So, You've Come out of the Church.. Now What?

This is a post that I linked from another blog (www.called-out.com).  It captures many of my same thoughts and feelings and I wanted to share because it touched me and I know there are others out there who have, are or will experience this same sentiment.

“And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues” Revelation 18:4.

Over the past 50 or so years, multitudes of believers have answered the call to come out of the religious systems and follow Christ. For many it has cost them very dearly on a personal level. There is a price for bucking the system. No one is going to give you a pat on the back for going against the flow. If you are among this number, then you know exactly what the repercussions are. Shunning is still alive and well in this modern age we live in, and is used against the wayward seeker by family, friends, and those whom they formerly worshipped with. I remember well what I encountered when I left my Church home. Rumors were flying… outlandishly ridiculous accusations were made… all in an attempt to humiliate and intimidate me into complying with their way of thinking. One of the things that I was struck by, was the fact that not one person from the Church “family” I had been faithful to for so many years ever even called to ask if any of what they were hearing was true, or if I was alive or dead. It was a traumatic experience; one that I could not have weathered if not for the comforting presence of the Lord.
One day when I was reading the Word, with all of these things churning around inside me, the Spirit of the LORD quickened this passage to me:

Psalms 55:4-14 My heart is grievously pained within me, and the terrors of death have fallen upon me. Fear and trembling have come upon me; horror and fright have overwhelmed me. And I say, Oh, that I had wings like a dove! I would fly away and be at rest. Yes, I would wander far away, I would lodge in the wilderness. Selah [pause, and calmly think of that]! I would hasten to escape and to find a shelter from the stormy wind and tempest. Destroy [their schemes], O Lord, confuse their tongues, for I have seen violence and strife in the city. Day and night they go about on its walls; iniquity and mischief are in its midst. Violence and ruin are within it; fraud and guile do not depart from its streets and marketplaces. For it is not an enemy who reproaches and taunts me–then I might bear it; nor is it one who has hated me who insolently vaunts himself against me–then I might hide from him. But it was you, a man my equal, my companion and my familiar friend. We had sweet fellowship together and used to walk to the house of God in company. [Ampl.]

This Psalm of David expressed exactly what I was going through… what every believer encounters sometime along the way if they continue to follow Christ. We are not going to encounter anything that others before us have not faced. The Word tells us that there is nothing new under the sun. Yet when it is happening in ‘our life,’it takes on entirely new dimensions. All these things that we suddenly find ourselves being confronted with are only happening because we stepped out of the ‘accepted’ religious comfort zone and answered the Master’s call.

According to most of today’s Shepherds, ‘Sheep’ aren’t supposed to listen to anyone but them. Conflict inevitably arises when sheep begin to develop a living relationship with the One True Shepherd of their souls… and those earthly leaders cannot keep themselves from exposing that they are in fact ‘hirelings,’ who care nothing for the welfare of the sheep. Jesus addressed this in John 10:12-13But he that is a hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep. The hireling fleeth, because he is a hireling, and careth not for the sheep. To the hireling, the sheep are his bread and butter, they feed his ego as well as his bank account. Insubordination will not be tolerated. Any rebellious sheep will be dealt with speedily, so that the rest of the flock doesn’t get any ideas that there might be another way of doing things, outside the control of all of the religious camps.

So, now that you're out… what’s next?

Continue reading at www.called-out.com