"The version of God I was taught was false, so I can't trust any version of Him now."
How it sounds in your head: You were taught God was angry, controlling, always disappointed. You were taught to fear Hell more than love Heaven. Now you're trying to unlearn toxic theology, but you don't know what's true anymore. If they lied about His character, how do you know what's real and what's projection?
"There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love."
-- 1 John 4:18Source: Religious systems that taught fear-based control instead of love-based relationship, poisoning the well of God's actual character with human distortion.
The God of your childhood looks nothing like the God you're discovering in Scripture, and the gap between the two feels like betrayal. If trusted leaders were that wrong, how can you trust anyone's interpretation, including your own?
The Samaritan woman had bad theology—her people worshiped on the wrong mountain, mixed truth with error. She'd also had five husbands and was living with a man she wasn't married to. Jesus didn't fix her theology first or demand she clean up her life; He offered her living water immediately, revealed Himself as Messiah, and she became the first evangelist to her city.
I REFUSE the lie that because I was taught a false version of God, I can never know the true one. IT IS WRITTEN that there is no fear in love, and any god centered on fear is not the real God. Jesus IS the exact representation of the Father, and when I look at Jesus I see the truth: love, mercy, inclusion, and grace. IT IS WRITTEN that the Spirit of Truth guides me into all truth, and I have direct access to God Himself to reveal His character. I am not dependent on flawed teachers; I am dependent on a perfect Teacher—the Holy Spirit. The BARAK blessing includes revelation knowledge and divine wisdom, and I receive that now to know God as He truly is, not as religion painted Him.
The Father isn't distant, waiting for you to figure out correct theology before He reveals Himself—He's running toward you with His TRUE face, desperate to show you that He looks like Jesus, acts like Jesus, loves like Jesus, because Jesus IS Him in flesh. He's been grieving the distortions you were taught, and He's ready to introduce Himself all over again.