I was in YWAM when CR started up, and all this is so familiar. I was skeptical about the hype (and many things), though I remained for another decade or so. Sean Feucht was involved in the early days of CR in a different location, I believe.
I owned a Freedom Manual. Notice how it instructs you to stand up and pray loudly? They really mean it! I’ve been in several conference sessions led by Brennt where you had to shout at the top of your lungs because otherwise you were probably passive or something. Reminds me of Elijah and the prophets of Baal - “perhaps Baal can’t hear you?” A former YWAM friend has frequently observed that the obsession with strongholds and “giving the Enemy a foothold” looks in practice a lot more like superstition and witchcraft than faith in Jesus. Like you put it, it’s transactional.
Being unoffendable also comes up in the classic YWAM teaching about relinquishing rights. One of the rights we should relinquish is being offended. It’s definitely a bind to be taught that if you’re truly surrendered to Jesus and spiritually mature, you won’t get your feelings hurt. I experienced ongoing verbal abuse from one of my leaders and kept trying to forgive and be more likable, instead of getting the hell out of there. Funny how she was free to be offended by me all the time.
Yessss "it looks in practice a lot more like superstition and witchcraft than faith in Jesus." I grew up with so much fear of demonic influence. We had to do all these things to protect ourselves - don't watch certain things, or read certain things, or go certain places, etc. Now I call it demon worship. Because you're right, it's so much more like superstition and witchcraft than faith in Jesus.
This is so fascinating! I've been trying to figure out exactly how Sean Feucht was involved - there's so much overlap between all of these kinds of groups. Do you happen to know what CR location he was involved in?
I've heard that from some other people as well re: praying loudly! It is so transactional and definitely leans superstitious (I didn't even get into the whole "soul ties" part of the Freedom Manual, which.... oof).
On the Freedom Manual: my “XWAM” group chat was talking yesterday about the worksheets for specific strongholds in your life. Struggle with anger? Here, pray through this list! It literally had checkboxes. Besides being super formulaic, it’s so uncaring to just hand someone a checklist when they’re struggling - and by implication, if you’re struggling with something you clearly haven’t prayed the right prayers.
I was already a subscriber, so I was startled when I opened your newsletter and it hit so close to home. Had completely forgotten about the Freedom Manual.
"The language of the Circuit Riders turns, or perhaps simply fundamentally is, capitalistic. If you do something for God, God will do something for you. If you dismantle your stronghold, you will be free. If you have enough faith, you’ll know the love of God. If you repent of your sin, you will be healed. If your sin persists — if you are still depressed or anxious or suspicious of an authority figure — then you must not have consumed Christ."
Yes. This transactional faith is other places too - the prosperity gospel that says you'll be healed if you just have enough faith. The IBLP / Bill Gothard gospel that says you'll have a perfect life if you just follow the principles. What do you do when it doesn't work? It forces you to confront what you believe. Either something is horribly wrong with you, or horribly wrong with the god you believe.
You're so right, there's so much overlap with all kinds of fundamentalisms here - prosperity gospel, IBLP, etc. I think in every kind of strain of fundamentalist Christianity, there's a promise made (that God will do x if you do y), but the onus is always on you to execute that promise (If God hasn't yet done x, then you must not be doing y well enough yet).
You can ALWAYS find people who have been hurt, bothered, or otherwise had a negative experience with a church, ministry, organization, leader... Heck, you can find people who have something unhappy to share about most families in your town! That doesn't mean everything those families are doing is terrible. It just means there's a broken relationship there. Stories like this aren't proof that an organization is misrepresenting Christ. It means that there are people in the organization who - surprise! - are sinful. Nobody is perfect except Jesus.
If leaders have hurt others, it's our responsibility in the Body of Christ to encourage reconciliation. Articles like this don't do that. If what we seek, rather, is correction of beliefs or methods, like your issues with the Freedom Manual, articles like this don't do that either. Leaders from this group are likely not going to read this. If what we seek is increased discernment for ourselves or others - an ability to interpret and apply Scripture well - why not just teach Scripture?
This is just divisive at best and slanderous at worst.
I was in YWAM when CR started up, and all this is so familiar. I was skeptical about the hype (and many things), though I remained for another decade or so. Sean Feucht was involved in the early days of CR in a different location, I believe.
I owned a Freedom Manual. Notice how it instructs you to stand up and pray loudly? They really mean it! I’ve been in several conference sessions led by Brennt where you had to shout at the top of your lungs because otherwise you were probably passive or something. Reminds me of Elijah and the prophets of Baal - “perhaps Baal can’t hear you?” A former YWAM friend has frequently observed that the obsession with strongholds and “giving the Enemy a foothold” looks in practice a lot more like superstition and witchcraft than faith in Jesus. Like you put it, it’s transactional.
Being unoffendable also comes up in the classic YWAM teaching about relinquishing rights. One of the rights we should relinquish is being offended. It’s definitely a bind to be taught that if you’re truly surrendered to Jesus and spiritually mature, you won’t get your feelings hurt. I experienced ongoing verbal abuse from one of my leaders and kept trying to forgive and be more likable, instead of getting the hell out of there. Funny how she was free to be offended by me all the time.
Yessss "it looks in practice a lot more like superstition and witchcraft than faith in Jesus." I grew up with so much fear of demonic influence. We had to do all these things to protect ourselves - don't watch certain things, or read certain things, or go certain places, etc. Now I call it demon worship. Because you're right, it's so much more like superstition and witchcraft than faith in Jesus.
This is so fascinating! I've been trying to figure out exactly how Sean Feucht was involved - there's so much overlap between all of these kinds of groups. Do you happen to know what CR location he was involved in?
I've heard that from some other people as well re: praying loudly! It is so transactional and definitely leans superstitious (I didn't even get into the whole "soul ties" part of the Freedom Manual, which.... oof).
On the Freedom Manual: my “XWAM” group chat was talking yesterday about the worksheets for specific strongholds in your life. Struggle with anger? Here, pray through this list! It literally had checkboxes. Besides being super formulaic, it’s so uncaring to just hand someone a checklist when they’re struggling - and by implication, if you’re struggling with something you clearly haven’t prayed the right prayers.
I was already a subscriber, so I was startled when I opened your newsletter and it hit so close to home. Had completely forgotten about the Freedom Manual.
Sean Feucht was involved in an east coast branch of Circuit Riders. I believe it started in Pennsylvania.
"The language of the Circuit Riders turns, or perhaps simply fundamentally is, capitalistic. If you do something for God, God will do something for you. If you dismantle your stronghold, you will be free. If you have enough faith, you’ll know the love of God. If you repent of your sin, you will be healed. If your sin persists — if you are still depressed or anxious or suspicious of an authority figure — then you must not have consumed Christ."
Yes. This transactional faith is other places too - the prosperity gospel that says you'll be healed if you just have enough faith. The IBLP / Bill Gothard gospel that says you'll have a perfect life if you just follow the principles. What do you do when it doesn't work? It forces you to confront what you believe. Either something is horribly wrong with you, or horribly wrong with the god you believe.
You're so right, there's so much overlap with all kinds of fundamentalisms here - prosperity gospel, IBLP, etc. I think in every kind of strain of fundamentalist Christianity, there's a promise made (that God will do x if you do y), but the onus is always on you to execute that promise (If God hasn't yet done x, then you must not be doing y well enough yet).
Yikes. Thanks so much for your work on this!
thank you, Bobby!
You can ALWAYS find people who have been hurt, bothered, or otherwise had a negative experience with a church, ministry, organization, leader... Heck, you can find people who have something unhappy to share about most families in your town! That doesn't mean everything those families are doing is terrible. It just means there's a broken relationship there. Stories like this aren't proof that an organization is misrepresenting Christ. It means that there are people in the organization who - surprise! - are sinful. Nobody is perfect except Jesus.
If leaders have hurt others, it's our responsibility in the Body of Christ to encourage reconciliation. Articles like this don't do that. If what we seek, rather, is correction of beliefs or methods, like your issues with the Freedom Manual, articles like this don't do that either. Leaders from this group are likely not going to read this. If what we seek is increased discernment for ourselves or others - an ability to interpret and apply Scripture well - why not just teach Scripture?
This is just divisive at best and slanderous at worst.