This year marks the tenth anniversary of my descent into hell. I wrote a blog about the night my second pastorate crumbled into dust a few weeks ago so if you missed it and you want to know what all this rambling is about, I invite you to back up a few blog entries to catch up on the juicy gossip. Go ahead, I'll wait...

...ok, on with the show.

About a month ago, I found myself standing in the building where all of my ministerial drama took place; at the very same pulpit. Aside from some paint on the walls the room hadn't changed much since the last time I saw it. It even smelled the same. Now, this isn't the first time I've been back to that church building and in the times I've been in there before there was no revelatory scene like the one I'm going to describe for you now. The major difference between my other visits here and this one is this time I was all alone in the building.

I stood at that pulpit and looked over the empty pews for what seemed like hours. Memories, uncontrollable memories,flooded over me; I could not shut off my brain to stop the faces and scenes. It was as if someone had taken over my senses and was forcing me to relive some extremely painful and personal things that I had worked very, very hard to forget. The overriding emotion that I had when I finally left the building was anger.

In fact, since that visit back in early July, I've been battling intense depression. I won't bore you with all the details but for the last month I've been overwhelmed with a fatalistic attitude towards everything, especially church stuff. It was as if the hour I spent in that building was the catalyst for the concoction Satan had been preparing in me for years.

I've spent the last month battling, seeking and asking God the eternal question, "why". Not, "why did I go through all of that junk ten years ago"...I'm done asking that question. This time my question to God has been, "why am I feeling like this? I thought I was over all of that drama." When I say I was battling depression, I want to be clear. I was closer to quitting the ministry than I've been in the 7 years I've been pastoring in Pearland.

The reason I'm sharing all of this with you, my tens of readers, is because of what God has revealed to me in the last 2 weeks. God apparently orchestrated my return to my personal "Beth-el" to open my eyes to some deep seated issues that I needed to deal with if I am going to move any deeper with Him.

You see, because of my pain and heartbreak, I had developed a spiritual cancer that was slowly destroying me. I had allowed myself to grow hard-hearted toward God and His Word, His Will and His Ways. I had grown distrustful of God and His people...no scratch that, I had absolutely no trust for God and His people.

This may sound crazy to you, a pastor who doesn't trust God or Christian, but it is more prevalent than you may think. I know of many men of God who have grown hard toward their calling and resentful toward their people. Most of those men do not last long in ministry and I was definitely on my way out too.

But God...

God has used this visit to open my eyes and show me areas that I need to repent in. Yep, pastors have to repent too. I made a ton of vows during those first few years following my second pastorate and none of those vows were good ones. I've since recanted all of them...except for one. I swore to the heavens above that I would never trust another human being again as long as I lived. You don't have to be betrayed and back-stabbed too many times in life before you develop an intense dislike for that experience and a desire to never repeat it.

Please know, this hardness of heart was never a conscious thing. As with all of Satan's methods, this has been a subtle hijacking of my passion and heart's desire. The thing is, I've allowed this process to take place. Instead of "taking every thought captive" (2 Cor.10:5) and thinking on "these things" (Philippians 4:8) I chose to think on destructive things that were poisoning my soul. The result of my attitude and reaction to my past was, like Ephesus, I had left my first love (Revelation 2:4)

Like that ancient church, I'm faced with the same process of healing they were faced with. "Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen and repent..." (Rev.2:5). I needed to be reminded of some things. God brought me back to the place where he began to really work on me to remind me of where I've been and where He is taking me in His kingdom. I needed my trip back to my personal Beth-el even though the trip has been painful and filled with pitfalls. God has brought me back to a place of repentance and I can tell you that my attitude and outlook on life has done a complete 180 degree turn.

That's the process God has all of us on. Most of us want God to heal us from our heartbreak as He said he would do (Luke 4:18) but we usually want Him to heal us OUR way; specifically, just pull the pain and junk out of our heads so we can live in peace. Newsflash: God doesn't operate that way; He never has. His Word, Will And Ways for us are for us to choose His way. That requires repentance. Salvation does not come apart from true repentance (Matthew 3:8). There's an awful lot of born again Christians who still need salvation...from themselves.

I've been one of them. Am I completely cured never to fall into a depressed state again. Nope, Satan's regrouping and getting ready for His next attack on me, of this I have no doubt. But God is equipping me with His weapons of warfare. Strongholds are being torn down in my inner-man (2 Corinthians 10:4) every time I stop kicking against the pricks and just trust and obey Him. To get this trust issue out in the open, God had to bring me to my Beth-el. To get the trust issue properly dealt with I had to get on my knees and remember, repent and refocus on Him and His word.

It's amazing how many of us struggle with mental health issues. I wonder, when is the last time you got your knees before your King? I guarantee, an humble spirit and a contrite heart will chase the blues away faster than a lifetime of Prozac...thank God.

I've had a difficult time writing this string of blog entries. There is a fine line that I walk whenever I talk about personal issues; particularly issues that I'm still battling with. Most people have a certain image of pastors that they want cultivated and kept in pristine condition. Pastors are supposed to have their stuff together. They aren't supposed to struggle with the issues that plague everybody else. After all, we pastors promote a lifestyle of spiritual and emotional maturity with every sermon we preach. It is disillusioning when we discover our heroes have chinks in their armor. So, to prevent disillusionment, we'll play these image games with one another.

I hate the mind-games that have infiltrated modern Western Christianity. God, in his divine wisdom, decided to include very human flaws and weaknesses in every single Biblical narrative of even the most faithful man or woman of God. Noah has his vineyard, David has his Bathsheba, Elijah his juniper tree and even Joseph has his breakfast table confessional that really puts the nail in the coffin between he and his brothers. It is only in modern Christianity that we play these image games with one another. You know the game where we pretend everything is peachy keen when we're in a corporate setting but privately we're anything but. This practice is also known as "lying".

Pastors are the worst about this. We're taught in our seminary training to manufacture and maintain an image of maturity whether we are really that mature in our thinking or not. Again, the people have come to expect this of their spiritual leaders and we pastors are more than happy to work on maintaining this facade rather than work on really becoming spiritually and emotionally mature.

I learned a long time ago that playing games like this will eventually kill you. I've seen many great men of God go down in flames simply because they were deluded into playing these mind-games rather than simply working on their personality and character issues. James taught us to "confess your faults one to another and pray for one another that you may be healed" (James 5:16). Pastors are no different than anyone else in the congregation; we have hurts that need healing too. God's process of healing calls for brutal honesty, first with ourselves and eventually with others in the church.

As a pastor, I have no problem confessing my faults with people. I struggle with the same soul-sickness that you all struggle with. I battle with sexual lust, laziness, selfishness and pride issues just like everyone else. Lately, my biggest battle has been an emotional one; I battle with depression on a daily basis. The enemy of our souls knows my specific weaknesses and he's been hammering on my button like crazy lately.

Now, it has been my experience that many church attendees have problems with leaders who are so open with their battles. This is the line that I tightrope walk across on a regular basis. How much is too much confession? James didn't say "confess your faults to everybody in the church". Frankly, not everyone is spiritually and/or emotionally mature enough to follow a flawed leader.

If that describes you, then you probably need to quit reading the next blog entry. Don't worry, I'll be getting back onto some less uncomfortable elephants in our auditoriums in the near future so you don't have to delete this site from your bookmarks just yet (this site IS bookmarked, right?).

If you haven't discovered by now, I'm not your average pastor. I don't pretend. If I don't know the answer to a biblical question, I'll tell you "I don't know". If I have issues with you, I'll tell you what they are and work hard to find a way to repair the issue and restore fellowship with my brethren. If I'm struggling with things to the point that it is negatively affecting my walk, I'll share that too. Such is the case with this "Back To Beth-El" string of blogs. The next blog entry is going to be very, very personal.

So, here's your final warning; if you can't handle a pastor sharing personal struggles and character flaws, you don't want to read the next blog entry. But, if you want to see the inner workings of a Christian's mind as he battles with character issues and flaws, then feel free to join me in a couple of days. My desire in sharing this stuff isn't to gain pity or even a following. I just want to be used of God to bring healing to the broken hearted. God's got a process for doing that and I'm walking it right now. It is a very personal process filled with difficult choices. But God is able to set us all free of our personal prisons, if we'll let him. I hope he'll use my experience to set some of you free as well.

But to do that, a pastor has to shed the image and get "real" with the people.

You have been warned true believers...

The scene was familiar to the young pastor; he’d seen it several times as a lay member, but this time it wasn’t happening to his pastor…it was happening to him. The congregation was split and people were furiously calling for his head on a platter. You could cut the tension with a knife. The music director tried, vainly it turned out, to get the people to focus on worshiping God instead of their anger and desire for revenge. It was a valiant effort but ultimately fruitless. The young pastor knew he was in trouble because there were more people in attendance this Sunday night than had been in months; some in attendance weren’t even members of the church. The phone lines had been burning for weeks. The stage had been set. All of the players had gone “all in” and were ready to lay their cards on the table.

There were two clearly defined groups divided by the center aisle of the auditorium. One faction wanted the pastor to answer for his “crimes” before he was run out of town on a rail. The other faction was firmly on the pastor’s side; a few because they liked the pastor but most because they didn’t like the members of the opposing group. The worship service continued; every hymn brought the showdown closer. The young pastor could feel his pulse racing. He looked out onto the crowd of people and watched their faces. He found it amazing that they could sing these hymns that spoke of God’s grace and mercy all while plotting to remove him and his family. Their faces told the whole story. He closed his eyes and felt the last fragments of his battle scarred heart shatter into pieces.

The pastor was an emotional wreck. He’d been preaching to, praying over and fighting and feuding with this group of disgruntled members for over 3 years in a vain attempt to end the gossip and the judgmental backbiting. He learned too late that the root of bitterness runs deep and many of God’s children will fight to the death to keep that root healthy. What had started as very minor differences of opinion had now escalated into a full fledged turf war. All of his charm, his efforts, his sermons and his prayers had done nothing to prevent the inevitable public battle.

The song service ended and the worship minister turned the pulpit over to the embattled Pastor. He sat in his seat on the stage trying desperately to find a way to avoid what he knew was coming. He wondered why God was so silent. Was He really going to allow this travesty to continue? After several long minutes of silence the young man finally took his place behind the “sacred desk”. He half-heartedly ran through the announcements and prayer requests before leading them in a prayer. He had barely uttered the text for that night’s sermon when the deacon raised his hand and asked for permission to address the church. The old World War II veteran, survivor of Normandy and many subsequent military campaigns in Europe, slowly made his way to the stage to fire the first round of the night’s battle. The young pastor took his seat on the stage as the group of angry church members began the longest church service of his life.

The pain was indescribable. These were people he loved; widows whom he had visited, done yard work, electrical repair and other tasks for without a thought of recompense or reward. Now they were accusing him of verbal abuse, financial abuse and heretical teaching in their beloved church. One of these spiritual lynchers was a middle aged woman who had hosted the church’s weekly home bible studies over the last year. Now she was accusing the pastor of crimes of negligence and financial impropriety. The deacon standing at the pulpit was the spokesman for the group. He spoke with barely contained anger of the pastor’s mistreatment of the church widows and thinly veiled accusations of financial corruption. The agony of hearing these people angrily accuse him was more than the pastor could stand. He could feel his broken heart hardening with every word they spoke. The final bricks of a psychological wall of self-preservation were being laid with every tick of the clock.

The evening ended with high drama. A hastily called for vote of confidence (which the pastor won) was followed by an ugly mass exit of the group of bitter head hunters who wasted no time in calling the local police to come to the church and investigate charges of abuse of the elderly by this young upstart of a pastor and his followers. The police came and went without much incident due to a church full of witnesses who testified that the only ones guilty of abuse were the ones who had called them. When the police were gone, there was a celebration by those who were left as if a major victory had been won. The only one not celebrating was the pastor. Only he seemed to see what had just happened. No one had won anything and the church was now in shambles.

It wouldn’t take long for those who had supported the pastor that fateful night to see what he saw. Vows of allegiance and faithfulness were quickly and quietly forgotten as the ugly reality of rebuilding a shattered group of people with a damaged reputation in the community into a spiritual powerhouse for God’s kingdom set in. The young pastor was disillusioned, discouraged and frankly, bitterly angry at God and his people…ALL of them. It wasn’t just this heartbreak; it was all the years of watching God’s people in many different churches fight and split over curtain colors or music styles or some other mundane issue that did not matter in light of the eternal kingdom of God. It didn’t take long for the pity party to start in the young pastor’s heart. His dreams and goals of ministerial success had gone out the door with those angry, hard-hearted church members and he felt betrayed, abused and abandoned.

Where was God? Why had God allowed this horrible night to happen? Where was the fire from heaven or the splitting of the earth to swallow these stiff-necked rebels? Where were the legions of angels come to protect the embattled servant of God? Heck, he’d take a fat, lazy guardian angel at this point. God’s silence was deafening and the pastor concluded through his pain that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob was either a sadistic liar or did not exist at all. He was stranded on an island of despair with a ragtag group of immature, carnal Christians who were as dependable as a broken clock in terms of rebuilding a church. His faith had been in vain and the God who swore to “never leave or forsake” him had done just that. He had called him to this church, placed him in this pulpit and then left him to be eaten alive by these sharks in sheep’s clothing. The horrifying truth was too much for him to bear and at age 29, after 8 years in full time pastoral ministry in two different churches, the pastor bitterly resigned and vowed he would never stand behind another pulpit in another church for the rest of his natural born life.

Thankfully the story did not end there. Although the young pastor had years of prodigal rebellion and suicidal depression to get through, God was not finished with him; not by a long shot. What this disillusioned young man did not realize was that he had just completed a course at Real Life University (R.L.U.). I wouldn’t say I passed the course with flying colors, but I did learn a few things; in fact, truth told, I’m still learning from that experience.

One of the things I learned is if you are not careful, you will become the very beast you are battling. I am still humbled at how quickly I transformed into a bitterly angry man and how close I came to throwing my life away and becoming exactly like those I was railing against. I will never stop flooding my Refuge and my Strength with praises and eternal gratitude for rescuing me from myself. But, that was not the most important thing I learned from that night.

I had a counselor tell me that there would come a day when I would be thankful for the events of that night. He told me that instead of anger and hate, I would feel pity and godly love for people who wouldn’t have lost an hour’s sleep if they had succeeded in throwing me and my family out on the street that very night. Of course, at the time, I thought he was insane and told him so in as ugly a way as I could think of. But I can confess to you now that the man knew what he was talking about. I am more thankful now than ever for those people and that fateful evening because a funny thing happened to me after the longest church service of my life…

…I met God.


to be concluded...