first, my own vulnerability and naivety, and
second, the gradual decline of the group through changes in the leaders.

I married a wonderful man, whom I hardly knew, moved to a different country, and found myself in situation after situation which disappointed me, hurt me and set me up for more of the same. I became a Christian in 1974 and immediately embraced my newfound faith in God as the "lifeline" I desperately wanted. Somehow, I thought, if I could only be good enough or do enough, God would rescue me and give me the peace and the wholesome relationships I longed for.

I threw my whole self into the church. We moved around a lot, so I attended many different denominations. I was hungry for God! Not because I had experienced Him so much as because I knew that in Him I would find peace and my life wasn't peaceful. I thought that church would help me find God and sometimes it did. I thought that church would be my extended family, since I lived 2,000 miles from them and sometimes it was. I thought church would help me find those quality relationships and sometimes they were found. But, the basic problems were never addressed in the church and I continued to find myself in hurtful relationships.

I was not a flighty Christian--quite the opposite, I was a serious student of the Bible. I read my Bible and daily applied it to my life. My Life Verse became: Ezra 7: 10, "For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord, and to practice it, and to teach His statues and ordinances in Israel."

In 1980, my husband and I adopted a child who had been abandon at birth because he was handicapped. My motive for doing so was obedience to what I felt God was asking me to do. The Bible says: "This is pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father, to visit orphans and widows in their distress." (James 1:27) Taking this boy was an act of obedience and a huge leap of faith on my part, but it landed me in an arena of Christian life that few others could relate to--"sacrifice and self-denial." I had counted on my church to be a "support" for me, when I took the child, but that didn't happen. Instead, I found myself fairly isolated socially and spiritually from the mainstream of my church. At first I enjoyed this status as some sort of a martyr, but eventually the demands of this child wore me down. I felt I had to keep up my image at church, as the "mature" one--the nurturer--the teacher--the administrator, etc. I was afraid of bringing reproach to the name of Christ, after all, I had given many testimonies of how God had promised to give me strength for this boy, I couldn't let God down. So I struggled on the inside, but I kept the mask of the "all-together-Christian" on the outside. I kept everything going for seven years and then the crash came. It nearly killed me to place the boy our of our home, but I finally had to admit failure. This further isolated me from the Christian community because I carried this label of "failure" and that's not popular.

Six months later, my mother was dying of Lou Gerhig's disease and I nursed her for the last year and one-half of her life. About nine months before my mother died, my nephew committed suicide. At the time I was going through this grief and hardship there was very little concern shown to me by the Christian community. Maybe no one else had ever gone through a death or had to give up a child or suffered exhaustion such as I was experiencing. Maybe I didn't let anyone know that I needed comfort. Maybe I was too honest about my pain to the wrong people and felt them pull away from me. All I know is that I needed something "more" than what I was getting from my church.

While my mother was dying, I began to experience some of the revelatory gifts of the Holy Spirit. I felt I could not share these spiritual experiences with anyone in my church because the gifts of the Spirit had been openly ridiculed. I "withdrew" even more from my church and eventually attended a small charismatic church for a period of two years. Eventually I felt pressured by the Christian community to return to the church my husband attended. It was like cutting off my supply of oxygen to go back to the fundamental church. As I cried out to God for a way to express worship and the gifts He had given me, it was at this point that I found a small "prayer" group which met during the week. I figured I could go to the fundamental church on Sundays and meet everyone's expectation and approval and then fellowship with my "spiritual friends" during the week. I was a part of this "prayer" group for three years.

A "Haven for The Prophetic"

This group consisted of people from mainline, fundamental and evangelical churches who had discovered the gifts of the Spirit and were frustrated from using these gifts in their own churches. It was often promoted as being a "haven for the prophetic"-- implying that it was a safe place to learn about and practice the prophetic/revelatory giftings.

During my first year and one half of involvement with this group I experienced MUCH acceptance and approval as I received ministry and was encouraged to minister using my gifts. I felt like I had found the "more" I had been looking for. During this time, the group grew from six people to about forty people. In a way, it was becoming a church or parachurch. Two men were leading the group. One seemed to be highly gifted in the prophetic, although admittedly he was a "baby Christian." The other was a former pastor and missionary who had been rescued from a sinful life by the first man. They worked together. The first one receiving the "revelations" while the second man (being more knowledgeable of the Scriptures) was the spokesman.

During the second year I noticed several disturbing changes in the meetings. First, there was a shift from everyone's vision or words or revelations being important, to the "superiority" of the visions of that one man in the leadership position. About the same time as this shift was occurring, this same man would get these "grievings in his spirit" and wouldn't know why. The ex-pastor would be filled with fear and dread that someone had grieved the Holy Spirit in the first man. Somehow, the two men would figure out who was grieving the Holy Spirit and then that person would be confronted with their "sin" and with the fact that "God is grieved with you." I was accused on at least four occasions of this grieving. Each time I attended one of their "ministry sessions" for this problem in my life, I came away in an altered mental state (in a state of extreme confusion, feeling disconnected from my surroundings and with numbness in my body). When I tried to question whether or not this grieving was from the Holy Spirit, I was made to feel ashamed for questioning such a thing.

There were other changes occurring which bothered me: the two men became more and more "exclusive" saying that the Lord had them "boxed in." They wouldn't answer the phone or include anyone else in their time "with the Lord." Out of these "exclusive" times would come their direction, their doctrine, their revelations, etc. They said they had received a "revelation" from God that THEY were to be overseers to all the churches in this city. That THEY were to be "pastors to the pastors." I felt they were in arrogance and tried to say so--but was told I was "rebellious" and accused of "sowing seeds of discord." I was publicly humiliated for my "disloyalty" to them at a specially called meeting.

By the time my third year with them began, the preaching at the weekly meetings had taken a subtle but decisive turn toward legalism. I remember being troubled in my spirit, but again--who was I to question them? This whole year was one of constant frustration and friction for me. It didn't seem to matter what I did right, they felt they had to correct every flaw and fault in my life. "The last 3% is the hardest to get," they once told me. Always, when I would work through one thing, there was another and another and another! Major clashes occurred and there was no way to satisfy them short of total captiulation to their views.

Finding the "Real Thing"

Thankfully, God saw my heart and my need and He planned my rescue. He found a way to begin to show me the TRUTH about Himself and how He felt about me.

One day, He brought someone into my life who was not associated with this group. This friend saw that I was believing lies about myself and saw God in a very punitive light. He shared the TRUTH about God's nature--He is "compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in loving kindness and truth." (Exodus 34:6). And this friend brought many TRUE prophetic words to me expressing how God saw my heart as good, faithful and gracious not evil as these two men were telling me. I was beginning to see that two very different "voices" were speaking--one was the voice of condemnation coming from man and the other was the voice of grace coming from God. I was brought to the place where I saw that I had to make a choice: either believe the grace of God, or deny it and believe what these men are saying.

One Scripture kept coming to my mind as I struggled with "whose report to believe": I John 2: 20 & 27 say, "But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you know all things . . . But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him." Over and over I would read and think about the TRUTH contained in these verses. Finally I decided to believe that the Spirit of Truth lived in ME, that the Spirit of Truth would not lie to me about God or myself and that the Spirit of Truth would keep me abiding in Him. I chose to believe God.

Paying the Price

Leaving that group was not without a price, but the Lord prepared me for "bearing the reproach" through Hebrews 13:13, "Therefore, let us go to Him, outside the camp, bearing His reproach." I followed the Lord, left their "camp" and right away they began to persecute me.

They phoned everyone they could think of and told them to come to a special meeting. There, (I was told by several people present) I was publicly denounced for having "broken fellowship" with them. People were warned not to talk about the meeting outside that house, thus placing them (about 40 people) under a "ban of silence." They were informed that I was a "deeply damaged" person and that I was "terribly deceived." Then, the following week, at their regular meeting, they repeated the whole thing over again--just in case someone missed hearing it the first time.

The Lord had told me to "Make no defense" so I didn't make a move or a sound. So, in their next attempt to "flush me out," they went after my pastor. They phoned him up and tried to deliver a warning to him about how badly damaged and deceived I was and that I would wreck his church. Thank God, my pastor recognized the spirit in those men--"The Accuser of the Brethren"--and refused to listen to them. Instead, he offered me protection from them and provided me with a truly "safe place" in which to hide.

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