In need of advice

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by aron

The first tool I would offer is that God seeks engagement, and the enemy seeks estrangement. God wants to dialogue with your husband, but God's adversary wants to create a kind of antagonism, or a fight. So try to remember that if you want your husband to respect, acknowledge, and appreciate what you see, then you need to "go the extra mile" to meet him where he is. It is the proverbial "do unto others as you want them to do to you" scenario.

Jesus went out and found the sinners where they were. He didn't require them to go to Jerusalem or the holy mountain. You might be surprised how quickly the Lord can stir in your husband's heart if you meet him where he is.

What I am trying to say is that even if you totally disagree with your husband, try to communicate your present truth to him in a way that doesn't threaten him. The most precious truth your children can learn from you is that you love their father and are committed to going on together with him. Within that commitment you'll find the freedom to speak your mind. God has all power, and desires the light to shine. It will. So don't be threatened by your husband's reflexive beliefs, nor the group he's controlled by. God is greater than all.

And yours is a ministry of reconciliation, not estrangement.

Great insight, aron.

I Remember when I first got saved, my mom was so receptive because she saw a great change in my life, my attitude, etc. Then I joined the LC, and immediately went to the Revelations Training. Lee and company pumped me up with so much anti-Catholic ammunition that it spoiled my gospel of Jesus Christ the Savior. I threatened to smash idols and burn pictures.

The moral of the story is that we have Jesus and are now a people of hope. Our message is not that all others are wrong and the LC's alone are right, but that Jesus alone is our Lord, our center, our Savior.

Thank you Aron,

That is wonderful advice. I had come to a similar realization myself. I am working on communicating with my husband in a loving and respectful way. This is an area we struggle with in our marriage and I believe we have already come a long way.
I would like to mention that some recent circumstances in his family have arose that have deeply upset him. I feel like this may be an opportunity for me to minister to him. I can't help but feel a sense of urgency not to miss my window of opportunity but I know I must be careful not to rush it.

The circumstances in his family could either cause him to doubt his faith or to cling more strongly to it.

[aron]

Originally Posted by Ohio

When I first got saved, my mom was receptive because she saw a great change in my life, my attitude, etc. Then I joined the LC, and immediately went to the Revelations Training. Lee and company pumped me up with so much anti-Catholic ammunition that it spoiled my gospel of Jesus Christ the Savior. I threatened to smash idols and burn pictures.

The moral of the story is that we have Jesus and are now a people of hope. Our message is not that all others are wrong and the LC's alone are right, but that Jesus alone is our Lord, our center, our Savior.

When I said, "We have a ministry of reconciliation" that wasn't generic advice, but I think a real "tool" to dialog with people entrenched in LC-like belief systems. At its core, the LC doctrine pushes estrangement and judgment. Even "recovery" presupposes degradation and darkness, which is (naturally) everyone else. Everyone else is divided, we are one, etc. We have high peak truths, everyone else is low, common, fallen etc. The very language is loaded with subjective and judgmental terms. And this divides people from one another.

I think one way to approach these strongholds is not to become alienated from the person who is espousing them. Meet them where they are. The Spirit of the Lord can break any barrier. Paul wrote extensively about this in his epistles. We get the opportunity to live it out.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

I had come to a similar realization myself. I am working on communicating with my husband in a loving and respectful way. This is an area we struggle with in our marriage and I believe we have already come a long way.

Circumstances are temporary. The Spirit of the Lord is eternal. What an opportunity, to touch this in a real way, today! Your circumstances are God-arranged for you to find Him. As you do, you and those around you will be saved.

[New Beginnings]

This is the original poster now registered. I want to thank everyone for continuing to point me back to Christ. During my time stuck in the LC, I have struggled to grow in my relationship in The Lord. It is hard when you are alone. I have really closed my heart to the people at the LC for the sake of self preservation, although I believe they are good people simply misled.

Also, is there a way I can open the eyes of my husband to the contradictions in the LC in a nonjudgmental, loving way?

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by New Beginnings

Also, is there a way I can open the eyes of my husband to the contradictions in the LC in a nonjudgmental, loving way?

Personally, I needed many years of questions nagging at my heart. These were the discrepancies between what we were promised by the ministry and what actually was happening, in a word, all of the broken promises that had been accumulating for years. For example, watching scores of marriages crumble around me. How can I continue to blame all this on the devil? Where are all the promises of His rich blessings by our stand for "His testimony of oneness" in the LC's?

I know many of us in the Great Lakes Area (before we were quarantined, and about the time I left) found the instructions and practices for our families to be unhealthy. LSM talked about the "pipeline" which would usher our children into their FTTA and full-timer service. How has that turned out for those who went? How are they today? Did the FTTA really help their growth in Christ? Years ago the GLA leaders tried to obtain unbiased followup statistics, and LSM balked at that. Why?

New Beginnings, your children are younger, but your husband may still think LSM's programs are healthy for his kids. Every father wants his church to help his children's faith. How well are the older children in your LC doing? Has LC teachings prepared them for the world in high school and college? If the LC/LSM has not been good for the children in other families, how can you expect anything different for yours?

[New Beginnings]

Thank you for your insight Ohio,
We are in a very small locality. The handful of families with teenagers have stopped attending recently. There are a few young families like us with children. My husband has the tendency to blame the size of our locality for the lack of "shepherding" I received. He claims other localities are different/better. I visited enough of them to know better.

The fact that my husband is a chronic "backslider" makes it difficult. It seems he believes if he wasn't backsliding, all the riches blessings would be present in his life. Yet he has not taken the initiative to step up and "function."

[boughtbyJesus]

I have subscribed to this thread because I too am interested in how to help open the eyes of my husband in a non-judgmental and loving way. My husband has been re-connected with this cult for about 5 years now. My husband has always been a bit ornery, but in these past 5 years he has gotten so much worse. But he says that he always "comes to the blood." I'm not really sure what that means but I have reminded him that faith without works is dead.

With regard to FTTA, I came to realize that there is a brother in the church that my kids and I attend, SGCC, who grew up within this sect, attended FTTA after graduating from college and unfortunately, whose whole family is still immersed in the LC. When he and his wife were dating, she also attended some LC meetings but quickly realized something was not quite right. I don't yet know the whole story behind my brothers departure from the LC but with the holidays approaching, he did say that things were hard because he has two young children and his parents disapprove of their Christmas celebrations.

[New Beginnings]

Sorry to post so much. As I said before, I feel a sense of urgency. I feel like the Lord is arranging my circumstances perfectly each day.

I still serve with the children. In a small locality, there is a need for every parent and grandparent to serve with the children. I feel like this sense of obligation is a tie that needs to be severed. However, I hoped to make a decision to leave before I informed them I no longer wish to serve.

My husband rarely chooses to attend the meetings when I am not scheduled to serve.

Should I continue serving?

Thank you

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by New Beginnings

Thank you for your insight Ohio,
We are in a very small locality. The handful of families with teenagers have stopped attending recently. There are a few young families like us with children. My husband has the tendency to blame the size of our locality for the lack of "shepherding" I received. He claims other localities are different/better. I visited enough of them to know better.

The fact that my husband is a chronic "backslider" makes it difficult. It seems he believes if he wasn't backsliding, all the riches blessings would be present in his life. Yet he has not taken the initiative to step up and "function."

LSM has designed a program where all members are indoctrinated into believing they are not adequately consecrated. They never will be. There are not enough hours in the day to meet all their requirements. Members are forever chasing their elusive proverbial "carrot," and as soon as they take a break, their conscience condemns them as "backsliders." I lived in that state for decades. Those in big localities envied those in small, and vice versa, always thinking the "program" must be working somewhere else.

Being a backslider is not evidence that your husband is "bad," rather that is proof that the program is bad. Where is the rich supply they always boast about? In the early days of my salvation, I was amazed at how much the Lord did in my life compared to how little I was doing. After 30 years of slaving in the LC's, I was amazed at how little the Lord was doing in my life compared to all I was doing.

Your husband needs to realize that loving his wife, raising his children, and working to support them is what God called him too. The Lord wants to live through us in the very situation He has placed us in. What a shame that the LC's honor those who divorce for their cause. It really means a lot to a Christian man when his wife praises him for all the positive things he is and does. As they say, behind every good man is a great woman!

[aron]

Originally Posted by New Beginnings

The fact that my husband is a chronic "backslider" makes it difficult. It seems he believes if he wasn't backsliding, all the riches blessings would be present in his life. Yet he has not taken the initiative to step up and "function."

1. There are many who are "backsliders" and who think that somehow in spite of the "rich ministry" they blew it. They can't function but it isn't the fault of the system but their fault. Somehow.

2. There are many who come and function but are dry. They can't get happy like in the old days when they were swimming in the spirit, but they think that if somehow they keep going through the LC motions the spirit will return.

3. There are many who are very active, former FTTA trainees, with wives and husbands and children and professional-level jobs, who wonder why the LC experience isn't even a pale shadow of its former self. They have heard all the stories of the Elden Hall days and the great migrations to take the cities of the earth. Then it all dried up. Why? Storms? Rebellions? Lukewarmness? It is always, again, the fault of the congregation, not the "high peak" theology or the "rich ministry".

All of these folks are waiting for something good to come along. All of them are captive by "strong-holds". Their minds have unquestioningly absorbed certain things which they hold as unassailable truth, which when questioned will fall apart like so many cobwebs.

The "rich ministry" got a hold because they used a lot of verses, compared to what people were used to. Maybe the average church-goer was exposed to, say, 3% or 5% of the text of the Bible in a year. Along comes the "minister of the age" and goes over maybe 7%. So it seemed to me, coming in from the outside, that I was snowed under with Bible verses. But I noticed eventually that there are a lot of verses they really aren't interested in, because they don't line up conveniently with LC dogma. So they are ignored.

I think this is a pretty good chunk, actually. Some of it is pretty basic stuff, like "remembering the poor, which very thing we were eager to do", (Gal 2:10) which neatly coincides with Jesus' work among the despised of Judah, Galilee, and Samaria.

What I am suggesting is that you "enjoy", publicly and loudly, some of these verses. Let the Holy Spirit breathe life into them. And receive the LC verses as well, because those are also God's words. Just hold the interpetations carefully. But enjoy.

And those 3 "classes" of people will be puzzled: where is the joy that this person has? Why is God speaking to her and not me, etc? The strongholds will crumble. Believe me, the gates of Hades cannot withstand the word of God dwelling in you richly. As you see the Shepherd emerge through the mists of time, as the Holy Spirit declares the things of the Son to you and the Son shows you the way home to the Father, the small light in you will burn intensely and those people will see it.

So forget about your situation, at least to some extent. Focus on the Son of God being revealed in the word of Scripture. It will happen. Seek and you will indeed find. And as you find, light will pour out of you and others will begin to stir, and turn, and consider. The strongholds will not stand.

[aron]

Originally Posted by aron

I noticed eventually that there are a lot of verses they really aren't interested in, because they don't line up conveniently with LC dogma. So they are ignored...

p.s. If you "enjoy the spirit" in some of these verses, and do it publicly, the LC faithful will explain them away. "Oh, that is just such and such." WL already covered that. No big deal. You might do that ten times and they will explain it away with LC teachings ten times.

Then the eleventh time you "enjoy" some verse, and believe me there will be eleven times because God has a fountain, they will suddenly stop and stare.

What? Does the Bible say that?

Yes it does.

Oh, our 'apostle' never covered that.

Suddenly they will begin to stop and think, and the strong-holds will begin to shake...

[New Beginnings]

Aron, I appreciate your perspective and I believe it is wonderful advice. However, I cringe at the words "public and loudly." I have not spoken in a meeting in 10 years. I am not a confident person and am terrified of public shaming. I realize that The Lord can supply me with strength and confidence, but after all these years my faith is weak. I suppose I should start with strengthening myself through the word of God. Yet I cannot quiet the feeling of wanting to run away from the LC, quickly.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Then I joined the LC, and immediately went to the Revelations Training.

Wow! What a place to start off.

I know someone (actually to this day) that had a breakdown over the Revelation training. They eventually returned to the "fold" for a brief period, but left altogether a couple of years after that. Has since been a leader in lay ministry at a significant church in the area.