An Experience From The Pages Of My Life
Once upon a time, I believed myself to be “friends” with a group of people who were part of a praise and worship team at a church I attended long ago. Frankly, though, I was only friends with one person in the group, and that person was the leader of the group. That person was also the praise and worship leader.
The friendship came about because this person was in pursuit of me. It was during the time I had recently begun attending that specific church, and the narcissistic pastor (who I was unaware was actually narcissistic) was placing select members on a pedestal to tell their testimonies. I was one of those select members because the story of how I came to be in the area was nothing short of God’s gracious miracle for me.
In retrospect, I realize that I only became of interest to the praise and worship leader because of my place on the pastor’s pedestal. Being on the pedestal placed me at a spiritual vantage point and made me an unintended (or perhaps intended) target. Thus, this praise and worship leader wanted access to me via their proximity of me and what they believe I could add to their image. Being close to me meant that they would also reap the benefits of keeping themselves on the pastor’s pedestal too.
There was no other real interest that this praise and worship leader seemingly had in me outside of their personal agenda. In fact, I’d been in their presence many times prior to attending this church at another fellowship without them ever showing any interest in me whatsoever. So, I deduced from the lack of our previous interactions that we had absolutely nothing in common. Not to mention, I wasn’t feeling this person at all and had no interest in establishing a connection with them despite their persistence.
This praise and worship leader’s persistence to be my friend was so obvious to a friend of mine that the friend encouraged me to open myself up to the possibilities to get to know the praise and worship leader. To be honest, I was a little confused by the praise and worship leader’s behavior towards. This is why I blew them off when they seemed to be pursuing me. Specifically, their behavior ran hot and cold. I would sometimes see them, and they would look right through me – never smiling and never uttering a kind word to me at all.
Originally, I’d met the praise and worship leader through a women’s ministry they were a part of outside of the church. When I tried introducing myself to them, this praise and worship leader was cold towards me and seemingly even unfriendly. So, I figured from that exchange that we simply didn’t mesh. Any conversation I attempted to have with them at other times was always met with their disdain. So, I decided not to further pursue any interactions with them.
Now that I look back upon that time in my life, I realize that I already had reservations about this praise and worship leader, but since I was attempting to be a “good Christian”, I didn’t want to be thought of as unkind or ungodly. So, instead of heeding my own intuition, which felt checked by this praise and worship leader for some reason, I let my guard down and opened the door to them as a potential friend.
BIG, BIG MISTAKE!!!!!
Over time, I did become a very good friend to the praise and worship leader, but the friendship was rocky because this praise and worship leader is a narcissist, or at least their behaviors towards me and others would be considered highly narcissistic (times 100). This praise and worship leader was only a good friend to me in theory. They only did friendliness as it benefited them because all they cared about was their public image.
Deep down, this praise and worship leader actually hated me, but they spent months cultivating the façade of friendship with me. Ultimately, I was fooled and reeled into believing there was a friendship. We hung out a lot, but despite all the time I spent getting to know them, they never cared to truly get to know me. In fact, the friendship was merely one-sided, but at the time, I had not recognized this aspect at all. I simply figured that nothing about my life was all that interesting anyway since recovering from abuse wasn’t considered by many in the church to be a real testimony if I was still recovering.
Needless to say, a so-called friendship was established between this praise and worship leader and me, and I was devoted – so devoted that I ignored all the red flags of narcissistic abuse that they delved out against me. In essence, this person could be mean and ruthless and everything had to be their way. They presented the face of a godly person on church platforms, but behind the scenes, they were nothing more than an egotistical, arrogant, and mean person. Nothing I did was ever pleasing to them no matter how good of a friend to them I attempted to be.
This praise and worship leader had no tolerance for what they considered to be my weird traits even though those weird traits that bothered them were actually my autistic traits. They couldn’t stand that I was introverted and needed to spend an ample amount of time alone. They couldn’t stand that I froze into mutism around crowds. In fact, they often set me up to be ridiculed by others because they saw these traits about me as weaknesses. Then, they’d sit back and watch with a smirk of amusement on their face as I suffered in silence.
Despite knowing that I hated being hemmed into situations, this praise and worship leader would often invite me to outings and insist that I ride along with them. This way, I’d have no way to leave when they decided to disappear within the crowd – leaving me stranded and alone. This happened enough times that I actually stopped traveling with them anywhere. The worst instance was when I went with them to a couple’s home only to be made fun of and ridiculed for things beyond my control, such as my selective mutism.
There were enough times that I was hemmed in this way that I began to realize that this praise and worship leader would purposefully arrange these situations just to watch me squirm. I caught them a number of times smiling devilishly with a narcissistic smirk that I’d have to go home and replay exactly what I saw and what I experienced with them. There were, in fact, other times that they didn’t even try to hide their disdain for me. I’d actually hear them say things out loud but underneath their breath about me as if I couldn’t hear them. It was gaslighting at best so that if I did question what I was hearing, they’d quickly say that I was hearing things even though I could both see and hear them.
After enough of this abusive behavior, I’d had enough and eventually walked away when I left that particular church. Prior to doing so, however, I grieved over this person because I realized they’d never change despite them being a Christian. I grieved what I wished there could have been but never was in the so-called friendship. I knew the truth, though. This praise and worship leader hated me. Their hate was so intense for me that there’d be times I’d catch them staring a deadly stare into my soul. It was demonic to the core.
After a few years of distance from that church, I ran into this praise and worship leader out and about. I felt absolutely nothing. I knew that within myself the ties between us had been severed on my end, and I no longer had a trauma bond of attachment to this person. They called out to me, and I remember hearing them but not responding. I had nothing to say. My part of the relationship was over. I wasn’t bitter. I was just done.
Some years after this, this praise and worship leader reached out to me on social media. We had a small conversation about getting together, but deep down, I had absolutely no desire to reconnect. They reached out again to solidify a meeting, but I did not respond. I was done. I didn’t want to revisit. I didn’t want to reconnect. I didn’t want anything.
For all that occurred against me from this praise and worship leader, there was never an acknowledgement of wrongs done against me. Although I apologized for how things ended regarding my disconnections from the church, this praise and worship leader acknowledged nothing. They never considered they were wrong about anything, but I also knew that knew that nothing had changed with them based on the content of their social media posts. If things had changed, there’d never be any admitting to me that anything was wrong. So, I let it go.
I let the praise and worship leader go. I moved on with my life. I shut the door. I gave myself the closure I needed to move on, and I have no regrets. All that I would ever have to claim from that connection was a grave time of devaluation against me. If I had continued on in that so-called friendship, that devaluation cycle would have only continued and even worsened. It was to my advantage to move on and heal. So I did.
My Voice Unchained 