ISU Bible Studies

Welcome to De-Commissioned, a place for former members of the Great Commission movement (aka GCM, GCC, GCAC, GCI, the Blitz) to discuss problems they've experienced in the association's practices and theology.

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[ISU Alumna]

I'm new to this site, and I'm curious. I find so many references to "GCI," here, which strikes me as strange, since I was a member of what must have been GCI, back in Ames, Iowa, in the late Seventies... and yet... nobody back then ever called it that! It was just referred to as "The Work," by us insiders; and to outsiders, the front was known as "ISU Bible Studies." I was aware at the time that there was an exclusive inner circle that kept secrets even from us members, but it is astonishing to find out just how well organized all of that secret-keeping must have been.

What I'd like to know is: Has anybody ever done any studies on how much the group influenced the drop-out rate at ISU? I recall being under enormous pressure to leave college, get a menial job, and give my money to "The Work." (I didn't.) For a group that identified itself with the name of the university, ISU Bible Studies was appallingly anti-education.

Are you aware of any feedback from those people who threw away their chance to pursue an education? Did they ever go back and finish their degrees later? God knows I hope so. So much wasted youth was a sad, sad thing to witness.

[ISU Alumna]

By the way, I never heard the term "Blitz" mentioned back then, either.

Guess I must have been much, much more of a nobody within the church than I realized... even though my old neighbor Jim McCotter would greet me as I walked down the street, saying, "Hi, sister!"

So glad I survived.

[EverAStudent]

Welcome to the forum!

I have read several testimonies of folks who did both, stayed in school and dropped out.  One person did return to school and graduate, another was recently considering do so.  I am personally thrilled you stayed in.

It is hard for me to imagine how you could have escaped being identified with the GCI label back in those days.  It was on all the publications and used at all the conferences.  It was virtually the same as saying "the work" or "the great commission" in our church.  Nonetheless, welcome.

[ISU Alumna]

It is hard for me to imagine how you could have escaped being identified with the GCI label back in those days.  It was on all the publications and used at all the conferences.

Thanks for the friendly welcome, EverAStudent. Let me guess.... You're probably a guy, right? That would explain your finding it hard to imagine how girls were kept in the dark by their elder sisters.
 
Woo-hoo, it was amazing how skilled some of those women were, when it came to running interference any time somebody posed a simple question! I can remember being at a weekend retreat with the whole church, where Jim McCotter introduced us to all kinds of "old friends" (whose names appear repeatedly in something like "Marching to Zion"). But nobody could ever explain what the connection was. Honestly, I would have no way of determining which people said they didn't know because they actually didn't know, and which people were lying when they said so. Most of us were just too focused on the content of what was being taught, to give much thought to who was teaching it.

[EverAStudent]

That would explain your finding it hard to imagine how girls were kept in the dark by their elder sisters.

That is a new slant for me to hear about.  I knew many of the women in the church were treated as caterers, babsitters, and wash-women, but I had not heard that there was an effort to keep them uninformed about "the movement." 

Did other women find this happened to them as well?

[CarolR]

...Were any of the rest of you around during the late '70's ? The group was known as ISU Bible Study back in those days as you've mentioned. I don't think they (re) named themselves into GCI or GCC until later. Here's what I remember:

I was never pressured to leave college. I was quite heavily involved with ISUBS for about 2 years, after which I "got out" and joined Campus Crusade. I remember door-to-door evangelizing in the dorms in 1977, which caused a stir and probably and ISU Daily article.

I remember that our non-student small group members were expected to quit their jobs in order to go out on evangelization sorties a few times a year. I got the feeling that a woman's role in the group was to be a wife and mother.(Not what I had in mind for my life back then, or even to this day). I remember that one of the leaders of our small group 'disciplined' their infant son to the point he had welts on the back of his legs. Years later when I saw that child it certainly looked like some mental damage had been done because of that. To this day I wonder what happened to that kid...
After I got out I heard that one of the women had had a miscarriage (what an awful word!) I also got the impression the group was blaming her for it. Even if they weren't, it's very likely she wasn't getting the kind of support she needed.  I also saw someone I'd known in the group become pretty much like a zombie in the years after I left...and she stayed.

[wynter]

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