27/09/2026
You taught me the Bible.
That is what makes this so difficult to write.
I didn't come to Global Vision looking for someone to control me.
I came looking for Jesus. I love His Word, and I wanted my life to be poured out for the Kingdom.
I believed I found a bold pastor I could trust. I believed that serving on this church staff was a privilege.
I believed that being close to spiritual leadership meant I would be challenged, corrected, discipled, and strengthened.
I never imagined that one day I would have to untangle Jesus from the way His name had been used over me.
You taught me the Bible, but somewhere along the way, you began using the Bible to teach me what I was allowed to think.
You taught me submission, but submission slowly became agreement.
You taught me honor, but honor slowly became silence.
You taught me unity, but unity slowly became the inability to speak honestly and freely.
You taught me about rebellion, and eventually I became afraid that even having a question in my heart meant there was rebellion in me.
You taught me to guard against bitterness, and I became afraid to admit that I was hurt.
You taught me to forgive, and forgiveness means I had to pretend nothing had happened.
You taught me to trust spiritual authority, until questioning your spiritual authority became questioning God Himself.
I don't think you understand what that did to us.
Maybe that's part of what makes spiritual abuse so difficult to explain.
There isn't always a single moment you can point to and say, “There. That's when it happened.”
It happens slowly.
It happens through conversations that seem small. A correction here, a warning there.
A private conversation about someone's heart posture, or an open rebuke in front of all the staff. A staff text reminder about loyalty, an underhanded sermon about submission, a Scripture used just right about rebellion. A spiritual "warning" about division or a strategic conversation about who is safe and who isn't.
Eventually, without anyone ever sitting you down and giving you a list of rules, you learn the rules:
You learn what you can say.
You learn what you should never say.
You learn who you can talk to.
You learn who you shouldn't talk to.
You learn that questions are not safe
You learn that there are certain subjects you don't bring up.
Certain concerns you don't voice.
Certain people you don't confide in.
Eventually you stop asking questions out loud and internally start asking yourself, “what will happen to me if I actually say how I feel”
That is a terrifying place for a Christian to live.
Because when Scripture is constantly benefiting and validating the authority of one person, you can slowly lose the ability to distinguish between God's voice and that person's voice.
I know the difference now.
But I didn't then.
Then, I was trying to be obedient.
I was trying to be humble.
I was trying to have the right heart.
I was trying not to be offended.
I was trying to honor my pastor.
I was trying to honor my boss.
I was trying to protect the ministry.
I was trying to protect the church.
I was trying to protect the people we served.
Somewhere in the middle of trying to protect everything around me, I stopped protecting the part of me that God had given a conscience to. I began questioning myself instead of what was happening around me.
Maybe I'm the problem.
Maybe I'm offended.
Maybe I don't understand the whole story.
Maybe this is just what church leadership looks like.
Maybe this is what it costs to serve.
Maybe carrying my cross means enduring this mental prison.
That last one almost destroyed me.
There is a difference between carrying a cross for Christ and carrying a burden Christ never asked you to carry to protect the image of a man and his wife.
There is a difference between dying to yourself and being taught that your conscience must die so someone else can remain unquestioned.
There is a difference between biblical submission and surrendering your God given ability to discern, so that someone's reputation can be protected at all costs.
There is a difference between honoring a pastor and fearing a pastor.
I didn't know where that line was anymore.
Because You had taught me the words.
You had taught me the verses.
You had taught me how to defend your honor and ignore my convictions.
So when those same Scriptures you used on everyone else were applied to me, I assumed the problem had to be me.
That's what made it so powerful.
You didn't have to say, “Don't question me.”
You could quote Scripture intentionally and let me come to that conclusion all on my own.
You didn't have to say, “Don't talk to the other staff.”
You could talk about gossip, division, dishonor, and protecting unity until we became afraid that an honest conversation was going to be used against us.
You could say "they aren't loyal to the church" and I'd believe you.
We watched how real relationships became threatening to the machine of ministry. Then systematically dismantled at your hand before our very eyes.
You didn't have to say, “You can't leave.”
You made leaving feel like rebellion using the Bible.
You made walking away feel like abandoning God and the ministry we loved.
You made disagreement betrayal.
You made us believe that if we were truly spiritual, we would stay and remain silent.
Eventually, the cage didn't need a lock.
We had been taught to lock it from the inside.
That is the part I still struggle to put into words.
Because I didn't feel trapped in the beginning. I felt blessed, chosen, and trusted. I felt like I was part of something bigger than myself.
A Venus flytrap doesn't look like a trap.
You don't approach it because you know you're walking into danger.
You approach it because it looks inviting.
It doesn't need to chase you.
It only needs you to get close enough.
Then it closes.
Slowly.
Piece by piece.
Until you're trapped.
That is what happened to us.
The trap wasn't one command.
It was full dependence on the church, relationships you could ruin at any second, ministry you could strip away because you didn't like what I said, finances you could withhold at any moment, my family you could plant seeds to destroy, our children you used as tools against us, our livelihood by which you reminded us you supplied when you wanted something that didn't sit right, our sense of purpose you could easily strip away by a phone call to you "ministry friends"
It was the belief that leaving the church would hurt people we loved. It would hurt my family and my calling.
When your finances and your ability to help your children become intertwined with a pastor who also has total spiritual authority over you, leaving becomes much more complicated than simply deciding you don't like the way you're being treated.
You start thinking about your kids.
You start thinking about your bills.
You start thinking about what happens when you lose relationships.
You start thinking about what happens when people turn against you.
You start thinking about what will be said about you from the pulpit.
Because we've seen it happen to other people before us.
Suddenly you're not staying because you're free to stay.
You're staying because you're afraid of what happens if you leave. I wasn't making decisions from freedom anymore. I was making decision out of manipulation and fear.
I was making decisions from consequences that "could" happen to me if you realized I was questioning things.
That's when I realized how deep the control had gone.
The trap had reached places I never thought a pastor or a boss should ever have access to: finances, family, decisions, confidence, relationships, understanding of scripture.
My ability to trust my own discernment.
Still, I kept telling myself that I needed to "have a better heart."
Do you know what that does to someone?
To constantly be taught that the problem may be their heart when the problem is actually what is happening around them?
It makes you distrust yourself.
It makes you apologize for things you didn't do.
It makes you over explain yourself.
It makes you afraid of being misunderstood.
It makes you rehearse conversations before you have them.
It makes you think about how every sentence could be interpreted.
It makes you wonder who is listening.
It makes you wonder who will repeat it.
It makes you afraid that honesty will cost you everything.
Eventually, you don't even realize how quiet you've become.
We were the staff.
We were supposed to be able to trust one another. We were supposed to be brothers and sisters. But we couldn't safely talk about what we were experiencing.
No one could.
No one did.
So we all stayed silent and struggled for years privately.
That isolation did something terrible.
It made each person believe they were alone.
One person thought, “Maybe I'm the only one who feels this way.” Another thought, “Maybe I'm just struggling spiritually.”
Another thought, “Maybe I need to submit more.” Another thought, “Maybe I need to pray harder.”
Everyone was privately questioning themselves and their relationship with God, while the pattern continued.
You strategically made us question one another and only trust you. Then you destroyed us all from the inside out.
That is one of the deepest wounds I carry.
Not simply what happened to me.
But what I watched happen to people around me. People who loved Jesus. They gave their lives to the ministry that was destroying them slowly. They were exhausted fighting made up wars for a man that invited controversy at every turn.
People who gave up weekends, holidays, and family time to help you do nothing but gain popularity.
I watched people who genuinely wanted to help people become people who were afraid to ask for help themselves.
It was dangerous to not be ok
These people didn't want power.
They wanted to serve.
You knew that and took full advantage of their love for the Lord.
Slowly, some of them became afraid of you.
Some became quiet.
All of us exhausted.
All began questioning themselves.
Some changed, became cold and distant.
Some left.
Some stayed because they couldn't see a way out.
I cannot pretend that didn't happen.
I cannot "spiritualize" it away anymore.
Because calling this ministry a church does not make it biblical or Godly.
Teaching “submission” does not make your control righteous.
Calling for “unity” does not give you a right to manipulate the minds of everyone around you.
Calling for honor doesn't give you a "get out of jail free card".
Quoting Scripture does not make the use of Scripture Christlike.
I had to go back to the Bible you taught me.
But this time, I had to read it without your voice over the top of it.
I had to read it without wondering what conclusion I was "supposed" to reach.
I had to let Scripture confront me again, not because I wanted to justify myself; but because I wanted to know Jesus again.
Slowly, I realized something that broke my heart into a thousand pieces.
The Bible wasn't the thing that had failed me.
My understanding of what you had taught me as a pastor about the Bible had failed me.
I had confused your interpretation of the Bible with God's voice.
I had confused your demanded authority and submission with Christ's authority and Godly submission.
I had confused loyalty to you with faithfulness to Jesus.
When those things finally began separating in my mind, I could breathe again.
I could finally see that I could love Jesus and disagree with you. I could love Jesus and call out a pastor that uses the name of Jesus for selfish gain.
I could honor what was honorable without honoring what was harmful and accepting what you did as a pastor I should have never trusted.
I could forgive you without giving you access to control me again and speaking out about what you did to your staff.
I could love people from that ministry without being acceptance or returning to the environment that wounded me and many other people.
I could walk away from you without walking away from God.
Perhaps most importantly, I could finally understand that my children did not have to become collateral damage for my obedience to another human being.
My family does not belong to you.
My conscience does not belong to you.
My future does not belong to you.
My finances do not belong to you.
My calling does not belong to you.
As much as you tried to control those aspects of my life....
They belonged to God.
For the first time, I wasn't asking, “What will happen if they dispose of me?”
I was asking, “What does faithfulness to Christ require of me?”
I wish I had understood that spiritual authority is not ownership. You never owned me, I wasn't your property or your slave. Neither was the rest of your staff.
You wrote a paycheck, that doesn't mean you get access to dictate my entire life.
I wish I had known that a REAL pastor is supposed to point sheep toward the Shepherd, not make himself the gate they are afraid to walk through.
I wish I had understood that healthy leadership does not need people to be afraid to speak out. A healthy church's actions speak for themselves.
I wish you had taught us that.
You taught me the Bible.
But somewhere along the way, you used it to control my thinking and dictate my life.
You taught me Scripture.
But Scripture became the language through which fear was created.
You taught me about Jesus.
But I had to learn that Jesus was not the man forcing me to submit to things my spirit knew was wrong.
You taught me about submission to leadership.
But Jesus taught me that my ultimate submission is to Him.
You taught me about authority.
But Jesus taught me that whoever wants to be great must become a servant.
You taught me about the Shepherd. But you taught him in a way that validated your abuse.
Eventually, Jesus had to teach me how to recognize His voice again.
Maybe that's why I can finally say this without the same fear I once carried:
I am not angry that you taught me the Bible.
I am grieving that something so holy was used in ways to manipulate people for your own benefit.
I am grieving for the staff members who learned to silence themselves for YEARS.
I am grieving for the people who YOU taught that questions about your ministry was rebellious.
I am grieving for the families who stayed because they didn't know how to leave.
I am grieving for the people who walked away from ministry because they could no longer separate the ministry of Christ Jesus from the prison you created.
I am grieving for the version of myself who thought being a good Christian meant becoming small enough that nobody could ever accuse me being dishonorable.
But I am not that person anymore.
Because the Bible you taught me eventually taught me something you never could.
Christ does not need me controlled to love me.
He wants me free.
You taught me the Bible.
But Jesus taught me how to be freed from the cage you tried to put me in.
He taught me where this whole experience was supposed to lead me
To Him.
In finding Him again, I finally found my way out of the prison that was called Global Vision Bible Church.
