Brokenness Mended By Grace: Part II

Looking For Love And Acceptance In Spiritual Places

The Life Changing Organization

It was my freshman year of college. When I went in, I went in a little fearful of what the future may hold. I was excited to be leaving my parents, but at the same time I knew I needed them near. I had to learn how to trust God and show that I was responsible enough to handle all I would have to endure. It was the beginning of a new, exciting chapter of life.

I knew that God had a purpose and plan for my life before going off to college, but I was not exactly where I wanted to be in life. As a young person, I was faced with many challenges everyday. There are many ways to get off track and off focus from purpose. During a person’s college years, there are loads of homework, stressful tests, guys, church, financial needs, and the list just goes on. Trying to balance it all can be a trial in itself. I know that it was only God who brought me through without going insane.

I moved in a dorm, sorority type house, on August 18, 2006. I discussed it with my parents that if I stayed in Houston, my hometown, I would not be staying home. I did not originally plan on staying in Houston or going to the University of Houston. It just so happened that the Christian sorority/organization I was introduced to in high school received an opportunity to have a townhouse in the Greek Park at the University.

Because the organization was the “center” of my life, I quickly applied to that specific University of Houston, dropping all plans I previously made. I did not give any other school a second thought. It was also suggested by the leaders that God purposed me to go to the University of Houston and to live in the house.

When I found out I could be living with my sorority sisters, I was overjoyed. I knew it would be a different experience living with people I never lived with before, so I tried to prepare myself for any drama that may come with it. I do not believe anyone could prepare for the journey we had ahead of us.

Two weeks before we were allowed to move into the house, we found out that six other girls not apart of the sorority would also be moving in. We did not have enough people to fill the house. We expected it to be hard, but it was the start of what felt like living hell.

It seems that it was here, where my journey downhill began. You would think it would be the exact opposite, because this was supposed to be a time that we were growing closer to God as we grew together as sisters. The first week we moved in the house, we prayed over it and all through it, loudly in the spirit. Some of the six girls that we had to live with were Christians as well, but we scared them.

Not that I am saying that prayer is a bad thing. I pray boldly now, but there is no need to be spooky with it. God wants us to win the lost; not spook them away! “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you” (Matthew 6:5-6, NIV). “For anyone who speaks in a tongue does not speak to people but to God. Indeed, no one understands them; they utter mysteries by the Spirit” (verse 2 Read 1 Corinthians 14:1-25 NIV).

We also had nerve to treat them as if they were less than for not being like us or involving themselves in our prayer time. It became us against them, and we were almost kicked out of school because of our spooky, cultish ways. Looking back, I feel so bad for the poor girls we judged and mistreated. We would go to our organization meetings and learn about the love of God and how we should show the lost love, then go home and treat them poorly. That is not love and that is not how God desire we treat people.

We had meetings and bible studies every other week that would take up most of your Saturday. Everyone living in the house was also required to be in attendance of house prayer at six o’clock in the morning and six o’clock in the evening. We also had to make sure our school schedules or study time did not conflict with house prayer. There were also times that many of us felt forced to say what others said God told them during our corporate prayer time.

Although we would hear from God, and had personal relationship with Him, we felt we had to hear the same thing that others heard. Sometimes when I submitted my prayer journal at the end of the week, I was told I needed to spend more time with God if I did not hear exactly what others heard. After a while I just started making up stuff. It was all exceedingly ridiculous.

Most of us living in the house were leaders in the organization and had been in it for a while, so we went along with everything. It was a lot of prayer, but that is what believers should be doing anyway, right? For the most part our whole life was centered around this organization we considered ministry. We were sold out for God! We were living our lives for Christ, right? Although everyone around us saw that something was off, we thought it was everyone else who was missing something.

The six girls that originally lived with us soon moved out and told everyone they knew that we were part of a cult. Most people thought we were. We were not really involved with other things, and some of us treated all other sororities, fraternities, and college organizations like they were devil worshipers. Sometimes our leaders told us that most of them were. I don’t know if they just wanted to discourage us from being apart of any other organization or what the reasons were behind those teachings. Whatever the reasons were, we were discouraged from associating ourselves with particular people and organizations. Even my mom and older sister tried to tell me something was wrong, and that I was being brainwashed. Of course, I thought they just did not understand.

The longer we stayed in the house, the worse it became. They, being the adult leaders that did not live in the house, were more and more controlling. The thing that pushed most of us over the edge was when a white board was put up with all of our names on it. Anytime we left the house, we had to tell where we were going and time we would be gone. This brought out the rebel in almost all of us. We would have ministry events at the house and have to end it with prayer sessions, because we were all “sinning” and not obeying God.

I remember this one particular holiday dinner we held at the house, and some of the girls brought their male companions. This was one of those nights the main leader decided she wanted to lay hands and tell us about our sins. The real issue is that we were tired of being controlled and we could not be fooled any longer.

Many of the young women would congregate in one room discussing their frustrations with what had become of our college life. We expected these years to be fun and a time to grow with one another as we grew with God. We did not expect our lives to be controlled and manipulated by two people who had already lived out their college lives. Somehow in the midst of everyone voicing their frustrations, I became Judas. Yes, I am talking about the Judas that sold Jesus out for 30 pieces of silver. As crazy as it sounds, they called me Judas as if I was the one who forced everyone to think badly about the sorority. This hurt to the core, considering how close I had grown to the leaders and the amount of respect I once held for them. Even when people came to me, I advised them to pray, hear from God, and do what God said they should. Never did I talk against the leaders. I worked for them, so I did not plan on biting the hand that fed me.

Living in and being surrounded by this environment brought those battles up in my mind again. I was even told that I was giving too much money in church offerings and should have given more to the organization and ministry. I wanted to live for God. I wanted to make my parents proud, but all the drama was literally pulling me away from God.

I remembered crying in the shower, telling God how my heart was hardened towards Him. I just could not believe He would bring these people into my life to help me gain a relationship with Him, then treat me as horribly as they did. One morning, I spoke up on behalf of everyone during Morning Prayer and got flack for it.

Eventually, I stopped working for the organization and wrote the leaders a long email, voicing my frustrations and thoughts backed by scripture. I never got a response from them. I could not break my dorm lease and I did not want to leave the organization until I felt it was my time. I did not want to leave just because most of everyone else in the house left it. I have always been big on waiting to hear from God before I make a move. I don’t like doing things just because everyone else does it.

Lessons Learned:

The biggest lesson I learned from this particular situation is to never center your life around things or people because they are tied to your relationship with God. It is often taught we should not have idols or any other god above God in the Christian world according to the ten commandments found in Exodus 20:3-5 and Deuteronomy 5:7. However, we often have them without knowing it.

For me, I placed these two women that opened the door for me to have a relationship with God in the place of God, like I believe many others do with spiritual leaders. It was as if God called me Judas when they called me Judas. At the time, I equated the hurt they caused to God being against me and hurting me. I believe this is where so many Christians get turned around.

For some reason, we believe that any person called to leadership or other Christians are going to be perfect although we are not perfect ourselves. If we were all perfect, there would be no need for Jesus Christ, for Grace. “For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God's glorious standard. Yet God, with undeserved kindness, declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins” (Romans 3:23-24 NLT).

As believers, we should all strive to be more like Jesus, to love and treat others like Jesus does, but we are all human. People, no matter how close to God, may fall. They may fail you sometimes. They will make mistakes just as you will. God has called us to uplift one another, encourage one another, pray for one another, and continue to point one another back to God when we go astray. “Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed” (James 5:16 NLT).

I have seen so many people leave church or denounce God all together because people offended them. People are going to offend you, and you will offend someone in your lifetime (Read Matthew 18:15-18)! Don’t let that discourage you from having a relationship with God and from fulfilling your purpose.

#BROKENNESS #MENDEDBYGRACE #GRACE #MYJOURNEY #TRANSPARENCY