Bill Gothard has always had an interest in and love for the “juvenile delinquent”, young people that have been consumed in sin and rebellion, seeing them brought to Jesus and their lives reclaimed. His early ministry was focused on the gangs he encountered in Chicago and resulted in the “Basic Youth Conflicts” seminar.
With a view to this IBLP began accepting court remanded youth in Indianapolis in the early 2000’s to see them redeemed and turned into radiant, godly young people. Such a ministry is inherently fraught with danger as rebels are usually quite skilled at lying and taking advantage of others to further their agenda. Additionally, such settings require great patience and skill on the part of the staff, there always being the risk of over-reaction to some of the intense stresses those settings can create. While many were won and became shining examples of God’s grace (including a member of our staff), others rejected those efforts and turned on the Institute.
Allegations of abuse in the program were being made back in 2001-2002 timeframe. In 2001 a young woman calling herself “Rachel” posted her story at Rachel’s Story claiming to have been being locked up for two months, finally performing a daring escape to get free, at that time in hiding. Don Veinot picked up the story and featured it in “A Matter of Basic Principles”, pages 206-210. When we starting checking into it in 2005, the website was already gone . . . with a specific exclusion made by the owner to keep it from being archived. During that time – and at the recommendation of Mr. Veinot – our staff joined the Metochoi anti-Gothard forum for the initial purpose of gaining more insights into this story. We were told by forum staff that she was a member. We specifically asked for any accounts from anyone that related to abuse at the ITC . . . and received not a single story, this again on a very violently negative Gothard and IBLP forum.
“Rachel’s” roommate Kendra posted her version of Rachel’s time at ITC on her own website . . . which is still up after all these years: Kendra’s Response It says in part:
“Now what shall I believe about you? I read your web site and scratch my head. “Held…as a prisoner”? I remember walks around our city parking lot, trips to church twice a week, holidays of picnics and sports in the country, shopping, the $600 music course you were scholarshiped through, a trip to hear the Indianapolis Symphony. “Treated…worse than a criminal”? Memories of birthday parties, tutoring sessions with Megan, welcomes with confetti and blue painted faces, cake decorating class, laughs we had over the antics of others around us, songs we wrote and sang together flood my mind.”
Around that time a 10 year old girl who was part of the program alleged she was locked in a prayer room for days with no food, spanked repeatedly, held down by staff. Indianapolis WISH-TV did a multipart expose on the ITC, highlighting her and a number of other plaintiffs, which resulted in a full investigation by the Indiana Family and Social Services.
At the end of it – May 22, 2002 – WISH posted the conclusion of the investigation (WISH-TV Report on Conclusion of ITC Investigation):
“During the investigation, Marion County courts stopped sending children to ITC and the center changed policy and stopped spanking the children. But again, the state says the training center is in the clear and all allegations are unsubstantiated. ”
Even though there was no substance found, that effectively spelled the end of that program. Other efforts continued over the years at sites such as Eagle Mountain in Arkansas and Eagle Springs in Oklahoma.
Since several came to our Questions area to lodge complaints of abuse we decided to highlight the matter here. At this time, and in light of a number of interviews we have done, we believe that there was no abuse perpetrated that rises to the level of a valid legal complaint. We do believe that an occasional staff member may have been deliberately excessive on occasion, but, again, the situations there were tough even with the most skilled and godly in charge. Sometimes there is also a good explanation as to why a young person’s account of their time there may differ negatively from that provided by others, even State officials that placed them there to start.
For our part, we will allow the discussion to unfold and will check into any situation that we have the ability to do so. One of our staff members was one of the early court appointed young people, going through the entire program, then observing it later on while on staff. We trust we have the objectivity to get to the truth.
10/20/2016
We were provided a copy of the resolution passed by the full city council of Indianapolis, Indiana on April 14, 2003, formally accepting the results of the investigation into the IBLP Indianapolis Training Center, apologizing to the Institute for the unjust damage done, and encouraging all pertinent authorities to continue sending young people to the facility. As a public body making a public policy statement it should be clear that the ITC passed its formal challenge from disgruntled former participants as executed through a skeptical media eager to damage and discredit a perceived “right wing” Christian ministry with flying colors.
Indianapolis City Council Resolution – April 14, 2003
Alfred,
If the ITC center was using “corporal punishment” or “spanking” that is abuse and if they dropped use of corporal punishment due to Indiana’s investigation then it is obvious that physical abuse was going on even if the so called “investigation” claims there wasn’t any as alleged in Rachel’s story. I’m not sure why the State of Indiana or for a matter any State would be sending troubled youth to Bill’s programs. If there were so many troubled youth helped by Bill, where are their stories of their glorious turn around? Why haven’t all these “delinquents” come out and given their testimonies? I think your point of saying that you have asked for stories of abuse is meaningless because the opposite is that I don’t see the stories of how Bill helped troubled youth. Likewise, the just because Kendra came out to on the internet to claim as a mentor to Rachel doesn’t mean she is being any more honest than Rachel, even if her blog post is still up. I don’t know who she is any more than Rachel. But again, if there was use of “corporal” punishment going on at these training centers run by Bill, that is considered physical abuse and the fact that they dropped it is telling.
Can you provide some legal backup for that? Since, if you are correct, I and all of my friends are in big trouble. Actually, IF that had been abuse, they would not have gotten a clean bill of health. Make sense? You don’t get an “unsubstantiated” finding . . . if they found substance. No, they dropped the spanking because of all the harassment that inevitably ensues, including these groundless claims . . . NOT because it was legally or even morally wrong.
They do. Their parents have, for sure, because I hear them. Hardly a week goes by and we do not get a grateful testimony to major life changes and blessing directly a result of Bill and his seminars and programs. Most everyone who feels wrongs will say so – 100% – but if the story of the lepers and Jesus is a bit of an example, maybe 10% of those blessed come back to say so?
I am talking about corporal punishment in either school or groups type homes such as these. Many States have made it a crime for a teacher to “spank” a student and that sort of punishment should never be found in any type of institution that is dealing with young people and children. I think in some southern States, it is still legal. It varies State by State. I know in MI, it is illegal. Maybe in Indiana which might have more conservative view might have been legal, hence would example why Gothard placed his ITC center there. If they were using corporal punishment, that is abuse whether it was “legal” or not. The fact that ITC changed it’s policy after the investigation is very curious. I am sure you read the “Fixer” piece on HA which went into the views and practice of physical abuse done in these ministries in the “name of Christ”. You are “hearing” in your words from “grateful” parents. Sorry Alfred, but you said “parents” not the children involved. There is a big difference there. I am not seeing anywhere the “grateful” students that have gone through this and other types of ministries and that includes ATI students themselves. Where are all these children that were help? Why aren’t they on the internet in blogs singing the praises of Bill. I don’t see any but there are many more that have stories including some posters here that tell tales of abuse at these centers. So all these people are lying or the weight of the evidence is that ITC was an abusive center that resulted in more damage to already damaged lives.
That is a very authoritative sounding opinion. I happen to disagree with you. Scripture would disagree with you. Corporal punishment appears to be ordained by God to accomplish things that no other means can. In fact, this is the only thing listed in Scripture as able to deliver a person . . . from hell . . . in so many words. But, regardless, it was not illegal in the state of Indiana, acceptable as a means of gaining repentance and compliance.
Years ago “Brother Andrew”, world renowned smuggler of Bibles into Russia, was stopped at a checkpoint . . . and the Bibles were discovered. They asked him a question to make a point similar to yours: “If what you are doing is legal, why are you hiding the Bibles from us?!” He was lead to take out and open his wallet, and show them his money. “I keep my money hidden, gentlemen, not because it is illegal money, but to keep it from thieves that wish to take it.”
Even Michael Pearl has in later years recommended that parents learn to discipline with minimal or no spankings. The reason given was crystal clear: It is because of evil people, thieves who work for the government, let alone neighbors and relatives that may be seeking to harm a family, who use an emotionally charged matter like that to hurt people whose values they despise. They did it to avoid frivolous investigations, like the one launched by the 10 year old juvenile delinquent and her mother, a girl that the investigation clearly showed deserved what she got – including being restrained by a number of staff members because she was physically out of control – and more.
And you are wrong. We do hear from grateful once-young people. One of them is Bettina, whose testimony is prominently featured on both our website and Bill’s. Right now you are not hearing much at all, right? I could present you a great many testimonies if those providing them felt comfortable with that. In this nasty environment most prefer to continue to lead quiet lives and not have to deal with the harassment of people who have it in for all things “Gothard”.
And, sorry, yes . . . a number of participants have lied. There were a number of them making these exact claims to the Indiana authorities. Not one of them had a valid complaint, as the investigation concluded. Don’t rust past that so quickly. That REALLY is not too far fetched of a notion, right, given the reasons they were there to start with?
Can’t resist busting your chops, Rob. You had no scruples against corporal punishment when applied to men who exploit women. But for you, some victims of violence are more equal than others, eh? Just kidding. I see the distinction between slapped creeps and spanked children.
Anyway, there are plenty of possible explanations for the silence of former “spankees.” Most males of our generation took spankings for granted, and it never occurred to us to complain about them. We would be scorned as sissies. Among some, that’s probably still true.
Another possibility is that the spankings “worked,” and those formerly sore-bottomed IBLP kids are now thirty-somethings out there producing wealth in the world, rather than pecking at keyboards on Gothard blogs. That’s far from certain, but we ought to allow for the possibility.
Your formerly sore-bottomed brother,
David K
Brother Dave,
Well, you haven’t busted my chops. There is a difference between giving someone a knuckle sandwich in self- defense and corporal punishment being done by an institution. Everyone has the right to defend themselves and their integrity. Barring all the negative stories that come from ATI students that passed through this particular training center, the admission of corporal punishment as well as the fact that they claimed to “stop” it, should be enough of a reason to know that ITC was an abusive place. There are enough other internet stories out there from those that spent time at ITC, including RG, HA, Heresy in the heartland etc. that collaborate “Rachel” than Kendra. The fact that the mayor sold this old hotel for a buck and there was a judge willing to send state wards to it, should make anyone pause to realize that there looks to be a political cover up. The original story broke when the local TV station went undercover with TV cameras to document a number of these abuses. The investigation was stopped and a city counsel that was heavy on the IBLP supporter side issued the “apology” over the objections of others on the counsel. The real question is why was a judge willing to send state wards to an uncredited, un licensed, unqualified program only to have the state ward by “mentored” by some inexperienced ATI students with no experience in dealing with such and that at a 24/7 watch. That is not right.
non-busted chops sister Rob
“Admission”? This was part of the program since day 1. Nothing was hidden. And “stopping” it was in direct response to the harassment provided by a whole series of folks unfriendly to a conservative, Biblical world view.
Here is something from the wisest man that ever lived . . . what do you think? Is it good advice?
Proverbs 20:30 “The blueness of a wound cleanseth away evil: so do stripes the inward parts of the belly.”
The world thinks it is horrible advice. You seem to agree. It is getting more and more that you can get arrested for applying corporal punishment. The world is so wrong, God is always right. But . . . the world can steal your ministry, your money, your freedom. So . . . sometimes you go with less effective things to avoid providing that opportunity. Especially if the government you are serving changes its mind and asks you to.
All of these hate Bill, have always hated him, and will do anything they can to harm him. You cannot honestly believe you are going to get “straight reporting” there, are you?
And “Heresy” left out the important point that it was the state department of Family Services that exonerated the ITC, not the City Counsel. At some point that has to become somewhat important, yes? The exonerated the ITC despite those hidden cameras and whatnot. The ITC did nothing wrong.
Alfred,
isn’t “hate Bill” a little melodramatic? Now maybe you find Bill the greatest since sliced bread but just because others talk about the problems they had with either his teaching or Bill’s behavior doesn’t mean that they “hate” Bill. I think there is a better response than dismissing all these blogs and people than they hate and are out to get Bill. I’ve seen some Catholics claim that about the Boston Globe and that they were “out to get the Catholic Church”. However, covering up sinful behaviors should never be tolerated by any Church and institution. So the so called anti-Catholic Boston Globe that was out to get the Catholic Church did the Catholic Church a huge favor in uncovering sin in the leadership. It is hard to look at bad things about people and places we may love. However, dismissing others that are pointing out uncomfortable truths as “hateful” is not going to help you or even Bill. I think you may know this. The movie “Spotlight” was even endorsed by the Vatican even though the movie and the whole Boston Globe expose is not a “pro-Catholic” movie.
Well, I would give you credit for reading what others write . . . but am baffled how you cannot see literal hatred in so many. Hatred . . . seething at the very mention of the name, disgust, revulsion . . . desire, even, to see bodily, financial and, yes, eternal harm come to a person. That last item is right out of Matthew 5 . . . “Hope you go to hell” is the ultimate expression of hatred, according to Jesus. And those are all sentiments we see repeatedly on these venues.
The opposite of hatred is love . . . which is command to we that confess the name of Jesus. Looking to see someone restored . . . forgiving a person . . . praying for their wellbeing. Seeing the importance of a person, even through the muck of a real or perceived failure, even one that has affected me deeply. That I could live with. But . . . hatred skews the narrative and is by definition unjust and unwise.
Rob, I think you’re mistaken on this one. Wasn’t it Augustine, or maybe Thomas Aquinas, who was careful to distinguish between what is legal and what is lawful? The idea was that only God makes laws. Men make statutes, which are legitimate only as they agree with God’s law. Or there’s Martin Luther, who famously resisted the claims of men to bind the conscience. Alfred makes a good point, and so does Pegasister, our non-ATI contributor.
Reading and thinking,
David K
I believe you are confusing this with the concept of natural law. The Catholic web site New Advent under their Catholic encyclopedia under Natural Law gives a great definition and break down on what natural law is. St. Thomas Aquinas is quoted in the article. The web page is http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09076a.htm. It was natural law that the founders of the USA were appealing to in the American Revolution “We hold these truths to be self evident”. Natural Law was the basis of the Magna Carta which has the full support of the Catholic Bishops in England which put limits on absolute power of the king. Magna Carta was also appealed to during the American Revolution and used as a model. Merging of State and religion happen more under the Reformation with Calvin and even Martin Luther who used or was used by German political powers looking to break free. King Henry VIII likewise merged his authority to the Church. The reformation was just as much about politics as religion. The KJV is a secular king authorizing a Bible translation. I’m not sure where you want to go with this but if you consider that things like abortion and same sex marriage are now “legal” here doesn’t mean and I’m sure you and Alfred and I would agree make them “morally” right at all. I think all three of us are against abortion and same sex marriage. So, when I say that even though the State of Indiana legally allowed corporal punishment in institutions doesn’t make that right and doesn’t mean because corporal punishment in such institutions and schools is “legal” doesn’t mean that such methods are not abusive because corporal punishment as used by schools and institutions that deal with children and young people IS abuse. The same with the complaint about ATI. ATI maybe a legal homeschooling program doesn’t mean that ATI was an adequate homeschooling program because it looks like it wasn’t even though you and Alfred use it and attest to it.
Rob, you are probably right. Once I started to read Augustine’s City of God but got bogged down and quit. The part I was thinking of was probably in there.
Ignorance is bliss,
David K
Rob War “Many States have made it a crime for a teacher to “spank” a student and that sort of punishment should never be found in any type of institution that is dealing with young people and children”. I see you believe states law usurps Biblical instruction. You probably could have used a good spanking.
I was living at the Indianapolis training center back in 1997. Yes they spanked me but it was worse then that. I would have to spend days in the prayer room and sometimes I was tied up with duck tape. My hands were tied behind my back, my feet were tied together and then they tied my hands to my feet and left me like that for hours.
I did try to call the police and ask for a welfare check but they took the phone from me and reassured them nothing was wrong.
I remember the press showing up. They locked all the doors. No one was allowed to come in or out, and we all had to go to our rooms.
After having spoken with any number of folks over the past 13 years, from those who went through the program to staff members, after posting openly and loudly in a large anti-IBLP asking for any tales of abuse at any of the training centers, and being aware that the state of Indiana did a full investigation of those very charges under very unfriendly circumstances, ending in complete exoneration and a formal apology from the Indy city council . . . You will forgive us for not believing everything stated. Spanking, yes, that was very carefully and deliberately executed under the guidelines given by the courts. The rest I would be willing to pursue with you if you want, duct taping in particular, lying to the press. If you have any corroborating testimony, folk that will talk to us, we have access to a great many that would remember that time frame. Let me know. Call me suspicious, but we will follow it where it leads.
I was at the Indianapolis Training Center back in 1997. I went there when I was 13. I spent a couple years there as an “LIT” Leader in Training. I was beat with a paddle until my bottom was black, blue and purple. I could barely sit. To beat me I was held down by several adults. The Gergeni’s were one of them holding me down. I was tied up like a hog. My hands and feet were tied together behind my back to each other with duck tape. A sock was shoved in my mouth and my mouth was duck taped to keep me from screaming while I was in the prayer room. I was kept like that for hours on the floor. I can still feel the pain in my arms. I still remember the bruises that covered my legs and bottom from looking in the mirror from that paddle.
I was up in Gothard’s suit alone with him. I remember that like it was yesterday. Oh but I could never be alone with another male or even watch Anne of green of green gables because that was a sin. But it was okay if I was alone with Bill Gothard in his suit at 14,15 years old. I also would be alone with him in his office, and alone with him in the gergenis office. Gothard would take a special trip to just come see me. He would take me with him to court in Chicago where the judge would order other troubled youths into his care. I would ride with him in his limo and go out to eat with him and the Gergenis. He would bribe me to keep quiet. I tried to run away. I called the police, but mr. Gergeni caught me and grabbed the phone and told the police I was a troubled youth they were trying to help. The police didn’t show up, but the press did the next day. I tried to go down to talk to them, but Gothard locked the doors. No one was allowed in and no one was allowed out. I was escorted back up the elevators to talk to Gothard on the phone. He promised me anything I wanted if I stayed away from the reporters.
On my 14th birthday when I “officially” met Gothard. He came into town that day to meet me. I was sent to the 13th floor to have my makeup and hair done for him. I was dressed pretty for Gothard. I was 14. He couldn’t keep his disgusting eyes off of me that night. He came to my table which was seated at the very front and it was decorated. Not that he could have missed me anyways. After dinner I was escorted out by him and the Gergenis. We went to the Gergenis office. The Gergenis left us alone there. He sat down beside me and started talking to me. Yeah he is a creeping man. He put his hand on my thigh when he went to pray. I was 14.
A lot more happened, but needless to say, that place is horrible. They are far from innocent. I am working like hell to heal what have happened to me during those days in my life. I was abused long before those days, but they made it worse. No one deserves to go through the hell they put people through. No it is not okay what they did to people. I would never let anyone do to my children what they did to me not in a million years. They all deserve to go to prison for what they did to me.
Hi, Tracy. We have been talking to former LITs for years – Including one who is on our team – and we have yet to find a verifiable case of abuse. And by “verifiable” I mean corroboration, something with details more than one person can recall. We were on a chat group (1,000 people) dedicated to opposing Mr. Gothard and openly asked for such accounts – not one was provided. Something as horrible as you described would surely have had witnesses, some of which would, with the attacks on Bill in recent years, felt the need to clear their conscience by disclosing.
Mr. Gergeni is with the Lord now, so we cannot follow up with him. We have spoken in detail with others that were in charge, none associated with IBLP now, and we have been told adamantly over and over that this was not the case. Indeed, as we noted in the article the State of Indiana launched a 6 month investigation into claims of abuse and they, with lots to lose if they got it wrong, found nothing amiss and even issued a formal apology for getting jerked into that process.
So, if you would like us to follow up, please give us something to work from besides your personal recollections.
And, BTW, Bill has never owned or used a limo. I know his 1970’s blue car looked big enough for that, but it was no limo.
re: Gothard’s limousine and “leaders-in-training”
I once re-purposed a Gothard car. I had the use of Bill Gothard’s blue 1969 sedan as a command car when I led ALERT Basic Training in 1994-95. We called it “the Milhous” after Richard Milhous Nixon because it was made the same year Nixon became POTUS. It was a formidable old tank that chugged serenely around the Northwoods Conference Center.
Did IBLP coin an over-optimistic euphemism? Bill Gothard used the “leader-in-training” label for the troubled youth he served at Indianapolis and elsewhere. It sounds more positive than “juvenile delinquent.” At his training centers, did Gothard transform losers into leaders? At ALERT in 1994-95 we had mixed results. My experience with ALERT of that era confirmed Gothard’s teaching about the five types of fools. Most of the boys I trained in ALERT Basic Training were quality youth. But we admitted the occasional fool. Unfortunately, some of these cleaved to their folly. But others forsook their folly, and one quickly rose to leadership.
Bill Gothard had sexually abused dozens of children, underage girls. He is a pedophile. Look him up online
Trust me, we have looked everything up online. We have interviewed anyone that would talk to us. We were actively involved in the 2015-2019 lawsuit where 17 folks (15 women, 2 men) sued Bill for $8.5 million for these very claims. Turns out, he didn’t do any of that, not once. If so the highly respected personal injury firm of Meyers and Flowers that was driving this forward would have been able to get something of the 180 counts through to trial. But they couldn’t, wasting a quarter of a million of their own money. They dropped plaintiffs one by one, plaintiffs dropped out by ones and groups, until the last 11 left standing dropped out in Feb. 2018. No settlement, no explanation, except citing “complexities”. The complexities were that they were all expecting the others to have the real “beef”, and nobody did. They came within a hair’s breadth of painful monetary sanctions for filing a “frivolous lawsuit”. Bill failed in that request over a technicality (the law firms needed to be the primary target, not the plaintiffs).
So – what do you know? List the specific accusations here and if we do not have that vetted we will investigate and report back.
On another note, falsely accusing a public figure of sexual malfeasance, even if you are sure, if it is done with “malice”, which you appear to definitely have, is defamation “per se” under the law. If you have facts that can be proven true, you are in no danger . . . Otherwise, weigh your words carefully.
Objectivity: impartiality, absence/lack of bias, absence/lack of prejudice, fairness, fair-mindedness, neutrality, evenhandedness, justice, open-mindedness, disinterest, detachment, dispassion, neutrality.
Sorry, I don’t see objectivity here. And before you claim RG isn’t objective either, consider the stated purpose of RG. The site was set up for stories to be exchanged, and for the sharers to heal. And more importantly to me, who was never part of ATI, the site serves to inform others of what people experienced under Gothard’s influence and serve as a warning. Bias isn’t necessarily a bad thing if it’s acknowledged and taken into account when giving your opinion or (more frequently on RG) personal experience. Bias becomes a problem, though, when its existence is denied…as it is here.
Am I biased? Absolutely! But I recognize that I’m biased and I take it into account. That’s not to say I’m perfect about it, but at least I acknowledge its existence and its potential consequences on me. I saw some of that in Alfred’s early RG posts when he talked about how much Bill meant to him personally, and how hard it was to see a father figure fall. That tiny bit of acknowledgement seems to have disappeared…
Also, allow me to point out that smuggling Bibles into Russia at that time was DEFINITELY illegal. But it was NOT immoral. The “thieves” Brother Andrew was referring to were government officials who were enforcing their laws. He was breaking their law and he knew it–but not God’s law. “Legal” tends to refer to human law, while “moral” refers to God’s law. And when the two contradict each other, God’s takes supremacy.
It is also a problem when it results in innocent people being charged with serious crimes . . . because a lot of people need it to be true. I am sure you can think of some examples where this has happened.
Actually, that was not the case and was the basis of the interchange. The Russians alleged full freedom to buy and read Bibles, a bit of their western facing propaganda. So he was not technically in violation of a specific law . . . as I recall. Which, when he pointed out, prompted them to demand why he was hiding the Bibles.
Dear Rob,
I concede your point. I don’t know much about the ITC and what happened there. I visited ITC briefly in 1994-95 when I was officer-in-charge of ALERT Basic. That was my only exposure.
Even so, I am less squeamish about institutional corporal punishment than you. I got my share at caesar’s schools, and deserved more than I got. Just look how terrific I turned out. (Or not.)
Of course I agree about our natural right to self-defense, so long as it is proportional.
But I don’t see much significance to the $1 sale of the ITC building. Maybe it was a gimmick invoked to minimize somebody’s taxation. I haven’t browsed those websites you mention, except for a rare visit to RG. Alfred seems to think they are pretty venomous.
No busted chops yet? I’ll try harder next time.
Your mischievous brother,
David K
Dear Rob,
Thanks for that link about natural law. I skimmed through it just now. That last part about the relation of natural law to civil law was what I was thinking of. Of course there was a lot of other good content in there, but today is my birthday, and I feel too self-indulgent to dig into it.
Naturally lawful,
David K
Dear Rob,
As Steve Jobs used to say, “one more thing” about the adequacy of ATI.
I used ATI for my homeschooling when I had minor children while in in my twenties and thirties. I don’t know whether Alfred still has children young enough for homeschooling. Is ATI adequate? Adequate for what? With its parent-directed unit study format, ATI was inadequate for college-prep purposes. I would not rely upon it to equip a student for college. Nor would I rely upon college to equip a student for life. ATI is no better than the parents who use it, but it is also no worse than they. Unfortunately, some educational paths can make the student worse than his parents. John Piper describes his first half of college that way. By the end of his student years, Piper had recovered from his college apostasy. But not all students are as fortunate as Piper. For Piper, college was a very expensive way to end up where he started, spiritually speaking.
For the record, one of my kids is doing community college, another is earning his college credits online.
Too cheap for either ATI or college,
David K
I guess when I meant adequate, I am thinking more of the college track which is the track that usually leads to higher paying jobs and security. No, not always but for many things. In this day and age, not all learning can be boiled down to on-job or apprentership type of learning which I think was the track of ATI and Bill’s ideas of education. You confirmed to me that ATI would not prepare children for a college or higher education track. Knowledge has increased too much since the agrarian days of the 17th and 18th centuries which had that model of learning that Bill ATI program was trying to follow.
I’m not sure what John Piper has to do with this. He went to Wheaton College, the same one as Bill Gothard, Billy Graham, John and Elizabeth Elliot. So again, I’m not sure what problem he faced or encountered there except I wouldn’t call Wheaton college a bastion of Calvinism and maybe that gave him his “spiritual” issues. Not sure. Piper also went to Fuller Theological seminary, so again I am not following this point. Maybe his spiritual crisis had more to do with having his TULIP Calvinism challenged at Wheaton. I don’t know that is just a guess based on what you described here and I would not call myself a fan of his and Calvinism (or his brand of it) at all.
Our oldest son is not currently enrolled in any higher education program. He is just working full time at age 22. Higher education isn’t for everyone either but to discourage higher education which Bill did or even set up a homeschool program which doesn’t leave or prepare that as an option is not right either. Especially since Bill did obtain college degrees including a PhD.
Hello again, Rob. I used the Piper bio example which I (vaguely) recall from his book, Don’t Waste your Life. I thought the anecdote from his student life was ironic, because his thesis was that a Christian should not waste his life. Piper narrated two years of apostasy while a student because he was indoctrinated in existentialism (not Calvinism!). Piper recovered his faith over the next two years, but assured his readers that the college apostasy did not count as waste.
I didn’t know Billy Graham was a Wheaton alumnus. Wheaton must be proud!
Congratulations on having a productive young man for a son. I got similar good fortune. My own son of twenty got recruited over the summer for a paid corporate internship, so he’s taking that path just now.
I’m willing to cut Gothard much more slack than you over the college question. When he started ATI back in 1984, homeschooling was very young, and mostly practiced by counterculture earth muffin hippies. Back then, most families did the lockstep institutional schooling march from first grade through college. Gothard was trying something in the spirit of the original Apple Computer marketing slogan, “Think Different.”
After a couple of decades, he took ginger steps toward college credentialing, while retaining the pioneer spirit as much as possible. At least that’s my assessment of ATI. I enjoyed it. It was the main tool in my homeschooling toolkit until I went solo with my homeschooling.
Some of my kids did the programs at the ATI training centers. It seemed to do them more good than harm. A couple of my daughters found spouses there (the Mrs. degree). I feel fortunate that they found good men.
Yes, I think Gothard earned a master’s at Wheaton, and I don’t know whether he regrets it or exults in it. Maybe he’s like St. Paul who kept his Pharisee card in reserve for when he needed it.
Besides, Gothard is far from the first man to cast doubts upon college. And the 2016 internet is planted thick with everything from absolute anti-college vehemence to college agnosticism.
Happily, former ATI kids are perfectly capable of earning accredited degrees through distance-learning colleges like Excelsior and Thomas Edison. That’s what my son is doing. It’s kind of an extension of home schooling. You can earn most of your degree through CLEPs and DSSTs.
Still thinking differently,
David K
Brother Dave,
I am not personally opposed to homeschooling at all. Mr W was and is against it so we never became involved with it. I believe parents should decide what is best way to educate their children and that may include homeschool, private, parochial, charter and even standard district public. We certainly have had experience with parochial, charter and now public and there are good and bad in all of them. I am surprised that you are doing “your own” program. Does FL allow that for homeschooling, I mean not doing a specific program but more of a homespun one? It would seem that is a lot of work to put something like this together. I clearly remember when I attended the Basic seminars a long time ago and before the ATI program started up, that Bill strongly implied that higher education (college) was “unbiblical” and what is “biblical” was an internship type of program. He also strongly implied and spoke against women seeking out higher education but should stay at home with parents until married. Bill cannot support his ideas really from scripture. Higher education (college, university) stems or was developed from the western monastic movement since monasteries became the centers of education back in the early middle ages. Christian involvement in education has always been there. Even in the founding of this country, the earliest Universities such as Harvard etc. were founded to educate pastors and had a very strong Christian base on the Protestant side. U of M was founded by a Catholic Priest working with a Protestant Pastor. A few years ago for a lenten reading, I read the book “Voices of the Saints”. What struck me reading this was how many Catholic Saints were involved with starting schools as an outreach to the poor and needy. Education was and is seen as more of a social justice cause or corporal work of mercy. Education was and is seen as the best way for those trapped by poverty to leave it. So, I guess with such a rich history and involvement on both Catholic and even Protestant side in education, why there is such a distain for education in some segments usually those influenced by Anabaptist ideas. Bill himself went to Christian colleges and even has a PhD, so I don’t get his views here. That is inconsistent.
Dear Rob,
Here in FL we are very fortunate. The homeschooling pioneers of three decades ago lobbied a sympathetic legislature to pass a pretty liberal homeschooling statute back in 1987. I mean liberal in the old sense of maximum liberty. Homeschooolers need only have a credentialed teacher certify once per year that the kids are progressing according to their abilities. Of course that statute has spawned a cottage industry of sympathetic teachers who will interview and certify your kid for about fifty bucks. Not a bad price to keep caesar off your back for a year.
You are probably right about Bill’s use of “unbiblical” to describe institutional schools. That’s a word I avoid because we evangelicals have a bad habit of baptizing our opinions and demonizing opposite opinions. We claim that our opinions are “biblical,” while opposite views are “unbiblical.”
Sometimes we use these terms so sloppily that we cover topics which the Bible doesn’t really address. Maybe this is one of those times. I don’t know whether Bill is right or wrong on that point. Nor do I care. I love homeschooling, so I won’t quit until I run out of kids and grandkids (great-grandkids?) who need it. I make no claims whether I am doing well or poorly. But the lifestyle is unbeatable. Just give me more than fourscore years so I can homeschool the great-grandkids. Is that too much to ask?
I like your examples of Christian involvement in institutional education. You covered a lot of history I didn’t know. But I wasn’t surprised.
I used to follow debates between evangelicals on whether homeschooling or private Christian schooling was superior. But I was too cheap to pay for private schooling. Besides, Bill Gothard sold me on homeschooling in 1987, and it proved addictive. Mrs. K and I never gave serious thought to anything else.
Fortunately you are right. In FL no one interferes with my homespun homeschooling. It is pretty simple. Saxon Math, Shurley English, handwriting and spelling, piano lessons, “unschooling” tactics on topics which interest the kids.
As for you, I hear you have kids worthy of proud parents. Why mess with success?
Mrs. K and I have the perfect division of labor according to our temperament. She does the love, I do the discipline. The kids have neighborhood businesses such as lawn care and pet care. We participate in local homeschool group enrichment activities. As Tony Stark (Iron Man) once said, it has worked pretty well so far.
Happy at home,
David K
“He also strongly implied and spoke against women seeking out higher education but should stay at home with parents until married.” Yes, Gothard certainly did do this in the video seminars I went to in 2001 & also in either 2002 or 2003. He also suggested that even single women shouldn’t be employed if employment competed with allegiance such a person owes to God via family &/or church. [And how does any person maintain full-time employment in any competitive marketplace without significant personal investment?!?!?!?] The dire threat of the shipwreck of one’s faith was held up as the result of “many who have gone even to Christian colleges.” Even parents who had already paid their kid’s tuition that was non-reimbursable just called it a loss & brought their daughter home after she’d just started. And they were Gothard’s shining example for so doing. Unless he just made it up as a prototype that modeled what he wanted families/girls/women to do. Also he defined any desire of a women to take an apartment as being that of a desire to appear “fashionable”. Not taking this individual’s concern with personal responsibility into account. Just chalked-up as an attempt on her part to relate herself in some vain way to those around her.
Yet, this:
illbehonest.com/patriarchy-vs-single-women-in-the-bible
is what the Scriptures actually say about this very issue.
(In glancing on here at this particular topic I couldn’t stay away from reading the last month’s worth of dialogue. And suggesting this link. Which highlights the functioning reasonableness of the norms for single women that were replaced with IBLP’s exception inasmuch as it’s coercive approach had effect).
Eternity alone will tell the damage that has resulted, both individually and in the family, from women entering the workforce en masse. The article is not bad, have little to find fault with. Regardless of the real exceptions mentioned, it still remains that the model expressed in Scriptures has the male of the household as the primary breadwinner. Sarah is held in the highest esteem as an example of a godly woman . . .
“For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to adorn themselves. They submitted themselves to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her lord. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.” (1 Peter 3:5-6)
If we keep focusing on the mice hiding in the corners we run the risk of missing the elephant in the middle.
Have found the following interesting, from the 10 commandments:
“but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns.” (Exodus 20:10)
Note who is missing from the list? Why, “your wife”. Because, it appears, she has no independent working identity. Before fussing in response . . . just ponder that seriously for a moment.
The OP was updated with a copy of the Indianapolis City Counsel accepting the findings of the investigation into the ITC and formally apologizing to IBLP.
“Work” for a mom includes nursing & diaper-changing (includes washing) & food-prep for weaned young-uns. God left no room whatsoever for any interpretation that could pretend he had stipulated child neglect. Can you imagine dried food (or dried spit-up) plastered on a little kid’s face for a 24-hour period being left there to honor the Lord? God isn’t stupid. But he knows that people can be. That’s what that verse’s exclusion of “your wives” is there for. It’s there for mercy & grace, not for legalism & bondage. How else does it fit with the whole counsel of Scripture?
I never said that active-duty mothers should be employed outside the home. But many wives are so for good reason. There are loads of Christian women who are newlyweds, or barren, or too poor even though married to have kids & quit their jobs, or empty-nesters, or moms single due to getting left, or due to coming to Christ after becoming a single mom, or those beaten by their husbands (which, according to the O.T., follows that the “marriage” may never be reverted back to following the beating), or couples who fight until they break the noise ordinances of their neighborhood association, or forever-singles who go without any respectable interest from the opposite sex due to our society being marriage-clueless. Also those of us who have rejected multiple offers of marriage because we heeded the Bible’s & the Holy Spirit’s caution against marrying the specific “man” who was making us such offers. Of the adult population in this country, the status of marriage is the minority status; most adults are unmarried. You may believe that ALL married women should be unemployed even in spite of the exceptions I mentioned. But, with regard to the unmarried, I hardly think you could wish that over 50% of this nation’s women quit our jobs & burden the taxation of employed people even more than is already the case. So, I don’t think that you really are against women having joined the work force en masse. Especially since the inclusion of “daughters” in the verse you provided shows that daughters in general are considered to have independent working ability. Us unmarried women certainly are not wives. But we are still daughters as long as our parents live. It would seem that God has ordained that unmarried daughters, as a rule, are to be considered in light of the independent working ability that is to primarily define her life’s situation. And is unimpeded by any responsibility for child care within her father’s house. Stay-at-home-daughtering is not her work to do 6 days a week & neither would her doing such work able to be ceased from on the Sabbath. (Since the one holding such responsibility does not get a Sabbath). A daughter gets to observe the Sabbath because she spends the other days working OUTSIDE the home.
A tad bemused. The whole counsel of Scripture is very much in favor of a wife staying at hope to run the estate. While Scripture does not bar outside work, and examples may be found where it was performed by godly people, there is no way this can be taken as normal. Your reasons about marital problems are irrelvant – that could as likely be used as a motivation for divorce or even murder. And I always laugh a tad when folks tell me that “have” to have two wage earners “just to get by”. We enjoy the highest standard of living in the world, certainly in our history . . . yet with less money and less expectations preceding generations seemed to make it all work. All about expectations.
I am specifically focused on married women, although young women groomed for the workforce have an overwhelming motivation against giving that up to join and raise a family. Especially if they accumlated large debt in getting there.
But yes, I am against it, not that it much matters. Truth be told, the Lord has seen to it that troubles – expensive troubles – have multiplied in response to the thrusting of wives into the workforce. Just one child out of control costs far more than a working wife brings in. Let alone the extra expense from fancier clothes, extra car, fancier vacations, fancier houses . . . all because “I owe it to myself”. It is a lie that has been sold to us. AND less children are born. People are the hope for the future, the ideas and drive that drive the nation forward. Today the immigrants surge in . . . because we need them because we don’t have enough “people” for our society.
Dear Incredulous,
re: taxation and the mass exodus of the fairer sex from “the workforce.” Suppose we had a female version of Atlas Shrugged, and caesar had a financial crisis for all the lost tax revenue? Might that prove that the women were really working for caesar?
If caesar really needs a huge corps of female labor to balance his books, isn’t something wrong with caesar, or Christianity, or both?
Hoping caesar starves for lack of women to tax,
David K
I only agree with you inasmuch as a wife is also a mother, then I definitely agree with you. I disagree with you strongly, however, on your thought that it is a bad thing for a single woman to be strongly motivated against giving up employment for marriage. I would wish that EVERY single woman had this same motivation. It would definitely guard against the following scenario.
As related to me a year ago last summer as I sat face-to-face with one of the 3 persons in this scenario:
Pastor “Beard” (not his real name) ushered a new congregant into his office. This was the result of the 3rd invitation he had extended to “Buxley” (not his real name) in the 2 months since Buxley had begun attending the church every Sunday. This time, after a few preliminary remarks, “Debra” (not her real name) stepped into her dad’s office at hearing her name called. As instructed by her father, she had stayed out of sight, waiting for his call which would be her cue to come in. Now that she had seated herself in the chair that she’d previously been told to sit in, she delivered the line she had rehearsed, as directed: “Well Mr. Buxley, who’s that young lady I saw with you on Sunday?” Her reference was to the fact that Mr. Buxley had met a young woman in the lobby the last 2 Sundays and preceded to lead her to where he & his 11-year-old son had already been sitting. [Mr. Buxley had already told Pastor Beard that his divorce had been finalized 6 months prior to this meeting]. Both times, she had then been accompanied by Mr. Buxley out to her car in the parking lot following the service. Mr. Buxley passed-of the reference with the casual mention that this was “a gal I’ve been seeing for a few weeks.” As directed, Debra teased “So…… you’re interested in dating, Mr. Buxley?” Without giving him a chance to answer, Pastor Beard said “You know, church is great place to meet a nice young lady. My Debra here is 21 already & I’m very proud of here homemaking skills.” Mr. Buxley laughed & said something about that being a good thing, with Debra being the oldest of 14 kids (NONE adopted & 13 of them by Pastor Beard’s current wife). Pastor Beard laughed along with him. Debra stayed, awkwardly, as she’d been instructed to, although her 2 lines were already recited as prescribed. Mr. Buxley continued to see the original gal, however, so her dad made sure to call attention to Debra’s beauty & her age in a sermon to come. It seemed to help him along when Debra reported back to him that the gal he was seeing was 35 (she ferreted this out on order). Mr. Buxley was 46 years old at the time this happened July of a year ago. (But he looked no younger than 55). She, as we know, was 21. Twenty-one plus twenty-one is 42. This man was not only old enough to be her father, he was more than twice her age!!!! She had never yet been employed (& still has never been). She is not permitted to become employed. No doubt she is as excellent with her homemaking skills as ever, though!
This being told to me 1st hand left me wondering “Why?!? How can this be?!?!?” But, Moderator, your most recent moderation answers those questions for me.
Trying to dig through your story:
1) I am confused as to what employment outside the family has to do with this issue. Would Daddy be less inclined to try to line up his daughter with a – to him – good match if so? I see no cause and effect here.
2) If you are Bill Gothard, you immediately note that a divorced man should not be under consideration for any future match, other than with his former wife, or after her passing, assuming he outlives her. So Beard was out of line in dramatic fashion, rendering any seeming “good” aspect of the situation as a 2nd tier issue.
3) Personally, I fail to see any Scriptural or practical reason to look aghast at, let alone bar, a union involving that kind of age gap. Other than your cultural prejudices, can you think of anything objective? That was much more the norm in a day gone by . . . indeed, many saw great advantages in such an arrangement.
This is a totally sick story. She is 21 and a legal adult and should be allowed to make her own decisions which include marriage. The pastor father should not be arranging his own daughter to marry a divorced man twice her age. Like Alfred said, this man is divorced and the pastor shouldn’t be arranging a marriage to his oldest daughter who has no choice in this matter and being forced into it. What a sicko. Arranged marriages are not real marriages in my book and based on what State she lives in, I would bet she would have pretty good grounds not only for a divorce but for a legal annulment. This is not a marriage.
Because this is reasonable to you, or because we live in the US and those are the current laws? You do know that God’s ways are not our ways, and His thoughts not our thoughts. We have already discussed the strange case of Jacob, who stayed at home and did not pursue a wife until directed by his parents . . . at which point he was 70 years old. Highly commended in Scripture. So . . . it appears that the Lord’s opinions differ from what you articulated regarding what unmarried young people can and should do or not do.
For the record, I am NOT in favor either of the dance described by Incredulous . . . for multiple reasons. So it is not a great example to examine Biblical principles by.
Alfred,
women are not the property of men. The story as told by Incredulous is pretty sick, a 21 year old woman being set up for a divorced man twice her age. “God’s Way” is not arranged or forced marriages even if the OT records such situations. OT also records polygamy, endogamy and slavery. None of these situation recorded in OT means that any of them were “God’s way” no matter how you want to twist the Bible to support such things. I’ll stand by my statement that forced or arranged marriages are invalid marriages. One should not be forcing their children into them and even arranging them with the expectation that their children are expected to “submit” to them. One can even see that in the Duggar kids where at least in Jinger, she seemed to be genuinely in love as opposed to Jill and Jessa that were more arranged by Jim Bob. One can’t force a marriage any more than one can force their children into salvation. It needs to be a free and open choice by the person themselves.
And I will disagree 🙂 So . . . there you have it. Not that that would work terribly well in our current fluid society . . . it works quite well in cultures where families knew each other for centuries, watched everybody grow up.
And I have no idea where you get the idea that either Jill or Jessa were “arranged”, let alone that they were not in love. Got that wrong on both fronts. Daddy making a suggestion or an introduction is far from an “arranged marriage”. Jessa met Ben through homeschooling events, as I recall.
And . . . on forcing children into Salvation . . . Salvation is a command, from the Lord, no less than “Thou shalt not kill”. If parents can command their children to not kill or steal because God says so, they can most definitely command them to trust Christ, again because God says so:
“And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ” (1 John 3:23)
Obviously . . . they cannot keep that commandment without repenting . . . and genuinely trusting the Savior and His shed blood . . . but it remains, again, that salvation is non-optional for all of us, and children must be taught that with the same earnestness any other command of the Lord is given.
Twas true for Abraham, and the Lord commended him for that – Genesis 18:19 “For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him.”
In any case . . . you have no authority other than your own heart to make such pronouncements . . . about arranged marriages. As long as we are all clear on that, it is all good.
Dear Rob,
People as property? You betcha! Not in every sense, of course. But you and Mr. War are under oath to jointly own one another. You know, “to have and to hold.” So in some important sense you own a man and he owns you. But I prefer to lead, rather than own. I try to lead Mrs. K and our daughters in the course of leading my entire household.
In my house, my daughters’ love lives are my business. Only once have I had to shove my oar in for something negative. The elder daughter was being courted by a man who had sought my consent in advance. The day came when I had to withdraw my consent and insist that he stop seeing her. Talk about a high-risk situation! Fortunately my daughter was relieved because I spared her a painful break-up which she was contemplating anyway.
That leadership turned out well. But sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes a leader looks back, and no nobody is following.
FYI, I won’t be “arranging” any romances between my daughters and middle-aged divorced men. That sounds no less creepy to me than to you!
Happy Christ the King Sunday,
David K
It’s true. I am 100% certain that the person who told me what it was like to be in that crazy meeting has told me the truth. I dearly wish I was making up what happened there, not just attributing fake names to these people. I have re-verified my information at the source, however, & I am wrong in one aspect (just making sure I am being totally honest): Beard is the father of 13 of his 14 children, not the father of only one of them that his current wife bore to her 1st husband before he passed away. (I had incorrectly stated that Beard & his current wife had all but one of the 14 between the 2 of them). The current wife has borne 12 of the children because 2 of them were by Pastor Beard’s 1st wife before their divorce & his remarriage to the current wife & biological mother of 12. Also, interestingly, the 4 oldest are all girls. So that explains how there would have been enough help around the house if Beard’s attempt at pawning-off of Debra had been effectual.
(1) Moderator, I’m sure you have associates & colleagues, maybe even relatives who are the fathers of employed daughters. Why don’t you ask your peers when is the last time they tried to arrange a marriage for one of their daughters? Also, you clearly wish to find out if un-employment had any factor in Beard’s motivation and so following my comment here, I will click on the “contact us” tab above & provide you with the real names of all involved as well as the name of the church. Please only use these names for direct contact purposes, such as should you feel the need to talk directly to Beard about this. Please also know that, if black eyes or other physical marks appear on any of the parties, or any of them cease to appear at church as usual, or appear to be exceptionally subdued or dejected, this is being monitored & the police will be contacted with this information. I’m not kidding. I’m pretty sure you all over there know my real name. It’s the name on the checks I used to tithe to there. You may provide it to Beard as your source if you wish. I will not be checking up to see if you do or not, but if you should wish.
(2) Well now there’s another probable reason why Gothard never married. If he had, & became divorced, he would likely have had to stay that way. Very hard on his ministerial image to have such a status. So much more glossing of one’s image if “Married” is the box that can be checked-off! (Except where getting pandered-to by guys-and-daughters like Beard & co. is the main objective.) After all, people see marital status first about a person, long before they ever get to the under-lying reasons for it. (That he’s RE-married. And to a different spouse.) But, then again, it’s all about the 1st eight seconds, or so we’re told. Hence, (re)MARRIED is opted for in most cases where there’s opportunity to do so.
(3) The following is a hypothetical scenario, not a known happenstance:
Billy-Boy heeded his parents’ pointing out to him that he has aptitude for engineering. He went to college on their blessing. Newly graduated, he came home & promptly made out a resume & then applied all over the place for every engineer job he could find. He got some interviews, but no takers, in spite of having done 100% in aligning himself to this vocation. He began to think he should go down & work at the tire shop down the road, or become a waiter, clerk, or some such thing. Every time he headed in that direction, his father would become apoplectic, telling him he was losing sight of God’s highest purpose for his life. “You’re going to get in the habit of getting some measly $30,000 per year & so when an internship opportunity to an eventual $100,000 career opportunity opens up, you’ll be disinclined to it!!!” So, Billy Boy spend the prescribed 6 hours a day in search of one of these & spent the rest of it in agreement (& also great solitude) with his father that he was of the engineer class. The months went by. Perhaps it was his age now, in conjunction with no current or past employer listings, that rendered the calls for interviews fewer & fewer as the years went by. His father was getting up in years. All his friends fathers were, also, so he though to ask them one day: “How often does your dad set up meetings to introduce you to corporate gurus?” Bob, the bowling alley assistant manager, Chuck, the oil-changer, & Joe, the school janitor all looked at him strangely. “Never, dude!” They all finally said in unison. Before paying for Billy-Boy’s bill along with their own at the lunch counter. Billy-Boy reminded himself of how much better he was than any of them, and walked home to save them on gas, since they’d each offered him a ride. One stroke that Billy-Boy DIDN’T have against him getting the dream job was this: None of his prospective employers expected a portfolio of pictures to peruse through along with his resume. His age & lack of experience (unable to be chalked up to youth, now, due to his age) were only abstract detractions. Nobody analyzed his age on the concrete evidence of looks: “Gee, I know whoever has his cubicle across from mine is somebody I’ll have to look at, maybe even for as long as I supervise here!! I’m gonna make sure whoever that is is something worth having to look at every day.” Despite not undergoing this disadvantage, the day came when he overheard on the sidewalk outside one of the businesses where he was following-uo on his application: “Yeah I got the internship!! Oh yeah, I’ll be making it big time in a year, baby!” The speaker was a kid who looked no older than 20 but had to have been, since a 4-year degree like Billy-Boy had was a prerequisite stated in the ad.
Moderator, maybe, just perhaps, after reading about someone of your own gender experiencing something like this, you might want to explain on here to the imaginary Billy-Bob: Why it is more “advantageous” for the company AND the younger man who was interned by them that Billy-Bob be passed-over? We all know the reasons; the company has more of what they want, the fresher a candidate is. AND THE YOUNGER MAN DOESN’T WIND UP LIKE BILLY-BOY, is saved from a rotten life. Yet, because wife & mom is a woman’s highest calling, you claim that all women should do the Billy-Boy thing in favor of those who might get an eventual internship by holding-out like this. Yet you say here it’s better they be passed over. If such is the case, it’s better if Billy-Boy (single women) got a job. Period.
Thanks for your diligence to clear some things up. It is an interesting tale, and perhaps should be broken out as its own thread.
I know of a number of marriages that you would call “arranged” which have worked out quite well. Not too many of them involve parents as the “first cause” to bring the couple together. You may know Jonathan Lindvall – “Bold Christian Living”, “Dare to Shelter” – a friend, who was early in Bill’s orbit, more separated later. He took the ideas of “courtship” and went a step further, to “betrothal”, which is much more “arranged”. His own marriage was suggested by his father at a time when he was pursuing another prospect. Over many years it is still a great marriage. He has seen it work out for his kids, and others. It is not a model that I am personally espousing, but what do I know, none of my children are yet married. NOT interested in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” dating service:
Level of interest does not rise to this kind of involvement. We have enough to do chasing down things directly related to Bill. As I said, Bill would have opposed the situation you described without question, but for more narrow reasons, the divorce of the gentleman. I can also say – because I have heard him say it – that Bill is not a friend of “betrothal”. The reason given was the one I articulated, that it works only with closed societies, where all know the families going back for many generations. No surprises, in other words.
Anybody who is planning for a divorce is in trouble and should not be getting married. Bill never got married because he could not continue the crazy schedule that defines him. Unless you have seen it, you would not believe it . . . but he really does redeem every minute from his rising time around 4AM until close to midnight. Still does. 82 years old. Still wearing helpers out.
You get an “A” for creativity. If I am following your analogy . . . Billy-Boy was not CREATED to be an engineer. Because of this his father may be wrong to demand that he look only to that profession. [Of course, some professions ARE part of creation, like being a prince, but I digress] However women WERE specifically created to be “Help-Meets” for husbands. If they are not such, they still live and have happy lives . . . but, truth be told, the fact of them being A WOMAN is inexorably tied to . . . being a wife . . . of a husband. Feminist perspectives of fish and bicycles notwithstanding. The modern notion of women being completely happy outside of marriage is rooted in a hatred of the Lord and His design. As Bill points out, women were taken out of man, man being taken out of the earth. Men turn instinctively to the earth – hunting, fishing, farming, dirt bikes – and women turn instinctively toward men, toward family. It is not a command, it varies, and it can be overcome, but it remains a matter of design.
Well there are some people that take that into consideration, calling that what it is. Mostly I think of the “family man”, the churches who are faithful to hold women’s Bible studies, woman-to-woman discipleship, and men answering questions HONESTLY during dates. And then there are others who make the most of what you’ve above described, and for every pragmatic design they can think of in gratifying themselves. At the end of the day (or the months/years that they’ve thus capitalized on the truth) they decide it isn’t a real thing, after all. That kind of exploitation is not second-best. It is bottom-of-the-barrel pathetic. So, anytime there’s consideration of the “best” that marriage is, it should be duly noted that the 2nd best of “career” (college-produced) or the 3rd best of “job” are absolutely necessary as back-up plans. “Come now, you who say, today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage [ENGAGE?!?!?] in business and make a profit. Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow.” James 4:13, 14(a) What we know about what our life is like is from the past on up to today. In most all cases this involves having eaten fairly regularly, not having gone naked & never having spent a night out in the rain. There’s no reason to believe these needs will change and the only thing that can be counted on to do about them is only what can be done right now. (Not what can be planned on being done tomorrow). So, unless you’re Pastor Beard & get right down to the meeting he orchestrated (although that was likely a few days or even weeks in advance), it seems that the only way to take James’ advice is to get down to work. It is certainly the only way that an individual can be productive towards the prevention of the pathetic exploitation of the reality of marriage. Which, as I’ve said, is far, far below a woman’s being employed.
btw I have stood next to a person while Johnathan Lindvold came up to speak to them. I agree with him about burning the Barbie doll. I don’t agree with his attempt at humor in describing his exclaiming to his wife on their first date that her father had given him permission to marry her. She dropped her fork & exclaimed, “Do I have to?!?!?” That is MESSED-UP. Especially when you take into account how many kids she then HAD to bear to him. Also the signs he put up all around his kids at conferences that said not to ask them any questions seemed a little weird when I saw that. Other then that, maybe he’s just trying to get other males to man-up with his whole betrothal thing. One thing that family association cannot do is tell you enough about the individual. The most violent man I ever dated came from a great Christian family whom I was better acquainted with than all my other boyfriend’s families put together. So I don’t know. I would rather see that he’s taking all his daughters to karate.
There are lots of ideals that come up short in real life. So my intent is not to somehow demand that women never work, have careers. Wrong focus. Rather, it is, I believe, very Scriptural, God honoring to seek a life where our women never have to work outside of the home. That still allows for exceptions that we would all acknowledge have the Lord’s blessing. What this isn’t, though, is the current scenario where the working woman – wife, daughter – is the norm, if not even virtually commanded as the only responsible position to take. And I remain of the opinion that the change in our culture to remove the honor of the Biblically traditional role of the woman, so propelling almost all into the workforce, is one of the most consequentially damaging paradigm shifts our church/Christian society has seen.
Knowing them – OK, him – as I do, I can see the humor in it, as it sounds like she saw as well. They have a great relationship, from all I have seen. As to number of kids to bear, you assume that was not her desire. I have understood the exact opposite. If you have information to the contrary, pass it on. Everyone assumes that I commanded my wife to bear me many children, whereupon she obediently suffered to fulfill my expectations. Reality is, there was no childbearing plan to start between us . . . and when she lost confidence after the first 3 came so quickly, I committed to her that we would have no more until she clearly said she had the peace and faith. It was hers to call, and remained so until the end (11 kids later). Our prejudices compel us to conclusions that are often mistaken.
Dear Incredulous,
I am sorry to hear about the violent man from the Christian family. That’s the scenario which Christian fathers dread. We try to do everything right, then an outlier slips in under the radar.
But too bad you couldn’t introduce him to Rob. She sounds pretty fierce sometimes.
Peace,
David K
I have some things to say to you.
I say that, generally, an employed MOTHER is a scenario that society as a whole should strive to avoid. I think God’s blessing acknowledges the wisdom of this. However I certainly do not agree this applies to “wives” in general, as you’ve said, & I most adamantly argue against this applying to daughters. (“Daughters” defined as non-wives/non-mothers). Please re-refer to the link I re-post below:
illbehonest.com/patriarchy-vs-single-women-in-the-bible
If a husband whose wife isn’t raising any kids of theirs nonetheless needs her home all day while he’s at work then he has got some serious dysfunction. I can picture the Do-list now: Squeeze my toothpaste. Put a slice of lemon in the dog’s water. Water down the driveway. Iron my jeans. Chew gum & stuff it down
the yard’s mole-holes. Audit the toilet paper (making sure it’s all over-under, or under-over; whichever is “right”.) Video-tape the neighbors throwing their dog-doo across the fence. Price small-claims court filing. Price lawyers. Shovel-up poop. Save in an ‘evidence’ container. But not on the dresser. Post photo-shopped pictures & clever sound-bites on all my social media channels. Run feasibility study on running for public office. Tell your mother we’re both dead (so she stops calling). Poison the neighbor’s cats (they keep leaving paw-prints on my car. That you don’t always wash off before I leave in the morning.) Fish around for sponsors for my next golf tournament. Get liposuction (to make your presence there really worth it’s while). Roll fresh cigars. Make sure beer’s forefront in ‘frige. Better yet, run & open one to hand to me as soon as I come through the door. Imagine The Rest Of This List From Here. The End.
It is in outrageous denial of all the responsibility a mom carries out to set the same hours for every woman that good mothering requires. It implies that mothers are abdicating their role of wife by being mothers. Whereas the Bible says they are fulfilling a wife’s highest calling to submissive servant-hood by being mothers. Which is not a passive role; it is leadership over subordinate(s). If a wife is expected to simulate the type of responsibility that motherhood carries without actively mothering, then the closest she could come is by being a corporate project manager, or policewoman, or executive chef, or 911 operator, or some other capacity where people look to her for EVERYTHING. Such responsibility is, more often than not, a DUAL component TO a wife’s modeling of submission to her husband; not in conflict AGAINST it. And a woman’s submissiveness to her (potential) husband’s authority -bespoken by wife/motherhood being womanhood’s highest calling- is a capacity much better readied by daughters being employed. Daughters are not *domestic engineers* in the home, we would be the employees of the *domestic engineer*, should that be where we spend our days. Employees training for a hopeful position of *domestic engineer* in an invisible house headed by an abstract-concept of a husband who is likewise non-materialized. Very few bosses let their employees supply their contributions to the company all from an off-site location. A stay-at-home daughter is being better trained to live on completely out of relevance to an apparition (husband/kids) that her life is thus ordered in reference to. Specifications for executing wife-ing/mothering require a specialist. *Domestic engineering* is not an ideal job for an employee that can only perform repetitive tasks only amongst the same handful of people. Especially when it admittedly cannot ever become the correct setting or the unique people for which the effort is really intended (hypothetically intended). We daughters whom have been in contact with our mothers while growing up recognize that our nurturing output as single women is nothing compared to their’s. It’s squandering that example unless we are to try to measure up to this output as it was represented to us. Which, for the single woman, means full-time employment or full-time ministry. This is the only comparison that measures up; however genuine your attempts to lift up daughters by equating daughterhood with a mother-lode of responsibility, all you’re really doing is detracting from it. It’s unfortunate that anyone would make motherhood out to be less than it is on the assumption that general female capability is less than it is. I guess us single women who don’t care for motherly honor being sponged to mete some to our account are just going to have to go out & work harder. Thank the Lord, we have the right (& are only right) to use the freedom & grace He’s granted to do so, & to do it well. May it never be said of us: “We build fences to keep ourselves from committing certain sins. Soon these fences- instead of the sins they were designed to guard against- become the issue. We elevate our rules to the level of God’s commandments.” ~Jerry Bridges
There is only one other way of humanly measuring a person’s submissiveness besides gauging their productivity: Subjection to harm as an end unto itself (as opposed to suffering for the sake of productivity). Which would be utterly sick. Suffering harm that’s meted-out by so-called Christians is no substitute for productivity. Not in the economy of God’s kingdom, anyway, which is also mankind’s dominion here on earth.
In Response To Your Next Point:
I mentioned the many kids as concrete evidence of the fact that marriage impacts a woman to the core of her being, consuming & culminating everything she has/is. Even if a wife has zero kids, the rest of her life (including her eternal rewards) is heavily determined by whom she married. John 10 has Jesus defining His followers as not listening to the voice of strangers. Submissiveness is whatever listening to a particular person entails. For a wife, this is a life sentence of heeding & deeding someone else’s will, &, at times, one which is not always in line with Jesus’ will. (Not to say that a woman under no one’s will but her own always obeys God). But, the voice of her will is what GOD gave her at birth. A husband’s coming into position to override her in this is a HUMAN DECISION that he do so. All successive leadership she then has is secondarily-human in derivation from Christ’s direct headship of her husband. This is a severe concession that a bride makes. Even the PERFECTLY RIGHT Man that Jesus is did not command anyone to believe on Him & be saved devoid of any appeal to reason. “Come, let us reason together, saith the Lord; though your sins be as scarlet they shall be whiter than snow” (Isaiah somewhere). And, REASONABLE service to render all of ourselves unto Him (Romans 12). Johnathan Lindvold is not better than Jesus. Therefore, I don’t see how he stills sees an *out* for himself in the matter of his lack of a decent appeal to his wife that she become such. Jesus treated (& still treats) His bride as though she has much more autonomy than that kind of over-simplification derides. And I certainly understand why it can only be assumed that his wife is okay with both this & his having made a romance-conduct-instruction ministry in which that story plays a prominent part. No one outside the walls of her home will ever know what she really thinks about that. In my life-group, there are 5 married couples. Any one individual of these couples could call up another & clarify this question in a minute or 2 of conversation. No one would bat an eye. Seriously.
Next Issue:
The attitude of respect you have maintained toward your wife totally counts against violence, the barking of orders, & all-around piggishness. And that’s saying a lot in this day & age. But it says no more than that. That it’s supposedly the choice of the wife to have most every one of her & her husband’s kids sounds pretty phony to me. Especially if she doesn’t have her own room with her own bed in it, adult communication outlets (& time to utilize them) apart from him interacting with her………… & a sense of decision-making-confidence along with the freedom to exercise this. God’s role of headship for husbands secures such a fellow enough play to be in the driver’s seat without him ever needing to resort to acting like a pig. I am glad to hear you are not a pig in addition to being the man of the house. And I believe you in that. However, what you’ve said about ANY wife having autonomy in such matter as family size really isn’t saying much. Would you buy it if some young lady was shacking up with a guy & claiming: “It’s okay because he respects my body & I’m keeping him from having it.” Yeah, I didn’t think you’d buy that; no one would.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Not much to complain about, some real good advice in there. Only comment: IF a wife sees herself as employed by her husband to “run the estate”, and she has no children to be encumbered by, THAT is where all of that creativity manifested by the Proverbs 31 woman comes into play. There are a ton of ways to enhance the family budget where she remains the COO of the home. AND a lot of that financial impact is tax free. AND then she is also free to invest in others in ministry, be they young or old. The picture you painted is completely devoid of creativity.
Happy Thanksgiving to you as well!
The notion that women cannot work outside of the home is actually not supported in scripture. The Proverbs 31 woman was her own business woman. Women did manual labor (see Ruth, 1 Sam. 8:13. Exodus 35:25). Likewise the Gospels record the Jesus and the apostles were supported a group of women, listing them more than once not just making meals for them but also including financial support, which didn’t appear to be monies from their husbands. the 1950s mode of the stay at home housewife has only been twisted in recent years by evangelicals to be the “Godly” standard. But one cannot truly support that at all by examples given in both OT and NT times. Women are portrayed many times in leadership roles in books like Judges. St. Paul worked with different women like Lydia, a seller of purple clothes. Priscilla and Aquila worked together with St. Paul as well. The notion that women can’t earn their own money or need to always depend on a husband is really a set up of dependency. There is no support for these notions except for the few lines from St. Paul which have been twisted to support the 1950s housewife model. St. Paul obviously did work alongside women.
Proverbs 31 lady was running HER OWN ESTATE, while she managed several additional family ventures she started. This is ANYTHING but a woman becoming the servant – slave – of another man.
Not even remotely! I can think of one (1) Judge, Deborah . . . and she went out of her way to find a man to execute the work God had commanded. Hulda (means “mole”, no idea how you come to that baby name 🙂 ) was a prophetess sought after by the men in charge . . . and beyond that, what do you see? This is how the Lord felt about women being put in charge, which He clearly did from time to time:
“As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them . . . ” (Isaiah 3:12)
Rob! St. Paul said:
“Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety.” (2 Timothy 2:11-15)
Most interesting is that the word translated “through” as in “saved THROUGH childbearing” is the Greek “dia”, which is properly, “by means of” . . . NOT saved from trouble in childbirth. The latter is a goofy translation because we all know godly women who have died in childbirth, and total wretches that have born many children. So . . . Paul suggests that the bearing of children SAVES a woman. From what? From all the evil that has beset the modern women’s movement . . . self-sufficiency and pride. And echo of this intent, by St. Paul, is found here:
“And withal they learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house; and not only idle, but tattlers also and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not. I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully. For some are already turned aside after Satan.” (1 Timothy 5:13-15)
Whatever Paul’s relationship with Lydia, Seller of Purple, it was NOT an expression of an intent to signal to Christians that the “working woman” with no husband and few or no children is to be considered equal or preferable to traditional roles.
Now, it may quickly be said that Paul – 1 Cor. 7 – affirmed the blessing of staying single, that that being specifically for the purpose of full time ministry. In the absence of that intent, he says: “Let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.” (vs. 2)
The day will come . . . I thought it had done so already, if not, it will be here soon – when we will not be able to speak freely about what the Bible SAYS . . . because it so offends the modern heart that has believed the lie of the Garden and declared itself . . . equal to God, let alone any other human being, determined to be in subjection to or need . . . no one.
“The modern notion of women being completely happy outside of marriage is rooted in a hatred of the Lord and His design.”
No, Alfred, it’s not. And it’s particularly bold of you to speak on the Lord’s behalf about it.
What do you make of this?
“To the woman he said, I will greatly increase thy travail and thy pregnancy; with pain thou shalt bear children; and to thy husband shall be thy desire, and he shall rule over thee.” (Genesis 3:16)
Now we are not so much into “PC”, so we can actually objectively consider what Scripture says. “To thy husband shall be thy desire” is a part of the constraint placed on the woman. That is the same phraseology speaking of the craving of “sin” lying at Cain’s door later on, the one he must “rule over”. In any case, this word “desire” is the Hebrew “suqa”, which means “stretching our after; a longing; – desire. Desire, longing, craving”. This is most definitely a desire that needs satisfying, and the constraint placed by the Lord in the Garden was . . . that she would long after her husband as a source of happiness.
This is built into the human heart, things we know instinctively. Known in every culture, because God has written His law into our hearts . . .
“For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves; Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another . . . ” (Romans 2:14-15)
So . . . when we, in our modern culture, suddenly declare that “a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle”, that is an act of rebellion of what is KNOWN in the heart. A tiny fist waving in God’s face,
“It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.”
Tell me that is not the attitude of the modern women’s movement. This is completely in line with God’s Word.
Good point, brother. I had to look up the poem. It was artistic to combine it with Gloria Steinem.
David K
The poem can be applied to men and women not just the modern feminist movement. Genesis 3:16-19 describes the results of the fall on relationship between men and women (men “ruling” over women), child birth pains and the toil of work. Ruling over women should not be seen or interpreted as it is too often as the way God meant men and women to relate to one another but should be seen as more of a result of the fall and a curse. I’ve read in some Protestant commentaries that there is thinking that Adam watched Eve and the exchange with the serpent and did not step in to save her or prevent her and advocated his responsibility to project her or even defend her. Now there is conflict between men and women where before there was harmony and peace. The TGC and the patriarchy movement has twisted these verses to mean that men ruling over women was God’s plan. No, not so fast, it was a result of the fall. But the key in Genesis 3 is the 3:15 when God is addressing the serpent and out of this big mess, promises through the seed of a woman, he that will crush the serpents head. This is the only time “seed of a woman” is used and it refers to the virgin birth and a coming savior that will crush the serpents head.
How do you relate this as “sin” to statements like this? “Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands. . . . For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands: Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters ye are, as long as ye do well, and are not afraid with any amazement.” (1 Peter 3:1-6) That SOUNDS like a wife having trouble submitting to her husband – ruling over her (can hardly blame her) – and being afraid with “amazement”. But grace takes over, and she can do it with joy and power, so winning the sometimes louse with her attitude. Sin is something we do not do . . . here it is something that is commanded and planned for.
I reread I Peter in it’s entirety again and compared that with Genesis 3. I think you are falling into the common trap of proof texting the Bible. I Peter if read in it’s entirety is a pastoral letter from St. Peter to Christians about what to do when facing and in hostile and dire situations. He focuses through-out 1 Peter on having a Christian response of returning good for evil and put that in a number of situations that the early Christians were facing at the time. In chapter 2, right before chapter 3, St. Peter addresses slaves and how to handle abusive owners, Then in chapter 3, St. Peter talks to wives which in that time were a little above slaves in society status. The point of the whole book was when facing hostile dire situations as well as persecution, is to behave in exemplary manner and responses. St. Peter never said that women would face abusive situations if they didn’t “submit” but that God would be with them, their behaviors might win over their husbands and the warnings by St. Peter were to abusive husbands, not un-submissive wives. He ends that thought with verse 8-12 of being of “one mind, sympathetic, loving toward one another, compassionate, humble”… I think that applies to men as well as women. St. Peter then goes on in Verse 13 to talk about suffering and how to behave when facing suffering and dire situations. Genesis 3 isn’t talking at all about suffering people may face and how to behave but about the consequences that the rest of humanity has faced which is pain in child birth, the toil of work, when we die, we return to dust and men “ruling over women” while women desire men. It is nothing about “God’s” order but the fruit of Adam’s and Eve’s sin. I Peter is again a pastoral letter giving advice to Christians in bad situations which included women in bad marriages. St. Peter isn’t justifying abuse to slaves or wives. St. Peter isn’t saying either that abusive situations were due to slaves or women being “unsubmissive” to either owners or husbands. Both slaves and women had not rights, no ability to leave, no status in society. St. Peter was offering a help line to Christians in bad entrapped situations. The cut and paste proof texting takes different verses out of context in order to try and prove bad ideas and justify bad behaviors. I think husbands would do better to look at the warnings St. Peter gave about “unanswered prayers” than focussing on telling their wives that they are king and the little woman needs to submit.
Women leaving their husbands is no more allowed or blessed by the Lord in this day and age than it was then. God can spring both slave and wife from a bad situation as easily as He created the world. The fact that He never talked about that, but rather how to bloom under the circumstance should tell us something. AND . . . it is goofy to suggest that this is designed just for abusive situations. Read what it says:
“But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price. For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands: Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters ye are, as long as ye do well, and are not afraid with any amazement.” (1 Peter 3:4-6)
So . . . unless Sarah was in an abusive home with a cruel husband . . . that just can’t explain it.
I think St. Peter used Sarah as an example was not do to Abraham being abusive to her at all. Sarah certainly was not a milk toast type of woman as recorded in Genesis. She certainly had her own ideas and thoughts and opinions and seemed to express them to Abraham. Some like giving Hagar to Abraham not so good but to send away Ishmael, God told Abraham to “listen” to her and do it. Even with her own ideas and opinion and probably personality, she seemed to have served Abraham. In Genesis 18, she dropped whatever she was doing to make food for the guests that Abraham invited in (not knowing they really were angels). In Genesis 20, she went along with Abraham’s idea to present her as just a sister to King Abimelech who then took her to marry her as part of his harem. Now whether she actually agreed with this or not and yielded to Abraham’s idea isn’t exactly clear and maybe she trusted that God was going to work all of this out on her behalf which God did do in speaking to King Abimelech in a dream. I think her example of service to Abraham and even trust in God when Abraham made choices that actually put her in a precarious situation is probably why St. Peter used her a model for women. It wasn’t because Sarah was a meek mild woman because it’s kinda obvious she wasn’t and expressed herself to Abraham in a number of things. It was her quite trust in God while yielding to Abraham is what St. Peter wanted us to note.
Agreed. My point is that 1 Peter 3 – that powerful Scripture that women have grappled with for millennia – uses Sarah as the go-to example of how this – which Peter is discussing – works. So, as you state, there are no milktoast wives here, rather powerful individuals. They, however, like Sarah see the need to operate that power from the position that God has ordained, officially “under authority”, even to the point of reverentially calling her husband “Lord” – “master” elsewhere, for a slave addressing his boss. That is hard to spin.
I think I Peter has a number of challenges for both MEN and women. The over all challenge he talked about in I Peter was about returning good for evil, loving one’s enemies, winning others over by charitable behavior etc. All of that is not easy to do for anyone. He talking about praying for kings etc. Please note that his king was Nero who had St. Peter crucified upside down. Again, very challenging stuff.
I have another thought about Sarah. I went to some Orthodox Jewish web sites in order to get their understanding of her and their view is that Sarah, Rebecca, Leah and Rachel are considered the four matriarchs of Israel along with Abraham, Issac and Jacob. Sarah is held in very high regard, seen as even a prophetess not just renowned for her beauty but good works. The different comments all mentioned that these 4 were strong women, their own persons and were just as important as the men. I think St. Peter mentioned Sarah to his Jewish audience out of the high regard Sarah has in Jewish thought. It makes sense. They also mentioned and it always had been a curiosity is that the half-sister comment to Abraham was do to the fact that she is really Abraham’s niece and a sister of Lot which is why Lot did travel with them. Grand-daughter status was considered a daughter of someone. Lot who is a nephew was also called brother. An finally, there is thinking that when Abraham went to offer Issac as a sacrifice, this stressed Sarah out so much that she passed away in the next chapter in Genesis at 127. All this gives a more complete picture of these key Genesis characters.
I am obviously emphasizing parts of this account that I would normally not . . . because of many of the reasons given . . . God’s commands to men, if understood and obeyed, are at least as tough if not tougher, and not followed much either. AND that, truth be told, women are expected to be powerful and even outshine their men. But the evil heart of man – and woman – does not like to be restrained, yield rights, give in to others who think they are more important. The whole thrust of society’s advice is “Be Yourself”, “Stand up for Yourself”, “Me first” . . . “Don’t let anyone put you down” . . . “Never bow to anyone”. All bad advice . . . the “me” that I am asked to “be” is “desperately wicked” . . . “Let each esteem the other better than himself” . . . “Meek and Lowly in heart” . . . and we are to serve, like a slave, EVERYBODY ( in decreasing order of importance as they are removed from us). So those kinds of Declarations of Independence come not from the Lord, but from the original rebel, Satan.
Well if sin crouching in desire for Cain is the same thing as a woman desiring after her husband, are you saying that the sin crouching for Cain was obedient to God in desiring to have Cain, & therefore wasn’t really sin? Because it sure doesn’t seem like you’re saying that desiring after one’s husband is anything to be discouraged, even in your comparison of it to sin itself. Maybe the Bible’s phrasing these both the same has to do with BOTH of these desires needing to be mastered by the one being tempted by them? [Hint, hint!!!!!] Or, do you rather say that Cain also was submitting to God’s will in letting sinful desire consume him, by which he murdered his brother?
btw in case you didn’t notice I’m with Sandy & Rob on this.
Also a shout-out to Brother David K. for getting a lousy court-er away from his eldest daughter. Saved her from hearing the inevitable sob-story spun by said lousy court-er so as to mess with her mind to convince her to keep him. No doubt the father of the secretary whom Steve Gothard tried to marry showed similar scruples in denying him this opportunity.
Notice the parallelism:
“thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” (Genesis 3:16)
“And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.” (Genesis 4:7)
The analogy of the husband ruling over his desiring wife is the same as Cain ruling over desiring sin. Sin is evil, and so the desire is evil . . . Eve is not “evil” in that sense, and her desire is not evil . . . but the one ruling, managing it is NOT Eve . . . but Adam.
Thanks for the shout-out, sister. A little affirmation goes a long way.
As Aslan says, we are never told what “would have happened.” My daughter’s romance may have turned out fine. But the poor fellow was very indignant that I intervened. He had some fair objections to how I handled things, but he finally left town when I held firm.
Oddly, my eldest son and I agreed that the suitor was entirely too much like us at our worst. So now my daughter has been spared the worst version of her brother and me. We hope that’s a good thing and and that better fortunes lie in her future. Meanwhile, we can devote ourselves to love and enjoyment of Advent, right?
Peace and love,
David K
Though I’m not too familiar with the Steve Gothard story, I hope that one ended well too.
Your brother,
David K
From all accounts, even those directly affected by the scandal . . . the answer appeared to be ‘Yes, it ended well’.
Alfred,
“ended well”? are you kidding me? Whose account are you taking in there? Bill’s side of the story? The problems were shoved under the carpet. I’m sure Larne would have a thing or two to say about this.
Actually Larne is, in fact, the primary source for that statement. It was his opinion that for Steve’s part, he appears to have been recovered, recovered himself in the fear of the Lord and has lived a quiet and righteous life for decades since the devastation of the scandal and subsequently dropping out of sight. No, Bill has not weighed in on this specifically.
And what about the girls involved? Is the only concern is that it ended well for Steve? Women don’t count? The term “ending well” makes it sound like all the issues are no big deal because it ended well. Not a good choice of words.
I see your point. Since he mentioned the “Steve Gothard story”, I was focusing only on the part that related to him. And, truth be told, I was only left with impressions from public comments Larne has made.
Yes, Larne did publicly indicate that Steve Gothard now lives and has for a while a quite repentant life, not in the public eye and not in another ministry of some sort. I think that speaks to the power of repentance and forgiveness from God that is open to all. I also think Larne has indicated that the others that were involved have likewise ended up in the same way, living quite lives of faith where ever they are living now.
Okay, we can consider the Steve Gothard scandal outcome settled by three hearsay witnesses; namely Alfred, Rob, and Larne. Steve repented, the women forgave, and everyone landed safely in a peaceful future more than three decades later. That sounds like ending well to me.
Rob’s summary sounds very positive.
A holy Advent to all,
David K
I don’t think Larne is a hearsay witness. He was very involved being the pilot as well as marrying Ruth who was Bill’s personal secretary during that time.
So Cain could have instead maintained his innocence from sin and also earned some brownie-points toward curse-management by going home to beat his wife in place of having risen up against his brother. But no one could have told him that at the time; it’s taken awhile for what God said to be re-interpreted through the lens of human prejudice. You might want to get your stories straight. There are 2 of them affording the comparison. And just look at what you say about the girls. You’ve said they’re disrespectful to rebel against mere grandfatherly treatment that they were supposedly lucky to get. Yet they WERE living in stringent obedience to some of the strictest-in-the-world ruling-over by the male authorities in their lives and their doing of their submissive part did not prevent SIN from being committed against them. As a matter of fact, this is the means by which what was enacted against them took full advantage. There certainly was no let-up of the ruling-over each girl in any of these scenarios!!! Yet…….. (but this was awhile ago) you said these should have no way of speaking up in the manner in which they have. Saying that you’d paddle the bottoms of any daughter of your’s who even would speak of such happenings. It seems that ruling over women- & all the more so- is the catch-all solution to everything. That Eve-curse passage is NOT the only thing that the Bible says!!!!! There’s that other story, too, ya know. Just maybe that Cain situation has repetition in more than one Gothard brother’s life?!? I think that what is supposed to happen is banishment away from civilization in such a case. Ruling ever more over girls/women certainly has not solved the problem. It only made it worse. Eve certainly represents all women. But Cain also certainly represents some men, Moderator. So far, beating-down some daughters of Eve has hardly been any decent substitute for effectively dealing with a Cain. I bet that no women- not Eve nor any of her 1st generation daughters- got the smack-down for what the original Cain did. Abel didn’t get the blame, either; his “BLOOD STILL SPEAKS”; therefore innocence & speaking-up must somehow go hand-in-hand. So, these girls have every right to be heard based on their own status alone. In addition to this there’s also the factor of principle: ruling over females is not rightful work for the Cains of the world. (Duh, b-a-n-i-s-h-e-d!) And coming under a Cain to be ruled certainly isn’t a viable option for any daughter of Eve, let alone for a daughter & sister of God. You’re being stood-up-to on this, because it has been realized that God provides the “out” option regarding the pressures of this lifestyle, even though escape means a whole different life to have to condition to. The Gothard girls finally became free. Only then could they finally determine for themselves that where they were taken to (IBLP) & what was done to them there was unbiblical & harmful.
So….. please learn to tell the difference between rule over Eve & civil dealing with Cain.
You have a habit of putting words in my mouth. The thing that is disrespectful is loving and caring for Bill for 20 years, getting married . . . having kids . . . living normal lives . . . and THEN, within days if not split seconds of coming into contact with RG . . . THEN “rebelling”. That feels less like ‘abuse’ . . . and more like politics.
You forgot all of the stringent obedience to some of the strictest female authorities as well. Equal opportunity.
Don’t recall saying that . . . or thinking that. In fact, we are in favor of really loud “speaking up”. But . . . not 20 years after the fact, claiming to suddenly discover the damage they had never seen, just in time to join a significant lawsuit.
Now that is getting offensive. Please dredge up the quote, if you would.
What difference does it make if a misdemeanor call is initially made by a person it’s done to versus their admitting it’s occurrence only when asked? It is what it is. There is so much humiliation felt by victims of sexual harassment, or molestation, or battery even if they are unaware of what it is called the eyes of the law. There is also an objective reality concerning what is & what is not sexually appropriate that transcends ALL (jury, too) human perception of whatever took place. (“In the sight of God”.) But your point rests soley on the girls’ perceptions of events, rather than on the objective standards that has typified many a like occurrence, so…………… why do you yet undermine these perceptions??? What they say or don’t say is supposedly your only indication of what happened. So one might think to accept what they’ve said. The fact that you claim it as invalid seems to lend even more gravity to things as they are. What they say DOES carry weight; hence you would that they be silent- silent about incidences that are very morally heavy. On your end it may well be: “May a weight rendered of expected silence match the weight of the offense”. And myself & probably a lot of other people out here likely see that this in converse is just as true: “May a weight rendered for the offense match the weight of the expectation of silence.”
Also, if a girl/woman is too arrogantly self-reliant to muster it up to ever earning her own living………… how on earth could she ever “bring a charge against God’s elect?” The Answer: Not until she can finally come to terms with the fact that the pervert is not God’s elect, after all, in spite of what many hold him up as being. In case this isn’t adding up in your mind: what this amounts to is a lawsuit now………. & no sooner than now. A spirit of independence (versus DEpendence!) & assertion to this end on the part of women is evil, you know; hence, the suit didn’t happen before because it couldn’t happen before. Especially with the work of trying to survive in the world as a post-Gothardite!!!! Talk about employed mothers being overwhelmed; how about what the past 20 years has had in store for these girls!!! Seeing how it’s happened this way is not rocket science, Moderator; it’s merely common sense. Look at what you say: that they’re wrong to be doing this even in spite of WHY it’s only being done now. You help make their case.
Have looked for the “paddle their bottoms” quote, I thought it was in Shepherd of the Hills but apparently it’s elsewhere. I will look through more to find it. You better have not deleted it. Then again, perhaps this would be best.
It matters a lot to the accused . . . who would like justice as well. The reason for “Statutes of Limitations” is that the likelihood of accurate recall, let alone access to witnesses, evidence diminishes dramatically with each passing year. And as has been often pointed out here, if someone of Gary Smalley’s character could bungle up a recollection of “The Cabin Story” so dramatically 30 years hence, as testified by his own wife and acknowledged by himself before multiple witnesses, what hope is there for anyone? It is just not fair, truth be told. And the likelihood of creative recall coming into play – remembering things that fit the desired narrative – goes way up in the presence of large amounts of money to be gained.
Add to that the obvious lack of concern displayed by a majority of the plaintiffs up to literally the point where RG came into play, as witnessed by loving and joyous letters sent to Bill by the very same women, and you have things that, well, feel more consistent with a political action than a grieved, abused victim. Every one – all 14 – of the plaintiffs have now officially declared themselves victims of a psychological condition that left them unable to recall facts until recently, or unable to appreciate the abuse . . . until 20 years later. That, again, is more consistent with a group of lawyers seeking a thread of legal foundation on which to get to a jury trial, where they can apply all of their skills in manipulating juries, rather than a true case of a damaged mind. In fact, there is no other reasonable explanation. Our cry to the Lord is that the judge will recognize and judge it for what it is.
Not a chance 🙂 I never made such a quote, because . . . I don’t think like that.
At least one of the girls (I think more than one but am specifically thinking of a Chicago Magazine article) said that in reading one other girl’s account “it was like a dam broke” & she was absolved in grief over HER OWN experience. That doesn’t happen unless there’s something to grieve over that’s still seriously raw even after time has passed.
Also I myself have shared that myself & some other ladies underwent sexual misdemeanors that we were each accosted with. In calling the cops years afterward, the officers’ questions & honest answers led them to say that prompt arrival at the precinct was in order. And “misdemeanor” is what at least one report was classified as. Even though a few of us (myself included) resorted to aggressive physical defense, many did not, opting instead for avoidance/escape tactics such as practiced by the plaintiffs & others who have shared their testimonies on RG. Regarding the pervert I speak of, NONE of the 26 of us concluded our attacker’s misdemeanors against us by verbal objection. I, for one, was utterly speechless after I initially yelled “What are you doing?!?!?” As a matter of fact, he had scared & intimidated me so badly in the attack that, in the immediate aftermath, as he gushed on & on about how he had turned me into a fine young woman by all his “life-coaching” because I was “just like a daughter” to him & we were all like a family, yada-yada-yada, I consciously AGREED with everything he said. I knew he was spouting hogwash, but that’s how scared I was. In the next 2 times I saw him, he made a point of coming up to me in referring to “you know what happened back there” & blaming me for my dress & that “God has mercy on loose women”- all to pin it on me. Which my previous indoctrination in the Umbrella, “no rights”, “bitterness”, & “give only a good report” doctrines had already done. (These 4 are all IBLP dogmas). So, I kept associating with my friends on a weekly basis even though we were all under his ultimate headship. When one such friend started getting “discipled” for quite a few hours per week by someone else who couldn’t keep any job, had divorced their spouse -To Marry Their First Cousin!- & had been diagnosed by a doctor as having schizophrenia, I became so concerned that I told this guy: “Why don’t you get discipled by the ‘life-coach’ [a.k.a., the pervert] He’s trustworthy.” I meant, ‘MORE trustworthy’ but didn’t want to deflect negatively on the previous mentor my friend had in case that presented a wall. It wasn’t long before I began to see daylight about the fact that my friend was better off with what councilor he already had. I also NEVER would have suggested such a thing if my friend had been female instead of male!!!! So, when I confronted the pervert 2 & a half years after he attacked me, he at one point said to me in front of 2 pastors & another representative they had there: “You told __________ last summer that he should come council with me. You told him I was trustworthy.” The pastors turned from him to just stare at me with raised eyebrows, asking me: “Did you say that?” He had effectively manipulated them with this one statement. Also there were the cards. I had signed all the pervert’s birthday & anniversary cards post-attack just as I had prior-to. I had even MADE a thank-you card out of poster-board for the guys who had cooked dinner for all us ladies at the pervert’s bidding. I had designed it like a flow-chart with the pervert’s name at the top part of the triangle. I used words like “super” & “terrific” & “GENTLEMEN”- yes, g-e-n-t-l-e-m-e-n to describe them all, inclusively. Not to mention I kept quiet for over 2 years about the shame of what “I” had somehow caused to happen. I went months without remembering. When I occasionally did, I became so anxious & ill I could barely function. Unbeknownst to me, at the point in time that God would not even let me sleep until I made known what had been done to me, the pervert accosted another girl in front of over a dozen people. I was later told that what he did was exactly what “Rachel” in the RG accounts described Bill Gothard doing to her in the car when he grabbed her long hair in both hands & yanked her head backwards. Our Perv. said nothing about “I love your hair” but nonetheless several people shouted “What are you doing??”, & “What are you doing to her?” & one girl broke the silence that lasted over a minute afterwards with the observation: “Perv, that was very inappropriate.” (No one in the room was younger than 26 & many were in their mid-30’s. Hence, the boldness.) So, at this same time God is giving me insomnia without my even knowing what has just happened to this girl. At the confrontation, one of the pastors opened it up by saying to the Perv. “Perv., Incredulous here has called this meeting to address an incidence of inappropriate touching.” And you know what the Perv. said? He said: “Oh, you mean about ______________.” [Though I had not been among those present when he had accosted ___________.] And went on to gush about he & ___________ had a relationship that was like daughter/father. I was stunned to hear another name mentioned, & so were the pastors along with their representative they had brought in. Even so, the pervert was able to manipulate them all with the fact that I had showed appreciation over the years for what I had come to believe the pervert had done for me as well as what I believed he meant to me, him supposedly being a Christian person. That meeting to confront him was one of the worst ideas I’ve ever had. It ushered in bullying via the Umbrella dogma that you would not believe. Or then again, maybe you could/should. The amount of sin that only one of those pastors & the pervert [the other pastor was/is godly & good] that the Perv. started against me in that meeting racked-up to be more than I would ever want to reckon with at the White Throne. Moderator, your cohorts are LUCKY that only 2 confrontations by any victim of Bill Gothard for specific incidences of his inappropriate touching seem to have occurred. Because it’s those being confronted, & not the confronters, that really seem to make a bad situation worse. As was in the case of Bill towards Robyn & her father. Him ridiculing them in talking to other people? Oh yeah, I relate to that having happened to me, too. And then some.
Like I hinted at in my right-above-this-one-comment, there are absolutes that should lend sanity to human governance regardless of how effective manipulation was/still is.
“Absolved of grief” presumes . . . grief. If these young ladies were seeking Bill out in the months preceding the dam breaking – not motivated by anything apparent other than sincere love and gratefulness to him, gushing multi-page letters – It is just hard to reconcile with the perspectives you present. But we will leave that to where it is for now.
Taking your experience . . . can you imagine alleging in a lawsuit that you were unaware that the actions were abusive . . . until, say, two months ago? Or even that you could not recall the events . . . until about two months ago? If you did, would you be lying? Every one of the 14 plaintiffs has stated this. Including one that has had her story out for many years prior to RG. If you were sympathetic to the defendants and were reading this in the lawsuit . . . what would you conclude about the validity of their assertions? This psychological dance is being carried out by lawyers trying to game the system. There is no way this can have the Lord’s blessing. It is dirty.
Is Bill so out of it that he “didn’t” know he was abusive? Is that what you are saying? So you are basically admitting here that Bill didn’t know that putting his hands and feet on young ladies would be abusive or considered as such and because Bill is so clueless here and that he justified all of this in his head as “fatherly” or “grandfatherly” or dutch uncle affection then he innocent because Bill in his head wasn’t abusive or sexual so he is innocent. I kinda think Bill is out of touch with himself and his own sexual feelings as well as out of touch with appropriate behaviors for a single man with single women. You are admitting here whether you want to or not that he was touching young women that he surrounded himself with. He should have learned from the blow out with the Steve scandals to keep his paws and tootsies off period! One of the stories on RG was from Robin with her father and her father did write about going to Bill. They are not part of the suit. If I were a gambler, I would bet others did as well. So I’m not buying this “i didn’t know it was wrong” excuse that Bill is feeding you.
Motive is key. And everyone who knows Bill knows that he lives in a different world than most folks. An old world, a world of pure intentions where a lot was “OK” or “no big deal” which is now – in our perverted world – frowned upon (cue picture of the “Shepherd of the Hills” and stories of 6-year olds arrested for “sexual harassment” after kissing a classmate). A gynecologist and pervert perform the same acts – motive is completely essential. Some doctors have crossed the line, and the women involved testify that they could tell immediately. All of which renders the allegation of every one – all 14 – of the plaintiffs that they did not know that they were being abused – as he held their hands and gazed into their eyes and spoke to their hearts – noteworthy.
Yes, Robin and her father went to Bill. And Bill apologized for any misunderstandings, and the matter was closed. Some women do NOT like to be touched, ever – view all kinds of possible “personal space” interactions with suspicion. Others feel completely differently about, say, a trusted man steadying her as she enters or exits a van. Once you know, you respond accordingly.
Bill can march to his own drummer, live in his own world all he wants but the reality is that he shouldn’t have been touching any one for any reason and at any time. His own “courtship” teachings say as much. Doesn’t matter what norms were during the time period of “Shepard of the Hills”. It’s a mute point. If some kills someone else and then gets caught and then claims “well in my head, its wasn’t wrong or I didn’t know it was wrong”. that person is still going to be tried for murder no matter what he thought in his head or what that person understood. Innocent by reason of insanity is very rare and almost impossible to prove. Since Bill lives in his own world with his own “old fashioned” (your terms) standards, are you saying he is innocent by reason of insanity because that is what your excuses look like, that Bill is an insane man.
ANY time for ANY reason?! That is quite a standard to establish. We have wandered out of the realm of what is and was . . . and the world of tainted prejudices. This is the world we live in, and it is not good –> “Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure; but even their mind and conscience is defiled.” (Titus 1:15) Unless forced otherwise, we should think the best we can. Nothing Bill has done in 50 years in minstry has risen to the level of evil.
Well the insomnia that I came down with didn’t need to pass your inspection, either; only God could have allowed me to suffer that. And the timing of it coincided with (totally unknown to me) The Perv grabbing the hair of some other girl that I have never- to this day- laid eyes on or heard speak. It seems that God Himself didn’t want a woman to walk this road alone. Even though quite a few of the over 12 people who saw him doing doing that to this other gal immediately yelled at him at the time (one calling it ‘very inappropriate’), NONE of THEM reported it. And, even though the Perv said nothing verbal about any aspect of her body or his personal feeling about it, he nonetheless commenced to lay hold of her the way that many rapists do. So, Moderator, in a world where over a dozen people in unison express that something is unacceptable but continue on in their submission under the same leader, I’m not sure why you expect a single individual who has undergone abuse to revolt so as to put a stop to it. Usually the ones that perverts single-out to assault are not lawyers or criminologists or psychiatrists so as to be able to identify abuse verbatim.
And it’s not manipulation by lawyers: After he attacked me, I was physically ill for over a week after it happened as I had to go on with life- work, college, volunteer responsibilities, friends, dating offers- so that after that week I had to push it back from wherever it kept cropping up in my thoughts. Otherwise how would I get everything done? Or even get ANYTHING done? My performance really suffered that initial week & I couldn’t afford to have that. Just because you think this is just manipulation doesn’t take away me having hardly been able to eat for a week, to cry intermittently at work & in walking up the hill with my backpack to class, & walking though the wooded path at night to get home with the distant realization that I was way safer out there than I was at the organization I attended every week. That was no dance by lawyers; it was my life.
I ask you to take a little longer to note what I wrote. You seem to have brushed right on past some rather weighty testimony I gave. Since my previous indoctrination in IBLP dogma heavily affected my judgement during & after the time that I was attacked, & since the Umbrella ended up being thrown in my face by one of the Pastors in his blaming me for it happening, I ask you to pay closer attention. I’ll give you a version that will likely be more palatable for you:
Donald Duck has gone to his & my pastors to report to them the objective, specific, behavioral actions of my having done something unbecoming & lewd to him. I am called to a confrontational session. One of the pastors opens with: “Incredulous, Donald Duck here would like to address with you an incident of unbecoming lewdness.” Pause. Me: “Oh, you mean about Mickey Mouse.” Pastor: “What?” Me: “Mickey Mouse & I-” Pastor interjects: “DONALD DUCK, who is sitting RIGHT HERE, would like to address an incident in which he says YOU acted with unbecoming lewdness towards HIM. There’s no one else involved. Donald, you may proceed to address Incredulous with your account of what you say she did to you.”
Moderator, do you recall having read in the Bible: “Do not receive a report against an elder but by 2 or more witnesses”? I ask you: within the 1st minute of the confrontational meeting I describe, how many witnesses had identified Incredulous as having acted -specifically- in unbecoming lewdness? Were any MORE witnesses/objects of her having done so named? If so………. by whom? If the additional witness/object of Incredulous’ lewdness had been included in an investigation, whom was it that referred the pastors to him by name?!?
Please answer these above questions. Please also realize that, as was the case with Robyn & her father, many times individual women address perversion on a case-by-case basis……… & it gets thrown back in their own face (as Bill Gothard did to Robyn) as if what happened is due to HER moral failure. Many times, the initially confronted individual gets their slate wiped clean by his blaming of the one accusing him, which, if you’ll recall what the Bible says about sexual assault, is the antithesis to God’s judicial record as recorded in Scripture. Each time each girl/woman gets blamed & sent away each in her turn because she is only “one” witness. Even though there were -how many testifying?!?- witnesses to The Perv’s “inappropriate touching” in at least 2 instances against 2 different victims, the Umbrella was afterward thrown in MY face. Supposedly the Umbrella amounted to me being not only at fault for what the Perv did, but also afforded chastisement of me for my “disrespect of authority” & “selfishness” as proven by my not having just “let it go.” Talk about a dance by lawyers!!!!!! How about all those dances?
Oh, and one more thing: not only was there my statement of The Perv being “trustworthy” even after he blatantly assaulted me, & the cards I wrote sentiments in &/or made, but there’s one more thing: After I confronted the Perv, he snorted in amusement & said: “So, you think I’m a pervert, huh?!?”, looking rather sheepish & cocky at the same time. Tears filled my eyes. “No, you’re not a pervert.” I said. Both pastors just turned & looked at me in bewilderment. The meeting had started with the Perv’s immediate identification of himself in a specific instance of having committed “Inappropriate Touching”- an instance that none of us was familiar with, including any familiarity with his victim. It ended with him having nonetheless having convinced both Pastors that I thought he was categorically above reproach, including a strong indication of this that he elicited from me in the meeting itself. Manipulation goes a long way, Moderator. No one knows this better than a pervert who has made an art out of manipulating women in order to exploit them for their own gratification.
You telling me that the abused is required to see past the abuse?!?!?!? How about when 2 leaders with bachelor’s degrees sit and hear about 2 of their subordinates getting “inappropriately touched”, one of them by the pervert having volunteered this info himself, and the pervert is such a great manipulator that one of them insists for the next year that NO ABUSE has taken place?!?!?
A meeting by someone whose trust has been exploited confronting their abuser is, for this reason, a horrible idea. Others besides the abused just get sucked right on into the pervert’s manipulation. It takes objective, BIBLE-HONORING experts with an objective view of both the manipulated & the manipulator to assess how much of this has occurred, & to what degree of abuse as purposed by the abuser.
I finally caught up on all the RG fun and noted your taking exception to my holding your enormously long post. You apparently did not see my private email back to you attempting to get some more information and allow me a footing . . . so I could respond. Truth be told, I feel like the proverbial person drinking from the fire hose. My question to you was, “What exactly did the pastor do to you?” I frankly got lost, and felt I could not respond without that bit of information. Did try and read back to prior posts, but, again, got lost. Seriously, it would be helpful to condense a tad . . . main points . . . allow for a back and forth.
Thanks
‘”What exactly did the pastor do to me?”‘
He very harshly held me in contempt of the IBLP Umbrella. And for what? For the occurrence of “inappropriate touching” even though this was admitted by The Perv himself as having done……. to somebody else BESIDES me.
Picture this: “Moderator, Incredulous is here to address with you an incident of inappropriate touching.” You: “W-H-H-A-A-A-A-T?!? What. On. Earth. Are. You. S-A-A-A-Y-Y-Y-Y-I-I-N-G?!?!? I have never, ever creeped-on her!!!” You & any non-Perv would be utterly flabbergasted to be hit with this. Do you not think it strange for someone to immediately start talking in reference to a time & person whom they have inappropriately touched………….. unless they do indeed readily think of themself as having done just that?
I remain confused. You resisted . . . An act against yourself? What did your supposed tight dress or whatever he citied as an excuse have to do with it? I do apologize . . . You can be super hard to follow, but others have complained about that for me too. I suspect I have not given you all the focus I should have.
Dear Rob,
When I labeled Larne a hearsay witness, I wasn’t trying to discredit the brother, but making a technical distinction which I thought fit the context of the legal goings on. I meant that Larne was probably not a personal firsthand witness of any sexual abuse, repentance, or reconciliation of third parties. I meant that despite being slightly removed from the allegations, he probably has reliable enough sources to render an accurate account. So that’s why I accepted Alfred’s account of what he said. Plus, I’m prejudiced in favor of positive outcomes. I hope nobody cures me of that.
Your uncured optimist,
David K
I’m not following this. Larne worked for Bill in the late 1970’s, so he has first hand experience and witness. He also married Ruth who was Bill’s long time personal secretary. Her testimony is very much first hand experience. There is no hearsay here at all. If you bothered at all to read Ruth’s story on RG which I would highly suggest you do if you haven’t tells a tale of manipulation and emotional control and over the top inappropriate contact between Bill and the women on his staff. Holding hands, sitting in his lap are very inappropriate. Bill did admit when the Steve crisis blew open that he was inappropriate and “defrauded”. He didn’t learn the lessons obviously and didn’t set clear boundaries between himself and the female staff. Having “positive” outcome which you seem to imply that the old scandal and problems were “no big deal” because the ending is “positive” is a mute because the “positive outcome” has more to do with turning to God or with Steve, returning to God, time and healing and forgiveness. The Denver meetings that Larne and the other old guard was a part of before the current suit is a result of many issues that are still unresolved from the pre-1980 years.
Haven’t been tracking on this little subthread. So let’s try to clarify.
1) Larne made hopeful comments about Steve’s recovery both public and private. I doubt he intended it to be “first hand” in that it is also clear that his contact with and knowledge of Steve in the later years has been very limited.
2) Larne’s direct involvement with the scandal involving Steve was after the fact – he was not involved with the women during the time this was going on. Afterwards he obviously spent years agonizing through this with Ruth, and also spoke with other women. That is not “first-hand” but second hand, just for the record.
3) Bill’s reference to “defrauding” dealt with him on the one hand basically entering a “3rd level” relationship with Ruth, acknowledging it to Gary and the board as such, along with physical access liberties that, while not involving kissing, did involve hand holding and lap sitting and canoe rides and time alone gazing at the stars . . . and yet never “closing the deal”, keeping her at a distance whenever thoughts of marriage came up. The “inappropriateness” was not entering a formal “courtship” mode involving her parents, as he taught, simply because he taught it so clearly . . . which would have solved the other issue, defrauding, raising expectations in her that he actually was not committed to. That is the extent of his crimes . . . and he and the ministry suffered acutely as a result. The punishment matched the crime, and there is no further need to continue to ponder it.
4) There was a foundational desire in the “Denver Committee” to force Bill to assume responsibility for knowing that the women were likely to be abused when he was sending them up to work with Steve, This he has steadfastly refused to do, with a great deal of emotion – indeed, in many intense discussions, he told us he could not, with a clear conscience, do so. He is adamant that he believed the “Steve Problem” – what he understood of it – to be resolved at that point, with the power and blood of Jesus in control. It remains one of his greatest failures of judgment, which he has freely acknowledged . . . but was done with a completely clear conscience on his part. The refusal of the Denver Committee to accept his attestations on this is what terminated their efforts.
Larne was the PILOT in the late seventies before all of this blew up and open. He is not after the fact here. He knew because he worked there and at the same time will all these people. That is called “first hand”.
To make a technical point, his knowledge of the facts of the abuse that went on with Steve is second hand, because he was not privy to any of that as it was going on. But we have probably beat this to an unhealthy death.
Dear Rob,
It seems very important to you that Ruth’s Story be taken at face value. But it flunks the WWRD test.
Yes, I did read Ruth’s story on RG. It is Larne’s story about Ruth, her parents, Bill Gothard, and Steve Gothard. Here is my synopsis:
• Beginning as a teenager, Ruth volunteered for Bill Gothard, because both she and her parents admired him.
• Ruth came to see that Bill was a creep who interfered with the love life of staffers, but Ruth volunteered for him for almost eight more years, during which she had an emotional breakdown which cost her favor with Bill.
• Bill transferred Ruth to the Northwoods over her objections about the moral pressures there. This landed Ruth in proximity to Steve, who was a worse creep than Bill. Steve had been seducing women at the Northwoods for five years.
• Ruth “admitted” that she “had been sexually preyed upon” by Steve at the Northwoods.
• Ruth’s parents vanish from the story after they relinquish their teenaged daughter to Bill’s custody. Why?
All of this is hearsay, whether it is true or false. It is a second-hand account of things which the author did not personally see, but heard about from others. Whether it is true is another question.
WWRD? What would Rob do? Rob would not put up with this foolishness. According to Larne, Ruth did. Ruth’s Story claims that Ruth “admitted” her consent to a sexual liaison with Steve.
So I think Ruth’s Story cannot have it both ways. If a woman was raped, then say so explicitly. If she was a fornicator, either admit it and repent, or shut up.
WWRD? Rob would either consent and reciprocate a man’s affections, or unleash that soccer kick. No coy ambiguity.
Neither coy nor ambiguous,
David K
I have know clue what WWRD is. After getting a rather nice compliment from Larne over on RG, I think it is interesting that you are now picking apart a woman’s story that is now in heaven. Nothing you just wrote here is making any sense. I think that all of this is spinning around into lunacy and corrupted thinking and reasoning. I think you owe Larne an apology.
I am petty sure “WWRD” is “What Would Rob Do”.
And I love and respect Larne. But after years of keeping her story out of circulation it was deliberately inserted in recent years in order to help Recovering Grace, damage Bill, and it certainly gave energy to the current lawsuit. I know that was done with great soul searching and prayer . . . but it remains that it puts the account, of one who cannot speak for herself, out into the open where it must be examined by those who support Bill as well as those that do not. We can all be more sensitive, but the ensuing discussion and second guessing is inevitable. And not out of line.
It doesn’t matter whatsoever what I would do, what matters is what did happen with the people involved. Hypotheticals are meaningless. Different personalities react to different things and do different things at different times. And considering the times and the ages it is impossible to even go there. Don V. had their story and knew both of them. They at the time didn’t want them to use it in their book and Don wanted his book to focus on Bill’s teaching and it’s problems not on Bill’s behaviors. Likewise Ruth was battling breast cancer and the attention to her plus the criticism it would open her up to by die-hard supporters, I think I can understand that totally.
Thanks for the input brother, but who “r” you? I admit I was being cute with the WWRD, but please read my entire post in context. It was in reply to Rob, who had exhorted me time and again to read that RG article by Larne.
I have never met brother Larne, and I hope I didn’t insult him. By accident, my timing was lousy. I had already posted the summary for Rob’s sake on DG, when I saw Larne’s kind words on RG. That made me cringe.
I admit it appears that I am insulting Larne, which is the opposite of our Lord’s command to love. God forgive me if I insulted Larne, but I did not intend to. Anyway, my synopsis of Larne’s RG article was as objective as I could make it.
We are stuck in an ugly inter-family quarrel among Christians. Larne’s stake in the quarrel could not be more tragic. Mine could not be sunnier. My outcomes from Bill Gothard’s ministry could not be more positive. Larne had the opposite outcome. His could not be more catastrophic. I have no right to second guess Larne, and I don’t even have a right to my own good fortune.
I admit this is not exactly an apology, but I hope it’s not too clumsy as an explanation.
Peace?
David K
“R” was Rob, may have been a typo, thumping the name.
I also have another thought for WWRD. Excessive submission teaching towards women leads them to end up in situations like Ruth and the other secretaries where they are taken advantage of by men that are over them, they end up trapped in those situations with little thought of how to get out. Submission teaching is what lead to Incredulous here being taken advantage of by a pastor. Then these jerks turn around and claim that either the clothing “tempted” them or they didn’t “cry out” so they must have wanted it, so it wasn’t rape etc. I think Larne was always described Ruth as a very sweet, kind hearted wonderful Christian. There was no mean bone in her body. Women with an extremely sweet and passive temperament are the most vulnerable in these situations which I how I read what happen to her. That doesn’t blame her whatsoever at all but a true victim of patriarchal teaching that sets up women, especially those like Ruth to be taken advantage of by men.
Genuine teaching on “subjection” would clarify that a young woman is under her father’s authority, or other relative, as necessary . . . Until marriage. No pastor or other important person may usurp that. A father may entrust her to another authority for a time, but the notion of being alone to battle the advances of unscrupulous religious individuals . . . That should never be. Esther responded to her “cousin” Mordecai for protection and then counsel up to and after marriage. He was her earthly strength in a godless world.
R was a typo on my part
Women are not the property of their fathers, their brothers, their uncles or their husbands. The over emphasis on women being in subjection to any of the above ends up treating women like a piece of property. Mary was a single young teenage girl when the angle Gabriel approached her. The Angel Gabriel didn’t do to Mary’s father or even Joseph. Mary likewise didn’t go to either to ask for her “authorities” permission. She said yes all on her own, it was her own decision, not anyone’s else. Your “under authority/subjection”scheme falls apart when one starts really looking at scripture and all the people in it OT and NT. Women are “joint heirs” in Christ.
And that was, as you know, precisely how the Lord in the Jewish culture of Bible times viewed women. A financial transaction was the basis for an engagement. Do you find that demeaning? I would never look to the sensibilities of our godless modern age for advice on how we should think and live.
She was engaged to Joseph, which made them legally married, and it is clear she went to him first. Then off to her elderly cousin Elisabeth. The Lord independently confirmed what He had told her to her authorities. There was nothing in Mary resembling an independent spirit.
Alfred,
You are missing my point. Mary made her own decision. I guess you would call that “independent spirit” but she made her own decision a part from anyone else. Jesus first miracle was at the suggestion of Mary at the wedding at Cana. Jesus first said no but did do what she asked Him. I’m not sure if you ever looked at any Jewish internet sites but Jewish view of women is pretty high and Sarah, Rebecca, Leah and Rachel are called the four matriarchs of Israel, equal to Abraham, Issac and Jacob. The so called patriarchal movement is missing the matriarchs. Jew of Jesus web site also has some very interesting articles about all of this and they state that the Torah does not treat or consider women the property of men but gave women more of an equal status and only later was Jewish culture corrupted and Hellenized in Jesus to where women were considered the property of men. Bill Gothard like to pretend and dabble with bits and pieces of Judaism but he again has no clue. Proverbs 31 woman was basically a business woman, not a milk toast yes girl subservient to her husband with no thoughts of her own. Jesus likewise treated, talked to, interacted with and even accepted financial support from women. There isn’t a different view between OT and NT. You have more in common with Islam which does treat women as the property of men instead of real Christianity or even Judaism in all its forms.
I also want to point out because I’ve worked for a group of Jewish Doctors that Jews over all, no matter what branch they are from have a very high view and emphasis on education, both men and women. That is why you see so many of them is high level professions such as Doctors, lawyers, accountants, teaching etc. That also flies in the face of the belittling of education by Bill Gothard and the anemic ATI program.
They probably also say that the Lord did not approve of any ownership of individuals as property . . . and that Jesus cannot possibly be the servant of Isaiah 53. AND that the Torah approved of abortion . . . I see that bouncing around too. We love and trust the Lord, we open our eyes, we look and we see.
I agree with you that the Scriptures do have a high view of women. Yes, the Lord spoke directly to them . . . you left out Manoah’s unnamed wife, the mother of Samson. That proves that in the spiritual state there is neither male nor female. But on earth there are clear roles which are tied in this life to the failure of Eve in the Garden, where God placed “the woman” in subjection to “the man”.
The following is NT, which takes precidence over anything we think we might understand from the OT. Inasmuch as it presents the OT as its support, that kind of settles how we are supposed to understand it. There simply is no way to spin this “patriarchy”, to use the modern slur . . . other than deciding that Paul was confused . . . which is a pretty big problem:
1 Timothy 2:11-14
“11 Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. 12 But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. 13 For Adam was first formed, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. “
The passages in I Timothy have to again be taken into context of the whole book as well as II Timothy and Titus which is St. Paul again giving advise on Church order. The particular passage should be read in the context of Church discipline and order in which Church authority is based on male leadership. Teaching authority of the Church rests on male leadership. This isn’t about the husband and wife relationship and it doesn’t mean the way you are trying to twist it here that women are the “property of men”. The comment by St. Paul about women being “silent” should be understood to mean teaching authority (in the Catholic view, teaching authority is the magisterium of the Church). Silence in this is being proof text literally by you. The balance is that one can just read Acts and see that women were prophets and even deaconess (in service to other women). I am a lector which is I do official reading of scripture at Mass. That isn’t being silent but I have no authority to teach on what I read as a lector, that belongs to the priest and deacon, they are the only one’s with authority to teach at Mass. I think this example give balance on what St. Paul was talking about.
The command to not teach, usurp authority is based on Adam being created first . . . and not being deceived, as Eve was. That is a fundamental design issue. As prophetesses and deaconesses . . . 1 Cor. 11 commands women to have their heads covered . . . so as not to “dishonor their head”. And we read that her husband is her “head”. So . . . this is all done to honor headship. The father is the head of his family . . . the husband is the head of his wife. The Queen is the head of her nation . . . and of the Anglican church. As sign of that honor . . . is that nobody speaks unless approved or spoken to. I think it is much the same idea.
In any case . . . I am sure that we will never see this completely on the same terms. I still say . . . that the term “patriarchy” is a slur aimed at those that would see this order acted out. Make it sound like a bad idea. Abuses within God’s order do NOT mean His ideas are bad . . . just that the actors are . . . sometimes.
Ruth was 18 at the time when she went to work for Bill as a secretary. So she was a legal adult. Likewise, she moved quite far away from home and her correspondence was censored by Bill. Her parents probably had no clue. She also worked for Bill for ten years. You are trying to twist this story into something that it isn’t in order to justify Bill or Steve and again shows how little you paid attention to the actual story and what it said. She was like the frog in the jar that is slowly being boiled alive, the heat is slowly turned up, the frog adjusts to the ever increasing temperature, not realizing that the end result, it will be boiled alive.
The “heat” being applied was . . . The lustful desires of Bill’s brother. Sin lies at the door and will dominate and consume us if we do not take charge. Our responsibility to Jesus exceeds every earthly loyalty . . . You know, hate them all as necessary to be His disciple.
Dear Rob,
May I propose a truce? On the topic Of Ruth-and-the-Gothards, I submit that you and I are tied with about an equal accumulation of points. Shall we settle for a truce for the remainder of the time between now and the Resurrection? In the World to come, we can reconsider whether to take up this topic again (if we still give a hoot by then, for rumor has it that higher and better things will occupy us in that Day). Poor Ruth would probably rather rest in peace between now and then.
Waddya say?
David K
@ Brother David:
“If a woman was raped, then say so explicitly. If she was a fornicator, either admit it and repent, or shut up.”
If only things were that clear & black-&-white, life & faith would be way, way easier. And the Bible would be at least a few pages shorter. Take Genesis 19:6,8, for instance: “And Lot went out to them & shut the doorway, & shut the door behind him, & said, “Please, my brothers, do not act wickedly.Now behold, I have two daughters who have not had relations with man; please let me bring them out to you, & do to them whatever you like; only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof.” Then check out 19:15,16 “When morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, ‘Up, take your wife & two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away in the punishment of the city.’ But he hesitated. So the men seized his hand & the hand of his wife & the hands of his two daughters, for the compassion of the LORD was upon him; & they brought him out, & put him outside the city.” So……….. is it without regard to circumstances that the compassion of the LORD falls to a person who suggests rape with- not one, but TWO “please”-es -with that suggestion? If so, you should definitely go down to the corner tonight with any single daughters you may have & start begging any guys passing by to do whatever they want to them. You may well avoid disaster befalling your house by eliciting God’s compassion by so doing. Am I being facetious? Yes. Indeed. Why? Because it is obvious that suggesting rape- nay, BEGGING rape- of women is passable in God’s sight only if the verbal demands of a dominating assaulter have been issued. The one being demanded-of to specific compliance by the assaulters is forced to bargain. It’s not Lot whose own initiative has created this situation; it is the assaulters. THIS is an *Umbrella* of sorts under which dealings ensue. Look again in Genesis 19:30,35. Again, an *Umbrella* of sorts “made their father drink wine”- so much for, “You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make him drink.” And again, God did not follow your rule, Brother David. He does not say that Lot was raped explicitly nor does God say that he fornicated and repented. (Just as He doesn’t say whether Lot was offering rape or fornication in offering of his daughters). One can only assume that Lot neither offered rape nor fornication either of his daughters or himself even though he was indeed raped. Since 2 Peter 2:7 calls him a righteous man with a righteous soul.
Indeed if Ruth has the same standing in righteousness as her fellow rape victim Lot carries, then you owe Larne a sincere apology. Especially since the Bible gives ample voice to what it doesn’t define according to your terms that you therefore say people should shut-up about.
Many thanks to both Alfred and Rob for all that recent exposition of 1 Peter. I just saw it. Anybody else out there agree that Rob has a lot of Sarah’s lively spirit dwelling within? I don’t know about milquetoast women, but Sarah comes across as a pretty sassy gal now and then (the laughing incident, etc.). So does Rob.
Smiling,
David K
Dear sister Incredulous,
Thanks for that input. It was quite a tour of unsavory situations, both in the Bible and in the hypothetical world.
You’re right. That account of Lot’s cowardice is about as ugly as it gets. Yet in the NT he gets commended as “just Lot,” right? Go figure.
But please cut me a little slack for context. My post replied to Rob, who had insisted that I read Ruth’s story again. I thought she considered it proof positive of something. Either it proved that Bill Gothard is a creep, or that Steve Gothard raped Ruth, or something. So I read Larne’s story carefully. I couldn’t find the firm conclusions which Rob apparently saw. Because Rob sounds so scrappy, I wondered why she was so favorable to an account of a woman much less scrappy than she.
“Lot’s Story,” like “Ruth’s Story,” is grim. I don’t see how can conclude anything from it, other than The Fall. I agree 100% with you about the moral ambiguity we face (too often) in the human condition.
I think Larne is a good man. We never met face-to-face, but only via email.
If my reply to Rob sounds exasperated, it is. Bill Gothard may be a creep to Rob, Larne, and others, but he has never been a creep to me. It takes more than Ruth’s Story to recruit me into the enemies-of-Gothard column.
I make enough enemies just being myself. I’m not shopping for any new ones.
God help us,
David K
Gets commended as “righteous Lot” with his “righteous soul”, then he is specifically acknowledged for his personal grief (yes Moderator, GRIEF) in what he was subjected to as a result of others being slaves to their own flesh. I do not get why you & others read “cowardice” into Lot’s story. Obviously he was courageous in his morals; both sets of his assaulters knew full well that the only way to hit anybody within his household was to surround his house & yell their demands or else get him drunk. And only drunk when he mistakenly assumed that there was no one around to take advantage of him. Kind of blows apart the notion that anyone is supposed to guard themselves against their own immediate family members……. right? And yet there’s the IBLP notion that not only adults, but even children under actual familial AUTHORITY are supposed to safeguard themselves from birth so that no immorality happens to them. It is easy to observe from these Scripture texts that: (A) No hardcore definition of the crime of rape needs to be included in narratives of sexual exploitation in order to substantiate either culpability or innocence. Not to mention the importance of these things being made public. (B) The main content of the narratives center on the taking of dominion &/or manipulation of the assaulters. This is apparently what most concerns the writer of the Bible, initial assault being the emphasis to the exclusion of the definition of the crime of rape. And you, brother Dave, would not be the type to try to tell God to shut-up about it. The emphasis on dominion & manipulation self-explains the moral scruples of the one being violated (Lot): It is because of his righteousness that such lowdown tactics are employed by the perverts. The lowdown tactics themselves testify to the pervert’s awareness of Lot’s morals.
The tactics of Bill in every single one of his accusers being those he had brought under his dominion indicate the same things about his predation & what kind of gals he did it to.
You say “there is nothing” to these observations of the Scriptures. Then what substance do you see for IBLP sex attack teachings? (Primarily that “If a woman doesn’t cry out when attacked then she is as guilty of rape as her attacker”, and, a child is to be the willing doormat of any manner of disrespect dolled-out by their authorities ; UNLESS the disrespect is immoral- in which case they are obligated to put a stop to it?) As a full-grown adult brought under the authority of his assaulters as they wielded this over him, was Lot likewise obligated to stop their immoral assaults? Each of which were launched against him in the city & again in the foothill country, respectively? Am just wondering how you reconcile the “there is something” to defend of IBLP in which BILL pontificates on these issues. Even while you simultaneously say “there is nothing” to see even in the Scriptures that specifically deal with instances of sexual predation.
P.S. This is totally unrelated & I do not want this to become a distraction but I have an adopted friend who was harassed by her family for agreeing to requests from her birth family to meet with the still living birth parent. She stood strong & agreed to meet. She is glad she did so. But she had to face harassment & discouragement. Am just saying that I am familiar (albeit via “hearsay”) with the reality of that phenomenon.
That is, again, interesting . . . but completely incorrect. The Lord was most concerned with specific prohibited acts. In the case of sodomy . . . most definitely. “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.” (Leviticus 18:22) In contradistinction to what they would have done had they taken Lot up on his cowardly offer. “Sexual predation” is not a Scriptural term, for whatever it is worth. “Lust” is . . . maybe that is what you mean? After a lot of interchanges I must confess I am still largely baffled as to where you are coming from, or going.
I think this is another classic example of the errors of proof texting the Bible instead of looking at the whole context. St. Peter’s remarks about “righteous Lot” follows the example of “righteous Noah” and St. Peter was using both examples about how God rescued both of them and their families from a final and total judgement (destruction of Sodom and the world wide flood). They are not called righteous because they were sinless nor because everything they did was “right”. Noah afterwards got drunk and passed out. Lot basically lost his family in escaping Sodom in that his wife “looked back” and was basically vaporized into salt and then Lot’s daughters came up with the sickest of ideas to have sex with him in order to have babies. Not really a very happy ending. The whole context of II Peter chapter 2 is talking about false teachers and their final destruction and the examples of Lot and Noah of how God will rescue His children from a final and total judgement and destruction.
The offering of Lot to the sex mob for rape is also similar to the ending of Judges, where the Levite offered his errant wife up to a mob to be abused, which she was and it resulted in her death. Both examples demonstrate the common cultural view that women are just property of men and since they are the property of men, men can offer them up to others for abuse. The Judge’s example demonstrates in so many ways how the children of Israel had strayed from following God and the Torah. The Levite married a non-levite that was already an immoral person. He goes to get her but in actually, takes revenge out on her by offering her up to the mob, then he desecrates her body by cutting it up to pass it out in order to alarm others against the tribe of Benjamin. The whole story is a sick twisted tale of one bad choice upon another and is a demonstration of a society that has become totally immoral and sick. But if one falls into the proof text trap and read “well II Peter is calling Lot righteous and Lot in a last ditch effort offers his daughters up for raper, therefore Lot’s actions here must be righteous” is drawing wrong conclusion about evil actions that are not supported at all by using cut and paste proof text of the Bible.
Dear Rob,
Merry Christmas Adam (the day before Christmas Eve).
On behalf on Incredulous and me, we plead innocent to prooftexting. Prooftexting means bringing my conclusions to the text, then cherry-picking verses to support my conclusions. It’s like begging the question. Neither Incredulous nor I were doing that. But May I interest you in a plea bargain? I concede that I were guilty of shallow reading compared to you. Had we taken the trouble to read the text as thoroughly as you, we may have noticed Lot’s symmetry with Noah, the “preacher of righteousness.” Noah deserves this NT title of commendation, even though he had that embarrassing drunkenness incident after the Flood.
You’re right. The central message of the 2 Peter text is that God is prepared to rescue his faithful followers even as He destroys His wicked enemies. The personal virtues and vices of Noah and Lot were beside the point.
Even so, I wish I were permitted to write the script for Lot’s confrontation with the sodomites. Lot would have delivered a line with a raspy growl like Clint Eastwood. Then the angels would have smitten the sodomites with blindness. Only afterward would Lot’s daughters be mentioned as they gushed about their heroic father’s courage. But that’s not the way it happened. Instead, Lot came off looking less like Clint Eastwood and more like Don Knotts.
So may we beat the rap for prooftexting and plead guilty to a lesser charge of shallow reading?
Your paroled brother,
David K
Dear Incredulous,
Below, please see Rob’s interesting thoughts on our Lot topic (12/21 post), and also my reply to Rob after it clears moderation. I address the cowardice in my reply to her. I hope you don’t mind my being whimsical about it with my comparisons to Clint Eastwood and Don Knotts.
Also, thanks for that p.s about your adopted friend. Sometimes those family reunions go well, and sometimes they are a disaster. I never sought a reunion, but I would welcome one with the family I never met. It has to be their idea. Otherwise you risk a double desertion.
I haven’t followed Bill Gothard’s opinions about resisting rape, and they don’t interest me much. Every Christian must settle his own
conscience about cheek-turning vs. lawful violence to resist evil. I favor lawful and minimal violence to resist evil. Happily, my wife and daughters are pretty scrappy, so any bad man would find them difficult to subdue. Happier still, women’s self-defense is a hypothetical problem for us and not a real one.
Peace on earth,
David K
@ Moderator: “Sexual predation” is my abbreviation for how the narratives state how the 2 houses were surrounded & the demands made, & how, in the 2nd Genesis 19 account of sexual assault, Lot’s daughter’s conspired together to plan their rapes that necessitated getting their victim drunk. Not sure why you are repeating one of my main points, this being that hardcore definition of rape is not included in two of the accounts; YET SO THE ACCOUNTS ARE WORTHY OF MENTION. [So much for the “shut-up if you’re not going to say ‘rape'” approach]. You also underscore my same point in noting that the Writer did not use the brevity that I used. If the term “sexual predation” had been used to abbreviate these accounts of sex assaulting in the Scriptures, our Bibles would be hundreds of words shorter! Indeed, I am right there with you in regarding the fact that God had WAY more specific details to highlight. My “sexual predation” term abridged many specific details that took up most of Lot’s stories’ narratives. By the way, have you ever considered a second career as a Creep-Defender in religious organizations? Because what you’re saying would fit really well in a transcript of a meeting in which it is claimed that 2 or more people conspiring together to force a person to meet their sexual demands is NOT sexual predation. Especially if dominating their target by cutting-off from all escape route(s) is a key component of their strategy. Just think if meetings had to have every reference to inappropriate touching &/or threats of the same in lengthly form as the Bible does. No two-word abbreviation because “it’s not in the Bible”. You could circumvent all reference to sexual predation simply through your red-tape process!!!……… That wouldn’t be any purpose of your’s, now would it? Also, I’d like to see what term(s) you use to sum up the actions of the assaulters in all 3 accounts. What do YOU conclude that they did in 2 words? Or, are you okay with all the space that gets taken up in the describing of the strategy of gaining dominance over a human target? I doubt that. Lastly; you have hereby said that the target suggesting a little-er sin in place of a bigger one acknowledges just how bad sin is on this relative basis. I couldn’t agree more concerning such instance wherein sin is already occurring so as to declare even more as being inevitable. Either way, (big sin or substitution of small sin), the threat of the relatively big sin being held over the victim’s head is only one aspect of the sin of going up to them to hold ANYTHING over their head. Sin was already happening the minute that the target was held under someone else’s dominion whereby the dominating one made their threat/demand.
@Rob,
I’m not a teacher, or anything, so I probably have not made my points well. My points are: (1) Moderator please stop calling Lot a coward (& other things previously) especially since God calls him righteous. I have never, EVER said or even hinted that Lot was acting righteously in ANYTHING he is recorded as having done. In fact, the only act of righteousness performed by him that I can see is his entertaining of angels. And maybe he fought in Abraham’s army. Nonetheless, he is set against those condemned as UN- righteous, particularly against those who indulged their own flesh at the expense of Lot’s vexation over how they lived by which they also assaulted him. (2) What assaulters do to a righteous person does not taint their righteous standing before God. This includes if they did not prevent themselves being overtaken by the assaulters so as to be intimidated into complicity and/or therein violated. This is what I find in literally interpreting the Scriptures. My apologies for making it sound like I think it is righteous to plea-bargain to try to attain some safety via offering sexual favors. It is not. In such a case as Lot’s & the Levite’s, these were not their own works; even if such begging somehow WAS an act of righteousness, they could not take credit for this. Rather it would be their assaulters who got the credit for this so-called righteousness. Lot & the Levite were links in a chain of causation started by unrighteous deeds done by unrighteous people. So, if Lot’s & the Levite’s response was “righteous”, then this “righteousness” would be to their assaulters’ credit as having been elicited from them directly via sin. And sin does not produce righteousness. (3) Lot’s 2 tragedies demonstrate prime historical exhibits during the Patriarchal Age showing what happens when Gothard’s umbrella gets erected by yet another poser over a righteous person. (Not to mention other problems with patriarchy that you well explained). “Every” means “every”. And Gothard’s umbrella teaching emphasizes “every”, all posers included. It’s whomever has the biggest stick & who-all’s head that they hold it over that is the authority & their minions “have” to assent to the rule of this authority. That’s ultimately what Lot & the Levite were doing; assenting to the existence of self-proclaimed authority. Today, all that’s needed for credentials is the claim of IBLP teaching itself, & the claimer thereby has “official” basis for their “authority”. Rob, I know that we both believe that the slap-on-a-nametag-and-become-a-mighty-dictator-dogma is wrong. Please write to me more on RG. If you reply here, I likely won’t see it.
Back to Moderator: I’m not going to share details with a practicing Gothardite about the inappropriate touching that The Perv did to me. Your buddy Knecht, whom I used to think highly of, doesn’t seem to think there is such a thing worth mentioning unless it involves hard-porn-style-rape. You are sane enough to call the gaining-of-dominion-so-as-to-rape what it is, (even if “rape” isn’t always the term used); you equate the description of the attempted rape of Lot’s guests & himself with “rape”. But then you say that the detailed descriptions of what amounts to sexual predations does NOT equate with sexual predation. You take issue with me for saying that Lot & the Levite were preyed upon sexually. You’ve always skirted this point of mine, & now you counter it outright, that because the exact term isn’t there that it’s therefore not in the Bible. And that means you are in massive, massive denial, excusing this by means that are very much sounding like Bill himself. This totally creeps me out. I’ve been trying to call your attention to how the Umbrella was used to blame me for the action of a pervert. That it was totally consistent with this teaching that it be used in this way. But if you won’t accept a point that God Himself belabors in Scripture to make, then I’m not sharing other facts that I myself have experienced with you, either. If I’m going to tell stuff to people who deny what the Bible says, I’ll at least tell people believing in the justice system’s statutes & laws of this land, among which those defining sex offenses were made by those who believe the truths that the Bible says.
I will read any reply you may make to me here, & then I’m not going to take up any more time trying to explain a reality to you that you are determined should not be acknowledged. This is my Christmas present to myself this year. I hope you get to spend this holyday with your family. Adios.
Let’s see . . . You are resorting to slurs against us on our own blog . . . So let’s tone it own. In fact, let’s cut the volume of text way back. It is virtually impossible to keep up.
Maybe that is true, maybe it’s not. I am not a millennial, so there are a lot of things claimed as abuse in this day and age that just aren’t seen that way by everybody. Particularly Scripture. The favorite “obfuscation” trick is redefining words and phrases. So let’s be like lawyers. Let’s suppose that a thing is a sin only if the Bible says so. And in order for it to say so, we need to use the same words and phrases the Bible uses. Fair enough? So take me back to your own example, and tell me in Bible terms what was done to you. I do understand the Bible terms “lust” and “fornication” and “beguiling” a woman, i.e. tricking her into sex . . . And “rape”, while not in the good old KJV, is found in the word “forced”, although it was only a mortal crime if one or both were married or engaged. I see “abuse” used to refer to unwanted sexual activity in your cited accounts, male or female. Exposure of “nakedness” as a crime. And to “know” or “lay with” for the sex act, male or female. I do not see “spiritual abuse” and “domination” and “predation” or such things that are brought up.
Doug Phillips said he never “knew” his accuser in the Bible sense, but that there was inappropriate physical contact which one can only assume to be an expression of “lust” by “abuse” or exposure of private areas (“nakedness”). Apparently it was a lot less that her public statements which she was forced to retract . . . But still a Biblical crime by his own admission.
The Gibeonites were guilty of “rape” and murder of a married woman . . . And the Sodomites were judged by God for their evil intentions, although not carried out. Lot’s daughters committed one of the sex crimes God condemns with a curse.
So, if you feel comfortable defining your experience in simple terms I can understand, we will all be better. As stated previously, I am still confused.
Dear brother,
Our sister Incredulous is wounded. I too am getting overwhelmed in the volume of her heart cry. But I picked up a few points.
• because she had a bad sexual experience, she considers Bill Gothard’s teachings on sexuality as a license for the strong to abuse the weak. Ironically, this seems to me like a case for the patriarchal protection of women.
• Incredulous formerly esteemed me until I denied that Ruth’s Story proved anything. It didn’t help matters when I called Lot a coward.
• Incredulous is disgusted at what she reads here on DG, so she intends to stop posting here and resume posting on RG.
Sincerely,
David K
I have called Lot a coward. The concept of “righteous” is relative. Example:
Genesis 38:26
“And Judah acknowledged them, and said, She hath been more righteous than I; because that I gave her not to Shelah my son. And he knew her again no more.”
Tamar, upset that Judah’s third son was not given as her husband after God killed the older two for cause after they were each briefly married to her, pretended to be a prostitute and enticed Judah to get her pregnant out of revenge. Judah acknowledged that she was “more righteous” than he was. [Interesting that one of the twins born from that incestuous dalience was placed in the lineage of David, and ultimately the Lord Jesus.]
So Lot was “righteous” compared to the Sodomites, but he was still a bit of a scoundrel.
Ruth’s Story is obviously interpreted differently by her family than by those that know and are sympathetic to Bill. I think this go-around centered on the difference between a first hand witness – Ruth, Steve, Bill – and second hand witnesses, those that heard it from first hand witnesses.
Incredulous,
Merry Christmas and thank-you for the clarification on your views. If you wish to talk about all of this on RG instead of here, that would be fine with me. I appreciate you sharing what happen, that took a lot of courage to do and is never easy at all, for many reasons and for that, I admire you for speaking out. We definitely agree on many more things than not. The more I read the stories from those like yourself that have been victimized by authority/submission teaching which ends up dehumanizing women and children, the more it seems like these view point have more in common with another religion whose name means submission and in countries that are ruled by it, women and children become lower than animals. Perhaps the unsung hero of the nativity narrative in the Bible is St. Joseph. He took in Mary as his wife, even though Jesus isn’t his child. He left in the middle of the night to Egypt to protect them, he came back to Nazareth, he worked as a carpenter to support them. He did all of these things and the Bible never records an actual word he says. His actions never demand “submission to his authority”. His example is of service and self-sacrifice on behalf of Mary and Jesus. He flies in the face of patriarchail/complimentarian teaching which is probably why those groups totally ignore him as an example of what it means to be a husband and father.
Dear Rob,
On the 1st Day of Christmas, you made a good point about Joseph’s virtue. But perhaps we could call Joseph “less sung” rather than unsung? Apparently he was well-sung enough to get canonized by Rome! Then again, our records place him in very distinguished company. It would be a rare man who is not upstaged by Mary and Jesus. Never was there a man happier to be upstaged.
But I think our account of Joseph and Mary is about as complementarian as it gets. Here is the non-complementarian version: “When the census order was announced in Nazareth, Joseph went up from Galilee to Bethlehem for he was of the house and lineage of David. And Mary said unto him, get thee hence dude, I shall abide here, for we are equal and independent. Message me on Facebook once you arrive. I subscribe not to this patriarchal dung. Nazareth and Bethlehem have equal rights. Why shouldn’t the natal star appear right here over my hometown instead of Bethlehem? Besides, that Bethlehem prophecy was made by a male prophet, whom I am disinclined to complement.”
Anyway, Joseph was a Great Man. We should imitate him as much as possible.
David K
Ok, the following sentence that you included in your latest Moderation is what convinces me to answer.
You said:
“I see ‘abuse’ used to refer to unwanted sexual activity in your cited accounts, male or female.”
Based on this, I will tell you what happened, although it disturbs me that you placed the word ABUSE in quotation marks rather than simply left it to mean what it says. I am also concerned that you do not acknowledge that conspiring together to get their father drunk was a sin of dominance in and of itself, even if rape had not followed it. The intimidation & dominance exercised in the making of the perverted demands in ALL of these Biblical accounts is both abuse and sin. Though I agree that Lot being declared righteous IS in the comparing of him to his attackers, the comparison is made by God Himself. It is not merely a quotation of Judah. Lastly, the treatment of Ruth & the other secretaries of her generation as well as those in following generations, is abuse/sin. It makes me absolutely sick. So think about how God must feel about it.
What The Perv did to me:
He sent me on errands for 6 weeks. After the first 4 weeks, he started telling me I had to come report to him when an errand was completed. I objected to this, openly stating my 2 reasons: (A) I had already been accomplishing the errands to his satisfaction. I had proven competent enough so as to be trusted, and this without ever having previously reported right back to him. (B) [When he would assign me these errands, it was always while I was in his presence along with the rest of the group of 30 or so]. Since he always gave me my assignments at the close of our group meetings, there was high risk that I would be returning to the room which would no longer have anybody but him in it. He answered me that, nonetheless, I needed to come back to him to report completion. Each & every week. So, that 4th week I came back & told him “It’s all done”. He gave me a speech about how he trusted me. Finally I cut him off, saying “I get it”, & turned to go. He brought it up again, saying “It goes without saying that I can trust you.” Then he said, “What you coming back to talk with me REALLY means is that YOU trust ME.” I told him “Sure I trust you, but I came back because you told me I have to in order to report that I got the thing done.” He sharply said, “That doesn’t matter. That doesn’t matter. [He repeated himself] The point is is that you are here.” IT MADE NO SENSE WHATSOEVER. “Well I’m going”, I replied. He got very facetious, saying that he gave me “permission to depart from the grace of his presence”. [He often liked to speak in extravagantly gallant terms.] I left gladly. The 5th week, he said nothing about my return, nor anything about trust. Instead his monologue was about how, due to his life-coaching, he now perceived me as a grown woman instead of as a mere child. [He had often informed me that I was “dull-witted” & “not very bright” over the past year that I’d been in his group]. He now informed me that my parents had not done a very good job, but that HE had. [This came out of nowhere, since I’d never said anything negative about my parents to him, and since I was 26 years old when I met him. He was 71.] What seemed even stranger was that he held his long shirt sleeve out, almost touching my torso with his elbow, saying: “You & I are wearing the same color.” He then, with the same hand, poked me twice in the abdomen with his index & middle finger. I immediately backed away. He whistled, saying that I had “tight abs”. This freaked me out so much that the next week I skipped part of the task in order to try to return back before the room had cleared out. When I came back, I was in luck; one girl was left! She was muttering about being late for service. “Go ahead & go, I’m coming”, I told her. I grabbed my purse & book-bag as I let The Perv know that “the mission is accomplished”. As I turned to go, he suddenly reached out & tickled my right rib cage. I squealed & scraped his hand away with my inner arm, backing up, since both my hands were full. I pressed both my inner arms against either side of my rib cage. He couldn’t tickle me that way. All of a sudden he lunged at me & jabbed his index & middle fingers hard into my lower abdomen. [With my arms up trying to protect my rib cage, my lower abdomen was, to him, wide open]. He plunged in 3 or 4 jabs before I could YELL out “What are you doing?!?!?!?!?”
He criticized me to both of the pastors when I formally confronted him, saying, “There should have been something verbal by way of objection.” He went on to be adamant that what he did to me was “consensual”. But, initially, he volunteered the information that he had “inappropriately touched” someone when the pastor first told him he was being confronted with an instance of inappropriate touching. He immediately identified this “inappropriate touching” as being done to another gal whose hair he’d suddenly grabbed & jerked so that her head was yanked back. [At the moment that The Perv named her, none of the rest of us was familiar with her or with this instance of “Inappropriate Touching”.] This admission came from The Perv himself. However, with regard to my case, he tried to pass it off as “consensual.” But I ask you: what case of APPROPRIATE touching begs the excuse of it being “consensual”?!?!?!?
I went to the cops nearly 3 years after the fact. It took me that long to develop my own autonomy, to face what had happened, & to finally quit caring what others’ expectations of me were. Even though I had a well-rounded life outside of the organization. Even though I was 27 years old when it happened. Even though the organization itself was/is not a cult. The police asked a couple questions, then told me that if I had reported it within 30 minutes they would have come & arrested The Perv & booked him at least overnight. They said that nonetheless I needed to come down & fill out a police report. I did that. One of the 2 pastors who had administered the confrontational meeting thereby became utterly incensed with me. Back when I first reported it to them, they had asked me if I had filed a police report, or if I intended to do so. I had said “No” & that “No I don’t plan on it. I want to handle it in-house.” After the confrontation, my newfound awareness of what The Perv himself deemed as “inappropriate touching” led me to go to the police. Not to mention his unchecked delusion that what he’d done to me was “consensual”. The Perv submitted his own addendum onto the police report, “categorically” denying what he’d done. [No “consensual” claim there!!!] Meanwhile, he went to one of the 2 pastors & confessed to him that yes, he HAD done it. But that it was Incredulous’ fault. [My fault for having been in that room & for how I was dressed, the latter blame just as he’d accused me of right after the assault.] Finally, at this point, effort was made to get The Perv’s organizational membership stripped. However, nobody reported The Perv’s felony to the police. (It is a felony to file a false police report).
That’s when I got called by the closet-Gothardite pastor in to a “counseling session”. [He was at great odds with the other NON-Gothardite pastor]. I was told I didn’t have enough respect for human authority, that I needed to learn submission to my human authorities. I still have the Umbrella drawing that was drawn up for me right there, flaming missiles hitting little Stick-Figure-Me, because I was “out from under the Umbrella”. I was told to get into submission to my human authorities, that THEN I would obtain protection. (Another Umbrella drawn with Stick-Figure-Me “safely” underneath.)
Maybe this is the reason that Gothard’s teaching is not anywhere in the Bible but rather is something that he (a fallible man) says?
My head is spinning trying to figure out what he was thinking here. Regardless, that was anything but “consensual”. It was bizarre . . . and he blamed your clothing on the need to poke you? My requests for more information were simply to try to find a context for your comments. What happened to you was very wrong. No young lady should ever have to be afraid of being touched by a man against her will.
Is the point of your earlier statements above to declare “dominance” a sin, per se? That I am not tacking with. “Abuse” is a much abused word, but the Bible does use it, which was the reason for the quotes, as in “the very word”:
Judges 19:25
“But the men would not hearken to him: so the man took his concubine, and brought her forth unto them; and they knew her, and abused her all the night until the morning: and when the day began to spring, they let her go.”
Incredulous,
You did the right thing in reporting even if 3 years late. I think in telling your story here is that others that have had similar violations will step forward, sooner than later and report as well. What really should have happen is that the pastors you originally complained to, should likewise have immediately called the police as well as removed this pervert from ministry to protect others. I’m sure if he did this to you, he did this to others since people like this usually have many more victims. I hope this pervert isn’t in any more Churches in positions where he has access to anyone. Churches that cover for people like this and not reporting it to police are participating in the perpetuation of crime because this is what this is, a sexual assault crime.
When dominance is exercised to get another person into a position that is therefore acknowledged as one they would never get themself into, then yes it’s wrong. Conspiring of Lot’s daughters to get their father drunk was one such instance. You notice they never said to each other “Hey, one of these times that our dad gets drunk we should take advantage of him.” No, they didn’t say that; they manipulated him to get him into a situation where they could then rape him. That is abuse, in & of itself, especially since the initial trickery likely went against his established personal standards.
In my case, it was abusive of The Perv to override my year-long habit of only being around any man while in the company of others. Let alone in light of my expressed concern about having to report back to him when we would be alone. He tore down my scruples with his dominance, even if he’d acted right other than that (which he did not). That could have set me up to learn to likewise obey another pervert even if he himself hadn’t turned out to be one.
Agreed. Especially when you opened your mouth and made it quite plain, erasing any chance of confusion in his heart. And then daring to blame some really bizarre behavior on your clothing is unconscionable.
Compare your account with those in the lawsuit. To a woman they explain that they had no idea that this or that was “abusive” and damaging . . . until years later, in most cases 20 years. Comparing that with your own revulsion and violent reaction, does that make sense to you? In the only instance I am aware where a young lady reacted to something (as I recall, Bill putting his hand on her back to help her into the van), he immediately assumed responsibility for it, and it never happened again.
My expressed concern about coming back to an empty room with just him in it centered on all my friends having already left. I had pointed out that my friends would already have arrived in the vicinity of where my errand was to, so, why couldn’t I just stay with them as soon as I completed it?!?! Also, The Perv himself would be there fairly soon, too……… so why couldn’t he just look to see that I’d done my assignment when he got there?!?!? I had no fear of being alone with him until the 5th week when he first tickled me (lightly & only a couple brushes of his fingertips). And all I did at that time was to hastily back up. I thought it shockingly inappropriate, but didn’t know how to convey this. Also, my year there in The Perv’s group had me purposefully never being alone with him because I liked being with my friends, not because I had morals against being alone with a man. But The Perv didn’t know that. When I told him I didn’t want to come back to report I said “by then everyone will be gone.” He had no idea that I was only referring to wanting to be with my friends without any reference to proper policy. And, he himself had been told prior to any of this to never, EVER be alone with a female student either there at the organization or outside of it. Even if he’d had some way of realizing that my concern wasn’t over being alone, but instead wishing to be with my friends, he was still being a controlling bully in isolating me in this way. P.S. I have been alone with just one other man (various ones) for hours at a time while on the job. Probably hundreds of times I’ve been in that scenario. I have even been alone for 10 minutes or so with other men in church. Nothing remotely like that EVER happened any of these other times. And, as to that tickling that 5th week that freaked me out so much that I skipped part of the errand to try to get back while people would still be there: THIS is what I would only have long belatedly realized was “damaging” & “abusive” even though I instantly knew in to be inappropriate. Inappropriateness that disrespects one’s very personhood is always “damaging” & “abusive.” I am in some ways blessed that The Perv was such a pervert. This way, he acted so bizarrely that it simply could not be long-suppressed (except for almost 3 years). It is, I am sure, easier to report assault that is overtly violent than that which is more calculated to be subtle.
Are we reading the same account?!?!? Because Bill Gothard most absolutely did NOT take responsibility for touching Robin when she nearly lost her footing. He made clear that he was still the teacher in the confrontations that followed, lecturing her on how men desist from such actions if someone in her position gives the right signals to effect this. (In itself a nominally incorrect statement). He thereby subjected her to instruction in a meeting called by her & her father in which THEY were HIS spiritual benefactors!!! Talk about turning tables. Furthermore, he said he apologized for the “misunderstanding”. He therefore assumed the status quo as his version, not hers, & that SHE misunderstood what reality actually was. He apologized for not making his status quo more clear so that she could have avoided “misunderstanding” his action. Everything that he said was based the assumption that she had no correct perception of what had taken place. Only he did. He assumed no responsibility whatsoever. Instead he directly inferred that she was confused. This is gas-lighting & blame-shifting.
I just reread. It sounds like Robin does not even remember the van incident, although she allows that it happened. According to Bill the parents called the meeting because of that. What he apparently told a friend of hers is the story he also told me in the last year. So . . . the van incident, which he recounted with clarity, certainly was a bigger deal than seems to come out in the RG account. The Lord knows.
What I said was correct, and magnified by his comments to her. You telegraphed your unhappiness with the “attention” being directed to you . . . which your “boss” chose to ignore. Bill has always been very focused on being sensitive to those he works with . . . and responding accordingly. I have yet to become aware of a situation where a counselee or staff member expressed discomfort with a situation and it was not corrected. A chasm of difference, being based on a completely different set of motivations.
Alfred,
the other accounts on RG mention that Bill Gothard repeatedly put his hands on the backs of different girls going in and out of vans. Starting with Lizzie’s account. This just isn’t a one time incident with Robin. It is also mentioned in the other accounts.
I agree that this was not a one time incident. It begs the question of whether it was a bad thing. In a day gone by, such things were considered honorable and chivalrous, and Bill is a student of such olden time protocols. Some women do not like to be touched, ever, for any reason . . . which is important to know. Others are just fine. As long as the boundary rules are clear, or clarified, it is all good.
“old time protocols” that you are referring to never included “touching”. The old time protocols of chivalry behaviors of men towards women included but not limited to: opening doors for women, letting the woman go first, getting up from your seat on a bus and offering your seat to a woman that just came on etc. etc. etc.. In other words, “ladies first”. That is old fashioned protocol and it doesn’t include any sort of touching at all. One sees “old time protocols” on the Titanic where women and children went on the limited life boats first and the men stayed back to die. THAT is old fashioned, old time, chivalry behaviors and it has nothing to do with touching anyone female for any reason what so ever. But when one has pumped their head full of men as the “authority” and the boss and the leader, these sorts of “ladies first” acts go out the door. Alfred, I have know idea how today in court will turn out, but trying to justify Bill’s “touching” as old time behaviors is grasping at straws.
Even on the surface that is wrong . . . you are making these rules up as you go. Taking a lady’s hand or arm to assist her was, in fact, quite common. I cannot believe you would suggest that any gentleman would not do something proper to help if a lady stumbled while attempting to enter a conveyance . . . what would most definitely involve a “touch”. A kiss of greeting on the hand – some even allege that cheek smacks were in order, more in the south.
The incidences of touching girl’s backs as they go in and out of van do not mention or have nothing to do with stumbling and that Bill has just trying to be a “chivalrous” man in helping them out. Likewise, taking off one’s shoes in vans and then proceeding to play “footsie” as recorded by all the accounts absolutely have nothing to do with “chivalrous” behaviors. Likewise, using a 17th century lithograph from an immoral and godless French Court does not prove your point either. Considering Bill’s courtship teaching that the Duggars have fleshed out for the world to see that basically is over the top obsession with hand holding, hugs, kisses etc fly in the face of so called “chivalrous” touching behaviors that your are trying to justify here for Bill. You can’t spin this really any further and if this is going to be Bill’s defense in a court of law by saying “Well I’m just some old fashioned kinda guy and in my view, old fashioned kinda guys didn’t keep their paw off girls” is going to fly like a lead ballon.
You make many authoritative statements based on your own perceptions and, well, authority. We strongly disagree. And we are wandering from the main point, which is that when any unwanted attention or even touch was brought to his attention, that never happened again.
No. They do relate to a man with constant pain in his feet from years of doing standing seminars 6 days a week getting comfortable on long van rides and poking his male and female companions to get their attention.
So, I don’t mind entertaining concerns and challenges . . . but if you intend to hunker down on every minor point, where a woman of less intelligence and experience would readily concede the point based on it being obvious, well, not helping anyone.
And if you expect to “keep up”, drop the prejudices and at least approach this in a reasonable way. Not everyone thinks like you do, especially outside a tainted perspective of Bill Gothard. Start by admitting that I have a valid point here. You may argue that Bill went way beyond what I say he did, and offer your proof, but . . . at some point closing your eyes and denying becomes partisan politics.
My habits & the verbal expression of my will to be with my friends was very apparently an “obstacle” in The Perv’s view. So he deliberately paved the way for his perversion by using his clout to set me up into isolation with him. As I said, even if he had at the last minute changed his mind about sexually assaulting me, he still had already overridden healthy social connections & friend-focus that I had developed. This, in itself, was abuse. I reckon it akin to if Lot’s daughters decided at the last minute not to commit rape. They still plotted & manipulated, they still coerced so as to have their victim in a compromised state that was only thus because of their sinning in these ways………. they still abused. Lot would have still woke up with a hangover. Twice. Same hypothesis if the “worthless fellows” of Gibeah & Sodom had given up on their own in the middle of their attempts to lay hold of either the Levite or Lot. They had already indeed assaulted so much as to elicit offers of sexual favors from these 2 victims. This is wrong. It is sin. What made it easier for me to see that The Perv was committing perversion was the logistical acrobatics. I happen to know (second-hand) specific instances in which The Perv was just as much of a pervert in 3 different natural settings. He hijacked these normal life settings to take advantage of 3 other women in similar ways to what he did to me. I have experienced these instances described to me by 1st-hand witnesses. It was easier for me to report to The Perv’s management & to the Police than it was for them, although they all eventually did so, due to the extenuated manuevering of The Perv in my case. I assume that most of what the other 25 first-hand witnesses who reported him to his superiors and/or the police over the years did so over “natural setting”-type perversion although I am not sure.
Reminds me of a story from “The Hiding Place” or similar account, I forget now. All of the women inmates were inexplicably moved, one day, a rather involved and arduous task. The woman relating the story had to go back to the vacated area for some business . . . to discover the commandant having sex with another inmate. In other words . . . he moved heaven and earth to have a single dalliance. Such is the corrupt heart of motivated pervert. Men have been known to plot for months, spend insane amounts of money . . . for one tryst.
“There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not:
The way of an eagle in the air;
the way of a serpent upon a rock;
the way of a ship in the midst of the sea;
and the way of a man with a maid.” (Prov. 30:18-19)
I am very familiar with “The Hiding Place” after having read it several times I do not recall this particular story being mentioned there. Corrie did mention the times that the inmates were stripped naked and forced to walk in front of the guards to bath and what brought them strength was the realization that Jesus hung on the cross naked in total humiliation as well. I am not following your quote from Proverbs 30 here because that particular set of verses is a demonstration of the mystery and beauty of intimate relations between men and women as God designed it and someone that is a guard forcing himself most likely on some poor inmate is not a mystery or beauty but a sick and twisted perversion of what God designed and intended.
I recall the account quite specifically . . . there were many more stories of believers subjected to some levels of internment abuse. It was amusing to the one who observed because of the effort the commandant went to . . . for one sex act. Let’s leave that one there.
I do not take the quotation from Proverbs 30 to indicate something that Solomon considered “wonderful”, but, in the sense of the original word, something so amazingly complex as to be incomprehensible. The laws of physics fail to give us a good handle on which way a ship is going to pitch next on a stormy night . . . An eagle’s flight is unpredictible because we do not see what it sees from high up . . . a snake on a rock weaves about in an unpredictible manner because we do not see what it sees from up close . . . and the direction a man will take with a maid . . . is similarly incomprehensible. You are just left shaking your head – “I don’t get it, WHY would he do that?”.
I’m not sure how you read Proverbs 30 and come to the rather negative conclusion that you do. In verse 18,19, Agar starts out with the word wonderful and I’m not sure if you have ever watched an eagle or hawk in the sky but the fact that they spread their large beautiful wings and without flapping them, seemingly float effortless in circles. Like the song in Oklahoma, “and watch a hawk making lazy circles in the sky”. Likewise, a snake without legs, arms or appendages moves rather effortlessly and effectively around. A ship on the high seas, moving from point A to point B, without a road and using wind, waves and currents. All these things can be explained now by our understanding of physics but still, they are all amazing and wonderful and incredible. So, Agar then concludes with “the way of a man with a maiden” and at least in my Bible commentary is talking about the wonderment of procreation of human life. Many of the other verses of Proverbs 30 talk about paradoxes and amazements of nature. To say that Agar is talking about the “unpredictable” seems to miss the tone and point of at least these two verse in Proverbs 30. Wonder is not unpredictable. Wondering or amazement or curiosity is pondering God’s incredible creation and how different things work in it whether we have all the answers or understanding about it. And even if we do have the answers of physics, I still would rather “watch a hawk making lazy circles in the sky” and still be amazed at God’s beautiful creation and the creatures in it. And the most amazing and incredible is how God has designed the man and the woman to come together and out of that, bring forth life as we are carefully “knitted together” in our mother’s womb.
A ship being tossed senseless in the midst of the sea is as wonderful as standing at the base of Mount St. Helens as it began to explode. Unpredictable and life threatening. Fortunately some correctly predicted what the mountain was doing and got out in time, barely . . . others never lived to tell.
You have much to learn, grasshopper. “Fluid Mechanics” remains one of the most stubbornly difficult aspects of physics to codify, understand. As a testimony to that, as top scientists were hired back in the 1950s to develop the, at that time, very top secret ballistic missile program, they were forced to sit in a conference room for weeks, waiting for their security clearances . . . so they could even find out why they were hired. How did they spend their time? Testing the direction a whirlpool develops as still water begins to drain, in this case from a coffee urn. It was a top notch problem for the best brains available . . . and not much has changed.
There is nothing terribly wonderful about sex, truth be told. The acts, the emotions that get us from generation to generation as about are studied and understood as anything out there. What IS amazing is how it affects otherwise intelligent people . . . who suddenly do the most bizarre, even dangerous, immoral, illegal, things . . . those with everything to lose, little to gain. THAT is still hard to grasp . . . as it keeps surprising us, generation after generation. Solomon, who most people are sure was “Agar” and wrote these words, was Exhibit A, what with his 1,000 wives and unparalleled wisdom. It is said that the wisest man (Solomon), the most innocent man (Adam), the strongest man (Samson), and the man most “after God’s heart” (David) all fell because of a woman. Add to that the man closest to God (Moses) who at least did something the people of God around him felt was wrong with the “Ethiopian woman” he married late in life (between 80 and 120), NOT Zipporah, who was a Midianite. The two “best” that did NOT fall . . . were the “most righteous man” (Job) and the “man of faith” (Abraham). There is no need to read endless significance into all of this . . . other than that “the way of a man with a maid” remains the most confusing, unpredictable, destructive, shocking, uncontrolled thing . . . all the while still being “wonderful”, as we would use the word.
Are you calling me a “grasshopper”? I haven’t called you any names! I am still at a loss even more so at the conclusions you have furthered espoused here. I’m sorry, but I don’t see those verses from Proverbs 30 negatively as you do. I think actually they are quite sad. I’ll leave it at that.
“Grasshopper” is a way of addressing the unenlightened by the enlightened . . . far eastern gurus. Was meant to evoke a smile.
You are beginning to crack me up Alfred! I’m totally surprised that a fundamentalist Christian like yourself would use an “eastern guru” concept. Maybe the real grasshopper here isn’t me but you :)! I’m not sure if you ever heard of him but Fr. Michael Scanlan just recently died January 7th. The name probably doesn’t mean anything to you, but he was a pretty big name among Catholics, especially since he took a failing Catholic University in Steubenville and turned it around to become a powerhouse. He had a law degree from Yale and was even a college room mate of George Steinbrenner. At once point when at college, he become so distressed by what is truth and reality and who is God, that he went out into the woods and sat under a tree to figure it all out. After a day and night in the woods, he got his answer and he eventually became a Franciscan priest and the rest is history. I really think Alfred that you need to take a brake from all of this and pull a Fr. Scanlan and take some time to be alone with God and maybe get some peace and even some “enlightenment” :). I think it would do you a world of good.
from one grasshopper to another.
Haha! Well . . . the irony is in my trying to pretend to be an all knowing far eastern guru . . . as little care as I have for such things. Not even a physics guru. I know something about fluid mechanics . . . only because I work for the company where the Big Brains were intently hunkered over a coffee urn . . . trying to figure out which way the water would twirl . . . and why.
If so called “big brains” are sitting around trying to figure out which way the coffee is going to whirl out of some urn, then I think these “big brains” have way too little to do and think about. What ever happen to the correalas effect? Maybe these “big brains” are not so big after all if this is what they are pondering. Not to bust your bubble here, but if I have anyone fall in the category of “guru”, they probably are in black with a collar and the head guy is in white. I’m also not sure what fluid mechanics have to do with eagles gliding in the sky or snakes slithering on the ground. I would highly suggest for the “big brains” to retake 8th grade science to learn about why water drains one way above the equator and another below the equator . My daughter just studied this, she could probably explain it if these “big brains” forgot 8th grade science.
Oh, Rob, for once you are completely out of your depth. “Fluid mechanics, especially fluid dynamics, is an active field of research with many problems that are partly or wholly unsolved. ” (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_mechanics) These men were the ones who built the first ballistic missiles for the US . . . this really was “rocket science”.
And the relationship back to Prov. 30 is simply that . . . to predict the way waves will toss a ship in the midst of the see requires all of those “partly or wholly unsolved” problems . . . to be solved.
Not really, I understood very well that fluid dynamics or mechanics applied to oceans, seas and waves but fluid dynamics doesn’t explain how an eagle glides in the air or how a snake without arms, legs or appendages slithers along and if you re-read my previous comment, I mentioned both of them AND both of them are mentioned in Proverbs 30:18-19. I think this conversation has gone on the the silly and ridiculous. I think it was an erroneous quote on your part to apply those two verses to abuses in a concentration camp. I do not find the quoted reference of some abusive guard having sex with some inmate in the “Hiding Place” by Corrie ten Boom. Likewise, that particular camp was one of the most abusive camps in Hitler’s system. To make light of all these things in order in the long run to justify Bill Gothard, has twisted your thinking and reasoning here. To boil those to verse down to fluid dynamics because it just happens to mention a ship on the seas is avoiding your misquote and misuse of the Bible in this case.
Breathe 🙂 There is no need to discect, to kill every analogy or story. Perhaps we differ on the overall meaning of that passage in Prov. 30. I think there is at least as much support for my interpretation – that “the way of a man with a maid” is simply unpredictible and incomprehensible, as yours . . . which is that it is simply awesome. Do you disagree with my bewilderment in this area? As long as you have lived, I suspect not. We could wander over to the main point, that, at least to me, the actions of Incredulous’s boss fall into the “you have got to be kidding” category. The hormone driven interactions of otherwise sane individuals still never ceases to bewilder.
I’m not sure what to say but that there is a big difference between wonder or amazement and those of bewilderment or even confusion which is what bewilderment implies. The later comes from more of a negativity. Maybe that is how you are viewing all of this and then quoting them to acts of evil and immorality in one of the worst death camps in history. If all you see is hormones and that is what drives this and per your earlier statements up above that its no big deal or over-rated is a pretty sad statement coming from a man that has 11 children. If you hold that view that God designed and ordained marital acts FOR marriage and that in marriage, this is sacred and even spiritual then I don’t think you would have quoted Proverbs 30 towards Auschwitz. The is nothing wonderful or inspiring about Auschwitz, it is a totally evil hell. But since I consider Bill Gothard to be a mixture of gnosticism which views the physical or the body as evil, what should I expect from one of Bill’s most loyal supporters. I’m not going to change your views Alfred, all I can do or will do is challenge them when I think they are wrong. Change can only come from God and in one’s own heart and mind. Are your children a product of your love with Christina that you both share in together as spouses or are your children just a product of uncontrollable hormones that you can’t comprehend and are bewildered by?
So . . . maybe it is time to move on 🙂 Frankly, this is getting a tad weird. Ships passing in the night.
4 questions to ya:
So are you saying that the commandant’s rape of the inmate was instead him merely having sex with her? Because, when I read the book “Auschwitz”, the Nazis running that particular camp weren’t at all into attaining consent from those whose major life events (e.g. losing virginity &/or dying an unnatural, early, tortured death) was therein dictated. The strict compliance of subordinates there was forced. It was NOT consensual. Corrie’s internment camps were not described as affording anything as being consensual, either.
Is the Prov. 30:18-19 reference Bill’s “life verse”, by chance? If so, this being taken out of context could certainly explain past 47 years………. except he forgot to show any regard for it in light of Steve’s gratifying himself with all the casualties incurred by Bill’s spelling of “wonder” in his “way” with maids. One would think that the desecration of the outward form held forth by Bill in maintaining his hobby would have spurred his defense. If it had any Biblical basis, that is. Odd *principle* that this is in being supposedly Scripture-afforded as something to attain to. A *principle* which, when *followed*, in itself filled the keg with the “Defraud” stamp hidden underneath. Filled it chock-full with the “wonder” of Bill’s “way”. At which gauge-point Bill finally distanced himself a fuse-length & handed this to his brother along with a lighted match. I think history itself has answered my question.
Moving on, do you think that, had he quoted Prov. 30:18-19 to the cops, that The Perv thus arguing with them to get them to expunge the police report would have been successful?
Assuming that The Perv’s quoting of this reference would NOT have met with his success, would this indicate that the prevailing governance in regards to sexual assault is Biblical? (Or, by your ideal, would they be MORE Biblical if Pr. 30:18-19 was the heavyweight verse permitted to weigh in on the subject?) The Bible has A LOT more to say on interaction with maids & related matters (such as sexual assault) than anything that this verse says. Furthermore, it is clearly Solomon speaking for himself. It certainly isn’t God speaking through Solomon on behalf of Himself here! If something a human did was too wonderful for God, whatever that may be would still not elude His full conception of it so much so that He could not attain to it. Especially if this “something” happened to be sin. He attained propitiation for sin on the cross. So, He “gets” a man’s lechery of a maid. He knows everything.
OK, I posted it. Please see my response to Rob to respond to your similar concerns.
Dear brother Alfred,
If your 1970s Kung Fu quote was wasted on Rob, at least one of us smiled. Maybe young Rob was making better use of the 1970s that us who were watching Kung Fu on TV!
Peace,
David K
Is THAT where that is from?! That would be funny indeed.
BTW, posted a lawsuit update . . . new post.
Sure enough, brother. The Kung Fu TV series was so popular during the early 1970s that “grasshopper” became a popular term among my peers. Here is a clip from an episode where the term was used by the blind old mentor to address his young apprentice. I guess if Rob missed that old series she might misunderstand the word and feel insulted. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2yIkDVs0cA
In 1973, my late mother had WATERGATE hearings on and if there was 24 hour TV like now, they would have been on 24/7. I did not watch adolescent boy junk. I knew all the Watergate characters etc. I didn’t not know and don’t care to eastern religion quips.
Dont forget using the “Web Archive”. You can often find the content you are looking for… that has been deleted or is no longer available… unless it was done in a short period of time and/or missed being captured. You may not always find it… but worth the try.
Here’s ‘Rachel’s Story’ you referred to here and a few other misc posts on her page… https://web.archive.org/web/19991013103249/http://members.tripod.com/Glenwood37/homepage.htm
Excellent, thank you. The page has been updated to correct the broken link.