The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse, Johnson & VanVonderen

[JJ]

I recently read Jeramie Rinne's 9Marks book "Church Elders - How to Shepherd God's People Like Jesus" and was stunned by how right on it is.

When describing the New Testament's requirements for elders on page 22, one of them is "Gentle". He then goes on to say there is a famous Swahili proberb that says, When the elephants fight, the grass gets trampled." and likens the elephants to combative and aggressive leaders, and the grass to the sheep in god's flock who get trampled when they fight. He cites 1 Timothy 3:3 and Titus 1:7 to back this up.

What stunned me about this particular part of Rinne's book is that it explained to me some of the baffling things I had experienced in the local churches and couldn't understand why things ended up going so wrong. I wondered if others on this site could relate as well. Please let me know.

When I looked up the proverb on an African proverb internet site, one of the commentaries noted the similarity to Matthew 23:1-36 when Jesus castigates the scribes and Pharisees as hypocrites, blind guides and blind fools for vying for places of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, but oppressing the ordinary people:

"They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them."

"For you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven. For you do not go in yourselves, and when others are going in, you stop them."