cult to an evangelical Christian church, more than 60% of the church’s 120,000 members left almost overnight.

The financial impact to the church would ultimately leave my father — who supported the doctrinal changes — jobless as a pastor after 35 years of service. He and my mother would pay a steep price for giving up legalism.  They could have held on to the list of rules, but they felt God was moving his church into “new truth.” Legalism is another word for the many rules you had to keep to “earn your salvation” which was also seen as a”free gift.”  That’s right, salvation was a free gift but it was not free. If you weren’t experiencing cognitive dissonance in our church — as I state in my book “Cults and Closets” — you weren’t paying attention.

I agreed with the changes the church was making and I stayed as well and then I watched my father lose the only livelihood he’s ever known. The dysfunction and identity crisis the church was now faced with after the big changes was something  I could no longer be a part of, so my new wife (who felt the same way) and I left to attend a “mainstream” Christian church that didn’t have all of the baggage and rules — a church that believed you were “saved through faith alone in Jesus Christ.”
After a number of months we learned the church we had joined was not too different from the cult we left. They, too, had their set of “rules” for pleasing God. Doing the bare minimum to gain salvation — “faith alone in Jesus Christ”– wasn’t quite enough to be “okay with God” in the eyes of this church either. But I would learn most churches operate the same way: Here’s your list of rules; dishonor the list and there’s the door.

While attending this new church, I was now into my second year of marriage to my wife, who I had met in the church when I was 13. My dad was the pastor of the congregation her family attended.  Because of the social dysfunction I felt I had experienced growing up, I could not wrap my head around the idea that I might be gay, even though my sexual thoughts almost never had anything to do with girls.  Being gay in our church was no more an option than being a murderer or a pedophile. I thought the feelings I was having about guys was due to my messed up social life and feeling insecure around my male peers growing up. I figured I had “sexualized” my desire for more male friends.

I thought all those feelings would go away when I got married and started having sex with a woman like a “normal” person. Our church taught that premarital sex was wrong, so I was a virgin when I married. I figured God was allowing the thoughts in my head about guys to continue — despite my desperate prayers for him to remove them — because he was going to show his “power” and “plan” for me by removing those tormenting evil thoughts once I got married. He would reward my patience and virginity by removing the “gay.”  However, I still didn’t think it was “gay” he would be removing. I just thought it was “unnatural thoughts” I needed him to “straighten” out. That’s how deep in the closet of denial I was. Two years into my marriage, it became clear God had no interest in removing the feelings or thoughts and they only grew stronger and stronger. This, and the fundamental doctrinal changes in the church of my youth, triggered my “crisis of faith.”

Why would a loving Father and all-powerful God allow me — his “child” — to suffer and be tormented all those years and then NOT help me overcome these “obvious” evil thoughts about men once I got married. Something wasn’t adding up. For the first time in my life I was pissed off at God!

What kind of insane game was he playing with me?  Why, why, why would he put me through this torment?  In my book I share my “big prayer” to God. It was more about my “New Deal” with God and how I was tired of looking to others for answers about his apparent will for my life. I won’t share the prayer here but what I will say is that I truly laid out for God how I had tried so desperately hard to do his will — and I had followed that will — but he never kept his end of the bargain. It made no sense to me what was happening. Either God was playing a nasty, sinister, sickening trick on me or there was no God.

Over a period of time after my “big prayer” — not more than a year — it became clear to me that I no longer had a belief in God — I was an atheist. At least I no longer believed in the God of the Bible.  I still considered myself agnostic because I was afraid to believe that it was “safe” to rule out the existence of God. By calling myself an “agnostic atheist,” I could leave room for the potential existence of God and hopefully God would have mercy on me at any “final judgement” that may occur in the future. Call me crazy, but that’s how I was reasoning at the time.

But, I stopped worrying about God condemning me to “hell” at any final judgement, not because I proved God does not exist. You can not prove a negative. I can be no more sure there is no God than I can be sure there are no magical purple ponies living in another galaxy.  The reason I stopped worrying about missing the boat of salvation is the same reason I believe most of the religious — even the judgmental ones — and, DEFINITELY, most atheist and non-believers don’t need to worry about it. And again, it’s not because I believe there is no God and, therefore, no Judgement Day. Hang with me here.

The reason I don’t fear God’s final judgement is because I believe that IF there is a God — an all-knowing, all-loving being — he knows my heart. And he knows yours too. And I think most of us have good hearts. I may not know your heart, but there is nothing I know better than my own heart. I know what my intentions have been from the very beginning. I know how hard I sought a relationship with God and Jesus Christ. I know how I cried myself to sleep at night, begging God to take away the “evil and unnatural” thoughts in my head. I know during my “crisis of faith” how desperately I sought answers and begged God to lead my path.

Read the entire article here: Cults and Closets, How An Atheist Can Be Saved