Our Stories - I Will NOT Be 'Left Behind'
I want to start off with a brief summary of my background. I was born and raised in "The Message", I was a 2nd Generation "Believer". I had a sheltered life growing up, even though we still interacted with "The World", my family’s life evolved around the church. Both sides of my family are/were in "The Message" and several have/had positions in the "hierarchy" within the church I grew up in. There are many things I can discuss but there is one topic I want to talk about because it affected me most in my walk with God, which was the fear of being "Left Behind".
I want to start off with a brief summary of my background. I was born and raised in "The Message", I was a 2nd Generation "Believer". I had a sheltered life growing up, even though we still interacted with "The World", my family’s life evolved around the church. Both sides of my family are/were in "The Message" and several have/had positions in the "hierarchy" within the church I grew up in. There are many things I can discuss but there is one topic I want to talk about because it affected me most in my walk with God, which was the fear of being "Left Behind".
For those of you who joined "The Message" or grew up in it, we all know of William Branham’s teachings of the Rapture. "The elected seed" that is "predestinated" will escape God's wrath and leave everyone else to face judgment God will put upon the earth. Even if the sermon topic was not focused on the Rapture, there would always be at least one reference to it or some reference to a recent event that ultimately brings the line of thought back to the Rapture. You couldn’t escape it, it was ALWAYS there, always discussed or if not spoken about, thought of.
When I was a kid, my parents let me watch the Left Behind Movies with Kirk Cameron, of course my parent would "correct" all the teachings in the movie that did not follow William Branham’s point of view. But it was a fear that soon made its way into my mind at a young age and infected me. I remember one Sunday; a minister showed the congregation a video to "give a glimpse of what the Rapture will be like". In the video, it showed a Sunday congregation during worship service, then suddenly everyone except a few disappeared "in the twinkling of an eye". "The foolish virgins" immediately went to their knees shocked, sobbing, crying out for mercy, and then the video repeated. After the video finished, the sermon continued with careful warnings of which group you were in. If you didn’t "believe the Message and the Messenger for your day", you will be left on the earth to face the "consequences". I was 11 in 2007 when Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were debating for the Democratic nomination and after church as girls, we would often say to one another, "I want to AT LEAST get married before the Rapture happens". It was a very stressful time for us then because if a women became President, "the Rapture is right around the corner" and we wanted to experience what it was like to be in love. Then Barack Obama was chosen as the leader, and we girls sighed a breath of relief. It turned into full-blown paranoia. I didn’t think I would make it to age 16, then age 18, then 21, then 23, and now here I am. Whenever I was in our house, and there was noise in another room and then it fell silent for a few seconds, I fell into a quick panic, "did the Rapture happen?" "Did I get left behind?”. When I went out anywhere with my family and they wandered off to another aisle or somewhere close where I couldn’t see them, I went into a mental panic. It turned into a daily habit to apologize to God, beating myself up mentally all the time. Repenting out of fear that if the Rapture were to happen any day "I would be washed clean" before then and be a part of it. I always "accepted and believed" what was being preached even if I didn’t understand it because I wanted to "please" God and I wanted Him to remember me when He called "His elect" home. I didn’t want to be abandoned; I didn’t want to be forgotten. Whenever something bad happened on the news, I would hear, "the Rapture is close", "this world is gone", "It won’t be long now". I grew up believing my purpose here on earth was to be raptured or if I wasn’t then I would be in the Tribulation. I wanted to be one of the "chosen ones" who God put on the earth to "display his bride" and possibly witness to "the last person" before God decides to "take us out of here".
The level of perfection to strive for was so great. Everything is so complex.
Fast forward, it feels like a dream; I still can’t wrap my head around the fact that I grew up in a Cult. When I say the word Cult, it feels so weird. I struggle with the outlook of living my life. I still battle mentally of "will I die of old age?", "will I have the privilege of living out my life?". There are so many terrible events in the world, and it strikes that fear.
I won’t give up on God. William Branham took a lot of things away from me, but I refuse to let him rob me of my desire to understand God's love in the process of leaving his "Message". I choose to believe God understands my healing process, He knows, He’s compassionate, He’s gentle, He wants me to enjoy my life, and there’s a reason why I’m here. He knows I love Him and I’m trying and that’s all that matters.
-Anonymous