Leaving a cult is exactly like this...
It is not easy to leave a Cult.
I am telling you this by personal experience. When your entire worldview changes, your entire way of looking at life changes, it is a process that literally takes months, years - and decades. No human likes anything related to change. Especially - yes, especially when it involves the core fundamental beliefs of your entire being of soul. In fact, leaving the mindset of a spiritually (and sometimes, physically) dangerous cult can be the hardest and most difficult thing you may ever be faced with a decision to do. But I will tell you, many many years after the initial process, it was the best thing I ever could have done - and I could only do it with the help of Jesus.
I remember very well the very first moments when I began to realize that what I was being told was wrong. At first, every single cellular part of me absolutely rebelled. But it was not a "logic" based rebellion. Because logic was telling me that something was amiss throughout the entire Armstrong experience. The "rebellion" was fear-based. And it was that all-encompassing fear that was resisting the gate to freedom that was right in front of me.
I will tell you everything that I feared in those initial days.
First, I feared that I was "breaking" every command that I had believed that God had given me through the teachings of the Church, and that I had committed to through Baptism and through countless periods of dual Bible-Armstrong studies. I had grown up in the full brunt of the Armstrong Lifestyle. Honestly, I knew nothing different then the do's and the dont's of our interpretation of Mosaic Law. And the interpretation that my family absorbed and practiced was on the extreme conservative, fundamental end of the scale. In fact, my entire childhood in the Armstrong environment was firstly, fear based, secondly, command based, and thirdly, isolationist-based. My entire life during those periods could be based on this one sentence: "Obey, or God will Strike." And by the word Obey, I mean "Do NOT mess up". By the word "God", you could replace that with "The Minister". And it was "The Minister" who ruled our family and our family's every decision. Freewill was not existent in our family in the Armstrong hierarchy. There was plenty of reason due to personal family circumstances why I should be in fear of God or The Minister. So, the Church Doctrines were not, in my mind, debated or even considered to be anything but the highest order of Obedience - our Prime Directive, if you will. For years and years, this is all I knew - and any alternative was satanic, devilish, demonic, and destined to doom me to destruction for all eternity as judged by The Minister.
Second, the only environment I ever knew - due to many circumstances - was the Church. My exposure to the outside world, for many reasons, was severely limited. The only culture I ever knew - was the Church. And Church families - and all the problems associated with Church Families. My entire environment was rooted and cemented in fear. So when I began to open the Bible and to read it for what it said - it could not have been a more polarizing emotional experience.
First, I could not dispute what was being plainly taught by the writings of Paul to the Galatians, Collosians, Ephesians, Philippians and Corinthians churches. Now I know that in the audience here, there are many opinions concerning Paul, and I've heard them all, so try to set aside those for a second. The point I am making is simple: For the first time, when I read these scriptures *without the bias* of Armstrong's interpretations, the points made were shockingly clear. ANd pointedly clear. I read them over and over again, and had no choice but to conclude three words: Herbert Was Wrong.
But how could Herbert have been so wrong? How could he have been so in error? What else did I not know? Eagerly, I began to, for the first time, begin to investigate the secrets of the Church that were exposed by certain individuals who were "in the know". And this was the most shocking revelation of all physical revelations that one could encounter. How could it be that these things could have happened? And if they DID indeed happen - is there evidence to prove they happened?
I quickly found out there were VOLUMES of evidence that proved that what was alleged was not a fabricated attempt to defame. The evidence fit exactly with what was alleged. And slowly, I began to piece together a puzzle that never fit in any way before. Things made sense. The disconnects began to finally form a very ugly picture.
I saw the undeniable evidence that Herbert was wrong in his speculations. I saw the undeniable evidence of fear-based financial fraud. I saw the undeniable evidence of ministerial abuse. I never could, before delving into these things, understand how Herbert, with a rage-ful and angry temperament and explosive personality could be the messenger of a God of Love. This did not make sense! I never could understand the haughty arrogance of ministers that made you afraid of them. Or how snooty and pompous they were. I didn't face these questions because I reasoned that "God's in Charge, He will take care of it." I was in total denial of the questions that I knew I had but never wanted to face because deep inside, there was the idea that maybe, just maybe, I was wrong! But I couldn't be wrong! I was chosen! Called! Special! One of the infinitesimal few who God picked! I was going to be a King! a Leader! Why, if I'm wrong, then what am I? Who am I? So better to shove it to the back, I'd think.
Yet, in time, the realities could not be ignored. I began to realize how intensely we focused on the physical and completely ignored the spiritual. I began to see how much we not only rejected Jesus' teachings, but despised them. I began to see how Herbert had jumbled up the Bible and threw out any ability of understanding context, because he threw EVERYTHING out and based everything on HIS understanding, and rejecting everything else that wasn't how HE saw it. And it wasn't long before I clearly had my answer right in front of me: We were wrong. "I'm out."
Gulp!!!!!
Let me tell you, my absolute fear and panic was extreme the very first time I understood my allegiance was not in obligation to obeying the Old Testament ceremonial and regulatory laws of worship and festivals. When I realized that my salvation is not dependent on food or drink, and that Jesus is my atonement and has made atonement for me and rejected the notion that keeping Atonement had any affect at all on my salvation, I decided not to observe Atonement any longer, and that was the hardest thing I had ever done. Same with Unleavened Bread. I knew this was true, because I can remember that though I was physically following the letter of the law, my spirit was getting more and more spiritually prideful and corrupt. The "better" I kept the letter of the Law, the more prideful my spirit was getting. This happened with every Holy Day and every Sabbath - that haughty arrogance that comes with believing you are right and everyone else is wrong. That you are earning your salvation by obedience to the Law (YES, we believed that, no matter how many times we said that wasn't the case.) That God is going to judge you not on your love to God and Man and following the words of Jesus, but that you ate a piece of food at 7:45 and not 7:48, or had a hidden piece of leaven in the heating register all that time and you didn't know it, and you broke Unleavened Bread because of your negligence. Or the constant wonder if you accidentally broke the Sabbath by doing too much of one thing, or not enough of the other. Or wondering how all that work on the Sabbath was actually okay, because you'd be breaking the Sabbath if you did the same thing at home and not for a Church Potluck. Or seeing a Sabbath Command in the Bible that the minister just skipped over because "it doesn't apply to us" when the minister issues another command that was NOT in the Bible that DID apply. It did not make sense, and I knew it, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get it right, and then it hit me that that was the point. It was about Jesus - so He, and not my observance to ceremony and ritual - was to be my emphasis from that point on, not worrying about days and seasons and years. And again.
Gulp!!!
The initial fears were unfounded. I was not struck by lightning. God's love did not fade. Yes, changing your entire life was, and is, hard. But spiritually? It was the very best thing that ever happened to me - I began to understand the Rest that happens when you surrender to Jesus, whom all of those ceremonies and rituals pointed to in the first place. There is no rest when you are living in fear. There is no rest when your focus is on the physical. The only rest is in the Spirit - and that is only because of what Jesus did for us and how we can now have access to the Throne of Grace and the Father through what Jesus did for all of us. No longer was there that feeling of haughty, arrogant pride because I was doing everything so much better than those evil pagans on the outside. No longer was there that special feeling of superiority. Though many challenges were to come - the lesson was learned. The lesson was the lesson of learning the meaning and the lessons of love. And no observance of any physical ritual will ever give you that Rest that can only happen by thinking, and acting in the love of Jesus in your everyday life.
No, it's not easy to leave a cult. I'm still going through the process of deprogramming - decades later. But if there's one thing that I have now, that I did not have then, while in the cult? It's the fact that I can say, resolutely, that I'm at peace. And I can say that I know Jesus loves, and that the Father cares, and that God has not left me like I had feared. In fact, I can say to you that God has made himself more known to me now than I EVER thought I knew him while in the den of lies that was the cult.
One word, however. You cannot do it alone. But there's good news in a song we all know and love. The four words of that song?
You'll Never Walk Alone.
God said he will NEVER leave you, never forsake you. And you will NEVER walk alone. He's there for you now, He'll be there for you there, He'll be there for you anywhere. We even sang those words in the song we sang "Lord you have searched and have encamped my paths, you oh eternal God know all my ways, If up to heaven Lord, you are there, if down to hell you would soon find me there", or something like that, I'm not looking it up right now. But you know the words, and I'm sure you get the point. And the point is: Jesus will always be your firm foundation, so long as you trust in Him. Life has its challenges in or out of the cult, of this you can be sure. But Jesus isn't going anywhere - He's there. Of that you can be absolutely sure.
submitted by SHT
