Joy Chose Me

“When we are willing to risk venturing into the wilderness, and even becoming our own wilderness, we feel the deepest connection to our true self and to what matters the most.” 

Brene Brown

On January 1, 2023, I posted a blog called I Choose Joy in 2023. I shared how I discovered my theology was not bringing me joy and decided to embrace the gospel message of good news. One year later, in my 2024 New Year’s Day post, my title is Joy Chose Me. I have learned that the things we choose in life turn around and choose us back. So, in this blog, I reflect on the impact of this decision in 2023 and how it has brought me to where I am today.

To sum up 2023, I would say it was the year of daring to venture into the wilderness. I finally understood that I needed to belong to myself before giving myself entirely to another. Without this decision, I knew that the entryway into any group, especially a Christian community, would look more like a carrot dangling in front of my face. The carrot is all the acceptance and validation I would receive by doing as much as possible to serve and belong to the group.

Being alone has always felt unnatural and highly uncomfortable for me, so I have been running from myself all my life, not wanting to face how awkward it feels to be in my skin. But it was time to dig deep and rediscover who I was, what I liked, and what I always wanted to believe about the Bible now that I had walked away from my former church that played an all-encompassing role in every area of my life since 19. In 2023, the biggest lesson I learned was to trust the Holy Spirit to lead me to the truth.

After my daughter and I left our former church, we had nowhere to go, no people to see, and only our jobs to keep us busy – a problem for those who have no life outside their church community. However, we understood that this transitional stage of walking away from the only church community we had known would look and feel precisely the way it did – lonely and disorientating. Though my daughter and I have since been on different journeys, we have both weathered the wilderness well in 2023 and have come out of it stronger than ever.

By entering the wilderness, I discovered what I believed about the gospel message. I had to become untethered to the strong opinions about the Bible taught in my former church to realize that I genuinely wanted to follow Jesus and join a church community, just not the way they did it.

Below is an overview of the top experiences that brought me joy in my new church community and relationship with God in 2023.

1. Learning how others do church outside of my former church has been life-changing. I have been attending Lifegate Denver this past year and have witnessed how the Holy Spirit grows the church rather than man’s effort, how to give all my attention to the glory and praise of God at the Wednesday night prayer nights, how people come to Christ without man’s interference, and how to build friendships that are not co-dependent or judgemental but instead encouraging and supportive. I have witnessed an open-handed, grace-based church that doesn’t rush people in their faith and obedience to Christ and allows them to choose the church events in which they can participate. The result: People are eager and happy to be there.
2. Met with a therapist who received his Ph.D. in cultic studies. That may sound like a strange and sensational profession, but it isn’t. He helped me understand the characteristics of high-control Christian churches, behaviors that are spiritual abuse, and doctrines that are works-based and not in agreement with mainstream orthodox Christianity. Our talks were helpful to me in naming and framing what I had experienced in my former church and how I had a wound that had never been allowed to heal.
3. Became a faithful friend volunteer with Re-fined. Re-fined’s mission is to form empowering and restorative relationships with survivors of sexual exploitation. My faithful friend is currently living in a recovery home. We meet twice a month to hang out and talk at coffee shops or take a walk in the park. I have learned a lot from her. She dares to put one foot in front of the other toward her goal of an independent life. She is one of the bravest people I know.
4. Learned from the Dean of Spiritual Formation at Colorado Christian University. I met Dave and Debbie Jongeward at a Lifegate Encore lunch meeting in December 2022. Dave and I happened to sit next to each other, and once I heard about his lifelong profession in pastoring, I told him that I felt a bit messed up with my understanding of God’s grace and how most Christian groups view baptism. He gave me the book Rooted, and I met with him and his wife around six Saturdays at Corner Bakery during 2023 to discuss the book. He taught me about secondary and primary doctrines and why black-and-white interpretations of the Bible divide Christians. Dave died of brain cancer in November 2023. How he handled the last few months of his life inspired everyone who knew him that Jesus is all that matters.
5. Learned how to listen to the Spirit and pray faithful prayers. I met Kathy Hahn at a Lifegate Prayer night, and God had plans for us to build a beautiful friendship. Kathy and I met on Friday afternoons at her house for several months in 2023. She taught me what the Bible teaches about the gifts of the Spirit, how to listen to the Holy Spirit, and how to forgive others with the help of the Holy Spirit. In September, I attended a prayer weekend she hosted at an Airbnb in Granby, Colorado. Twelve women stayed in a beautiful, spacious cabin with great mountain views.
6. I learned how to respect my daughter as an adult. I have learned to acknowledge that my journey and my daughter’s journey of healing from some hurtful experiences during our time in our former church will not look the same and doesn’t have to be. I have tried to keep silent as I watched her navigate relationships with two boyfriends this year. She was on The Crumbled Papers podcast in June 2023, when Austin Noll interviewed her on “When a Church Kid Leaves her Church.”  She was very raw and honest about her experiences growing up in church, and I chose to respect her for her honesty. I no longer have a cookie-cutter view of what the Christian life looks like, and I do not make my daughter think she has to live life a certain way.  
7. Lian and I reconnected with family and my high school friends in 2023. In June 2023, Lian and I flew to Chicago and stayed with my high school friend Debbie. We had pizza with Nina and spent an evening talking in her backyard. We spent the day at my Aunt Dee and Uncle Franks’s house and had a wonderful meal with my Aunt Joe, my cousins, and my cousin’s kids. We also drove to Burns Harbor, Indiana, to visit with my nephew Joey and his wife and children. In July, we went to Grand Junction and hung out with Miketa (Max’s wife) and grandchildren Maeve and Murdoc. The connections we made during that trip were very grounding for Lian and me because we have no family in Denver.
8. Listened to countless hours of podcasts about spiritual abuse in churches and connected with old friends who were members of my church in the past. I must say that Aldo B. Martin’s Reclamation podcast and Austin Noll’s The Crumbled Papers podcast were informative and life-changing. Through these podcasts, I connected with friends I knew many years ago in my former church who no longer attend. Church leaders must listen to the voices of those who say they experienced spiritual abuse in their churches. However, leaders who do not bother to take the time to understand church trauma and provide no resources for people who say they have trauma from their leadership are most likely going to continue to hurt the people they lead.
9. Below is a picture of Jesus running after the lost sheep. In talking with many Christians this year who experienced spiritual abuse from their leaders, they all had one thing in common. The members and the leaders of their former churches simply let them go and ignored them because they were unwilling to sit and listen to their wounded brother and sister in Christ. But the gospel I now believe is truly good news. And the Jesus I know searches high and wide for his lost sheep. Once Jesus embraces his sheep, he lovingly places them in a herd with a good shepherd where they will not be left to die but rather flourish.

Choosing Joy in 2023 meant walking into the wilderness, away from my comfortable and familiar way of thinking and living. But unfamiliarity encourages exploration and the joy of discovery. Today, I feel hopeful that in 2024, I will continue to explore all that God has set before me, and I am grateful Joy has chosen me.