| Author | Message | ||
| Jrt Registered user Username: Jrt Post Number: 1330 Registered: 10-2008 |
I am curious what those who are former Adventists understood about grief, sorrow, and tears when they were an Adventist. What were your thoughts about mourning when you were still an Adventist? This isn't a question for your theological understanding - Like what happens when you die? Rather it is what did you understand about grief or sorrow and crying? | ||
| Punababe808 Registered user Username: Punababe808 Post Number: 571 Registered: 4-2012 |
My mother taught me it is a sin to be angry. Disapointment and sorrow were acceptable emotions within reasonable limits. Extreme joy and jubluance was avoided. For the most part my family was quiet stoic. I figured it was caused from a combination of my ethnic heritage and the religion. Ellen White says somewhere that emotions are wrong and are to be kept private. As far as grief goes, we suck it up and tarry on. I sometimes think alot of it has to do with the hardships so many faced from WW1 and The Great Depression, too. | ||
| Philharris Registered user Username: Philharris Post Number: 2919 Registered: 5-2007  |
Even today after many years of knowing better I still have a struggle consistently showing my real emotions. For others it is often hard to tell if I’m either experiencing great joy or undergoing sorrow or showing any kind of pain. While it is likely a part of my own personality it is obviously also related to how I was raised as an Adventist. Interestingly, this all became apparent to me many years ago when my wife and I were separated and I was undergoing some intensive group therapy. At the time I was living alone in a small travel trailer. One evening, as I was reviewing the things I was learning of myself it dawned upon me that much of my bad choices and actions were undergirded by the false teaching of Ellen White. I broke down, screamed my hatred for her, cried and beat on the walls of the trailer. Then, I realized she must have been a very tormented person and no longer hated her. That was the first time I ever showed (even though alone) any emotions about anything in a physical way. Quietly, I rededicated my life and surrendered whatever my future held to our Savior Jesus Christ. The staggering miracle of all times occurred the next night when I got home from work. My wife called and said she wanted to put our marriage back together. I cried again, but from a joy I never expected to experience. Fearless Phil | ||
| Trans4mer Registered user Username: Trans4mer Post Number: 364 Registered: 9-2011  |
Jrt, Being still mostly Adventist in my mental framework (I was at the start of transitioning) my grief and mourning was compounded by bereavement. I lost my wife of 38 yrs. to cancer in 2011. I believe that because I still had much of the Adventist framework that it greatly increased my grief. In fact I was looking to end my existence since my wife didn't 'exist'. I really believe that my grief would have been far easier and my transitioning if not being Adventist. It's a deep scar that will have to be healed by the Lord Himself. I hate that twisted belief of body and breath 'soul' that sda's believe worst of all; worse than all the others combined. Charles | ||
| Mjcmcook Registered user Username: Mjcmcook Post Number: 1212 Registered: 2-2011  |
Phil~You 'Are' Fearless! Thank you for sharing your heart~ You have touched my heart~ ~mj~ | ||
| Eternal_joy Registered user Username: Eternal_joy Post Number: 52 Registered: 9-2012 |
One of the things that has really impacted me in this last year and a half is that people allow me to cry. My Christian family doesn't tell me to "put on a happy face," as my grandmother always told me if I started to cry. They let me cry. They let me have my emotions. They comfort me when I am grieving. They never discount my emotions are tell me to stuff my emotions. I was never allowed to be angry growing up. My mother could rage all she wanted, but anger was an emotion that was denied me. Tears were used to manipulate in family, and if I was crying and sad over something, I could only cry for a short time before I was told to "put on a happy face" and move on. I was also told that Ellen White said that some things were "for Jesus' ears only," which only reinforced the unspoken rule that we were to keep the family secrets of abuse locked up tight. | ||
| Punababe808 Registered user Username: Punababe808 Post Number: 574 Registered: 4-2012 |
I am not sure what is to blame, my ethnic heritage, my families extreme poverty during the Great Depression , or them being SDA. I imagine it's a combination. But, whatever it is I was exposed to a lot of death and great sorrow growing up. I was taught grief was to be in private. The funeral was a formal, stoic service. Then in my early 20's the young man who had tutored me through some very hard college classes was visvousely and brutally murdered. His family had been sharecroppers in The South before relocating to California. I am white. I'd been to funerals of people of other races but they were SDA so it wasn't anything to perk me up. You been to one SDA funeral you pretty much been to all of them. But,at my friends funeral there was true, raw emotion. Like I didn't know could exist. They were Baptist from the South. I'd never witnessed wailing. I think emotion is good for the soul. | ||
| Colleentinker Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 14578 Registered: 12-2003  |
Phil, thank you for being so transparent. God arranged that sequence of emotion in your life. And Charles, you have no idea how happy it makes me to hear that hopeless, helpless grief has been mitigated by actual Truth. I was quite worried about you for a while about the time your wife died. I don't remember what I was taught; I know that I learned very early to stuff my emotions, and when I was a teenager, I was quite depressed. I remember hearing that emotions were unreliable, that we shouldn't act on them or believe them...they were "just emotions". I also remember believing that positive emotions were unreliable, and I further steeled myself not to show reactions when I was spanked or punished. I decided that if my mom expected me to cry, she would be disappointed...so I learned to sorta "zone" and put up with the punishments and internally refused to give her the satisfaction of thinking she "got to me". (How sick is that??!!) I definitely learned not to give any importance to emotions. Jesus gives us back our emotions! Colleen | ||
| Mjcmcook Registered user Username: Mjcmcook Post Number: 1214 Registered: 2-2011 |
In my adventist 'years' I would never have been moved to have tears streaming down my cheeks in a church service! The HOLY SPIRIT changed all that! I will always remember the first time this happened. It came unexpectedly, in a 'Christian' Sunday church! And thus began the cleansing of all the toxicity from my life as an adventist. No, I do not think(the tears) are necessary for anyone else, it is what happened to me. ~mj~ | ||
| Colleentinker Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 14580 Registered: 12-2003 |
MJ, I totally understand that!! Praise God! He awakens our emotions and gives us deep repentance, gratitude, and awareness of what is "real" in our lives. Amazing. Colleen | ||
| Freeatlast Registered user Username: Freeatlast Post Number: 903 Registered: 5-2002  |
I have been in a room where more than 50 men were openly crying in humility and repentance before God and I have never heard a more inspiring sound than that in my entire life. It still brings me chills to think about that Sunday morning. I will NEVER forget that sound. | ||
| Trans4mer Registered user Username: Trans4mer Post Number: 366 Registered: 9-2011 |
Freeatlast, I'd like to hear more of that experience such as where, what subject etc. Colleen, It was in fact the case, that it mitigated my grief to come more clearly to the Truth that her spirit is with Him. I still wonder about the aspect of the cursed earth and our 'connection' with it but relieved that Jesus has taken part and suffers with us, knowing full well how it feels. I couldn't even get thru Grudem's description of it. It was just too cruel. Too gruesome. Adventism NEVER taught that but taught instead that it was some kind 'separation' from the Father that caused His REAL suffering RATHER than any physical suffering. Can you really believe that one??? Charles | ||
| Mkfound Registered user Username: Mkfound Post Number: 209 Registered: 1-2011 |
Colleen, now I know I wasn't the only one doing the zoning out when being punished, for the same reasons as you. Wow! I would brace myself and pretend like nothing was happening - and would be satisfied if I could hold out without crying. I hadn't thought about that for a long time | ||
| Colleentinker Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 14586 Registered: 12-2003 |
Wow, Mkfound, another one who refused to cry. Good grief, we were a mess, weren't we?! Praise God He has us now! Colleen |
