For the leaders of this people cause them to err, and they that are led by them are destroyed. Isaiah 9, 16
Dear Reader!
In the last post we got to know "Sandy" from the US who married the co-leader of my cult. I will tell her story from my perspective with love because that is what I had always felt for her, but the truth remains painful. If she ever reads my recollection of the time when our paths crossed for a few years I hope she will find my memory to be honoring and accurate.
Obviously Sandy and the co-leader barely knew each other as they had not spent much time together but a week at a time during international conferences, over the phone and maybe skype. And more than that Sandy barely had a clue what she had gotten herself into concerning our little group of Zombies. The leader fooled her with his charm.
She moved over to Germany to get married and have a leadership role next to the two leaders. She had proven herself to the leader; he had gotten to know her a little better by travelling to the US after the infamous women's conference and spoke of her only in highest terms, she would be a shepherd to our apostolic group (that had an apostle and a co-apostle but no other apostolic roles filled, as described in Ephesians 4). We women were looking forward to a more feminine leadership style.
You could argue that it is pretty drastic and maybe even foolish to follow a fairly unknown man into his country, which language you don't speak, to marry him and give up your former life. And that is what some people did tell her.
But Sandy told all the voices of doubt in her life back in the US that this was God working out his romantic magic. That her leaving everything behind after a guy visiting from Germany for a week and proposing to her, to live in Germany was what she believed God had arranged for her to do. She said she had seen signs and visions all over the place for a while, feeding her obsessive faith that she will get married soon. And then came the man from Germany to propose. It had to be God. She even used the term of "divinely arranged marriage".
Her first weeks with us were ecstatic. We were excited to have her among us. She was excited to be among us. It was the middle of December of 2007. I at that time was still suffering from my broken relationship with James. The two love birds were very much attracted to each other and could barely keep there hands off of each other. We had never seen the co-leader so happy and relaxed. Sandy lived with one of the women of our group, enjoyed getting to know our Christmas spirited city, and started to focus on applying for permanent residency next to planing her wedding, which I helped her with. There were also plans of her learning to speak German, but that is easier said than done in a quite English-savvy country. I spent a lot of time with her, as the co-leader was busy being the co-leader and I, having been a college student, had more free time on my hands.
Falling from Grace so soon
It was somewhere in those first weeks that the leader told me when I was alone with him in the car, that a wife should not be involved in her husband's ministry. After all, his own wife was not part of the group either. That was true. I had often wondered how she was doing with her husband being absent most of the day, especially knowing that he had entertained an affair with a young woman he claimed to disciple not too long ago.
I was shocked and told him that he had presented her as an apostolic shepherd leader to us. He said he now had his doubts about that. I left the conversation feeling terrible for Sandy. She had come with the clear expectation that she would be a leader in our group, side by side with her husband, ministering to foreigners, her personal dream (granted she was more drawn towards an East-European or Middle-East population, but who knew what God had in store for her, right?).
What had happened? I have come to believe that the leader felt threatened by Sandy.
-He knew that she had worked closely with internationally known individuals in the US he wanted to be close with- but had been ignored by.
-She had a lot of experience leading people.
-She had her own opinions.
-She disagreed with the leader on some things.
-She was very meek. She had God-given authority.
-She naturally assumed leadership during a healing prayer which I recall vividly; the holy spirit had shifted the authority from the leader's hands, who usually led prayers, into hers and the leader did not know what to do about this strange sensation but to stop the whole meeting, later blaming her for undermining him. It was awkward for everybody involved.
-Being a narcissist, he also must have hated to have to share his best friend now with a woman.
-He did not even get the pleasure of "prophesying" to the co-leader who he would marry like he had tried in the past, the co-leader had acted all on his own.
This marriage was not going to be beneficial to the leader at all. So now the leader's plan was to just get them married and have her get pregnant right away so she can stay at home, keep her mouth shut, and he can have his best friend and most loyal servant back.
Happily married ever after?
In the new year things did not change for the better. Their wedding in March certainly was a highlight for the whole group and brought a bunch of US visitors, some of them quite suspicious, to our group. But unfortunately for Sandy she got very sick. It started with a cold that would not go away and developed back into a tonsillitis which she had been treated for back in the US. But back then she had run out of money to pay for all the antibiotics she needed to get completely bacteria free- to support her sister instead. By that time we actually thought that God had sent Sandy to us not for our sake but to literally save her life as she had medical coverage as soon as she had married and with that accesss to medication. I remember telling her that if she had been with us we would have made her aware of her unhealthy bond with her mentally sick sister. I recall her responding that in America people are careful with intruding into someone's personal life.
But the months after her wedding went by and not only did she not get pregnant she also did not get better. Soon she was limping and could not move one of her arms anymore due to the inflammation that had spread throughout her body. I recall the leader mentioning that her not getting pregnant was a sign for her spiritual state.
One evening the co-leader led a gathering and the few of us sat as usual in our too big room for the small amount of people that we were as he stood in front of us by the podium struggling to get the meeting started. We had never seen him looking so pathetic and small. We had no idea what was going on with him, but apparently it must have been very challenging because for the next hour or two we did nothing but stand and listen to the song "Turn your eyes on Jesus" performed by Hillsong in a loop at the top of the speakers ability, ... over and over again. That is all I remember happening that night. Needless to say that I needed some time to stop associating Hillsong music with the cult.
Soon after that, and please forgive me as I do not recall the exact chronology of the events, I sat with Sandy in her kitchen. She was but a shadow of herself and told me in a quiet voice looking down at the floor that her husband had told her that she is more rebellious than all of us women together and that he is considering to kick her out of the group. There she sat at the kitchen table looking like a weak, cried-out little girl that faced the worst punishment she could imaging: Having to watch alone from the inside as others were joyfully playing outside. I felt so sorry for her. I was wondering if I would be allowed to still hang out with her if she got kicked out. Usually the rules were clear- leaving the group on what ever terms meant something was terribly wrong with that person and God had basically forsaken them. But this was the co-leader's wife! Would he be able to treat her like that? I put the two events together and realized that he had attempted to find some sanity after this terrible fight with her that one night a few days ago.
Days later she told us women, when she was allowed to join us again, that in another fight he eventually sat down on their bed totally broken and asked her if he should release her back to the US. That, according to her, was the sweetest thing ever, softened her heart towards him, and made her agree with what ever they couldn't agree on before. She seemed better after that, at least her staying in the group was out of the question. Apparently it also helped to "cut all unhealthy soul ties" with friends and relatives in the US, meaning that she had to delete her facebook account and other social networks she was a part of. Any time she considered traveling to the US, be it for a funeral, wedding or because she missed her family and friends, her husband would "sense in the spirit" that she wasn't to leave the country.
Falling apart
In the year 2008 in front of our very eyes fell apart that woman who we got to know as a spiritual powerhouse, lioness, and picture of gracefulness. She became more and more careful in what she dared to speak out loud, as the walls had ears in our group, sounded more like her extremly critical husband in the harsher way she was suddenly seeing fault that needed to be addressed right away everywhere in our women's group, and one had to be careful what to say around her as she over-spiritualized even the most common comment, sometimes carrying it to the co-leader as well; which meant more feared sudden "announcements calls".
The climax of her physical and maybe emotional suffering probably took place when she needed a tonsillectomy in the fall of 2008. Expressing how much he did not care for her (or of course, based on the "holy spirit's leading"), the leader had scheduled a mission trip for himself and the co-leader to India to start a couple of days after her surgery.
Before they went on this trip, leaving Sandy in the care of us women, we had a meeting at her hospital. During that meeting, as we all went for a walk on the hospital grounds, Sandy publicly apologized to the leader and repented for rebelling against his authority. We had been trained to look at sickness as an expression of some kind of sin as the root cause, but I still was shocked that she felt convicted of this daring crime! She looked him straight in the eyes with a dead-serious face and spoke out those words. It was a courageous, if not desperate, move on her part.
The leader appreciated the gesture and publicly forgave her and prayed for her healing. Truth be told- she slowly got better after this. Back then I had thought it was her repentance- now I am seeing also the fact that she had surgery as a factor in this nightmare equation. By that time James and I had gotten engaged and he actually witnessed this strange moment.
Would God ask a fresh husband to leave his even fresher out of (for an adult) traumatic surgery coming wife for a week to go build his kingdom somewhere far else? Somehow I doubt it. But apparently the co-leader felt it was the right thing to do, so off they went and mostly I and another woman did our best to keep Sandy company, and help her through the painful post-surgery week. She was in a lot of pain and had long lost access to her sweet and upbeat personality.
Already during the first evening she had a melt-down about how I am not providing the care I should and she wishes that they had left her with someone more mature and mommy-like. I apologized profusely, realizing that I had no experience in tending to a very sick person. But there was more to the story.
The night before I had a dream in which I was Sandy. My tonsils were removed, which I was awake for in my dream, I felt incredible pain, and then I cried out from the bottom of my heart "Husband, why did you leave me alone in this?". I told her about my dream and finally there was a moment of long desired honesty; she was heartbroken about her new husband leaving her alone in this. She had put on the obedience mask until then but finally dared to express that it was challenging for her.
"Not to idolize" her constantly absent husband was apparently something God was working on with her (and coincidentally? also with all the few other wives of the group) and she said she needs to look at it as part of her sanctification.
The week until he returned remained painful for her, physically and emotionally, quite sacrificial for me, and she had to make one more emergency trip to the hospital which was very discomforting for her, but I will spare you the details.
Of course the leader was raving about their India-trip, claiming all sorts of great experiences, and God-led appointments. After all the trip was force-sponsored by one of the younger members (but that is a different story), so it better had been meaningful. The co-leader turned out to not have had such a great time as he was sick himself most of the trip.
Turning the page
Towards the end of the year overall things started to change for Sandy. She got pregnant and seemed happier. Probably due to her weakened condition she would have qualified for worst-first-trimester-ever-award, as she threw up after eating or not eating seemingly all the time. After a while she was able to figure out some specific food sensitivities, but her situation offered little to envy.
She had caved in. She was not the Sandy we knew anymore. She spoke and sounded like an English speaking female version of the co-leader who was an impersonation of the leader. But she was one of us regulars, not a leader. She now had found her position at the co-leader's side who stood at the leader's side, which was being a quiet intercessor and becoming a quiet mother. The Sandy we knew had to leave, she could not survive under the incredible emotional, physical and spiritual pressure the leader essentially caused.
She did what we all did when we thought that leaving was not an option: Become a Zombie.
After giving birth to their first child we didn't see much of Sandy. She barely was present at meetings or services as the leader did not like (baby-) interruptions during his speaking times. Mothers could partake by listening to the Internet live-stream of services that James helped set up. I would visit her to spend some time with her.
A week after James and I got married she called me with a very interesting dream she had about me, but this I will share in a different post.
The last communication I ever had with her was a text message from her to warn me to not engage in a discussion about the leader in an upcoming dinner with my visiting new parents-in-law, after she had tuned into the service live-stream with a standing-out-insane-message from the leader that we all had attended.
I know very little about her current situation but that she now has more kids and loves her role as a mother, but she still has not been back to the US ever.
Why did Sandy not see that (again) the leader was practically the source of all her problems? That marrying the co-leader meant basically being wed to the leader, since the co-leader mostly gave up thinking for himself a long time ago? What were the details of her disagreements with the leader?
I suspect that at the begining of her time with us she did notice controlling, opressive and old-testament fashioned dictator theology induced behaviour, especially compared to the more polite and edifying "american style" she was used to (which the leader liked to mock). But pointing that out had made her the target of the leader's sudden disapproval in the first place.
I recall a meeting between the leaders and her before the wedding that was supposed to clarify things, but all the leader did in this meeting was blaming the "obviously unresolved issue of abuse in her childhood" for her current rebellion, furthering her disempowerment (since I was helping out with the renovation of their living space I overheard parts of the conversation, she shared a little about it as well). I now think that her past issues had been more resolved that she realized herself as they had made her extra-sensitive to the abuse that was going on in our group.
The leader did not want to be challenged. Seeing him act for three years it became obvious that he would shut down, attack, or kick out any voice of critisicm. All he wanted was a group of faithful followers that jump on his command. If a person had no alterior motive, "no skin in the game", they would smell the herring and disappear. With Sandy's strong desire, I call it truly an obsession, of getting married soon, she had "her eyes on the prize", namely marrying the man that proposed to her, rather than looking seriously at the flashing red flags and the blaring alarm sirens that presented themselves in the three months before their wedding.
I am not saying that it was not God's plan for those two to get married. The co-leader's slavish obedience to the leader put these two in the mess they were in for a while and probably still would be had Sandy not given in. He also could have realized that the leader and his control were the real issue in the scenario, but he had made his according to himself "lifetime deciscion" to be covanented to the leader, which apparantly included accepting abuse and bringing other people into the same abusive scenario.
This was her story as far as I am able to tell it. If you ever feel moved to pray for her, go ahead. I want to doubt that all the potential God has put in this wonderful woman will fall short of what it was supposed to accomplish in this world just because of a Zombie-leader and a sad impersonator.
To discovering that the Good News are much better than we thought!
