What do real leaders look like?

"Hold everything in your hands lightly, otherwise it hurts when God pries your fingers open." - Corrie ten Boom (April 15, 1892 – April 15, 1983)

It can be very confusing and even scary. There's just so much poor and false leadership among those who call themselves "Christian" today. It's very easy - as Jesus warned it would be - to end up on the wide path to destruction, instead of the narrow path that actually leads to God and life.

So where do we find people who've done it right?

Well, one of the leaders I've learned most from is a woman who never would have called herself a leader, and who never had any intention of becoming a well-known anything (though I'm sure she would have loved being known in her local community as a really good watch repairer).

I never met Corrie ten Boom. In fact, when she died in 1983 I was a young lesbian still in deep hurt and hatred of all things Christian, having been chased away from God by those who were claiming most loudly to be His best (and often only) representatives.

I wonder if I'd been able to meet Corrie before she went to the Lord, would I have been spared another 15-20 years of struggling to find out that God had nothing to do with the rejection I'd been dealt, and that being a follower of Jesus actually did mean something good (and not something vile and hate-filed, as I'd been taught)?

Truly, God only knows. And although those were horribly painful years, I don't regret them. I learned as Corrie learned: the pain in our lives can come from outside evil, or from within ourselves, but neither of them is God's real way. What is God's real way?

That's the other thing that Corrie ten Boom can show us so very well.

Corrie grew up Christian in the Netherlands, and was in her middle life when the Nazi's took over her country. She and her family soon were hiding and helping Jews escape, stealing and making food ration cards to feed their charges, all while continuing to work their family business. All until they were found out and taken by the Nazis, first to prison (where her elderly father died), and then she and her sister to the horrible Ravensbrück concentration camp in Germany. There, her sister died and Corrie was spared death only on a technical error (so the world would say!).

And it was in the midst of all this pain that Corrie learned about the real Jesus, and about allowing Him into her heart and strength to do the things she could not do under her own power.

What things? Well, things like:

• Risking all she had -- even her beloved family and ability to make a living that fed her family - to stand up against what was wrong. 
• Surviving horrible evil that beat, starved, reviled, and killed her family (a sister right before her eyes), when so few were able to. And,
• After the war and being released, actually shaking the hand and forgiving one of the camp guards who'd done all this to her, releasing her worldly right to hate and perhaps even hurt this man (she later wrote of that experience, "For a long moment we grasped each others' hands, the former guard and the former prisoner. I had never known God's love so intensely as I did then.")

See, one of the things I appreciate most about Corrie ten Boom is that she is a real Christian hero. She's also a real Christian leader. She was confronted by evil and pain the likes of which most of us reading this post will never know, and she did things wrong. She hated. She failed her Lord over and over again.She was just as human as all the rest of us.

But then she allowed Jesus to heal her. She allowed Jesus to teach her. She allowed Jesus to correct her day after day after day, again and again and again until there was so much of Jesus in Corrie ten Boom that few could walk away from even a conversation with her without knowing the depths of Jesus' love for them. She brought untold numbers of people to Jesus - both in the camp and later throughout the world - not because she helped them learn the prayer that would get them a new car, or pay off their bills, or even to have a happy family or strong nation. Not because she got them hooked on her own church. Not because she zoomed them up each Sunday so they'd have enough spiritual zip to make it to the next Sunday "hit".

No, Corrie ten Boom was truly the hands, eyes, feet, mouth, and heart of Jesus in this world because she gave people Jesus - just Jesus.

If you haven't checked Corrie ten Boom out, I invite you to do so. If you think you've learned all you can from her life, I invite you to take a new look. Jesus never stops teaching through the example of those who are real leaders in His real church.

Here are some things to check out:

Her life:

• More about Corrie's life from Wikipedia

Her books (note that a lot of these can be found at the library or in used book stores - I list links only so you can see more about them):

• The Hiding Place - the one she's most known for. It's the story of her life through surviving Ravensbrück. It was also made into a movie, which is not as good as the book, of course, since they have to leave out so much in a movie.
• Tramp for the Lord - the followup, this one goes from after the camp through most of the rest of her life. 
• I Stand at the Door and Knock: Meditations by the Author of the Hiding Place - this is a collection of essays that were originally radio talks Corrie did after the war. 
• Prisoner and Yet - more details about Corrie's time at Ravensbrück.
• Defeated Enemies -  Corrie writes about deliverance and our power as children of God.
• Not Good if Detached - Corrie writes about how to live attached to Jesus
• Each New Day - a devotional by Corrie. 

 Other stuff: 

• Some quotes from Corrie ten Boom 
• The Corrie ten Boom museum

Real shepherds really repent

Recently a large group of Gay Christian church leaders of a certain "brand" (not named for privacy, but it’s a familiar kind of modern Christianity I'm referring to here) invited a number of us here locally to take part in its newest venture. They're attempting to build a new worship community, and offering all the things that normally attract people to church (even to the "unchurch" they say they're making this time).

Funny thing is, despite there being hundreds of spiritually hungry Gay Christians of this "brand" here (just that I know of), these church leaders are failing miserably even to come together amongst themselves, much less to attract other so-called "laity" to their endeavor.

How can that be?

Over the last three decades, these church leaders – counting themselves and each other "apostles", "pastors", "evangelists", "prophets", "worship leaders", and more – have, sometimes together and sometimes by themselves, run dozens of church groups. Most were in some kind of straight ministry for more years or decades before that. So, they more than know how to build and lead religious organizations.

Problem is, they don't know how to live as part of Jesus' church.

Like most of us, these church leaders' spiritual training began early in the legalistic, self-righteous, self-serving God-clubs that call themselves "Bible-based churches".

Like most of us, they absorbed translations of God's Word that twisted His meaning, ignored context, and only lived by certain Scriptures (while claiming to cling to all of it).
And like most of us, they learned how to be "church" and "church leaders" based on this false Christian, only-living-(a sorta)-Jesus-on-the-surface world.

The problem with all that is obvious. Especially for those who want to be church leaders, as they learn to:

• Continually sing praises to and ask God for His healing,
• but consume human filth,
• become spiritually sick,
• and then go out and convince others to also consume human-filth
• while praising God and asking for His healing.

People in this kind of muck soon start thinking evil things are "normal" and "biblical". They start finding ways to ignore or justify things like lying, cheating, power-tripping, sleeping around, hurting and killing people, misrepresenting God for their own benefit, failing to speak up for Jesus' real way if it would cost them something, attacking and monitoring others for sin instead of oneself, and more.

And that's what these church leaders have demonstrated in too much of their "ministry" and "churches" in the last decades. And worse, they've yet to repent of any of it, which means that, whatever their intentions today – and it's a good bet that each and every one of them counts themselves as loving, godly Christians – they are just as dangerous and anti-Christ now as they were before.

Jesus referred to this kind of fake God-living when He said:

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel around on sea and land to make one new convert; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves. (Matthew 23:15)

This kind of "Christianity" has been mainstream for 1,900 years, starting when the Greek "saints" first began reinventing God's Word so it "made more sense" and was "better" than what Jesus and the first disciples taught. This more-human-and-less-real-Jesus "Christianity" rooted and branched out from there, so that through the centuries and even today all kinds of religious and secular "scholars", both Bible- and tradition-based, have continued to "improve" God's Word and His way so much that it really reeks.

And many of us – especially our leaders – are still up to our eyeballs in it.

But hey, if we've grown up in a vat of muck, we can't help having absorbed it into every pore of our body, right? And we probably can't be blamed for thinking that's the only right way to be a disciple of Jesus, since we've never seen anything else, right?

Right.

But if we're going to be a real follower of Jesus, and especially if we're going to claim to be one of His shepherds, we've got to get out of that filthy vat and let the Holy Spirit hose us off in the yard before finding ourselves a hot bath with a lot of real-Jesus soap, somewhere else.  

And that's what these, and too many other church leaders, fail to do. Instead, like worldly leaders, they press for more limelight, more power, more gain, while refusing more and more accountability and openness. They do this again, and again, and again, all in the Name of the Lord.


That's what makes them not worth following – because that proves them to be false leaders.

Today, it really doesn't matter how much these local or any church leaders want to create a new worship community. It doesn't matter how deeply in their hearts they feel a "call" to do so. Until they clean up and correct the messes they've already made in their own hearts and in the lives of others, they are false prophets and anti-Christs, faking the love and miracles of God without producing the Real Thing.

And they aren't to be followed or heeded by any who love and obey Jesus.

Some will hate them for their falseness. Before God healed my heart now years ago, I certainly held my share of hatred toward false Christian leaders that hurt me growing up. And since false Christian leadership has been one of the biggest causes of personal and world suffering the world has ever know, it's easy to see why they're so easy to hate.

But hating isn't the answer. Not only because as Christians we are forbidden to hate, but also because hating them means denying that God will wants these people in His (REAL) kingdom – if they will only choose to let go of their sins and come.

As for so many things, love (even of those who make themselves our enemy) and prayer (even for those who don't "deserve" it) are the answers here:

• Love of those who have sinned and need deep repentance – just as so many of us deeply sin in our own ways.
• Prayer for those who think they have the real Jesus and the real Holy Spirit, but do not – so that they will not be fooled into thinking their "good works" in His name will be enough to get them into heaven.

This week, I'm praying:

• That false leaders will find their false-humility and selfish vision as repulsive to them as it is to those they've hurt – and to God.
• That those who've been injured by false teaching will come to recognize how different it is from the real Jesus. 
• And that those that I've hurt and mislead in my own life will be revealed to me, so that I can also repent of and correct the wrongs that I've committed.

In Jesus' Name – Amen!

When there's real reason for shame (part 2)

Gay people aren't the only ones who feel shame, of course. But being Gay, in and of itself, isn't a real reason for shame.  

Being a crappy Christian is.

I talked in part 1 about one big way to be a crappy Christian: not making decisions like Jesus did. That means believing we're following Christ, when it's actually the devil's values, the devil's temptations, and the devil's way of doing things that are most evident in our religious and secular lives.

And to one extent or another, we're all guilty of this. It's one of those things that come from being part of a fallen race, one completely and utterly loved by God all the way down to the smallest, most insignificant individual - but one that just can't stop being just a little more impressed with what we can do than what God can do.

Think I'm exaggerating? Well, consider this one example.

Matthew tells us that after Jesus defeated the devil in the wilderness, he went out and started choosing His first disciples. All of the Gospel writers tell us that He choose leaders for His church from among the working poor (like Peter, the fisherman), social outcasts (like Matthew, the tax collector), and the alienated (like Simon, the zealot / revolutionary) of that time.

But that's not what we do, is it? Nope. When we choose who will lead our churches, or run our denominations, or speak in our assemblies, we choose people who:

• were able (financially and culturally) to attend college, 
• have degrees in psychology, theology, music, church administration, and the like, 
• are trained, professional, and entertaining speakers,
• have a natural impulse to take charge and lead/push others, 
• enjoy official titles, garb, positions, and manners, and
• are mainstream enough in their politics and such to have been accepted for ordination by an official religious group.

Indeed, our way of recognizing and accepting church leaders has absolutely nothing to do with the way that Jesus or the early church recognized and accepted church leaders. In fact, our way of choosing church leaders looks exactly like the world's (and therefore the devil's) way of choosing business and political leaders.

But that's ok, we tell ourselves, because the world is different now. We do it better now. We're more advanced / enlightened / intelligent than they were 2,000 years ago. We want to make sure we get it right.

Sorry - but that's a real big crock. Jesus chose people who fit God's plan. In Jesus' name we choose people who fit our plan, and then call it God's plan.

Not the same!

There was a reason for Jesus' plan. And as long as we are more impressed with our way of doing things than with God's way of doing things, then we will continue to get the half-baked, only-nice-on-the-surface results of our plan.

Even worse, people outside the church -- people desperately loved by God and needing to see His real work in who we are and what we do -- will continue to see us for the religious bozos that we truly are: saying we're one thing, while being completely something else; claiming to represent God while trashing His image.

And that is a real reason for shame.

So, how do we avoid this way of being a crappy Christian?

Well, for starters, we start taking Jesus and His way of doing things seriously. Not the fake "seriously" of mainstream churches (whether conservative, liberal, straight, Gay, pentecostal, evangelical, charismatic, fundamentalist, non-denominational, or something else), that are really just a Jesus-coated version of the devil's world. Because Jesus truly did mean it when He chose "down", instead of "up", on the human scale. He once said, for example:

"I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight."  [Matthew 11:25-26]

If we are taking Jesus seriously, that means taking passages like this seriously, and not just finding ways to discount or distort what He said. 

We also need to find out why Jesus choose "down", even though it makes more sense to us human beings to choose "up". We need to understand God's purpose in all this. Paul helps us out a bit with that:

"..the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God. But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, so that, just as it is written, 'Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.'" [1 Corinthians 1:25-31]

So, why does Jesus choose "down"? Because we human beings get too proud of ourselves and our way of doing things (even the first disciples made this mistake, until Jesus reminded them God's way is not the human way.)

And when we get too pleased with ourselves, we start taking the shortcuts the devil is always happy to help us with, as when we start imagining that we're "better" than the early Christians, far more knowledgeable about God's way of doing things than the people who learned firsthand from Jesus for three years -- and remaining this "humbly" arrogant even though those "backward" early Christians turned more and more people into Christians, while we continue to turn thousands upon thousands of people away from Christ.

The first step away from being a crappy Christian is to stop being proud of the gold we think we or our church is producing, while we can barely breathe in the stink of our own garbage (much less sell it to others).

It's to start taking Jesus as seriously as we claim to. 

The early Christians -- the ones that really loved God -- learned that.

We can too.

When there's real reason for shame (part 1)

I'm continuing in my read through Matthew, and I'm here at Matthew 4. What's going in Matthew 4? Well, first Jesus, newly baptized, goes into the wilderness and is tempted by the devil. And then, having passed the test, Jesus begins to call up His first disciples.

Here's what came to me in reading the first part of this chapter, this time.

Ancient people's often believed that the devil lived in the wilderness. We can certainly understand that while out there, Jesus - the man of flesh and blood - was far beyond anyone's help, far beyond the law, should someone set on Him. Scary enough, but when it was the devil himself (and not just some run of the mill robber) getting in His face, for this trial not even the angels came to help Him. No, Jesus was on His own.

And that fits, doesn't it? One of Jesus' tasks on this earth was to do -- sometimes literally, and sometimes symbolically -- what we human beings have proven through Old Testament, New Testament, and into the modern age that we can't do for ourselves. In this case, Jesus the man goes into the wilderness for forty days, just like the ancient Israelites were in the desert for forty years. He's tempted just like they were -- but He succeeds where they failed miserably. There is symbolism here, to be sure, but there's real world too: Jesus, the human being, takes on the devil - and wins.

As Christians, when we have Jesus' power behind us, we can also win against the devil. But we have to actually want to do that, for it to happen. Unfortunately, while continuing to believe ourselves going along with Jesus, Christians often follow along after the devil, and don't even realize it.

In Matthew 4, for example. Jesus was hungry. And the devil tempted Him to use God's power to take care of that hunger. Jesus refused. He chose to remain hungry and wait for God's power to accomplish God's will, and not the devil's will.

But what do we Christians often do? We also get hungry - for more money, for better cars, for better things, and more. And, we tell ourselves, it makes sense that God our Father would want to always take care of our comforts and concerns, right? So the devil whispers in our ear: "If you are a child of God, use the Power of Jesus to get you want you want!"

And too often we say "Amen!" -- and we often get that money, that car, that thing.

But, who do we think, then, is really fulfilling that prayer? 

Another example. The devil took Jesus to the pinnacle of religion, and tempted Him to prove God wouldn't let Him fall.Jesus refused. But to our minds, in a lot of ways what the devil proposed doesn't sound like such a bad thing. We want assurance that God cares for and protects us. So the devil whispers in our ear: "Rest assured in your solid position in the church and/or as a child of God! Go ahead and do what you will - God won't let you fall!"

And far too often, we cry "Amen!" -- and we are protected from being found out when we've lied, cheated, fornicated, committed adultery, gossiped, power-played, and so on.

But just who do we think is protecting us in that position? 

One more example. The devil took Jesus to the highest place in the world - and here the devil gave away his true evil design. Here the devil offered Jesus what belongs to the devil -- "..all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.." -- if only Jesus would bow down to and worship him.

We know that in the end everything belongs to God, but here the Bible tells us that for now the devil is allowed to own the world's power and place, and all the wonderful things that go with power and place. The Bible also tells us here that the devil is allowed to offer those things -- and he does so to those who bow to him, and who worship him. 

When the devil offered these worldly things to Jesus, Jesus refused. But the devil whispers in our ear: "Go ahead! God wouldn't have put you in a place of ease in the world if you didn't deserve it! And think of all the good things you can do with your power and position!" And too often we Christians praise Jesus with our lips as we kneel to the devil, taking on whatever power and position we can get our hands on. All, we claim, "for the glory of God", of course!

It isn't hard to understand that only a remnant of those who believe themselves to be God's people will actually be saved, because when we truly look in real repentance, ashamed of our greed and gluttony and self-service, we can't help but realize that it's we who choose to go with something besides God. Too often, we Christians want to have it both ways:

• We want to be saved by Jesus, and to claim Him as our own
• But we also want just a little bit more (sometimes a lot more) what the devil has in hand.

And that just can't be.

But that want is  part of our fallen human nature, isn't it? To keep hearing that whispering devil -- and keep falling for his garbage -- over and over again, until at last we tell him to truly take a hike - and we really mean it.

But what does that look like, when we Christians are truly following Jesus and no longer being part-time devil-worshippers?

It looks exactly like what Jesus says it does, in the Bible. It looks, for example, like turning the other cheek, instead of going off to war.It means things like doing good deeds in secret, instead of making sure everyone can see how righteous we are.

And it means taking Jesus - literally - at His word. Even when it hurts. Even when it costs. Even when it doesn't make sense (now).

It means really, truly, being a Christian.

Good for you, Anne Rice

Here's a comment I added to another blog regarding Anne Rice and her recent decision to abandon "church" and go with Jesus, instead:

I've also tried and failed on several occasions, in the conservative and liberal versions of both Roman Catholic and Protestant churches, to be a part of what's called "the Church" by human beings. I've walked away from church, and thought I had to walk away from Jesus.

 That's an error, if not an outright lie.

 Even the Bible itself warns that most of us are going to get it completely wrong -- unless we are willing to follow Jesus, and not each other, not ourselves. The Bible itself tells us that most people who say they are God's People will even go so far as doing God's work -- and still not have Jesus' heart.

It's still possible to be a Christian, and not be the anti's. It's still possible to get it right, and actually be a good thing in the world, and not just another spout for evil. But the trick is to stick with Jesus, just as Anne Rice and so many of us are now learning each day.
Good for you, Anne! You're on the narrow path. And that's a good thing!

Upside-down and backwards

My Bible reading has brought me once again to the start of the New Testament, and I sat down to read Matthew 1 and 2 again.

It amazes me how far off we human beings often are in recognizing and following God's real plan and His real work. And among the greatest and most unlearned truths of the Bible is that those who claim most loudly to know, trumpet, and guard God's Truth are most likely to not only be the furthest from it, but also actively at work against it. 

Matthew reminded me of that this morning while I read that "boring" list of Jesus' ancestors, and what happened to and around Mary and Joseph, before Jesus was born. And it came to me all over again:

• God really does have everything already planned out. He always has, and always will. If something is a surprise, it's only to us - not to Him.

• God really does do things His own way - even when it makes no sense to us at all, and even when it violates human laws or goes against human authority. 

• God's actions in the world often provoke evil reactions like angry confusion, vengeful hatred, repressive attempts at more control, and even mass murder among those - both religious and non-religious - who put themselves and their own will and understanding before God's. 

• God invites people that "Good Religious People" chase away or block from "His" churches and temples, because His real places and power human beings can't control.

• To keep doing God's will, and acting only within His parameters, sometimes we ourselves have to act outside of what's legal, comfortable, or smart according to human values and rules, just to keep from participating in evil ourselves.

What does Matthew's introduction to Jesus speak to you?

Two reasons you may still be hurting

Recovery from false-Christianity (even Gay false-Christianity) and its "loving" hatred of Gays and Lesbians, "loving" obsession with power and greed, and so on, is a long and hard process. I know – I went years through it myself, and I've watched and helped untold others struggling through it in the years since, as well.

We seem to have two problems that can prevent us from recovering from the false and moving on to the real.

For one thing, we may not yet realize we are in false-Christianity.

That's how it is for the vast majority of Christians – today, in the future, but also throughout history. Jesus, Paul, Peter, and others throughout the New Testament speak of falseness in what calls itself of Jesus Christ even in the first "churches". Yet most "churches" and their "pastors" and "apostles" and "teachers" and "prophets" manage to turn those warnings aside, and even pervert those warnings so they seem to warn against doing or believing anything these false leaders say, instead!

And when we grow up in that, for example, those lies and perversions of scripture seem as normal and invisible to us as air. And, being human beings, we will most often choose to kill and hurt others and ourselves, rather than change how we believe when we are convinced we have "The Truth".

Consider all the so-called "Bible-believing Christians" in the USA today, for example. Their modern "Bible" is full of outright fabrications in translation. Doesn't matter – King James or NASB or NIV and so on. Each and every one of them carries flagrant and soul-deluding mistranslations that are worshipped and defended as if they are Jesus Himself. And those so deluded have no issue with – for example – using their human-inspired "scripture" to promote the emotional and physical torture and killing of Lesbians and Gay men, or to support and turn a blind eye to those who do. In fact, their hearts blaze with the devil's glory to do so!

But Gay and Lesbian Christians do the same to themselves and each other. We also too often worship those same blasphemous mistranslations, and we torment and even kill ourselves and each other – our hearts, our bodies, and/or our faith. The devil's glory then burns in us, as well.

And that brings up the second issue the prevents us from recovering away from false-Christianity and healing in the real:

Even when the facts are made apparent to us, we will not let go of that devil-glory and reach out, instead, to the real Jesus.

I did this too, for many years. It's very common. I used to work with a lesbian, for example, that had developed a ferocious hatred for anything Christian because her mother was a "Christian" who, for more than twenty years, had delighted not only in publically humiliating her Lesbian daughter and her daughter's twenty-year spouse, but also in being just generally and gleefully hateful and greedy, all while boasting of her "assured salvation" in Jesus Christ. This mother is one of those "Christians" the Bible warns us will cause others to malign the real way of truth (see, for example, 2 Peter 2:2).

When I asked this lesbian daughter once why she continued to have any contact with this horrible, hurtful  person, much less continue to believe her opinion of her and her spouse and so on, she was astonished and replied, "Because she's my mother!"

But think about that (in the way that this lesbian daughter would not):

Even though it was killing her, driving her to self-hatred that was truly pushing her towards losing her mind, towards wanting to kill herself, and even towards choosing evil in her own life, this Lesbian daughter would not move to save herself by distancing herself from the evil monster. She LOVED the evil monster. Put and kept her identity focused on that evil monster. Refused to not believe that evil monster.

And worse, this Lesbian daughter had at different times in her life either ignored or told the real Jesus to stick it in His ear – because she was sticking with her evil monster, instead of Him.

At some level in her heart, this lesbian daughter had come to understand what an evil monster her mother was - she knew it. Talked about it, even. But still she would not let go of her.

Instead, she clung to death – and despised and turned away from Life.

And in doing so, she's ruined not only her life in this world, but also in the next. All because she won't let go of the false, and take on what's real.

How often do we, who cling to our family and church opinions of us, and refuse to let go of mistranslations of God's real Word, and so on, do the same thing?

I used to do it – a lot. Figuring out that the so-called "scriptures" that seemed to condemn Gay and Lesbian people were intentional mistranslations or self-serving misinterpretations was only the first required step on the way to the Real Saving Jesus.

That's what so many Gay and Lesbian Christians miss. That's why we continue to struggle in spiritual, emotional, and even physical agony for so long. That's why we continue to teach false-Christianity even in Gay churches. That's why we continue to be a force for evil in our own and others' lives, even once we've seen the facts of God's real Word about Gays and Lesbians.

You see, the second step – to let go of the false, to take on the new – is actually easier, but also a hundred times harder, than the first.

Let me explain.

It's easier because truly – all we have to do is let go. Go to your desk right now and pick up a pencil or pen or something. Hold it up in front of you – now let it go. That was easy to get rid of, right?

Now go to your kitchen, and get a paper towel. Put it under the faucet, and soak it through. Hold it up in front of you. Now drop the water out of it.

No, really. Let the water go.

Can't do it?

Or maybe you can get the water out, but you'll have to get some help.

Time, maybe. Like, time for the water to evaporate out – assuming the air around that towel isn't so humid it can't dry out! We can also use time to get rid of false-Christianity, IF we are staying away from things that will add or maintain the water (things like continued exposure to false-teachings, for example).

Or a tool. Like a light touch with a hair dryer, to get rid of the water. We can also use tools – like exposure to the real Gospel, and making the effort to find and study the real Jesus (which does NOT mean hanging out in Gay or straight false-Christian bible teachings or churches and continuing to absorb their values and teachings!).

We NEED to dry the water out of our towel. It's not supposed to be filled with common sink water. And as long as it IS filled with common sink water, it's never going to be able to absorb the Living Water that we're really needing.

And getting rid of that impure, common, human-fed and -led kitchen water you've absorbed and want to cling to, so that you can be filled instead with the real Holy Spirit is going to be the easiest – and the hardest – thing you've ever done.

But it is required.

It's required of every human being on the planet: to truly walk away from everything that isn't Jesus. To let go even of our most precious emotional attachments, if and when they put themselves between us and God.

See, Gay and straight Christians alike rightly elevate family and church relationships – we cling to them, love them, protect them, and thank God for them. We are supposed to do that, after all.

But we "conveniently" forget the rest of what Jesus told us: that even those relationships must be put by the wayside, if and when they stand between us and the real Jesus.

Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to SET A MAN AGAINST HIS FATHER, AND A DAUGHTER AGAINST HER MOTHER, AND A DAUGHTER-IN-LAW AGAINST HER MOTHER-IN-LAW; and A MAN'S ENEMIES WILL BE THE MEMBERS OF HIS HOUSEHOLD. He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it. [Matthew 10:34-39]

and,

 Do you suppose that I came to grant peace on earth? I tell you, no, but rather division; for from now on five members in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.” [Luke 12:51-53]

and,

Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it. [Matthew 7:13-14]

False-Christianity is one of the devil's main lies, and has been for 2,000 years. In fact, false-Christianity is the false prophet he's going to use and promote more and more as the End Times approach and unfold. While some like to argue that Islam or New Age or something else will be that false prophet, the whole idea of "false" is that it must be something that pretends to be by and about Jesus, but isn't. Nothing else qualifies, then, except the same false version of Christianity we are warned about not only in Revelation but also throughout much of the New Testament.

That's why we have to be willing to let go even of our families and friends and churches when they fill us with false teachings.

False teachings deny the real Jesus Christ!

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. [1 Peter 2:1]

Take it upon yourself to pray, today, that the Holy Spirit will begin drying the deceitful devil-water out of your heart, and filling you instead with the Living Water of the real Jesus Christ.

Pray that He will grant you the emotional strength you need to turn away from the addictive power of false-Christianity and towards His healing.

And then make it part of your daily efforts to work with the Lord on this. To do your part:

• studying the real Scriptures (ALL of them, not just the corrected "clobber" passages), 
• sticking with the real Jesus and only the real Jesus even when if it costs you, and
• asking the Lord for wisdom in your daily life.

It's what's required of you.

It's what's required of all of us. 

Why? Because that's where the real treasure is! And that's where our only salvation is.

The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in the field, which a man found and hid again; and from joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking fine pearls, and upon finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet cast into the sea, and gathering fish of every kind; and when it was filled, they drew it up on the beach; and they sat down and gathered the good fish into containers, but the bad they threw away. So it will be at the end of the age; the angels will come forth and take out the wicked from among the righteous, and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. [Matthew 13:44-50]

...Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. [Matthew 6:21]