Leaving the Holdemans: Part 1
I left the Holdeman (Church of God in Christ) church over a decade ago. Sometimes I wonder how life would have turned out if I had remained a member all these years. Would I be a minister or deacon by now? Or perhaps sent to a remote missionary outpost somewhere in a neighboring country? But I chose another route and even though I will admit it wasn't the best choice at the time, God has worked things out for my spouse and I.
I was born into a Holdeman Mennonite atmosphere. Grandparents and some of my uncles and aunts were Holdeman members. To a certain extent although it was done unintentionally, I was brainwashed into believing that only baptized members of the Church of God in Christ were the only ones in the world who were truly saved. I grew up with a horror of being excommunicated, scorn for "ungodly" females who dressed in pants and used jewelry, fear of breaking the doctrines which forbade photography and music, and vowed that when (there was no if) I joined the church I would strive my utmost to faithfully follow each doctrine to the letter. Church was God, and God was the church.
During my mid-teen years I underwent an "experience". Some congregations of the Church of God in Christ appear to rely heavily on some sort of emotional breakdown as a sign that you have truly been born again. It was different for me. There was no dramatic tear-filled experience; after speaking with parents and ministers a cousin and I began doctrine classes. Since we had both grown up in and attended the Church all our lives, the classes lasted only a few weeks. We skimmed over the finer details and focused on the main points: the fall of man, the plan of salvation, the sacraments, the standard of dressing, and immorality. We gave our public testimony together, were baptized together, welcomed by the local congregation, and were now ready to stand up for the one and only "true"church of God.
We wholeheartedly assisted the small congregation in leading songs, we handed out gospel tracts, visited the poor, sang at the prison and occasionally preached. My cousin is still a member of the church and serving at a missionary outpost. I on the other hand struck up friendships with ungodly co-workers, partly with the intendion to bring them to Christ. But instead, a year after my baptism, I was an emotional and spiritual wreck. Late night partying, secretly smoking and drinking, movie watching, immorality, and my greatest weakness: reggae music all led me into deep depression at a young age. I knew these things were wrong yet my inability to climb out of that rut frustrated me and turned me into a moody, isolated teenager. The Holdeman church in Belize has no certified counselors to deal with depressed members. I did reach out for help time and again, the ministers looked grave, but nothing serious was done to arrive at the root cause of my depression. So I attempted suicide twice but each time remained silent about it. If the ministers couldn't help me, then God couldn't either.
In spite of the dark side of my life, I still faithfully attended and participated in Sunday services, frequently traveled throughout Central America on youth gatherings, and helped out wherever I could. Everybody commended me for being such a dedicated teenager.
I wasn't. I had simply become a first-class hypocrite and hated myself for it. I wanted all the benefits and blessings of being a church member, I wanted the assurance that my membership would save me; but I also wanted other things which were strongly discouraged by the church. Smartphones, social media (Facebook being the most popular one then), music. I longed for a smartphone or camera to snap pictures of the volcanoes in Guatemala, to record my trip to a crater lake in El Salvador, to capture the bustle of the Central American border crossings. I itched to write as a free-lance journalist while at the same time pursue a career and become a doctor. But the church frowned on the use of the Internet for recreational purposes and prohibited members from becoming doctors. This brought me frustration which caused me to seek out non-Christian friends as mentioned above which in turn led me down the wrong path. Finally the climax was reached. I committed what the church would label a "death" sin, was expelled from the church, then two weeks later was reaccepted partly because I was sorry for what had happened but mostly because I was terrified of remaining in excommunication due to the emotional, social and spiritual shunning facing me. The dread of expulsion was interpreted as repentance by the ministers and me.
There was a huge effort to clean up my life, I confessed my sins, temporarily quit my job, and decided that being expelled once was enough. The social shunning really affected me. I would now be faithful until I was an old person.
A. Mendoza
