Some do end up getting it. Glory to God!!

[arion]

An Open Letter to My Former Parishioners:

Dear Ones,

I am so very sorry. I hear the pain in your hearts when you tearfully admit you have a hard time believing God could love you. I now realize I bear a good bit of the responsibility for it. Some of the things I taught and did when I was your pastor harmed you and were a great disservice to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Early on I simply didn't know any better. I taught you what I had been taught. I was the product of a form of Christianity that has dominated for so long—an institutionalized, clergy led, power preserving perversion of what Jesus intended for his followers. It's true I had not done the critical research for myself. But, after all, who was I to question what my instructors said was the correct way to believe and "do" church?  

When life experiences and personal Bible study exposed some cracks in my rigid doctrinal foundation, I began to suspect there was more to knowing God than I knew. But I deviated little from the denominational tradition in which I was trained and continued to teach things of which I was no longer convinced. It was too important for me to preserve my good standing and keep my denominational star on the rise.

We claimed our mission was to save lost souls from hell by getting them to "make a decision for Christ" and become one of us. More candidly, we were mostly focused on growing the church. By means of sermons and programs of all sorts, I pressured you to try harder. I exhorted you to demonstrate "deeper commitment" to God and the church. I called upon you to be "faithful" and give more money. I taught you that if you wanted to please God you would have to strive to be a better church member. In a thousand different ways I made you think you were still lacking in God's eyes.

No, I wasn't mean about it. I usually did it with a smile. I found entertaining ways to say it. Nonetheless, speaking on behalf of God, I made it clear I expected more from you and so did He. No matter how hard you tried I had to keep you motivated and centered in the church. I needed you to fill your seat and bring someone else along to fill an empty one. The church (and I) had bills to pay.

The outcome for so many of you has been learning almost nothing about the abundant life Jesus promised. You live in constant doubt that God could ever be pleased with you. The abundant life is simply not compatible with constantly worrying we might be disappointing God. I taught you he was ready to banish to eternal torment everyone who didn't find his or her way into his grace. Trying to measure up was why we did most things. Guilt and shame was really the glue that held us together.

Most of our time was spent striving to earn favors from God by praying more, reading the Bible more, doing more in the church and "witnessing" more. I never taught you how to live in the knowledge God unreservedly loves us because of Jesus.

Our church environment was a chronic breeding ground for hypocrisy. We played comparison games and excluded ourselves from anyone who sinned differently than we did. We were hard on each other whenever one of us failed. We thought it was our duty to keep each other in line and maintain impossible standards of "holiness". We occupied ourselves with debates about whether Christians should dance, go to movies, use alcohol, sleep in on Sunday and miss going to church, wear certain types of clothes, or listen to certain types of music. We quarreled over Bible translations, hymnals, sound system volume and carpet colors. Conformity to group standards was a very high value, as was compliance to membership policies and the pastor's authority. In the name of maintaining order I rebuked and "disciplined" those who did not comply.

When I began to realize the magnitude of God's grace through Jesus Christ. I kept it to myself. Not until I was off the church payroll was I willing to declare in no uncertain terms, "that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:19 NIV). And, because of this, our mission is to go lovingly into the world around us with liberating good news rather than with preachy judgment pressure people to withdraw with us into our own little subculture.

My constant prayer for you today is that our merciful Heavenly Father will undo the damage I caused in your spiritual development. I pray that God will make himself known to you as the essence of love that he is. Should our paths cross again, think only of me as a fellow traveler—no title, no pedestal, please. And, remember, God loves us and will never give up on us. He has included all of us in his grace through Jesus Christ and never has a single condemning thought toward us, ever. Be at peace.

Repentantly yours,
(Name withheld)

***No links allowed***

[indianabob]

Arion,

Very interesting and provocative way of sharing your views.

I will give this a lot of thought and let you know what I come up with.

Thanks for sharing,
Indianabob

[MePogo]

These words touched me so.  I'm so blown away by your words that I don't know what to think.  Yes, Glory to God.

Blessings and strength to you from Him who is the source of all.

Pogo

[Dave in Tenn]

Is this a letter you wrote?  Or one you read?

[Kat]

That letter is amazing, very well thought out and written.  What a bold step for a Pastor to take, to admitted that he had been teaching heresy and to discredit the church.  I hope that this will cause others to question what they have been taught and possibly leave the church as well.  But it will most likely bring on condemnation and ostracizing from the whole church community that hear of this letter.  But the deeper we go into the church the further we have to come out.  Glory to God a Pastor has made that incredible journey out.

Mark 8:34  When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, "Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.
v. 35  For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel's will save it.
v. 36  For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?
v. 37  Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?
v. 38  For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels."

mercy, peace and love
Kat

[firefly77]

Arion,
Thank you for sharing this honest and touching letter; it reminded me so much of the times when I was still attending church and looked at God as the stern taskmaster, never satisfied, never pleased with anything I did or what I gave to Him. I am so glad I left.
I don't know how anybody of your former parishioners would have ill will toward you after reading this; however, it will most likely happen.

Peace,
Angie

[9440geoff]

I know one thing, Arion. You are forgiven.

[Akira329]

Arion,

Is this letter real???

Antaiwan

[Craig]

I don't know who the original author was/is.  It was posted from tentmaker.

Craig

[arion]

No, it wasn't me.  Thats why I posted the url to tentmakers to make sure that nobody thought that I was the author.  The link was edited out by a mod.  I have posted some truths of the eventual universal salvation of all on various forums including some of Ray's materials and snippets with appropriate links back to the website.  

One thing interesting that I noticed from some of the most ardent hell and brimstone people is they don't have a lot to say when confronted with the voluminious amount of scriptures which show that God will save all.  I posted the small article in full called 'God's Love for All Mankind' by Brian Albert which is available as an e-sword module and there wasn't much they could say.  It was a short article but it was about 85% scripture with one after the other.  Only one person responded in the negative saying that the word 'Kosmos' in the various scriptures about saving the world only meant the bride of Christ per a subsection of Thayer's explanation about the word.  A very week argument seeing that even if that were the case what do we do with the rest of the scriptures...throw them under the bus?  It was encouraging however as I received a few private messages at least from people who are starting to have their eyes opened and for the first time are questioning what they were taught and I provided a link to them going back to the website here.  The fellow that was opposing the message I simply told him that I refused to go with the dueling scripture route.  The scriptures don't contradict.  As Jesus said His word was for those that had the ears to hear and that is good enough for me.  God has blessed us with an opportunity to plant and water a few seeds and it's up to the great Vinedresser to bring any fruit to maturity from it.  

[blakparty]

Wow!!  Amazing.  I guess it takes a real miracle to have so many people decieved and a bigger miracle for a person in that pastor's position to see the truth and admit to it.  God is great!