Bible College Graduates: "I Stopped Going to Church!"

Excuse the delay since my last college posting. Travel has gotten in the way.

Lately I have been reading and thinking a great deal about liminal space. In brief liminal space is understood as a transitional space somewhere between where you once were and where you have not entered. Liminal space is often thrust upon a person as in COVID, the loss of a job, or the sudden death of a loved one. Sometimes, however, it is a decision to leave one place for another. It may be because the former place was too toxic, and unsafe. Or maybe one just outgrew their environment.

The following voices in this blog have emerged from deep within the recesses of liminal space. Armed with their Bible College degrees and/or diplomas in time these graduates stopped attending church. Of the 70 plus graduates I have interviewed they represent about 15%. They are from both men and women. Have they lost their faith? I am inclined to say no, but their voices deserve to be heard.

Caution, this blog is longer than most. The comments are edited but unfiltered.. And it should be noted that in the interest of anonymity the posts are intermixed and not linear.

· I pray that I will be ready to live with the same robust faith and the same character of carrying the DNA of God, where I have the capacity for resilience for creativity, the capacity for forgiveness, the capacity for love … to locate the divine motion in any space of time. … I don't go to church because I don't subscribe to the rituals as a way of getting close to God, I think getting close to God is creating a false sense of need in people. It's a backsliding state where we think we must do something to get closer to God, instead of just realizing I am in God.

· (My daughter) saw a lot of the damage that we went through. And she experienced a lot of it and how it affected us. And she carries that, and she has no interest going to church. She believes in God but when people try to talk to her about Jesus or anything, she just laughs in their face because she says I've yet to see someone who truly is Christ like. Everyone tries to be, or they say they want to be, but I haven't seen it yet.

· And I felt like I was making a call and there was nobody on the other end of the call. And it was exhausting. And by the time I was into it for a few years, I was just like, “How can I tell these people to struggle with God and I'm not hearing from Him.”

· And I saw plainly that everybody was just like everybody else that I knew. I had to work at the time to make ends meet. … I worked with a whole bunch of guys who swore, pissed and drank beer. And they were good people. And, and some of the people that I was dealing with in the church were really not good people.

· And this is probably why I don't … go to church anymore. The message that's being spoken from the pulpit is usually a message from the pastor regarding whatever he is dealing with that week, or that month with the board members or what he's dealing within his own family or marriage. And he brings it out as if this is God's message to us. “This is what God is telling me to tell you”, when really, that's not true. It's usually what God is trying to deal with him personally. But rather than accept that they are fallible, and that they have their own issues that they deal with, they want to put it out saying, “this is what God told me to tell you.” When really, this is what they needed to hear.

· I can't get to church I get emotional, there's something warm about that still. And so yeah, there's the heritage piece that keeps me connected. But a lot of it I'm not sure that I need in my everyday life anymore. Prayer is a constant thing. It's not necessarily to any person or anyone but I feel like need that a lot.

· I couldn't say right now that I look at the Bible and say, I can take that literally ... I couldn't say that I really look at the Bible and say, it is all 100% accurate. But at the same time, you know, I do have a faith in God. I believe I'm a spiritual person. And I'm working my way back.

· I didn't want the life of a minister. I had grown up in it my whole life. And I thought surely there's got to be a better life than this. And I am a woman … I knew I definitely didn't fit the role of being a pastor's wife … But I was confident in my calling, and it wasn’t being a traditional pastor's wife. And so, I became a pastor. And I discovered if you are a good communicator, and you get the right people around you anyone can grow a church and God does not even have to be a part of it. So, I left the church ten years ago. I don't know what that says about me … I just know that the theology that I once had is very simple now. I believe in Jesus. And if I can, I model my life after him, and beyond that, I'm not sure what I believe. I don't know what I believe about heaven and hell or salvation. Today I am okay with not knowing. I am okay with some things being a mystery. You would think that I would miss church because it was such a huge part of my life, but now I find I get agitated. I know how to talk the talk … But now it is almost like a choking of the words, so I just don't do it anymore.

· I don't feel like I need to go to church to hear the Word of God or to hear God's message for me, or to be energized or invigorated or whatever. That's what the Holy Spirit does. In between me and God, he's the one who knows me, and he will confirm things with me, and I'll hear things, or I'll see things, or I'll read things and, and that will be God speaking to me.

· I don't know how to describe it. It slowly happened, and I didn't even notice what was happening. … the bottom kind of fell out in 2015. It was a crisis of faith ... I didn't know if I believed anything … I don't remember a time in my life when I wasn't in church. But it was so tough. I was depressed and anxious … but I think it was a good thing. You know, in some ways, I've been able to build back from that … more authentically, then maybe I would have been previously.

· I don't read my Bible. I don't. I have lots of like books like Max Lucado and Walter Wangerine and I keep buying them, because I really want that back. But I don't know how to get there. I kind of let it go. And I don't know how to get back.

· I have redefined the role of faith in life. I have abandoned the need for faith. I recognize faith. I understand why people are faithful. However, it became very clear to me that it didn't involve anything to do with the Bible, anything to do with supernatural beliefs.

· I remember that series Left Behind. And lately, people have been claiming that COVID is a sign of the times and whatnot. … fear was my whole mindset growing up … if I was back in church, I would probably gravitate to that (again). Which makes me want to stay away from the church even more.

· I served (ministry) for a few years and around 29 years old, I was like, you know, I can't look these people in the face anymore. And tell them that I have no doubts about the things I'm telling them. And it was tearing me up. And I was fighting with God to speak to me, like I was taught to understand he should.

· I understood how the sausage was made. I paid attention to church history. It was a messy thing. I paid attention to Pentecostal history, which was a messy thing. I paid attention to church history and didn't hear about slavery until I brought it up at the end of the course. You know, it's a messy thing. I paid attention to Pentecostal Distinctives and I talked about the psychological, psycho sociological bits about how we express the charismata and got an A plus on my paper and then had my professor tell me, you might not want to mention any of these things when it comes to your credentials exam.

· I wanted to recognize the sacredness of whatever you're doing. Nothing must be secular or sacred. It was my oldest son who started me in that line of thinking … he writes a prolific amount of songs and poetry and music. (when questioned why he does not write Christian music) he said, ‘What is Christian music? If it's not something that comes out of the heart of someone who carries a certain amount of faith?’”

· It should be more about our personal relationship with God and Jesus and thus, it should be about our walk of faith - Christianity is church and religion in organization.

· On the survey. You asked, “Do you feel like your faith is stronger now than it was before?” Absolutely, I feel like my faith is stronger because I had to rediscover who God was to me without wearing a mask … Before I went to Bible College, I thought I was really strong in my faith and then I was destroyed, for so long I tried to pick up the pieces. And then once I was in a place of safety, where I was allowed to figure out who I was and what the truth was, I realized I was just as strong as I was before. And just because I don't go to church and just because I will disagree with many pastors now doesn't mean I'm a weak Christian or I'm straddling the line or I'm cold or, or lukewarm. …I'm good with who I am and where I am. It's good.

· The Bible was written by man. It was selected by men. When people try and tell me that it's God ordained, I really tend to disagree. I firmly believe God talks to us and speaks to us and has messages that he wants us to hear regarding what we're going through and the life that we have lived. And so, I believe that those scriptures are written from the man's point of view of what they were living through, what they have gone through and what message that they want to get across. So, while there are scriptures that still resound with me, and that I will hold … there are also books that were better left out of the Bible. When people talk about how this is God's scripture, and God's word, and it's him speaking to you directly. I don't agree. I think that God was speaking to that person who wrote that portion. And this was the message that he was getting across to them and they're sharing it with us.

· We believe that we're going to come up with some brilliant theology that will make people behave in the right way. And it's ass backwards. It's assed backwards to put behaving before belonging, because it's all about us in being interconnected.

· When I speak of faith, I speak of a particular or a very specific belief system that I no longer have but I believe in community.

Post Script.

If you have made it to the end of these posts, you may question why I would dedicate a post to people who no longer attend church. For starters it may not be a comfortable discussion, but it is a growing demographic. Were, I to include those who started in vocational ministry but after ten years are no longer in ministry the number would rise above 50%. These are voices that have largely been silenced - voices that if spoken are usually only in whispers, voices that generally can only happen when the filter of professional courtesy (“this is what I should say”) is no longer in play.

Second, for those who have ears to hear, listen carefully there is truth to be found here either explicitly or reading between the lines.

Third, though each of these voices have their different reasons for leaving church, it is a reminder spiritual abuse is a real thing.

On a positive note, I finish with a quote from a former Baptist minister Eric Minton in his book, It’s Not You, It’s everything: What Our Pain reveals about the Anxious Pursuit of the Good life, “At bottom, what if Christianity is less about how much faith we can muster in God and more about a God who inexhaustibly believes in us?” P.138.

I leave again for another extended trip and when I come back, I flip the switch.