Posted by Charlie on October 27, 2012 at 09:56:15
I'd like to read your book Ray. What did you title it and where do I get it?
In response to some of your post below, my journey to find God ended back in the late 60s (my late teens) when I apologized in the wee morning hours for my prodigal son life in absolute fear and trembling while draped over the altar at the Anglican Church just down the street. I had reached the end of my rope (drugs).
I knelt there, looked up, said I was SORRY and nothing happened. Ha! It was when nothing happened that I gave up in utter despair and was left there draped over the altar, head hanging low. But in the despair thoughts started coming to me which just weren't right. Don't ask me how I know they, 'just weren't right' cause I don't know. All I know is that I knew. As each one came to me (and there were 4-5), I rejected them and it was as if evil spirits were being cast out or me. I could litterally feel them leaving. When it was all over, The Holy Spirit gently descended down on me and there I was, born again, completely renewed and transformed, and walking in newness of life. Gone were the effects of the drugs, gone was the past... As the Bible says in John, "You shall receive power after that the HG is come upon you and you shall be witnesses... I had received power. There's power in knowing. "Oh, God is a spirit just like Jesus said to the woman at the well."
So for me, joining and then going though the devastating effects of leaving the Fam was no longer a search for God.I had found Him 6 years before joing the Fam. That's not to say that I didn't 'go and sin no more'. I sinned exceedingly, knowing better, not long after having been born again, backsliding into the vomit for a second round. It was the 'second round' that drove me into the Fam those 6 years later. I thought I was doing the right thing in joining, and thought I had heard from God, but in my naivety I think I ignored the warning, "Beware of those coming in My name saying I am Christ". Moses David certainly did say Jesus was the Christ. In fact, that's all he ever said. And I did get deceived. But what did I know back then? Anyway, through it all, I picked up a just as highly deceived and dysfunctional wife as I was, had a bunch of dysfunctional kids, eventually left the dysfunctional group and went through a blistering 10 year round of trying to recover from it all. It's been fun! I'd like to say, "You should try it! You'd like it!" But I know you have so all I can do about that is chuckle about it. "Chuckle, chuckle, chuckle..."
My time in and out of the Fam has been a time of learning to build a relationship with God, not find Him, since I had learned who and what He was back then in the church prior to joining the Fam. It was a time of learning to build relationships with others as well and I wasn't any good at any of it while in the Fam cause I spent most of my time avoiding correction and going through the motions of trying to look good. I was one of those, "Depart from me I never knew you" guys and didn't know it. But that didn't work and never does. In fact, that's what drove me out of the Fam. It took getting over coming out of the Fam to get good at relationships - ok, better at them.
I can say, assuredly, that getting over coming out of the Fam (and it took ten years) ended any and all of my, 'The Fam is still in me' thinking. I was able to knock the Fam off the pedastal that I had had them on, the unfinished business and the siren song that kept calling me to go back to them ended, and I was able to begin to pick up the pieces of what had become a life of devastating chaos and destruction. I healed, my wife healed, and my kids who had spun off into dysfunctional sins and directions of their own have started healing, sort of...
Has it been worth the trip? I think so. I can look back on all the good times and count my blessings. I can look back on all the tough times and give thanks that I learned a few things, and I can carry on with my life now unincumbered with the things that dragged me down in the past and walk in newness of life and have it more abuntantly like He promised.