First of all, I am hoping my question doesn’t come across as violating any community guidelines. If I have something questionable, I am sorry and please forgive me, and let me know what the offending issue is, so I can learn from my mistake but also answer my long question before you choose to ban me. On one Christian site, I asked for prayer and was banned for violating their community guidelines. The strange thing about it is that I read their guidelines and there is no rule concerning asking for prayer.
In Matthew 25:44-45 Jesus states: “Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee? Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.”
I am a Christian and I am not ashamed to be a Christian, and I have paid dearly by being persecuted by non-Christians. While being persecuted by non-Christians is not enjoyable, I saw it all as suffering for Christ and God rewarded me each time with a Crown. In Luke 6:22 Jesus states “Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake.” 1 John 3:13 also states “Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you.”
I am not marveling at the world over their hate for me but I am marveling over the amount of Christians who hate me and people like me. For example, prayer. Since when has asking a Christian for prayer considered an abomination? Does not 1 Thessalonians 5:17 state “Pray without ceasing.”? Romans 1:9 states “For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers;” Acts 12:5 states “Peter therefore was kept in prison: but prayer was made without ceasing of the church unto God for him.” 1 Samuel 12:23 states “Moreover as for me, God forbid that I should sin against the LORD in ceasing to pray for you: but I will teach you the good and the right way:” God commands that we pray for one another without ceasing. Jesus commands that we pray for one another without ceasing. The Holy Spirit moves those HE dwells in to pray for one another without ceasing. Yet, many Christians will only pray and help those Christians who are wealthy and are in the church clique. In James 2:1-9 , it states “My brethren, have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons. For if there come unto your assembly a man with a gold ring, in goodly apparel, and there come in also a poor man in vile raiment; And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool: Are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil thoughts? Hearken, my beloved brethren, Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him? But ye have despised the poor. Do not rich men oppress you, and draw you before the judgement seats? Do not they blaspheme that worthy name by the which ye are called? If ye fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, ye do well: But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors.” I am a Christian, but I am a poor, sick, disabled Christian lady. Before becoming disabled I worked as many as four honorable jobs at a time, yet, many times it was not enough to afford basic housing and basic expenses. I continued on trusting THE Lord and HE always provided whether it was shielding me with HIS warm hand when I found myself sleeping on a park bench in the snowy winter, whether it was ketchup packets to live on until payday came that would allow me to afford fast food since I was homeless and therefore did not have a kitchen to cook in. THE Lord has been very good to me. I used to have a home church I went to and I never told them about being homeless. They still found out and they wouldn’t even pray for me. The Pastor’s wife did not want to shake my hand or breathe the same air as me because she thought people are only homeless if they are prostitutes, child molesters, cop killers, alcoholics, drug addicts, or some other deviant, and she believed I would give her some disease. I was only homeless because I didn’t make enough money to afford basic housing and basic expenses, and not for nefarious reasons. I caught pneumonia one year and was in the hospital for about five days. I didn’t expect my Pastor or the Assistant Pastor to visit because the one was out of town while the other was trying to hold down the fort. The Senior Pastor barged into my hospital room one morning screaming at me out of his mind about how he had just gotten back from California and he couldn’t get to his office because of two women nagging and refusing to let him go to his office until he visited me. I offered him a chair to sit down and minister to me and he angrily refused saying he was too busy to minister to me. The other Pastor came in right after he left. He didn’t scream at me but he refused to sit down and told me also that he was too busy to minister to me. It wasn’t long after this, a wealthy man in the church had a heart attack and ended up in a hospital that was about 80 miles roundtrip. The Senior Pastor drove up there, everyday, and stayed for several hours sitting by his bedside ministering to him. I was in a hospital that was only ten minutes away. This was many years ago. Right now, THE Lord has blessed me with an apartment and HE fulfills my basic needs, and I am grateful. With this being said, I don’t know how long this will be. Nobody but THE Lord knows what tomorrow holds. I am disabled, not by choice. I am sick and possibly terminally ill, but the doctors don’t know yet. I did not choose to be sick and possibly terminally ill. I would love to work, but I don’t have the strength for it. Just yesterday I had to go for a doctor’s visit and then get some shopping done. When I got back, I am not embellishing when I say I thought I was dying. This morning I couldn’t hardly get out of bed because I was so paralyzingly stiff. Where I am living, I don’t tell people my personal business because they don’t care. We have a Bible Study group here and I have gone a couple of times. I haven’t been going for about a month and one of the women saw me one day in the lobby and started interrogating me about why I haven’t been coming and the word “cult” came to my mind. I cautiously just told her I had been overwhelmed with pressing business. If somebody had told me this, I would have responded with “I’ll pray THE Lord helps you with them.” She busted out laughing and walked off with her husband mocking me. I went to the Bible Study last week and we are always asked at the end of the meeting if we have any prayer requests. My prayer request was that there would be worldwide Salvation and Revival. They don’t want people saved or revived. They wouldn’t even pray for Revival and Salvation of souls. I don’t go to church anymore. Instead I watch the Livestream Church services faithfully. Let me first say that the preacher does preach from the Holy Bible, unfortunately what is missing is compassion and empathy in the preaching. The preacher and his assistants have been overwhelmingly blessed with never knowing any hardship, never knowing hunger, never knowing homelessness or borderline homelessness, never knowing having to live paycheck to paycheck, never knowing sickness or disability. Never knowing being a victim of child abuse, elder abuse, domestic violence. With this being said, they preach and condemn. In James 5:14 it states “Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord:” This church doesn’t even obey this command, but then, I don’t know of any church that obeys this command. If you are sick, terminally ill, downtrodden, hurting, just need encouragement, to be uplifted by your Christian sisters and brothers, you won’t get it because it doesn’t exist. You only get condemnation and chastisement of “Your supposed to be joyful. Stop being grumpy!” They are tone death. Even in Job 2:11-13 Job’s three friends came to comfort him before they decided to betray and condemn him as causing his and his family’s demise starting in Job 4:1. Oh! They were ugly to Job and God chastised them in the end. Not only his friends were ugly but also the community. Can you imagine even the community who came up to Job in his time of need and spit on him Job 30:10! Yes! I have had people spit on me in my time of need and I did nothing wrong to deserve their spitting. I have had people kick, hit, throw things at me, scream, call me derogatory names, and even slander my good name to others through gossip, and they call themselves Christians, and they did it simply because I was not wealthy like them. I have found that people who claim to be Christians are just as ugly as Job’s three worthless friends and Job’s community. So, my question is: why are people, who claim to be Christians, this way? Surely, if they would faithfully read their Holy Bibles, they would learn what God expects of those who claim to be HIS and would obey? I would be heartbroken to find out that all these people who claim to be Christians do faithfully read their Holy Bibles, but they choose to just ignore what they read.
Hi @amy6,
I am so sorry to hear that many of your encounters with Christians, especially at a time of great need, have been anything but reprensentative of Christ’s love. I have not experienced the difficulties that you have and I don’t have good answers, but I do want to begin by reminding you that God loves you deeply —your sickness, disability, or financial challenges are irrelevant in His eyes. As Romans 8:38-39 assures us, nothing can separate us from the love of God, not even the trials we face. In Christ, your worth is not determined by how other Christians treat you but by whose you are, a child of God!
It’s true that Christianity is often reduced to a mere verbal confession, and there are sadly many who carry the Lord’s name in vain. In Matthew 25, Jesus speaks of those who profess His name yet fail to walk in His ways, especially in caring for those in need. He was also harsh with the religious leaders of His time who, instead of helping, burdened others with their pride. He called them “whitewashed tombs” (Matthew 23:27), showing us how serious God takes this disparity between outward appearances and inward righteousness.
You are absolutely right to feel hurt, and I’m so sorry to hear that even pastors have not ministered to you in your time of need. That’s heartbreaking. While we cannot control other’s actions or change the hearts of others, we can ask the Lord to change their hearts, and seek Him in how to respond. We can carry our burden to Him and we can seek to understand actions of others, like your question reflects. Could there be reasons behind their lack of response? Could they simply not know how to help? Could other commitments, rumors, or fears be at play? These are some questions I think we could consider, whether we have answers or not.
Though what happened is unjust, we are called to forgive, even though discrimination and neglect are deeply painful. The world is full of injustice, and at times it feels like the wheat and the tares are growing side by side (Matthew 13:24-30). But we can remind ourselves that God is with us in it. He wants what’s good and true and is angered by injustice (Psalm 5:4-6).
I pray that God pours out His love in your heart once again through the Holy Spirit. May God give you direction on the next steps. I pray that, this Christmas, you experience the love of the Lord in a new way. May your perceptions of Christians begin to change as you experience love again, one Christian at a time. May God touch you powerfully where you are, healing you, empowering you, and enabling you to do the good works He has planned for you since before the creation of the world (Ephesians 2:10).
Here in this community, we will be honored to pray for you. I hope you will not be disappointed by the Christians in this community. We are not perfect, but just trying to follow our Lord Jesus. God bless!