As you deconstruct, it may be helpful to ask whether you left the 2×2 worker church, or did the worker church leave you?
Some say they followed Jesus out of the worker church, and that is a good approach to take as well.
While all of this is semantics, it matters. If you are feeling adrift and abandoned by a group that has been an elemental part of your life, it can be empowering to take control by deciding that you actively left a community that ceased to uphold the values and scripture you continue live by.
If you are feeling a vague feeling of guilt or a sense of being judged by those still in the church for making a moral decision, it may help to frame this as the worker church leaving you and swerving wildly off the moral high road.
In a sense, this is no different than the high school experience of being in a car with your longtime friends, and realizing that one of them has pulled out a bottle of whiskey and handed it to the driver, while a couple others have pulled out packs of cigarettes. This is something new that you hadn’t seen from this group of friends who you thought you knew well. But you realize in the moment that you need to tell them this is a bad idea. So you do, and the car pulls to stop, they open the door, and say “We don’t want prudes riding with us! So long, loser!”
They have left you, but you have prevented yourself from being in a potentially tragic situation by not simply giving in. That is the mark of a winner, not a loser. You owe that car full of former friends nothing, you owe them no guilt, and you do not have any obligation to accept the judgement they make of your morals or decisions. You are free. That maybe lonely for awhile, but you free, and that is awesome.
Similarly, when you find out the next day that the car crashed an hour later killing one of your friends and a child in the mini van they hit, you don’t have to accept any guilt that you could have changed things if you stayed in the car. They made their own decisions, and they alone are responsible for the consequences. They knew what they were doing was illegal and dangerous. They did it anyway. That is not your guilt to carry.
Lyle Benjamin
Clancy, Montana USA
September 10, 2024
Comment by CJ: That analogy is apt and powerful. Further expanding on your example, those in the car could have taken note of your decision, and that you’re someone whose opinion, judgement and input they valued in the past. They could pause and consider if they shouldn’t give your warning credence.
They had the opportunity to reflect on what they were doing, dump out the whiskey bottle on the roadside, stub out their cigarettes and join you. As you said, they’ve made their decision but not without an opportunity to course correct. For those who’ve followed Jesus out, you made a choice years ago…to follow Jesus. You left friends who you found disobey the law and run with a bad influence, and you stuck with the one who sticks closer than a brother and saved your soul. IMO, that’s just common sense.