How dare you...

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[Linda]

I got the idea for starting this thread after we bumped into some friends (the former GCM variety of friends) while shopping the day after Christmas. In the course of our pleasant conversation, I suddenly had a memory of something I had forgotten about.

Now, two years plus away from my experience, I found myself especially infuriated by one particular event that looks even worse in the rear view mirror.

There are several reasons I am starting this thread.

The first is that others of you might have realizations of things so wrong they demand to be out in the open.

Secondly, I am hoping to warn any parents who may have children involved in GCM just what happened to our family.

Third, I am hoping that the pastors involved will read this, be convicted of their error, and repent.

Now, back to the topic.

How dare you...

...TRY TO PUT A WEDGE BETWEEN ME AND MY FAMILY.

I will explain.

Anyone who knows our family, knows we have a very close family.

We love God. We love each other.

I have mentioned this before, so it's not news, but suddenly two days ago, I had a renewed sense of how truly wicked this was so I want to warn new readers of what happened.

When we left ECC Bloomington, we wrote a 2 page letter explaining that our theological differences were so extensive that we had to leave. We received back a 2 page letter of rebuke in which we were told that we "missed the mark", "were unfair", "were inaccurate" and "borderline defamed them". (The "borderline defamed" them part was a comment about how they choose leaders through a system of apostolic succession similar to Catholics). Included with this letter was a several page long GCLI paper (full of inaccuracies) on church government.

So far so good. They are allowed to say whatever they want to us. It didn't fit the mold of the "thank you" letter Bovenmyer suggests in his 1991 talk on a different thread, but we let them have the last word (they always take it so you might as well give it to them!)

Then, a few days later, A COPY OF THAT LETTER (a PERSONAL LETTER in which we were rebuked) WAS SENT TO OUR GROWN CHILDREN without our knowledge or permission.

That, is wicked. That is a violation of our privacy. That is borderline libel. That type of behavior is an attempt to put a wedge between parents and their children. It doesn't promote the idea of honoring your father and mother. And, then, they had the audacity a year later to accuse us of being slanderous and divisive!

All 7 Bloomington ECC pastors names were on that letter. None had personally signed it, so we don't know who of the 7 actually saw that letter. We don't know who agreed that it was a good idea to send that letter to our grown children. We don't know which of the ECC pastors whose names were on the letter knew it was sent to our children. We don't know if any pastors from any other locations know what transpired.

But, it was a very bad idea to send that letter to our children. It was wrong.

For all the talk about "Premeditated Parenting", I have a little tip for parents. If any spiritual "leader" tries to insert themselves between you and your child, grab your child by the hand, and run in the opposite direction. If your children are grown and out of the house, get down on your knees and beg God to open their eyes and protect them.

Don't mess with my children. Don't you ever try to put a wedge between me and my children. You will have to answer to me, but worse than that, you will have to answer to God.

And, so I say, "How dare you?"

[Jason Stauffacher]

Linda, you gave your life to an organized shepherd movement.  I posted on the FaithwalkZchat this from Wiki:

CAN had classified GCI as a shepherding cult based on criteria including procedures, use of mind control and thought-stopping techniques, and the degree of member consent; they said that "Great Commission discouraged its members from listening to outside criticism...

[/b]

Can you not agree with that above assessment?  Now they send letters to the kiddies, thinking they can get them.  Mark and gang might cite the verse that Christ makes brother against brother, wife against husband.  I believe it is in the Book of Mark.  I am sorry you had to go through this.  Please write me directly if you want at my email: jasonstauffacher@gmail.com

I dealt with issues like this with my cousin and auntie, Cathie and Ron Max about their son Chad who was advised to never speak to his parents again, by the advise of a GCM pastor in Colorado.  Fancy that.  A GCM pastor gave advise that a child was told not to talk to his parents.  You think it was bad, this damn letter?  Call up my auntie Cathie Max, and she'll tell you the war-story about losing her son to the GCM bullcrap.  It was more than a letter.  She'll tell you it's fine and that God was in it.  Well, I see when a pastor invades a life of a family like yours or my family, the Max family at Evergreen, they have another thing coming.  

The most horrible thing about all this, they believe Jesus is on their side and NOT yours.  That is scary.  Real scary.

Praying for you.

-Jason

[Linda]

How dare you...

...withhold information about exactly what your "movement" is from a majority of the people attending.

Jason's comment gave me a new "How dare you...."

But first I wanted to say, Jason, I am sorry to hear about how your cousin was asked to never speak to his parents again. That's wicked. Also, I did want to make one slight clarification to your comment.

You wrote:

you gave your life to an organized shepherd movement

I want to make it clear that we did not give our life to a shepherding movement.

Our problem was that we went there 10 years and didn't realize that it was a shepherding movement. We were idiots, I know! When we realized that it was a shepherding movement, we left immediately.

From what I can tell, there are two levels of "membership".

The first is just the people who attend, give money, teach a Sunday School class, go to a small group, show up on Wednesdays, and have no idea how the system works.

The second group is the "inner circle". This is the "by invitation only" group. You need to "demonstrate your character" and be "recognized" to be "tapped on the shoulder" and asked to be part of the GCLI group of men and their wives with the hope of one day being one of them.

Matthew 6 speaks to that:

"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

It is not a good thing to do things to be seen by men. To be "recognized". Hypocrites do things to be seen by men.

Tell me, how stupid we were to go there 10 years and never hear of the GCLI guys till 7 years after we started attending.

Tell me how stupid we were to not realize that the way you became a GCLI guy was to be "tapped on the shoulder" and then "discipled". We learned 2 weeks before we left that you had to be asked to be on the pastor track. We thought if you wanted to be a pastor, you just went up to a pastor and expressed an interest in being one!

Tell me, how stupid we were to not realize that there were guys meeting late at night at pastor's houses to be "discipled" by that pastor with the hopes of one day being one of them.

Tell me how stupid we were to not ask more questions when things were odd or seemed "off" because we wanted to encourage these pastors who seemed like nice guys. We gave them a pass on some decisions because we just thought they were uneducated, but sincere men.

Tell me how stupid we were to not realize that there was a whole "movement" out there that had a history and a founding apostle and excommunications, and a statement of error.

We trusted these people and we loved these people and because of it we didn't ask questions. We were deceived. We feel terrible, absolutely sick, about not seeing it for what it was and protecting our children.

We don't hate these people. They are deceived. We hate the system they are in.

[boboso]

It is appalling to see the destruction caused by this "movement".

Like you, we blithely went along with whatever the church was doing until the fateful day one of the "leaders" approached me about "leadership training". After the "truth" came out, we argued (not exaggerating) for nearly 8 hours about commitment.

I remember clearly asking: "What you are really asking for is commitment above and beyond what we already have in the Bible as brothers, right?"

"Yes".

That was the beginning of the end for us at GCx. I'm just glad it happened early.

[theresearchpersona]

You know, if someone really were in an area of rebellion/error (against God, not men in error) then it wouldn't be bad to give warnings...except that any separation people have for one another must be according to the word, and done by obedience to God and not compulsion of men.

There's a lot of unanimity of what happens with these letters among ex-members who don't seem to portray any fault in matters, so that GCM seems like it's often (nearly always) in the wrong.

I know one example where it was/wasn't. A friend who had strayed from sound doctrine (the kind on paper, not really what GCM strongly teaches) wrote a paper critically examining some of the teachings (that are on paper). He told me they said he was being divisive, and he ended-up leaving; but according to scripture we're to correct one another when in error, and I still wonder why they didn't sit-down with him and teach him lovingly.

Now, howewever, I wonder if there are any teachers there who are actually "apt" to do such. . . and if so why they haven't examined the Church there and say anything.

[Jason Stauffacher]

Can you re-phrase that theresearchpersona?

My college writing prof said you can pretty much sum up any idea in two well written sentences.  Get to the point.  I am not sure what you just said.

Oh, by the way, how long have you worked for Chic Publications?

-Jason

[Linda]

You know, if someone really were in an area of rebellion/error (against God, not men in error) then it wouldn't be bad to give warnings

Obviously, that is true. We are not talking here about areas of rebellion.

There's a lot of unanimity of what happens with these letters among ex-members who don't seem to portray any fault in matters, so that GCM seems like it's often (nearly always) in the wrong

I'm not sure what you are saying here.

The final issue that brought all of this to a head was that our daughter (17 years old at the time, while attending an HSLT funded by us) was told that she was to commit herself for the rest of her life to her local GCM church. When you are 17 and living at home and have Christian parents, THEY decide where you go to church and it is a betrayal of their trust of pastors to be in a different state at a conference and have a leader say something like that.

This HSLT was on the heels of several months of trying to determine what leaders meant with their nebulous teaching on commitment to the local church followed by teaching on "obedience" to leaders and learning that "obedience to leaders" meant giving the controls of your life over to your leader.

By, the way, I am assuming you are still involved in a GCM church, but while you are making comments about your issues with the Catholic church, I might suggest that you take a step back and think about the leadership structure of GCM.

Jim McCotter was a self proclaimed apostle. Every GCM elder has been chosen by other GCM elders in a unending line of succession that can be traced back to Jim McCotter. And, that is the basis for them asking you to give the controls of your life to them.

[theresearchpersona]

Can you re-phrase that theresearchpersona?



My college writing prof said you can pretty much sum up any idea in two well written sentences.  Get to the point.  I am not sure what you just said.



Oh, by the way, how long have you worked for Chic Publications?



-Jason

Thanks for the college writing advice...though I'd like you to tell that professor to read Romans sometime. : )



Basically I have known biblical correction of members who err and by opions try to be factious in GCM...but the procedure was all wrong; the member was simply seeking truth and he said he was labelled "divisive", but they didn't sit down with him and go through the scriptures to teach him what is correct. I don't know if they even believe what he was criticizing (except on paper and some of the auditory teaching they've don). Anyways, I don't work for Chic Publications, see http://gcmwarning.com:8080/decomm/index.php/topic,465.msg2961.html#msg2961.

[Linda]

Basically I have known biblical correction of members who err and by opions try to be factious in GCM

And what does this have to do with this thread? I am not following your logic.

Are you accusing the posters here of unrepented sin?

If people have continued in sin, left because they were confronted and didn't like it, then went on to be factious, they are wrong.

That's not what we are talking about here.

My husband and I were not accused of sin. We confronted some leaders about some bad teaching. They told us they would not correct the error (isn't that odd that some pastors agreed with us that the teaching was off, but wouldn't correct the error because they felt that would be judging the heart of the pastor who misspoke) and we left.

We didn't say anything for 9 months. Then, when we realized that people thought we left for reasons other than false teaching, my husband blogged our reasons.

We didn't leave because we were hurt.
We didn't leave because we were confronted with sin.
We didn't leave because we found a better church.
We weren't church shopping.
We didn't leave because we were asked to give too much money.
We didn't want to leave.

We left because we believe there are some very significant flaws in the DNA of "the movement" that go way back. In fact, we didn't even know there was "movement" till just a few months before we left.

This is old news to most posters here, but we have been shunned by some leaders, have received several letters of rebuke from pastors telling us that we are divisive and slanderous, and we even had the honor and great pleasure of having a sermon preached against us.

We see the system of elevating leaders and demanding obedience to them on matters of personal preference as a major flaw in the DNA. False teaching needs to be confronted and corrected.

Incidentally, when we left, we were asked to agree to a two sentence generic statement about why we left and TO SAY NOTHING MORE. This is very odd. We did not agree to it.

And, lest this sound too harsh and dogmatic, we are still friends with and love many of the pastors and their families. I am choosing to believe that some have no idea of what transpired as we left and after we left. For all the talk of plurality, I have learned that not all leaders know what is going on.

[theresearchpersona]

Sorry Mrs., I was replying to Jason when he asked me to re-sum what I stated earlier. Sorry about that mis-communication, I should have been more specific; something to remember.

God bless.