Tags
abuse, culture, faith, insanitybytes22, life, persecution, rants
I need to say this on account of having once been a minimizer, a denialist, made of teflon really, a rock and prone to not acknowledge those wounds that seem trivial at first glance. Don’t dismiss that kind of stuff, don’t pretend it doesn’t matter.
Also, I saw all the recent mockery, all the social media eye rolling about how Christians think they’re persecuted in the West and how they don’t even know what persecution is and they’re all just a bunch of snowflakes. Well, just because they say it, doesn’t make it true. Christians ARE persecuted in the West. It’s primarily psychological, emotional, and financial abuse, but that can be even worst, even harder to see and harder to cope with, and harder to heal from.
Not long ago someone spoke about bullying in high school and how awful this one guy was, tossing a kid in a dumpster. The essence of the conversation was thank goodness girls aren’t like that. Right, because women just bully and torment their rivals until they have a life long eating disorder, a hoarding issue, and the inability to form healthy relationships. True story. Don’t ever think physical abuse is the only kind of abuse that harms people.
So, I have never been executed, tortured, or boiled in oil and martyred, but I have been beat up, emotionally, spiritually, and physically. I’ve been shunned, screamed out, saluted with one finger, and left out of all the cool reindeer games. I’ve been rejected by friends and family alike, some of those relationships that remain unhealed to this day. I’ve lost jobs because people have found out I was a Christian and since they hated all things Christian, I was just deemed “not a good fit.” I’ve been called crazy, delusional, racist, hateful, and sick.
These are small things, but they affect you, they impact your life. Pretty soon you just start to comply, you just find it far easier to take your cross off when someone tells you they find it offensive and the last thing you want to do is offend anyone. When “praise the Lord” or “thank the baby Jesus” just slips off your lips, and people turn and stare, or express their offense, or start mocking, you soon just learn not to say it anymore.
Persecution is when people make you promise not to talk about Jesus at a picnic because, “we have to be fair to everyone,” but you notice everyone else is talking about the things that matter to them, and exploring every possible spiritual path that involves Anything But Jesus.
Persecution is when you walk into work and people decide to start chanting “hail satan” to ridicule you, to express their opposition to Who you believe in and you just have to smile sweetly because apparently they have a right to practice “their religion” even if you don’t. Now, keep smiling and put up with that nonsense at the end of a ten hour shift.
Persecution is when your whole life falls apart, when you are broken and wounded and the people who are supposed to be there for you, just can’t resist the urge to say, So where’s your imaginary God-god now??
I have a lot more to say on the subject of Christian persecution, about the wounds inflicted on us by our secular culture, by our cancel culture and shunning, even by other Christians, but I’ll leave it at that for today.
Not long ago my friend Daniel told a story about the French Revolution, about how all the nobles prided themselves on their stoicism, on their ability to go to the guillotine with dignity. This may well have contributed to how the crowds responded, to their inability or unwillingness to recognize the inhumanity of what they were doing. The last person to be executed was not stoic, she was someone’s obscure mistress who was not brave, she went to her death screaming and crying, accusing them of wanting to hurt her, making such an emotional fuss, the executioner tried to hurry and the people just turned away in discomfort.
The last person they executed told the truth about what was happening to her, about how people were behaving, about the injustice, the bloodlust, and the murder of the innocent that was going on. She was not a stoic.
Maybe if more Christians in the Western world could locate their intestinal fortitude with two hands and flashlight, and speak up rather than just priding themselves on their alleged stoicism and pretending these things don’t matter, we wouldn’t be in the situation we are in now.
One of the most grievous things I watch these days is how easy it is to talk young people out of their faith, to rob them of their relationship with Jesus, to try to make that sweetness into something shameful, something hateful, something socially unacceptable. I could care less about people favor and approval, but for a lot of younger people, the approval of their peers can feel like their whole world.
That IS persecution. There is more than one way to murder a person’s soul.
So very true. “There is more than one way to murder a person’s soul.”
Beheading might be easier to take than the constant shaming and degradation.
Thanks for speaking the truth.
Blessings.
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Thanks, Michael. 🙂
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This is sooo good. I sense the justifiable rage in defending the insidiousness of the ‘covert ops’ against believers from many fronts/ especially from within- from those who should know better.
Can’t even speak about marriage without being called intolerant. ‘You are not loving enough.’ Blah blah blah. These people are so insecure in their positions that they FEEL threatened by anyone who does not bow the knee to decadence.
Then there is c-19 and the many tentacled ramifications there. No, your opinions are also a threat! Agreed, the persecution is real. It is damaging. And I too have no problem standing up against the snowflakes who cannot connect the dots.
And guess what? Every news story confirms Gods word. Who would have thought.
But there’s good news too: blessed are they who are persecuted……
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Well said, Colorstorm. Thanks for mentioning marriage, that’s a huge issue. There’s a pastor not too far from me who said some pretty mild stuff like, “marriage is important and the church needs to focus on it more” He has really been getting kicked around over it. The LGBT lobby for sure, but it’s also coming from single people, divorced people, feminists, people whose parent’s had bad marriages, and on and on it goes. 🙂
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I feel your pain. More and more lately I’ve been going back to John 15:20 “Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also.” I work in a government facility and have been scolded for talking about my beliefs…but it is okay for people to bash Christianity and conservatives. That’s okay, I guess. I’m just trying to take it as a compliment at this point! The meek shall inherit the earth 😚
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Amen, that’s a great verse! Jesus knew all about persecution and betrayal and I guess experiencing just a tiny taste of that does help us understand His heart better, the depth of His love and mercy towards us. But it is just maddening to be scolded for such things. 🙂
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It’s a hard line to walk because we’re supposed to turn the other cheek, but Jesus also turned over tables in the marketplace. I think for too long, Christians have been taught to “shut up and go along.” And that’s just not Biblical. We are called to be different. I wish more of us would stand up and speak the truth even in the face of adversity. Who knows…maybe that’s what’s coming.
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You’re right, Lisa! That might be what’s coming. It’s is challenging because we do turn the other cheek and Christians have often valued keeping the peace over making the peace. 🙂
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Pingback: It IS Persecution… — See, there’s this thing called biology… – For Such A Time As This
Reblogged this on moreinkpleaseblog and commented:
Pay attention
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The disciples “rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer for Christ.” How did they do that?! They had each other! We (believers) need to stick together and encourage and strengthen one another, so that when someone calls you a Jesus freak, you can smile and say “Thank you!” Or when they say “You’re just trying to protect your kids,” you can respond, “Yes, I am, thanks for noticing.” This is not something many (or any) of us can do alone, so let’s not wimp out on each other! We need to keep in touch, share our experiences, pray for one another (and our persecutors), celebrate those overcoming moments, and embolden one another to keep speaking out, knowing that WE have the truth. Right now the Covid culture seems determined to separate us with fear and suspicion. It’s time to call their bluff and not let the Body of Christ be chopped up into little pieces to be devoured one by one.
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A big amen to that! We really need to stick together and also to meet together, as the Bible tells us to. That certainly all helps.😊
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It would, if I could find a church that hasn’t surrendered to covidphobia.
I haven’t been to church in almost a year. First it was because my church stopped offering in-person worship, and I don’t do Zoom. Now that they have resumed in-person worship, they require everyone (even children!) to wear a mask, and they take names at the door for contact tracing purposes. I avoid any place that requires masks, as well as any place that does contact tracing, since it would land me in quarantine if it turned out someone there tested positive.
Of all the depressing things that occurred in 2020 — a year that had far more than its share of depressing events — the worst was watching the way nearly every church in the country surrendered to the hysteria and paranoia surrounding a cold virus with a 99.7% survival rate.
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I so hear you! One of the hardest things for me in 2020 has been watching so many churches all around me just capitulate and fold. I guess in some part of my mind I clung to a belief that the church would always been there for us, standing in times of trouble. There are still pockets of sensible people, a few “radicals” left in the world, but yeah, thousands have found themselves without a church for the past year.
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This was great, the truth is Christians are being persecuted. And you’re right, physical abuse is not the only kind of abuse. A book you might want to check out about Christian persecution that is coming to the West is Live Not By Lies, by Rod Dreher.
I’m sorry to hear that you went through so much at work, but you will be rewarded for it all:
2 Corinthians 4:17 New American Standard Bible 1995 (NASB1995)
17 For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison,
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Saving this with Conducting a Symphony ) True, it’s sad and joyous, that we’re experiencing that which has been foretold
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Yea Scripture agrees and admonishes “all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution” 2Tim. 3:12.
As Marissa reminds us of our blessed privilege to be counted worthy of ‘suffering’ as Christ has, let’s also be encouraged
by philosophicallogic21’s council regarding the momentary, light affliction producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison. In proper perspective, persecution is really an alternative means of iron sharpening iron. More than mere cliche’ – spiritually speaking – whatever doesn’t kill you, tends to make you stronger!
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While I was reading your story I was reminded of Christiana and Mercy who were accosted by the Ill-Favored Ones (Bunyan’, “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” Book II.
Too long to post, but it’s available at Archive.Org. pps . 218-221. If you care to re-read it, this is the link: https://archive.org/details/progressbunyan00bunyrich/page/218/mode/2up
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We have an enemy who comes to steal, to kill, to destroy. Some serve his purposes blindly. Jesus (who came to destroy the works of the evil one) ended with, “Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they do.” It is best if we believers hold one another up, and seek Jesus for one another, because that work is impossible on our own.
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So very true, we are being persecuted for our faith.
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This was powerful. I’m glad that you are kicking and screaming. I read a book a couple years back called “IBM And The Holocaust,” about how IBM aided the Nazi’s in cataloging and identifying Jews, because there was good money in it. Big Tech has been on the side of persecution for a long time.
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“I’ve lost jobs because people have found out I was a Christian and since they hated all things Christian, I was just deemed “not a good fit.” I’ve been called crazy, delusional, racist, hateful, and sick.”
Nothing like breaking Federal laws on wrongful termination….but we’re the delusional racist, hateful, and sick ones… No blind hypocrisy there!
Great point about kicking and screaming. There’s nothing stoic about standing up for Christ.
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The persecution is real. Good post. It’s happening now in the West
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That seems to express how members of our species deal with each other. It probably has survival value, for the speies if not for individuals. We just need more individuals seeking to improve upon it …
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Brilliant and oh, so true. There is more than one way to murder a person’s soul. God bless you. Thanks for standing up for Jesus even when so many others are standing down.
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