Late night. A bowl of popcorn and a channel flipper in hand landed me on a .com preacher. Next! Wait! I flipped back. I grew up with this handsome man whose face I searched for the layers of 40-something years. He wore, I kid not, nearly hot pink very well-fitting jeans, a white button down collared shirt and a pale pink blazer. And…it actually worked! It was an eye getter, but it was perfectly finessed. As was his pacing a few yards across a vast stage in his beige cowboy boots.
I'd run across this son of a preacher man once before in my adult life. His father was the preacher at my South Carolina church in the early 70s. And now junior has as much charisma and suave as his father, who is also preaching it up to mammoth crowds in Texas. I was mesmerized by junior's blond, youthful good looks. By the thousands whose attention he held in awe. By the fact, I guess, that I knew him once upon a time.
When I found him accidentally in a Google search a few months back, I was tickled with his progressive message urging his church members (the married ones, of course) to have sex seven days straight. Here's a CNN clip. (Last night on t.v., he was even cuter as a blondie. As you can see on the video, below, he has since reduced the melanin in his follicular pigmentation….) (Only "The Fiance" would produce the latter verbal concoction.)
While part of me gawked with curiosity at this kid who swam with me and the other kids on Hammett Road in the Neely boys' cement pond, I could not. I could not keep listening to this message that. Hurt. My. Heart. OMG. I listened as he repeated again and again: "You are not worthy of God!" "You are not worthy of God!" "You are not worthy of God!" "You are not worthy of God!"
"God does love you," this svelte pink-jeaned preacher explained. "But, God does not love sin. And you are sin." Oh. Dear.
I cannot buy that. It took me 38 years of discontent with the message of Evangelical Christianity that a God of love would cast into the human fear fantasy of hell those who did not sit up and fly right and vote the correct religious party. I began asking the questions when I was 8. At times–in high school and immediately post college–I bought the fervor and I wore it like a banner. I am grateful for the mentors who encouraged me to question. The professors of the required religion courses at my Baptist college. Tom Conley at Northside Drive Baptist in Atlanta. There are so many other reasons why I dissected the construct of that belief.
And now here is what I believe: That God is Love. S/he is Our Creator. And, our co-creator of our lives. God is Good. I will not buy into a belief that tells me that I am bad. And God help us. Help the legions of our society who believe we are just that.
It makes. My. Heart. Hurt.
Hi, Leisa! I really like how you present so many different topic here! This made my heart hurt too. I was raised Catholic, but embraced Buddhism in my 20’s. LOVE is my religion. Buddhism is a path of love, compassion, freedom, understanding… I believe in a universal spirit of love. I could never grasp, even as a child, the concept that we are sin, that we are born of sin, that we are unworthy of God. If we live by right action, we give love and love comes back to us. This is a powerful post! Oh, and I must thank you for your visit to my photo blog and the interest in the cleanse-detox diet I’m staring. I’ll be posting a bit about it at both my main blog & the photo blog–stop by again if you get a chance. :o) Happy Days!
Ewe-that is too weird. I was thinking about you just this morning & your blog post about cleansing. My lemon this morning was especially large. Yum.
Thanks so much for posting something affirming here. I saw I had a response and I thought uh oh. I actually had a little twitter debate going last week on a similar issue. And am debating on whether I will link this to Twitter or not, though I will FB it. If anyone notices half of my friends will agree and the half from college to childhood mostly will not and think I’m hell bound!
I wanted to express my heart here and share my spiritual evolution (which is not a word used to mean I am better,) and at the same time not put someone down. You noticed I never used his name, though it is obvious by the You Tube, etc.
Thanks again! I love your photography. It injects me with doses of beauty!
You make me think, Leisa. I appreciate that about you. I feel your heart here, and I appreciate that, too. I don’t have experience with Evangelical Christianity, or with being told I’m not worthy of God or that I’m sin. At least if that ever was a message in my childhood church, I didn’t absorb it. Thank goodness.
In my husband’s hometown of Ft. Myers, Fla., there’s a neon sign in someone’s front yard that reads “God is love.” I believe that completely. I tell my children that God loves them, and years ago I decided that love is the purpose and meaning of life.
Great post, Leisa. I think it takes a lot of courage to write about religion. I often do, and I’ve decided it’s hard because we make ourselves so vulnerable with those tender feelings from deep inside our core that we place out there for everybody to read about.
I believe that God is good, that we are His children, and that He loves us with a depth that we can’t comprehend. I think everyone must recognize that on some level, but too many teach otherwise. So sad.
It’s good there are people like you to share the positive message!
Thank you for commenting, Rebecca. I love the idea of that sign, esp. since billboard-type messages regarding God are so often the antithesis of love. While he may not agree with my take, there’s a local blogger-author in town who has written a book to the effect of “Jesus Needs New PR.” 🙂
And just to clarify, there are more mainline protestants, such as the evangelical Lutheran church, of which I was a member for a while, who spell the word with a little “e” and even say it differently eh-vangelical vs. E-vangelical and it has a different meaning.
If you have been able to skip negative religious programming in your life, you have a lot less baggage in your psyche to sort through, girlfriend. That’s wonderful & lucky you!
JoLyn, thank you also for the positive affirmation. I think the following person who reads my blog and was one of 2 commenters to me via email says it well:
“Ditto.
God is Love. How could God, Who is Love and Love Alone, hate anyone or anything, even sin? Love ≠Hate. The question follows, therefore, that if God does not hate sin, does sin even exist? If sin does not exist, does its punishment, hell, exist? I think not, except to the extent that we, ourselves, create our own hells. If religious teachers can not threaten us with the prospects of hell, what power can they hold over us? Religion, therefore, ≠spirituality, at least not in my experience and study.
Seems that you and I may be on the same quest for Enlightenment. :-)”
One more comment here. I believe hell (other than that on earth that we create ourselves) and the concept of sin were constructs of the early church to scare people into staying “within the fold.” The research that’s out there about the distortions that occurred around Jesus message and that continue here today were very influencial in my journey away from Christianity. (With all due respect to those who still call themselves Christians….Jesus was the great teacher. IMO.)
I am reading C.S. Lewis’s book “Mere Christianity”. If you have read any of his works (Narnia for example) you know that he uses a lot of words but I really appreciate the research and thought that he has put into this work. A good read that I recommend.
I also believe that God is filled with love for us, His children. I believe that Jesus Christ is His son. I believe that He wants us to be happy. As a human being I think we often consider happy as a day at a theme park. I think that in reality true happiness and joy come in service to others and giving of ourselves with real unconditional love.
Good post. Thanks for having the courage to write about something so close to your heart. Especially since it involves some big changes in your life.
Thank you for commenting, Jenny-Jenny. I never got around to reading Lewis, unfortunately. I know of his interesting spiritual journey. I agree with most everything you write about here. I do especially agree that life is not a day in a theme park, but then that would be boring.
I’m unsure we’ve met, but my life is testament–and the source of my speaking and writing–that challenges can make us stronger and richer in spirit. I am grateful for every one of them. I’ve had my share. Really.
And service. Service has enriched my life. A pivotal turning point in my career was working in communications for a domestic missionary sending agency where I covered, as a magazine and wire service reporter, missionaries who served out of the well-font of their faith. They demonstrated and lived for me the beauty of Jesus’ message of service & love.
so interesting that this person from your past reemerged….if nothing than to show you how far you have grown spiritually, and how, sadly, these “christian” messages have strayed from the original intention and resonate with a dead thud.
Very well put, Nancy. I hadn’t thought of it that way as far as the personal angle. Sort of like a…redemption, huh?
And I so agree with losing the original intent. That’s the problem for me. It is not what Jesus intended. It was Early Church manipulation…carried on through the centuries. Knowing history is important.