From New Zealand:
Hi . . . I haven't read absolutely everything on your site..but I intend to.
It's funny how we can wander around for years sitting in church after church after church and still feel as though we just haven't found the truth.
I was raised for about four years in a Pentecostal Apostolic church here in New Zealand. I grew up in foster care and spent almost four years in the church. They preached rapture, which I believed, was taken to see the scary movies etc.
Basically all in all my early introduction to Jesus Christ was fine, but God was portrayed as the big ogre who could and possibly would destroy me at any given moment. Having a relationship with Jesus Christ was fine, but my relationship with God (who was portrayed as an entirely seperate thing from Jesus) became a fear thing. Any move I ever made was made in fear. I still fear God now and suffer from horrible panic attacks, a fear of death, and I'm not the only one. A lot of people I have found to be suffering this most dreadful disorder seem to have had contact very early on in their life with the radical pentecostal movement.
It's interesting because as a child I was sexually victimised by three members of that Apostolic church, two were elders and one was the son of an elder. I was only ten or eleven, so the effect was profound, especially in the spiritual sense and cognitive functioning areas of my life, complete confusion was what was left to me, and I was made to feel responsible for what had happened to me, and the church hid it.
I stayed away from the church for many years, but then got back into it again. Sat there for a year sensing something was very wrong, but didn't know what. Then my eyes seemed to start to open, and I began to see things in a way I'd never seen them before. Like for example I was told I didn't speak in tongues because I didn't want to.
The eldership basically told me to go home and spend the weekend on my knees, and if I wasn't speaking in tongues by Monday, then I obviously hadn't prayed hard enough. I have never been able to speak in tongues, even when I wanted to, it never happened. Same with being slain in the spirit, they said I was fighting God and that's why it wasn't happening. I replied that if God wanted to 'lay me out' then He would be in absolute control, and no human would need to stand behind me to catch me when I fell, nor poke me in the back nor push on my forehead to make it happen.
They adored Benny Hinn, he made me uneasy the very first time I ever saw him. The first time I ever saw Benny Hinn on the television, I knew something was dreadfully wrong with him, I didn't know what it was then and I don't know what it is now, but that man makes my whole insides crawl! I said that to the pastor and his wife but in a very much gentler way, and I warned others in the church to be careful, that something didn't sit right with him, I got into major trouble for that too.
Well, I also questioned the pastor and his wife's need to travel to America to see homeless people at great expense to the church (we had people going without sitting in the pews who were dutifully paying their 10% and they were not being blessed...trust me on this). The pastor and his wife could have put five bucks gas in their car and gone to central ________ to see homeless people, we have them there. But no, they went on a huge tiki tour of the states.
I started to tactfully question everything, and when they realised I no longer idolized them or adored them, they did what they did to the others who had come before me, they ex-communicated me and not one soul from the church would speak to me, not even out on the street. My youngest child has special needs and the leadership said they would fast until he was healed.
I basically told them that I hoped they were prepared to starve to death because I believed my son was born this way for a reason. Not that God did it to him, not that sin did it to him, he was just born that way as a result of chromosomes going amuck, it happens. As it happens, my son is such a blessing to others, and he has been the making of me, even though it's hard at times. I told the church that I know not why he was born this way, God may tell me that when we finally meet, but for now it doesn't matter.
They saw that as a lack of faith and accused me of not even believing in God at all.They turned up at my house unannounced at 10:30pm for their witch hunt. They tried to completely destroy me, and their ultimatum was if I didn't agree to have serious spiritual counselling from one of their members, then I could not remain in their church. I opted to give it a miss.
The Pastor and his wife had sort of become a stand-in mum and dad for me as I don't have parents, and the pastor's parting words were, "By the way, we're no longer mum and dad or grandparents to your children."
That was their example of Jesus love, and that hurt like you cannot even begin to imagine. But oddly enough the rest of it didn't hurt at all, instead of feeling bad about all the things they said to me, I felt completely calm, like a weight had been lifted from me. I kept asking God what was wrong with me that I felt no guilt or fear, and all I could think was, well I actually did nothing wrong.
See that's another tool of manipulation these people indoctrinate kids with from a very young age the "God told me to tell you..." line.That used to get me every time because we were taught not to question anything God says, and if someone used that line on you, you took it seriously. Fortunately God created me as a very curious soul and I became not very trusting as a result of my upbringing. I don't believe God desired that upbringing for me, but rather He used what he had to teach me to be questioning, curious and careful.
Anyway, part of my eyes being opened was seeing that line for the manipulation that it is. If God has something to say, I'm sure he'll make it quite clear to me. If someone ever says to me "God told me to tell you..." I start to run really fast in the opposite direction.
So you see, all that you say in your column brings a peace to my spirit and my soul, yet I still have this terrible fear of God that I cannot shake. Perhaps it's becasue he represents a Father, and fathers have mostly been cruel to me in my life and have been something to fear, I really don't know what it is. I'm tired from trying to work it out anymore, so I just live with it the best I can.
I'm thirty eight years old and I have been plagued on and off with this incredible fear since I was eleven, and it turned into pure unadulterated panic attacks when I was eighteen, just one night it crawled in and grabbed me and it's never let go for very long.
I'm not asking for healing, I'm not asking for anything from you, just letting you know how dreadfully powerful and dangerous this kind of cultist religion is, but what's worse is that they pass it off as relationship with Christ, and I have to say that if that's what a relationship with Christ does to people, according to them, then there's no wonder people opt to give it a miss.
Think about it, be in a pentecostal fire and signs following church at a cost of 10% of your wages every week and become extremely miserable, or stay out in the sunshine and be miserable for free. That's not how I feel, I believe relationship is crucial, I'm just portraying it from an outsider's point of view.
Worse still, every other establishment gets tarred with the same brush. Anyway, I could go on, but I won't.
But your site, your information has not opened my eyes,they were already open, your information has just confirmed what I always suspected was the case, but never really heard anyone else say, so good on you, you're doing a good thing, an important thing, and if I can be of any help at all, please feel free to ask, because I have been inside that kind of thing, false doctrines and false teachings that destroy lives, I may be able to be of assistance to you in some aspect.
Anyway, thanks.
Sarai
***
Was thinking about some of the things that went on in church and I remembered this one incident in particular.
A wife of an elder was trying to slay me in the spirit (this has never happened to me either by the way).
She began to become frustrated by the fact that I would not fall backwards, despite the fact she was pushing me, and someone had poked me in the back to let me know they were there to catch me.
In the end she exclaimed in a reasonably loud voice, "Oh my goodness, you don't even believe in God." Then she went on to say that I needed to go home and think on the fact of whether I was actually saved or not.
I have to say that hearing that from her really made me question everything initially. I did begin to wonder whether I was actually saved or not. I wrestled with the fact that I was unable to speak in tongues, and that I could never be slain in the spirit. I mean I had watched this kind of thing happening to people even when I was in a church of the same ilk when I was a kid.
You know, people would be prayed over, and then they'd start laughing hysterically or crying hysterically, or they'd simply fall to the fall (always backwards I might add). Why wasn't it happening to me. I mean I'd be up the front saying in my head, "Ok God, bring it on, I'm ready." But it never happened, ever.
Then I began thinking that maybe God didn't really want me, maybe I was so filled with demons of this that and the other thing that there was no room left for God's spirit.Then for a while I struggled with the thought that maybe I was cursed becasue I was born through rape, you know totally unacceptable in the sight of God?
Yet the weird thing was I felt such a closenes to God, but usually it hit at the weirdest moments. Like when I was driving my car facing a sunset, and the light in the sky was so amazing, and in the moment I'd feel as though God was right there, right in my face, but a nice in your face kind of way. Staring out at the ocean, I could feel God's presence so vividly it was unreal, yet in church I rarely felt that kind of closeness.
I mean these people had this idea that people were filled with all kinds of spirits, take for example the following:
1. spirit of fear
2. spirit of gluttony
3. spirit of the spoiled child
4. spirit of hate
5. spirit of death
...etc, etc, I could go on.
It seemed that they believed that no person ever made a choice about what they thought or felt independant of any kind of spirit, either bad or good.
If you did something wrong, then the devil or something of the devil made you do it. If you did something right, then God made you do it, you never actually did it for yourself.
I mean sometimes I witnessed them trying take spirits out of people and that was always interesting, the shrieking and all the carryon. Then there were all the generational curses as well that they went on about, and perhaps there is some truth to those.
But basically if things don't happen in your life the way they think they should, then they give you the chop. The leadership will stand at the front of the church and tell everyone you are blinded or whatever, and that it would be better for all concerned if they stayed well away from that person, least they be infected by their issues too.
Most people in the church are so sucked in, or too indoctrinated to argue, and just do as the leadership tells them.See the ultimate goal, the sll consuming thought is to be viewed as acceptable and righteous in the eyes of the pastor and thus the eldership, if you can do that, then you're in, so to speak. If you don't, you're out.
You could never admit to having feelings of doubt, or feelings of pain, if you did then you obviously weren't growing in the Lord.
I really quit taking too much on board when the pastor stood up and asked the congregation to follow the leadership blindly, yes that's what they asked, and quite frankly huge alarm bells went off at that one. I told them the only person I'd blindly follow was God, not man.
This was around the time I was supposed to graduate bible college, you know all the invitations had been sent and dutifully accepted etc.
Well graduation day arrived, I got to the church where graduation was to be held, sat with all the other graduates, went up on stage, got my certificate and all the hoopla that goes with it. Anyway, it was only after the graduation ceremony when everyone was embracing their families, celebrating etc that I realised no one from the church had come except two people. One to mind my kids, and the pastor, both who left immediately after without uttering anything. I found out that the word had been sent out to everyone that under no circumstances were they to attend.
They knew that that would really hurt me, and it did let me tell you. I felt so lonely and betrayed and stupid standing there on my own with everyone around me hugging each other and generally buzzing out over their relative's achievement.I did start to cry and made a quick exit out to the parking lot to my car. Then I went back and retrieved my kids and snuck off home. It wasn't as though only a few people didn't show up, over fifty people didn't show up.
I was still dumb enough to turn up to church the next day, and when I got there, no one mentioned graduation or even bothered to really speak to me. I sat in the church for about ten minutes and I was feeling really miserable. Then suddenly I thought outside of the people to myself and I asked myself, "Why are you sitting here letting these people hurt you and treat you this way? What are you getting out fo this other than hurt, rejection and feeling embarrassed?"
I got up, gathered my kids to me, walked out and never went back. No one rang for a few days, but then the phonecalls started, the pastor (my standin dad) was trying to summon me to a meeting with the eldership, citing that it was serious and I needed to be there.
I refused. A second phonecall was made by him, yet another summons to attend a meeting with him and the eldership (for a witch hunt, I would be the witch they were hunting for).
Again I refused, and told him not only would I not attend their meeting this time, but that I would never attend a meeting with him and the eldership. I knew what was going to happen, and I refused to let them do it to me. Suddenly even friends from church, really close dear friends would no longer speak to me either, this occurred over a one week period of time after grad. Then, as you know, they couldn't get Muhammed to the mountain, so they brought the mountain with them at 10:30 one night. They stood outside in my driveway (I refused to invite them into my house) and they belittled me, even laughed at me, said what I told you about last time and left.
To this day only one person from that church has spoken to me since. I was in town one day and I saw an elder and his family, and when they saw me, they crossed the street to the other side.
What was interesting though before all the garb went down, and they said this to everyone, was that they love you with Jesus' love which is perfect. But once you err from the path, then that love is withdrawn, technically anyone who didn't know better would assume Jesus love had been withdrawn from them. I managed to see it all for what it really was by the time it happened to me, but others have not been so lucky.
The worse thing I ever did was write a letter trying to pitch my point of view, you know, where I was coming from about not being slain in the spirit, not speaking in tongues, worse thing I could have done, really stupid stupid move. I have no doubt that the letter was probably read out in church and twisted to suit their own end.
But they leave you feeling like you're nothing, like you're nobody without them, and I have no doubt that a weaker person who has not learned to deal with hurt appropriately (as if there actually is a way) could possibly become quite suicidal. Because the church becomes your life, your lifeline, your only means of interaction with the world around you, and as I said before, because you've cut off any lifeline out.
So now you've heard quite a bit about me, I'm picking you must be getting a feel for things now, what do you think?
I've never been able to settle in another church, and have in fact quit trying. I get in there and just feel so claustrophobic, like the walls are caving in on me. there.
I only learned the truth about the rapture lie a year ago, and initially I didn't want to accept it, but I chose to investigate it myself, and all the evidence pointed to it being a lie. When I discovered it to truly be the lie that it is, I was quite, I don't know, kind of not shocked, but...not confused, just...well I don't even know really. I mean I had terrible experiences of thinking I had been left behind when I was just a kid, and I was terrified.
I lived on a farm and my foster parents were away milking the cows, and all their kids had disappeared off somewhere too. Usually everyone surfaced again in time to watch the six oclock news,and then to eat dinner at 6:30. But it was like 7 at night and still no one had surfaced. I'd just seen that movie Left Behind and I thought Jesus had been and gone and I'd missed it.
The terror was unreal and I didn't know what to do. I went looking for everyone in the end and I couldn't find them anywhere, I was almost hysterical by the time they surfaced at 7:30. Then ensued years of nightmares about being left behind, about being detroyed, it was horriffic.
Then there was the confusion of working out exactly what Jesus actually intended to do. I thought he was comning back to steal everyone away, then he'd come back agin to Earth to set up his kingdom here on Earth. But I was always confused because the bible only talked of one second coming, not two. At church people would speak of the dead as being at home with the Lord, but then they'd talk about the dead in Christ being raised first, so which was it, were they there already or were they still asleep waiting?
Then don't even get me started on the holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I'm still confused on that one to this day. On one hand they identify them as three seperate beings, then they'd call them all one, well which is it, are they all one or three separate things? I view them as three separate beings, but all from the one place, but with different functions. God is the father, Jesus is his son, with whom I have my relationship with, and the Holy Spirit being the force that helps me to discern what is right and what is wrong aside from the written word, or along with the written word as it may happen.
I'm not sure that speaking in tongues is of God, or the Holy Spirit talking through you, which is why I've probably never been able to do it. If I'm not sure, then I try not to touch it. Same with being slain in the spirit, I'm not convinced at all that that is of God, well at least not the way I've ever seen it done. And if it is of God, why does it only ever happen in church?
If you speak in tongues and get slain in the spirit, then some Christians say you're delving in occultic stuff. If you don't then other Christians accuse you of denying the Holy Spirit. So in that lose lose situation, I decided to go with what I felt comfortable with inside myself, and I have to say that I have a pretty good anti missile system going, and not very often have I been wrong when sensing that something is not right. But oh well.
Anyway, that's it for now.
Take care
Sarai
* * *
I just finished reading about your run in with Word Faith, and I read, with some amusement I must add, about them trying to baptise you in the Holy Spirit. I mean it's not funny, but brought to mind something really funny that happened to me on one particular occasion.
Two apostolic men were trying to do to me what those dudes did to you. Like your dudes, mine got pretty peeved off that nothing was happening too, and like you, I took a peek at them as well.
As a little kid, if I got really nervous and scared, I'd start laughing, well when I took a peek at those two guys (was 17 at the time) I just started laughing my head off, and I'm saying to them "I'm sorry I'm so sorry," becasue it felt so disrespectful to laugh at them, but the more I laughed the madder they got and the more I apologised the more I lauughed.
They said not to worry, they were used to the Devil mocking them. You can imagine how I felt, but even when they said that, my laughing became riotous and I just couldn't stop. In some way, I think maybe I was made to laugh in an effort of protecting me, becasue from all accounts, they'd never actually struck this before, and I was almost the only one they never managed to baptise in the Holy Spirit, or slay in the spirit or get to speak in tongues.
Like you, in another little group I got involved with (a bible study group led by a guy named Barry and a lady named Linda). Those two would never look me in the eye, and another one of their followers claimed he saw demons in me, but this was after another intersting thing happened of a similar ilk to the laughing.
I was suspicious of Barry and Linda from the get go, ( was 30 by this time) something wasn't right and they'd never look me in the eye. Like you, I thought I was probably full of demons too and that was why they wouldn't look me in the eye. Anyway, one night during bible study Barry starts to tell the story about how he used to walk around with a knife in his shoe when he was a younger man. I don't know where the story was going to go because he never got to tell it. He had barely got an explanation out about why he carried the knife in his shoe when this hysterical laughter just took me over, you know the kind you initially try to suppress but the more you try the more you laugh. Then you're laughing so hard you end up with tears rolling down your face? Next thing I'm laughing so hard I'm down on the floor, and everyone's staring at me like I got horns and a pitchfork.
Then the laughter suddenly turned from very funny to extreme sadness, just complete and utter desolation inside my very soul. I was crying out loud, something I learned never to do as a result of childhood. So I'm laying there bawling my eyes out, then suddenly it went to laughter again, and then it reached the point where I didn't know if I was laughing or crying anymore from one second to the next.
I had no idea what was happening to me, but upon reflection I think God was maybe trying to warn me of the confusion those two people were apt at introducing into people's lives. Nothing like that in those extremes had ever happened to me before, and Barry and Linda didn't know what to do with it either, and everyone there saw it.
Their answer to me, like what happened to you, was that they openly declared themselves as my enemies. I was no longer welcome in their home, and they tried to get my best friend not to hang with me anymore. She was a new christian, you know she didn't have the level head of experience, and believed that essentially every christian was good.
They introduced her to Benny Hinn, the first time I ever saw him was on her TV at her house and I told her that there was something wrong with him, but she was totally taken in by him and them. The war that ensued was as long as it was ugly. She started saying she could see demons in my house, demons in me, and all of that was positively fed on by Barry and Linda and co. They told her to ban me from her house which she did for a while, and then they told her not to allow me to be involved in her wedding party as a bridesmaid. But she didn't give in to that one.
Like you I am a compulsive thinker, I think things to death...I dwell on conversations had and words spoken long after everyone esle has forgotten them. I pick up on enunciations and inflections of voice becasue they tell you soooooooooooo much about the climate of which something has been said in, what was really meant by it.
I analyse stuff to death, I'm such a thinker, but one thing a wise man once told me was that people who have wisdom are generally wordsmiths, generally very deep thinkers and are almost always artistic in one form or another. He asked me if I like irony, I love irony, and he said that that's another trait of the thinker, and I bet you love irony too. He said that those who have wisdom and knowledge are few and far between.
I told him that quite frankly I'd be rather happy if God would please take those gifts back and give me something else, becasue thinkers who have the Lord's hand on them, and most who don't and who also possess wisdom cannot consume what is untrue -- it is physically impossible for them to do it, I believe that is of God, because no one has ever been able to make me speak in tongues, be slain in the spirit or any of those other carnival rides they offer, and you know what, like you I've stood there many a time and said, "Ok God if it's of you then bring it on, I want it." You know what I got? Like you, a big fat nothing, I remained untouched by it and I'm so pleased I cannot tell you how pleased.
Of course the fallout from that was always interesting to sit back and watch, and if it hadn't been me, I might have even found it funny.
My mum and dad (pastor and wife), aka L & L were into that "think it and you'll get it" version of gospel as well, I always found it to be repugnant to say the least.
Another thing they liked to do was get in this person who would speak over everyone individually. Everyone sat there, including me, waiting to 'hear from the Lord', and after, I realised the semi-demonic nature of what we'd all done.I mentioned this on the sly to an elder (stupid me) and I think that went a ways to getting me burned too. But it occurred to me at the time that it was quite a subtle way of getting people to look upon man, not God, even though at the time I really believed I was waiting on God, was only after it was over that I realised the stupidity of what I'd got involved with.
I mean some people sat there for almost four or five hours waiting, and I certainly didn't know the guy from Adam.
But it was also another lesson for me about being careful who you let pray for you. I have had occasion where someone has asked to pray over me and I've actually exercised my right to say no.
They really hate when you do that.
Also that philosophy that "if you say it then so shall it be" thing has reared its ugly head where I've been too. L & L were like that. When I got the diagnosis on my child, they said there was no need for me to spiral down in sadness, that I actually had a weak spirit and had not grown in the Lord as much as I thought I had, actually I never used to measure my growth in the Lord, could never find an accurate tape measure to measure something like that anyway, and, as you know, I'm totally useless with numbers.
They lost respect for me becasue I became a bit depressed by my son's diagnosis.
Everything i knew to be so, was no longer so. All the things I just took for granted would happen for this so were no longer a part of the picture for his life. I was faced with a hideous potentially freakish, very black future for my child in comparison to what I had thought would be his life. I don't think God begrudged me a bit of sadness, anguish and confusion. I don't think God would have begrudged them missing their fancy dinner out to be of comfort to me and my child.
I mean my child went through a horrendous few days after I got the diagnosis, I couldn't bear to even touch him for a few days. I felt like someone had stolen my son and replaced him with a freak, mean I know, but that's totally how I felt. I felt sick thinking about the physical implications of it all, and every time I looked at him I felt sick and I just wanted to cry...and I did.
I wanted to run, but didn't know where to or really what from.I wanted someone to hug me and tell me they'd be there, not that everything would be ok, but that it'd be different, and eventually it'd be ok, even if it wasn't going to happen until we left this earthly sphere.I was a single mum, still am, have been for nearly 11 years. I don't mind, kind of like it actually, but I just wanted someone who was older and wiser to just be there, know what I mean? Not to be there in judgement, just to be there, even if they never had a word to say.
My poor kid, and the others. Took me a good six months to really start to come to terms with it, but after a few days I started to feel this much stronger sense of protection for that sweet child, and I became so much more careful with him than I already was. But anyway, according to them, all these feelings were living proof of my immaturity in Christ. Maybe they were kind of right in some aspects, I don't really know for sure, but I have my doubts. But you know what? I never asked God why my son was born that way, never had the audacity to question God on something He never did anyway.
Just finished reading your Fruits of the Spirit page. Remember how I said I wrote that letter to L & L about not speaking in tongues etc? Well in that letter I used the analogy of gifts and their differences like this.
I stated that I had been given the gifts of wisdom and knowledge, and even they had said this. I said however, God in His wisdom has decided not to give me the gift of speaking in tongues. That being the case, I do not believe I have the right to whinge and wine about the gifts He chose to give me, that would be as ungreatful as me moaning that you gave me a hat for xmas and asking you to please take it back and exchange it for a box off chocolates.
They found what I said to be offensive, stupid and immature.That's what they laughed at me about because their proof test of someone being of God is their ability to speak in tongues, I tried to explain that not everyone is given that gift, they called me a heretic. With every argument I presented to them I just dug the hole a little deeper for myself with them. Their whole system is 'My way or the highway'. Pure and simple.
L & L seemed to have an insatiable need to be adored and idolized, and after every Sunday service you could see the long lines of people jockeying for position in order to have just a second on their attention...it was quite sickening actually.
I did the same for a while too, except my need was more intense and had roots in having known them as a child. Part of that child like love for them was still alive and well, so adoration along with the throngs was easy, the mere thought of losing that 'special' place in their lives scary.
Anyway, aren't you sick of this yet? It's just such a comfort to speak these things and knowing that you can hear what I'm saying, you can grasp the reality of what actually happens in these churches.
I'm so glad my little venture into looking at what actually is up with Benny Hinn led me to you. That's how I found you, I finally decided to see whether my Benny Hinn heebie-geebies were of my own imagining or whether I was feeling and thinking right. I've never bothered to really look into him at all, just sensed he was not good for the soul. Eight years it's taken me to actually get brave enough to check it out, I was so scared I'd find out that I was the one with the blinders, not him.
I'm sure you can imagine my relief.
Sarai
P.S You know what haunts me the most about this? How can so many people be wrong and so few be right? Technically, well not technically, actually, if I'm right, then just about every Christian I have ever known and respected, is deluded. I mean these are people I looked up to, people I respected with reverence, and they're deluded. That shakes me at my very foundations and I got to say there's a we bit of fear and trembling going on inside me, peace, but fear and trembling too, it's like I was right. How could I be right? I am the one they say is spiritually blinded, my gifts of wisdom and knowledge aside, I'm supposed to be deluded, but I am not. I'm still coming to terms with all of this.
* * *
Andrew Wommack, I think I read this page a while back, although I am unsure. It is interesting to read it though becasue what he does mirrors what was happening in the Apostolic church even as an adult. What I find extremely wild and perplexing is how, even I, at the time, did not see those types of behaviours for what they were. The deception is so concealed and revealed so very carefully that one hardly notices that one is being led down the proverbial garden path.
Especially that healing thing, speaking to the illness yourself, only asking God once for things and all that.
I am just thankful that for some reason or other, God saw fit to keep me slightly jaded, so I was suspicious and when a rat started crawling around, I eventually saw it. It's tough though becasue as I have said before, knowing what I know now, most of the christians I hight admired and some I genuinely liked and respected are mere deluded fools following false doctrine and errnoneou sinful witchcraft like practices...and the irony is, that if they truly understood what they were in the middle of Wolf, they would be absolutelty devastated and appalled.
The more I learn of these things, the more I can look back at my life, especially childhood and teen years, I can see the why of some of it, I truly can, and these days I actually thank God for it, for where would I be now if I had learned to be too trusting of man? I mean I wasn;t that trusting and yet got sucked in for a little while, but that untrusting nature, that suspicious nature, due to the childhood and teen years has absolutely served its purpose well. I just hope that other people can get their eyes opened, but I watch them and I fear there isn't much hope for them.
You are right when you say there is more hope of reaching a non christian with the truth than there ever will be of reaching christians, yet christians are supposedly enlightened to the word of God and free . . . yet they are bound up and trapped and can't even see it. So sad, it really is.
And I don't even understand how people can stare at their television screens and not cotton on to the lies, I mean the demeanour of the tele evangelist alone screams scam, their body language, their eye movement, the rapid speech, the puffed up sense of self worth and importance. Anyway, this is all stuf you know anyway, so why am I singing to the choir?
* * *
I know how hard it can be for people to let go of 'old erroneous truths' okay so erroneous truths is an oxymoron, but you know what I mean. But once you let go of all those lies, the freedom you find is really quite incredible, it's like being released from some kind of spiritual, emotional and cognitive prison, and instead of walking in fear, you are walking in freedom, which is exactly what Christ intended for us, that we be free. It is really sad to see people all bound up by this that and the other thing that they have imposed upon themselves becasue they are believing lies and they call it salvation.
When I talked about the Baptists and the SDAs, I really only just pulled them out of the sky as an example, but I did not know that the SDAs came out of the Baptist movement, so there you go, I learn something new every day. I went to a Baptist church once, and I have to say I found it to be almost dead, like there was no sense of life or happiness about the people, instead this was this kind of false sense of purity and security about them that I found unnerving.
They are not welcoming of strangers either, they tend to be very suspicious of them, in my experience.
I don't know a lot about SDAs, although my Great Aunt Daphne is one, and she has talked to me on occasions about it, but from what I gather, they are much closer to being doctrinally sound than most others I have spoken to. Well doctrinally sound as I understand doctrinal soundness to be....and I guess there is still huge room for error on my part there.
I have never heard of the Church of God Seventh Day at all, perhaps they are here somewhere too?
Most people don't know that the Apostolic movement, (at least here in New Zealand anyway) came out of the Quaker movement. Everyone, (the eldership and families of the eldership) at the church I went to as a kid, came directly out of the Quaker movement here.
I didn't know that until about eight years ago when someone I knew as a kid, an elderly lady, told me that that is what they all were before joining the Apostolic pentecostal movement. And that in itself is scary becasue the Quakers were crazy! Their teachings were totally off the wall, yet just when you think it can't get any weirder, then came along the Quakers in the Pentecostal movement and, when you are on the outside looking in on it, it is a scary contemplation, the things that they do, believe and say.
I mean there is good and bad in everything, but I have to say that I believe, in some pentecostal movements and or organisations, there is more bad than good.
The Apostolics used to view the Baptists (where I grew up for a time anyway) as the poor ragged brother, mere deluded fools who were on the right path, but who sadly, short of miraculous intervention by the wise and all knowing Apostolics, would never quite make it there...there being...well I'm not sure I can give a definition for 'there', becasue I am not sure I understand it myself, I hardly believe I ever did truly understand what 'there' was.
As for Baptists being the most legalistic aside from Catholics, I don't know about that so much, I would venture to say that I think the Apostolics are more bound up than any Catholic or Baptist woven together.
I mean as an Apostolic, from what I viewed in both settings as a kid and then as an adult, there is bearly any room for self in the mix, the devil's got you or God's got you, you are merely reduced to some pawn who is stuck in the middle of the fight for good and evil, kind of like Luke Skywalker without the light sabre...the devil is Darth, God is Yoda and you will be either taken over by one of the other. Even when you make it to God's side you still have Darth screaming at you 24/7 "Come over to the dark side Luke."
The trouble with that kind of concept, the removing the aspect of self, you also remove the critical aspect of free will, in a sense, by believeing in the darth/yoda concept, you call God a liar.
God said that He will never force himself upon anyone and thus the devil cannot force himself upon you either, Jesus proved that in the dessert, even his human portion could not be forced to do anything that he was not willing to do. Yet whenever something goes wrong in their life (the Apostolic), the devil is trying to get at them, if they do something right or something works out good it was God.
Don't get me wrong, I believe all glory should go to God too when good things happen, and I believe that God helps us, but He doesn't do it for us, if He had intended to do everything for us, then he would have created robots and not humans. And this is where the Apostolic mindset gets scary is that when things go wrong, the Devil did it, not the person, or demons in the person did it, never the person. Yet that is erroneous becasue the devil can no more force his will upon us than God will, and yet they make out like there was no human element to these things.
The worse examply of this I ever saw was in adulthood, I was like 19 at the time.This guy who had three daughters, the eldest was 11, well he repeatedly raped her and got two years jail for it. I came in on the tail end of the story when he was parolled, and that mother, under guidance from the church, upon his parole, took him immediately back into their home where that poor little girl had to be with him every day 24/7. To my mind, they re-victimised the girl and they excused the father becasue 'the devil made him do it, demons made him do it' and all attention was focussed on him the perpetrator instead of her the victim, it made me sick to my stomach let me tell you that much.I wanted to rip that bastard's head off and spit down his throat for what he did to her, I wanted to slap his wife stupid for being so...stupid and gutless, and I wanted to tell the church where to go. Instead I just left, and I don't know what became of that girl, whether he relapsed and did it to her again, or whether he did it to his other daughters...
When you take self out of the picture, you take personal responsibility out of the picture too and then everything you do is no holds barred becasue it is excusable with six little words...'the devil made me do it." That's what I hate most about the Apostolic Pentecostal movement.
I'll shut up now about that because I'm getting real angry just thinking about it.
* * *
I have had Mormons try to run rings around me before, but they've never managed to yet, although I made a point of finding out all I could about them years ago. Often when the yknocked on my door I would invite them in, give them a drink of cordial and end up talking to them about America and their families. Most of them were very nice, in fact I have yet to meet a Mormon I didn't like. Jehovah's Witneses I merely feel sorry for becasue they are fed the lie that they need to work their way into the 144,000 (or whatever the number is) in order to get to Heaven. They have a big huge headquarters just up the road from where I live, it is like a 10 million dollar property and yet these poor people are walking the streets trying to sell magazines, the majority of them living in poverty. It makes me sick to see people emotionally exploited like that. Even the young Mormons riding around on their bikes half way around the world are being exploited to my mind, but at least I guess they are getting the experience of travel and they stay out of trouble, kind of like forced army service...which we used to have in this country. It certainly never hurt anyone, yet I accept that the Mormon movement is much more insideous than the army...well in NZ at any rate.
I agree with you when it comes to the Charismatics and I have trouble actually defining the charismatics from the pentecopstals, they are pretty much the same really. Or perhaps I have them confused in my own mind and there really are glaring diferences between the two.
But you are right when you talk about them taking all the tenants of witchcraft and renaming them with Christian labels, having watched the wacko behaviours, I truly understand exactly your point. In some aspects they are truly spiritually blind, and they are so unopen to the possibility that what they are doing is wrong that it is downright insanity. Woe betide the person who points out that perhaps what they are doing isn't quite along the lines of biblical truths. They use manipulation on people, but by golly look out if you accuse them of it. They are the biggest manipulators out there.
Creflo Dollar, oh my gosh I actually looked in on him a few weeks ago on the telly and he was basically kicking back at people who were saying he was money oriented. He was justifying his money/blessings oriented message with scripture...I almost chundered and had to trun it over to the other channel only to run smack bang into Benny Hinn who makes me feel more ill than Creflo. And Creflo's wife? Don't even go there with her bling bling sparkling from the stage!
We have a guy here named Brian Tamaki who is running a charismatic church and he has a huge following, and he is one of the most dangerous leaders we have here in that respect. He milks millions from his church goers and yet I used to teach some of the kids from that church and I can tell you from first hand experience that they are NOT beingblessed and their kids live in poverty while he drives Beamer, a Harley Davidson (amongst other expensive vehicles) and has more bling bling than Donald Trump or Paris Hilton. They also think they are above the law too, but that's another whole story.
Anyway, I agree that having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ is more important than any religious undertakings you may indulge in, and I will not affiliate myself with any denomination again, merely indulging in aspects of truth, nothing more.
Sorry this email is so long....
* * *
I read the Wommack stuff. I know exactly what you mean about him being more deadly than even the Benny Hinns of the world. He sounds more proficient at hiding the glaring lies and twisted scripture than anyone. Reading that page was quite scary indeed, especially the way he twists scriptures, and if you weren't really paying attention, or even more than that, acyually looking for the flaws in his message, you'd never even see it would you?
You know something Wolf, years ago when I read that scripture about how many would come in His name and that many would be fooled, in my youth, and even up until I was around 33/34, I always thought that verse referred to someone who would stand there claiming to be the Christ, and that they would do miraculous deeds in His name in order to deceive people. I never truly understood just how slyly they'd perpetrate the lie, or how quietly. I mean Benny Hinn is ridiculously easy to see through, as is Creflo (give me all your dollars) Dollar, but this Wommack character is almost awesome in his deception, it is really rather frightening to think of the masses of truly God seeking hurting people being dragged into his net. Again, pious youth has tempered by adult experience for me, and the older I get, I seem to be having my eyes opened more and more and it is just so easy to see this really insideous situation evolving into mass delusion of the elect.
Remember in a previous email I mentioned 'getting there'? I think I have worked out where 'there' is...and I believe it is the successful living of a life for the Lord, the way in which he intended us to live it, as much as we are able without being suckered by the cons out there. I think that that is what 'there' is.
And further to what I said about that guy who repeatedly raped his daughter and then the wife took him back into the family as soon as he was parolled? Well I just think that I need to make one thing very clear here, and that is that I wrote that piece from the perspective of being a surviving victim. By virtue of being a victim, my perspective was always going to be on the side of the child, and my empathy was always going to lay with the child, and an unacceptance of the possibility that he had rehabilitated/been healed was always going to be present, victims, even surviving victims think quite differently to non victims. That being said, I think it is always wise to remember that there are different perspectives and other wise people may very well have viewed this situation very differently and there is the chance that their observations are as valid as mine were at the time, and are now.
The truth may in fact be that he was fully rehabilitated, and it may be that he never did anything like that again to any of his children. My point was, that I don't think that any victim should be forced to live under the same roof as the perpetrator no matter what the circumstances, becasue the overrididng message that it sends the vicitm, (in my experience, and it is only MY experience and opinion at play here,) is that he did nothing wrong becasue he is allowed back into the house, so hey victim the problem was obviously yours so you better deal with it. Of course I am bound to be angry at this situation and find it unacceptable that the girl was placed in what I perceived to be a high risk situation by her mother allowing the man back into the house. As a surviving victim, I would die before I allowed my daughter to live in the same house as someone who perpetrated those things upon me, let alone someone who had done it to her. Again, in my role as a Probation Officer I have seen cases like this case in point, I also know from experience that most perpetrators of sexual crimes repeat the same sexual behaviour at some point in their lives. Yes God can heal anyone of anything, but when it comes to habitual flaws, like say smoking, part of the healing process and ability to keep yourself away from the cigarettes has to be a dogged determination to never touch them again, and yet even when one is determined, one still craves the cigarettes.
Sexual behaviour and motivation of said behaviour has been proved to be along the lines of the habitual behaviours seen in smokers or drug addicts, therefor one can only assume that sooner or later that man will have been strongly and sorely tempted to revert back to old habits, and it takes a strong and determined person to resist.
If smoking is the habit, then one is rarely a danger to anyone else so long as they take the habit outside. But having sexual offending as a habit, to my mind, as a surviving victim, and as a person who dealt with people like that in an official capacity, I think it is too greater risk to any child to be placed back into a situation where they have to have direct daily contact with the perpetrator of the offending.
And I believe it is irresponsible for a church to either sit by and let it happen or to encourage that situation. The child is the one in danger, the adult has the added advantage of being able to think through things rationally, to understand what they are doing, to process the concept of their desires and to think through the consequences, the child possesses none of that, not even the means of escape or protection from it.
And if the adult concerned does not possess the ability to think through what he is doing, then all the more reason why he should not be there present with the child.
As a child having to live in the same house as an offender and having to attend the same church as the other two offenders, and having to do this knowing that everyone knew what happened was soul destroying and demeaning, and it made me feel as though I was the problem, I had caused the strife and I carried that responsibility on my shoulders and it near on killed me, I swear.
So my opinions on the situation with that man and his daughter, although in some aspects are sensible, tempered with professional experience, coherent and understandable, they are still marred with bias in that I am surviving victim of abuse, all the more biased becasue it was at the hands of Christians, as was hers. So just keep in mind that although my opinions are probably quite justified, reasonable and agreed with even by a lot of people, they are still biased in favour of the girl. I am human, I will always bat for the victims. Important to note that if I were not a survivng victim, I may well indeed be sayiong to you that God healed him so everything would have been just fine, except that I know this big old bad world better than that. Sure God could have healed him, I am unsure as to the character of the healed as to whether he has the backbone to put in the effort to stay on the right path seeing as how he succumbed to the most heinous temptation in the first place.
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Art et Amour Toujours
...quite scary indeed, especially
the way he twists scriptures,
if you weren't really paying attention, or even more than that, acyually looking
for the
flaws in his message, you'd never even see it would you?
You know what haunts me the most about this? How can so many people be wrong and so few be right? Technically, well not technically, actually, if I'm right, then just about every Christian I have ever known and respected, is deluded. I mean these are people I looked up to, people I respected with reverence, and they're deluded. That shakes me at my very foundations and I got to say there's a we bit of fear and trembling going on inside me, peace, but fear and trembling too, it's like I was right. How could I be right? I am the one they say is spiritually blinded, my gifts of wisdom and knowledge aside, I'm supposed to be deluded, but I am not. I'm still coming to terms with all of this.
