There I sat numb after what I just heard and experienced! The life I had was just sucked out of me, and at this moment I really wanted to just return to my old ways 100 percent and say to hell with it all! You mean to tell me after all these years of struggling and falling and stumbling and confessing and crying and repenting and finally getting to somewhat of a break, I HAVE TO GET PUNISHED FOR A SIN I COMMITTED SIX YEARS PRIOR BECAUSE I DIDN’T CONFESS TO A MAN?
You mean to tell me all those years of confession and counseling that seemed to do nothing for me but give me the go ahead to keep on doing what I was doing because there was no REAL SOLUTIONS but a bunch of scriptures and church formulas that included “sitting down” and not participating in ministry activities. After experiencing all of that and still being clinched in the grips of my addiction, and finally going to the master and pleading my case and finding a freedom IN HIS PRESENCE that I never experienced before, THAT WASN’T GOOD ENOUGH? I think it was at this moment that all of the studying I had been doing that I never really shared with others because I knew my views on a lot of things that were going on within the church I was a part of, and the organization I was a part of, though claimed to follow a lot of the bible, a lot of the actual practices in the church were off.
I sat there as my “sentence” was pronounced over me in bewilderment. Because I was a part of the organization and ministry and had subjected myself to the “rules and order” of the church, I submitted to the sentence of being “silenced” for six months. I just couldn’t shake the fact that six years had passed, and if I hadn’t experienced a transformation in my life from the other times of going to confess, and since the pastor had revelatory knowledge and God spoke to him, He would have informed him that during those six years, I was not qualified to keep doing and leading praise and worship, teaching adult Sunday School, and Bible Class in his absence. Preaching some Sunday mornings in his absence, preaching around the state in our organization as requested. Surely, if my life was tainted and polluted, God would have revealed that so I would not pour any of that into the lives of those that I had been placed over to serve as youth pastor and to teach as well. To this day, I felt because other clergy had become involved in the entire situation, it was more of a power move to show them that I had been punished for my wrong. I could be wrong, but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Needless to say, this event, coupled with some other issues that I personally felt were not handled properly by many in leadership would forever change my view of church, and actually help thrust me into a place of unexplained freedom I would embrace!
Excerpt from The Preacher & His Porn