Sometimes You Gotta Run
By David L Rattigan
Mom had already left one
spiritually destructive church, and thought she had finally found a
spiritual home. The people were so friendly, the worship so alive and the
Spirit seemed to be "moving" so strong. She was buzzing in this newfound
"fellowship". I had my suspicions, but I kept them to myself. She was so
wrapped up in everything, it would have been like raining on her parade,
so I brushed aside my concerns and decided I'd let her have her fun.
I should have clued in to
what was really going on when I first visited the church one Sunday night.
The sermon was nothing but a rehash of the same message I had heard
regularly at my previous church: If things seem strange or wrong to you,
it's because you're thinking with your "mind" and not listening to the
Spirit. For years, that had been a staple teaching of the kind of
charismatic Christianity of which I was part: Your mind is carnal,
fleshly, so don't listen to it, and don't think that reasoning things
through or working out things logically can get you anywhere; you have to
listen to the Spirit, and not trust your corrupt mind. Whenever there was
something you found hard to accept, that was the response: You can't
accept it because your mind is trying to figure it out -- just let go and
trust the Spirit.
For about two years, the only
thing I would hear of that church was how wonderful it was, how much the
Spirit "flowed," what glorious, uplifting times they had during their
worship. Although I was a little skeptical, Mom never seemed anything but
happy and content there.
Then, almost literally
overnight, it all fell apart for her. I received a distraught email
followed by several phone calls as Mom apparently woke up to what had
happened to her over the previous two years. The occasion of her wake-up
call was a cellphone text-message from one of the pastors, a message of
which she was the subject, but not the intended receiver. Without going
into detail, the message she mistakenly received revealed the extent of
the manipulation and control she was under. All of a sudden, the many
doubts and fears she had suppressed about her involvement in this
too-good-to-be-true "fellowship" were rising to the surface.
It was the beginning of a
breakdown for her, from which she is still recovering -- despite an awful
lot of healing -- two and a half years later.
Spiritual abuse is subtle.
Often, when you're in a spiritually abusive situation, you are blind to
it. I've been in spiritually abusive situations myself (albeit milder than
that Mom was in), and only long after have I been fully able to recognize
what was really taking place.
Mom was oblivious to how she
was being controlled. When she made that decision to break free, the many
ways in which she was being manipulated and abused were suddenly
abundantly clear to her. She had become part of what we'll call a
"covenant relationship". This was not the term used, but I am adopting it
here to maintain some anonymity. These relationships were encouraged to be
unhealthily close, as this excerpt from the church's literature
demonstrates:
Result of [covenant
relationships]? Soul and spirit joined together, become one heart and
mind ... amazing love for one another. Want to be together all the time,
because God is more real when together and there is the comfort of God.
[All mistakes here and in the following excerpts as in the original
letter]
During the course of her
involvement with this church, Mom was gradually discouraged from spending
time with her own family. Her own daughter was a "negative influence" on
her, supposedly, and she was cautioned and encouraged to stop spending so
much time with her (including grandchildren). Her "covenant partner" would
be there every time she turned around, intruding on every other
relationship in her life. The literature she received encouraged this:
What are the bad things
[about covenant relationships]?...Provokes tremendous jealousy and
opposition both among God's people and among principalities and
powers....Totally overwhelming especially at first but doesn't seem to
get a lot better...You have to fight hard to concentrate on God ... you
have to be very disciplined in your thoughts because the other person is
in your face all the time spiritually.....Can't sin. If you lie to other
person or don't tell whole truth pain unbearable. Every little shadow on
relationship gets a rebuke from God. Must be put right at once. Not
always just a quick sorry God either! Some things you will have to work
through. This can be frightening because you lose your fellowship with
God as well.What are the dangers?...Dangers to existing relationships.
Long term well established spiritual relationships will cope better
because they are more stable. There has to be understanding on behalf of
other relationships and the grace of God....God is a jealous God and He
won't allow anything to come between Him and His children....You can
lose your existing relationships, especially if they have been the
conflicting type.
There were to be no secrets.
It was right there in black and white: If you withheld information about
sin in your life, the pain would become unbearable, even to the point of
losing fellowship with God. But there was more:
It is a burden bearing
relationship and as a result of this there is great pain. [A prophet in
the church] said to say this: DO YOU REALLY WANT THIS? DO YOU REALLY
WANT THIS LEVEL OF PAIN? SOME PEOPLE CAN'T COPE AND HAVE HAD NERVOUS
BREAKDOWNS. (I for one can totally understand that!!!) IT MAKES YOU
TOTALLY DEPENDANT [sic] ON THE OTHER PERSON. [Caps in original]
Long after Mom left "the
fellowship," she was shocked to stumble upon these things in an old
letter. She'd kept hold of very little literature from the group, since
they deliberately avoided letting copies of such things get circulated
outside the walls of the church. For example, they would photocopy only
enough notes for one Bible study, and then collect everything in at the
end of each meeting. But with what little material she had left, the
warnings were all there, clear as crystal. They had even acknowledged that
their teachings had led people to breakdowns. Their teachings gave a
perfect recipe for what psychologists call
codependency, an
unhealthy dependence on other people, and in particular a need to be
defined by the behaviour of (and your control over) others. Yet
incredibly, at the time Mom didn't even see it. Spiritual abuse is subtle.
When Mom first contacted me,
filled with trepidation and confused about what to do, I told her simply
to turn round and run, and never look back. She wisely refused to be drawn
back into a dialogue with the leaders of the church, despite their
attempts to drag her back with the warning that she was "listening to
Satan" and not the Spirit.
Words are powerful things. In
a particular kind of charismatic subculture, the language of Satan and
demons, the mind and the spirit, become instruments of control and
bondage. The constant threat that you might just be unwittingly "listening
to Satan," or paying too much attention to your mind and not enough to the
Spirit, easily enslave people who are eager to serve God.
Sometimes you just gotta run.
Thank God Mom had the courage to do that, and not look back.
................................................
Addendum: If you are
in a similar situation, the best thing to do is to cut off all direct ties
and associations immediately, and refuse to be drawn back into dialogue.
While in some conflict-situations, including those involving churches,
dialogue and negotiation can be fruitful and the right thing to do, in
highly abusive situations such as the one I described, being roped back
into dialogue unnecessarily exposes you to more opportunities to be
manipulated. It helps to have a counsellor involved, or a strong,
responsible friend who is aware of the situation and can make rational
judgments about how best to proceed. When your spirit has been abused and
damaged, your first priority is not how to be "nice", or even how to
"forgive": Your first priority is you and your mental, emotional
and spiritual wellbeing.
