Causes for pain

I'm not sure if this will help anyone, but maybe it will help people understand their pain better and deal with it.

I think people have issues with GCM for various reasons:
1. Feel pressure to perform or judgment
2. Passionate idealists, that get let down
3. Bad teaching
4. People whose lives are wrongly interfered with

Thoughts for each:
1. Churches rightly want people to put Christ first in their lives. Some focus on personal holiness, some on compassion, some on winning souls.

Resentment may exist for people not meeting the expected standard. (see 1 Cor 10) Leaders that resort to manipulation have clearly abandoned God's plan to change us from within through the Holy Spirit.

2. People that are committed to putting Christ first in their lives are often drawn to GCM churches. Things may be great at the start. But whenever these idealists see a conflict with the Bible’s teaching (real or subjective.) GCM leadership is not generally good at handling criticism. (Is this some trial, some attack from Satan?)

3. I can see pain coming from bad teaching, generally beyond accepted evangelical/biblical norms. Examples may include dating/marriage, loyalty, slander/gossip, pastoral authority, stay/not-stay in school, etc..

4. People have the individual responsibility to make career and relationship decisions. Rarely is there Biblical justification for outside interference, such as illegal activity. Cults often exert control over these personal decisions. Interfering with Christians decision to get married, or isolating people from their friends is wrong at a very fundamental level.

Conclusions:
One hot-point for me is manipulation. (Extreme #1) I have fought that whenever I have encountered it and hoped it didn’t affect those I’m close to. I would strenuously fight if I ever encountered #4, which I don’t think I have. I would truly sympathize with any who did encounter it.

When it comes to the rest of these issues, I realize that people are imperfect and I am generally very gracious about others’ faults. I agree that better training on proper behavior (1, 2, & 4) and better knowledge (3) would help GCM improve upon its past.

My break with GCM is probably due to #2 more than anything else. My idealism would hold that if two believers obey Eph 5:21 (submit to one another) and love one another, that they will be able work out any issues. I have many great testimonies to this.

Some GCM leaders have a warped view that blinds them to Eph 5:21. They believe in a hierarchy where they do not need to submit to common believers. Perhaps it is a protection mechanism they have resorted to. It does not feel like love.

Rember 1 Peter 5:5 "..All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble." I believe the struggles these "proud" leaders face so stubbornly is not from Satan, but God who desperately wants them to repent.