A Rant!

OK, here's where I am today. It's not eloquent. It's a rant. So deal.

I just got off the phone with a friend of mine who I believe will be a friend for life, unlike many "friends" I feel like I have lost as a result of many things, not the least of which is this journey I'm on to figure out what I believe. I've lost some friends as in gone forever, yep, it's over, she's nutz, lost; and I've lost others in the, we'll stick around and just talk about safe topics because she's off her rocker on the stuff that will save her soul from hell fire. To both groups of people I say, good riddance!! If anyone else would like to join the party, please jump on board post haste. The ship is sailing.

GOD in heaven forbid that I have chosen to think for my damn self with regard to what I believe!! I don't understand why people, correction, Christian church-goers, get their drawers so up in a bunch over my struggle, my journey. I don't care if you used to look up to me. I don't care if I was the one who used to teach you. I don't care if I have some amazing power to influence you. NEWS FLASH: I shouldn't!!! Adults should think for themselves. Oh, wait. I forgot, that's forbidden by the Church. No individual, free-thinkers allowed. Only absolute, zombie conformists. Only parrots who can quote the pastor and the Bible verbatim...never mind the fact that they have no clue what either meant by said quote.

I just got into this discussion about how I should be careful who I share my thoughts with because I wouldn't want to "cause anybody to stumble". Listen, if you ask me, "Lexi, what church do you go to these days?" and I respond, "I don't go to church right now, I'm trying to figure out what I believe about all that. I'm sure about God, but church is up in the air for me," and you respond by, say, dropping out of church to wander around aimlessly trying to figure out what you believe about church since that's what's Lexi's doing, then you're an idiot. I'm not responsible for your choice. Christian church-goers, pull up a chair. Listen closely. ADULTS HAVE BRAINS. They should use them. Should they chose to let their brain function lie dormant and be led around by sermons and books and people who express a dissenting opinion, without running these ideas though their thought factory, their resulting choices are NOT the fault of the person whose thoughts they have hijacked. ADULTS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEMSELVES. Geez, Louise!!!

Have I mentioned before that I am frustrated as hell that the church seems to be a place where everybody is expected to think the same way and be the same way? Well, if not, I just did. It makes me so angry. God didn't make us all different for us to spend our lives trying to figure out how to UN-do his creativity and diversity. Give me a break!!! Be your own person, for the love of GOD!!! I am not responsible for YOU. There are about 15 people on the planet who need to get that through their heads.

Do you know what I love most about where I am. I have a chance to sit on my living room floor, buck naked if I want to, and try to figure out ME and God. Nobody else. I don't have to be concerned about X and Y's marriage, X's infidelity, whether A and B are having pre-marital sex, whether or not C and D are going to tithe off of that huge bonus check C just raked in, whether in Bible study we need to focus on prayer lives (since D, E, F and G are struggling so much in that area), or if we should focus on gifts and callings (since H, I, J and K are ready to step up to walk in their calling). I'm so glad to have a relationship with God that has nothing to do with telling other people how to live their freaking lives. Does anybody else know what that feels like? What it looks like? If so, let me know. And give me the address to your church if, in fact, that's where you learned to be so....I don't know.....normal?

How about this? If I drink, curse, dance, decide not to be celibate, decide not to attend church or whatever the sin du jour is, SO WHAT??? My sins or lack thereof are between me and GOD. Guess what? I sinned when I was a pastor too!! NEWS FREAKIN' FLASH!!! Don't quote bible verses to me. I KNOW THEM ALL . I taught them to YOU. Release yourself of the need to worry about me. If you believe HALF of what you say you believe, I hope it's the half that includes the fact that GOD is bigger than YOU and he is so much more capable of handling me than you are. LET. HIM. Return to the business of what color tie to wear on communion Sundays or some other world-changing shit. I'm sorry to curse on this blog, but I'm mad and God already heard mE curse on my other blogs, so too late.

I never wanted to use this blog to defend myself, so I hope to heaven that this is the last such post, but for the record....here is where I am:

I. BELIEVE.GOD. I haven't turned my back on him or backslid [insert tongues and sarcasm]. I even hold the Bible in some regard (and yes, I'm still trying to figure out what that is), BUT (and I do mean a BUT as big as the one I sit upon) I think the Church has gotten TONS of what it says WRONG!!! I'm tired of feeling like I had to fit in a box that I knew had things, many things wrong with it, and worse, like I was responsible for cramming that down someone else's throat. I won't do it anymore and I.WON'T.GET.BACK.IN.THE.BOX just because it will make people more comfortable with me. If you're uncomfortable with me, stop talking to me like the rest of them. I've decide I won't miss you. The truth is I can't. You weren't my friend anyway, just the friend of the girl who tried to live in the box and play the part everybody would accept. Lexi is done with that. If you can handle Lexi, call me. If not, it's been real.

Peace.