Introducing Church Hurt

Speaker 1 0:00

And you know, as a licensed professional counselor, I see the importance of being able to help people lean into their spirituality, their faith, and often people will come into my office dealing with a lot of church hurt. When church is that place that you are supposed to be safe, it can push people away from God and that's not where they're going to find their best healing and that's not where we are going to find our best healing. So, really trying to just name the elephant in the room.

Speaker 3 0:43

Yeah, and honestly, it's a testament to how real church can be. I guess, because, if you think about why people hurt and it's something that ellie says throughout her book and throughout the podcast hurt people, hurt people hello everybody and welcome to a better way to heal, where faith meets therapy hello, hello, hello another day, another hour.

Speaker 1 1:10

Hello everybody. I am ellie and I'm isa, and you are watching or listening to a better way to heal, where faith meets therapy. This is a podcast that is really both of our hearts. Yes, it's really helping us understand what a better way. What does a better way even mean? It's based on it's. I want to say, it started out being totally based on my book and we branched off here and there a little bit, but yeah, I think it's still authentic to it, but expanded.

Speaker 3 1:50

It's a supplement to the book in order to dive deeper into some topics that are addressed in the book. Absolutely.

Speaker 1 1:58

So today we're going to talk about something that those of us in the church world may not like to talk about too much the elephant in the room? Absolutely. If you've been in church for more than six months, chances are you may have felt one of these things. But we're going to talk today about three signs you might be carrying church hurt. Yep, church hurt.

Speaker 3 2:24

Wow, yes. Have you ever carrying church hurt? Yep, church hurt. Wow, yes. Have you ever had church hurt? Yes, and to be completely transparent, I have inflicted church hurt.

Speaker 1 2:33

Yeah, yeah, I have too. Immediately, do you have that one? That, oh yes. If I could get that one back. Yes, sometimes we heal out loud. We've talked about that before. Healing out loud, it can be ugly.

Speaker 3 2:51

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I say that to say and I know that a lot of people don't talk about the hurt that they've caused through their walk with faith caused through their walk with faith but I think we all have a season in our work on their journey with the Lord in which we can inflict church hurt, and I think you can even see that throughout the Bible. So I guess I felt led to say that so that people understand this is not a judgment or an excuse to dump on the church.

Speaker 1 3:23

Oh, absolutely.

Speaker 3 3:23

We need the church, the church is the bride of Christ and he loves the church. So I don't want that to be kind of like that. It's more of we get it, we don't agree with church. Hurt, we've been hurt and we've hurt. I guess that's the.

Speaker 1 3:42

And you know, as a licensed professional counselor, I see the importance of being able to help people lean into their spirituality, their faith, and often people will come into my office dealing with a lot of church hurt and when church is that place that you are supposed to be safe, um it, it can. It can push people away from god and that's not. That's not where they're going to find their best healing and that's not where we are going to find our best healing. So really trying to just name the elephant, in the room.

Speaker 3 4:24

Yeah, and honestly, it's a testament to how real church can be. I guess, because if you think about why people hurt and it's something that Ellie says throughout her book and throughout the podcast hurt people, hurt people, and most of us that go to church go into this building with our trauma and literally the worst of ourselves in order to surrender it to christ, or because we're dragged and forced by our families whatever season you are in, we are broken people and I know it's a cliche that sometimes is used to tell people that have been church hurt to shut up um that you know it's a hospital, not you know.

Speaker 3 5:05

I get that, we totally get that there's wounded right in there. It's still not an excuse. No, one people know, by the same standards that we're holding individuals through. There's a better way. There is a better way to do church yes.

Signs of Carrying Church Hurt

Speaker 1 5:20

So first sign that you might be carrying some church hurt is when something happens to you. You avoid church because it can feel more painful than safe. Yeah.

Speaker 3 5:33

Yeah, another thing is there's a lot of excuses to not actually interact with people. So you know, there's a conviction in you that you have to be in the building, right, but you don't really participate because you isolate yourself. It's another form of isolation within the body.

Speaker 1 5:49

Yeah, absolutely so. It's really. Avoidance is a protective copenic. Wow, words are struggling for me today. Mechanism Well, there's a blooper for you.

Speaker 1 6:07

We'll see if it makes the video so, but it is a coping mechanism that we use whenever we're hurt. We will avoid that, the thing that hurt us, or just you know. And I can think of a time where I had gotten some pretty bad news. I thought it was going to impact my ability to graduate and I told my husband. I said I just can't be around church people tonight. And it was just me. I had to. Sometimes we have to withdraw so that we can heal and then sometimes we withdraw because you know you're going to get that person that's going to say yes and we all have them Uh-huh.

Speaker 1 6:53

Every church has them. You might have been that person I have.

Speaker 3 6:58

I definitely have said well, have you prayed? Yes, Are you typing? Maybe? You need to type yes.

Speaker 3 7:06

And while all those things are in Scripture, they are not the Band-Aid that God gave us to help our brothers and sisters heal. It says carry each other's burdens, which means you can be empathetic to people's situation and even though you might have a solution for it for yourself, it might not be the time or place Sometimes. Just recognizing someone's pain is healing, absolutely Just acknowledging that it sucks. And I'm going to be really raw, like I feel like I need to be like sometimes it sucks, yeah, and you should be able to be really raw, like I feel like I need to be like sometimes it sucks, yeah, and you should be able to tell your brothers and sisters they just suck, you know.

Speaker 3 7:50

And even though every day is holy and every day is the Lord's, sometimes some days suck, and not because of God Right, but because of sin, and we live in it and it doesn't even have to be our sin Right.

Speaker 1 8:05

It's just here. Well, I think about Job's three friends that people think I'm crazy when I say this, but for seven days they were the best friends in the world. They sat there, they sat there. They did not try to fix them, and sometimes that's what we need. We just need an ear to hear. But sometimes we're uncomfortable and we want to give God a, and maybe that witnessing is enough for now.

Speaker 3 8:33

Yeah, so sometimes it's just hey, I really had a bad day. I made it late to work and when I got there I just was in a bad mood because of traffic, because I know that if I make it five minutes out of my house I'm going to hit full traffic. Mind you, there's so many things you can say to Greg. Well, next time, get up earlier Maybe, but is it the time for that? Most of the time, we know what we did wrong. Most of the time, we know what god is there right. We're just feeling it and and it's, it's okay to sit with a person and be like okay, yeah, I get it, I hope your day gets better. Or let me make it better. How can I make your day better? Or just sit there, just sit there now.

Speaker 3 9:15

Of course, this is not a blank card for you to be that person that's always complaining and not expect anybody to say like at some point yes, yeah, absolutely, we gotta. I'm not saying that because that can cause hurt too. There's negative people constantly bringing negativity, but also kind of like measure the time. If you're the person that can never just listen, you're not going to be welcoming. You know there has to be an acknowledgement, it's just, sometimes it's just acknowledgement.

Avoidance as a Coping Mechanism

Speaker 3 9:47

I'm like, oh my gosh, it sounds awful. Or I hate when that happens. You know, because it happens, you know, and that's it. Sometimes silence, is it just sitting there letting the person process it? And then if they come and say, you know, I wonder how I can avoid that. I just can't stand how this happens every time. If you're prompted by the Holy Spirit, that might be a time to be like you know what I do. I leave a few minutes early because I know there's construction or you know I try to go anyway. Advice comes with a prompting, but comfort, kindness and gentleness should always be the first thing.

Speaker 1 10:25

Yeah, yeah, yeah, often we can come across as judgmental or dismissing and you know, we just want to try to avoid that if we can, and often another way of looking at this is that you know, church is more than uh, or you know, being in god's presence is more than a building, and for me that night that I just needed to be, I needed to be with god in prayer, and God goes with us everywhere. We are the church. It's more than just a building and we can build a community. I would never say don't go to church. However, if you're being repeatedly hurt in a church, it might be that that might be something to be addressed. Just kind of explore is this the right space for you? Am I safe here?

Speaker 1 11:21

And the best way to do that is biblically.

Speaker 3 11:24

So the Bible gives you instructions on how to do that. If you're offended by a brother or a sister, look at how safe the church should be. You should be able to approach that brother and sister and kind of say that, hey, this really bothered me. Or the way you speak to me every time I come with a problem makes me feel unseen or unheard or uncared for. Doing it with an open, obviously not a blaming, but I feel this way when I come here and I'm really looking for comfort.

Speaker 3 11:53

You're doing two things. They might be completely unaware. They're not intentionally doing this completely unaware, and you just gave them a perspective for them to grow. You just are helping them. Iron sharpens iron. Two. They might absolutely know they're doing it and they might double down. Now you know this is not a safe place for you. Scripture then says okay, maybe I need to bring this to somebody else higher up in the hierarchy of the church, because it happens to be that this person is in the prayer team or is somebody that people will go to. I might want to bring that to the attention of a church leadership, this person. You know, when you come with a problem there's a lot of judgment and very little like comfort and love coming from them. And then there's a conversation that happens there. If you approach it that way and you still see that you are not being seen, cared for or heard in the way that scripture describes that it needs to be, it might be time to find another church home.

Speaker 1 12:49

That's yeah actually what we're saying. We are living in a world where there's what we're seeing and now, mind you, there's a lot of, I would say, evil in this world right now and we are seeing a lot of church leaders that are falling and it's unfortunate. So, yeah, while we pray for them, we also pray for the people that are being hurt. I mean, we really pray for the people that are being hurt.

Speaker 1 13:11

I mean we really pray for the people that are being hurt, because that turns people away from God, because they think of this as then being God doing it, and we are not God. We are representations of God and when I hurt you, it breaks my heart that I might hurt someone that I have before. It's not God, and when I hurt you, I I. It breaks my heart that I might hurt someone that. I have before. It's not God. God didn't do that.

Speaker 3 13:40

And we have bad days. Everybody has bad days.

Speaker 1 13:41

Have you ever been in a?

Speaker 3 13:42

situation where you're having a bad day and somebody came at you just doing something that normally annoys, annoys you, but you have the self-control on a regular basis to just kind of dismiss it or not really play into it. That day, just that day, was not a good day, right. That day your dog died. That day you got in a car crash. That day you argued with your spouse, whatever. You were just hungry, hangry I get hangry. So like that day just was not a good time and you might have responded in a not so kind way.

Speaker 3 14:12

The same Extended grace that you want we should extend to others, not necessarily Condoning and allowing repeated abuse. Now, if you're just a person that are constantly irritable, and now it's her Responsibility to find out why and you need to get some help, we all need to heal from that, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I just just kind of like clarifying, but circling right back before handing it to ellie. Ellie mentioned, you know, that time she needed to be on her own. She did not need to expose herself. She knows she was vulnerable and she did not need to expose herself to imperfect people like her in the situation where she would have been sinned against either.

Speaker 3 14:50

In thought. It's not isolation, it's solitude. There's a difference between avoiding because there's so much trauma and so much church hurt that we don't even want anything to do with church, versus today's not a day. I can do this. I need to be like elijah, be in the cave and being nurtured by the lord and ministered by angels and taking care of myself spiritually from home and getting scripture and refilling my jar so that I can be at church and not be one of those people that hurts people.

Speaker 1 15:21

It's like a cycle, absolutely, and Jesus did that so we can do it.

When Scripture Becomes Painful

Speaker 3 15:26

He went into a boat and was like okay, 5,000 people, you got to wait there because I need a minute.

Speaker 1 16:15

The next one is the next sign is certain words or verses bring pain instead of comfort. There are a lot of verses in the Bible about forgiveness.

Speaker 3 16:28

There's a lot of verses in the Bible about God's goodness, and sometimes people can misuse them and almost make them feel like a weapon toward us, like we're doing something wrong yeah, and in a case of that would be um, let's talk about jesus, because jesus is the standard, right, and we're all going to fall short, and the reason I use jesus is because we're all going to fall short, that's the whole point. But he's the standard and right and we're all going to fall short, and the reason I use Jesus is because we're all going to fall short, that's the whole point. But he's the standard, and because he's the standard, I believe this is important. What was close to Jesus's heart was the people that came to him and surrender Sinful people, broken people. He fiercely protected that vulnerability in people and you could see that throughout the gospel he protected it. Who he was harshest to was those within the body that lacked grace and compassion, even though they experienced god's favor so in modern terms, that's the church, right, the, the pharisees, the leadership of the church, the churchy people.

Speaker 3 17:36

right, we are in God's eye. He loves the churchy people. Don't get me wrong, but if you're using that place of love and protection to hold other people down, he's going to have something to say about that. And he's going to come, after that soul that came in there, that smelling of alcohol, crying because they're having a crisis, something to say about that. And he's going to come after that soul that came in there smoking that smelling of alcohol, crying because they're having a crisis, and you're over here thinking like, why didn't you, why did you drink? And trying to push them away. He's gonna see our reaction way harsher than the person that's coming broken to find healing.

Speaker 3 18:13

Um, so we have a responsibility to one understand if we are wounded, right, so that when we're at church we're not wounding people. Do I need isolation? Do I need solitude? I should say in this moment, while I heal, so I don't bleed on other people. That's a form of love, that's a form of self-care, that's a form of self-control, because I know I'm vulnerable right now, right, or hey, I am vulnerable and that person just never listens. So you know what. I don't need to go seek that from this person. You know that's both both angles of those trigger words and how we can hold others accountable, but also hold ourselves accountable for understanding that people are on their own journey.

Speaker 1 18:59

So I did this Bible study years ago called Experiencing God, and one of the things that they talk about and we talk about in the church a lot is ways to know that something is from God, and one of those is does it speak life? Is it encouraging? So are you using the scripture in a way that speaks life or a way that is encouraging? Yes, there are times that, uh, that we scripture will, um, it will. Words are failing me right now, but it will there's a big time for review.

Speaker 1 19:40

Yes, right, there'll be a time for review, but the scripture does it in a way that lets us know that we are loved and Jesus is a representation of God. Right, absolutely, he is God and God is love. And when you love, you might convict, but you don't condemn. And we, in this world, we condemn a lot, too much, we don't have the authority to send anybody to hell.

Speaker 3 20:14

And you know we're all falling short. We all lived in a state of death and we were brought to life, to spiritual life, by the sacrifice that Christ made. He made that part void for those who receive him. That said, once we're in this fold of grace, once we're in this side of grace, it's not a justification to then mistreat those who haven't received it and accept it yet. Instead, the call is higher. The call is okay. Now that you're in christ, you are to be like christ, and I brought you in when you didn't deserve it. I brought you in in love and gentleness and I expect you to do the same. Yes, part of it is the truth of hell and damnation, but that's not the gospel. The gospel is the good news that you don't have to end up there, right? Gospel isn't hell. Gospel is telling you you don't have to go to hell, because I love you where you are, I receive you where you are and in me you can be perfected.

Speaker 3 21:15

Right and perfected and perfect are two different things. Right, perfect does not exist in our world. Perfected just means I'm going to do that one thing today. Yeah, that one thing today that I've struggled with and we've talked about this in other podcasts, podcasts but I'm gonna shower today. I haven't showered for three days because I've been depressed. Today I'm being perfected. I'm gonna get up against my desire to stay in bed.

Shame vs. God's Truth

Speaker 3 21:44

I'm gonna shower and I'm gonna be and that's gonna be good. You know, yes, you know. And jesus approached things with so much compassion. He, he was in front of possessed people, literally demonically possessed people. They were foaming at the mouth and raging and he was authoritative to that spirit and he was very much in control and in power, but he was tender and kind and loving. Leave that man. Do you want to be free? That's how we approach things. And then the woman on the well. I love that example because he humbled himself in such a way. Mind you, just coming to earth was humbling. But sitting with a woman and remember, we have to go to context it was not allowed for men to just sit and talk to women, period, point blank. That discredited both of them. Not only is he sitting and talking alone to this woman that he knew would be there alone, it's a woman of bad repute, like bad reputation in her community.

Speaker 3 22:50

And he knows that and he sits with her and humanizes her and asks her to give him water. It might sound like hey, serve me. No, no, no, no. Very significant Jewish people did not touch anything unclean Kosher. Look up kosher and what that means. They did not partake in anything they considered unclean.

Speaker 3 23:16

An unmarried woman living with a man from Palestine. Mind you, she was Jewish, she was from Palestine. There was already problems there. Do not share food, do not share water, do not drink from the same vessels. He asked her for water and a conversation started. He humanized himself for her and then, when she was condemning herself because she was condemning herself, she was speaking as being unworthy and Jesus said I know, I know that the man that you're with right now is not your husband. I know all these things and I am offering you. You don't know who you're speaking to and I'm telling you that I have water that's better than the water that I'm asking from you, and that was the kindest way that you could say it in that point, to the point that he just said just go and sin no more. If you truly feel the shame about your life, truly feel the shame about your life, you're free to stop. Right, right. That's so different than you, you, you, you, and he could have done that.

Speaker 3 24:24

he was blameless, but he didn't yeah so who are we to sit there and not love people through their sin not their sin, but through it to a point where they make that choice because, at the end of the day, it's their?

Speaker 1 24:38

choice. Yeah, change comes from within, not without Exactly. Yes, all right, so step three, or sign three, I should say step three.

Speaker 3 24:49

We're cheating, we have notes.

Speaker 1 24:54

You wrestle with shame or guilt that is tied more to people's judgment than God's truth, and I think Issa talked a lot about that already I got ahead. Yeah, she did, but you know, we can often confuse human rules and judgment with God's voice, human rules and judgment with God's voice. And that is that leads us to feeling unworthy like we cannot, we cannot possibly be clean enough for God, and that God says he, we are loved and we are redeemed.

Speaker 3 25:35

And.

Speaker 1 25:36

I write a lot about shame because I think shame is very much. Shame came into the world with sin and it wasn't here before, and I think the issues of shame can cause us to bleed on one another and it can cause us to really struggle to connect to the goodness of god.

Speaker 3 25:59

Yes, yes, and I think honestly, church hurt. Going on that again. Going back to the beginning. It's a hospital and people are hurt again.

Speaker 3 26:08

Not a justification to live in trauma and and dysfunction, and that applies to the church. That's not god's plan for the church, but I think a lot of it comes from. I have struggled with these things and God has brought me so far. I don't want anything to do with it. So we project our own sin and insecurities onto people and it's almost like we're trying to fix ourselves through other people.

Speaker 3 26:33

I think there's a little bit of that. Oh, absolutely Like that. Judgment is almost self-inflicted, but it's easier for me to fix you than to fix the me, or it's easier for me to I don't have a problem with alcoholism, so I can speak against that and there's a place for that. Instead of dealing with my gossip, or instead of dealing with my overbuying, or instead of dealing with my overbuying, or instead of dealing with my laziness, I am going to address your sin because it makes me feel good about myself, right? Yeah, I think it's a little bit of that in church and sometimes blindness, unawareness, I mean I'm not saying everything is intentional, but that deception of walking with undealt with shame.

Speaker 3 27:19

And another example of what Ellie's saying is sometimes we're convicted of things in our lives by God that God knows are destructive to us because of our life experiences. They're triggers to us to sin, they're triggers to us to isolate, they're triggers to us to not do the will of God in our lives. That might not be that other person's case. Right, absolutely. And we tend to project. We try to become God instead of like God and God like we try to be God. Yeah, and there's things assigned to the Lord that weren't assigned to us, right, right, condemnation is one of them.

Speaker 1 27:55

Yeah, absolutely so I talk, uh, you know, one of the things that we have to do is really start to understand where is this, where is this voice coming from? Is this coming from the word of god or is this coming from man? When it comes to, what are those? Those inner thoughts, the shame based thinking and those kind of things, the avoidance, all of this stuff, where does it come from? Is it from things? Maybe I'm running from something that I feel like God has said to me. I mean, that's a possibility. Or maybe there are people that are putting their own stuff or mess on us. I know I've done that before. We often operate in on, we go this pendulum. I think of this pendulum when, uh, we first get saved. A lot of times we go we, we've been freed from so much. We go way over here and now everything's a sin, and they will call it out Some people not everybody, not everybody or they'll come way over here and nothing's a sin and we live recklessly.

Speaker 3 29:12

And not recklessly in love, exactly.

The Path to Healing

Speaker 1 29:15

And so the truth is often somewhere blended in the middle, and it's really having your own personal relationship with God, understanding that God is I mean the church hurt is real, and recognizing, acknowledging it as church hurt, and even the church hurt that we cause our own selves. Recognizing that and making amends or reconciliation with whoever you may have hurt at one point is a good way of starting to really start in the beginning, A path of healing and not retaining Right, absolutely Acknowledging.

Speaker 1 30:01

Yeah, absolutely. One of the things I share in the books is this better framework, and the very first thing is we have to begin to notice, yeah, and then we really have to educate ourselves. What is it that led to this? Was it a misunderstanding? Was it somebody maybe just had a bad day? Is there a space for grace?

Speaker 1 30:27

You know we, because, again, like Issa said, it's not an excuse, but we are all broken and think about the people in your life. I can, I can hold unforgiveness in my heart, or I can forgive them and move on.

Speaker 3 30:43

Yeah, maybe they're they're not in my life anymore, but that doesn't mean forgiveness can't happen correct and you can heal from it, um, without necessarily reconciling, because the person might not be there yet and it could cause both of you more harm to even force that situation. It's release and pray and when reconciliation is possible, of course we should pursue that when it's possible and viable in the will of God. Of course it's not like we're going to use this as an excuse to cut everybody off. Sometimes we have to repent and it's misunderstandings and it can lead to healing. But I also don't want people to get hung up on the idea that if you don't reconcile, you're not free, you're not in peace. That's not the case in every case if that makes any sense.

Speaker 3 31:33

I think too. I'm just kind of like thinking about the concept of church hurt and how to, because it seems like a deeper topic now that we're in it. There's just so many avenues and so many examples of God. I guess a simpler closing is everything that you've applied to self-healing to help yourself overcome trauma outside of the church applies to the church. Like one thing at a time, like do the steps that you need to do to first be self-aware of what you can control, of what you have control over, and release that that you can't, and create healthy boundaries between you and people. Like it's all applicable because it's the same dynamics. The dysfunction happening in the walls of the church are the same dysfunctions that happen within us and around us in every situation. Absolutely, and um, the steps are the same. Like don't stop going to work because you had a bad experience at work right, you'll never work. Don't stop going to the gym. You know it's the same process.

Speaker 3 32:41

Do not completely disassociate from life because, it's painful work one step at a time to heal that, because yeah, there's also good in it yeah, absolutely so.

Speaker 1 32:55

if you've got something out of today, we would love to hear about it, and I agree this might be even we might go even deeper in this in a later episode.

Speaker 1 33:07

There absolutely is. I'm sure there are. We wanted to keep these in bite-sized, digestible episodes. So, again, the three signs are you avoid church because it feels more painful than safe. Certain words or verses can bring more pain than comfort, and you wrestle with shame or guilt, more tied to what people think of you than what God thinks of you. God's truth, and there are ways to overcome that.

Final Thoughts and Resources

Speaker 1 33:41

Acknowledging it is the very first step Giving yourself permission to step away if you need to step away, and then working with someone, maybe, whether it's a safe, another safe church or a therapist. You know, sometimes we need a therapist to help us see. Well, maybe there's some things that I need to work on myself. And then I really want to leave you with this. When I think of God, do I hear his voice or the echoes of people's judgment? So I want you to think about that as you go throughout this. You know, throughout this day, like this is at the beginning of your day. I don't know when you're reading this, but or listening to this or watching this, but just think about that.

Speaker 1 34:32

Do I hear what God is saying, or is it really what someone else is saying? And so I think that's all I have. So if you want to hear more like, subscribe, share with a friend. If you want our resources resources a better way to heal go go to my website, eleanorbrowncounselingcom. We have a lot of resources out there. Shame a better way approach a guide that teaches uh you about what each of the steps from the better framework mean. I also have a shame quiz that can help you understand whether or not you're dealing with toxic shame, and you can always reach out to me. I have a contact me. You can reach out to Issa we're, you know, just we can I, yeah, yeah, connect?

Speaker 3 35:34

I think we can pray over you. Not a therapist, but I am a believer and we are there to lean into one another. I can pray over you, I can listen to you and um, and just kind of like guide you. So we are done for today. Yes, a little long, but I think it's going to be it yes, yes, all right, thanks for watching.

Speaker 1 35:56

Bye-bye, bye.

Speaker 2 36:00

Thank you for watching us. We really appreciate you being here. If you enjoyed the episode, like, subscribe, share with a friend and join us next time. Thank you, Bye-bye.