Practices Not Seen In The Bible

There are a number of things which happen in churches that do not get questioned by members and they should. Things are accepted and perpetuated because new people come in, witness what happens, and accept that this is the way something is done.

In Apostolic churches, they will tell people they are lost if they do not speak in tongues (because they teach that is the initial evidence of receiving the Spirit). This creates an unhealthy atmosphere as many people struggle to get this alleged evidence, all the while feeling lost and possibly rejected by God in the process. Some never do.

Many of us never stopped to think while reading the New Testament, that it never speaks of things being done that we see in some churches today. When people spoke in tongues in Acts 2, 10 & 19, it shows no one screaming in anyone’s ears, holding up their arms, grabbing their chin, pounding on their back, wailing while waiting for it to happen, and all of the other things that may be seen today.

I once shared a five minute video that showed people praying with a young male, who supposedly started speaking in tongues. At some point after it was shared, they made the video private.

In the video you could see people talking to him, some yelling, “Come on!” They got by his ear or right in his face and either talked to or yelled at him. Some pounded the floor or stomped their feet near him. They wailed and had concerned looks on their faces, even after he said he had the Spirit. Most everyone was making noise at the same time while he lay on the floor and periodically thrashed around. There really wasn’t much else he could do since he was crowded by church members. It was intense.

There were many hands placed on him. They grabbed his arms, sometimes moving them around. They touched his legs, head, chest- even hitting on his chest. How were any of these actions supposed to help him speak in tongues?

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Informational post on speaking in tongues #14: Almost Got The Spirit

This is just a little ‘did you know’ informational post on the subject of speaking in tongues, shared as some food for thought.

Another thing that often happens in Apostolic churches is people being told they “almost got the Holy Ghost/Spirit.” This is different from mainstream Pentecostal churches because Apostolics believe that speaking in tongues is the “initial evidence” of having received the Spirit. Because of this, if a person fails to speak in tongues, they are considered lost. Some will say this is not related to spiritual abuse, but I disagree. When you tell people that God “almost” gave them His Spirit, it leaves the person fearful and frustrated. Let’s look into this.

I don’t know how many times I have heard it said since the early 1980s that someone “almost” got the Holy Spirit. Perhaps the person expressed joy or had what some term “stammering lips.” Maybe they stumbled over their words (sometimes due to exhaustion). The person might be told this “almost” happened or, at the very least, people who are established in the church will think this or say it to someone else.

The person who was “tarrying” for the Spirit may walk away drained, tired and defeated in their spirit. Why didn’t God go all the way and just given them His Spirit? Why did God withhold? Is there something bad in their heart? Do they have unrepented sin? Do they lack faith? Could God be rejecting them? Maybe they need to stop some bad habit first? What if something happens to them before this happens? Oh, no, they don’t want to be lost! Many questions, doubts and fears can fill the mind of the person who “almost” received God’s Spirit.

Where did this belief come from? Can we find any instances in the Bible where someone “almost” received God’s Spirit? Can we find Jesus or any of the apostles teaching that this can happen? For those reading who have been subject to this teaching, have you taken the time to search your Bible to see if anything related to this is found there? This is a teaching that has been passed from person to person through the years and has been accepted by many. It causes unnecessary turmoil and fear.

One biblical incident that some might attempt to use in an effort to teach this is found in Acts 8, where the Gospel is delivered to the Samaritans, people believe and are water baptized, and yet they did not receive the Spirit right then. (There is not space to go into the other aspects of the incident in this post and so I am sticking with my main thought.) While this is true, they did not “almost” receive the Spirit as that was something absolutely impossible. Why? The Spirit had not fallen on any of them yet. Because of this, no one can use Acts 8 to prove that someone can “almost” get the Spirit.

Another incident some try to use is in Acts where Paul “almost” persuades Agrippa to be a Christian. This has to do with a person believing on and placing their faith in Jesus and has nothing to do with him “almost” being filled with the Spirit.

There is not one incident in all of the Bible where it is shared that a person “almost” got the Holy Spirit. Not one time do we find anyone teaching that a believer can “almost” receive the Spirit. I know this may be hard for some to realize, but it simply is nowhere to be found. If we cannot find trace of it in the Bible, why do we teach and accept this today? Has God changed? Has He lost some of his power and authority down through the years?

What the Bible does teach is that the Holy Spirit is a gift from God. Jesus shared that He is our Comforter. Believers are sealed with the Spirit. Why would God “almost” give a person this gift? How would God “almost” give a person this gift? If God so loves the world and God so desires us to have a relationship with Him, why would anyone “almost” be given His Spirit? Stop and think about this.

Don’t continue to live in fear or spend days, weeks or months worrying about what is wrong with you that you only “almost” received God’s Spirit. This is a man-made teaching that causes people to be fearful and to believe God is not yet accepting them. Doing this to a believer is spiritual abuse.

Informational post on speaking in tongues #14: Almost Got the Spirit
Informational post on speaking in tongues #13: Praying Through
Informational post on speaking in tongues #12: Stammering Lips
Informational post on speaking in tongues #11: Prophesy
Informational post on speaking in tongues #10: One of many gifts
Informational post on speaking in tongues #9: Continued evidence
Informational post on speaking in tongues #8: Acts 8
Informational post on speaking in tongues #7: Acts 19:6
Informational post on speaking in tongues #6: Speaking in tongues a second time
Informational post on speaking in tongues #5: Acts 10:45-46
Informational post on speaking in tongues #4: Known languages
Informational post on speaking in tongues #3: 1 Corinthians 12:29-30
Informational post on speaking in tongues #2: 1 Corinthians 14:27-28
Informational post on speaking in tongues #1: Pray to interpret

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Informational post on speaking in tongues #13: Praying Through

This is just a little ‘did you know’ informational post on the subject of speaking in tongues, shared as some food for thought.

One thing that often happens in Apostolic churches is “praying through.” This is stressed for when one sins (real or perceived), as well as for when one “backslides” and leaves one of these churches. Now, some will say this is not related to spiritual abuse, but I disagree. When you tell people that they are no longer saved or that God hasn’t accepted them back simply because you have not heard the person speak in tongues again, it causes harm to the person. It puts them in fear and they doubt their salvation. It causes some to have a distorted image of God.

This notion of “praying through” basically means that, since Apostolics/Oneness Pentecostals believe speaking in tongues is the initial evidence of receiving the Holy Spirit, many in this group also believe that if a person sins or backslides, they need to “pray through” afterward until they speak in tongues again. Until the tongues are heard, the person is usually perceived as not right with God, not accepted by God and/or still has sin or unrepented sin in their heart. Faith is tossed aside in exchange for some type of tangible proof that God still wants that person.

Sometimes these people are able to quickly speak in tongues again. It is a relief to the person as well as to their fellow members. Sometimes the person never speaks in tongues again. Other times it takes days, weeks, maybe even months before it happens. During this time, the person often fears for their soul, wondering why God hasn’t accepted them. Their fellow members may keep their distance or they may regularly fast and pray for them. In their mind, the individual is holding back, doesn’t want to stop sinning, or has some sin for which they have not yet repented. Leadership may even say fearful things like, “If the rapture took place today, brother x isn’t ready and would be left behind.”

In unhealthy churches, fear is a main motivating factor behind a majority of what is taught and done. Causing someone to believe they have not been accepted by God is as bad as it goes. For a Christian, if you believe God hasn’t accepted you, what hope do you have? Your life is fraught with dread and fear and you spend your time searching yourself to discover just what is so bad that this is happening. You repent of all sorts of things, as well as the things that may be in your heart that you don’t see. Finally one day you manage to speak in tongues again and you are relieved (for the moment). God does really love you! If this happens at home, you may still be seen in the same way by fellow members until they hear you for themselves in a church service.

Where did this notion of “praying through” until you speak in tongues come from? Are you tormented by a teaching that can be found nowhere in the Bible? Are you beside yourself, thinking that God has not accepted you, all because some minister or fellow Christians told you this? Has anyone read where Paul was told by Silas he needed to “pray through” after having his heated disagreement with Barnabas? Did Paul tell Peter he had to “pray through” when Peter wrongfully separated himself from Gentile believers?

Have you taken the time to search your Bible to see if you can find this teaching? Have you looked to see if you can find examples of the early believers doing this or being worried about it? If not, I encourage you to spend time doing so. You will be surprised at what you discover and the fear involved in this will no longer have a hold on you. You will also learn to walk in faith and not need signs like this to confirm your relationship with God.

Informational post on speaking in tongues #14: Almost Got the Spirit
Informational post on speaking in tongues #13: Praying Through
Informational post on speaking in tongues #12: Stammering Lips
Informational post on speaking in tongues #11: Prophesy
Informational post on speaking in tongues #10: One of many gifts
Informational post on speaking in tongues #9: Continued evidence
Informational post on speaking in tongues #8: Acts 8
Informational post on speaking in tongues #7: Acts 19:6
Informational post on speaking in tongues #6: Speaking in tongues a second time
Informational post on speaking in tongues #5: Acts 10:45-46
Informational post on speaking in tongues #4: Known languages
Informational post on speaking in tongues #3: 1 Corinthians 12:29-30
Informational post on speaking in tongues #2: 1 Corinthians 14:27-28
Informational post on speaking in tongues #1: Pray to interpret

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Giveaway: Speaking in Tongues: A Critical Historical Examination: Volume 1:

This is only open to those with a USA mailing address. There is absolutely no cost to enter.

This is your chance to receive a new copy of Speaking in Tongues: A Critical Historical Examination: Volume 1: The Modern Redefinition of Tongues by Philip E. Blosser & Charles A. Sullivan. It costs just under $35.

“In three carefully researched volumes, this ground-breaking study examines the gift of tongues through 2,000 years of church history. Starting in the present and working back in time, these volumes consider (1) the modern redefinition of ‘tongues’ as a private prayer language…

“In the first volume, the authors establish that modern glossolalia, far from being a supernatural gift enjoyed by certain believers since the time of Pentecost and undergoing a resurgence in modern times, has no precedent in church life prior to the nineteenth century. They discuss why German theologians, responding to the Irvingite revival, coined the term ‘glossolalia’ in the 1830s; why Pentecostals between 1906–8 quietly began redefining ‘tongues’ to mean a heavenly language unintelligible to human beings but pleasing to God, instead of foreign languages useful for evangelism; why Protestant cessationists believed miraculous tongues had ceased; and why interpolated idioms like ‘unknown tongues’ in Protestant Bibles were aimed originally at Rome’s use of Latin.”

One of the authors, Charles Sullivan, has a website where much information about speaking in tongues is posted. I am unsure how much is included in the book.

This giveaway is a drawing. To enter, just leave a comment to show you wish to be included. The drawing will close on July 17, 2024 at 6pm (eastern time), after which I will draw a winner.

Be sure to check back to see if you have won as in the past some people have not responded after winning and so a new winner had to be drawn. You will then need to email me your mailing address if I do not already have it, so be sure to watch your email and check the spam folder. If I know your Facebook profile, I will message you there.

Don’t be alarmed if your comment does not immediately show as it may require approval.

Check back every month for a new giveaway:

August 13: Unveiling Paul’s Women: Making Sense of 1 Corinthians 11:2–16 by Lucy Peppiatt
September 16: The Uncomfortable Confessions of a Preacher’s Kid: A Memoir by Ronna Russell
October 16: Women and Worship at Corinth: Paul’s Rhetorical Arguments in 1 Corinthians by Lucy Peppiatt

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The UnBoxing Project: Cynthia Jeub’s story

Editorial Note: The following is reprinted with permission from Eleanor Skelton’s blog. It was originally published on March 10, 2015 as part of a series. 

Continued from Ashley’s story.

I introduced Racquel and Ashley to Cynthia Jeub (now known as Artemis Stardust) shortly before they left their church, the First United Pentecostal Church of Colorado Springs.

We had both been homeschooled and raised in a Christian fundamentalist, Quiverfull environment. We went to college together and were both editors for our college’s newspaper. Here is their part of the story, in their own words. 

Mouth shut like a locket
Like you’ve nothing to say
Speak your mind up,
Come on, baby, free yourself…
Don’t let nobody try and take your soul
You’re the original. – Switchfoot

I met Racquel over the phone.

She explained that her best friend, Ashley, was being kept from attending her college classes, and her parents had taken away all contact to the outside world — no Internet, no cell phone, and she couldn’t drive.

“We can get her a cheap cellphone,” I said. “One she can hide, and use in case of an emergency. It’s dangerous if she won’t be able to contact anyone.”

Racquel hesitated.

“I’m not sure if it’s really that big of a deal,” she said. “They’ve only done it a few times, and it made her get behind at school, but I really trust our pastor.”

It would be several weeks before we met in person. We had an argument. Her church was a large congregation of Protestants who spent most of their Sunday meeting time meditating and speaking in tongues.

She told me that the pastor could always tell if your spirit was in the right place or not, based on his communication with the Holy Spirit. I asked if the pastor had any accountability, but she found it unthinkable that he’d say anything that wasn’t true.

Racquel said that though she loved horses, she wasn’t allowed to enter any competitions. She agreed with the church doctrine, she said, because it kept people humble.

Winning competitions, or even trying to be good at something or to look good, was distracting from drawing attention toward God and away from oneself.

That conversation bothered me because it was so backwards: I was taught to pursue excellence, because it brought glory to God, and I was a living sacrifice.

We lived on two sides of the same self-deception.

// // //

It was early 2013, and I drove an hour to the airport to pick up my dad from one of his events. He asked about school and life, and I confided about the exciting things going on: I was rescuing abused adults from cult-like fundamentalist families.

The first person who got out was Eleanor.

I wasn’t there when they moved into their first apartment, but I was part of the group of friends that gave them support as they adjusted to life away from home for the first time in their early twenties.

After that, Eleanor did most of the networking.

They didn’t go looking for these people, they just found them everywhere — in their classes and at work, they found people in the many cult-like churches of Colorado Springs, adults still living at home, adults with weakened self-confidence, adults with limited skills and resources, all trying to get out, all trapped and afraid.

In our little group, I earned the title of “the logical one.”

Eleanor and our other friend, Cynthia Barram, turned to me as the no-nonsense anchor. When Eleanor found someone who was in a bad situation with their church or family, they’d connect them with me, and I’d check the facts. Then we’d find small solutions — things like helping people get a car, cellphone, job, or place to live.

Several people were trapped because their parents wouldn’t even let them get a driver’s license.

I networked with the homeschool families I already knew, and asked them if they could provide safe houses for these young adults. I wanted parents who were good homeschoolers, not abusive, who could demonstrate that homeschooling could be done in a way that wasn’t harmful.

If such parents had a guest bedroom, we could send homeschooled alumni there to pay rent, while still having parental figures who could provide support without the intense control their own parents used.

The homeschooling community could respond, I thought. They could prove to those who’d been abused that it wasn’t all this bad.

It surprised me to find so few homeschooling parents who were willing to help.

I related all of this to my dad, and he quickly shut me down.

“Don’t get between rebellious kids and their parents,” he said. “I do not support this. You don’t know the families and the full stories. You shouldn’t get involved with this at all.”

“Daddy, I think these situations are… different. There are some rebellious kids…”

I didn’t say Alicia, because my older sister’s name was so taboo in our family that it was always implied, and I didn’t want to hurt my father’s feelings.

“But there are also some very controlling churches and families, and they don’t ever let their kids, especially daughters, grow up. Even if they’re adults.”

He grunted severe disapproval, signaling that the conversation was over. That was the most we ever argued, because I always succumbed. I turned up some of the classic rock music he’d introduced me to, and let it drown out any awkwardness in the car.

I decided I cared too much for those girls I’d met to just leave them in those suffocating situations. This was just one more thing I’d stop talking to my dad about.

// // //

Eleanor and our little crew kept working to help people.

We helped one young woman escape from an arranged marriage, and gave resources to people whose parents kept them from contact with the outside world.

Mostly, we talked to our friends who were in cults about their aspirations and personalities, and helped them see their controlling churches as obstacles to what they wanted out of life.

The common theme was that we all had our own problems to sort. I thought there weren’t any problems with my family, but then I needed to fall back on our group more than once. Our friend Suzana supported me when I got drunk for the first time in my life, a few days after my parents kicked me out.

Eleanor was frustrated with how Racquel and Ashley couldn’t see that their church was a cult, but they still kept in touch with her own overbearing parents.

We’d all lost the trusted older-generation adults in our lives, so we leaned on each other, but we were still young and inexperienced and unstable.

I posted an article on the Huffington Post about my frustration with freeing people. I couldn’t control them, but I also knew they wouldn’t stand up for themselves. I was tired of waiting.

I found out later that Ashley used a code name when she talked about me to her mother, because she was afraid her parents might find my writings and deduce that she was planning to leave.

In December, Eleanor sent out a distress signal to the group.

Ashley’s father discovered she was dating a guy outside the church and said he was kicking her out.

Around 6 a.m. on December 16, 2013, Ashley’s father texted her that he was dumping her possessions outside their apartment at 3 p.m.

Eleanor and Racquel left with Ashley to collect her things in Cynthia Barram’s van while her parents were at work.

When Suzana and I arrived, her bedroom furnishings were strewn about.

Racquel drew our attention to the picture frames.

Ashley’s father had removed the family photos with Ashley from the walls and laid them face down in a corner, a symbol that her family had already disowned her for rebelling against the church.

Her father had also damaged the car she drove by tearing off the rubber lining in the door. And dumped out her purse in the car.

Racquel’s parents were less strict, and she moved out on slightly less dramatic terms.

Eleanor was living in a two-bedroom apartment with a roommate who had also left fundamentalist Christianity, and they now housed three extra refugees there, including another girl who worked with us at the school newspaper.

It was too small for all of them, so they moved into a house together, sharing the costs.

Cynthia Jeub writes about philosophy, religion, and growing up in a Quiverfull homeschool family of 16 and being on their television show Kids By The Dozen at cynthiajeub.com. They studied communication and theater at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, where they were a reporter and culture editor at the campus newspaper, The Scribe.

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