spirit of legalism?

[shiroineko]

I met this woman several months ago at the gym, she would work out while I babysat her son in the same facility. Eventually we got to talking, and I found out she was saved, she shared her testimony with me.

As of recent months, however, I've been getting bad "vibes" being around her; I'm not sure why but I'm growing more and more uncomfortable around her, I sense a condemning spirit about her, and I prayed to God to show me what to do, whether I should distance myself from her or continue to share the Word with her (she said she was a newer Christian and did not have much knowledge of scripture), and so I continued to talk with her on the phone for a while about God and such. But lately I've been praying about her again and I'm feeling drawn to cutting ties with her, either permanently or for a while, can it be an okay thing to do that? has anyone ever had to do it?

I mean lately she's been kind of...well almost controlling, it seems like. She says things like "God is angry with you because you didn't go to church on Sunday" , with a threatening tone (this was only -one- Sunday, and I usually go to services Wed./Fri nights more so, but still), and this sent me home in tears, because I didn't think I did anything wrong. and my Pastor told me not to get caught up in arguments over the Sabbath (a group of Christian friends advised me not to receive her words also). The other day, I was there at the gym, and I was a bit weary (it was 8 am and I hadn't got much sleep the night before), and I happened to see her; she said hi to me, I did smile and say hi in return but I was in the middle of another conversation with someone else and didn't want to be rude...and she later comes up to me upset because I didn't seem all "excited" to see her, and I told her that I did smile and say hi and that I was still waking up and hadn't had coffee...but then she goes off on this whole long rant about me not acting godly and the whole gym having "bad energy" and everyone having Satan and so forth.....yeah, it was about all I could handle. =( I apologize for this long thread, but any spiritual advice on this matter would be greatly appreciated. Has anyone dealt with situations like this with other Christians?

[Mr. SmartyPants]

I imagine that her mindset is due to the way she was brought up in her own church or possibly influences from her parents and/or grandparents.

Of course, the basic rule here is to just continually love them.

[mechana2015]

I would cut ties.

A person like that is just going to end up causing you harm emotionally, using her "rules for being a good christian" as a swinging point. My impression is that in her world one has to be perfectly healthy, constantly cheerful and living in a church building to be acceptable, which is asinine. She probably did a lot more for the "bad energy" of the gym ranting off on you, than you did coming in a little groggy, and it would be to your best advantage, spiritually and mentally to back away unless you feel fully capable of taking her on in a drawn out battle of 'standards' which you most likely won't win.

[animewarrior]

I would keep praying for this person but I would cut ties with her. I have a non-christian "friend" was like that for a while. She just made you exhausted, mentally, physically and emotionally. And if this lady is seriously stressing you out then its better to cut ties. Even if she reacts badly keep praying. Just because the Pharisees (sp?) were cruel to Jesus that didn't mean he didn't pray for him but then again he didn't sit down for tea with them either. ^^ I'll pray for you.

[Mithrandir]

I was in a very similar situation. In my case, though, this person thought that her version of scripture was clearly right, and justified everything she ever wanted to do. Based on a lot of things, though, I just stopped returning her phone calls/emails. I severed all ties.

She was completely draining, and her spiteful lifestyle was totally dragging me down. I would advise you to continue to pray about this, but don't be afraid to distance yourself from her - ESPECIALLY if you EVER find yourself behaving in the ways you don't feel comfortable around!

[shiroineko]

thanks so much everyone...I'm leaning towards severing ties because it really is draining, but I'll definitely continue to pray for her.

[PigtailsJazz]

Have you talked to her directly about the situation? There's definitely a chance that that could do more harm than good, so it's certainly something to receive a lot of counsel on and do a lot of prayer about before acting, but I think that if God leads you to speak earnestly with her about how you are hurt by her actions, it may do good. If anything, if she isn't receptive to it, you would know that severing ties for a while would certainly be the best idea.

[termyt]

Young Christians often tend toward legalism. When we learn something new, we need to follow the instructions closely to avoid making mistakes. As we become more familiar with it – we get to know it, we no longer need the instruction manual and we may find that, while the instructions were correct and they got us the desired results, they did not encompass the entirety of this wonderful thing. There is actually a whole lot more to it and you can accomplish some many more things with it, but if you knew all of this in the beginning, you just would have gotten lost and confused.

So, in the beginning, we limit ourselves so that we can come to a better understanding with out going astray. As we learn and experience, we find out there is much more to it.

Many times, though, we fail to realize this thing we’ve received can do more than the basic instructions tell us and we become locked in how to use it without ever understanding that it can do so much more.

It sounds to me like your friend is stuck in the need to act a certain way because, when she became a Christian, it was the way she was taught to act. When such a significant change to our lives come, we have to practice the new way and avoid the old way, lest we fall back to the way we were. The next step for her is to realize that that while her new way is an appropriate way for Christians to act, it not the way all Christians MUST act.

And Christians are allowed to have bad days. It’s helpful if our brothers and sisters can recognize that we are having a day and give us the encouragement and space we need to overcome bad days by the grace of God instead of demanding a certain action or appearance. Christ Himself was not so demanding.. Love is accepting each other for who we are and helping each other to improve – at our own pace. It is certainly not rejecting each other and demanding we fit some pre-ordained mould immediately.

[shiroineko]

she's a very strong-spirited and opinionated person, I don't know if I'll get very far with discussing my feelings with her but God can do anything, so we'll see; but if she shuts it down then I could take that as a cue to dust my feet off.

thanks for your guys' advice =)