Life Harder after baptism?

or just God's wrath for leaving the "true church?"

Courtesy Chat-GTP

We are warned before getting baptized Orthodox that life after conversion is not easier. This is not a prosperity Gospel church. They say this in the LDS church, too, so I didn’t pay it much attention, but the fathers were not wrong.

Since getting baptized things have gotten more difficult for me. My period of Grace that Fr. Trubenbach mentions was short, about 1 month. Then the challenges appeared.

Paying the penalty?

Some TBM’s may point to the struggles I’ve been through in this article and think that this is the effect of leaving “God’s true Church.” That by leaving he then withdraws his spirit, protection, and blessings. I think that’s a horrible thing to believe about God, on top of being highly transactional, what would that say about his nature? Indeed, the thought had crossed my mind. When I told my mother I was leaving the LDS church one of the things she said to me was “You are a grown man and you have to live with your choices.” Alluding to a threat of consequences.

This is a cultural perspective that few people say directly, so to be clear, this is not an official teaching of the LDS church and it’s not a teaching I’ve from the overarching LDS leadership. I don’t have and couldn’t find any LDS leader teaching that leaving the LDS church would result in catastrophes occurring in one’s life - but some LDS members may believe that and may jump to that conclusion. Perhaps b/c when Br or Sister so and so leaves the church and falls on hard times, it’s reinforcing to the group identity to be able to point to those things and feel like it’s safer to stay in the group. I’ve never heard stories of people leaving the LDS church and then going on to live their best life.

Spiritual Warfare

When we are baptized Orthodox the service begins with prayers of exorcism, followed by a ritual of denouncing and then spitting on the devil. We actually go outside and spit on him, (figuratively of course.) I remember doing this and thinking, well this is fun, but perhaps this is foolhardy. Is it really wise to spit on the most powerful of all demons? As the challenges began appearing, I remembered this moment and feeling.

I had that thought that “I guess the Devil really did not appreciate me spitting on him and is coming for his pound of flesh.” I mentioned my struggles and thoughts to one of our parish deacons while serving in the altar and I said. “I guess Satan doesn’t like it when we spit on him and he loses his grip on us.” He corrected me saying. “It’s not that the devil is afraid of losing us, it’s that he and his demons become afraid of us and what we may become.”

“The devil does not hunt after those who are lost; he hunts after those who are close to God.”

~ St. Paisios of Mount Athos