Last Letter To My Pastor

[Margee]

I am posting this letter to encourage a friend on our board.

 

This is the last letter I wrote to our pastor when I decided to leave the chruch. It was the hardest letter I ever wrote in my life.It felt like I was 'divorcing' God. I lost every friend! Thought you would be interested in reading it.

 

 

Dear Pastor ######## Jan 06/08 The first thing I would like to say is Happy New Year to you both!

The second thing I would like to say is that you MUST not take this little letter personally because this is NOT about you dear folks—this is about me and my beliefs. One thing that I would like you both to know---I believe with everything that is within me, that Jesus knows my dilemma AND he knows my heart!!

 

I feel that I do owe you a short explanation for my lack of attendance and dedication to the church. Basically, I have been living a lie (to myself and to the church). Please Pastor --I think you already suspect what my greatest problem is-- I have never really believed that the bible is the ‘true’ spoken word of God (you know that I have always leaned towards Charles Templeton’s rational thinking). I do believe that the bible is full of wisdom, guidance and many good stories of the people and how they made it through their struggles back in ancient days. I also believe that these same people were inspired to write of their experiences-- of who they thought the God of the heavens were because of some of the huge violent circumstances that they faced. Do I believe that it was Gods own voice speaking through them? No. (God supposedly spoke and told too many people to ‘slay’ innocent women, children etc. in the old testament for my liking) The God of the old testament, when read in context of the stories seemed to be very cruel. I’m sure there must have been times when you questioned this yourself? My goodness,God even ‘blinds’ his creation at times from knowing the truth, which means these dear people (that he himself created) will land up in Hell. Why would he do this?

 

My goodness, Pastor ---to be honest with you, IF ONLY I could believe the way you all believe about the bible, it would have made things so much easier for me, but, the fact is–I don’t.

 

I also understand that you will all think that the devil has got me ‘blinded’.But you see ---I don’t believe that there is a devil. I do believe that we as humans have the capability to make wrong choices (and God knows I have made a lot of poor choices in my life) and I have had to pay the consequences. I have tried sooooo hard to believe that you folks had the ‘full truth and nothin’ but the truth’---- but again, I don’t. I pray with everything in me that I have not committed blasphemy against the Holy Spirit- but I may well have. In this case, I have understood throughout the years (according to this word of God) that there isn’t any forgiveness from God-- so part of me will always be a bit frightened.

 

I have agonized with this for 30 years and I have certainly prayed over and over to God about this. I am actually willing to take a chance on hell at this point (but really, deep down I don’t believe in hell either) I do not expect you folks to understand this.

 

Can I prophesize? Yes, I believe that I can-I am a highly intuitive person and I believe that I have a special ability to speak loving words of encouragement to people about Gods love.

 

Can I speak in tongues? I have studied glossolalia and I know as a fact that every religion around the world (not just Christianity), AND new age people can ‘speak this unknown tongue’. (And I know you will say---so do the devils....)The language experts say it is a learned behaviour. I guess I’ll never really know, except the fact that I have learned to speak it quite fluently. Maybe highly gifted, intuitive people DO possess this ability.

 

Do I believe in the law of ‘sowing and reaping’? You bet I do! When I have done wrong, I have faced the consequences and ANYTIME that I have been loving and kind, (including giving money) it has come back to me. The money part I find to be quite disappointing because I personally have worked very hard to make my money. I have re-financed my house 3 times in the last 5 years, took in ‘nasty’ borders etc… to hold on to it (And I DON’T make a large amount of money) But I realize that I am blessed to even have a house, and for that I am very grateful!

 

If God shows me anything different in the next while –Your church is DEFINITELY where I would come back to, (IF you would allow me to) because it was the closest I ever came to being really happy in a 'grace filled' religion. It is religion to me, regardless of what anyone tries to promote. The churches are all still legalistic and preach “works’ to some degree to get the ‘blessings’ of the Lord.

 

You see Pastor–to me, there is NO free will in this bible—you either believe the whole thing OR you go to the burning fires of hell for eternity. That is NOT the God that I believe created the universe and it is certainly not the God that I personally serve.

 

Again, I question myself-If I don’t believe in the burning fires of hell, then do I even believe in heaven? I really don’t know what happens when we die. I pray that the Creator will finanally reveal ‘himself’ and show us why we were born and tell us the purpose of it all.

 

You might ask –do I really believe in God? Your darn tootin’ I do!! (Still did in 2008) I have studied the laws of the universe for many years and the microscopic details of the human body and nature,to ever not believe in God!!

Do I believe in sin---widely known ‘as missing the mark’? Yes, again, I have missed the mark many times in my life. Do I believe that we were born in sin because of Adam? No.

 

I will probably lose my church friends over this because I know you are not supposed to stay connected with a non-believer---‘lest they pull you down with them’--- and this makes me very sad because I really do love you all. (And I am not a bad person)

I am NOT going to another church. Literal bible doctrine is just not for me. (Please, don’t stop praying for me) MAYBE, just maybe, someday I will be a true believer in the bible the way you are.

 

Do I believe in Jesus? Yes. I believe he was a rebel (much like me) and that he died trying to show the people back then in ancient times that the God of the Old Testament was a very cruel version of God. Do I believe that he was God in the flesh? I don’t know. Born of a virgin? No. But I do know one thing for sure- (just not sure why) he did die for ME, and that makes him the love of my life.

 

I will end my little letter now. I love you two very much and I know that you are good people. When you meet me on the street-Please just give me a hug and do not let my belief system get in the way of our friendship. You may show this letter to the other 'leaders' or whoever you want (because I also consider them to be my dear friends) if you wish. It may help them to understand me a little better.

 

I will miss many things at the church and this letter makes me very sad, but I have cried long enough(30years) over this. Jesus knows how I feel---I have been VERY honest with him in prayer. I have asked him over and over in the last 30 years to change me and make me a believer the way you are,but it just doesn’t seem to happen for me.I have also said the sinners prayer a billion times in my life (and I have been very sincere every time). Maybe I have never really been born again because of the 'doubting Thomas syndrome'?

 

Thank you for some of the best memories and happy times. I REALLY tried. With every ounce of love in me –I wish you all the best. God continue to bless you both! P.S. the best sermons you ever preached (as far as I am concerned) were the ‘100% covered under grace messages.’ I believe that your new church will fill to the brim if you continue to give people this message of truth and love!!

With my whole heart and soul, I thank you for listening. Sincerely, Margee

 

P.S. I never got a responce or a phone call and I was VERY active in this chruch! I never heard from any of them again and I lost every friend in the chruch.

 

Hope my letter helps! Margee

[Larry Spencer]

>> I never got a response or a phone cal and I was VERY active in this church!

 

That's too bad. Are you sure they got your letter?

 

>> I never heard from any of them again and I lost every friend in the church.

 

How did you lose your friends? Did they refuse to return your phone calls? Did they shun you if they saw you in public? Or was it more like they just didn't call you and you didn't call them either?

[Margee]

On 12/26/2010 at 0:51 PM, Larry Spencer said:

>> I never got a response or a phone cal and I was VERY active in this church!

 

That's too bad. Are you sure they got your letter?

 

>> I never heard from any of them again and I lost every friend in the church.

 

How did you lose your friends? Did they refuse to return your phone calls? Did they shun you if they saw you in public? Or was it more like they just didn't call you and you didn't call them either?

 

Hi - yes, I met the pastor about 6 months later (at Starbucks) and he acknowedged the letter. He did tell me then, that he missed me very much at the church. I had many friends and they did not call me at all. They do not 'shun' me, nor I, when we meet in the grocery store, but it is very awkward. I had been to many churches in the past 30 years,but I felt very hurt by this particular one because I thought they were more open-minded.

[Galien]

One of the reasons I left the church is that I realised that sunday friends are not real friends at all. I watched as they ignored others who left (I refused to ignore them) and would often argue the point about why it was okay for them to treat people so badly. It slowly dawned on me that these people have no real affection for anyone really, they are shallow, which is the last thing I expected christians to be. Sure enough, when I left I got the same treatment.

 

I am sad for you Margee that you had to go through this. It isnt right and it isnt fair, and if there is a god these people really have it coming. I hope you have some real friends who love and support you.

 

 

[Eugene39]

Margee,

 

That letter was excellent! I had thought of sending them a letter but decided to just sit down and have a face-to-face conversation with one of the assistant pastors. I guess it shouldn't be shocking, but he had gone through a period of deep doubting also after he was in the pastorate. He was apparently able to "come up" with answers sufficient enough to satisfy him, something I have been unable to do. Interestingly enough, our senior pastor is something of an unusual breed for fundamentalists. He purposefully maintains friendship with some plain out-and-out sinners, plus gets together with a Jewish friend every week, simply because he wants to know what is going on in the culture, in regards to how outsiders view Christianity. He will undoubtedly want to talk to me. I think I'll give it some time first.

 

We covered a lot of stuff in the 10-15 minutes I talked with him: multiple biblical contradictions, God's evil side, existence of suffering, how I fought de-conversion, fear of hell, and depression caused by literal interpretation of the Bible. I can't hardly talk about the depression I've been through without almost breaking down. To end it, I told him after wrestling with everything, I decided that I was too old (39) to live a lie to satisfy a few people, too honest, and that the best thing to do was just leave quietly.

 

I know it's going to seem irrational, but I'm somewhat afraid that God will kill me for leaving church. My uncle says that it's not an irrational fear based on what I've been taught that God is like. I guess if I come up missing off the site here, that's what happened.

 

Thanks again for posting your letter.

[Margee]

On 12/26/2010 at 3:20 PM, Galien said:

One of the reasons I left the church is that I realised that sunday friends are not real friends at all. I watched as they ignored others who left (I refused to ignore them) and would often argue the point about why it was okay for them to treat people so badly. It slowly dawned on me that these people have no real affection for anyone really, they are shallow, which is the last thing I expected christians to be. Sure enough, when I left I got the same treatment.

 

I am sad for you Margee that you had to go through this. It isnt right and it isnt fair, and if there is a god these people really have it coming. I hope you have some real friends who love and support you.

 

 

 

 

Thank you so much for the validation Galien! I really appreciate it. It is soooooo hurting for Christians to reject people like this. I did not deserve it. I was very active in this church,( I was the lead singer in their 'blues gospel band') and I gave a lot of money (that I did not have).

 

I have a few Christian friends in my life (and clientele) right now, but these guys question 'things' as much as I did, so we are more open to have discussions.

 

There is one Christian fundalmentalist lady that I absolutely adore (she is my old pastor's wife and I went to her church for a long, long time.) I left her church because it was quite a few miles from my home. They gave me their 'blessings' when I decided to go somewhere closer.

 

If I told her who I really was - she would leave and I know this. 

 

I also am in the business of helping 'substance abusers' recover, and they think that the reason I don't go to church anymore is because they 'allow' this part of my life to be my 'ministry. I suppose they believe that I am 'promoting' Jesus with all of this. I don't say a word. because I just can't right now. I truly feel bad because of this. I will continue to read this forum and hopefully - I will become as strong as some of the other x-christians.

[Margee]

Eugene39 - you are much better than me for sitting down 'face to face' with these people! I am so glad that it went o.k. for you today. You may feel a little lost for a while - I certainly did.

 

My pastor and I had quite a few disagreements during the last year that I was there, and that is why I choose to write the letter. He loved and hated my ''feistiness!'' I know I gave the poor man things to think about. I wasn't trying to be arrogant - I just wanted answers and I got tired of them telling me that I this was a walk of faith and just had to have 'certainty' that god was there.

 

Keep us posted on how you are doing! Good luck my friend!

[isawthelight]

My pastor and I had quite a few disagreements during the last year that I was there, and that is why I choose to write the letter. He loved and hated my ''feistiness!''

Hi Margee,

Thanks for sharing your letter to the pastor story.

 

I doubt that he loved your fiestiness. Pastors do not like to be questioned because they

don't have the answers to the hard questions. Consequently they always fall back on

the "you just have to have faith".

 

If any of your friends from the church were true friends, they will eventually come around.

If not, then they were not friends anyway. They were merely church buddies, sort of like

drinking buddiws are not your friends.

[Overcame Faith]

Nice letter, Margee.

 

I suspect you have grown in your "disbelief" since you wrote the letter or you were "pulling some punches" when you wrote it. In any event, I'll bet when he read the letter, he just shook his head and thought that the devil had ahold of you and that you were blinded to the truth as he sees the truth. That is, he believes this way if he was/is a true believer himself - not all pastors are true believers, you know?

[Margee]

On 12/26/2010 at 5:15 PM, Overcame Faith said:

Nice letter, Margee.

 

I suspect you have grown in your "disbelief" since you wrote the letter or you were "pulling some punches" when you wrote it. In any event, I'll bet when he read the letter, he just shook his head and thought that the devil had ahold of you and that you were blinded to the truth as he sees the truth. That is, he believes this way if he was/is a true believer himself - not all pastors are true believers, you know?

 

I agree Overcame! I know this man really liked me.(He seemed to anyway??) I can picture him praying for me and saying, ''Devil - in the name of jesus, - take your hands off god's child!'' Either that - or he could give a damn about if I go to hell or not at this point!

 

I never did understand why God would let Satan 'play' around with his children??

[Denyoz]

Hi Margee, I know I'm late but nevertheless, just wanted to let you know that I have read this thread and that I admire your courage and honesty, and, and, and I think you're cute

[Margee]

On 2/22/2012 at 7:25 PM, Denyoz said:

Hi Marge, I know I'm late but nevertheless, just wanted to let you know that I have read this thread and that I admire your courage and honesty, and, and, and I think you're cute

Denyoz, thank you so much for the nice compliment!! I am blushing........

 

I think this is one of my first posts . I was so confused and hurt last year when I joined this board. I am mostly a different person this year. My confidence is growing better everyday.

I welcomed you over on your thread! Glad you are here with us!

[Zephie]

One of the reasons I left the church is that I realised that sunday friends are not real friends at all. I watched as they ignored others who left (I refused to ignore them) and would often argue the point about why it was okay for them to treat people so badly. It slowly dawned on me that these people have no real affection for anyone really, they are shallow, which is the last thing I expected christians to be. Sure enough, when I left I got the same treatment.

 

I am sad for you Margee that you had to go through this. It isnt right and it isnt fair, and if there is a god these people really have it coming. I hope you have some real friends who love and support you.

 

I have no doubt that church friends aren't real friends. They've no interest in life outside of church...and to be honest...I'm not all that interested in theirs either. We just don't have anything in common. One can only take being told that everything they like is demonic before one just gives up. It's isolating really. All in all, I cannot wait to move so I can finally be honest with myself and those around me. Living a lie like I am is no fun. Margee, I am so glad you were able to be honest

[Zaphod]

When I first went to college, my entire social life revolved around church friends. Due to a couple of demographic anomalies, the church was about 1,500 members total with about 200 college students attending, so I ended up befriending lots of folks in the six years I attended there. Today I regularly talk to two of them. Many have friended me on facebook, but there is pretty much zero interaction after the initial greetings and they find out I'm gay. I'm not ready to tell the last two I'm an atheist. They say you're supposed to make friends for life in college. For the most part that really hasn't been the case for me. Maybe I'm not being fair though because I did cut myself off to a large extent upon coming out.

[Prestissimo]

Hey, thanks to this topic being bumped I got a chance to read it now. Well written, sad story.

 

Since the letter is now a bit dated, how have things changed for you? You do write about your believe in Jesus, your doubts regarding the existence of hell/heaven. Is that still the case? Are things getting easier?

[owen652]

yeah, after I left I never received one message or phone call or anything, despite being a central part of many different ministries. meh. seems to me, if they really believed in hell, they don't seem to care too much if one of their flock is one their way there.

[Margee]

Hey, thanks to this topic being bumped I got a chance to read it now. Well written, sad story.

 

Since the letter is now a bit dated, how have things changed for you? You do write about your believe in Jesus, your doubts regarding the existence of hell/heaven. Is that still the case? Are things getting easier?

Prestissimo, I still question if jesus really existed, but basically, I am a 'non-believer' in god altogether. I've tried to research all types of sprituallity, but it keeps coming back to belief and no eveidence. I am a evidence person. I want so much to believe there is something after death, but I have my doubt's. If there is a hell - I am going there, and that still can bother me to a certain degree.That's why I stay on EX-c.

 

I think I follow a 'soft core' stoic philosophy....... It is what it is.......and I try to accept life on life's terms.

[Paine]

HOW BRAVE to actually write a letter. That takes character and concern for the relationship that you (THOUGHT) you had. I am sorry so many gave you the boot. But no one here is actually surprised, as I am sure neither are you, sadly.

 

I have recently moved back to my Bible Belt Ant Fart hometown after twenty three years traveling and living all over the world and working in some very mind blowing places. I have changed. Everyone else, sadly , has not. I want to embrace my roots, but the Church thing is getting in the way. I am still closeted, and probably will remain so until my children are grown.

 

BIG QUESTION>>> HOW DO YOU LIVE AMONG THEM AND HAVE A LIFE IN THE SAME TOWN WHERE THEY TREAT YOU SO BADLY? Not to mention your BUSINESS!!!!

 

I am struggling too. My maiden name is on the library and a cancer hospital here...there is also much to lose in order to simply

"have my say". My Bible thumping mother knows about me, and has not been TERRIBLE, but I know she "fears for" my children and frankly HER position in society IF I ever "came out".

 

Thanks for posting your very brave letter. WOW. Still in awe of THAT!

[TrueFreedom]

I just finally read this, Margee. I never wrote a letter, probably primarily to protect my wife and kids from the shunning, but I certainly relate to what you went through. You have my unconditional love, and I hope that you will always be willing to put up with me and be my friend as well.

 

If there is a hell - I am going there, and that still can bother me to a certain degree.That's why I stay on EX-c.

 

 

Do you still find yourself asking God to forgive your unbelief?

[Margee]

On 7/28/2012 at 2:54 PM, TrueFreedom said:

I just finally read this, Margee. I never wrote a letter, probably primarily to protect my wife and kids from the shunning, but I certainly relate to what you went through. You have my unconditional love, and I hope that you will always be willing to put up with me and be my friend as well.

 

On 2/24/2012 at 9:17 AM, Margee said:

If there is a hell - I am going there, and that still can bother me to a certain degree.That's why I stay on EX-c.

 

 

Do you still find yourself asking God to forgive your unbelief?

TF....If you are on Ex-c...You are my friend!!

 

This is the other letter I posted just after I posted this one........I was asking god to forgive my unbelief.....

 

http://www.ex-christian.net/topic/44259-please-forgive-me/

[Wings]

Margee,

thanks for re-sharing such a thoughtful and heartfelt letter. Could just feel your pain in it! I'm sorry that no one wrote you back or acknowledged it- sometimes we just need that concern, love and validation and for people to just drop you like that is incredibly painful. I sometimes think I would rather have someone say rude things to me than to pretend I don't exist... non-existence is one of the greatest insults.

I'm glad you have come so far in your journey from that place then... you remain a gift and guide to many of us on here! Thank you for sharing your journey and inspiration!