A little over three years ago my church announced that they would be sending a pastor and small team to Phoenix, AZ to support a small church in our movement. Unbeknownst to me several people near and dear to me had already been asked to join this team and when it was announced, I just KNEW I was supposed to go too. I prayed about it for a few days and then I called the man who would be sent to pastor the church and he prayed too. We both agreed that I should go...but him and all other counsel said to wait until June. So people left in small waves and my departure was delayed until August and I arrived alone.
I was expecting hardship. I knew that things would be slow and there would be much loneliness...but my heart was not prepared for what I encountered. My body not ready for the hardship I endured.
Churches are full of sinners...I think believers and non-believers alike forget this fact. We are still human, despite accepting a Savior into out lives. Yes, we are different...but we still make mistakes and the mistakes in a small church are less easily covered by grace and love. I learned a lot and I will never be the same. Some of these things I learned I will share for those planning on going on a church plant, or joining a small church plant.
1. Satan hates you. He hates churches. He hates church plants. He is out to get you...HE IS OUT TO GET YOU!
This plays out in any way he can possibly get his hands on it.
My experience was relational. Satan saw a weakness and went for it to draw blood.
Right upon my arrival I was told to join a Bible study that I knew would not be good for me (not at all because of the lack of amazingness of the people on the team!) The people on the team were in different seasons of life and very much introverted, and I'm an extroverted extrovert (well, I used to be). Right away I experienced loneliness, but figured that leadership knew everything and it would work out...
** Blind submission is dumb. Satan uses it. I should have spoken up, I should have stood up for myself, my personality and situation...and I didn't and soon loneliness gave way to jealousy and bitterness.
Phoenix is a harsh environment. Many people in our church experienced hard things and saw pain and evil in a way they had never seen before and there was an environment of "wagon circling" that occurred. Family units were tight knit with each other, risking less than they would have in other environments and this led to loneliness and isolation for all. My problem, was that I had no family unit to even be tight knit with. Within the first year of being down there people stopped pursuing my friendship. The men in my life stopped checking in on me, spending time with me, and in some cases, even talking to me. I don't relate well to women...it is something I am growing in, but I need that masculine voice, that protection and wisdom and it was just suddenly gone.
** I struggle with feeling worthless and unfortunately Satan monopolized on this feeling and instead of confronting this issue and telling the men I missed them, confronting sin and explaining my need for friendship I accepted that I was in fact worthless and dumb for feeling like I needed that fellowship. This grew into self loathing and depression, pain and anger.
My relationships with women too changed. My friends disappeared and fun activities ceased. Instead, if I spent time with a woman, it was one on one and it was a discipleship relationship. While these women tried to understand me, they just couldn't and they aren't men. Women cannot be the only support for women, and I began to sink. I began to feel judged for my feelings of isolation and needs and desire for fun. These women in no way were out to get me and had sincere and best intentions at heart (do not hear me say that! These women loved me to the best of their ability and are AMAZING!)
** Again in my belief of being worthless, I could not explain my desperate need for fellowship and fun and didn't really even realize at the time that I felt like a project and not a friend...because these women were not trying to convey that...Satan is just really good at his job.
Within a year of being in AZ I was alone 99.9% of the time, unless you count work. Unfortunately for this scenario, though I work in draining environments. Most of my time working in AZ was at a rehab center for pregnant women. It was truly rewarding, but utterly emotionally draining. As I gave at work and lacked fellowship and friendship at home, things got worse. Horrible days happened at work and even when I made phone calls for support, people just weren't available to comfort and mourn with me. I had less and less to give and had no energy to pursue friendships. Fear of rejection, busyness and lack of fun activities, turned to avoidance of discipleship.
I began to long for home, for family, for singles who knew how I felt, for families who pursued me talked with me, did fun things with me. I longed for the safety to be Biblically feminine. For men to create a safe environment to be vulnerable instead of making me feel shameful for needing. For women to understand my needs. For the demand to be a soldier ever pursuing to end. To be allowed to be a princess and be cherished as one.
I began sinking, I could no longer hear God's voice and no longer felt cherished by my local body and I didn't know how to explain that. I didn't know how to explain my desperate, suffocating loneliness and the women in my life (bless their hearts!) were just not enough to keep me afloat. I walked right into sin. Open arms, sigh of relief, this is what I needed, walked into sin. I knew it was wrong, but it met a need and I didn't care. For once in a long time there was a man who was not treating me as a pariah, who acknowledged my pain and need and allowed for vulnerability and gave me protection. And once I walked through that door, I didn't know how to get out (nor did I want to, in all honesty).
I disqualified myself from so much by entering into this sin, but sadly I don't think I could have made any other choice. I had accepted my worthlessness, my valuelessness in the church and hadn't spoken up with verses to validate my need. I hadn't explained in right words the agony. I hadn't pleaded for my needs to be met, I hadn't confronted sins against me. I let them fester in my heart and I ruined it.
Now sin is sin and mine was horrible, but the way I was met by several people in my church killed me. It solidified my need for this man to protect me, because I sure as heck wasn't going to get a hug and a safe place to mourn my sin, to run from it, to be protected, to heal. I sank further and further, distancing myself from the church. I had already been so hurt, and I was so deeply entrenched in the lies of my value and worth.
See, "it is not good for man to be alone"...God himself said that...and that was BEFORE the fall. All the more that is important now. This doesn't even mean marriage, I can tell you from personal experience. I needed people to bring me into their wagon circle. But I didn't express this lovingly, I didn't confront those in sin against me and I failed.
My sin, people's sins of omission, and people's unintentional misunderstandings led me to failure.
If you're going to succeed at planting a church...at being a believer, you have to dive in with others. You have to be a true, heart friend to others and I wasn't. And singles need men and women, to pursue us with intentionalily in this. We don't have a built in partner (not that it's perfect or easy in marriage, I'm simply saying you have someone for which you are responsible for and to). Singles get forgotten, neglected and isolated. We need men and women to take us under our wing and check on our hearts, to be our friends.
I've learned about myself that I have to figure out Biblical ways to explain my needs instead of frustratingly telling my sisters that I feel desperately lonely. I have learned to stop blindly submitting. Submission is beautiful, but if something is not right for you, it's okay to open dialogue and stand up for yourself. Sin needs to be called out before it is allowed to ruin. I have lost friendships because I allowed sin to persist and so did they. I lost trust, respect, hope in others and in myself. Sin ruins.
I've learned that I am grateful for the women who tried. They were not enough, and I know they feel pain because of that...but it's not their fault and they did make a HUGE difference. Olivia, I miss you a lot and wish I had been strong enough to realize these things, these words while I was there. I wish I had made us do more fun things together, you need those things as much as I do. I hope you're able to get those things. The Christian walk is not just discipling and plugging along, it is about joy and life to the full. Laughter and funny moments. Thanksgiving, rejoicing and perseverance.
I have green, mountain license plates for my car again, instead of the AZ desert ones. It's a relief to be home. To heal, to be with people who protect, cherish and shelter me. Who understand what I've lost in the desert and who weep with me. But it's also a sharp sting. I failed. I failed at loving those around me, for standing up for myself. I failed at fighting sin and Satan's fiery arrows.
I get to live the rest of my life knowing that I failed at planting a church, and that more than that, it almost killed me. I get to live the rest of my life with the consequences of the psychological damage, with the damaged and lost relationships I allowed through sin. I get to live with the growing medical bills and doctors appointments to figure out exactly what is wrong and how to treat my physical body from the damage. I get to live my life with the repercussions of my sin.
Church planting isn't rosy, isn't lit with golden sunbeams. It's hard...harder that I could handle. Harder than I thought possible. Satan attacked the one area I was sure wouldn't fail me...and fail I did indeed.
