To which I replied, “You are correct. You do. And I told you so.”

While Bartholomew’s name is fiction, this snippet of conversation occurred in the fall of 2001 in a church parking lot. The broader subject was the institutional mistreatment of a local church organization. The context spanned months of interpersonal antagonism between him and me. 

My second Kinko’s-published edition of had been circulating Montgomery County Maryland for some time. This individual had read a copy though he didn’t get it from me; I was later to learn it was a copy of a copy of a copy given by a pastor I’d never met. The evidence for the book’s truth had been stacking up for years. The human outcomes were toddled through Montgomery County, Maryland churches like an epidemic of Canadian Geese: Even if one could not see the birds, it was impossible to miss if anyone would actually look at the droppings everywhere.… Read the rest

The excerpts that follow are from the book’s second chapter circulated in PDF form by the Peace Makers organization (click here). I haven’t read the whole book. But since the PDF is being circulated as a self-contained document, I am going to focus my comments on the ominous undercurrents of this chapter.

It is my understanding that Ken Sande is a lawyer. And in light of what follows, I’m curious how good a legal beagle he actually is. I’m not a lawyer, but I’ve watched enough Law & Order to get the gist of a good legal argument.… Read the rest

I dares ya ta’ step across this line.

- Bugs Bunny

Click here for audio

I had thought to let this series of posts go, (June 12th, 12:20 a.m. to June 13th, 2:43 p.m.) on Women and Children First, offered by self-identified Mike Doherty. My reasons were equally divided across a few thoughts. First, I am working on another article tentatively called “Crisis Management” and didn’t want to get distracted from research. Second, in my mind, Mike Doherty’s words speak for themselves, and I expect that the savvy Spiritual Tyranny readership sees the implicit failure in Mike’s demand. Third, I have addressed many of the stock defenses of tyranny over and over and over and over and over and over. Fourth, I anticipated this was just another drive-by blogging; people say their piece and move on. However, Mike did return for a couple more shots at me, my character, my lack of deference to him, some foreboding proclamations about biblical authority, and a general: “What are you talking about?”

One must wonder if orthodoxy forbids classes on reading comprehension, because detractors seem not to grasp my specific criticisms in context to the atrocity of rape, and my unrelenting critique of the doctrine of apostolic covering being taught to American Christianity:  its catastrophic failure to deliver on its self-declared social contract.… Read the rest

For Audio click here

“We doubt you, why don’t you doubt yourself?” This gem of saint-equipping counsel was said by my favorite spiritual tyrant. On the surface it looks like he is trying to convey the general opinion of his partners in tyrannical pastor-ness about moi. I don’t remember the specific conversation, but I do remember this was a response to my confidence. But in actual fact, his words are really an implicit doctrinal statement. His words sum up many Christian leaders’ ministerial assumption:  the quest for Indoctrinated Self-Doubt.

Notice that my favorite spiritual tyrant’s pithy statement IS the logical conclusion of Augustine’s Pervasive Depravity. By Orthodox standard Humanity’s greatest transgression is self-will. Self-will is the sum of our corrupt appetites, desires, and aspirations that get lumped into the general category lusts. Corrupt human nature requires a sanctification then that is little a more than confining that nature, binding it, placing man in an ever more sterile circumstance to incarcerate his action.… Read the rest

By John Immel (Click here for MP3 audio)

The original publication of Moral Seduction was my first effort to show how the seeds of tyranny are sown with precise ideas beyond the narrow confines of church and Christianity. 

My first months of blogging stardom were spent highlighting tyranny’s philosophical elements as displayed in the Charismatic Reformed denomination called Sovereign Grace Ministries.My familiarity with their doctrine and practices made it an effective stepping off point.Plus, other voices needed to rise up to join the existing blog commentary concerning their blight on the vineyard.I was happy to take up in 2007 where I left off in 1998 before the blogging world took notice. 

People tend to think that this blog revolves around the very narrow criticism of Sovereign Grace Ministries.This is understandable but not true.No matter how much I enjoy poking those specific intellectual and spiritual thugs in the eye, they are hardly the bulk of my concern.… Read the rest

So a duck in a mask walks into a bar and says, “Got any bread?”

(Stop me if you’ve heard this one.)

The barman says, “No.”

The duck jingles his spurs says, “Got any bread?”

And the barman, “NO!”

The Cavendish Gang said different. “Got any bread?”

“I said N-O, NO!”

Tonto said different. “Got any bread?”

“For crying out loud N-O spells NO and I mean NO!”

The Lone Ranger had friends. “Got any bread?”

“NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO”

The townspeople were pansies. “Got any bread?”

“Look, if you ask me one more time if I have got any bread, I’m going to nail your beak to the bar!”

“Got any nails?”

“No.”

“Got any bread?”

*    *    *

Oh, the furry of being powerless.

So a masked  man walks into a church and says, “You’ve got it all wrong.”

(Stop me if you’ve heard this one.)

The pastor says, “No, I don’t”

The man says, “You’re not running this church right.”

And the pastor says, “Yes, I am.… Read the rest

Here is what I mean by this: follow the metaphor.

You get out of high school and take a JOB at a local factory, or a grocery store, or restaurant. The first day on the JOB, your boss beckons with a finger as he walks towards a large empty floor. He hands you a broom and says: “You got to start somewhere.” After the first hour, you are a master. After the first month, you are desperate to volunteer for any other JOB you can find.

We’ve all been there. I started my working life hauling trash for 5 bucks an hour and all I could eat. I started there for the same reason everybody else starts the world of work–using muscle and brawn; I didn’t have skills much past the very basic:  a pulse body temperature… and if I was really good, I showed up… AWAKE.

This is how we acquired employable ability.… Read the rest

“We are strongest when we are connected to others. Why do we run from this reality? Could it be that in our pride we don’t like the idea of exposing our weaknesses to others?”

This is a Spiritual Roofie.

“Well, you know that Iron sharpens Iron. You need to have more friends that will hold you accountable. You need to come be a part of our group.”

This is a Spiritual Roofie.

“…But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. We need each other everyday to offer unbelief-splitting encouragement to love God through the cross and only at the cross. If God loves you, my desire is to love you the same.  We should get together.”

This is a Spiritual Roofie.

As are comments like “Confess your faults, that you may be healed…”  “They met from house to house….… Read the rest

Another story of carnage, of oppression, of injustice comes to our attention and we wonder why?

From where does this come? What is the source?

“It is our nature,” say some.

“It is in our nurture,” say others.

So we build elaborate doctrines to elevate men to arbitrate good and right and truth:  these men will beat back the evil and defend us from the carnage. Only to find that those we follow have done worse, in the name of the people, in the name of good, in the name of God.

We wail at our dissolution. We weep at the injustice. We moan at our plight. “See,” we say, “We are doomed. Not even the best amongst us can prevail. Don’t judge, for you can succumb to the same nature. Don’t condemn because you haven’t walked in the shoes that nurtured the evil.”

But it never occurs to us that we are lost, because each INDIVIDUAL refuses to FIND.… Read the rest

Come to me all you who are weary and heavy-laden and I will give you…covering.

As of today, I have decided that I want be all y’alls covering. That is right… today is the day. I am officially, in all my self-appointed glory, the effective “covering” for everybody.

I’m a leader. I’m spiritual. I figure hey… I can do this. I can be a covering.

What does that mean? Well, not sure exactly. It seems that the content of covering is dependent on what the given church sells… oops… emphasizes. And since I want to be all things to all men, my spiritual pedigree will remain open. Don’t want to offend anyone after all. I am a universal covering.

(Not to be confused with our resident Universalist.)

>snicker<

If those desiring covering are Reformation Theology types–like Sovereign Grace Ministries–then the “covering” is really called “oversight” and the content my “oversight” will be an  assurance that you will have right believing.… Read the rest

Let us never lose site of what Government really is:

“Government is not reason; it is not eloquence. It is force. And force, like fire, is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”  George Washington… Read the rest

*******

Here is my own version of Carolyn Mahaney’s “Modesty Check for Women”. Many SGM women are subjected to this list during their membership in SGM. I always fought against the legalistic and condemning spirit behind this – and the implication that women alone are to blame for men lusting. Time to take the chains off ladies – and realize that we each give an account to God – check yourt hearts of course and don’t be foolish in your dress, but don’t be legalistic about it. In all things balance and moderation. We are free in Christ, and if the Spirit of God does not condemn you for your dress, don’t let SGM, Carolyn Mahaney, or anyone else do it!… Read the rest

So, what follows is my take on Accountability and TEAM Leadership…at its heart and soul the idea is a myth. I’ll make my point with a conversation I had with a Pastor. The conversation that I recount really did happen.
******
During my conversation that serve as background for this lengthy muse, a Pastor of an Independent Charismatic Church said to me: “Are you accountable to men, John?”

I asked this pastor what that meant; to be accountable. “Well, who speaks into your life and holds you accountable for your actions?”

“Anyone who has truth,” I replied.… Read the rest

Modern Christianity is filled with doctrines that dis-empower and de-humanize people into the cogs of a vast church machine, designed to do little else but employ a few in the business of making the machine bigger so they can travel in nicer cars, and bigger planes, and fill larger buildings.  

We are no longer a people of freedom, but a people of serfdom, with many of the doctrines of the Medieval Three estates being enacted before our eyes:  some pray, some preach, all others work.