Still even more delayed reactions

(I guess technically, this post should be titled "Delayed reactions, part 4," but I didn't initially plan for this to become a blog series. This has been pretty spontaneous. If you have no idea what I'm talking about and would like to catch up on my previous puke-healing ramblings in parts 1, 2, and 3, please see my posts dated June 21, June 26, and July 5, respectively.)

Not for the sake of being gross, but for the sake of being descriptive: You know how sometimes when you have a stomach bug, and you're puking into your toilet, your stomach keeps dry-heaving long after everything has already been puked out? I'm not exactly sure why this happens, but maybe your tummy dry-heaves just to be doubly, triply sure that every ounce, drop, molecule, atom, quark -- every tiny bit of infection -- is gone. Well, I think after all my spiritual puking, I'm now spiritually dry-heaving. I'm writing this post not for the sake of being redundant but for the sake of squeezing out whatever has still been floating around inside me that is aching to leave my system. So, for this post, I'll try the old-school mass-email cutesy format.

YOU KNOW YOU'RE A HYPOCRITE WHEN...

- After telling an aspiring missionary to her face that being a faith missionary doesn't work, you become a faith missionary and put her on your support list. Um...

- After explaining that you leave the "o"s off your internet posts so as to not offend Jewish people (e.g., writing "G-d" or "L-rd" instead of "God" or "Lord") and to not leave anybody out, you publicly make fun of gay people. So... you want everybody to hear the gospel, as long as they're heterosexual?

- You openly cuss when you watch made-for-TV movies, calling rapists "bastards," and yet you allow ushers to repeatedly violate your daughters under the roof of the church building where you are a pastor. Hold on; I think I need to cough up a hairball: coughcoughMILLSTONEcoughcough. Whoo. That feels better now. Thanks.

YOU KNOW YOU'RE SPIRITUALLY ABUSING PEOPLE WHEN...

- You perform an original skit at church to illustrate the evils of watching a movie to relax on a Friday evening. Hmm. Do you think it's any wonder that any of the former members of your congregation have struggled with workaholicism or just have had a hard time relaxing on an actual Sabbath?

- Your boundaryless preaching becomes contagious to your disciples, especially when it comes to money. I'm sorry, but I don't remember giving you permission to lecture me about saving money when all I was doing was giving you a casual "I already spent all my paycheck" statement to continue our "How are you" conversation. Um, unless I live under your roof or unless you pay my rent, please keep your nose out of my bank account.

- You make people's walk with Jesus so dependent on you that they have no idea how to follow Him when they leave your environment, and they abandon Jesus and/or become openly gay and/or agnostic. I have a sarcastic message for you: Great job.

YOU NEED TO JUST STOP EVERYTHING AND LET GOD LOVINGLY REBUKE-SLAP YOU IN THE FACE WHEN...

- Your advice to an able-bodied, college-degreed, extremely competent adult -- who happens to be struggling financially -- is to apply for food stamps and/or write hot checks for cash at the grocery store. Excuse me, but she needs a rope to help climb out of the hole, not a shovel to dig it even deeper.

- Your view on the abortion issue is so casual that you'd actually counsel a girl who's considering the procedure to pray about it. If that girl were ever me, do me a favor: Clasp my shoulders, look me in the face, and tell me to just say no. But, I mean, considering your history of spiritually abusing people, should it really surprise me that you couldn't care less about an innocent human life?

- You have the audacity to stand up and teach in a class full of aspiring missionaries that the Bible ISN'T inerrant. I'm not saying that there may not be grammatical errors here and there, and I'm not saying that there aren't all kinds of awesome paradoxes floating around in there. But have you ever met God? He's perfect. He's incapable of making mistakes. Sure, He used fallible human beings to write the Bible, but He wrote it. Do you really think He's dumb enough to allow glaring errors to hang out in His perfect Book? I mean, it's as if you invited the devil into your aspiring-missionary classroom, pointed at each student, and said, "Hey, look, a chink in the armor. Go to town, princey." I want to throw a book at you now. Calm down, Tirzah. OK. Maybe you could just read 2 Samuel chapter 22 and Psalm 18. I dare you to tell me that isn't the same song or the same story. Please type up a report and have it on my desk by Wednesday morning.

YOU KNOW YOU MADE THE RIGHT DECISION TO LEAVE A SPIRITUALLY ABUSIVE ENVIRONMENT WHEN...

- You've noticed that unfriending approximately 100 people from Facebook -- so as to distance yourself from a certain church that was harmful to you -- feels wonderfully exhilarating, not sad. Hmm. Proverbs 17:1 isn't kidding when it says that a dry crust with peace and quiet really is better than a house full of feasting with strife. And your shoulders feel lighter, too. Hmm. Walking with Jesus is so much easier without a million-ton weight on top of you.

- You don't feel the need to leave EVERY church service early. Wow. Parking your exhausted butt in a church sanctuary for the entire duration of a church meeting -- without dodging any guilt trips -- is supposed to be normal. Listening to a sermon -- and not wondering when it will be over -- is a healthy thing, especially when the message gives you hope instead of shame.

- The peace and quiet is so pervasive in your life, you could almost sometimes hear a pin drop. No more manipulative friends calling you every time they want a piece of you. No more mockers leaving Facebook comments that make you feel two inches tall. No more overgrown children turning a perfectly good holiday into a freakout session or a Sabbath into another workday or a headcold into a terminal disease. God takes care of me because I let Him. And He does an infinitely good job.