The Redeemed Backslider
“Welcome to The Redeemed Backslider—with your host, Kathy Chastain, Christian-based psychotherapist and a redeemed backslider. This podcast dedicated to those who have wandered but are ready to return to the life-changing power of grace and the freedom found in Jesus.
In Luke 4:18, Jesus proclaimed: ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed.’
This is the heart of our message. Whether you’re wrestling with regret, despair, seeking freedom from spiritual chains, or longing to see the light of God’s love again, you’re not alone. Here, we share testimonies, biblical truths, and encouragement to remind you that no one is too far gone for God’s redemption.
This is your invitation to find healing, hope, and restoration in Jesus. Welcome to The Redeemed Backslider—where grace is greater than your past and your future is abundant when God redeems your story.”
The Redeemed Backslider
Spiritual Bypass THB #26 Dr. Peridot Gilbert-Reed
Have you ever been told to "just pray more" when facing depression? Or heard "God has a plan" when grieving, leaving you feeling worse instead of comforted? You're not alone, and there's a name for this phenomenon: spiritual bypass.
In this eye-opening conversation, Dr. Peridot Gilbert-Reed shares her groundbreaking research on how Christians use scripture and religious language to avoid processing psychological pain. While often well-intentioned, this practice prevents genuine healing and can leave lasting wounds. As a licensed professional counselor with a Ph.D. focused on spiritual abuse and spiritual bypass, Dr. Gilbert-Reed brings both professional expertise and personal experience to this sensitive topic.
We explore the difference between healthy faith and harmful avoidance, examining how phrases like "do not be anxious about anything" can be weaponized against vulnerable people. Dr. Gilbert-Reed explains how spiritual bypass occurs most commonly in three contexts: home, church settings, and ministry workplaces, and she provides practical guidance for recognizing when it's happening to you.
To reach Dr. Reed, you can visit her website at www.peridotreed.com
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Kathy has two books out and they can be found on Amazon or Barnes & Noble online:
Redeem California, With God it IS Possible:
God of the Impossible: 30-Prayers for the Redemption and Restoration of California
Welcome to the Redeemed Backslider with your host, kathy Chastain. Christian-based psychotherapist and Redeemed Backslider. This podcast is dedicated to those who have wandered but are ready to return to the life-changing power of grace and the freedom found in Jesus.
Speaker 2:Hi, welcome to the Redeemed Backslider. I'm your host, kathy Chastain. I'm a Redeemed Backslider and I'm a Christian-based psychotherapist. With me today is a colleague of mine. I'm super excited that she agreed to join the show today. I'm going to read a little quick bio.
Speaker 2:Her name is Dr Peridot Gilbert-Reed. I first met her at the American Association of Christian Counselors conference in Dallas last year and I think it was just a God thing. We hit it off right away and I was so excited about the research she did for her doctoral dissertation, totally in my wheelhouse, something I'm very interested in and hopefully you guys will enjoy this as well. Um, dr Peridot Gilbert Reed is a licensed professional counselor and a registered play therapist, as well as a supervisor in both areas. She received her doctor of philosophy and psychology with a concentration in Theology from Liberty University. Her research focuses on spiritual abuse and spiritual bypass. Her research, combined with her own lived experience in spiritual abuse, provides a unique lens into spiritual trauma and its impact. Lens into spiritual trauma and its impact. She is an adjunct professor at Liberty University and has written articles on this topic for Christianity Today and as well as Christian Counseling Today magazine. So welcome to my podcast, perry.
Speaker 3:Thank you. Thank you so much, glad to be here.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm super happy to have you. My podcast is geared I sent a little bit of this in the email but towards backsliders. Is that a term you've heard? Yes. I don't know what Christian background you come from Sure sure, it's definitely one used in my apostolic Pentecostal organization, but I didn't know if other Christian denominations are acquainted with that term.
Speaker 3:Yes, we are.
Speaker 2:Or I am Okay, okay, and so that you know, I held that title for many years in my life and so I just wanted to redeem that because that's what God does with our lives. But so it's really geared towards people that have not come back to a relationship with the Lord or come back to church because of all the reasons we're going to talk about today and many, many other reasons. So that was one reason I really wanted to have you on is because spiritual bypass that we're going to talk about today, I think, affects Christians in any religious denomination. It's just people trying to serve and understand the Lord and understand the Bible and apply it. So with that, could you kind of start with a definition of what spiritual bypass is and what led you down this road to do your doctorate in Sure.
Speaker 3:So spiritual bypass has been studied previously Dr Craig Cashwell is the one that brought it into the realm of Christianity and basically, spiritual bypass is when we use scripture, religion, any type of spirituality, to bypass the psychological tasks we need to complete. For instance, if I've lost a loved one and I am saying, you know, I've lost this loved one, I'm sad, but you know what, god's got a plan or he's in a better place, while there is some truth to that, when we know Jesus Christ is our personal Lord and Savior, we know that this is not the end. Death is not the end. However, when I use that so that I don't have to grieve, that becomes a maladaptive coping skill. So that's how it was studied as we do it on ourselves. That's what most of the research has been on.
Speaker 3:When I was doing some work in my doctoral work within the first term, I mean, god must have known what he was going to use this for. Obviously and I was. I don't know if I was reading an article I think I was by Dr Craig Castro and he mentioned spiritual bypass and I had gone through an experience of spiritual abuse more on the covert side, so just kind of under the radar it didn't really fit into what we've seen a lot of the documentaries on and many podcasts on all the different things, and so I had a hard time being able to just even validate myself that what I've experienced was this. But when I read that I was like I think this has been done to me, and so I actually sent a message to Dr Craig Cashwell to see if any research had been completed on how we commit spiritual bypass one person toward another. At the time there had been none. I don't think there has been much, except for mine, and so it's novel research in that I did phenomenological research in interviewing individuals and just asking them about their experiences, and it certainly is something we experience as Christians.
Speaker 3:And the way it looks different than the example I gave earlier is if I, you know, as a Christian, have lost someone that I love, and let's say, I come to you to just get help through that and I say, wow, I'm really sad because I'm missing. You know my dad and you tell me well, you know what, god's got great plans for you, he's going to cover you and you can trust that you will make it through this. Well, that's fabulous and there is truth to that, but you did not validate me at all in my pain. In fact, what we find is that many times what happens is that person becomes shamed and that, well, just pray harder, well, just, fast, more Well, just, and you fill in the blank, and so that person feels as well I must be doing something wrong, that I have this emotion on there, and so that's the angle from which I did my research is how we commit spiritual bypass on one another, encouraging another person to bypass psychological tasks they need to complete to heal.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And so just in your example, I think what is really difficult to ascertain and distinguish is motive, because, like with religious abuse, I think religious abuse can be motivated by narcissists with, you know, a Reverend behind their name, because sadly there is a lot of that. But but there is also very good intentioned people that only understand from that lens and so they're not necessarily trying to promote that, but rather encourage you know.
Speaker 2:And so how do you think that distinction is made? Because one is I've been a victim of this and the other one is we're just really ignorant in being able to know how to differentiate and distinguish. You know, christian principles versus psychological principles, and I think part of that is because psychology has been left out of the church conversation for so long. It's either you're going to live for God or you're going to seek secular help, and you know the two never met until recent years. I think we're seeing that integration a little bit more, but how would you see that in terms of your own spiritual bypass and the research that you did in having it be done to someone else?
Speaker 3:Sure. So, and that is a question that comes up often and one of the things that one of the analogies that I like to use is if I come, sit next to you and I cross my legs and I hit you in your shin as I'm crossing my legs, well, that was unintentional. And I would turn to you and go, oh my gosh, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to do that. And then I'm going to adjust my seating, possibly so that I don't do it again, right? But let's say, I come and sit next to you and I cross my legs and I kick you and I go, oh, I'm sorry, and I straighten out. And then I do it again and I do it again and I do it again.
Speaker 3:Now, it doesn't matter whether I was intentional or unintentional, it hurt. Matter whether I was intentional or unintentional, it hurt. Even when I unintentionally hit you in the shin, it still hurt. What happens with intentionality is you finally figure out? This person does not mean what they say, and I'm going to choose to move to make sure that I don't get hurt again. So, when it comes to the intentionality piece, hurt again.
Speaker 3:So, when it comes to the intentionality piece, yes, I found in my research, I would only say probably about three said all components of it were intentional. They knew what they were doing, they knew the harm that would come, they knew how I felt about it and they chose to do it anyway. The others said, out of the 14 participants, the others said it happened to me. It was an intentional act. They truly believed what they were saying, but the harm of it was unintentional. They didn't know how years and years of telling me not to be anxious for anything but in everything about prayer and supplication, give your request to the Lord was going to promote in me. You know this person saying this was going to promote I'm just, I must be doing something wrong not praying hard enough, not doing all these things because today I'm still anxious, right, rather than saying you know, we might actually have a psychological problem or there may be things in our environment, all the things.
Speaker 3:So the fine line comes in with this on understanding that probably most people I would hope I think this is a part of our humanity that wants this. I don't think that spiritual bypass is necessarily, on the average, an intentional act that someone wants to use for harm act that someone wants to use for harm. However, what I did find in my research is that spiritual bypass does share components of spiritual abuse, because it still produces hypervigilance in people. It still produces shame in people. It can be used as a form of control from the person that's using it. So I have morphed a definition of spiritual abuse to include spiritual bypass as a component of that, because when it's used over and over and over again, it becomes an abusive component, right, right.
Speaker 2:Well, walk us through the research, if you can, and maybe just elaborate a little bit more on all of it. Sure For the person out there that really doesn't know. I think your examples are very helpful, but I think you also have the psychological piece too, to sort of weave it all together. So I'll just let you do your thing.
Speaker 3:I love it, and when you have questions, just feel free to bust in and ask them. Okay, so you know the research. I interviewed 14 people in phenomenological research. Research is going to be smaller because you're interviewing individuals and so about 14 participants and they spanned mostly Protestant faiths, and it was three questions that were asked. Two were asked directly to the individuals and one was you know, have you experienced what you believe is spiritual bypass and what do you believe were the outcomes that you experienced? And then the last one was never asked, it was just gathered from the data, and that is does spiritual bypass share components of spiritual abuse? And so, as I did the research, there were a lot of things that came up from individuals that I think they felt validated A lot of times with spiritual abuse, any type of abuse let me put this on the side no, abuse is okay.
Speaker 3:When we think abuse, though, often what we think of as physical abuse or we think emotional sexual abuse, there is this scar that can be seen or something like that, something that's very tangible. This happened to me. What happens with spiritual abuse and what makes it so, what I believe, what makes it so difficult, is it's not necessarily tangible, in that I can, you know, put a name to this and I could say this happened. Most people still don't even know what spiritual abuse is. They don't even know it's a thing. Add in spiritual bypass and they really don't know because, again, I've only researched this for a while and if you're not one who was in the Christian counseling world, you may not even know it from the standard of how we just do it on ourselves, right. So I think one of the things that enabled or that allowed this research to be so successful is that it allowed people to name their pain, and when I gave yes, so important.
Speaker 2:Yes, validation, because now there's a solution. Yes, if I can name it, then I can fix it.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. And how many of them said spiritual bypass is exactly what happened to me. Like this, a perfect word. And I didn't name that. You know John L Wellwood, way back in the day, named that because spiritual bypass in its inception was from John Wellwood, who was a psychotherapist as well as a Buddhist practitioner, and he actually developed it to state how people were trying to overcome the tragedies and the things that have happened to them and reach this spiritual status where they didn't have to go through all the hard stuff they didn't have to endure. And he found that it was premature in its inception. Like these people were like, yeah, I can do all these things, it's not really because you haven't dealt with all the stuff back here, right?
Speaker 3:Um, it then went into 12-step literature and christian uh, charles whitfield did that, and then from there, that's where greg cashwell showed how it could be done in the, in the christian world as well, and so, um, often when people are engaging it it, what I found too, in the research, I should say, is that it came from different facets. Anywhere religion is, there's a chance for spiritual abuse. Anywhere religion is, anywhere spirituality resides, there is an opportunity for spiritual bypass to occur. So the top three places that it occurred was home, coming from an authority figure within the home, was home from coming from an authority figure within the home. It came from, obviously, church or any religious environment, and then work. And some of the people who said work, they were in a nonprofit, they were in a ministry, which also coincided getting that throughout the day of being at church on Sundays as well, and so it was anything from church discipline, from working at camps, church camps just home, from parents, from loved ones that thought they were helping, but again, the words that that thought they were helping, but again the words that they were producing were not, some came from, just again, volunteering within the church. So a lot of different avenues, but all of it religion or spiritual based. And one interesting thing I want to say that maybe it was three of them. One interesting thing I want to say that maybe it was three of them, that it was enough of the pressure from spiritual bypass that they did have suicidal ideation Because there was that constant.
Speaker 3:You shouldn't feel that. You shouldn't feel that. So again, if we go to scripture and you really dive into and you brought it up earlier, is that to the order? And I'm saying this to the average person who does not have a theology degree. Why would we know all these things about theology right Now? I have a background in Christian ministry, I also have my counseling degree and then I have the doctorate, which also has a theological component to it. So in doing that I'm able to. I was able to see, especially when it was starting to happen to me, like that verse is not what that means. And then, two, because I worked in ministry for a while, I also saw where I did it to others and knowing that it's like, okay, I can shift this information so that it's healthier. But to the average person who doesn't do that or doesn't have that background, when they hear, do not be angry, what do they hear? Don't be angry. So anger must be a sin. That's what's concluded from that right. That's not what the scripture says.
Speaker 2:Right? Not at all. Not at all.
Speaker 3:Be angry and sin not exactly, and right so they receive that and then it becomes shame because you know what? I wake up the next morning. I'm still angry, and I have worked with some people in working with in religious circles that when the pastor is preaching, he is preaching the word of God, hopefully preaching the word of.
Speaker 3:God and often pastors don't have a psychological background. Most seminaries, if the pastor has gone to seminary, many seminaries only teach six hours of any kind of mental health out of their whole degree and so they don't have that piece in that. That's not technically, that's not their job. In theory, right so. But what happens is to the woman who's sitting on the front row just found out possibly her husband's cheating on her and you say forgive one another as quickly as God has forgiven you.
Speaker 2:Or submit to your husband.
Speaker 3:Or submit to your husband and the woman's just like okay, right.
Speaker 3:So then it's very frustrating because she's hearing this, there's not this. And again, this is no shame to anyone, it's just the average person doesn't have that. Then she goes home and she's trying to smile and she's trying to forgive, and every day it's getting harder and harder and harder. Why? Because she's bypassing the grieving that she needs to do. She's bypassing the fact that she herself may need to go to counseling and work through. She may be bypassing that.
Speaker 3:Hey, my husband's even abusive in the way that he uses this. I was working with a client one time this is I can't even tell you how long ago and for the client, the spouse had committed adultery. They had gone to a pastor and the pastor had told in this case it was a woman that your husband's asked for forgiveness. I don't see why you can't forgive him. And it's only six months removed from my situation, and she carried that for years and years and years and years until she came to see me and we had to work through what that looked like. And so those are the kind of ways that spiritual bypass can do the harm, because now I'm taking on that shame that there must be something wrong with me, rather than being able to attribute hey, no, that's not okay. You crossed a boundary in what you just said to me or what you just did there.
Speaker 3:The research also showed that several scriptures have been used and misaligned, even in church discipline. Several scriptures have been used and misaligned even in church discipline of how to you know, do that in a way that is not harmful to another person and in fact, the person who conveyed that was like racism was common in our church because they use this scripture to do this. So those are some of the things. They use this scripture to do this. So those are some of the things. Like I said, 14 participants and only I would probably say maybe about two or three decided to leave the church and not have anything to do with religion. They haven't necessarily left their faith, but they did leave religion. They don't attend church. One has said I'm on the fence. I don't know how could I have a loving God that would allow this to happen to me. But the majority of them said we were able to separate that this was not God.
Speaker 3:But at the time, whenever you're being told these things by someone in authority which would have spiritually abused somebody, in authority who implements these things that you are to do X, y and Z, then we do feel well, okay, I'm not a good enough Christian that I can receive all that. I know those were a lot of words, so are there any?
Speaker 2:No, it was great. And I just kept thinking. You know, just the term bypass means we're missing the process, and I just kept thinking, you know, just the term bypass means we're missing the process and all throughout scripture. Jesus was big on the process, but unfortunately, when we read the Bible, we're a lot of times reading it in storybook form and we forget that between you know, verse 22 and verse 23, there is some time that goes by, and it's not just that Lazarus was dead four days before Jesus got to his house. There is a process that's happening there and so I feel like we kind of miss that and I do think some is.
Speaker 2:I mean, I think there is a lot of harm in it. Obviously, I hear it the most in relationship issues, when people don't feel like they're enough because, well, you know, if my faith was strong enough, I could just believe God and not take this medication. Or if my, you know, if I really love my husband and let him lead me, then I would just submit to him when you know the husband is doing pornography, not taking home a paycheck and, you know, not actually operating in the role of a leader. And I always tell people before. The Bible says wives, submit to your husbands. Before that verse it says husbands, love your wives like Christ loved the church.
Speaker 2:They go together, and so I think in the Christian world, I think a lot of people grew up in church really not reading their Bible. They grew up following a leader, and I hope that that's changing now where people are actually reading their Bible for themselves and figuring out this is what this says. This is what this says, and I think the more that happens, people, people will do it. So can you talk about, um, some of the features that get missed out when people bypass, like you know, using the term of an affair, because I think codependency is a big key and boundaries is a big key. Among Christians we don't A know boundaries, we don't know ourselves very well for people that haven't really done any work, and so they're putting all their faith in something else other than figuring out who they are and how God made them. So could you maybe just talk about that a little bit? What you've seen with Go ahead, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3:Whatever, whatever you want to talk about, yeah, so just I'm making sure that I understand your question correctly. So for understanding how the individual works through the bypass if they're receiving it, is that kind of what you're asking.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or the components, like if they bypass. So like avoiding painful emotions, sure, sure, I think grief that you used is a huge one, because I hear is it must have been God's will, or God must have a plan in this, and never, ever, ever giving credit to the fact we have an adversary who is coming to steal, kill and destroy.
Speaker 2:And that God is not the author of any of the evil that's taking place in the world. And so, but yet people, do you know when they don't get healed after they've been prayed for and a loved one does in fact die of cancer, or you know a child of cancer, or you know a child, sadly, I've known several friends who have lost their children, you know, that is if they're Christians. That is often what they go to is well, god must have a plan, and then they don't know how to reconcile. How could you know? How could this have been your plan?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, okay. So yeah, I think when we're receiving it, when we're taking on ourselves again as we do it on ourselves, we're usually trying to negate some kind of pain we're experiencing and we are in a world that loves to make sense of things in a world that makes absolutely no sense, right? So if we can make sense of it, maybe it'll hurt less. And so I think sometimes that spiritual bypass, if I can come up with a good enough answer and I can be satisfied with that, they don't have to hurt as much. Of course God says in this world you will have trouble, and unfortunately, because we live in a world that is subjected to sin, that sometimes the bad things do happen to good people.
Speaker 3:And I tell my clients sometimes when they come in and they're telling of those really hard things and that it's really hard to feel God's presence. I don't try to deny that for them, I just say you know it must be, it must be really hard to be in that space. I just say you know it must be, it must be really hard to be in that space and then give them the validation so that they can move forward. Because I think sometimes they battle with. I'm not supposed to be not feeling, not God, you know. And so I'm helping them to create a different where they can say I'm never going to make sense on this side of heaven of these things and I don't know, I just don't know. But what I do know I have to do is I have to grieve. But grieving it hurts and to day in and day out have to walk that journey of grief, whether it be because we physically lost somebody or we lost our marriage, or we lost the, the job, or we lost and you fill in that blank. So um, them receiving it on themselves. That's a like I said, I think it's trying to make sense of the world that we're living in. That can't be made sense of it. When we're receiving it from someone else, what happens? The main things that I found was that there were this manipulation tactic, there was this need. Often, what happens is the person committing the spiritual bypass toward another person. There is something that they are gaining from this. So let's take the grief situation.
Speaker 3:I don't like to watch people hurt. My goodness, if I could come over and fix it just like that so you wouldn't have to hurt anymore, I would do that in a heartbeat, and if a scripture could do that for you, I would absolutely do that. But it's because I don't want to hurt and I don't have the ability to help you not hurt. So what happens is the person may give a scripture, the person may give us a religious idea all these different things but we never validate the person's pain. And so then what happens and what my research uncovered is that leads to a marginalization of feelings. It can lead to mistrust in individuals and authorities. It is a dismissal of individuals pain and the struggles that they're going through. It is a dismissal of individual's pain and the struggles that they're going through. We even wind up misusing scripture, because that's not like we've talked about here, whether it be forgiveness and anger. Those are some of the ones we're more familiar with. That's not going to happen overnight, and you know what Grieving has to come first. So it's going to be a hot minute for you to complete the forgiveness process. But to the person who thinks don't let the sun go down on your wrath, well then, by 6 o'clock tomorrow morning I should be ready to go, and that's not what God intended.
Speaker 3:Out of that, probably the hardest thing that a lot of spiritual bypass can lead to is a lack of trust in self and, as we all have probably experienced, when we can't trust ourselves, that can feel very, very helpless and very powerless. It is one of those things. Well, this person said it meant this and this is how I'm supposed to use this, but I still don't feel like forgiving the person. I still am grieving. So then it's like okay, did I hear it wrong? Is something wrong with me? And that's where a lot of my spiritual abuse came from.
Speaker 3:Is that a lot of things and things with spiritual bypass? Again, they're slight, it's not the overarching. Hey, I'm in your face, I'm a narcissist. Everybody knows I'm a narcissist and I'm abusing you. There's no question about it. It is just right under the radar. It comes from the trusted person and you're like I don't, something doesn't feel right about this, but I don't know what this is. And they use scripture, so it must be true, but I don't like how they use that, and so it can very much come to a lack of trust in self and then also it can lead to that distrust of any religious persons, because how do I know what you're saying is truth?
Speaker 2:Because everybody else tried to use that same scripture and look what it did to me on there. Right, and especially in this world where we've seen so many preachers famous preachers fall or find out they've had, you know, um secret lives that's coming out into the open. People have equated a leadership role with who God is, instead of being able to separate that, and that's what I had to do in my life is see God different than you know and figure out what was true and you know. When I came back, full circle and everything is good. But I totally understand from a different place today.
Speaker 2:So I think in the Christian world also, I think most denominations teach you that we're a sheep, the Bible calls us a sheep and that we have a shepherd, and so that automatically places us in a category of not trusting ourselves. That this quote unquote man of God knows better than we know, and that's a very difficult thing when your heart is to follow the Lord and when your heart is to be submissive to your leadership, because the Bible tells us to do all of that as well. So how would you, what would you say to that? How do you think we bridge the gap in helping people Be good church members but also know themselves Like. You can speak to that however you want.
Speaker 3:I think a couple of things has to come in, and that is one that we recognize, and God tells us this in the Psalms Don't put your faith in man. Man is faulty, we all are. I'm going to fail people, the next person is going to fail people. Expect your pastor to fail people. Why? Because he's human.
Speaker 3:What happens in some of my research for my book that hopefully will one day be published, is that many pastors live in a fishbowl. They're there, they have to be all things to all people, which produces its own level of spiritual abuse and bypass that can happen to the pastor. But because they are always, you know, we always have our eyes on them. We sometimes, whether we do it cognizantly or subconsciously, put them on a pedestal. And so if they say it, well, then it must be true. And I remember being because I went to a Baptist college growing up and I remember going to my first exegetical studies class. And this is where you have to break down the scripture. You have to find out its meaning, its attachment to other scriptures. Like you're finding out, we're not just pulling one scripture out, we're diving into the whole thing.
Speaker 3:And I remember walking in and the professor said anything you've ever learned before is going out the window. You're learning it for yourself today. And we were all like you know, because what do we do without? Our pastors always said it means this and this, and what happens if we don't find out what it means? You know all the different things and I am so grateful for that class because it has taught me that I don't just go with what has said. So I think that's one thing. Us as Christians, when we are in a church setting and a religious setting and there is an authority that, yes, god gives us shepherds for a reason Right, but we also have to be responsible sheep. We also have to be responsible sheep. I do find it very interesting that and I don't know if anybody listening to this or you heard this growing up sheep are stupid. Sheep are stupid.
Speaker 2:They're the stupidest things on the planet. I looked up the definition when I first gave my life back to God and it literally says in the biblical definition that sheep are so dumb they will walk right off of a cliff if someone doesn't, if the shepherd doesn't stop them from doing so.
Speaker 3:So yes, we've heard that over and over again, and in my book one of the things I talk about is sheep are anything but stupid If you really study the nature of sheep because the title of my book at the time was famine and the flock, so it was going from that perspective they are not dumb, in fact they will. They have emotions and they will help each other when they have those emotions. They will, um, even forgo food to make sure someone else is taken care of. Another sheep, I say someone else, another sheep is taken care of. They know where the food is, they know the voice of the shepherd. That's not stupid. Sheep are not stupid. So what we need to remember as sheep is we are not stupid.
Speaker 3:We can go to the scriptures for ourselves If something doesn't sound right. And this goes back to trusting ourselves, because if we have been taught over and over again not to trust ourselves, we feel like we are betraying the shepherd by going and studying this for ourselves. No, you need to know the scripture for yourself. So if something inside of you says that doesn't feel right, that that doesn't sound right, go study that. If the shepherd is a healthy individual, you should be able to go to him or her with that information and discuss that.
Speaker 3:So I think that's one thing is, you've got to know the scripture for yourself. Start practicing that. The other part to just protect, I think, ourselves is boundaries right. So if I'm hearing from the stage something that maybe doesn't align with mental health, doesn't align with even scripture, I'm going to bring that up because I need to be able to trust that the person who is spending time in the word is going to be able to present something that I can actually implement in there and so if you were talking about forgiveness and that you know right now I want you to stop and go to the person that you need to forgive.
Speaker 3:I ain't walking, that's not. Yes, god tells us to put our stuff down and you know our offerings. Down and go to that person and try to make reconciliation. But understand this reconciliation takes two. So if the other person is an abuser, if the other person hasn't changed, I'm not going to go to reconcile. Forgiveness does not equal reconciliation. Forgiveness is an act I can do on my own and I'm called to do. I'm not going to get around that, even though I may have to breathe through it.
Speaker 3:I may have to do these things, but I do not have to reconcile. And so if something like that is being presented, I may have to go to that person and go, hey, can we sit down and talk about this and have those boundaries, even with spiritual bypass? If someone's continuing to spiritually bypass me, I may have to stop and say, hey, I recognize you. Mean well, that's not truth, that is not what that scripture says, or I would appreciate you not sharing that with me.
Speaker 3:I'm okay with that that's not being un-Christlike. Jesus had boundaries. We can have boundaries. I know I came a long way with that answer to that question.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's okay. I want to pause here really quick and just speak to my audience, because nothing that I do on the show is ever, ever, ever meant to negate or to speak ill of ministry or Christianity or anything actually. But my heartbeat is to reach those who have left church, and there is so many people that have a very warped and incorrect idea of who God is because of issues that have happened inside the church, some intentional, some unintentional, some just ignorant. Because, you know, I'm 58 years old and I'm still going to be learning, hopefully until the day that I die. And I look back in my therapy practice and a client that I had I think I did spiritual bypass too and I'm like, oh my gosh, I would love a second chance and it was not. It's we learn, hopefully we're growing through the things that we don't know, and this podcast particularly, and the discussion of religious abuse and spiritual bypassing, is to really mostly bring light to the situation, because what I hope to do is just go through some very particular examples that I see in the clinical setting and what I've heard and how we can sort of break those down in practical application, because people are very much suffering Because they if you think that something is wrong with me, if you believe that you're never going to be able to overcome. And we are called to overcome.
Speaker 2:And so I heard a message a couple of weeks ago and I just wanted to jump up. And you know, I heard a message a couple weeks ago and I just wanted to jump up and applaud out loud in front of everyone because he said one of the things he does to keep his circle protected was know yourself. And he basically told everybody you have to know yourself. And I don't know why that seems threatening in a Christian culture. It's almost like some teaching wants people to be ignorant, that if they know themselves, that maybe they will bump up against their leadership more. But, like you said, it shouldn't be that way.
Speaker 2:But if you don't know yourself, you can't distinguish, in my opinion, between our human flesh, the voice of God and the voice of the enemy, because they're all speaking. So if I'm constantly questioning, well, is this this, is this this? Am I supposed to do this? Is this sin? Is this what the Bible says? If I don't know, I can't have discernment in any of those other areas. And so the point of the podcast is really to kind of ask questions out loud and to give some context to what is happening in the church culture across denominational lines and hopefully for people that are estranged from faith and really don't really know if God is good so many people see him as punitive.
Speaker 2:I don't really know if God is good. So many people see him as punitive that maybe some of this conversation could kind of help them understand or be willing to come back and look. Okay, maybe that wasn't God, maybe it was ignorance, maybe it was abuse, maybe it was my own conceptualization of what I thought I heard.
Speaker 3:You know, because all of the all of those things can be true at the same time, Absolutely, and that's one of the things I really work when I'm working with someone who has experienced spiritual abuse, spiritual bypass, is I really really work with them on holding two truths you can hold the truth of I've been hurt and Right. Not, but, because when we say but we negate the first thing Correct right and my God is still good.
Speaker 3:I have experienced spiritual abuse and my God can redeem that Right. So yeah, it's very, and you can grow.
Speaker 2:You can grow through it.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely, and I think that's part of the redemption piece of it is that God is not going to.
Speaker 3:And if you read first Corinthians, you know you hear that God, you know we persevere through these things and hope that endurance that we come to a place where we can use this Second Corinthians one I believe is goes through a lot of that process.
Speaker 3:So you know, the one thing that for and I'm using your term backslider that may be listening is your pain is real. I'm going to validate that you can, can hold space for that and that you can experience the God of truth, the God of hope, the God of redemption, as you seek to know who he is for you. I remember on some of my one of my darkest days, when I was just questioning everything like what am I even here for? I lost both my parents at an early age. I was divorced, and so here I was, sitting on my couch, going if you got a reason for me to stay now is a good day to tell me, um, yeah, but I was having a hard time receiving God's words because I'd had the spiritual abuse, because I'd had this spiritual bypass, because I couldn't trust myself and what felt like anybody else and I just remember praying God.
Speaker 3:If you've got a reason for me to stay, now's the time to tell me. And he did. He brought me to a passage in scripture and I have it tattooed on my arm to never forget and it was Psalm 73, 4, tell the next generation of my power and might to come.
Speaker 3:And in that moment, what God revealed to me is he's going to reveal himself in a way that I can receive it and my pain and my hurt and my abuse and the bypass, I can still hear him and so, for those that are listening, know that your pain is real when you validate that and you can be an over overcomer and you can do this very hard thing of trusting yourself once again but also being able. And it will be hard because when we get into religious circles again or into an environment of spirituality, whatever it is, we may have those triggers that come up inside of us and it's noticing that and being honoring our body, heart and mind as we experience the healing of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I I can say that with mine. I realized, you know, one of the things I ask exactly what you said, holding both truths at the same time. If this is true, if some negative thought or belief, what else is also true in addition to that, like you know? Um, because I think faith in and of itself is an intangible thing. It, it exists in, like emotions. We feel emotions, but we don't see them, we don touch them, we only feel the byproduct of them.
Speaker 2:And so you know, when it comes to having a new outlook on God or being open to what you said, yes, I went through abuse, yes, lots of spiritual bypass and not ever validating the person and only using shame and condemnation against them, that that absolutely probably happened and can be true. But what else is also true? You know, who is God in this moment? And what have I learned? You know, maybe I learned I just don't take everything I hear at face value and I do do the research. And you know, when I gave my life back to the Lord, I distinctly heard him say keep your eyes on me, and what that meant is I have to be looking up always. I'm not looking horizontal.
Speaker 2:I'm always going to be looking up, and I'm very, very fortunate to have a pastor that I can go to and talk about and ask questions when I don't understand. Because, going back to the process, god is in the process. I personally don't believe the Bible is just a book of do's and don'ts and if I don't do this, or if I do do this and I'm not this, god is so loving and I think he teaches us from a place of desire and a place of wanting to fall in love with him more to please Him. All those things tend to leave our lives and we don't have a need for them anymore because we're healing Right right, absolutely.
Speaker 3:I love what you said about you know recognizing to keep your eyes on Him and being vertical not vertical, but being able to look up and know that God is for us. How many times has that have we heard that throughout scripture? He is for us, and if something is happening to me that is not showing God is for me, this does not mean life is great and hunky-dory and we never have problems or troubles, or suffering.
Speaker 3:It just means that if I'm receiving information that is not living out the character of Christ, I need to question that.
Speaker 2:The fruit of the Spirit, the fruit of the Spirit, if it is not honoring God if it is producing condemnation.
Speaker 3:There is nothing that says that we should be growing a fruit of condemnation. You know, recognizing like hey that that doesn't sound right and that doesn't feel right. I'm gonna honor myself because we. That's probably the hardest with my research that I heard many people say the hardest part, the thing that has taken the longest, is to trust themselves again, to be able to trust that what they're experiencing. If they feel something isn't right, rather than dismissing it and going, oh, I must be a sinner and I'm not receiving something. No, honor that and go. I'm going to research that.
Speaker 3:I may find that I'm wrong, but at least I honored myself in that and I can trust that. And then discernment comes in because I'm allowing that space for God to teach me and then I can go forth with that. But when we've had again that spiritual bypass and that spiritual abuse depending on where it came from as well who the authority figure was it can take a while to get over. So also give yourself grace. We're often very good at giving others grace, but we're not very good at receiving grace or giving ourselves grace, and this like I love the word process right. So all of this takes a process and even trusting yourself again, we'll take that process.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think you know trusting yourself, having grace for yourself. You know, one of the things that I hear a lot. You probably do as well. People don't know how to love themselves, and I think you know we are made in the image of Christ and we have to be able to love ourselves because Christ loves us. And I feel like the enemy attacks us in our shame and our identity in order to prevent us from loving. If we ever could get a revelation we are made in the image of God and he did not make a mistake, no, he did not Then we could embrace that so much better. We could start to discover. Well, who did God really make me to be? Why am I wired this way? Why is my personality bent towards this? Why do I bristle at certain things? Well, because God's got purpose in all of that. If we could ever give ourself permission to discover and not just need to be led because Paul said follow me as I follow Christ, and you know it's great to have a shepherd.
Speaker 2:I love that, but not at the expense of my own soul, because I'm supposed to search out my own salvation with fear and trembling, yes, my own salvation with fear and trembling, and so I think there's so many avenues by which confusion can set in when trying to tweeze out all of these concepts For the churchgoer sitting on the pew that has kids that are into crazy stuff or smoking pot, or the spouse is not really being a partner in the marriage, or they just had a suicide in the family, which happens so much in the church world devastatingly. So I think it's just so much opportunity for healing the body of Christ overall. If we could just have these conversations without fear, you know, yeah.
Speaker 3:And you know talking about Paul and Paul following Christ. Remember that Jesus wasn't scared of any of the apostles' questions. Right, he answered them. And so that's where I think we need to remember yes, we have shepherds in our churches that lead our churches, and we should be able to ask them questions on there yeah.
Speaker 3:Even if it is a little bit of a challenge Now, we want to go respectfully right, of course, and even when we are not in alignment with what someone says, I still need to act Christlike towards that person and be able to express that. But again, to model what Christ set up was like. Yes, you can ask questions, yes, I may give you answers you don't like, but again, being able to feel free to do that, being able to feel free to do that, and then you know Jesus. Often not often, but he did use a Socratic method would sometimes ask questions for them to be able to, for the apostles to reach a place of going. Okay, I get that. So even in our own time with God, we may have a question that comes up that leads to another question, and maybe that's the Holy Spirit saying keep going, keep going, you're going to get that answer to there.
Speaker 3:Another thing that you said, if I may real quick be able to say, is that a lot of times we're taught some negative language, like I'm broken. I remember it was actually what brought me back to Christ, a message that brought me back to Christ. But the more I've studied, the more I'm like okay, I recognize the negativity of that, you are broken, but you're God's masterpiece. Do I believe I'm God's masterpiece?
Speaker 2:The potter's will.
Speaker 3:Exactly, but let's look at God never calls us broken. God never calls us broken. Then If you read scripture, he never calls us broken. And how people receive that sometimes as spiritual power pass, is I must be wretched and I'm a sinner and I'm not deserving of anything. No, God says he draws near the broken hearted hearted, hearted. And that's when he uses that term broken. But we ourselves are vessels and so, yes, we have to. Our hearts are broken so that it is shaped to honor Christ.
Speaker 3:But if you go to first Peter, totally you're a royal priesthood of people belonging to God, so do not forget that Right.
Speaker 2:That's so good because you're right People do. It's just that condemnation. I want to have you define a couple terms for the audience Um, Socratic method and holding space.
Speaker 3:Thank you.
Speaker 2:Because they may not. They may not know what that is.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 2:But the Socratic method is helpful for people and just for themselves.
Speaker 3:Sure. So Socratic method is when we ask a question to answer a question. So if you and I were talking and you and I do this a lot with my clients they ask me just tell me, is everything okay, you know, should I be feeling this? That's the question I get a lot of times. Should I be feeling this? And so a Socratic method would say well, what do you think you should be feeling? Then, if you don't think you should be feeling what you're feeling, what should you be feeling?
Speaker 3:And they hate this because I'm making them come to their hands or they just want to right, we're just giving things. But when we do that, I think it's so empowering because we're using our own mind, we're using the gifts and talents God has given us, we're using the information God has given us to be able to reach a place of going, oh, okay, and then it becomes ours. We feel powerful, we feel empowered to be able to say, hey, I did this and now I can begin to trust myself because I know how to use this reasoning and these tools to be able to do that myself.
Speaker 3:So that's the Socratic method when you're asking a question to answer a question, to arrive there and, like I said, it can be frustrating because you just want the answer, but it's so empowering when we know we've used our own skill set to reach that place. As far as holding space, holding space is, you know, when God holds space for us, he leaves it open for us to feel our grief, to feel our pain, to feel our anger, to feel all the things. It is safe. It is a safe space. It is a place where I can validate my own emotions. I can receive from others that as well, People who don't hold space for that.
Speaker 3:If we don't even hold space for our own feelings, that's where we get into. It's not safe to feel feelings. We try to shove them down, put them in a closet somewhere, but when we hold space for it, we give ourselves permission to experience that in a safe way. So whoever is giving us the space, holding space for it, we give ourselves permission to experience that in a safe way. So whoever is giving us the space, holding space for us, just like, you know, in the therapy room, I'll hold space for people to be able to experience their emotions and that safety. Safety is always a key, and I don't mean just a physical sense of safety, but also an emotional, mental, spiritual sense of safety that you can have all the questions, you can feel all the things and you're still going to be okay.
Speaker 2:Right, right, and you know, jesus was acquainted with all of our emotions, the feeling of our emotions. He was touched by them all, so he created them. It's so important that we recognize them and be able to sit with them. And for anyone that doesn't do well with emotions, there's a great book by Dr Mark Brackett called Permission to Feel. Men sometimes struggle with that, you know, because they're taught that they're just supposed to be macho and men don't cry.
Speaker 2:I wanted to just maybe go through a few scenarios and have you address how it bypass. Look, you know, what would the bypass language be in each and then? And then what would the therapeutic process be? Okay, so so let's say somebody. This comes to me a lot single women or single men who are waiting for God to send them their perfect one, right, and they're very sincere in trying to wait and especially in trying to hold a covenant of abstinence, right, and so they come. They've been single for years. I mean, one of my clients just found someone and it's so exciting, you know, because there there does come with that a hopelessness for people that are really wanting to find a mate. And of course we're not God, we can't say when it's going to happen. But what do you think? The spiritual bypass that they tell themselves, and then the wrestle that they're going through in their humanity.
Speaker 3:Sure, I love that. So that scenario, so I think the spiritual bypass that they can do on themselves is possibly if I fast more. You know, I've heard a lot of people say if I just fast, god will give me the answer and if I just fast I'll have the mate I'll have, you know, these kind of things. So we're spiritually, we're using a spiritual activity to bypass the fact of just sitting down going. This really sucks. I don't have somebody right now. This is hard. I'm lonely, I don't I just God, where are you? Because I've been waiting six years and he's still not here. I used to tell people because I was single for in between my divorce for about five years, I'm like that guy in the white horse got lost in the forest. I've been with him a long time for this
Speaker 3:And so we choose to not really engage what we're feeling. Maybe we're even angry at God and that feels uncomfortable, but trust me, god can handle that Right. So that's how it can be if we're doing it to ourselves. Someone asked us because the church sometimes doesn't know what to do with single people. Not all churches have a singles ministry and when they do, even the people in the church, whatever denomination it may be, you know they'll say, oh hey, do you have a boyfriend? Or, you know, are you married? No, well, you know what. God's got somebody for you. Well, really, who is he? Since you know so much, I can get real sassy sometimes, but that's what it can kind of feel like internally, that we're just like well, if you have all the answers, why can't God just give me that person then? Right right.
Speaker 3:But again, we probably feel uncomfortable that we've asked that question and so we want to give a quick quip Well, god's got somebody for you, but we don't know that Right, and so only God knows the day and time. So, rather than do that, it is better for an individual to go, you know, if we were to ask that question, like I'm so sorry that I asked that, or we may just go okay and not say anything else, we don't have to give a rebuttal to that person experiencing that. We can just say well, hey, I'm glad you're here today. That's all you have to say, right? As far as the therapeutic process, when they're coming in, I think it's again giving them the ability to hold two truths the truth of I am single right now, and getting them in touch with what that feels like. Yes, it is hard, it isn't comfortable. I know you want this right now. So we give validation to that feeling and God may have somebody for you, but we don't know. So, the meantime, I work a lot with the in between.
Speaker 3:In the meantime, right right to you with what we have been given sometimes we get so focused on what we don't have, we forget that god's given us something that we do have right now, right, I love that.
Speaker 2:yes, and I think too, in situations like that, they don't stop and look what they can do to kind of move the ball forward. You know they don't look at are they healthy? Do they even know what they're looking for in a mate? Have they identified that there's so much practical things? I think that when we're just looking at God to drop someone in our lap, we're really not engaged in the part that he has us to be a part of, in that right, and I think spiritual bypass incorporates that same ideology that God's just going to do it for me and I don't have to do anything, and I just that's just not the case, right, right, and we also just going to do it for me and I don't have to do anything and I just that's just not the case, right right.
Speaker 3:And we also just have to remember that our time is not his time, correct? I remember when I was really like praying for God to bring me somebody, because I'm tired of being alone, because in my world I truly was alone, I had no family. And so I remember God impressing upon me one day, just like you may be ready, but he might not be, yeah, have you prayed for him. And I'm like, dang it, yeah, I'm going to take that step back. I'm just like, okay, it's not going to be right now, but I was ready and able to receive that. Not all of us are there because we have to grieve what we thought we were going to have at this age.
Speaker 3:I know some people put Angel as, by the time I'm 25, I'm going to be married and have two kids, and so sometimes we have to grieve that dream. That's another grieving.
Speaker 2:It is and that like, yeah, taking out what we thought it was going to look like, because sometimes I've seen horrible marriages end and when you talk to the person they'll say you know, well, it was a horrible marriage. So it's not the person they're grieving, it's the idea that they had of what it should have been. You know that they're grieving, and when they can recognize that, it's so much easier to let it go. You said something I wanted to comment on, but I can't remember what it was. It was so good though, perry, it's just such an important conversation. What do you say to church people who are depressed and they can't seem to overcome their anxiety or depression? Because I think there is a lot of that and they just really really struggle with perpetual depression or perpetual anxiety. Yes, what is what's the spiritual bypass piece, and then what's the therapeutic piece?
Speaker 3:Yes, I think on ourselves we do, and that would probably be where I did a lot of spiritual bypass on myself in the area of depression, and that was I was been three or four hours studying my Bible and I would feel better after that three or four hours, only for it to last a day or two, and then I would be right back in the same space again and maybe I didn't learn enough of what God needed to teach me the first time and I need to do it again. Right, so I just kept doing this. I was using scripture, I was using Bible studies.
Speaker 3:I was using all these things, volunteering I would volunteer at the wazoo, and because I'm doing all these things right and I feel so much better, it will last. And it didn't. And I still found myself in a counselor's office. I still found myself in a counselor's office. I still found myself needing medication for my depression, and so I think sometimes that's what it can look like from ourselves, my research. There is some research by another individual, and I've forgotten the person's name, but they did research on how individuals in the church, many who suffer from mental illness, will leave the church because they're demonized.
Speaker 3:There's something wrong with you. You must have the demon of depression it's been named or mental illness. Well, that must be the devil. And none of that's true, I mean. Can it be true? Sure, but the majority, I would say is that you're just struggling. You're wired differently. We know this now. Neurobiology has taught us this. Sometimes our brain just doesn't release as much serotonin as somebody else's, Somebody. You know, the events that happen in our life, especially if they're a zero to three time, impact our attachment and it just simply impacts the wiring of our brain and we struggle with depression right when we come in with the church factor, and I saw it down to myself. I even did it of just you know here. Read this book. Remember Job suffered as well, and then God gave him two faults. That does not help somebody over their suffering.
Speaker 2:You know, I know that now I didn't then right.
Speaker 3:So I thought I was doing something good and I, like you, if I could go back and talk to those people, that conversation would be much different. And so sometimes, again, those giving that spiritual bypass often mean well, but what they're doing is they're not validating the individual and again that condemnation comes out, that guilt, that false guilt comes up. Right, right, just do more than maybe it'll go away. That's not necessarily true in the therapeutic process. It just depends. As you know, you deal with trauma and are there things in your life that have not been dealt with and we may have to work through that and we see some of that depression live. Sometimes we just have a chemical imbalance and we have to work through that.
Speaker 3:One thing I run up against is often Christians are skeptical of taking medication because they feel that that's a lack of faith. Right, and that is not a lack of faith. That is just simply God gave us that medicine. That medicine is on this planet for a reason. It is not a lack of faith, that is just simply God gave us that medicine. That medicine is on this planet for a reason. It's not a lack of faith, it simply says I need more help, and God honors us asking for help, and so he's given us tools here on this earth to be able to have the help that we need to Now.
Speaker 3:We don't want medicine to be a crutch. We may still have to work through the things and incorporate skills that we need to now. We don't want medicine to be a crutch. We may still have to work through the things and incorporate right skills that we need, and that's part of the therapeutic process that you know, when we find ourselves in a panic, panic attack, I don't necessarily always need to go reach for the hardcore medicine. Maybe I need to practice my calming skills first before I reach for the medication on there right right but when we have, when we have to see it, we're not sinning.
Speaker 2:Right and I want to clarify a little bit for the audience about depression because I think that it does show up in different forms. So there is physiological depression. That's what Perry's talking about. The chemical imbalance Our body's wired. If you're going through any sort of hormonal changes or thyroid issues or anything like that can just create havoc physiologically and a medical doctor can usually run those tests and give you some clarification.
Speaker 2:There's also circumstantial depression. When you're going through a situation that is absolutely difficult, you're going to go through a natural process of circumstantial depression and ideally behind both of those is there's going to be a solution for that. And then there is spiritual oppression that is on the outside of you and to me the way I think I can distinguish that best is when it's a little irrational, when I've had people come into my office and they're like man, I'm just depressed, I'm just sad, I want to sleep all the time, but they can't really identify any real reason why they just feel this heaviness and many of them will describe it as I just feel like there's a wet blanket on me or I feel like there's this dark shadow. So there really is a spiritual oppression and that does really. You can speak to that and tell it to leave, if you can discern it, if you can recognize it. And so we do often confuse all of those things in a church environment.
Speaker 2:Just because you know, I don't know why church environments are so black and white either. Or it's either this, or it's this, or it's a sin, or it's you know godly, or it's you know godly because faith is so ambiguous. Faith is not always clear, you know, and so it's just a trust in God, and so things are not always so black and white. But I just wanted to clarify that, because I think that, you know, people do struggle with a lot of condemnation and guilt around, having anxiety and depression, and sometimes, if you can give yourself permission to think it through and maybe work through it and get into some self-discovery, you can maybe answer some basic questions. That would lead you to the next answer.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we got to feel it to heal it. So if we don't feel those things, if we keep trying to bypass them, we're going to also bypass our healing. That's not what we're going for right.
Speaker 3:So you know one of the things, that and this was often a verse that was used, interestingly enough, from a lot of families toward a child, and that would be, you know, cast your cares on him. Do I believe that? Do I believe, matthew? You know when he says, or when Jesus says come to me all who are weary and I will give you rest? Yes, I do, and, however, also know that I might still be struggling with anxiety, I might still struggle with depression because of these things. And two, if there is a spiritual oppression, if we even and I'm going to say this, and if I don't clarify it enough, by all means, kathy, you do that so well is we can sometimes bring that upon ourselves by the decisions that we're making, right?
Speaker 2:Or what we're watching or entertaining.
Speaker 3:Yes and so sometimes I really may have to shift that. That is within my power to do. To change. Yes, to do that, but the enemy's good at what he does. He doesn't run around with a pitchfork in his red suit. Right, it's going to be subtle.
Speaker 3:It's going to be under the radar. The next thing you know we're struggling, but also know that sometimes we can name it all day long and it's still something we need help with, we need the help of talking with someone. We may need help with medication. We can cry out to God. You see it all throughout the Psalms. David did it that if Paul had a thorn in his flesh that he struggled with, that God did not bring healing to.
Speaker 2:We may have that as well, and so whether that I don't think that God looks at us and goes, I'm just going to slap depression on you for the rest of your life, and you're never but we also have to recognize that that may be something we struggle, that may be what we have to endure sometimes because we live in this world that produces some of those things right, and I think you know there's. The bible says that wisdom is found in the, in the house of mourning, and there's so many great things about sorrow that produces wisdom. And there's seasons of life, and so sometimes just recognizing a season that someone could be in is helpful too, so that it's not just without purpose. But I think one thing that people do with spiritual bypass is they just accept it. As you know, I'm not good enough, I'm not doing enough, or God's never going to answer, or this must be the thorn in my flesh and they stop and they quit, they get, they give up, they give up their faith, they give up believing that God's going to take care of it, they give up and they just settle in and it begins to own them.
Speaker 2:And I think that is such. You know, we see that for sure in the church because we have a biblical answer for it. But I don't think God ever meant for us to just take on those things, especially if it's hindering our joy and peace which, as fruit bearers we're supposed to have, so things that can be very convoluted in a biblical context. We have to rightly divide the word as a whole and not take all these things out of order. So another thing I see in church culture and I don't think it's you know, I think some, maybe more than others, but obesity. Do you have any thoughts about that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, it all depends. Of course, there could be varied reasons for why obesity occurs, and so I think there has to be that medical piece that we look at, and the thyroid and those different things Do I believe that? You know, god tells us do not be gluttonous. I mean, that's one of the things, and that sin of gluttony, I guess you would say, can be anything. It's not just food, it could be the TikTok videos we watch all day long. That could be a maraud of things. So I think what we want to do, though, is recognize that God has created his temple within us, right?
Speaker 3:So, we reflect that Also being able to do our best that we can with what we've been given. So we want to have a healthy relationship with food or with drink or with whatever it is, and be able to hold space again for when something is happening outside of that. So if you take, for instance, eating disorders and I tell often people this we don't have a DSM, which is our diagnostic manual that every counselor and psychiatrist has it gives us, you know, these wonderful names for the things that you know we put on depression, persistent depression, dysthymia, all these different language things, and so if I open that up, nowhere in there does somebody go. And so if I open that up, nowhere in there does somebody go. I am so glad that I have depression today. It is so great Nobody does that. We have been through things that have led us to this place a lot of times of having this. So you take, for instance, personality disorders. Nobody wakes up saying it's a great day to be a narcissist until they're full-blown.
Speaker 3:They may enjoy the power that comes with that, but something in oh my gosh. Oprah Winfrey wrote what Happened to you, and I just forgot the famous guy's name on there.
Speaker 3:I know what you're talking about, yes, what happened to you? And so when I'm working with somebody, even with eating disorders, nobody wakes up wanting to have bulimia or have anorexia or have, necessarily, obesity. What is going on in that person's life that has led them there? Like I said, it could be medical, it could be a thyroid, it could be a child who endured cancer, and now this is the outcome of the cancer. Eating disorders we often know is a response to trauma, right? So sometimes it is a response to trauma, and so this is the only thing I could control, and by golly, I'm taking control of it. What we have to do again in the therapeutic process is be able to tease that out Trauma is like gum and hair.
Speaker 3:It just grabs a hold of it.
Speaker 2:That's a great analogy.
Speaker 3:We are sitting here as therapists and the client trying to tease out what is what, and sometimes it takes a hot minute. If you've ever gotten bubble gum in your hair, because here in the South we chew a lot of gum I haven't known too many people who haven't gotten bubble gum in their hair. It is hard to get out, it takes a lot of effort.
Speaker 3:The same thing is with the healing process, and so I would probably say the same thing is true in struggling with obesity. We have to look at really what is the reason of the obesity, and then, working with a therapist, how can we work together to provide the best care for this person, whatever that struggle may be?
Speaker 2:And I guess I'm so glad you said that, because when I see obesity, when it's very overt, my first instinct is trauma, you know, and it's because it has been used as a coping mechanism for so many and a defense mechanism to keep people away. And so I think about spiritual bypassing as, okay, you know, god's just fixed this, I don't have to deal with it. And so there's just unhealed trauma and stuff that's never really getting addressed and it's showing up in this way. And yes, obviously, because I'm not trying to speak negative about trauma, I'm just saying that is often a red flag that there is something that still needs to be healed, and I believe God wants to heal the heart.
Speaker 2:And so when we don't allow him into that space, because a lot of people come into church culture and they just start abiding by the do's and don'ts I'm going to start going to church every Sunday, I'm going to go to Bible study, maybe I'm going to go to a prayer group and I feel better. So it's fixing their emotions often, but it's not fixing their history or doing the deep, deep work of healing that God really wants to restore and redeem all of those places. So that's how I see it when I see that in the churches that maybe we've bypassed the need for overall restoration, not just salvific, not just salvation, not just okay, I found the Lord, I'm saved, I'm going to go to heaven.
Speaker 3:God is so much more than that, you know, and I feel like that's where my heart is. I want to see, I want to see the deep wounds of the heart be healed by the Lord, if we can just learn to look at those things. Yes, yes.
Speaker 2:Absolutely yeah. Let me see if I have other questions. Let's see, I feel like there's yeah, there's two pages here, so I think you've talked about one of them praying it away.
Speaker 2:You know, if I just pray it away, that's, you know, works Over-spiritualizing everything. Spiritual warfare, which I'm a huge spiritual warfare person, I tend to see through that lens quite a bit. But I also have the practical piece, I think, from the therapeutic practice. But there is a lot of over-spiritualizing things also in a spiritual bypass way. Are you seeing that much? I don't know what church culture you come from. What is your church? Is it Baptist, southern Baptist?
Speaker 3:I was well, I say, raised. I wasn't raised in the church, but yes, I'm probably more associated with Baptist. I work non-denominational more now. But yes, the over-spiritualization piece, that's a lot of what people come in with Because again, they've been spiritually bypassing themselves or someone else has put a spin on everything to be spiritual. That may not be, and so all they know is this over-spiritualization. I don't know if y'all know who Michael Jr is, but he's a comedian and a Christian comedian and he talks about being over-saved and he uses this idea of, like you know, can't find my keys, oh, the keys to the kingdom. And you know, everything is super spiritualized.
Speaker 2:That would be hilarious.
Speaker 3:That was so funny because we know people like that right, and I don't think of course you know a person's relationship with Christ. That's their relationship. I could not speak into their relationship. If somebody asked me about it. I might be able to say this is what I see, but ultimately that's between them and God and I. That is not, that's their business and I'm not invited into it. God will do in them what needs to be done.
Speaker 3:But I think over-spiritualization again is a defense mechanism. It is and let's know this the studies by Jesse Fox, who did the spiritual bypass scale and his research on validating that scale is and it is on how we do it to ourselves. He found that oftentimes that people will use this spiritualization again as a minute coping skill. So in small amounts, when I am in my initial stages of grieving, for instance, I may use spiritual bypass and for a very small bit that may be okay. When we prolong it, we're getting into a maladaptive, a defense mechanism. Now, the way I define defense mechanism is a knee-jerk reaction. That's just what my body does, that's what I was raised to do and that's what I'm going to go for. What we want to do is really implement coping skills. So over-spiritualization sometimes becomes that defense mechanism.
Speaker 3:Because we were raised, you just got to pray about it. There was a saying I got in high school and I still remember this. I just had it ingrained in my brain and it's so not healthy. It's pray, believe and receive, or pray, doubt and do without. But the unhealthiness in that is God allows me to doubt. He allowed Thomas to doubt. He allows us the space to be human. Yes, when we believe and we are able to receive God's goodness, it's good. But that doesn't mean we're going to go without. When we doubt, it just means that we're going to get to know God for who God is and be able to see he's not always a slot machine. So sometimes we are going to go without on there. So sometimes that over spiritualization can lead us to that place, like if I just pray more, if I just. There's a saying out there faith over fear. No, it's not faith over fear, it's faith and fear Right, yes, yes.
Speaker 3:And so these are quotes I have to dispute often, because these people are coming in with this and they're over spiritualizing their pain, like if I just pray about it more, if I just do this and I was told growing up that if I just pray about it, if I just read more scripture, if I just do more Bible studies, if I, if I, if I then this will get better. And here they are at 30 years old and it's not better.
Speaker 2:Right right.
Speaker 3:Over spiritualizing isn't going to make it better. Adding more Jesus over something just isn't always going to make it better. We know this. With salt. I can salt my food a little bit. It might make it taste good, but if I pour the whole thing on it's not edible anymore. We can't just keep pouring on and heaping spiritual, hoping for something different. We can't just keep pouring on and heaping spiritual, hoping for something different.
Speaker 3:This is where we have to be active in our healing, spiritually, mentally, physically, emotionally on there and being able to say okay. The scripture says do not fear, but fear is an emotion. Jesus expressed that in the Garden of Gethsemane when he said let cup be passed for me, if possible, right, right. But he knew it couldn't be. He knew that the ultimate. Because he loved us enough, he was willing to endure the cross so that we could have ultimate salvation.
Speaker 3:So I think that's how we kind of see that, and so the therapeutic process is going to be. You're going to see, possibly, a therapist kind of challenge that belief system through a Socratic method, as we discussed earlier, or just saying, hey, I hear you and I know that your faith is important to you. How can we also see that when you were saying do not be anxious for anything? Do you see people in scripture that were anxious?
Speaker 2:Of course we do, and how, and I knowing that god was still with them even in their anxiety so I think, if we clarify doubt because I could just imagine the religious people out there you know saying well, thomas said lord, believe, help my unbelief, which he did. But I think doubt, what God doesn't like about doubt is doubt is doubting that God can or that God will. There's so many times I went to the Lord and I just wept and bawled and just said, lord, I'm so scared and I'm not scared that things aren't going to be okay. I know that God, my faith is completely in God, but the humanity in me, the process of what's going to happen between where I'm at now and what I know, god has already spoken to me or already showed me. So my doubt is never that God is able, god is capable, and that whatever comes is going to be good, ultimately, be good ultimately, even if it's bad, it's going to be good and I will, somewhere along the line, understand and be able to love God in spite of it.
Speaker 2:But the fear, or the being scared or the doubting is often. You know what's this going to look like? Am I actually really strong enough to to deal with what might become me my way? Am I? I am alone in this world and that weightiness of that gets very heavy, you know, and so I think that we have to. Really. One thing that I really love about therapy is we really do clarify what we're saying. Communication and the words we use are so important that we know what we're saying and we know what we're talking about and we're not just taking something out of context. But our faith is always in God, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to fear.
Speaker 2:I'm going to trust him, I'm not going to fear. I'm going to trust him, but I'm going to fear. You know what's life going to look like now? It's so uncertain, but I'm at peace at the same exact time. And so I think it's what you said being able to hold them both and people. Just, I think if more Christian culture was willing to have conversation or just think for themselves, they could finally maybe get to some different ideas about these long-held automatic belief systems that they've never really looked at. My parents taught me this, their parents taught them that, and, bless God, this is what I believe. But why Look at it.
Speaker 2:And not that we need to challenge. I think it goes back to knowing myself. I often I've said this before, I don't know if I've said on my podcast, but for years I would go to the grocery store and I'd pick up Oprah Winfrey's magazine. I wouldn't look at anything else but the back page Because on the back page she wrote an article, said what I know for sure and every, every magazine had what she, what she learned, that she could prove that she knew for sure.
Speaker 2:And I keep lists in my phone what I know for sure about me, what I know for sure about God. Because when the enemy comes in like a flood, like the Bible says he's going to do, he's going to challenge us in our mind, he's going to challenge us in our beliefs. And if I don't really know what I believe, if I don't know what my Bible says, if I don't know what my pastor said this but do I really own that in my own belief? If I don't know myself, I'm going to be-washy and I and there's room for the enemy to come work against me and create doubt and instability. So I see, I see it all as a way of really getting grounded in who we are what we know for sure, how we know that God moves what we have experienced in his goodness in our life you know, because the bypass piece it's just so easy to do in a Christian culture.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so so I I want to have you back to I told you this in the email but I want to have you back to kind of tweeze out religious abuse.
Speaker 2:That also can seem very like we're just casting stones and I will never cast stones, but I want people to have a really good definition so that they could ask questions and, ultimately, so that they can heal. You know, because because it can occur so easily without intention, um, but it does occur also with intention and um, and I I want to be able to give some really good descriptive around that. And so I'm saying that now on the end of this podcast, because I I want the viewers to be able to write in and ask some questions. What questions would you, what questions would you have for Perry about spiritual bypass and what questions would you have about religious abuse, so that when we do do our episode on religious abuse, we can maybe address those Um. So, as we close close, what would you say to the Christian out there who has maybe lived a life of spiritual bypassing and is now hearing this might be going, oh, light bulb moment. What would you say to them you know, to come back home.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I would definitely say you know that everything that you have gone through or experienced, that, it is your experience. Nobody can take your experience from you. And you are still loved, you are still redeemed, you, like everybody else that jesus died for, for god, so loved the world that he gave us only the godless son, um, and his redemption is ever flowing, and so you don't have to live alone, spiritually specifically, anymore, um, you know, as the old hymn says, come home, come home. Yeah, your jesus awaits you. Um, man is going to fail, because that's what we do sometimes, but overall, just being able to recognize that jesus won he is here for you.
Speaker 3:He's going to hold space for you and he's going to love you through every part of your journey.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and he will use it for good. I mean, I have had a crazy life. I've said I've had like five lives. I feel like and I sit in my chair and I think to myself. And I sit in my chair and I think to myself. I have no business. Being able to speak into the lives of people and being a therapist with the history that I have, other than God has just 1,000% redeemed my story and made something new of my life. His mercies are in the morning and that's who he is. He is not all of the horrible stuff some people do experience in religious context. Yes, yeah, well, perry, any last parting words before I let you go.
Speaker 3:No, just thank you so much for the opportunity to do this. I am a believer in the more we get the information out there, the more we have an opportunity to stop the act of spiritual bypass, whether we are doing it to ourselves or we're doing it to someone else or we're receiving it for someone else. So you know, thank you so much for the opportunity to share about spiritual bypass on there and, again, if anybody has any questions, feel free to you know. Thank you so much for the opportunity to share about spiritual bypass on there and, again, if anybody has any questions, feel free to send those to Kathy. You can also check out my website, paradoxreadcom, and I guess you'll have that in your show notes maybe.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'll put that in my show notes for sure, and it has my dissertation on there, as well as some articles and different things, that if people are more interested in spiritual abuse or spiritual bypass, these are things that they can read, whether they be articles, podcasts, anything like that.
Speaker 2:And do you do any training for clergy pastors? I mean, I feel like I wonder if I don't know how receptive pastors would be to kind of you know, doing a workshop or anything. Do you do anything like that for leadership?
Speaker 3:I do, matter of fact, I just did one from the American Association of Christian Counselors on spiritual abuse, overcoming spiritual abuse, but also, you know, the incorporation of spiritual bypass in that, and it was for clergy, clinicians and coaches. I also have written some articles. Of course, counseling today, that again was more for the therapist or for anyone that works, whether that be the pastor or so forth. So, yes, do um the presentations on that. Again, it's this topic of which I'm very passionate about, because people, I think if we're not careful, spiritual bypass can be again a bypass to the healing and that's not what we're going for right, right, complete healing yes yes, okay, I will put your website, stuff everything down in the description and hopefully move this forward a little bit, okay.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you so much, perry. I'll reach out for the second episode. I really, really appreciate you doing this Absolutely.
Speaker 3:It's great to see you. Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2:Okay, we'll see you soon. All right, bye-bye, bye, bye.
Speaker 1:We are so glad you joined us. If you have a story of redemption or have worn the label of a backslider, we would love to hear from you. If you'd like to support our ministry, your donation will be tax deductible. Visit our website at theredeemedbacksliderorg. We hope you will tune in for our next episode.
