Can you heal from church hurt by walking away from the church?
In the second episode of No One Finishes Alone, a four-part series on The Journey We Share, Inés Franklin answers that from the inside. She was seven when a nun shamed her for asking a question about God, and she stayed away from church community for thirty-three years afterward.
That is why she refuses to minimize your wound. It is also why she will not tell you that distance is the cure.
If you have ever asked:
- What does the Bible say about being hurt by the church?
- Should I leave a church that hurt me?
- How do I know whether a church is healthy?
- What is the difference between ordinary conflict and spiritual abuse?
- How do I forgive someone at church who hurt me?
This episode gives clear, Scripture-based answers.
Paul wrote to churches that were suing one another and getting drunk at the Lord’s table, and he kept calling them the body. To the Colossians, he wrote that we are to bear with one another and forgive one another, just as the Lord forgave us. To the Corinthians he gave the image of a jar of clay. The treasure of the gospel is carried in a cracked vessel, so that the extraordinary power belongs to God and not to us. The cracks are not a malfunction in the church. They are the condition every one of us arrived in.
Inés names her own part plainly. Fifteen years as a pastor, and a confession about the tone she did not mean to take and the names she cannot remember. She draws on Dallas Willard’s picture of the church as a hospital, staffed by people who are themselves in recovery and healing anyway, and on Jim Wilhoit’s idea of optimistic brokenness: believing Christ is at work in the person who just frustrated you, because you would want the same believed about you.
She is direct about the limit. Where there is abuse, leave, get away, and find professional help or wise counsel. Everywhere else, the friction is ordinary human nature, and leaning in is how a person grows.
You will also learn how to:
- Tell the difference between an imperfect person and an unsafe one
- Recognize the four marks of a healthy church
- Bear with someone without excusing harm
- Hold an optimistic view of another believer’s brokenness
- Name a wound honestly before God and ask him to lead you somewhere healthy
Whether you left a church years ago and never went back, or you are still in the room and quietly keeping everyone at arm’s length, this conversation offers a way forward that does not require pretending anything. The wound is real. It is not the end of your faith.
Scripture: Colossians 3:13 · 2 Corinthians 4:7 · Galatians 5:22–23 · Romans 5:8–10 · Matthew 22:37–39 (CSB)
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