http://www.teachinghelp.org/giving-your-child-to-the-devil/


"It has been said that in marriage, the pain and stress of divorce is greater than even the pain of losing a spouse to death. I believe the same can be said of breaking ties with your child. Unless one has experienced this kind of loss and grief, they cannot fully understand the depth of pain experienced by a parent.
Someone may ask, “Why would anyone break ties with her own child?” The answer is, “loyalty to Jesus.” Being a disciple of Jesus demands our relationship to him be greater than our relationship to our own family, even our own children (Matthew 10:37).
I pray that you never have to make such a sacrifice, but I also pray that you love the Lord enough to choose Him over your children. This is where we find ourselves. This is our life. Our oldest son has turned his back on the Lord, and in spite of all our attempts, he refuses to repent. Consequently, our relationship has changed. It cannot remain the same and be loyal to Jesus (2 Thessalonians 3:6,14-15; 1 Corinthians 5:1-13). Our contact with our son is now limited to attempts at restoration. We have no fellowship. We used to share holidays, regular phone calls and texts, family events, etc. but now, all that is gone. Our son has completely turned his back on everything he ever believed. He has no respect for the Lord or His church. He has chosen a life of sin rather than the hope of salvation. And because of his rebellion against God, we as parents must make a choice. Do we overlook his practice of sin and maintain our relationship, or do we withdraw ourselves from him as the Lord instructs?"



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/14/2017 09:32AM by anybody.

Sounds like my ex wrote that !!!!

"Rebellion against God"

WOW! I forgot how intense all their rhetoric can be.

From where I sit now it all seems so transparent. They call it 'putting Jesus first' but it's really 'the church' and their devotion to the cult.

Just another way to break families apart and further commit it's members to it's leaders.

It makes the parents that reject their children feel righteous in doing it.

They can't see that it's just differences of opinions and they aren't being respectful of their son's opinion nor his 'freedom to choose' which they just LOVE to go on and on about.

How they in their LDS faith, have the 'Freedom to choose' as if it's a novel concept and something no other faith has but them. But at the same time it's clear that it's a lie, for if you choose 'wrongly' (i.e. 'rebelling against God') than you are cast off.. so clearly there is only ONE choice which means you really DON'T have ANY choice at all.

Complete B.S.!!!

It sounds like the son was the one who just finally got free of them. Good for him!

Let me translate:

"Draw a line in the sand around your kid. If they cross that line, kick their ass."

Imagine the people who give such advice humping coeds on their day off, like Garner Ted Armstrong. Not exactly words to live by.

Most fanatics seem out of touch with reality. Their thinking, and their language, is skewed. Whenever I hear or read garbage like: "He has no respect for the Lord or His church". I cringe.

Fanatics easily replace "The Lord" with "our church". When we quit Mormonism and Joseph Smith, they accuse us of "turning your back on God" or "following Satan."

Hey--a cult and "God's church" are two entirely different things.

Joseph Smith and Christ are NOT interchangeable--complete opposites, IMO.

Why should this son have any respect for what in the mother's opinion is "the Lord's church," when the mother has no respect for her son.

Where's the love?

What happened to the lovely little mormon couplet: "Love the sinner but not the sin". This so-called mother has all the loving instincts of a black widow spider. Loyalty to Jesus? IMO, she's at the top of disloyalty because His teachings were about love, forgiveness, and mercy; things apparently she has never heard of.

How sad for her.

It appears that she is a member of an independent, fundie church. Her husband appears to be one of several "ministers" there.

She doesn't detail her son's sins. From a guess, he might be gay. Or he could simply be living with a girlfriend, drinking, etc.

http://www.teachinghelp.org/about-me/

iginally from Poplar Bluff, MO, I left home to attend Harding University and then Freed Hardeman University. While at FHU, I met my husband Steve whom I married in 1984. We are the parents of four children, Kelli (and husband Justin), Michael, Matthew and Anne Marie. After Steve’s graduation from FHU, we moved to Nitro, WV where I completed my bachelor’s degree at WV State and Master’s degree at Marshall University in elementary and special education. After completing school, I taught in a class for preschool children with disabilities in Charleston, WV.

After five years in WV, we moved to Glasgow, KY where I enjoyed being a stay home mom for 16 years. I eventually went back to the classroom and spent six years as a special education teacher in KY and one year in TN with preschool through sixth grade students who have moderate and severe disabilities.

Since 2010, Steve and I have been at the Karns church of Christ in Knoxville, TN. Here at Karns, I work at the Southeast Institute of Biblical Studies as librarian, adjunct faculty member in the women’s program, and the Dean of Women. I also serve as the director of “Forever His”, a ministry that serves children with disabilities and their families .

In addition to work, I enjoy Andy Griffith trivia, working on my cooking blog (RelativeTaste.net) and being an amateur detective in genealogy research.

Why would'nt he choose Satan when he has the parents from hell who think love should only come from him while they give none in return. If they truly followed Christlike principles their love should be just as strong during dark days as during light and happy days. The true love of Christ is unconditional.

That being said they may be doing him a huge favor by withdrawing from him. What kid wants to listen to that for the rest of their lives.

FYI it also says in the Bible that it is a sin to eat shrimp. Go figure

Anyone'smother Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> If they
> truly followed Christlike principles their love
> should be just as strong during dark days as
> during light and happy days. The true love of
> Christ is unconditional.

Is it?

"If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple."

Luke 14:26

WOW I do stand corrected on that one! Thank you for the heads up
The more I see and learn the more I hate religion of any kind. I am not a bible thumper so that one did escape me. My comment about " Christ like principles" actually came about because of a conference talk I heard once that actually made me turn the tv off as this lady droned on ad nauseum about how special Mormons were because they lived Christ-like principles.

My comment was meant to be ever so slightly tongue in cheak but
Ended up sounding "foot in mouth". I do appreciate the comments you make whenever I read your posts ......hietokolob

I didn't mean to make you put foot in mouth...:)

I just find that many jesus believers who say things like "jesus is about unconditional love" haven't read their bibles, so I like to point things like that out. You have to really cherry-pick the purported jesus quotes to make that kind of claim!

It's verses like the one I referred to that can enable people like the mother in the original article to feel "justified" in their actions. It's OK to hate my son, jesus told me to.
Ugh.

I forgot to mention in my previous post: what kind of selfish, thoughtless, and cruel individual would boastfully talk about her
Child the way this mother has in a public forum where people know them and her child by name. If you read farthur down, lots of people show her support and solidarity without a shred of humanity or compassion for him. What treachery and complete disloyalty.

Instead of satan, what if you abandoned your child to one of his lesser demons like the Q15 ?

The beauty of it is that by the selective use of scripture and the go-ahead from cult leaders, a parent can justify doing what was in their heart all along.

I don't get it either and never will... this is your child for goodness sake, and BIC, TBMs are doing just that.

The man who introduced me to Mormonism, ultimately accepted a calling as a bishop, has gone on to serve several other callings within his ward and stake. He truly is a good and kind person, and during a very vulnerable time in my life (like many of us here), encouraged me to investigate TSCC.

It didn't take but a few months, rather more like weeks actually, of studying and researching facts, to find out that TSCC was nothing but a manipulative, secretive, money worshiping cult and had nothing whatsoever to do with anything I stood for or believed in, especially having attended a Unitarian church as a child, and later in my life, an Episcopalian Church, however I digress.

Although we are still friends, and don't talk as much as we once did, we still keep in touch. His oldest daughter is a TBM/BIC going back many family generations. She is a lovely young lady and recently left on a mission to a poverty stricken third world country and other than what she learned at the MTC, can barely speak the local language.

Knowing what we do about some of the filth and poverty these young missionaries are forced to live in to "be among the people", and reading many of the stories on this site, I cannot help but wonder how she is doing, how she is feeling, and most of all, what her state of mental health may be.

Prior to leaving on her mission, she was attending college (not BYU) was doing OK, and was quite close to her parents and VERY close to her two younger sisters. I saw a family picture prior to her leaving, and all I could see was a sea of those fake Mormon smiles we all know and recognize. :-( She has been in the mission field for close to a year now, and only other photo I have seen of her speaks volumes.The phony Mormon smile literally looked SO sad...not only I am sure that she must miss her life as she knew it, but they are now calling her by some very odd name that sounds as though it would have been common over 100 years ago, not in 2017.

Wow, this truly saddens me... her once sweet smile is so fake,and even her darling name has been taken away from her. How degrading and how frightening for her, especially for a 19 yer old girl who knows nothing about the real world. What is the deal with this weird name they now call her (even her parents do it)... I thought these secret names were NEVER to be revealed to anyone. EVER.

My, my, my... what a sad, depressing, frightening, experience she must be going though... even worse, her parents fully support her and were thrilled that she was going on a mission for GAWD.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/15/2017 08:48AM by cynful.

Wow, how very sad for all concerned. This takes 'bible thumpers to a whole new (disturbing) level.

"working for your church while your family dies!" - arcade fire

My sincere apologies if this is not the appropriate thread for this comment, but as a young child, I attended the Unitarian church where my parents were married. After almost 50 years, my picture, along with my Sunday school classmates, still hangs on the wall.

Even at such a young age, we studied many different faiths and learned so much about their origins, beliefs and forms of worship. I will never forget it.

The best memory I have, especially since Unitarians tend to believe that God is the goodness in all of us, was my Sunday school teacher playing the Beatles song, "The End", with of course the last line being:

"And in the end
The love you take
Is equal to
The love you make"

Many thanks to everyone here who have shown me and so many others true unconditional love. :-)

Hi,

I wrote a blog post about "Giving Your Child to the Devil," going into some detail about how what the mom said and did conflicts with what the Bible actually says. Your comments are welcome. Thanks!

--Steve

Link is here:
https://divinityschool.wordpress.com/2017/05/26/does-the-bible-instruct-christians-to-break-ties-with-gay-friends-and-family-considering-giving-your-child-to-the-devil/

The judge from Alabama gives you a 10 for your excellent performance in mental gymnastics! I award you 10 cherry bushels.

How lucky Christians are that YOU are here to tell them exactly what passages to select, how to decide what they actually mean, and what Jesus wants them to think.

You've made a career out of apologetics apparently.

Why can't Christians realize that other Christians can and will cherry pick differently and they are all just as valid? It's not like Jesus showed up and mansplained it to anyone. This is the nature of scripture and why people need to quit giving religion any credibility.

Hi Dagny,

Thank you for your comment.

On your question, I think most Christians do realize that everyone cherry picks from time to time. The challenge is to make ourselves go deeper and try very hard not to do that, to seek understanding. Part of the reason I wrote the post is to try to understand better myself.

I respectfully disagree with your comment on Jesus. He did show up and explain it. In my post, starting at "Jesus: Love One Another, No Conditions" and on through several sections until you get to "Second ..." gives an outline. The scriptures are cited at the bottom of the post if you want to take a look yourself.

Part of the nature of scripture is to prompt us to dig deeper than the surface.

He didn't write anything. If (big if) he showed up, it was 2000 years ago. He has not bothered to show up and clarify anything. Just look at all the Christian varieties that exist today.

I've read the scriptures many, many times.

The "nature of the scripture" is whatever you want it to be.

Beware of hearsay and people who presume to know better than you what God wants everyone to be doing.

Hi dangy,

Thanks for your comment.

I’m not aware of any reasonable dispute that Jesus did not show up. No big if.

I think Jesus himself was clear. Just read the book of John. Or even the part of my post that I mentioned as an outline.

Us humans, though, haven’t been so clear.

I don’t think that scripture can be whatever you want it to be.

One can cherry pick and stop reading the rest of scripture or ignore context to make it what one wants it to be. But that is inappropriate, and it isn’t the nature of the scripture. It is the nature of some who want to read or think just enough to reach the conclusion they want to reach. Scripture is richer than that.

I agree on being careful with hearsay and those who know better. At the same time, a great deal of what one learns is hearsay and it is a good idea to listen to people to try to understand. The hard part is figuring out what hearsay and people are reliable!

Have a good one.