from the comments

And so we go, sometimes forward, sometimes to the places we started, time, unforgiving train, never stopping to wait for any. Each with a thought of what we would if we could, or maybe what we wouldn’t. Familiarity we share, never waiting permission, clumsily pulls us together and tears us apart. Regrets we know better than to have, an itch, there to remind us when our minds finally find rest.

We were only children. How could we have known? Who should we tell that we had to watch our parents cry? It was for God! Wasn’t it? We were going to be righteous. We were a step above, set apart. We were on fire, righteous indignation. We did what we had to, anything, to survive. Some fought, some ran, and some learned to pretend.

The good news, I stopped caring. The bad news, about anything. That’s why I’m not mad at you, I lost that ability when I was 12. I’m indifferent, I think. Except for one thing. I would drag myself, crawling, across all the hot asphalt in the world, to save your children from you.

I’d introduce them to the God you lost somewhere in all your religion.

Catching Up

Received via email sometime ago. Sorry for the delayed post.

It’s been thirteen years since the Lord Jesus rescued me and brought me out of darkness (LFF) and into His marvelous light. I only spent four years there, but they were the formative years of my relationship with Jesus, and it has taken years to unravel the harm that was done to my soul by abusive leaders. He has been so gracious to me throughout this entire experience and tonight after reading the blog I am filled with faith that each of you will find your road to healing in Him and be made whole again, or for the first time. Your pain is real. I validate you, not that you need me to validate you, or anyone really, but sometimes that helps. I was not so fortunate. I did not have a blog to turn to. In fact, the first church my hubby and I attended didn’t even know what to do with me, so we began going to every church in our town and surrounding towns looking for someone who understood and it was a few years before I met someone who had been through a Shepherding movement and was delivered from it. He and his sweet wife heard my whole story-it took hours and hours. They cried with me, held my hand, we got on our knees together and wept and cried out for Jesus to heal my broken heart. This validation healed me. I had thought I was losing my mind and had disqualified myself like Esau from his birthright (because I married a divorced man). I left that room a healed woman. I got in my car and felt happy for the first time in two years. These sweet people were so wise. They told me to be patient with myself, to forgive myself frequently, to talk to Jesus a lot, that He was not some mean dictator in Heaven waiting to hammer me into dust and that it might take years before all that ugly pharisaical leaven would be worked out of my life. They were right. Even as I read this blog I realized that some of the issues I have with my darling daughters is because of the harshness in discipline I experienced myself at LFF.

I also learned through the years that Our Father in Heaven is nothing like these people who ruled over us with an iron fist and kept us in fear. He is kind, and it’s His kindness that leads us to repentance, not someone digging around glaring at you and confronting you with your “whatever” sin. NO, He is not like them at all. He saved me from this mess and I still thank Him to this day for His amazing love towards me. I also thank Him because the man I married is also amazing. He has been so patient, gracious, loving, and gentle with me over the years. He has also endured much as a result of what I allowed LFF to do to me. When I got done reading this blog I just ran over to him and thanked him for being my hero. He told me that I was worth it all! At LFF I was not worth much at all, always screwing up, always being confronted with my attitudes and sin. Now, I must admit, there were times this was merited, but again, I have learned that the Holy Spirit, given the chance, will convict you of all sin and give you the opportunity to repent and change. They never gave Him a chance. The other thing is He is gentle and lowly and they were harsh and vindictive. In order to heal well we must discover first who God really is—not looking at people, but at Him. How we choose to view Him will determine everything.

I thought it would be valuable to write to encourage the wounded to persevere—healing is possible. God has been gracious to me and as I chose to be honest and lay it all out like it really was, in time, His love has covered over a lot of inadequacies. He has also restored so much. At the ten year mark, after I left, I received a phone call from one of my precious friends from those days, she asked me to forgive her and I was at that time ready to do so, then another wrote asking for forgiveness, then Kari and I saw each other and she asked me privately, away from our mutual friend, to forgive her, thankfully, I already had. This was another piece of the healing-to be able to forgive before being asked, but that takes time. Then, Julie Kobelin called and asked me to forgive her (she had been the most abusive towards me) and I already had forgiven her too. She wanted me to specifically tell her all that she had done to hurt me so she could specifically ask forgiveness, but the cool thing was, I couldn’t really think of anything, all the sting was gone. Love had covered over the multitude of inadequacies. Now, I do not have any real relationships with anyone from LFF except one and she is a treasure indeed, but I have no desire to pursue any of those relationships. It is time to move forward and those that really loved me came forth—one. That is a sobering reality after you spent so much time with people only to discover what you thought was real wasn’t all that real after all. I really have no issues with anyone from LFF anymore. However, I have a huge heart for those on this blog and those who are even now being harassed. I have been praying for years for freedom to come to this place. I will not give up in prayer.

Reading about the PCS kids breaks my heart to pieces. I will commit myself to pray more for you. You suffered the most. I was a nursery worker and loved you so very much and my heart ached that you were never with your parents…oh sweet souls may He who is able bind up every single one of your wounds and plant you by healing waters. There is a chapter in Ezekiel 34, I think, anyway, about the bad shepherds and the sheep roaming the hills, you are those precious hurting, lost, and wounded sheep wandering the hills, but not forever—hang in there.

I guess we all want to tell our story. It amazes me that when I attended LFF no one dared ever speak any of these things, yet so many of us were feeling them…big sigh…we were just being critical, oh how we needed to know that testing the spirits is of God and that we also were the Lord’s anointed…..how dare they touch us…His sweet children…may the Lord have mercy.

I was a brand new convert zealous for Jesus and eager to find a church like the one in Acts. I thought I found that at LFF. My life was transformed at Heartbeat Retreat. It was the real deal. I have not been the same since. Water baptism was powerful for me and I spent my whole Freshman year full of the Holy Spirit and just so in love with Jesus and following hard after Him in any way I could. I did not start out wanting to please leadership only Jesus. This was a great year for me. I found freedom from my previous life of sin and rest for my soul. I will always remember that year with great fondness. Then, I became a JCD my sophomore year and that all changed. The truth began to stare me in the face, but who would dare say anything, not me, I didn’t want to be rebellious, or critical, even though I always was found that way. I was a messy person, messy with a lot of worldly baggage, a lot to undue to become more like Jesus, but now I see, I was a mere infant in Christ…holy moly…it’s a miracle any of us survived this kind of scrutiny.

The first time I realized that something was seriously wrong was when the Koeblins were leaving for Russia and I went home and cried tears of rejoicing because Julie wouldn’t be around anymore to torment me with her ceaseless demands and cruel words. I couldn’t tell anyone why I was crying, it was so lonely. Then, that summer after visiting my mom, after begging for permission to be released from my unbelievable ministry responsibilities, I was on my way to Pullman, pulled off at Ellensburg for gas and when I got back on the highway and without realizing what I was doing I found myself heading back towards my mom’s house, oh, how I should have kept on going….it went on like this in many ways my whole senior year. The Lord was good to me and caused me to have a back problem right after my senior year that forced me to rest and made people say way judgmental things to me about my condition. God totally healed me, but then I was in massive pain due to the healing….

During this time it became even more obvious to me that He wanted me out of LFF, but I was struggling because my pride was so invested into this place. He and I argued a lot about this, but He kept bringing situations so I couldn’t avoid the truth anymore. When I left to student teach I actually felt strings being cut from my back (like rubber bands) and the strings were retracting back to LFF. I felt free and felt guilty for feeling that way. I had no idea that my high school sweetheart was waiting for me to get home so he could steal me away from this craziness—he was my knight in shinning armor, though at the time, I thought he was sent by satan. Finally, the Lord convinced me that it was truly His will for me to marry this great guy, so of course the cost on my side was losing all my “friends” at LFF, but many had already forgotten me, out of sight, out of mind, but I went back one last time just to be sure it was God that I marry this guy—of course the leadership said no, he was divorced and used goods (even though this happened when he wasn’t saved…the unpardonable sin…) and as I was there I was sooooo confused, but it was good to see them all. I really missed everyone. On my way back to my mom’s house my car broke down on the pass and God told me that my boyfriend needed to be the one to come get me although I called many and many were willing…I had stayed totally pure in my relationship with him, but the thought entered into my head that if I slept with him I would be so humiliated that I would never go back to LFF and it would be easier that way-YIKES, so I lured that poor guy and made him compromise himself too---just so I wouldn’t feel so condemned about leaving LFF. That is my largest regret—that I didn’t have the guts to just leave LFF, but thankfully, God has forgiven us this also, but I saw clearly how whacked this whole thing was and just said good-bye.

Now, I have to say that I really do believe that God takes everything and works it for good and I have often thanked God for all the many things HE did in my life while I was there. I did learn how to serve others in love, I did learn how to do everything as to the Lord, I do have a solid foundation that I have continued to build on, I did learn how to hear His voice and how to go against the flow in order to follow Him. I am grateful that there was good to be taken from such a harmful situation. I still have a whole lot of love for people who have left and the people there. I actually really love the Vances and pray for them often. I didn’t know the Barden’s all that well, but I do pray that they would find freedom and seek to restore what they broke down. I believe all things are possible. I really believe He is who He says He is and that His word and His Spirit are enough to satisfy and bring us to wholeness again. I pray that as believers we will stop harming each other and start assisting each other in His love and under His direction, not under man made religious systems full of the traditions of men. I pray for the Church that call themselves by His holy name to rally under His banner which is LOVE. I pray for people to stop following men and their opinions and to follow Jesus the Christ—our savior our kind Lord.

We home churched with another couple for five years and it was the BEST…we really learned how to rely and depend on Him alone. He has just recently brought us out of the wilderness and called us to break down religious systems that are killing God’s precious children. I feel awake, alert, and sound of mind for the first time in too many years. God’s spirit is moving everywhere…He is roaming the hills and finding His lost sheep and restoring them. In fact, one of the small home groups we attend is called: Compass Ministries, our whole focus is Jesus and being His hands to comfort those who have had so much stolen from them. God keeps collecting them and bringing them to us. God is raising up an army of those wounded who He is healing and He is taking their brokenness and glorifying Himself in it. The world doesn’t want religion---it wants a Jesus who saves them from the torment of sin!!!! The church needs a Jesus who is real and binds up their wounds.

Oh I pray for the comfort of these hurting people Jesus, be ever near their aching hearts, place your presence around them that they may know that Your love is perfect and Your ways are sound. Touch them with gentleness and take off heavy yokes and burdens and show them that Your way is easy and light. Lift off the depression, self-loathing, and sting of the harm done against them. Touch each one here with Your real concern and care for their individual situation. Jesus, bring back to them seven times what was stolen from them.

I will keep praying.

Quote

"With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion." -- Unknown

Were the atrocities committed at LFF simply blindly done because of twisted theological beliefs? Thoughts?

Baptism

In the 'Question of Forgiveness' blog Nikkoly said

"I was just baptized again this past Sunday as a
consecration to the Lord, to free me form religious
bondage, spiritual abuse, and half truths that kept me
in despair for WAY too long. I came out of those
waters with even more love and freedom. I highly
recommend it for any who were baptized at LFF."

For my husband and I, even though we don't agree with
a lot of what goes on at LFF, both of us feel that our
baptism experience was sincere and between us and the
Lord. We actually left a church recently because they
told us that unless we provided papers to show we were
baptized that we would have to get re-baptized to
become members. When we told them our reasonings for
not wanting to contact LFF, they insisted that we get
re-baptized no matter what. That didn't sit well with
us because to us baptism is between you and God, not
you and a church and it's certainly not to obtain a
piece of paper.

We now have philosophical disagreements with the
speaking in tongues that was to happen "by faith" as
you rose from the waters (if you hadn't previously
been baptized by the holy spirit) but despite all that
I feel that God used my baptism, even if those
preforming it weren't totally correct, my God is big
enough to use that experience for his Glory. I don't
personally think I need to get re-baptized. Just as I
no longer believe that a saved person can be possessed
by demons and need deliverance; another LFF teaching

I may have been taught some crazy wacked out doctrine
at LFF, but I think over the years God heals wounds
and rights wrongs.

What are everyone's thoughts on the subject?

Concerned Family...

Received via email. Is this familiar to anyone?

Hello,

I'm not sure if you're who I should direct this letter too, but if not, if you could direct it to someone else? I would really appreciate it.

My sister is currently on multiple anti-anxiety and anti-depression medications, plus some to help her sleep. Despite the medication, she has anxiety that won't resolve and frequent migranes. We think a lot of her stress is due to the church she has been attending. Almost 6 years ago my sister moved to Pullman to attend college. She'd always been pretty quiet and never had a large group of friends, so we were happy when she said she was attending a church down there and had made many friends through it. However, the more she talked about it, the more uncomfortable my family was with the church. Her activities in the church began to take over her life. Whenever we tried to talk to her about it, she just brushed it off and said she'd finally found a church where she really wanted to participate. To us, however, it seemed like the church was drawing her in and not allowing her the time to make friends or participate in activities outside of it. At one time, she was even set on going to an African country deep in war on a service mission. She said the church told her she'd been called to go. She hadn't felt called, they told her she was. Luckily, it ended up not working out for her to go. The past six years have been agonizing as we recognized there was something not right about this situation, but were powerless to change things. Now, thankfully, she has decided the city does not allow her to finish the training needed in her career and she will be moving back home in a few weeks. We are ecstatic that she's leaving the church and cannot wait for her to come home. I don't know how deeply this church has affected her over the past years, and I want to be able to help her get over some of the things that have been impressed into her.

After this long ramble, my question is, do you have any advice on helping someone who has just left the church? I think she's still a big fan of them. I like to think that she will just magically be okay, but I worry that may not be true. Any advice you could give would be greatly appreciated.

Question of Forgivenes

Received via email:

I have seen many times on the blog, and often wondered myself why the current, and past Sr. Pastors would not admit any fault or ask forgiveness for the wrongs they've done. It's so obvious to all of us that they had major flaws in their practices, but that they turned such a blind eye to it. They put the wrongs back on our shoulders as we went and talked with them about specific issues.

I have been gone from lff for many years now and have heard stories of various pastors asking forgiveness. I'm pretty sure that all of the pastors (except Bardens and Vances) have been very open about admitting wrong and asking forgiveness. I'm wondering if anyone has been contacted by the Bardens or the Vances or talked to them and had them admit wrong or ask forgiveness. I'm not talking about forgiveness like at the members meeting where everyone went to the microphone and put it all out on the table and they said "Please forgive us" a hundred times and mostly on behalf of the Sr. Pastors who weren't present at the meeting. That was helpful in the sense that it was one of the first times were all able to be truly honest at a members meeting, but I'm talking about a more real conversation where they say that they were wrong and that they are sorry for the hurt and damage they caused? Just curious. To me, that says a lot towards real change. So far I haven't heard of it happening other than outward changes to church meetings and home group structure types of changes.

I know that Beckers and Kobelins have asked forgiveness; the wife-halves of those couples have asked forgiveness of folks. Interesting, I hadn't thought of this before, but I think all of the women in the church had a whole lot more to forgive than the men. I have a lot of respect for the fact that they can admit where they screwed up and apologize. This could be a tough one to comment on without exposing who you are but I'd love to know if there is any recognition that they did wrong and they are making things right. It won't make me run back to lff but it will help me to know God is working on their hearts--maybe. I still pray for that. They've had their chance with me, and I would never put myself in the position to be hurt by them again. That would be foolish. But for the future since they are still ministering, I hope and pray that they will do better with those that walk through their doors.

Thanks for reading, and I hope to hear that something is happening in this area. If not, well, I guess I will continue to pray. God is big enough to do it, if He so chooses.

Take care,
pastlffer

The nail that sticks out gets hammered

Received via email.

When I was at LFF it seemed to me that anybody who had a differing idea on any subject was silenced. You were to "disagree agreeably" which meant shut your mouth and suffer the consequences of your actions. You were treated with suspicion of being a dissenter, your life was meticulously picked apart and minor things were turned into major "sin issues." If you "Rebelled" or refused to conform, you were ostracized, excluded, even excommunicated just as many others have stated on this blog. The divisive and manipulative leadership of the Living Faith Fellowship uses this fear to suppress and control the people.

Since my exit from LFF I wonder if there are any left who battle "Group Think".
Are those who go against the flow still treated the same way? In hindsight, I should have been more of a thorn in their side, doggedly questioning publicly their practices and ideas. Lowering my shoulder, persevering in the face of their devices. The sacrifices of a few meant to ease and prevent the suffering of many and better the health of the church.

Those who read and agree with me, please speak up. The ongoing refusal to publicly admit wrong and accept any form of criticism is one of the main weaknesses of LFF's current leadership. If you are currently attending the church and striving to make a difference, I admire your efforts, but don't let them get the best of you. You will find support here on this blog as well as from others within the church who do not accept the Group Think--if there are any left. I am sure the admin of this blog would post your account, igniting a dialog and penning a record.

Finally to the administrator(s) of this blog, You are a gentle man\lady and a scholar, I owe my thanks to you, this blog has helped me beyond description and I'm confident it has helped many others.

The Irony of Living Faith

Now days, when I think of my time spent at LFF I chuckle to my self and laugh as if it was a bad dream. I usually scold myself for being so foolish, and then I think about the many humorous and ironic things that I witnessed that could really only happen at LFF.

Did you ever think that they should be called response to opinion forms?

Have you ever been told that you lack self control by a fat person?

Did you ever take a math class from CMT?

Did you ever pretend to laugh real hard so that the people who were scowling at you would know you were touched by God?

Does it ever seem odd that the people with the most screwed up family taught mirror?

Living Faith is the only church I know that hasn't had a split: Instead of going to another church, all it's members just stopped going to church.

The most judgmental people I've ever met preach that we should extend them grace.

A pastor told me that if I wanted to continue serving in the areas that I loved I would need to come to morning prayer. Then she told me she stayed up all night and came to prayer at 6 AM. But at 7 when the meeting was over I was one hour late for work and she went to bed.

Karl Barden would use many citations in "Leadership Class" from his favorite book "How to Win Friends and Influence People." He figured out the influencing part, but where are his friends?

There are plenty more ironic things and I hope you can think of a few but I am a few minutes late for morning prayer.

Easter Sunday

Every year that I attended Living Faith, I dreaded one thing: door to door advertizing for the Easter play. Now it’s not that I’m a shy person, it’s just that I’ve never been fond of people knocking on my door unless they were invited. I don’t care if they are selling encyclopedias, campaigning for office, or just trying to get me into heaven. I appreciate the effort but really, don’t need encyclopedias, I have an internet connection, I will be voting your stance on the issues at hand, and I am not interested in scientology, the Jehovah’s whiteness, or any other solicitation of any kind. And I know that this feeling runs though out. The moment the do-not-call list came out; it was set out in church, and passed in home groups and other meetings.

So regardless of how others felt, we went out into the streets and knocked on people’s doors. Without hesitation we explained that we had the best show in town, like some crooked Broadway producers, and then finished up with an always strong “we’ll have donuts.” And like that the door was shut and we would move happily to the next house as invite after invite was thrown right into the trash.

For this act of self indulgence we spared no expense, printing thousands of half page color leaflets, and used them to proclaim to the city:

“We don’t care to know you during the year! Even though you’re my neighbor, I’ve been to busy to make you cookies because I’ve been serving at church. I really don’t care to know you, unless you come to my church, so if you would like to know me, this card says where I can be found.”

And year after year we engaged in this act of self promotion, wasting thousands of dollars and man hours trying to boost the attendance number for one day so we could feel better about our efforts that we put into our amateur production of a classic story. And after it was all over we would spend a week or two, congratulating ourselves on a job well done. Referring to the one uneducated person who had “never seen a betters show in there life” and who had obviously never seen another show before now. Telling ourselves that we were almost as good as broad way, whilst the audience sat in the dark for 2:49 as a props crew of 23 or so bumbled along in the dark.

I hear they no longer have to go door to door, but I went to the play today and it’s the same old. Not an improvement since I left. The leper gets healed, then Jesus dies, the leper is sad, then Jesus rises, then the choir sings everyone out on stage, you know, the usual.

After I went, I was just thinking how happy I was that I didn’t have to be involved and flunk my mid-terms so people would like me.

It’s a good feeling to be free.

Administrative Note

We have added a widget to the sidebar that will allow you to subscribe to the blog via email. We encourage you to also visit the blog and participate in the comments. There have been lively debates and insightful advice by many users, so please continue to contribute.

God Bless and Happy Easter!

Success of the blog

In addition to helping us all heal, the blog has been successful in other ways. While dealing with the establishment of Living Faith Fellowship and its puppeteers is important, spreading awareness is equally important and was one of the original goals of the blog.

Some evidence of success:

• When you search "Living Faith Fellowship" in google, the blog is the 4th result! Here is a little more information on how Google page ranking works
• When you search "Karl Barden" in google, the blog is the number one result!
• When you search "Kari Vance" in google, the blog is the 7th result.

Blog readership:

• At the time of this post, the blog has received 104,062 visits.
• As many as 800 unique viewers a day.

We have received dozens of emails from concerned friends, parents and families of current members asking for more information regarding this church. Many parents have voiced concern over their children's level of involvement, even to the point of some students not finishing college. Others have lost touch with loved ones because their lifestyle did not align with the church's moral views.

Whatever the case, we hope that this blog continues to serve its purpose and help people make an informed decision about participation & attendance at Living Faith Fellowship. At the very least it may encourage people who currently attend the church to second guess what they hear sometimes and ask questions about why things are the way they are.

Excerpts

The Question: "How many people are still Christians after LFF?"

Excerpts from the comments:

-I feel closer to God to have a real biblical knowledge of him, rather than man's messed up views.

-We SHOULD question, we SHOULD look for sincerity and for spiritual leaders who aren't all about prospering financially...etc. etc. etc. I'm finally happy in church again and my kids will grow up knowing the LOVE and GRACE of Jesus Christ. Lucky them...

-We're just now (almost 10 years after leaving) getting a vision of what GRACE really means and learning to trust again. Sad to think we lost almost 20 years of our lives - almost 10 years there + almost 10 years post-LFF - to their skewed teachings. Thank God for the Christians He's brought into our lives since then who have helped us.

-I do not believe in hell or sin anymore so I am not a Christian. I believe we humans make our own hell here on Earth. And so many things are done poorly in the name of God by we mere mortals. I am more about the Goddess and peace and love and karma and good deeds and yoga and NOT judgment and negative un-acceptance which is what I got from LFF.

-not sure...not sure at all

-I have become an Agnostic. I don't know if Christianity is true, it has no greater claim to truth in my mind than many other ideas. I am more drawn to the idea of no god(s) and nothing after death.

-So really if Jesus is as judgmental as I was when I was in LFF I don't want it.

-There is so much corruption in the Christian community, that I've identified myself as a believer in God, but not a prescriber to religion

-LFF was a very sad place for me. Even my family memories with my husband and children are not fond memories for me because it is all tainted with so much depression and anxiety.

-If Christianity is based on what is taught from most of the pulpits in Evangelical or Charismatic (very little difference really), then I would have to say, No, I am not a Christian.

-It wasn't Jesus who constantly was disappointed in us and judged us daily, it was the leadership of LFF. Jesus is full of grace and would never treat us as they did. So many of you are blaming other christians for your loss of Christianity. How sad that you give hypocrites in the kingdom of God more power over your lives than God.

-God doesn't expect us to be perfect or he wouldn't have given us the gift of salvation. It was only LFF that expected perfection. I just can see that they really deeply hurt you but you shouldn't have to give up your salvation because of them.

-LFF created such a distorted picture of who God is and what his character is...the Bible clearly says that it's "God's Kindness" that leads to repentance. God is not a judging God yet...some day he will be but not yet! He does not have some hidden measuring stick that he uses to see who measures up and who doesn't nor does he have a hidden agenda.

a change

Dear DPR,

We thank you for all the effort you have put into this site. You have posed insightful questions and moderated with grace. While we languished, in recovery, depression, and sometimes despair, you led on with dignity. Not all of us are healing and some never will. But some of us have conquered our demons, reached beyond the pain, and now seek to actively aid in the healing we once sought.

We are a few of the originators of this blog and want to bring new life to the healing. The anonymity of this blog has forced us to assume administration of this blog without consultation. Thank you to past administrators (DPR included) and future contributors for your continued support of this important effort. If you have any questions please email truthaboutlivingfaith@gmail.com

Readers,

If you have healed from the spiritual mutilation, move on. But if you still find yourself fighting, struggling, and hurting, this is the place for you. Grieving is never easy, but it is a start on the road to recovery. Please continue to send your stories. Together we will mend and warn others, telling them The Truth About Living Faith.

Thank You,

Innocence Destroyed

Got Christ?

How many people are still Christians after LFF?

moderator's note: Let's get the discussion going. DPR!!!

a query

I had a mom contact me concerning LFF because she stumbled upon this website. She said that her daughter is currently attending LFF and she hadsome concerns and she asked her daughter not to get baptized a few weeks ago. I talked with her daughter and her daughter was still not sure if whatI shared with her was totally acurate. I don't know if her daughter got out of LFF but she did share one thing with me....The people there have been telling her that God is going to harness her personality and I told her that they told me the same things and she felt a little pressured to do the Carpenters program and mirror programs. I just told her they are very manipulative and she should watch out for herself. I also tried to call her mom but the number her mom gave me was incorrect.

This did pose some concern for me as to if this was a bogus thing that people at LFF were trying to mess with me or others because of anger and was possibly looking to sue someone. I didn't give any names in my conversation with the girl but if it is bogus watch out for yourselves. If in fact it is a true concern of a mother...I congratulate you for caring enough about your daughter to try and save her from this church. Bare in mind that most churches are not like this one so don't lump them all together but sooner or later if your daughter is still involved they will convince her that you don't understand what God is doing in her life and that she should cut her communication with you to minimal intervals. They did this with me and I ended up totally rejecting both my parents all in the name of growing in God in a way my parents would never understand. I have apologized numerous times to my parents for this and it has been a hard long road mending our relationship due to this matter.

They will do the same with her. Pretty soon you'll start wondering if she is still on the planet or not...It has been a long hard road for me coming out of LFF but I have managed to hang on to my salvation through it all and many times just barely by tattered threads...I was suicidal for a while because I felt that God couldn't accept someone like me because I could never be spiritual enough and could never attain the servants heart that I was ment to have...this alldue to the things said to me and "SPOKEN INTO MY LIFE" while in attendance at LFF.I know now that God accepts me just how that I am and I will always have things to work on in my life but God is not LFF and not all christians are LFF and not all churches are LFF and my parents are not LFF and people around me are not LFF. GOD LOVES ME FOR ME!!!! And that's good enough!

Editor's note: This is the first letter to post that we have gotten since December. We just want to make sure you know that the blog depends on you putting in content if you want the blog to continue.
thank you, DPR!!!!