At 18, I Thought God Hated Me

When I was 13 years old I stop listening to the preacher in church. When I was 14 years old, I decided to have my ears pierced. At 15, I began skipping Sabbath School and just sitting outside with some friends. When I was a teenager, I thought church didn’t offer me anything. I knew several Bible verses and all the words for the Lord’s Prayer. I knew the title to the hymns sung regularly during each church service, and I knew that. God loved me. When I was 15, I thought I knew all there was to know about the Bible doctrines the church taught.

When I reached 16, I quit going to church. At 17 I learned to dance. At 18 I almost lost my mother.
The minute I received the phone call from the hospital, I. knew God was punishing me. While Mom struggled to hold on to her life, I sat blaming God for being “unfair.” Since I had not attended church in almost two years, I knew God was after me; for just like the pastor had warned, “God always smites .the heathen.” At 18, I thought God hated me.

If wasn’t fair. I had spent all my life proving that I loved God; after all, I had obeyed His Ten Commandments, loved most of my neighbours, sung to the elderly in the nursing homes, and given up a tenth of my allowance each week for tithe. What didn’t r do?

Ok, so I had stopped attending church. Big deal. I figured I knew enough about loving God that I didn’t leally need to go anymore. No one wanted me there anyway. I was a rebel. I wore the wrong clothes, said the wrong things, dated the wrong guys.

If I couldn’t be like the rest of the church members, I might as well leave. So I. did. And I was happy. At least I tried to convince myself I was.

When my mother almost died, I realized I wasn’t very happy. I felt alone, and for the first time in my life I had no one to turn to, nowhere to go.

Before, I had believed God would always be there to comfort me. After all, I didn’t quit believing in Him; I just quit believing in the church. But this time He wasn’t there for me. This time He was the enemy taking away my mother because I was a bad Christian. At 18, I knew I was alone.

I thought about praying, but to whom? Since God was punishing me ‘for my attendance record, He surely wouldn’t listen to me now. So I left it up to my family to do the begging and bargaining. Certainly God could not be scolding all of them, since they regularly warmed the pews.

The whole ordeal infuriated me. Why was my mother’s health being jeopardized because of something I had done? Could it be possible that God was really angry with me for not going to church? Was it really that important for me to go to church for God to love me? These were questions I could not answer.

It wasn’t until I started college that I found the answers I was looking for. One day when cramming for a quiz in my religion class, I was startled by the professor, who, instead of passing out the normal 10 questions, abruptly asked the class, “How many of you attend church regularly?”
About a third of the hands slowly rose above the class.

After a quick glance around the room, the professor shot out, “What about the rest of you? Why don’t you go to church?”
“I go to the beach!” shouted a brave heathen from the back of the row. “That’s where I can really worship God.”

The rest of us just sat there, looking around from one blank face to another. No one wanted to make a fool out of himself by revealing any personal reasons for skipping church. Likewise, I remained silent, but slowly others started to divulge the all-too familiar grounds that “the church members were too old-fashioned, too judgmental, too patronizing.” Like me, many felt they had been driven away because they did not “act” like proper young Christians.

After class I decided to ask my teacher privately about God and His rules for churchgoing. “Dr. Masters,” I asked when the classroom emptied, “does God really get upset when someone quits going to church – I mean, enough to want revenge?”

“Well, I don’t know if He’d get that upset, Jen,” he replied with an understanding smile.
“Well, does, He hold a grudge? You know, like punishing someone who hasn’t been to church in years?”

“No,” he replied with some hesitation. “God does not hold grudges. He doesn’t punish anyone for not being happy with the church. After all, He established the church as a place for people to grow in Him. It’s like a home for His flock. And if people can’t feel at home, He’s not angry with them – just disappointed.”

“Well, what does He want l us to do, then, if we don’t like t church?”

“Do you suppose He expects us to try to change the things we don’t like – to change the church into a better place for Christian growth?” he asked just before he headed out the door.

He left me with a lot to think about. In fact, I pondered on the subject for many days, trying to rationalize my feelings. My professor had been able to convince me that it was not God who was punishing me, but me punishing myself. God had not made my mother sick because I had stopped going to church, and her recovery hadn’t happened because the rest of my family still attended. Feeling guilty for not going to church, I had been blaming God for my misery when it wasn’t His fault.

Still, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go back to church. What if the things I disliked about it never changed? What if the members interrogated me, or condemned me, saying “We told you so”? What if the minister made me stand up during the morning welcome and asked me where I had been?

Besides, I felt alone there; I was different. I didn’t fit the more rigid members mold of Miss Pentecost Christian. I had holes in my ears. I went to movies. I listened to rock music. I knew the members didn’t want me at church, even if God did.

After weeks of intense contemplation, I stifled my “what ifs” and decided to visit just once, Just one visit couldn’t hurt. And I could always leave if I started to feel uncomfortable. It didn’t mean I would have to go again.

The week I mustered up enough nerve, I dressed in one of my more “conservative” outfits (I didn’t want to stand out in the crowd) and headed off to church. Arriving before the service started, I took a seat in the back row just in case I needed to make a mad dash for the car. However my escape plan proved unnecessary, for I soon found myself absorbed in a discussion that would change my whole perspective of the church.

Ironically, in place of the usual “lullabying lecture,” the pastor spent the entire 45 minutes personally asking the congregation, “Where have all our members gone?”

Instead of jumping to answer his question, I just sat and listened. The congregation’s responses shocked me. Many of the “pious, hypocritical” members whom I loathed professed that some of their “friends” had left to find a church where they could feel they “belonged.” Some confessed that they had pushed members away by being too “judgmental and traditional.” Even cranky Mrs. Owens, the old organist, admitted that she missed seeing “the sea of smiling young faces every week.”

After that discussion, my attitude changed. Seeing those members whom I had thought were so mean and uptight express so much love and concern for those, like me, who had left “home” made me realize that I was wanted. I also noticed that I was just like all those church members I despised: I was just as naive, just as judgmental, and just as lonely. And like the rest of the members, I needed a place where I felt wanted, a place for fellowship, a place to call home.

That day I realized that God’s church is my home, not just a holy building with cushioned pews, stained-glass windows, and pompous members. Instead, it is a refuge, a family, a home. And like every other home, one can expect disputes and disagreements. However, if the family stays together, its members can work with each other to solve their problems. That day I learned that my family needs me, and I need my family.

Although I still hurt, I started attending church regularly. i still had holes in my ears and still listened to rock music, but I no longer felt alone. I was home. After a few months, the holes in my ears were empty, bearing no jewelry and the rock music was replaced by more wholesome music.

At 19, I went back to church.
At 20, I was baptized,
At 21, I know that God really loves me.