COGOP

This is a blog I wanted to write for a long time, and I want to be careful with my words and not be offensive but speak to an issue I see. I was raised in the COGOP. I left in my late thirties to never return. There are some good people in the COGOP. I have family in that organization. Even as many years as I have been gone I still seem to retain some negative feelings towards that organization. I know there are good people in that organization. But I remember their teaching on divorce. If you divorced you were to remain by yourself or be reunited with your spouse. Some relationships were entered into toxic from the start. They should have never been. I know they have changed some beliefs over the years and I do not follow them closely. But it seemed they had an attitude that they knew the Bible better than any other denomination.  When it came to truth they had a corner on the market. They had a better connection with God than any other organization. I still hear that when listening to others talk. He is a COGOP minister, he is one of the good guys. It's like being a part of that organization puts you ahead of the class. In my last few years in the COGOP, they counseled several families that at least one partner of the marriage had been married previously, to separate and the one married before was to either remain unmarried or return to the first spouse. Sometimes that is plain impossible. Then the other spouse would actually be able to marry a second time and start over with a new family. It didn't matter if there were children, they would still advise the couple to separate. They could have a good marriage going and children, but they would still advise them to separate. I hope and pray they do not do this anymore. It was so wrong and so legalistic. There are so many other areas in life we fail in God's perfect plan besides marriage. I saw this happen several times, and I think they really misinterpreted the scriptures when they counseled these couples. I don't have a problem with teaching that God's perfect plan is one man and one woman for life until death do us part.  But to destroy a working family unit with children and separate those kids from one of the parents when this is an epidemic in our world today, children being raised with one parent, just seemed to go way out of line. I often wonder how they resolved this issue today?  I am no example, I myself am now in my fifth marriage. But at least for the first marriage, I stayed in a toxic relationship way too long and hurt my children.  I believe, there is nothing better you can give to your kids than a good home life. I had a really hard time leaving the COGOP. For about four years I felt I was going against God when I left. I think that almost amounts to brainwashing. I was going to a good Bible-believing and teaching church but still felt I was going against God because it was not a COGOP. Now on the other side of this issue for almost as long as I was in the COGOP, I see the same problem in other organizations. There is a loyalty to a denomination that should be to God. No affiliation to a denomination should be more important or supersede our affiliation/loyalty to God.  Yes,  we need to be loyal to God first and foremost and to a family of believers.  But I think at times we get it mixed up with a denomination preference. I think of the many years, formative years when we lived 80 miles from the nearest COGOP and we would go once a month when there were many good Christian churches in the surrounding towns. I wonder if there would be more Christians in my family if God had been the priority instead of a denomination. I think when we indoctrinate people into a denomination instead of into God, I think we commit spiritual abuse. People and institutions are not perfect, but God is. Our dependancy needs to be formed in God alone. I remember riding with a Pastor one time and he asked me on a scale of one to ten, what I thought my Bible knowledge was. I said probably about 5. I know he probably meant to encourage me, but he said that just because I was a member of the COGOP it was probably about 8. When I was looking for a church home about 5 years ago, I visited several good churches. At one church, I mentioned the fact that I was searching for a church home to an associate Pastor, he said I needed to find the church where Jesus was at, where Jesus was moving. I believe Jesus was at every church I had visited. Sometimes God puts us in a place for our growth or sometimes a place where we can serve or both.  I believe God lead me to a good place and I am thankful. I have been there for five years now and believe I am where God wants me to be. I prayed for three months before I found this place visiting many different places. From the very first Sunday that I visited this church, I felt in my spirit that God had answered my prayer. It is not a perfect place, if it had been I would have ruined it when I joined. I am thankful to be a Christian and to be able to take any of life's issues to God in prayer. I feel he hears and answers prayer. It is a good place to be, in the hands of God. I hope this blog is not offensive to anyone, especially to anyone from the COGOP that may stumble upon this blog.  This is something that has been on my heart for a long time. The issue is if our loyalty is actually in God himself or in a denomination and we have mistakenly taken that loyalty that should be to God himself and place it in a denomination or a particular person.  People and institutions/denominations fail us. God does not fail. Have we been anchored in God alone or is our hope and faith in a particular denomination or a particular person? We have seen examples where men like Jimmy Swaggart, even Jim Jones of Guyana failed in their relationship with God. When I look back and see how indoctrinated I was to believe in the COGOP like it was a super organization, and my faith was almost in that organization instead of in God himself. We can be shaken if our faith is in a manmade organization or person. The core of our faith needs to be in a sovereign God alone. Jesus is enough, God is enough. Is our anchor truly in the ROCK of AGES? I saw this issue in myself as I reflect on the past and the way I was raised. I see it in many Christians I speak within various denominations, not just the COGOP. The COGOP was my personal experience, and that is what I know and how my history evolved. I think this is worth examining in our hearts. If our anchor for our soul is in God it will hold in the storms of life which we will face. But will our anchor hold if it is in a  man-made institution or in a man of God that fails?  Is your anchor in God himself? Perhaps there are those in the COGOP that have anchored in God himself and not in that institution. I hope so, I know how their teachings affected me, and I had to learn to anchor in the Rock of Ages, and not in a man-made institution. There is a big difference between the two. I hope I was able to talk about this issue in a non-offensive way using my personal experience.   God bless, LVZ.