first

Bronze!

Best regards,
God

Deb

Glad you are featuring this new (reposting) blog.

I didn’t see you meantiong your previous post that featured my blog about Maranatha on this group:

http://thewartburgwatch.com/2016/02/10/maranatha-ministries-reconsidered-steve240s-new-blog/

For those who have time you might find it of interest to read the comments in that blog post. I had quite the discussion with Thomas Cooper (now deceased) about Tom’s book that he wrote supposedly on the history of Maranatha. I find it Shocking Thomas Cooper titled this book “Raising Jesus.”

Thomas Cooper’s tactics in his attempt to defend his book in that blog discussion certainly came to mind when I read this blog post:

https://thoughtcatalog.com/shahida-arabi/2016/06/20-diversion-tactics-highly-manipulative-narcissists-sociopaths-and-psychopaths-use-to-silence-you/3/?utm_source=manipulativearcissists&utm_medium=fb&utm_campaign=ad

I don’t think the late Thomas Cooper could either see or at least admit all the issues with Maranatha if it bit him as the old saying goes. I am not sure if Thomas Cooper was just that deceived about Maranatha or that after producing a book that was incorrect he lacked the humility to admit his errors. With him now being deceased we won’t know the answer to that question this side of eternity.

I am still baffled that someone who claimed to have researched and was now writing about the history of Maranatha could use the word “raising” to describe Maranatha. As one person said I am sure the leadership and some members thought they were “raising Jesus” but looking back shows that a lot of what Maranatha Leaderships did (especially at the end) was anything but raising Jesus.

Similar to your comment on needing to learn from history what I like to quote is Psalm 78 where it says

to teach their children,

They would not be like their ancestors-

a stubborn and rebellious generation,

whose hearts were not faithful to him

(Psalm 78:5, 8)

What can be learned from the mistakes of the leadership of Maranatha that future leaders can take note of especially if Maranatha was originally a movement birthed by God but sadly became a sociological cult? Where did these men miss God assuming they were at one point truly doing God’s work? What do future leaders need to do to avoid these same mistakes.

My blog posts and especially future blog posts will ask that question and hopefully provide some answers to this question while Tikie’s blog is his personal account of being in what he calls a sociological cult. This blog posting Tikie’s account of his experience in Maranatha motivates me to resume my blogging on Maranatha.

The group claimed to teach the full Lordship of Jesus Christ though one wonders if many of these leaders were truly under the Lorship of Christ especially at the end.

Hopefully your featuring this blog will lead to more people reading Tikie’s blog and revisiting Maranatha.

GMFS

Comment 1 of 2: a quick analogy

If you build a tower of Lego™ bricks that’s, say, 30cm tall and around 6cm wide, it’ll be reasonably stable. A small push to one side at the top will tend to create a “restoring force” – that is, the centre of gravity will still be inside the base and its own weight will tend to push it back to vertical. It’s not exactly indestructible, but at least it’ll support its own weight reliably.

If, on the other hand, you make that same 6cm-wide tower 6 metres tall, then even a very small push at the top will move the centre of gravity outside of the base. The result will be a stronger force pushing it over, and obviously it will topple. (Equally obviously, it’ll be next door to impossible to build it in the first place!)

Comment 2 of 2: unstable organisations

If you build a small organisation on a university campus in order, let’s say, to compete in a sport or pastime, or perform music, then there’s no particular reason why this would be dangerous. No group of people is perfectly immune from sociopaths and abuse, but none of the societies I was part of at Cambridge was marked by any cultic behaviour. That includes the university Athletics Club, Magdalene College choir, the university Music Society, and Clare College Climbing Club. Oh, and Cambridge University Dampers Club – the punt-jousting society. Their vision was to fall in the river, or not, according to preference.

If, on the other hand, you want to “raise Jesus” – to change the world by turning it into heaven somehow – then you’re building very tall indeed. As Steve240 pointed out:

Where did these men miss God assuming they were at one point truly doing God’s work?

… it’s quite possible they did actually start out with a little something of the leading of God. (Same with the “Restoration Movement” over here in Blighty.)

The trouble is that the vision and leadership of a small number of men (occasionally women) is not a big enough foundation. A movement like that rapidly becomes unstable, and collapses into legalism, hierarchy, authoritarianism, control and – inevitably – bullying and abuse. What’s so dangerous about it is that it doesn’t look like it’s collapsed – it looks like it’s a rip-roaring success. It’s large, influential and growing. It never noticed when the Lord departed from it.

Nick Bulbeck wrote:

What’s so dangerous about it is that it doesn’t look like it’s collapsed – it looks like it’s a rip-roaring success. It’s large, influential and growing. It never noticed when the Lord departed from it.

Excellent heads-up.
In Matthew 13, Jesus describes:

1 – birds eating up the seed (Word of God) before it takes root

1 – a mustard seed, perhaps human wisdom or false teaching, not the Word, growing up out of proportion and providing a place for the birds to nest – birds that then eat the Word of God before it takes root. Noisy birds draw attention to the mega tree where they nest.

This is an open question to all-

How big was MMI and SGM in the Seattle / U of Washington area in the 80’s?

JYJames wrote:

Steve240 wrote:

For one thing, overreach. When man tries to imitate or manufacture what God can do in changing another man’s heart, it is invasive.

Would it be fair to say that is when mere men usurp the role of the Holy Spirit in someone else’s life?

@ A.Tumbleweed:
Spot on.

Campus ministries usually employ and cycle in and out leadership and leadership recruiting of people way too young into what amounts to pastoral and authoritative-like roles over their peers who are not that much younger than them. There are a lot of different angles and layers to why this is a problem.

****

I actually have a harder time thinking of someone I know who hasn’t had a bad experience or falling out with a campus ministry they were involved in. In my opinion it’s pretty widespread and common.

You can take 5 people from 5 different ministries from 5 different colleges but they will all have almost identical stories. The themes and dynamics will essentially be the same.

Spiritual abuse and typical cult patterns are easy to manifest and replicate in the college campus atmosphere.

Nathan Priddis wrote:

How big was MMI and SGM in the Seattle / U of Washington area in the 80’s?

I mentioned this blog post to someone who was involved with Maranatha in the Northwest (Oregon?). I am sure she can answer the question.

One major mistake the group made was their “unrestrained growth” in that they pushed to expand quickly. This lead to having a lot of young inexperienced leaders. A lot of people used this as the excuse for the ministries issues while at the same time not mentioning that it was Bob Weiner who caused this “unrestrained growth” and appointed inexperienced leaders.

emily honey wrote:

Spiritual abuse and typical cult patterns are easy to manifest and replicate in the college campus atmosphere.

Also common in other movements: Hitler’s Brown Shirts, Khmer Rouge, Mao’s Red Guard, the Moonies, etc.

Preying on a demographic: youthful, idealistic, available, seeking, open, emerging, embarking, inexperienced, naive, trusting, innocent.

Spirits never die – they just inhabit other ministries.

JYJames wrote:

Preying on a demographic: youthful, idealistic, available, seeking, open, emerging, embarking, inexperienced, naive, trusting, innocent.

= New Calvinism

JYJames wrote:

The Way

We had friends ensnared by The Way in the 1970s. A cult, no doubt about it.

The remnants of the Maranatha keep making news however.

University of Arizona bans a religious group from its campus. They are from the Hope Church.

http://tucson.com/news/local/star-investigation-tucson-ministry-a-cult-former-followers-say/article_8824efc5-f210-5041-8088-a654585e4673.html

Hope Church was originally a Maranatha Campus ministry.

http://www.hopechurchasucult.com/hopechurchasuculthistorymcm/september-02nd-2016

Several years ago a pastor in Gainesville, Florida made news because he was going to have public burnings of the Koran. Terry Jones worked for Maranatha Campus Ministries and took over a Maranatha affiliated group in Gainesville, where Maranatha was headquartered.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dove_World_Outreach_Center_Quran-burning_controversy

I was at Auburn when Maranatha was in its heyday. Almost all mainstream and evangelicals were leary of them and considered them a cult.

Max wrote:

Spirits never die – they just inhabit other ministries.

Or like Dracula, they just keep rising from their graves. Won’t stay dead.

Max wrote:

= New Calvinism

Actually, you contradict yourself with your logic in the recent comments. Spirits are free to try to gain influence wherever they can. They are ancient and personality cults with severe control issues are not “neo” but can be found throughout history, from Pharisees to Jesuits to a wide range of organizations today. While I am not a Calvinist, there is not a spirit that is exclusive to them. Should men doing wrong clean up their acts in Calvinism, these spirits will simply go elsewhere.
However, there are multiple spirits involved in getting Christians to join the ongoing civil war raging in Christianity. Calvinists are brothers. My best friend is a Calvinist. The problem is the human heart. Anyone in any denomination or theological school can go astray in common human ways. Throughout history people get harmed in the civil war and take up arms against those who injured them. Then they start fighting with not just the guilty, but also the innocent in the other denomination(s). Thus the injured become a warrior replicating injury on innocents and the cycle repeats. Blessed are the peace makers and those who learn to forgive and spend more time praying for those who injured them then preying on them. Lets not choose to pick up machine guns and shot guns against other groups, but lets choose to use sniper rifles very carefully, with as few a shots as is actually necessary. There is much collateral damage that goes on in the civil wars. Watchbloggers need to watch out that they do not become part of the problem while desiring to be part of the solution. The reality is that good and bad go on everywhere and no church or denomination is immune. Putting Jesus’ teaching into practice and keeping it the priority is the rub. When that fails then church goes astray.

@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
Gee, had forgotten all about,”Koinonia”
groups. We met once with a couple we knew who were involved and invited us to their home. Way too spiritually intimate for our liking…..this would have been in the greater Boston area in maybe 75/76.

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

JYJames wrote:
emily honey wrote:
Spiritual abuse and typical cult patterns are easy to manifest and replicate in the college campus atmosphere.
Also common in other movements: Hitler’s Brown Shirts, Khmer Rouge, Mao’s Red Guard, the Moonies, etc.
That’s because the SA, Khmer Rouge, and Red Guard were all Cults as well — POLITICAL/Ideological Cults. Cults don’t need to be based on a religion per se.
And when Political and Religious Cults overlap, you the “Iranian Students” who overthrew the Shah (replaced with the Ayatollahs) and the Taliban (literally “Students”).

On today’s campus, these kind of cults might be more prevalent, then the older pseudo Christian cults.

While we’re enumerating 1970’s quasi-Christian cults, let’s don’t forget the Children of God, Moses David’s cult. I was recruited by them while in high school in the very early 70’s (71 or 72) via ‘flirty fishing’, where an attractive member of the opposite sex comes onto you like gangbusters in an attempt to reel you in, as it were.

Luckily, I had a very special girlfriend at the time, and was immune. Though I would have been immune anyway – I read the stuff she gave me and it seemed absurd to me.

HUG – I think we’re both HS class of ’73 – you on the West Coast, and me on the East… what times!…

Gram3 wrote:

JYJames wrote:

Preying on a demographic: youthful, idealistic, available, seeking, open, emerging, embarking, inexperienced, naive, trusting, innocent.

To that I would also add adolescent logic that takes the form of “different from parent therefore good” which can be exploited for evil purposes.

That was a big one in the Piper cult out of Wheaton many years ago. You see, none of us family members knew the “true Gospel”. Everything about our doctrine was wrong. I kept goading my brother to withhold tuition and see if that might magically change their minds. He thought they were so brainwashed they might just go work for Piper for free and not finish college. One hoped it was a phase.

In the early days of the Neo Cal resurgence this was a big theme: Your parents churches are just feel good entertainment. Not serious like us. Not intellectual like us.

That worked for a while. But then there was a lot of entertainment focus with Driscoll, Acts 29, etc. They started adopting a lot of the same marketing tactics to grow churches. Funny that.

Mr. Jesperson wrote:

Actually, you contradict yourself with your logic in the recent comments.

Actually, I moved from a discussion on the spiritual world to one driven by men in my reference to New Calvinism. When JY James said there are ministries “Preying on a demographic: youthful, idealistic, available, seeking, open, emerging, embarking, inexperienced, naive, trusting, innocent,” close observers of the new reformation will know that its primary converts are Generation Xers and Millennials who fit this description. This movement of aberrant belief and practice would not exist – Piper et al. would have no followers – if it weren’t for an audience of the youthful and idealistic seeking a different way to do church.

That which comes against the Church can be lumped into categories: the world, the flesh, and the devil. The world and the flesh trip up many Christians long before the devil gets his hand into it. Such is New Calvinism.

Steve240 wrote:

My blog posts and especially future blog posts will ask that question and hopefully provide some answers to this question while Tikie’s blog is his personal account of being in what he calls a sociological cult. This blog posting Tikie’s account of his experience in Maranatha motivates me to resume my blogging on Maranatha

Tikie’s posts on Maranatha Ministries Revisited seem to end with #24 My Troubles Begin. Will there be additional posts regarding how he escaped from Maranatha and what happened to Tikie and his engineering career?

Lydia wrote:

In the early days of the Neo Cal resurgence this was a big theme: Your parents churches are just feel good entertainment. Not serious like us. Not intellectual like us.

Al-Qaeda and al-Daesh used an Islamic variant of this in their recruiting a similar demographic, that “Your parents have backslidden and compromised, lukewarm. Not like us, on fire with the True Original Islam As It Was In The Days Of The Prophet.”

I very nearly got sucked into Maranatha my first semester at UT Austin. I even got a prophecy from their “prophet” Joe Smith! I realized this was not a group I wanted to be involved with when one of the women from the group called me at home during Christmas vacation. Making a long-distance call to talk to someone you barely knew was a big deal in those days, because it cost money. It spooked me greatly that this woman called me. I made a point of staying well away when I went back to Austin after vacation.

Along those same lines, I’d like to mention that a group similar to Maranatha Ministries, Hope Church at Arizona State University, has had its activities seriously curtailed. Hope has been accused of being a high-pressure organization. In April, five of the six “front clubs” for Hope Church were put on four-year probation because of violations of ASU’s policies, apparently in recruiting members.

http://www.statepress.com/article/2017/04/spcampus-hope-church-update

But more importantly, Hope Church was basically made into an off-campus organization when it was ousted from ASU’s Council of Religious Advisors for four years.

http://www.statepress.com/article/2017/08/spcampus-hope-church-cora-update

This is seriously going to hurt Hope Church. Because it was a campus organization, it was able to get free rent on Neeb Hall, which has a capacity of 438 people, for its church services. However, as a non-campus organization, Hope Church will have to pay somewhere in the neighborhood of $3,500/Sunday to rent Neeb Hall. Also, and this is quite the sweet deal, what with tuition breaks, campus employee parking and an ASU ID for the three advisors who were in charge at Hope Church.

The State Press at ASU has a long story about its investigation into Hope Church:

http://www.statepress.com/article/2016/12/spcampus-asu-hope-christian-church-religious-cult-controversy-1-complaint

Hope Church was founded as an offshoot of Faith Christian Church, which started at the University of Arizona in Tucson. Faith Christian Church has also been accused of being a cult. Hope claims it hasn’t been in contact with Faith for over a decade. That’s possible but I’m still suspicious.

Everything about this Maranatha group sounds just like my former cult. Cut off all outside influences, label them “demonic” or “evil” or “worldly” or “wicked” or….pick a synonymous adjective – and you have a suitable subject ready to be conditioned and brain-washed. With regard to fear of dying if one left Maranatha Ministries, this was the common experience of many that left my former cult, The Forever Family later changed to Church of Bible Understanding. And if you didn’t die in a car, plane or train crash in the process of leaving, then you would surely become a prostitute or a drug addict or a derelict of some sort. Fear is what keeps people in these kinds of groups, and often fear is what causes people to return. One has to see that the fear is a lie to control and manipulate a person into staying in group. One of the most difficult things for a cult member to recognize is that they have been lied to and manipulated all for the purpose of fulfilling the agenda of the cult leader/s. Here is some info on my former shepherding cult. Just look at any number of the ex-member sites. The Wiki article is incomplete and in no way addresses the toxic teachings and practices of the FF/COBU.

https://www.google.com/search?q=the+church+of+bible+understanding&rlz=1C1GGRV_enUS753US754&oq=the+church+of+bible+understanding&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l5.10312j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
It works.

Many thanks for the site owners Deb and Dee first for the valuable Christian Service they perform here and also for posting the kind article and link to our new website with Tikie’s.

We are in the midst of editing and restructuring Tikie’s story and are posting them as we go.

Many thanks again Deb and Dee.

God’s Blessing to you
The Editors MCMrevisted

Darlene wrote:

What Maranatha Ministries took advantage of … and other groups like them – is the gullibility of young people, their interest in being part of social structures that are geared toward people of similar age and the propensity for teens and college-aged people to be drawn to altruistic beliefs … cater to a desire to be part of a movement with a lofty, impressive purpose, and you could be part of contributing to that purpose. Add to that, the idea that it is a unique move of God in history and few people have been chosen to be part of such a movement, but you are special and God has chosen you for such a time as this. Who doesn’t want to feel unique and part of something greater than themselves and have God’s approval at the same time?

Again, this all sounds very familiar regarding the appeal of New Calvinism to Generation Xers and Millennials. And there is no doubt that New Calvinist leaders target this demographic.

Gram3 wrote:

The only thing we had to agree on was that we could only sing the first, second, and last verses of the hymns out of the Baptist Hymnal.

Lol. Who decided that??? It is so weird to be singing the 3rd verse now 🙂

Max wrote:

That which comes against the Church can be lumped into categories: the world, the flesh, and the devil. The world and the flesh trip up many Christians long before the devil gets his hand into it.

True. Even a single pastor can become predatory, if they are flesh- or self-motivated.

i.e.: When my husband was gravely ill and our children were still in middle school, our pastor actually approached me and said that what I needed to do was throw myself completely into volunteering for his church in Christian education. No way. I was a care-taker of my husband and our children, deciding daily, moment-by-moment, who was the least of the least and who needed me the most: children or husband. It was never the programs of this pastor.

[Sidenote: later this pastor divorced his wife for a younger woman, after many years of marriage. Affair? Don’t know. He is no longer a pastor nor a celebrity, but food-addicted, obese, with health issues.]

A.Tumbleweed wrote:

JYJames wrote:
Steve240 wrote:
For one thing, overreach. When man tries to imitate or manufacture what God can do in changing another man’s heart, it is invasive.
Would it be fair to say that is when mere men usurp the role of the Holy Spirit in someone else’s life?

Most definitely it is a desire to usurp the role of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life. The members in these kinds of controlling cults are made to think that they need someone else to reveal the truth to them about themselves. Voila! Who better than the self-appointed leaders who have special revelation from God? They are made to feel that they are susceptible to self-deception and so they need to be instructed and mentored by those who are wiser and more discerning than themselves. Soon, it becomes a co-dependent relationship in which the cult member seeks the approval of the leadership (as well as those who are in good standing with the leadership), for their self-worth and identity.

Darlene wrote:

Most definitely it is a desire to usurp the role of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life.

Paul exhorted Christians to “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5). Cult leaders attempt to put their mind in you. It’s all about mind control. Only the Holy Spirit can protect you against such spiritual attack.

Max wrote:

Darlene wrote:
Most definitely it is a desire to usurp the role of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life.
Paul exhorted Christians to “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5). Cult leaders attempt to put their mind in you. It’s all about mind control. Only the Holy Spirit can protect you against such spiritual attack.

Max, I’m going to say something that might sound very unpopular, even heretical. But the Holy Spirit did not protect me, or the many other members of my Christian cult, from being abused and mistreated by the leadership. I would venture to say that is the case with Maranatha Ministries as well. That is one of the many troubling realities that those of us who have been in these kinds of shepherding cults must recognize. There are manifold reasons as to why people become victims of spiritual abuse, but the fact is God allowed it to happen. The is a hard reality to come to terms with.

JYJames wrote:

emily honey wrote:
Spiritual abuse and typical cult patterns are easy to manifest and replicate in the college campus atmosphere.
Also common in other movements: Hitler’s Brown Shirts, Khmer Rouge, Mao’s Red Guard, the Moonies, etc.
Preying on a demographic: youthful, idealistic, available, seeking, open, emerging, embarking, inexperienced, naive, trusting, innocent.

Yep, a demographic that can be easily controlled and brain-washed.

Darlene wrote:

There is no one quite so zealous for a righteous cause as the exuberant young person who has God on their side! Convince them that you can never be zealous enough for a righteous cause and what you have is a virtual On-Fire-For-Jesus wrecking ball.

Hmm…these quotes come to mind…

“I do the wrong, and first begin to brawl.
But then I sigh; and, with a piece of scripture,
Tell them that God bids us do good for evil:
And thus I clothe my naked villany
With old odd ends stolen out of holy writ;
And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.” – William Shakespeare, Richard III

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” ~ C S Lewis

Darlene wrote:

Yep, a demographic that can be easily controlled and brain-washed.

Gov and god are parallel universes regarding the need to control. Personal liberty/freedom is a mere illusion, the true reality of which is rarely experienced.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xbp6umQT58A

@ Darlene:
If you read the story there were several times he willfully ignored red flags. Or, chose to dismiss them. Most of us have done that in certain venues. I still kick myself over it and I was not in this sort of situation. I willfully chose to rationalize it away.

I honestly think many of us were not aware we have these instincts or “awarenesses” for a reason and to pay close attention to them. It’s something we need to talk about more with young people.

But nothing is more convincing than someone who is already convinced. He mentions that the deceived (Bob’s workers) really believed and he believed them.

Wow! Reading the stories about Maranatha brought back memories of Bob Weiner preaching at Covenant Life Church many years ago. As much as I was a kool-aid drinker back then, I had great difficulty getting into his style, which was very aggressive and harsh.

I also thought back to when I attended Catholic University in D.C., which is where I met a group of folks from what became CLC. They formed a group on campus and held bible studies. I remember Steve Shank (shudder!) coming to talk, and I don’t remember what other leaders came, but the group was run by the church. Mostly I just went out to church on Sunday’s with friends, and I was eventually baptized by Che Ahn, although I had given my life to the Lord years earlier. Those were mostly good times; however, the folks from CLC did push for you to be discipled. Because I was on a college campus and physically removed from the focal point of the church, I was somewhat protected. I did move back a few years after graduation and join the church, though.

Think of how invasive it was for this church to hold meetings at Catholic University. It did help me cement my commitment to following Jesus. However, they didn’t mesh with the school’s theology at all and were very secretive and intrusive. There was one horrible incident where a friend who worked at a coffee house on campus allowed a musician affiliated with the group to play there. He gave a very radical altar call right at the coffee house, and my friend was moritifed and thankfully didn’t lose his job, and I was mortified as well, since that wasn’t what they told him would happen.

OK, I have to post a followup to my post about Hope Church at ASU. It turns out they have Maranatha DNA. The flow is: Maranatha Campus Ministries >> Faith Christian Church (1990) >> Hope Church (2005). The complaint filed with ASU by former Hope Church members includes that history:

http://www.hopechurchasucult.com/hopechurchasuculthistorymcm/september-02nd-2016

@ Gram3:
…left off the wink.

roebuck wrote:

HUG – I think we’re both HS class of ’73 – you on the West Coast, and me on the East… what times!…

Yes I’m HS class of ’73. No COGs at my HS circa ’71; only thing resembling that were some Calvary Chapel-influenced student witnessers (and one teacher) and an on-campus “Spiritual Life Club”. HS really wasn’t the best years of my life.

@ Steve240:
Thank you Steve- we appreciate your efforts on behalf of exposing behaviors that result in groups becoming sociological cults.

The EditorsMCM revisited

emily honey wrote:

I actually have a harder time thinking of someone I know who hasn’t had a bad experience or falling out with a campus ministry they were involved in. In my opinion it’s pretty widespread and common.

Yeah, I participated in several different campus ministries and had some pretty bad experiences. They were particularly cliquish and judgmental, and it was the student leaders that were the worst.

Fairly recently, I had a friend from college come to me and ask why I didn’t tell her that I disapproved of what she wore back then. I said I never said such a thing, nor I did believe it. She said, “So and so said you had a problem…” This is years and years later. It wasn’t me who said that, but I’m pretty sure it got attributed to me because several of those people kept coming to me about their judgmental modesty culture on others and I kept telling them to stick a sock in it. Another friend still reverently tells me, about the same people, “So and so always thought you shouldn’t have done this or should have done that…” and the person she’s talking about never once made an effort to have a conversation with me, so I say so. Still comes up every couple of years or so.

Steve240 wrote:

One story I heard was that things became so bad at the Auburn Chapter and they thought that the culture was that bad there that Maranatha Leadership shut the chapter down with hopes that in a few years they would

reopen it. With the group imploding that reopening never happened as far as I know.

Steve, I was gone by the time it shut down. If you read the story at the link in the article above it is by a guy named Tic Tok who was at the Auburn Chapter of the Maranathas.

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

HS really wasn’t the best years of my life.

If I were to go back and redo high school I would make a concerned effort to be a little wild.

Darlene wrote:

Soon, it becomes a co-dependent relationship in which the cult member seeks the approval of the leadership (as well as those who are in good standing with the leadership), for their self-worth and identity.

And when the member (now ex-member) leaves the “lovin’ on ’em” stops abruptly and the shunning begins. It feels like being cut lose from your mooring and set adrift. And then you begin to realize, in time, that what you were moored to was a garbage barge and that you just got used to the stench…

Lea wrote:

I never got involved enough to see judgment (was busy doing my own other college things!) but definitely saw the cliques. High school church stuff too. I think some of it is just age, but I do wonder how much is promoted by teachings?

I think it’s all those things added to the assignment of big responsibility over others the same age, as Emily said.

Most of this group came from tiny Christian high schools to a giant public university, and they thought it was their job to police everybody else. If they had wanted the security of extreme modesty culture, they shouldn’t have gone to a large public university. At the time, I wasn’t sure that friend they talked about was a Christian, but I still didn’t think her clothing was a big deal.

https://maranathaministriesrevisted.com/2017/08/09/the-dating-revelation-we-say-adios-to-dating/

This is Tiks post on their dating policy. They called it a revelation

@ Lea:
What I meant to say is this ‘we are like this, not like THOSE people over there’ contributes to the cliquish feels…and it makes the rest of the world extra ‘scary’ if you’re trying to break free if you think they are all terribly worldly awful people because they, say, go on dates and wear tank tops.

@ Headless Unicorn Guy:

You are not alone in that experience.

Darlene wrote:

One of the selling points of the shepherding movement cults was to cater to a desire to be part of a movement with a lofty, impressive purpose, and you could be part of contributing to that purpose. Add to that, the idea that it is a unique move of God in history and few people have been chosen to be part of such a movement, but you are special and God has chosen you for such a time as this. Who doesn’t want to feel unique and part of something greater than themselves and have God’s approval at the same time?

Bingo!

One of the things I had to come to terms with after leaving Maranatha is why I had such a hard time with doing it, and the answer was because I wanted to believe it. Realizing that was a major step in my healing.

I came across Tikie’s blog about 8 years ago. At the time it only had a few posts on it, with other posts scattered on various other forums, but I had to track down as many as I could. I was in a Maranatha but never had dealings above the local level (somehow managed to avoid going to MLTS) and reading the inside stories about leadership was gripping, to say the least. I am glad they are being made available again.

Reading about current problems in the SBC I am struck by how similar they are to Maranatha’s problems, even without the shepherding or the charismatic theology.

Nick Bulbeck wrote:

Comment 2 of 2: unstable organisations
…
If, on the other hand, you want to “raise Jesus” – to change the world by turning it into heaven somehow – then you’re building very tall indeed.

What an interesting idea, sounds like building a tower of Babel and slapping the name of Christ on it.

Mae wrote:

@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
You are not alone in that experience.

Yeah. In my years in various fandoms (Lit SF, Gamer, proto-Anime, and Furry), I noticed most first-generation fans came out of abusive family backgrounds and/or school careers.

Bronies seem to be an exception; there abusive family/school backgrounds don’t seem to be a majority. However, Furry…

One of my writing partners (the burned out preacher – with background experience in horror, SF, Furry, and Brony) does online counseling of Furries. He has said that almost all he’s counseled had a high school experience he described as “literally hellish” (and he doesn’t use that word lightly). He considers the fannish obsession to be a survival refuge, exact quote: “Obsessing over upright talking animals beats sucking a load out of your father’s shotgun.”

Thersites wrote:

I’m finding good old “negative feelings” have kept me from harm.

Much of discernment is simply keeping your eyes and ears open. After having been bit by a religious snake or two in my younger years, I look carefully where I walk these days.

Max wrote:

Thersites wrote:
I’m finding good old “negative feelings” have kept me from harm.

Much of discernment is simply keeping your eyes and ears open.

Convenient how we have redefined it to mean seeing us under every bed when we’re not, Eh, My Dear Wormwood?

Robert M wrote:

Reading about current problems in the SBC I am struck by how similar they are to Maranatha’s problems, even without the shepherding or the charismatic theology.

I think the shepherding movement had a big influence on the New Cals, though of course none of them would admit it. Didn’t Mohler start out as a charismatic?

Lea wrote:

M.Stacey wrote:
He believed that you would just be going and doing God’s work and BAM God will speak to you about who your wife would be. Then get married. BUT DON”T YOU DARE DATE!
I’ve been reading some of the recovering grace stuff and this comes up a lot. I don’t know how much of this ‘god will send you a husband/wife’ thing sunk into my head when I was younger but at this point it seems like bunk.

It seems that in many Christian circles things are attributed to God that have little to do with God per say. Recently my husband happened to see a fella from our former Christian cult at a local restaurant. As they were speaking, the fella said that God had released him from X ministry and now he was pursuing X ministry. When one uses God has their stamp of approval you can do no wrong. God called me to….God spoke to me and….God led me to… and on and on it goes. Call me skeptical, but I think a lot of this sort of thing is Christianese.

Darlene wrote:

Call me skeptical, but I think a lot of this sort of thing is Christianese.

You’re not the only skeptic.

Darlene, I complete agree with you about seeing red flags. You don’t have to be that young, even, just unfamiliar. I have learned loads in the last two years that I never had reason to learn before. And I think the way you are raised has something to do with what you pick up on, either because you don’t have good examples or alternately because you do, and so you miss the deception.

Darlene wrote:

When one uses God has their stamp of approval you can do no wrong.

God told me to eat some cake this weekend 😉

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

Mae wrote:
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
You are not alone in that experience.
Yeah. In my years in various fandoms (Lit SF, Gamer, proto-Anime, and Furry), I noticed most first-generation fans came out of abusive family backgrounds and/or school careers.
Bronies seem to be an exception; there abusive family/school backgrounds don’t seem to be a majority. However, Furry…
One of my writing partners (the burned out preacher – with background experience in horror, SF, Furry, and Brony) does online counseling of Furries. He has said that almost all he’s counseled had a high school experience he described as “literally hellish” (and he doesn’t use that word lightly). He considers the fannish obsession to be a survival refuge, exact quote: “Obsessing over upright talking animals beats sucking a load out of your father’s shotgun.”

Adolescence for me, was a long , painful, confusing time. You couldn’t pay me enough money to relive it. The last place I’d ever go is to my HS reunion. ( ’69 )

Sometimes at night when I’m drifting off to sleep, I express to God, my wonderment, amazement, I didn’t lose my faith in Him, or rather He didn’t forget me.

@ Darlene:
Muff Potter wrote:

Darlene wrote:

Call me skeptical, but I think a lot of this sort of thing is Christianese.

You’re not the only skeptic.

Christianese, would be one way of viewing it, a kind way.
Whenever I hear, ” God called, led, spoke to me”, I interpret that as their license to do what they wish. It’s also part and parcel trying to manipulate me into accepting whatever it is they want to do.

Darlene wrote:

When one uses God has their stamp of approval you can do no wrong. God called me to….God spoke to me and….God led me to… and on and on it goes. Call me skeptical, but I think a lot of this sort of thing is Christianese.

It’s also (according to Jewish sources) the original meaning of the phrase “Taking the LORD’s Name in Vain”. (Convenient how it’s been redefined to mean cussing and cussing alone, Eh, My Dear Wormwood?)

An some time ago on one of these threads, someone commented that “God Led Me To…” should be spoken with the same caution reserved for “Please Castrate Me”.

Lea wrote:

God told me to eat some cake this weekend

I heard somewhere that you can only have your cake, butcha’ can’t eat it too.

@ Muff Potter:
Fav with Neo Cals. It’s an “end of discussion” verse.

Lydia wrote:

@ Muff Potter:
Fav with Neo Cals. It’s an “end of discussion” verse.

It doesn’t even make sense! One, your heart and your mind are different. Two, If you don’t listen to yourself who are you supposed to listen to? Some other man? Because in verse 5 it says NOT to do that. So I guess you are supposed to be listening to God. Um…how do you know if you are hearing god or your heart or your mind? Such a circle!

@ Lea:
Some of my research long ago pointed out that the “heart verses” are actually referring to our minds. In that era, they believed that decision making/thinking came from the heart. Your “head” was the “source” for your body as in eating, seeing, hearing, etc. it wasn’t until about 100 years after Paul, the physician, Galan, discovered that animals brains controlled their limbs (body)

It really changes how we view some passages. Thinking is perfectly ok in Christianity. 🙂

EditorsMCM wrote:

@ Steve240:
Thank you Steve- we appreciate your efforts on behalf of exposing behaviors that result in groups becoming sociological cults.
The EditorsMCM revisited

Thank you for updating and republishing Tiki’s traumatic story of being involved in what he calls a “sociological cult.”

It is interesting to read this sad story but one that needs to be told.

Lea wrote:

Steve240 wrote:
This is Tiks post on their dating policy. They called it a revelation
Funny how many people keep having these revelations? Gothard. Harris. A bunch of others I guess.

I would have to say that for the two others I have not heard their “alternatives” described as a “revelation.” Perhaps with Gothard where with courtship you will hear that this is what the Bible claims to teach.

Use of the word “revelation” means a lot more than just saying you have a “policy” of no dating etc. You are claiming that this was something revealed to you by God etc. Bob Weiner was teaching quite a passive approach to finding a spouse. On another of my blogs I comment here on the passage of scripture Bob Weiner used and point out that rather than be passive it could be quite proactive:

https://ikdg.wordpress.com/2008/01/12/issac-rebekah’s-story-proactive-or-passive/

GSD [Getting Stuff Done] wrote:

I really appreciate the effort to preserve Tikie’s memories. They read like a novel, or maybe a movie. Like the polar opposite of Animal House. I keep wondering what happened to the characters, especially “Ellen.” Her instincts seemed really sharp, especially for a college kid.
I can understand how Tikie overlooked some of his red flags. At that age, they just don’t seem as “red.” It takes some real pain and regret to get most of us to pay attention to the red flags in life. I certainly missed a lot of them.
I didn’t arrive at Murray State until 1982, and I can’t recall a Maranatha House anywhere. I’m still wondering where it was. MCM seems to have had just disappeared in most places, leaving a lots of hurt people behind, and a few odd churches.

Around the beginning of 1982 Maranatha felt a “call” to nationwide. Before that they only had groups in the Southeast. They started in Paducah KY and then on to a number of college campuses. This push to all of a sudden go nationwide was what I would call their entering in the stage of “unrestrained growth.”

When the group decided to go nationwide the would shut down some of the existing groups they had and the people would typically move to these other areas outside the south to where they were expanding.

This may explain why you never saw them at Murray state. The group disbanded (some would call implode) in the early 90’s. A lot of their local groups closed. A certain number that didn’t close formed a new group eventually called Every Nation that some will say is how Maranatha continued and the group supposedly has many of the same practices that Maranatha had though they will claim they have changed.

@ Steve240:

A lot of what is patterned in campus ministries today (I am younger than most who typcially post here, I think :)) are more subtle, more covert expressions of residue leftover but still stirring from the Shepherding movement. I don’t think it has fully gone away as makes sense from a sociological/group cycle of how things take awhile to cycle out through “generations”. But as the beginning of this post reminds, history will repeat itself if we don’t learn!

In some groups it is making a come back. There is enough distance for people to start forgetting how bad and damaging that movement was and what the root issues were. People my age or younger were born at the end of the Shepherding Movement or totally after its hey-day – so the timing makes a lot of sense for it to start resurfacing again. Though it will express itself and look different in response to the present times and cultural issues.

When I read your’s/those who post here/Tik Tok’s I am slowly working through – your college experience in the 60’s-80’s, I am fascinated how much I and others I know in their 20’s and 30’s who can relate to the stories! But I also feel like I am on the outside peering in as I think about what was going on in the world at that time – how that manifested particular issues you all were facing.

@ emily honey:
There are the get-rich-quick schemes, we know. Pyramids, ponzis, etc. “Follow me” to “the good life”, to the inner circle, to the power core, to the Beautiful People Crowd. Be elite, now.

Is it possible some of these faith movements mimic, as get-spiritual-quick, springboard to the top, highest-ranking in Heaven schemes?

emily honey wrote:

The Neo-Cal movement has a huge influence over many campus ministries.

No doubt about it. In my area, New Calvinists target communities with colleges. They are planting churches near campus and have active outreach ministries to attract college students. You say, that’s nothing new Max – churches in college towns have always done that. True, but the New Calvinists are more aggressive in their efforts and present an exciting, new & improved way of doing church that is attracting youth. When you tell young folks that you have come into the world for such a time as this to restore the gospel that the rest of the church has lost, you get their attention.

Max wrote:

No doubt about it. In my area, New Calvinists target communities with colleges.

I posted this comment on the May 26 TWW post about The Founders:

When I first started investigating New Calvinism a couple of years ago I was wondering if I was becoming some kind of a conspiracy theorists. Could all of the connections be true? Then I pulled a thread on Founders after learning about Founders here at TWW. Dr Stan Reeves is the Founders webmaster. He also founded Grace Heritage Church in Auburn, AL. That church is listed on the TGC and 9Marks church directories. He is one of two elders at the church, and has close ties with 9Marks (the church’s website has links to 9Marks articles). He is also one of the leaders and speakers for the Auburn University Christian Faculty Network. He is surprisingly public with his personal information: http://www.eng.auburn.edu/~sjreeves/personal/ (I’ve always been trained to not put so much personally identifiable information on the web). His personal philosophy link highlights his identity as a Christian Hedonist and his deep indebtedness to John Piper. The links among all these New-Calvinist ministries are very clear through “ministries” such as this. I wonder if the same thing is happening at other universities. In this case I just followed a very well laid out trail. I did not feel like looking into other universities – this one example gave me more info than I wanted to know. In any case, links like this make it easy to believe in the conspiracy.

Yes, they are definitely targeting the college crowd.

Ken F (aka Tweed) wrote:

Yes, they are definitely targeting the college crowd.

So did the Moonies, Hare Krishnas, and various extremist political movements.

JYJames wrote:

@ emily honey:
There are the get-rich-quick schemes, we know. Pyramids, ponzis, etc. “Follow me” to “the good life”, to the inner circle, to the power core, to the Beautiful People Crowd. Be elite, now.

Is it possible some of these faith movements mimic, as get-spiritual-quick, springboard to the top, highest-ranking in Heaven schemes?

Not just “possible”, I’m certain of it.

Amway (the best-known MLM/legal pyramid scheme) uses God-talk and Revival Meeting motivational shtick.

And Campus Crusade had its “Multiplying Ministry” idea, which always struck me as structured just like a pyramid scheme. Especially when you added a common belief at that time and place that God would Judge(TM) you only on the number of converts you made.(Much later, I learned Bill Bright had started out as a salesman. I was not surprised.)

Ken F (aka Tweed) wrote:

3DM and The Order of Mission – both organizations started by Mike Breen

under Mike Breen, wikipedia article:

“In January, 2014 Breen spoke in a leadership event to the multi-thousand member North Heights Lutheran Church, which sparked concerns leading to the April, 2014 decision of the elder board to remove 3DM completely from the church, and publishing at length the reasons for their decision. Among those reasons attributed to 3DM were that, “worship attendance has dropped off dramatically,” and a corresponding drop in giving, along with staff cuts.[15]”

Ken F (aka Tweed) wrote:

A somewhat new movement to look at is 3DM and The Order of Mission – both organizations started by Mike Breen.

Did I mention before I actually knew that guy? babysat for his kids a bit. So this is fascinating.

@ Darlene:
It should be worked into their marriage vows. Ya gotta wonder why those groups don’t do that. (Wink)

Ken F (aka Tweed) wrote:

I did not manage to flunk out of the Navs until after I was married. In hindsight, my wife rescued me.

Sounds like you have an Ezer Kenegdo in her. A powerful ally. Mrs. Muff is the same to me.

@ Steve240:
Good friends of mine attend a Every Nation church and tried to get me “plugged in” to their campus ministry.

Love my friends but that church gave me some weird vibes (granted I have a very sensitive radar to such things). But when I learned the link between Maranatha Ministries and Every Nation I wasn’t surprised.

My other friend who knows part of the story calls them the “cult affiliate” church.

Things like tithing and how they always spend all their free time with each other were the key alarm bells to me. Weird stuff.

Mae wrote:

very savvy on the internet

Without cyberspace, the New Calvinist movement would not exist … and we wouldn’t have a vehicle to sound an alarm about it. Watchbloggers have come into the world for such a time as this!

Mark wrote:

JYJames wrote:
@ Mark:
Thanks for sharing, connecting.
Tik wrote a riveting story without exaggeration. I think what helped him piece it all together is a lifelong habit of keeping a journal. What makes his writing so interesting is that many lived with all these internal battles but were not allowed to express them.

My understanding is that Tiki tried to be as accurate as possible.

What is something is that in a private Maranatha group the vocal people in that group scrutinized and tried to discredit Tiki’s blog. Then you have someone who wrote a book titled “Raising Jesus” about Maranatha with most of the bad about the group left out and that book was given little scrutiny.

Steve240 wrote:

Mark wrote:

JYJames wrote:
@ Mark:
Thanks for sharing, connecting.
Tik wrote a riveting story without exaggeration. I think what helped him piece it all together is a lifelong habit of keeping a journal. What makes his writing so interesting is that many lived with all these internal battles but were not allowed to express them.

My understanding is that Tiki tried to be as accurate as possible.

What is something is that in a private Maranatha group the vocal people in that group scrutinized and tried to discredit Tiki’s blog. Then you have someone who wrote a book titled “Raising Jesus” about Maranatha with most of the bad about the group left out and that book was given little scrutiny.

Tik sent a number of his chapters to me before release, especially the ones concerning me and my wife. He was meticulous about getting things right. I rarely recall correcting anything he wrote, but if anything I might have added a bit to a certain incident.

Muff Potter wrote:

I heard somewhere that you can only have your cake, butcha’ can’t eat it too.

That’s complete nonsense. Just what I’d expect on this site.

Yesterday, I had cake. Then I ate it. It’s perfectly simple.

You’re all rubbish.

Up Yours,

Roger Bombast

God’s on good form today.

@ God:
Your best idea was icing.

@ Gram3:
I could never understand the lengths they went to in order to protect Mahaney (and still do) except that T4G is big business for them. My guess is that it is a contractural issue and a source of income for Mahaney. His hotel church is certainly not raking in the dollars. Mohler made sure some of Mahaneys fleeing entourage had jobs/opportunities at SBTS. It is no small feat to get 6000 young men to come every two years to the gathering. The last one, they had to ignore the SGM protestors over child molestation. I could never understand the protection of the giggly, overly fawning, uneducated Mahaney by these guys. Arrogance? A business relationship? In too deep? It never added up for me.

I have been a bit amazed at the enduring aspects of the shepherding cult strategy. Once it was mainstreamed and had the backing of long time and respected institutions wth a leader like Mohler, it became normalized. Group think works. Grab the young before their frontal cortex matures!

Reading Tiks story this aspect jumped out at me when his parents and the BSU guy met with him. Today, the BSU guy would be part of the SBC Mohler/Dever shepherding cult apparatus….. although a lowly peon.

Lydia wrote:

I could never understand the protection of the giggly, overly fawning, uneducated Mahaney by these guys. Arrogance? A business relationship? In too deep? It never added up for me.

I think there was business but it would have been easier and probably more profitable to dump him at that point. So I think it’s either personal or the sheer arrogance of not caring what others think and protecting gods anointed.

The scary third possibility, which i can no longer discount, is that they are mostly all protecting or have protected so many molesters that they need to set a precedent.

Here is a quote from Tikie’s story of meeting Bob Weiner:

The short guy, Bob stared at me with those amazing blue eyes.

Albert Spear, the young architect, and later Nazi wartime armaments Minister, described his first meeting with Hitler in his book “Inside the Third Reich” like this: “I don’t remember exactly what he [Hitler] said to me but I do remember the eyes; staring, cold blue, sizing me up, looking into my soul, captivating me, and freeing me at the same time.”

I will not try to improve on Spear’s prose; but I will tell you that I had a similar reaction to this meeting and, like Spear, recalled it afterwards as a very important event in my life [I still do]. Years later when I read Spear’s description of meeting Hitler for the first time it rang true to me because I had the exact same reaction that day meeting Bob Weiner for the first time.

I felt a primal powerful presence and the sense of standing in front of a very special person. This visceral reaction to Bob occurred in split seconds and I reacted immediately to the force I felt coming from him. I imagine that a rat must feel this way when confronted by a cobra: fascinated and frightened at the same time.

Lydia wrote:

@ God:
Your best idea was icing.

It was predestined!

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

JYJames wrote:
@ emily honey:
There are the get-rich-quick schemes, we know. Pyramids, ponzis, etc. “Follow me” to “the good life”, to the inner circle, to the power core, to the Beautiful People Crowd. Be elite, now.
Is it possible some of these faith movements mimic, as get-spiritual-quick, springboard to the top, highest-ranking in Heaven schemes?
Not just “possible”, I’m certain of it.
Amway (the best-known MLM/legal pyramid scheme) uses God-talk and Revival Meeting motivational shtick.
And Campus Crusade had its “Multiplying Ministry” idea, which always struck me as structured just like a pyramid scheme. Especially when you added a common belief at that time and place that God would Judge(TM) you only on the number of converts you made.(Much later, I learned Bill Bright had started out as a salesman. I was not surprised.)

The group I was in, the Crossroads Movement (later the Boston Movement), did EXACTLY the same thing. You were “saved to save others”. The more people you converted, the more “spiritual” you considered. And although we gave lip service to “fruit” as also being “fruit of the Spirit”, “fruit” was defined as “converts”. The “fruit” of Christians was other Christians. And John 15 clearly states that God cuts off every branch that bears no fruit.

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

Amway (the best-known MLM/legal pyramid scheme) uses God-talk and Revival Meeting motivational shtick.

A lot of the big MLMs now are owned by Mormons.

Lydia wrote:

@
Grab the young before their frontal cortex matures!

This! It’s important to remember. My friend brings this up all the time. “Our frontal cortex wasn’t even fully developed yet!”

@ emily honey:
It’s a huge factor. I know most say that there isn’t anything to combat that but I disagree. Teaching the young to politely question what they are taught, rethink ‘the concept of authority in a Republic and in Christianity, beware of group think, beware of shame censoring, seek independent thinking, etc.

we do just the opposite today. Everywhere.

@ Tina:

Tina, if you don’t mind me asking, where was the Crossroads Movement located in MA.?

@ Lydia:

True. I agree.

College students get taken advantage of by older adults all the time. They are not there to control and live vicariously through. A lot of learning from a liberal or conservative agenda is codependent and stifling in form. So much weirdness/Orwellian stuff going on at different campuses today because of this. But some are seeing it and trying to transform it. This joint statement from Cornell West and Robert George with a ton of signatures of support of people from different ideologies is refreshing:

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/03/16/ideological-odd-couple-robert-george-and-cornel-west-issue-joint-statement-against

There is also ego stroking, as Tik)ies story keeps pointing out.

I remember hearing this in the 90s as a kids, and then the 2000s to now as a teen and young adult, as well. Though I am now at the age where people stop paying attention to you and fawning over your untapped future.

There has always been the “God has a special plan for you”, “You will do great things for God” “I have never seen a generation like this! This is *the* generation!” mantras in church and general history it seems. And it will continue and keep cycling.

ishy wrote:

Lea wrote:
Right? Especially buttercream. Whipped icing comes from the other place.

Mom was a pastry chef. One thing she showed me was to replace the butter with peanut butter.

I try not to eat bowls of it.

Ooooh! That sounds good. Too bad I’m trying to lay off sweets at the moment or I might make some!

BoughtTheField wrote:

I felt a primal powerful presence and the sense of standing in front of a very special person. This visceral reaction to Bob occurred in split seconds and I reacted immediately to the force I felt coming from him.

I browse The Atlantic site and came across this video about a non-Christian cult. At about the 1:25 mark, the description is remarkably the same:

https://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/501413/life-and-death-of-a-cult/

Incidentally, this is about smart, accomplished people who wonder how they got caught up in a cult. It is about 16 minutes long.

BoughtTheField wrote:

If you never experienced it, you probably don’t appreciate the huge power they had with the overwhelming emotional pull of their combination of over-the-top music, challenging idealistic preaching, and extreme love bombing in the tight knit community they offered.
I have never seen anything quite like it anywhere else. They could have been an enormous force for good but they badly went astray.

Now that is a very true statement. Had top leadership not been as arrogant as they were and if Bob Weiner followed most of his own teaching Maranatha would have been used for something quite good. It is a sad story.

There certainly multiple warnings and signs that the leadership chose to ignore. “Hubris of success” is one way to put the group’s arrogance .

This is part of what Tiki said in his post on “False Prophets:”

If a “sheep” or rank and file had spoken up they would have been labeled as “bitter” and/or “devisive” and before you could shout out “ Shaballaba” they would have been subject to having a “spirit” cast out of them and told to repent.

And if that did not work they would have been declared apostate and thrown out of Maranatha and suffer the loss both participating in God’s end time mission and what for all purposes was their family.

Sadly leadership in Maranatha were always quick to “turn the tables” when someone pointed out an issue or disagreed with with them. Rarely would a leader take it into consideration in my experience and even more rare for the leader to admit it was a problem.

If nothing else if they were a lower level leader (like on a college campus) this leader trying to bring the same point up to those “over them in the Lord” would be subject to the same scrutiny. Hence they produced a very conforming non questioning type of group. People of that type were either attracted and developed and those who didn’t “conform” were forced out.

@ Dave A A:
My interest in this is due to having a daughter in the ICOC for close to a decade now. More tomorrow if you’re interested.

Gram3 wrote:

And, furthermore, Mohler’s joking behavior makes a mockery of common decency and, worse yet, of Southern manners.

Here is the sticking point for me. There are ways to talk about this that would show sensitivity and still support cj. (I’m not saying they would be right, but there are clearly better ways to talk about this) They didn’t talk that way at all though. They talked about it like child abuse in church is a laugh riot.

That is BEYOND the pale to me. There is no way I can reconcile it…without thinking they truly don’t care, are complicit, etc. maybe you could say they believe it’s all lies but it still wouldn’t be funnny. And since someone was actually arrested iirc that makes no sense.

I am only left with thinking they are terrible and dangerous people.

BoughtTheField wrote:

They initially drew people in with their good-looking and skilled musicians and the super-charisma of their leaders. After the members were hooked, they used fear and guilt manipulation to keep them.

If you never experienced it, you probably don’t appreciate the huge power they had with the overwhelming emotional pull of their combination of over-the-top music, challenging idealistic preaching, and extreme love bombing in the tight knit community they offered.
I have never seen anything quite like it anywhere else.

Believe me, the modus operandi of Maranatha was used by quite a few cults back in that day.
Every cult has its supposed unique calling, it’s niche. For some it’s the cool preaching, or hyped-up praise music For others, the unique understanding they have of the Bible that NO ONE else has but them, i.e. – esoteric knowledge. For others it’s prophetic revelations about the End Times. You name it, they all have a gimmick. But they all use love bombing, at least initially. That’s to get you hooked in. Once you’re hooked, as you stated, the next tactic to prevent you from leaving is fear. They all use pretty much the same playbook.

Steve240 wrote:

Sadly leadership in Maranatha were always quick to “turn the tables” when someone pointed out an issue or disagreed with with them. Rarely would a leader take it into consideration in my experience and even more rare for the leader to admit it was a problem.

Well, of course. Sinful questioning. Rebelliousness. Insubordination. In one of our former churches, there were listening or feedback sessions. I do not believe that was because Leadership wanted to improve Leadership.

@ Darlene:
Not just “cults” do that… Campus Crusade, now CRU, at least many years ago, kept track of how many people you “witness” to… or more comonly went through Bill Bright’s 4 spiritual laws track.. and they shamed people that did not do enough… People “on staff” had to report the numbers back to their “boss”

my IFB did that also.. This is a very common behavior of IFB, and conservative evangelicals..

Darlene wrote:

Yep, HUG. The same for my former cult. When we attended the large Big Meetings where all the local fellowships were present, we had to give an account of how many people were “saved.” Those fellowships that had low numbers were shamed, while the ones with high numbers were praised.

i.e. Who’s Got The Best Sales Records. The bigger your Sales, the better your bonus from your boss.

“ABC — Always be Closing.”

Mark wrote:

Hello all, I am the ‘Matt’ of Matt and Allie in the story. If you have any questions I can piece some things together. It was not a time that was easily forgotten. Tik and I were, and are, good friends. I’m hoping we can meet him at an Auburn football game sometime in the future!

Mark

I would be interested in corresponding with you. You could post a message on my blog and I would get your email address that way.

Robert M wrote:

Every time I start thinking about Maranatha, and particularly about the dating policy and the shepherding, I say a prayer of thanksgiving that I don’t have to deal with that BS anymore

One thing to realize is that a fairly similar “dating policy” that SGM imposed and a lot of other groups imposed was “kissing dating goodbye” and “courtship.” It was a little different in what they taught but a similar controlling affect.

Steve240 wrote:

Mark

I would be interested in corresponding with you. You could post a message on my blog and I would get your email address that way.

Will do.

Steve240 wrote:

they will either see if ther is a way they can bully the person to stop questioning or force the person out of the group.

I think the purpose was to make sure the influencers were staying on track with the program of the elders and that any potential “problems” were promptly brought to the attention of the elders.

Just so everyone knows you can post comments to the revisited website being discussed here. You may need to click on the title of the blog a second time to be able to read and post comments to a particular blog entry.

Mae wrote:

Yes, interested.

In my daughter’s experiences in the ICOC, discilpling AKA shepherding plays a big role, it doesn’t seem to be pyramidal with charasmatic leaders at the top. The thing which really affected her negatively until her marriage was the group control over dating, as with Maranatha and SGM mentioned above. Another thing which would be very traumatic will be if she decides to leave.

Steve240 wrote:

Gram3 wrote:
The more a group moves towards being a cult like group the more insecure the are about people who question. My guess is they will either see if there is a way they can bully the person to stop questioning or force the person out of the group.

Rick Warren gave church management the blueprint for this practice around here. “Assimilate or eliminate” is practiced, even in low level “Bible” churches. The minute you start questioning how and why things are done, or where “that thing” is in the Bible, the elimination process begins.

BTW I speak from experience. I was in a church in Florida in the Shepherding Movement in the 1970s. I also attended Maranatha Campus Ministries. When my church fell apart in 1985 I moved to Maryland and joined CLC. I have also been to several other SGM churches.

@ Robert M:
Hi Robert, hope you are well! Life is good; Annie and I will be celebrating #39 on September 2nd.

BoughtTheField wrote:

They made you feel like they had everything you ever wanted and nothing else mattered.

Powerful. Seduction. “Love” bomb.
That’s actually God Himself, not a ministry. Idolatry? Nothing, no one takes the place of God.

A. Tumbleweed wrote:

“Assimilate or eliminate” is practiced, even in low level “Bible” churches. The minute you start questioning how and why things are done, or where “that thing” is in the Bible, the elimination process begins.

I hope that isn’t true of most Bible churches! Back before the turn of the past millennium, the ones I knew of were pretty easy-going. They had very detailed doctrinal statements and elders but no 9Marksy inquisitions or star chambers as far as I knew.

Ken G wrote:

It has been my experience in both church and secular settings there are individuals who will ask questions, make a point, etc not to seek answers, but rather to “show-up” the instructor or try to impress the class with their knowledge. These individuals are disruptive and should be removed.

Well, in my view the issue is scrutiny and discernment. Management has the upper hand by default (in their own minds) when they think and act like a corporate pyramid is the Biblical structure of the local church. And when someone shines the light on their activities, using the light of The Word, then they begin a campaign of slander and abusive behavior against what is supposed to be a member of the “family”.

In my experience, their ministry can’t stand up under even the most basic scrutiny. It’s easy to blame the questioner. Yet even us common folks can exercise discernment. We often do by walking out of the door.

At that point, management calls his buddy in the next church to tell him about the people who just left, and how a couple of troublemakers are headed his way. And the cycle of abuse marches on. This is the blueprint of the Purpose Driven Church.

Either you get on board with the vision casting man-o-gawd, or you get pushed off the train.

Ken G wrote:

It has been my experience in both church and secular settings there are individuals who will ask questions, make a point, etc not to seek answers, but rather to “show-up” the instructor or try to impress the class with their knowledge. These individuals are disruptive and should be removed.

Actually, professors and teachers deal with this on a daily basis: move along the curriculum or syllabus and include discourse. Normally, no one is removed, but the professor is definitely on their toes in managing the discourse. It’s a high level skill – pastors would do well to learn such skills. A church, in theory anyway, is not a business. Assimilate or eliminate makes sense in a business culture but not education or church, it seems.

Back in the day at L’Abri in Switzerland, Schaeffer always addressed the critical thinking of youth and no one was eliminated. That is why he established L’Abri. He said the church was not answering their questions. Church was my way or the highway.

However, Schaeffer tells of when he would reach an impasse with a student over theological or philosophical semantics and they were having coffee. Schaeffer would ask, “Please pass the sugar,” and the student obliged. “There,” Schaeffer would say, “I knew we were communicating.” In the end, Schaeffer would say, were underlying issues, like morals, for example. “The student was interested in God but didn’t want to give up their lifestyle.”

A. Tumbleweed wrote:

Sadly, it is around here. I have seen the same movie playing in several churches. All IFCA establishments

I think that the Gospel Glitterati is the Spirit of the Age now. Conformity is enforced out of insecurity or perhaps something worse.

Mae wrote:

Did ICOC choose her husband? Is he also in ICOC. Was she brought up in a regular church of faith?
Sorry, lots of questions.

No. But she had to bring him into the church to study the Bible and be properly baptized before it was ok to date him. So he’s been in it just a couple years– after awhile once the group approved they could officially date. Unlike patriarchy my input was unneeded. He’s a good man and asked her parents before actually proposing, but the church wouldn’t have cared about that. She was brought up in regular churches and baptized by the wrong hands, necessitating re-baptism upon becoming an official disciple. Our son-in-law has a much wider circle of friends and family (including a new granddaughter, just to give you an idea that they’re not kids) and I hope this will help lead them out.

A. Tumbleweed wrote:

“Assimilate or eliminate” is practiced, even in low level “Bible” churches. The minute you start questioning how and why things are done, or where “that thing” is in the Bible, the elimination process begins.

Groupthink locks in and all Heretics and Dissidents are Purged from The One True Way.

This usually happens around an 80% majority.
(Which is why all the 80-81% majorities in various election polls last November disturbed me.)

JYJames wrote:

Ken G wrote:
It has been my experience in both church and secular settings there are individuals who will ask questions, make a point, etc not to seek answers, but rather to “show-up” the instructor or try to impress the class with their knowledge. These individuals are disruptive and should be removed.

Actually, professors and teachers deal with this on a daily basis: move along the curriculum or syllabus and include discourse.

Why is the professor bothered if students have knowledge? I agree there is a way to do it that is ‘disruptive’ but a good teacher will probably include a spot for dialogue and if the students knows something, they will not be threatened by that! Students are supposed to learn things. People in church ought to know things if they are adults, sometimes more than a teacher!

No one is disruptive just because they know something, or have a different opinion, though.

Lea wrote:

Why is the professor bothered if students have knowledge? I agree there is a way to do it that is ‘disruptive’ but a good teacher will probably include a spot for dialogue and if the students knows something, they will not be threatened by that! Students are supposed to learn things. People in church ought to know things if they are adults, sometimes more than a teacher!
No one is disruptive just because they know something, or have a different opinion, though.

There certainly can be people that ask questions etc. only with intent to be disruptive vs. others that have different points of view that they wish to share and get someone with a different opinion to share their opinion. My experience with someone who is threatened by a person with a differing opinion is that they are insecure in their own opinion. My theory isn’t always right but certainly more the case than not.

When I was in college a few decades ago and in a political science class I had a pretty liberal professor. We would have discussions and I would find myself many times not agreeing with him to upset the class but due to having a differing opinion. The professor welcomed hearing differing views and showed no signs of resenting my bringing a different view to his classroom.

I received an “A” in the class so he obviously didn’t penalize me for speaking up and questioning his opinions. I have seen and am sure there are a number of professors that wouldn’t be the same and would resent questioning especially with the “politically correct” movement that sweeped most campuses a few years after I graduated.

I am sure it would have been harder to disagree if the class was more about more volatile issues such as affirmative action etc. Also you have to read people and figure out what the real rules are.

I have bosses of large groups tell me they thought anyone could tell anyone anything as long as it was with respect and the boss truly meant it. This boss if you told him something might not agree with you and might not adopt what you said but didn’t have an issue with your criticizing a certain plan though would expect you to follow the plan if that was decided plan. On the other hand I have had other bosses where you knew you couldn’t speak your min and thus wouldn’t point out the emperor had no clothes on and sometimes even had to say you saw them.

BoughtTheField wrote:

@ Darlene:
Darlene when I said that I hadn’t seen anything quite like Maranatha, I meant the effectiveness of their emotional persuasion. I agree there were others that used a similar playbook, but none of them compared to Maranatha in how powerful the emotional pull was. They were able to pull in strong, popular people who would never fall for another cult. Seriously, you would have to be there and feel it to understand. They made you feel like they had everything you ever wanted and nothing else mattered.

…but none of them compared to Maranatha in how powerful the emotional pull was.

How would you know unless you were on the inside of all of those other manipulative cults? Believe me, the cult I was in used very powerful methods to persuade and intimidate people. When folks started leaving my former cult and going to Well Spring Christian Counseling Clinic, the counselors and psychologists that worked there were shocked at the methods used to control members. Well Spring has counseled people from many different cults and they came to the conclusion that my former cult was the most toxic of any they had ever encountered. Now, objectively I don’t know if that is true. But my point is that all cults are effective in persuading people emotionally and psychologically by using mind control techniques that work to entrap and deceive. In that regard, I don’t think that Maranatha is unique.

This is Kristen Rosser’s blog where she has some quite informative blogs posts on her experience in Maranatha (the link I gave was one of her blog posts being posted on someone else’s blog):

http://krwordgazer.blogspot.com/p/blog-index.html

Robert M wrote:

One way organizations keep control is by preventing the rank and file from communicating their discontents. I didn’t know for years that other people in the group had the same concerns as I did.

Robert basically they call “the rank and file communicating their discontents” especially with other “rank and file” gossip. That tactic has sadly worked well in a lot of these cult and cult like groups to keep the sheep in the dark and people thinking they were the only ones with issues.

When the SGM Survivor Blog first started you would have numerious people indicating that they thought they were the only one with issues and were quite relieved to find that they weren’t the only person with these issues.

So true. Just a few years ago I talked with another former member who was in my local group. He indicated to me that he had a number of run ins with an assistant pastor. I had wished we had compared notes at the time we were both having issues with the control maniac of an assistant pastor. Again their broad definition of what they consider “gossip” sadly works well to keep the sheep in the dark.

Steve240 wrote:

I had wished we had compared notes at the time we were both having issues with the control maniac of an assistant pastor. Again their broad definition of what they consider “gossip” sadly works well to keep the sheep in the dark.

Jesus operated in the open with no secret agenda. He got in trouble with the religious leaders, publicly. His accusers and questioners confronted Him right in the streets where Jesus answered them back. Truth. Truth to power.

In contrast, the religious leaders, scribes, pharisees, etc., operated in secret. Plotted. Collaborated with the tyrannical Roman government against those they proclaimed to be their enemies – including Jesus, God Himself. How telling! Covert. Sneaking around with secret deals and evil motives. Power. To murder.

Robert M wrote:

I started to, but couldn’t finish it.
Keep in mind that if someone had a problem with something someone higher in the Maranatha food chain was doing, the solution was to trust God to fix whatever was going on. And to repent of bitterness and gossip.

Robert I can understand not wanting to finish that blog post of Tikie. Totally disheartening.

Interesting how you say that if a lower member “had a problem with something/someone higher in the Maranatha food chain” the only thing allowed as “to trust God to fix whatever as going on” and also “repent of bitterness and gossip.” That basically shut down any type of correction or pointing out of issues by regular members or those lower than them on the food chain. I would be curious how they could justify this using scripture.

I am sure this is one of their significant traits that caused them to implode. After all leaders must have been perfect and if not they would hear from God and God would show them so they would correct. We know that the leadership in Maranatha (especially Bob Weiner) exemplified humility so could easily be shown by God NOT.

Steve240 wrote:

Interesting how you say that if a lower member “had a problem with something/someone higher in the Maranatha food chain” the only thing allowed as “to trust God to fix whatever as going on” and also “repent of bitterness and gossip.” That basically shut down any type of correction or pointing out of issues by regular members or those lower than them on the food chain. I would be curious how they could justify this using scripture.

The usual scripture was about touching “God’s anointed”. Like criticizing a campus leader was equivalent to killing the King of Israel.

I don’t know if it was like this everywhere (though I suspect it was), but in Boston everyone was so hyper-spiritual that people would get words about mundane matters in everyone else’s lives. It’s no wonder my guiding principle now is to always attempt to mind my own business.

Robert M wrote:

The usual scripture was about touching “God’s anointed”. Like criticizing a campus leader was equivalent to killing the King of Israel.

Robert M.

If you care, I would be interested in corresponding with you I would like that. You can find my email at my other blog:

http://www.ikdg.wordpress.com