When I was young, I couldn’t sleep without a night-light, even if it meant leaving the bathroom light on with the door cracked. Just that little bite of light could help me discern if someone was in my bedroom who wasn’t supposed to be there. The worst fear of all was to be surprised in the dark and overcome by something you didn’t see coming! As an adult survivor of childhood sexual abuse, I still struggle with fears of being surprised and overcome by the unexpected.
As a child, I was taught that the church is a spiritual family, and that belief became a refuge for me when members of my family of origin betrayed me. Even while experiencing trauma that would remain suppressed for years to come, I turned to Jesus with childlike faith and sought to draw close to him. I remember climbing to the top of a pecan tree in my front yard and praying and singing to him there. I believed he cared about me and assumed members of his family did too.
An early indication that belief might not always be true occurred after my father died. A pastor friend of his made sexual advances toward me in the church parking lot when I was a young adult. I was mortified, but I did not give up on desiring a church home. I remained a committed member of local churches, even when other pastors betrayed or rejected me in years to come.
My personal relationship with Jesus is real, and I still long for authentic Christian community, although I have been deeply impacted by these harmful experiences with church leaders. As events in the world, and even the churches around me, seem to go from bad to worse, I have prayerfully pondered a warning found in scripture that speaks to conditions prior to the second coming of Christ:
At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.
Matthew 24:10-12
It is frightening to think that the darkness (i.e., wickedness of falsehood and deceit around us) can impact us in ways that may cause our love to wane or even tempt us to turn away from our faith. Yet, if I am honest, I must confess there have been times when the hurtful actions of those who claimed to represent Christ, obscured his face. I’ve had to battle to remember what he actually looks like in such darkness. Sometimes the pain has been so great that I have found myself focused on those who hurt me instead of on him. Like a child in the darkness, I was overcome with surprise that those I trusted were not safe and failed to represent Jesus well, if at all. This deception can be so confusing and confounding.
As I was pouring my heart out to Jesus about this recently, the Holy Spirit highlighted another scripture:
All this I have told you so that you will not fall away. They will put you out of the synagogue. In fact, the time is coming when anyone who kills you will think they are offering a service to God. They will do such things because they have not known the father or me. I have told you this, so that when their time comes, you will remember that I warned you about them.
John 16-1-4
Did you catch that? “They will put you out of the synagogue.” In other words, you might not be welcome in their “church” anymore. They may even seek to “kill you” and believe they are doing God a service! Wow, when I was a new believer, no one taught me that this could happen in churches, and few pastors talk about it now. It’s as though the church has closed its eyes to the darkness within and tries to pretend that everyone plays fair in God’s house.
Yet Jesus himself gave us this warning, and his purpose was to keep us from falling away! Jesus has always known that everyone who professes to know Him doesn’t, and we need to be aware of this too to keep from losing heart. In fact, He warns us about wolves in sheep’s clothing (Matthew 7:15) who intentionally seek to deceive the flock.
Do you have realistic expectations about churches, or do you assume everyone there knows Jesus and is trustworthy? Survivors usually fall into one of two camps; we either trust no one at all or we trust everyone even before they prove themselves. How can we participate in Christian community and still guard our faith from being sidelined by the hurtful actions of others?
I still need a night-light that pierces the darkness surrounding me and shows me clearly who is there. Scripture teaches that the Word of God is “a lamp for my feet, a light on my path” (Psalm 119:105). In a world of darkness, I need to continue looking to Jesus in prayer, seeking his truth in his word, and learning to accurately assess the fruit of others around me (Matthew 7:16). The beautiful thing about Jesus is that he welcomes my brutal honesty and my tears. When I talk to him, he responds with scriptures and insights that help bring clarity and ground me in relationship with him.
If you have been wounded like me, I encourage you to look for his light in the darkness. We don’t need to close our eyes in fear anymore. There is no betrayal so deep that his love is not deeper still. Yes, there are sheep and shepherds who know Christ and reflect His heart in churches, but there can also be wolves there. Jesus warns us to have this awareness up front, so we are not taken by surprise by people who threaten the sanctity of true Christian fellowship.
A night-light does not need to totally light up a room to be effective. It just needs to be nearby and connected to an outlet to provide hope for me at night. Jesus is a very present help in trouble, a trustworthy anchor for my soul, and ultimately the light of the world. I look forward to a day in Heaven when there will be no more night (Revelation 21:25) and everyone I meet will be as trustworthy as the day is long, but until then, I need his night-light of truth to pierce the darkness that surrounds me, especially when I am most vulnerable and subject to attack.
How about you? Are you close to giving up because of church wounds? Do you need Jesus’s word to be a night-light for you too? I’d love to hear your story.
Restored Destiny 