How I Left the Oneness Movement/UPC

This is my story on how I finally left the Oneness movement/UPC.

I had attended a church in Texas for nearly nine years. When the pastor was killed I stayed for nearly two years under the new pastor but his attitude was horrendous.

He was wanting to build a new church so he was trying to drain the people financially. He would make examples of you if you did not or could not contribute money to his causes. He expected the people to pay 5% offerings besides the 10% tithe. The problem with this was the former pastor put 65% or more of the tithe along with offerings into the church. This man did not. He kept 90% of the tithe and lived beyond what he should have. The church never had a paid secretary and he brought one in and paid her an astronomical salary. The woman was wealthy in her own rights and had much land in another state and this was too much of a drain on the people. Many people started leaving. I, too, felt the need to leave so I left.

I moved to Louisiana and met some UPC people and began to visit a local UPC church and for a few months I had a very rough experience with this church and its pastor. I moved to Sulphur, La to go back to an AMF church and this experience was as bad as Texas. So I moved back south and began visiting a church in another city in Louisiana.

Here I started finally to realize that nearly all Oneness churches are not what they seemed to be. I was asked to lead the choir and I did so. This church had not had a move of God in three years. Through my insistence of the choir having a prayer life God began to bless this church like never before. The Spirit really began to move. The church broke out into a powerful revival and we had people from all over South Louisiana coming from other UPC churches to hear the choir.

I found out the pastor had no plans to leave me as the choir and music director but was going to give his daughter the ministry when she came home in the summer time and then he would allow me to again lead after she went back to school. I did not feel this was right after all I had done to start a choir for this church. I stayed in Louisiana for a few more months and visited some other churches and all I found was a bunch of hypocrisy and dishonesty and right down morals breaking from the ministry to the laity.

I moved to Oklahoma and just quit going to any church. I prayed and read the Bible but I did not want to visit any churches. Of course I knew only the Oneness movement and after 10 years of that I could not make myself go to any other kind of church. I quit following any kind of dress standards but I never went into immorality or other forms of sinfulness. Yet during this time I was afraid of life. Fearful of dying lost. Could not sleep properly. I kept having fearful dreams of the churches I had been around. My life was miserable.

I moved to Lufkin, Texas which is the hotbed for UPC. Camp grounds, and about eight oneness churches there and probably about 35 in the surrounding areas in a 50 mile radius of Lufkin. I gave into my fears and started attending a church in Lufkin but I met some very close friends from the other Texas church who had moved to Zavalla, TX so I started going to the church there. I began singing in a trio and again was using my talents for God.

I became very ill with bronchitis in September of 1991 and I lost a Aunt who I was very close to on my mothers side and one of my Dad's sisters also passed away. I was still fighting bronchitis and missing church and when I called the Pastor to come pray for me. He said he would the next day and never showed up or called. After about a week I called his home again and his wife said he was not coming because it was 25 miles to where I lived and my mother and step dad were not Pentecostal and he did not feel comfortable coming there. Right there I said enough is enough. I moved to Fort Worth, TX and quit going to any church for eight years.

I prayed at times and read the Bible during those years and started seeing what I thought were errors in the Oneness teachings. Yet because of fear and anxiety of the standards that were beat into my head I lived in terrible misery. Nightmares. Fear constantly gripping me. Could not rest. Could not hold a job. Never got on drugs or never developed a drinking habit but my health rapidly went down hill. A terrible life to live for eight years.

In 1989 I had to go to Houston for training. I called a Pentecostal woman I knew who had been like a second mom to me and she talked me back into the UPC church. A few weeks later I lost my son at birth and this made me more determined than ever to become the dye in the wool UPC person. I began the ritual of following the standards again. I started going to a church but found myself miserable. I  became ill one day and when I asked the pastor to pray for me he told me he did not have the time so I left that church and went to another UPC church. The other reason I left there was because three children were supposed to have been taken care of by the Pastor and his wife because their mother had an psychotic episode and attacked their dad. Instead of keeping his word, he sent the children to the orphanage in Tupelo Mississippi illegally and the parents had to bring suit to get their children back. I could not accept that.

So again I go to another UPC church. The pastor asked me to help his wife with the choir and I became the main piano player. I began to do a lot of things for the church but I became sick again with bronchitis and because I missed eight services he gave the choir to someone else. (Four sundays) I accepted this and began doing other things for the church. I began cleaning the church and doing the tape ministry and running the church library. I kept playing the piano.

The pastor of this church taught a Oneness message but it was not along the normal lines UPC teaches on the Godhead and this began opening my eyes to the fact that the Oneness message as I had always been taught did not make sense.

When I took on writing articles for the church paper and people began telling me how much they blessed them the pastor became jealous and started tearing them up after I spent hours and hours on them. When I found out who was doing this I left for about two weeks. When I came back he had given all the things I had been doing to other people, even the piano playing. When I asked him why he lied to me.

I quit going there for about five months and during those months I spent hours in prayer and this is when the Lord started showing me about the truth on standards of Holiness. Not only that, he started opening me up to more truths on the Godhead etc.

I tried to go back to that church but I felt like an outsider and kept asking myself why had I even come back so I left once and for all from that church.

Another man, who had gone to that church for over 20 years, and I found a little Pentecostal church in the same city as the other one. We began to visit and the people were so loving and caring that we started attending there but I did not stay long because again the pastor taught certain standards. I left but kept finding myself going back for the fellowship. I thought what they taught on the Godhead matched what I now believed so I thought I could tolerate him teaching standards because this church allows people to grow slowly.

I found over the months that this group had some weird ideas and teachings on a lot of things. One of them was soul sleep and even though I had studied this before fear set in. Then they taught perfectionism so the fear became paranoia and for about four months I had such anxiety attacks, a fear of my salvation and eternity, and a strong fear of death- which I had never dealt with before- that all I wanted to do was to climb in the bed and pull the covers over me and stay there forever.

I quit going there and tried to go back to UPC but I just could not do it. I still fight these anxiety attacks at times. I still have a problem keeping a job because I find myself struggling with fears and lack of confidence and self worth. My self esteem is a constant struggle. My marriage is in trouble because of my erratic behavior patterns of fear of rejection. Not handling intimacy as far as wanting to hold her, etc. Having mood swings. Sometimes having to fight a persecution complex.

Every once in a while I have a twinge of guilt over the standards. Yet I know the Lord showed me how much of this was man  and not him. I keep trying to figure out why I had to experience all of this. If someone would ask me if I had suffered any form of abuse in life I would have to say yes. I have rarely had a decent nights sleep since 1979.

I believe God is trying to heal me. Now I need to find a church where there is no abuse and where I can use my talents for his glory but not have to suffer for using them.

If you want to use any of this for your web page please feel free to do so and if you want to share any of the experiences I have had with these groups over the years on your experience page feel free also.

Rick Guthrie

Posted July 20, 1999

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