Concerned parent of summer LT attender

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[tk]

I had never heard of GCM until my son was about to leave for the summer to work at the YMCA in Estes Park and had also decided to participate in the LT program.  He had a school friend who was doing the same thing.  Her sister had done the program the prior summer and had just loved it.  That was our first mistake....not investigating the group that he would be spending the summer with. 

A little background - our son was raised in a very loving Christian home.  He excelled in school.  He is just an all around good kid who had always made good decisions. 

He left in May for the camp.  As the days went by, we occasionally got a text, but no letters or much other communication.  We tried to call many times but just got voicemail.  On the few times that we did reach him, he told us that they had terrible reception, cell towers had been down, etc.  We believed him. We had no reason not to.  Fast forward to August.  He was coming home with a different person than he rode up there with which we thought was odd.  He could have come home a day earlier and we asked if we could come and get him so we could see him quicker, but he said he would have to "pray" about it.  Seriously, we hadn't seen him all summer and He had to pray about it before he came home!?!

He arrived the next day and we immediately "talk".  We have had a very long night just trying to understand what happened to our son.  He told us that he realized a lot of things over the summer.  Basically that he never had any real friends (these people he has known for only 10 weeks are his REAL friends),  he will be going back to college for just this semester and then he would be transferring to another school (where these kids go), the Christian college he attends is spiritually dead,  and he doesn't think he wants to pursue his major anymore.  Oh and he is not going to do his semester abroad, one of the main reasons he attended the college he chose.  Oh and by the way, we made him go to this college, it wasn't where he really wanted to go.  I can go on and on. 

I feel like they stole my son and I didn't do anything about it.

To date, he is at college and he is planning to do his semester abroad leaving in January.  He did go to see his GCM friends over fall break. He seems to be doing better and our relationship doesn't seem as strained.  I worry about over the holidays.  Should we allow him to see these students/leaders ( I think some of them are leaders of the GCM in College Station and Denton)?  We don't want to move backwards. Any words of wisdom are greatly appreciated. 

[Linda]

GC has a long and sad history of coming between parents and their college aged children. They even apologized for it (in writing, but not in practice) in their 1991 Error Statement. I am always sorry to hear it is still happening.

I'm glad he seems to be doing better. One thing for him to stay away from is Faithwalkers. It's the national conference held after Christmas. I will try to find you the quotes from the 2009 (I believe) Faithwalkers where a guy on the national board, Rick Whitney, tells parents that basically once their kid turns 18 they should back off and listen elders of the church instead of their parents. Scary and cult-like stuff.

If your child talks about going to Faithwalkers, you would be wise to listen to the messages. They are online. Also, we have a few threads going on this forum where we excerpt and discuss some of the more error filled teaching.

One thing to understand. These people want you to commit to THEM for the rest of your life. And, these people believe that you are to give the controls of your life to your pastors/elders. I can't emphasize this enough. They really believe it and they teach it to young impressionable minds.

[tk]

Thank you for the heads up about Faithwalkers.  We will be prepared to address that if it comes up.

[EverAStudent]

Dear tk,

Some things to remember:

1) your son is an adult, advise him but do not command him
2) GC is Christian and falls in the general category of orthodoxy, mostly (there are far worse organizations to be a part of, so do not panic)
3) GC's largest problems are biblically untrained leadership, elitisim, and a taste for extreme control, which they see as spiritual (though such things clearly are not)
4) the more time your son spends with Christians outside GC the more he will recognize the universal brotherhood of all believers and the better he will see the GC abuses for himself
5) enourage and advise your son to finish his college degree in an area of interest where he can almost certainly find a profession that will pay a living wage, that must be his priority because the Bible commands all Christians to be able to work with their hands and meet their own needs so as to be able to share with others in need.  If he starts talking about living off of "support" contributions take him to Ephesians 4:28).

[AgathaL'Orange]

Linda completely nailed it.  And Faithwalkers is crazy town!  That is the place where a pastor out right says that "sheep" (the congregants) are stupid!  That's why God gave them pastors!  So damaging.

I myself (after being a Christian for 32 years) am hanging on to my faith by a tiny little thread.  Not to make this "all about me", but if I can be in this position, I'm sure others can be too.

Thanks for sharing, and good luck. 

[Janet Easson Martin]

Dear tk,

I will pray for your son to be able to hear God's voice clearly through his Word and trust Him that He has plans so personal and so fantastic they will amaze and blow him away!  Plans that have been made since he was just an idea in God's mind.  Marvelous works to walk in that God himself will personally direct him to.   That he would flee from all who seek to captivate him (even in spiritual things) besides the Lord Jesus Christ.  The devil doesn't seem to change his tactics much since the early days of the christians written about in Galatians.  Perhaps we could pray together, myself and any others who are concerned with this mother for her son's decisions and the freedom in his faith that is at stake.  The devil does seek to steal, and so do those who are agents for his plans.  Could we pray the very words of God which he has made all-powerful!:

This is what the Lord says--your Redeemer, the Holy One of israel:
"I am the Lord your God,
who teaches you what is best for you,
who directs you in the way you should go......

Leave Babylon, flee from the Babylonians!"

Isaiah 48:17,20a

Trusting in His Grace,

Janet Easson Martin

[carmel]

Does anyone know anything about Ignite?

[BTDT]

Hi, tk -- I'm so glad you came to this message board to research your concerns. 

I agree 100% with EverAStudent's advice. 

In my opinion, a key thing for your son is for him to be around a variety of Christians, not just those from GC.  As others have said, much of GC is (still) very GC-focused.  The message from their national leaders is very clear -- they think they have the best thing going, and that to be truly committed to God, you must be 100% committed to *them*.  In the past, they have had difficulty discerning the difference between a command, a practice, a principle, and a preference.

Hopefully your son will see that non-GC Christians are just as committed to God, and that God works just as strongly through them.

I'm definitely praying for you and your son.  Hang in there.  It sounds like he is still very much committed to God, and is just wrestling with the words of some people who themselves have been somewhat deceived.  As I was, years ago.

-Ed-

[Linda]

Ignite. Good question. Long answer.

Here is my take.

There are a number of related organizations with "GC" in them. This forum is about all of them. Sometimes we refer to them as "GCx", or just the "Great Commission Movement". Here is a link to the history, in their own words.

http://www.gccweb.org/about/history/chronology

To summarize the link, they started out as GCI in 1983, a few years later changed to GCAC, then GCC. Somewhere along the line they started something called GCM--I think it was the late 80's. (They used to refer to this on the history page, but it looks like they have removed that little bit.) So, GCM (Great Commission Ministries) was started by GCC which originally was GCI. GCM was started by GCC, as I understand it as the tax exempt organization for the GCx "missionaries" to receive their support.

Here's how it works. GCC churches have some elders/pastors (elders are the pastors in GC churches, they are also the sole decision makers, the congregation never has a vote on anything) who are paid by their church. They also have some elder "wannabees" and other helpers who work full time for the church, but have to raise their own support. GCM is the organization that collects and distributes the support to these people and gives tax deductible receipts to the donors.

If you go to the GCM web page, you will find a questions section that refers to this forum (we are the detractors ). What they don't tell you as they refer to the "historic Great Commission Movement" is that GCM was started by the "historic Great Commission Movement"! Here is the link.

http://www.gcmweb.org/who/OthersSay/Questions.aspx

To complicate matters, there are actually some GCM churches! It is difficult to find a list of them, however. Tom Mauriello is the head honcho guy at GCM and he actually posted here (we caught them saying they were part of the NAE before they were members). In a private e-mail, he gave me a list of the GCM churches.

Here is a link to the thread where Tom posted.

http://forum.gcmwarning.com/general-discussion/gcc-and-gcm/

I guess he never came on with the list of GCM churches. Here is the list he sent via a private e-mail. Funny that GCM churches are difficult to find in any listing.

GCMC Churches:
-Ball State Revolution
-Bowling Green, Ohio
-H20 Orlando
-Illini Life, U of IL
-Illinois State Illini Life
-New Life Church, U of M Campus Church
-Ohio State
-University of Maryland Church
-The Rock, University of Missouri
-New Life Campus Fellowship, Virginia Tech
-Riverview Church, Lansing MI
-Texas A&M University
-University of Texas
-University of North Texas
-Kairos & Kairos West, Los Angeles
-Heritage Church, Ohio (affiliate)

Now, back to your question. It would appear that GCM, while started by GCC (I even have literature linking the two that I picked up on the table at my GCC church 10 or 15 years ago) is trying to distance itself from GCC, GCI or GCAC or whatever you want to call it. They have separate boards, however, at least 3 members of the GCM board go back to the "bad old days" of GCI.

Faithwalkers is the Christmas Break conference for GCC churches. Ignite is the Christmas Break conference for GCM churches. GCC pastors have spoken at Ignite. Why GCM churches have their own conference remains a mystery. Anyone know?

[carmel]

Wow, that's pretty confusing! I kept wondering why we were going through all that until you really did arrive at IGNITE at the end! What bothers me about the college bit is all the living together and being surrounded by GCM. I've never seen anything like it.

 I did not know that they have a GCM church in Austin, but from your list, it looks like they do. Anyone know the name of it?

So GCC pastors have spoken at IGNITE, hmm...

[Linda]

Yes. Here is a link to messages from Ignite 2009.

http://www.gcmignite.org/#/audio

There is at least one GCC pastor who spoke. There is also a GCLA (Great Commission Latin America) pastor/leader/elder/whatever who spoke. I forgot to mention GCLA. Makes you wonder why so many name changes, doesn't it?

I haven't listened to any of the Ignite messages (just snippets of a couple), really, don't have time for that, but my sense is that Faithwalkers is much more sectarian (trying to avoid using the "c" word because it is so inflammatory) than Ignite. I would get down on my knees and beg my children not to go to Faithwalkers if they were thinking about going. I would listen with them to talks from previous years and talk about what the Bible says vs. what GC leaders say.

Faithwalkers involves bold and false teaching combined with lots of "bonding" and building of "lifelong" friendships (till you realize that the teaching of commitment to the group and obedience to the elders is wrong, leave, and lose all your friends). Horrible, just horrible.

[Linda]

About Austin. I don't know. That list was sent to me by Tom Mauriello (the head of GCM at the time, not even sure if he still is, it is difficult to find info on the web page) about 3 years ago. Anyone know more? Tom, are you out there? Would you kindly post a list of GCM churches so that us detractors won't get your churches mixed up with the churches that belong to the "historic Great Commission Movement" churches?

[Linda]

One more list. Here is a 2006 list of GCM churches. It is different from the list that Tom Mauriello sent me in 2008 or 2009. I think they used to call the campus churches GCM churches. From what I can tell, sometime in the last 5 years, GCM has tried to distance itself from GCC. Not sure why. Anyone know? Also, I know that some listed as leaders are no longer with GCC or GCM so keep in mind, the list is old.

http://gcxweb.org/Misc/GCMChurchDirectory-2006.aspx

[Linda]

More is coming back to me. I looked at the list of GCM churches on the 2006 and remembered Arizona State.

In the Spring of 2006, Jim McCotter, the founding Apostle of Great Commission, spoke at the church in Tempe.

We found a link on the church blog (it was later removed, not sure if it was because we pointed it out on the forum or not). Puff had an archived copy of the post. Here is the link:

http://gcmwarning.com/Articles/McCotterASUArchive.htm

Interesting that it says McCotter was a founding member of GCM. Significant because McCotter left in the mid-80's ("to pursue business interests" because we all know that you can't go to a church and be a businessman at the same time ). GCM was not formed till 1989. So, when the GCM people suggest that those posting on this forum are misrepresenting them, they are confused!

[TechEd]

I'm a current "member"/attendee of a GCM college church at Kent State University (planted from Bowling Green in 2008).

I was interested in this forum because I've been reading about another Christian organization accused of being the "c" word (because we're not allowed to use it on this forum, so I've gathered) that an old friend from high school is a part of and it made me newly interested in what people were saying about the church I've called home the last 2.5 years (I first found this site after it was brought to my attention by members of my church from my hometown).

Bear with me, as it's almost 2am after a really long day of classes and work here at school, but I had a couple insights into what this particular thread is talking about.

First of all, to respond to the original post, I'd like to say that I was a part the summer Leadership Training program in Estes Park, CO this very summer and there's a chance I met your son, tk. There's also a chance I didn't meet him or know him (because I didn't meet that many of the kids from Texas), but I won't ask his name or anything because the rules I agreed to when I registered to the forum said I should respect anonymity.

The only things I wanted to say specifically in response to that are 1) The phone reception was indeed terrible because we were surrounded by mountains at a retreat center designed to help people escape the hustle and bustle, and I personally felt guilty for not calling my parents more than I did (my difficulty with phone reception was compounded by the fact that my phone got ruined and I had to downgrade to a terrible phone that had bad reception in normally good-reception areas) Oh, and the cell tower was indeed struck by lightning there in July sometime and at that point, there wasn't even reception by the flag pole like usual.

Okay, I'm rambling, but I had a few more things. 2) I just wanted to clarify that LT took place at the YMCA of the Rockies (not associated with GCM) where participants joined other college-aged students from around the world to work full-time jobs (that were emphasized as priority #1 when it came to time management) and live in the dorms that the YMCA runs and keeps. I'd say LT students made up about 35% of the seasonal student work force for the summer, the rest were mostly international students from many different countries. The LT program was designed around the unique opportunity of working at the YMCA for a summer (which is highly coveted in general), so worship services were after the last shift of work and things like that.

3) I'm really surprised by your son's reaction to you coming to pick him up, it doesn't sound like something I or many of my friends would do. I personally left early because I missed my family from being away all summer and wanted to take advanage of the few days I would have before having to return to school for work. The only thing I can think is that rides were really hard to organize and he didn't want to leave the others with the rest of the gas cost and responsibility of picking up his slack for driving back....maybe, I don't know.

4) I wouldn't trade my experience in Colorado this past summer for anything because 1, I was in the Rockie Mountains, how cool is that?, 2, I had an awesomely unique experience to meet and work with and get to know people from all around the world, and 3, because the biggest thing I grew in over the summer was being bold about my faith in my Lord Jesus Christ and sharing the salvation He's given me.

Um, as for the other stuff, There's a GCM church also at Kent State and the University of Cincinnati, and being planted next year there will be one in Pitt and at the University of Toledo, all are a part of the h2o network of churches (our church is called "h2o" because Jesus called Himself the "living water" in John 4). As for the rest of the list, most sound familiar, but I don't know how comprehensive it is.

Basically, I'd just like to say that I'm really sorry for any bad experiences people have had with GCx churches, but I have no fears or trepidations about h2o Kent, Ohio.  The people in my church are Jesus-followers and are far from prideful; three staff/pastors are attending seminaries outside GCx, we regularly partner with other campus ministries, excellence and committment to school is emphasized, I never signed any "covenant" during the discipleship class (and all churches have discipleship classes), and there are other things I could totally think of if only it wasn't 2am.

I'm still rambling, but in short, I don't dispute any of the claims made on here, because I don't know what goes on in the other churches or has gone on in the organization at large in the past or present, all I know is that my GCM church, my h2o, is the place where God has put people who love Him and have a heart for college students and just want to see more Jesus in the world, and I'm blessed to have these people in my life, and doubly blessed to be following a God that moves and works and changes lives despite sorted pasts and human mistakes.

Finally, I just want to say that there are people/pastors and churches as wholes in any denomination that wound people and cause hurt because of pride and human ambition getting in the way of the call of the (capital "c") Church to be Jesus' bride and a reflection of Him. No one demonination or organization is perfect or free from criticism, especially when we're tallking about Christian organizations because anything that is meant to or has the potential to bring God glory is opposed by the enemy, the devil.

I'd love to answer any more questions or give more opinions/insights from the "inside" as well as be open to hear what anyone else has to say about any of this.

PS If you finished reading all this, you deserve a cookie.

[Linda]

Thanks for your comment, TechEd.

You can use the cult word if you like. The reason I try to avoid it is because it is inflammatory. When people hear it, they stop listening to what comes after it. Also, doctrinally, there is nothing obviously off with the GC statement of faith. The quality of GC that makes it "off" is their view on authority and commitment to the group.

I wanted you to know that we did not leave our church because we were "hurt". I realize some leave for this reason. We left because the teaching on the local and national level was flawed/unsound. Again, not all teaching was flawed/unsound. Most of the time it wasn't. That's why we were at our church 10 years.

We are pretty easy going people and let a lot of things slip by because we knew and trusted the leaders. They were our friends (still are). We also joined a few years after the error statement and after a mass exodus (still not sure why) from our church, so perhaps they were in "act normal, don't mention McCotter" mode. We never heard the name Jim McCotter mentioned by name. Ever. Not once.

What I want to make clear is that while some may have trouble with personal offenses at the local level, that's not what this forum is about. We are talking about what the group believes, teaches, and practices on a national level. Teaching differs from offenses. The national leaders regularly teach commitment to them. To GC. For life. This is wrong. Rick Whitney told parents at a Faithwalkers that their kids over 18 should listen to their elders and parents should get out of the way. I can get you chapter and verse on that if you'd like. Or, perhaps you were there. Faithwalkers 2009, I believe. Mark Darling taught high school students in Colorado at an LT that they should commit to their GC church for life! He had them stand up and commit to this as one of his 10 commitments. These men are on the GC board and they are teaching this stuff at national conferences. So it's not enough to say "my church doesn't teach bad stuff". If your church participates or listens to Faithwalkers teaching, LT teaching, etc., you are being exposed to unsound teaching.

We are not saying that GC people are bad. Or, they don't love the Lord. Or, they aren't nice. We are saying that in the DNA of the group, there is a big flaw in the form of false teaching about leaders and commitment. It has never been rooted out. Sometimes it gets cut back a bit, but it always grows back. People should know about this and be warned.

Elders should have the humility and boldness to expose it and correct it.

[EverAStudent]

Greetings TechEd!

Thanks for providing your views from a different perspective.

Also as a perspective thing, we left our GC church due to its: 1) highly controlling authority structure, 2) poor theology overall, 3) the embrace of the national elders of contemporary apostleship (something we consider to have been heretical).  As for LT, I find it hard to endorse leadership training from those who did not have the wisdom or discernment to reject such doctrines as contemporary apostleship when it was first rolled out.

Blessings.