The Church and the People it Hurts

Ok, this is a VERY touchy subject, and I know just about ALL of you guys have experience with this.

Over the past six months, no matter where I’ve been whether its the church I work at, my former churches, or a church I’m visiting, I’ve noticed an AWFUL a lot of hurt people approaching me. The fact is, I know EXACTLY why they approach me. When I play music, I tend to wear my feelings on my sleeve. In the past, I’ve been burned by people in church before, and that tends to lead to a visibly raw performance when I play worship.

As I’m typing this, I know I don’t have ALL the right answers, but I WILL NOT hide the fact that I’ve been burned by church’s in EVERY single way imaginable! The reason why I won’t hide that, is because I also don’t hide the fact that I still LOVE the church no matter what I’ve been through, and I NEVER allow ANY excuse to change that.

So in this particular blog entry, I’m going to be VERY direct, and VERY honest, but if you finish reading this, I promise it’ll be worth it.


I want to address three different types of people in this blog: People that have been hurt, people who intentionally hurt people and people who unknowingly have hurt people. I can definitely say I’ve been on EVERY sides of this coin.

For those that KNOWINGLY do the hurting:
I know a lot of friends and pastors that will agree with me on this. In my experience in the ministry, there’s not a lot of things you can do to push away the Grace of God. However, one sure way to push God’s Grace away is to push the people he sends in your life away. Not only do we have a calling in life, but NONE of us can do that calling alone.

Whether you like it or not, GOD usually provides the people you NEED, not the people you HAVE IN MIND. The key to success in the christian life is ALL ABOUT PEOPLE...PERIOD. Love is not an option for us, it is a requirement! We have to willing to clean each other’s messes REGARDLESS of what YOU FEEL THERE SHORTCOMINGS are. Besides, we’re not the judge of people, God is. Let God be the judge, all we should focus on is using the people in our lives.

For those that UNKNOWINGLY do the hurting:
This is the category I tend to be in! First off, lets make it clear: it’s IMPOSSIBLE to make everyone happy in life! There are just SO many people from SO many backgrounds that SOME people are not going to be able to work with you. Does this mean we should avoid these people? Absolutely not. The hardest part of life is working with people you don’t like, but it’s required of us.

My personal story is the life of the “people pleaser”. Growing up I wasn’t friendly in order to make people happy, I NEEDED people to like me! It was an addiction for me! If ANYONE didn’t like me, I had a HARD time dealing with it! What ended up happening to me was that people walked all over me, and when things got out of hand, I started getting upset at people. When I started getting upset at people, people stopped liking me, and so I ended up being at square one again.

Everything started changing for me when I decided to actually LOVE the people in my life, rather than feed on people liking me. When you actually love people, you start celebrating there victories, and mourning there loses. That’s the difference between being a people pleaser and someone who loves people.

For those that have been hurt:
This is tough. My pastor say’s it the best. “When people leave church, you don’t say “Whatever”, you should say “Wow, there hurting, and I hope they get healed wherever they go.”

I’ve been hurt by churches before, but beside’s the fact that this information is VERY confidential, but more importantly it DOESN’T MATTER! John Bevere is a forefront teacher on this, and one thing he says is that “The church disappoints the most people because everyone has this expectation that church people can’t let them down”. John’s absolutely right on this! The church is made up of people just like me and you!

I FORCED myself to make this confession:

I AM CASTING JUDGEMENT ON PEOPLE BASED ON MISTAKES THEY’VE MADE TOWARD ME, AND I NEED TO STOP.

If there’s one thing our society is pathetic at, it’s our need to keep score of things. If someone does something to us, we have to keep inventory of it and count it against them. It happens in marriages, in families, in jobs, and especially in church congregations. This is why people in church use the word Hypocrite so loosely, because they judges peoples characters by the failures and not there beleifs. I’ll repeat this, GOD judge’s character, NOT US. Don’t sit there and cast judgement, and just learn to work with them!

Bottom line: PEOPLE make mistakes. The church is no exception. If you spend your time judging people by there mistakes, you’ll constantly be let down. But if you learn to work with people despite there mistakes, you’ll start to see why God is using these people, and why he sent them into your life.


I Corinthians 13:12-13 (NIV)
Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

MOST IMPORTANTLY FOR EVERYONE:
Don’t take anything I’ve said the wrong way, my intent isn’t to discourage, but to encourage true growth. If you’ve hurt people, don’t ask for forgiveness, BEG for it. EVEN if you don’t understand what you did.

If you’ve been hurt, FORGIVE them! REALLY FORGIVE people that have hurt you! Nothing in life is worth staying mad about forever, so just forgive them. If you REALLY need to, make a phone call, talk to them in person! I did this before, and a funny thing happened, people started to look past my mistakes and shortcomings and see me for who God called me to be: a worshipper.

ASK FOR FORGIVENESS, FORGIVE PEOPLE. The imperfect person (hypocrite/coward/people pleaser) in you will fade away, and you’ll become who you’re CALLED to be.

"The last thing people need is another jaded christian, especially when most people respond to a redeemed sinner"