Part 7: "God, if that’s the kind of God you are, kill me now! KILL ME NOW!"

(Phew! Had to read my own post to remind me where I left off).
Ok, by this time I had to do something. I discussed this with my wife and we decided to leave the church the following Sunday. We were just miserable. We went to Sunday school and normal worship service then approached the preacher and told him we needed to speak with him as soon as possible. We entered his office, sat down and proceeded to explain to him that we were no longer happy. (Silly me, I used the word happy. I have this foolish idea that going to church should make me joyful and happy, true on occasion it should cause internal self-examination and conviction under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, but mostly it should be happy right? It is the Gospel aka "Good News" not the "Good News but you will feel guilty and miserable until you die and get to heaven" --sorry I digress) I told him I was no longer being fed, that my feelings toward the IFB denomination had shifted. I no longer believed in the IFB doctrine of tithing: 10% of your Gross Income (not including offerings, Faith Promise etc). I no longer was convinced that the "KJV-Only" stance was appropriate, and I was just plain tired of it all! (Where was the "easy yoke"? The light burden?) And for the sake of my family and our spiritual well-being we felt we had to leave the church. My wife's attitude towards church had become so negative that her stomach hurt every time Sunday morning rolled around. The Pastor's reaction was calm and collected. He wished that I had come to him sooner to discuss these matters with him. (A valid point I suppose, but what was he going to tell me that I had not already heard? What verses in KJV Scripture was he going to point to that I had not already seen? Indeed, the very verses I myself used when preaching/teaching on these exact issues). Well, as expected he wasn't thrilled to see us go. He asked that I not speak to anyone regarding the subjects of tithing/"KJV Only". That I leave without causing controversy (after all, I was until recently the Adult Sunday School teacher) I assured him that was not my intent. I wasn't going to stir any strife or try and convince anyone in the church to come and join me in my new beliefs. If they asked why I left I would defer. (I couldn't help but imagine church members dropping on the floor convulsing violently as I told them why I was leaving --got to admit that would be a little funny). My wife stood up first and went out to the auditorium and started to cry while I said our final farewell to the pastor. It was a sad moment, we both considered many in our church as "family". (It turned out that, except for a few members, most of the church members kind of left us alone sort of like "out of sight, out of mind").

What followed was perhaps one of the darkest episodes of my Christian life. We tried to do what we thought was the right thing and find a different church that would be a little more . . . what's the term . . . "user-friendly?" (I know some of you are thinking: "Sinfully Liberal") We tried some Southern Baptist churches and the like but found they didn't meet our spiritual needs. What I was looking for was a "thinking" or perhaps a better phrase is "intellectually open-minded and historically practical" church. I was looking for a "teacher" not a "Hell-Fire and Brimstone Preacher". I knew the Gospel, I knew about salvation and hell. I had the milk, I wanted some meat. (Ok, hard to put in words what I'm looking for but here is a litmus test: I want a church where I can ask the following question and not get stoned with Hymnals: "It sounds like Preterist view answers a great deal of the questions regarding the 2nd coming of Christ, can we discuss it's merit during Sunday School?", this will let me know 2 things: 1- Does the leadership know what Preterism is? If they do, then there is evidence of some theological training, if not I flag the church as a potentially "Intellectually Bereft" or a product of "Intellectual/Theological In-Breeding" --a pet peeve that I will get into later. 2- Are they courageous enough to examine an alternative view point and give it a fair shot or they going to say "Not just No, but Heaven No!" . . . well they wouldn't say the other thing would they?). Well we tried and tried. We took a couple of Sundays off and spent some family time. All the while I had growing feelings of guilt and anger. Guilt because of not "being in church" and anger in part because of the demand of "being in church" --which turned around and created even more guilt for being angry, which created more anger, which . . .well you see the cycle. The other source of anger was due to the disillusionment and difficulty in finding believers that were "Like-Minded". (Yep, in this part of the state of #### there are maybe 2 Catholic churches, oogles of Baptist and Pentacostal/Charasmatic churches.) In the meantime, my wife's parents (remember they are hardcore IFB missionaries) were not too happy or supportive (Ya think!?). The ringing echoes of past preaching messages on the topic of rebelling against God began their destructive affects on me. I kept expecting God to kill one of my kids, or maybe God will be merciful and only cause me to lose my job. Or my car's engine will blow up, or our house will catch on fire, or . . . [insert God's judgment here]. Finally, I broke. Driving home one evening by myself I was looking up and praying desperately to God to show me what church, or which way to go. I started to unload on God. Wondering why it was so difficult. I finally snapped and said "Ok God, if that's is how you are, then kill me now! Let me have an accident at the next intersection, and just take me home! If that's the kind of God you are I don't want any part of this. Kill me! KILL ME!!! (Yes, I was yelling at the top of my lungs as I drove, I'm sure someone would have thought me insane had they seen me.) The natural progression after this (for me anyways) was to think about helping God out by driving my car into an embankment or into a river (aka suicide), but thank God, I was (and am) too chicken to go through with it. More coming soon . . .