Last month marked 3 years since my wife and I walked away from Healing Place Church. I knew that I would eventually need to tell my story before I could truly move on from it. This turned out to be challenging, at times painful, but ultimately a cathartic process. Most of the memories that would keep me up at night have now been shared. I could continue to reveal more, but doing so wouldn't serve much purpose and would most likely devolve into pure mudslinging.
People's reactions to my blog posts have been very interesting. I've had amazing phone calls, private messages and public encounters with people from whom I never would have expected support. For this I am very grateful. If I judged how I was being received solely by the lack of engagement here and on social media, I'd think I was being completely ignored. The truth is, my site metrics tell a different story. Geographic data alone suggest that this series has been read by a wide and varied audience, including the public figures I've mentioned or alluded to herein.
Naturally, a lot has happened in the aftermath of the HPC saga, and my life is different now. Immediately upon leaving HPC, my wife and I were recruited into another ministry where we continue to experience love, community and healing. My new church family has been surprisingly gracious as I've worked out my issues, even as I've spoken publicly about the wounds I suffered in ministry. I will say that my new home has not been without it's problems. I came to it still raw and reeling from my experiences at HPC. Issues have certainly come up. However, I'm happy to report that, through a commitment to one another, we have risen above any turbulence and are now better for it.
My wife and I were able to conceive our first child within 30 days after we left Healing Place, ending a long and difficult battle with infertility. Today our daughter is healthy, beautiful and exuberant. Lucrative opportunities have come along, allowing me to save up enough cash to transition into a career that reflects my passions and strengths. My fledgling photo/video business, along with this blog and my musical activities are bringing me closer to what I've always wanted to do with my life. I am, again, very grateful. That's not to say I don't still dream of Hollywood. To quote John Connor:
"The future has not been written. No fate but what we make."
Speaking of which, I am also a huge fan of the Lord of the Rings film franchise, and I sort of feel like Frodo at the end of Return of the King. He finishes writing "There and Back Again" and "The Lord of the Rings" before sailing to the Undying Lands. During that closing sequence, Frodo refers to the wound he suffered as a part of the Fellowship:
"It's been four years to the day since Weathertop, Sam. It's never really healed."
I don't want that as my fate, because I'd like to believe that I can heal and move on. I don't want to live the rest of my life in the shadows of past hurt. Somehow, I'm not worried. I had to heal a good bit before I could even write effectively and tell my story. Then, after getting it down and sharing it, a much deeper level of healing came about. I value this newfound lightness, having unburdened myself of all this emotional baggage. This new life came at a cost, though.
A couple of years after I left HPC, there were guys from my old team who reached out to me. It seems that they wanted to preserve our friendship, and so we started to hang out again. The problems we'd had were with our leadership, not one another. So, naturally, we fell right back into our old rhythms as if nothing had ever happened. Unfortunately, as soon as I made my first blog post, they all completely dropped me. No more lunches, no more communication, nothing.
Just as I had received acknowledgment and support from some very unlikely places, it seems there were yet those who could not stand by me through this. I don't know the individual reasons why some people pulled away from me, but I just offer them forgiveness and move on. Along those lines, a little about what to expect from Corey's Stories moving forward:
- Shorter posts
- Lighter and more varied content
- Perhaps a monthly or bi-monthly routine
- VIDEOS
Thanks to all of you who have maintained an interest in reading about my experiences. I look forward to those coffees and lunches, which are long overdue. If I've never said it, I really hope that learning about my experiences will help people use more caution when putting their lives in the hands of other men. We're all woefully under qualified to wield the type of power that church leaders often possess. Be wise and discerning. Be kind to each other. Until next time.