I Lived in Condemnation for Years

I lived in a condemning household.

I was filled with shame and regret about the things that I did, the thoughts that I had, the feelings that I had felt.

Wow!

I cannot believe that today, I can write about the freedom which Christ Jesus has purchased for me, which man-made cults like AA try to take away.

My mother was so caught up in the AA cult, that she took my sister and me away from our father for a period of time.

She wanted to raise us rigorously, religiously in AA.

The nine months were really bad for me.

It was a terrible, painful time for me. I felt sad, miserable, depressed, pressed upon in many terrible ways.

For years I lived with so much shame because of what someone else told me.

The sin consciousness of one person brought me into great bondage.

Now that that person is gone from my life, but more importantly, now that I understand the fullness of all that Jesus has done for me by dying on the Cross.

I lived in condemnation for years, convinced that my sins were so great, that I could not confess them without going to jail or dying.

The shame, the pain from the shame, was so great.

When I began to walk in a newness of peace, I started to wonder -- why was it that I had no peace in my life. I have the Scriptures before me which declared: "You are justified by grace through faith."

Why, then, did I not believe?

The Ten Commandments were featured prominently in my home, but more importantly, those awful Twelve Steps imposed a perpetual sense of sin and shame.

And the person who continued to push it? My own mother, who was a stepper Mom. Very sad then, but I am glad now that the truth of the Gospel has set me free today!