Cultish: Tactics Of Manipulators w/ Michael Foster, Pt. 2

All right, welcome back ladies and gentlemen to cultish entering the kingdom of the

Colts. My name is Jeremiah Roberts One of the co -hosts here. I am joined by Andrew the super sleuth of the show

Up there there in Harriman, Utah. How are you doing, man? I'm doing well I'm very excited for this second episode because we're gonna get into some

Really really interesting and things that need to be talked about things that people really need to be aware of right now

Yes, very very important conversation and we're Stan good to have you back man. I appreciate the question the first episode.

So welcome back Yeah, thank you so much Andrew. I'm still I'm still scared of the lack of facial hair there.

Yeah, it's your it's your driver's license face It's like your driver's license now become like one of those live things like there's there's this company called 19 crimes

It's this wine company and that's is every single there's a criminal in the front of every single one of them and they have this

And it's all like a picture from the you know 1800s but when you put this phone over the face of the bottle of wine like the person starts talking and like telling their story so I kind of feel like I have this app up and I'm like Listening to like the

Andrew to face in your driver's license. Just like talking It's the thing it's a thing of nightmares. I guess it's right.

I'm gonna work through it though I'm gonna work through you hurry up and grow that back. But anyways I'm super excited.

So we are this the second part of our series Talking about a very important subject talking about Manipulation and the first episode we talked about Really kind of laying a real foundation of really making sense of this all as we actually drive into these tactics

So we appreciate you all Patiently waiting a full week or if you're catching this episode, you know, if you're brand new the podcast catching up You're probably brand you're just gonna flip over to the part two, but thank you all for waiting

So we are joined back by Michael Foster Michael. Thank you for joining us. Good to have you back Nice to be here again.

Excellent. Okay, so let's just go ahead and jump into it So just reiterate we spent the first episode really kind of again laying the foundation and so you wrote this manual tactics of manipulators

I think you kind of mentioned it briefly in passing the first episode and obviously you have a background as a pastor Kind of seeing this

What was the motivating factor with and we're gonna have this list by time release this episode

We should have some blog content as well to really expounding upon this What was the motivating and driving?

Factor behind putting this list together if you can kind of bring everyone into that and expound upon that if you can Sure. So these started as just Facebook posts.

So I have a habit of I wake up every morning And read and write for about two hours just part of being a pastor and a content creator you gotta

Spend some time and I was reflecting on experiences I had in churches and that I've had relayed to me and and kind of identifying these trends or Tactics and ways that I saw in what

I thought of as manipulative ministers guys I weren't I wasn't really willing to call straight -out cult leaders.

So I do think some of these apply to cult leaders without a doubt, but these were guys that just were doing ministry in a way that I think

Was an abuse of authority certainly didn't glorify God. It wasn't properly Executed authority lawful.

And so I started writing these little Facebook posts and they took off right and they took and I had

I had Teaching elders and ruling elders and pastors reaching out to me from all different denominations

I had a lot of people saying whoa You described my church perfectly or my old pastor perfectly or or I used to be this way or whatever

And so as I kept kind of expanding on them and writing them from time to time I'd have people asking me where they're posted and they're just on my

Facebook. So it's kind of ethereal right just transient feed so what

I did is I put together a little PDF and And I went through and edited it a little and then

I was like, alright, this is about as edited as it's getting So if there's any typos, it's you didn't pay anything for it.

So that's you get what you pay for But um, then I I put it on a

Newsletter that I had for my when I was getting ready to church plant and man it got downloaded

I just put it on my Facebook page at the time. I had maybe two thousand three thousand followers and it got downloaded like six seven hundred times like in an hour and That's when

I knew there was like deep interest in this subject for sure and I have a I have a deep interest in it

I'm not an expert though. You know, I'm more of a I'm not a psychologist.

I'm not a therapist. I haven't looked into all these things. I'm you guys know Probably a thousand times more than I do about cults but I am a pastor and I've been in pastoral systems and churches that I I In retrospect look back and say that that wasn't good or a lot of aspects

It wasn't good and I regret being part of it and I've seen things from afar or a council it and mediated in situations

Where you're like man, this is not a good environment. They're not doing things. Well, so this kind of came out of that and It's a subject.

I want to divide Dive into more especially as I have now. I'm a pastor again. I'm planted a church and I Have been given this authority by God to represent him to his sheep

Yeah, and I want to represent him. Well, you know just like I want to be I want to represent God To my children.

Well, and I know I won't do it perfectly, you know But I want to grow in holiness and do that because it's

God's reputation and glory. That's on the line So that's why it matters to me. Okay, excellent.

Excellent. Appreciate that. So let's just go ahead and jump in the first category the benevolent the benevolent

Manipulator so you have a section here that describes it but if you could just describe just from personal experience how

Maybe like how you came about this description and then maybe give some key examples

You know just in passing of how you saw this played out I'm very curious to kind of see kind of really talk about this particular category

Sure, so kind of as a preface The way I look at a lot of relationships is through the grid of gravitas

So gravitas is an old Roman virtue that means dignity or graveness or seriousness

Means weight you see it referenced in different ways in Scripture But gravity this means someone that has a lot of weight and weight comes from You know

Authority so think of a command presence So if you ever met a guy that had been in the military or as a police officer

But he's in civilian clothes. You can still by the way, he stands and talks you you are you military, right?

You started because they've learned how to carry authority with them Yeah, they walk up to a car or whatever and they're actually trained to do that But also just by having status in life and working hard and having experience you can actually gain gravitas right through pietas by piety by growing and this is a

Idea, I think we need to Get back. It's very similar to like God's Kabbalah God's weight his glory.

God has weight and So gravitas is when someone's in a room They're the one

That is kind of in control Even if they're not like some big flamboyant personality

They just have this weight to them, but it's also really easy to fake by being kind of an overtop attention seeker

And all that sort of stuff. And so it's easy to have kind of faux gravitas And so if you think about how gravity works

Gravity, basically the weather has the greatest gravity will pull something of a lesser mass into it or at least in its orbit

Okay. Now a lot of people that don't have knowledge of Scripture Don't have practical mastery of Scripture don't come from solid families.

They really don't have gravitas yet The things that form it that form that that virtue in them isn't present in their life

They just haven't grown and so they're very attracted to people that have that just like a smaller

Satellite would be attracted to something with larger mass Okay so now The reason

I bring that up because it kind of it's a topic that comes up through this a lot But a benevolent manipulator what

I thought about is that we always want manipulators to kind of be evil Right.

We yeah, but it's not that complicated. So when we describe like a manipulator or whatever people say, well, that's a wolf

Right, you know, like I don't know. Maybe they're a coyote. Maybe they're a dog. I don't know I don't know I don't know where they're at in the

King whether unelect or whatever Because these aren't people denying the Trinity or denying the resurrection of Christ or anything like that in particular.

These are people That are trying to move you to do something in a way. That's not godly

So what I say is benevolent manipulator is someone Whose love or benevolence for it towards you is directly tied to your willingness to push for their agenda

So they're a manipulator in that They're trying to twist a motivate you against your will conscience

Or or desire to do something. You don't really feel good about right? They don't have a clear, you know You have a clear conscience about and they're trying to get you to do it via manipulation and that thing is tied up with this

Person is directly tied to their person, but they do they do have a sort of care for you

You know, they do they probably have stopped by and prayed for you. Maybe they even have

Given money to you or when you're in a real dark time They've come in and counseled you and poured into you

They're not they're not like some sort of like black hat mustache having yeah,

I'm tuned villain They're a human being with multi faceted Motivations and everything but they do have this tendency to try to twist you to to do what they want you to do and that thing doesn't always benefit you and It actually really does it directly benefits them.

And so that's a benevolent manipulator They want you in their orbit, right?

They're the center you orbit around them What I want as a pastor is

I want my people to orbit around God now They might be like a moon orbits around me

Or the earth and earth orbits around the Sun it may be for a time I take my sons they orbit around me as I orbit around God Yeah, and over time

I want them to grow and mass grow and gravitas, right? I want them so I don't want them to always be devotees.

I want my sons to be peers I want them to grow into men that are my equals manipulator though if that happens

Then you supersede him or at least he can't control you anymore.

And so it's very important that he keeps you Dependent and loyal to his person and so they'll do that I put a couple of these in here though often question your loyalty and do so silent

Slyly, right like man, are you are you committed to this or you getting pulled into all that weird Tim Keller nonsense?

Right, or are you gonna pull it into this guy or that guy? Whatever. No, no, no, man. I'm all with you.

I don't I don't believe that stuff, right? Yeah They'll always be suspicious of anyone that leaves the group.

Everyone's had this happen yeah, right you leave a church and then the people either unfriend you on Facebook or unfollow you on Twitter or Instagram or whatever or They just never talk to you again

And it's like you left the Church of Christ the Catholic the universal the general church

By leaving their church and that's because they're like, I don't know. He's not right with Pastor so -and -so so something must be wrong, right?

He's not in his orbit anymore Or they'll poison the well when it comes to anyone that might rival their gravitational pull, right?

Though and this is what you see again I mentioned this last episode in second Corinthians where the super Apostles are trying to say there's something wrong with Paul Because super Apostles want to maintain control and influence over the

Church of Corinth And so they they have to poison the well elsewhere and say hey, we're the only place you can get good water

They'll try to convince you that any concerns you have or actions you do which don't align with their agenda

Spring forth from some personal weakness. Look the reason You're scared of what we're trying to do is because you come from a broken family and that makes it hard for you to trust people and You know, whatever the main thing is that they're always trying to pull you back

Into being on their mission that culminates in their agenda, which is directly tied to their person

Mm -hmm. No, that's really good In fact, you guys gonna I'll let you guys jump in here a second

But one thing I came to observation to like in regards to a lot of the ways that you know

They're there and as they want to bring someone along to to fulfill their agenda but a lot of things you mentioned along that process may be taking them under their wing becoming a father figure to them or even helping them in a

If they're going through a hard time and some of the other things you mentioned that's not a wrong thing in and of itself

But given the motive instead of actually doing what is a good and ethical thing.

You're essentially that's that's grooming You know, I've seen that in examples where someone will a pastor or spiritual leader will use their authority to get spiritually close for example with a member of the opposite sex

And they use that as a way for them to open up about their tell me

I'm your pastor I can trust you and that's one of the reasons to why a pastor Jeff Durbin has had a policy even back when he was a pastor at a

Calvary addiction Recovery Center Never once did he ever counsel a woman with the door closed? That's been the case there's been times here

I've been at the studio to doing production stuff and Jeff's called me and said hey Or you asked me like hey, you might just come in the room with me because I need just a second person in the room

So there there's a lot of different variables in play which how that can come about so I agree with that for sure

Andrew now when you when you look at this aspect of the benevolent manipulator Are there any can you give any examples that have come to mind that people you've interacted with or just?

What comes to mind with some things that Michael talked about this first tactic of manipulators the benevolent manipulator? Yeah for first.

I just want to make mention. I love the the gravitas I think that is awesome way to explain things and it seems like the manipulator in general has it like when you said a foe

Gravitas it's like if you look at the orbit of the moon around the earth. There's nothing no strings attached to it

But the gravitas of the manipulator is full of strings from far away It may look great, but when you're zooming in and more of a micro level

You're gonna see all of the manipulation tech techniques that keep it afloat It's almost like the manipulator is the person who holds the kite with a string you know what

I mean the kites the kites in The air, but there's a string that's controlling it the whole time with the benevolent

Manipulator is that like the type of person as well that they would do things for people. We know there's

People don't necessarily do things altruistically like there's no like altruism in a sense except I would say

Jesus Christ is the perfect altruist kind of transactional relationship, right? It's like where they'll do something or let's say they go and they pray for somebody but later on in the relationship

If something's not going their way, they'll bring it up. I look look I did this for you Okay, I've had that happen to me very many times where did we not love you?

Did we not invest in you and And so there when you're trying to break free from a

Bad relationship a codependent wherever you want to call it. So there's like Bowen therapy theory

And I think he I think he's kind of like a Jordan Peterson guy. He's back from the 40s and 50s He did a really good job at identifying just by observation human tendencies

And so, you know, I don't I don't subscribe to the whole psychological model But he'll say when you're when someone's trying to become independent from someone more independent

There's kind of three stages that the emotions go through one. Why are you trying to hurt me? Right?

So it's very personal two let's go back to the way things were and three ultimatums and threats and so you see that happen when you try to like Maintain your own your own orbit because I kind of think of the manipulator like a black hole

It's like his gravitas has fallen in and he's sucking you in right as opposed to holding you in orbit

Right what I want for my kids if I can push it, I'll push this metaphor far I want them to become their own planet.

I want them to individuate for me over time I want them to be greater than me is what I really want But the manipulator like what is this about?

Don't I love you? Haven't I look like, you know, why would you treat me? So where it's like no man,

I'm just trying I'm moving away. I got this job. I'm leaving this church. There's nothing personal I'm very thankful like well,

I don't know if there's good churches out here We've been good to you, you know, whatever and then when you won't do that, like look just come back

Actually, we've been thinking about you maybe being a deacon, right? And we've been thinking about maybe being a deacon or we've been thinking like you might be helpful in the worship band

And let's just go back to the way things are and we'll look at these new things. No. No, I'm not gonna do it well, look

Then there's things that you've told us you've told us some of the pornography looked at you told us this and you know

We thought you're doing good But now we realize you're not doing good and we think it's probably best that we sit down and talk to you and your wife right, like this is these are how these things roll out man, and you look at it, you're like you know, they start throwing the cart cards down and you see this sort of These things play out in relationships, you know, and so the benevolent manipulator and he'll tell himself

That he's doing it for your good because you know what? This guy came alive under my ministry when he came here

He was this porn addicted loser working part -time And now he got a real job and he's got a wife and he's off the pornography and and he's leaving here

And it's he's being led astray. He's being led astray. He needs to stay at this ministry He needs this ministry and and that guy will reason will rationalize to himself that what he's doing is

Is actually helpful so he'll think of it as love and that's how deluded we can be, you know

Hmm. No, that's really good In fact when I was thinking about you know, look at all, you know all that I've done for you You know and like I did this and this and this for you as a way to kind of you know

You weaponize what should be servitude. I mean like we should be as men

You know, our goal is Christian men is just to serve to glorify God and not expect

Anything in return and not it's not be contingent upon the alkalis or praises or kind of you know Having all these people look up and revere to you.

I think that's a reality In fact, it kind of reminds me of what the classic scene in gladiator and comedist yells out.

Am I not merciful, you know, right? That's the first thing that comes to mind. I've always I live in movie quotes

So that's definitely something came to mind for sure But Stan what comes to mind anything you want to ask

Michael in regards to the benevolent manipulator? Yeah, so I was listening to you speak Michael and in connection to that benevolent manipulator

I I think because this just extends not only Like inside of the world of church leadership itself

But outside just the fact of the matter is that there are a good number of people In fact, I would almost want to say just about everybody

Who lies and manipulates people into doing things for quote -unquote good reasons?

Whether or not they would truly be good reason so like for our benevolent benevolent manipulators there

Do you feel like for them more? Is it something to where it really is them trying to focus more on like being selfless and for good reasons?

But like they're just view is completely messed up They're just like out of this world or do you think it's more focused solely on maybe more their desires?

The desires of the manipulator and then that's good for everybody else Yeah, so I think they think of their agenda as God's agenda a lot of times is what happens and And so they think they're trying to call you to the mission of God to the agenda of God I think that's how at least in a church environment.

This is how this plays out So they think of it as they're actually Serving you and it is for your good and that can lead to some of that like ends justify the means sort of scenarios

But yeah, I do think they they have a hard time separating their goals their themselves from the the plan of God the mission of God right for individuals and so for By you serving them

You are serving God. So they kind of functionally become mediators between you and God But I don't even know if they would put it in those words, so I don't know if that answers that question does that help

It gives a good ballpark there. Yes. Okay, cool. Okay. Awesome. So let's go ahead and just jump to the next tactic which is called the manipulators helper

So essentially I the first just from reading through it. I would these would be Enablers enablers of the manipulator.

I've seen that happen a Case study of where that happened. This is people were messaging us about it was

Ravi Zacharias after his death I think that you know, there was a situation there where people are just kind of like that shocked me

How could you even make these accusations? I mean, he's Ravi Zacharias and that's that's a huge That's a huge pinnacle example but you know there's many a times where There'll be a church structure or say there's there's a case of abuse and someone comes forward and say this person

Touched me inappropriately and and all those things again you want to adhere to Biblical standards when you come to entertaining accusations, there's a proper way to do it

There's a proper way not to but many a times. I think there just is this immediate

Defense of someone someone is in a spiritual authority Therefore there's no way they could have done that particular thing.

So already there's a lot of bias there So I definitely that's what comes to mind just off the get -go

But go ahead and just unravel that and and talk about that Maybe even give a couple examples of how you've seen this especially, you know, given the context in your experience

So, I mean and that's a good description You you gave a great description. I mean more or less it's when someone starts to doubt like hey

Why is he saying these things and doing these things? Let's say like a senior pastor scenario or whatever and They start to have their doubts that this is like a proper godly way to to go about dealing with tension conflict

You know leadership or whatever This is a person that will have to dispel those concerns and they'll say look he's just he's been really tired

I know he probably shouldn't have said that way. Here's what he actually meant Right, so they couldn't exist to as a buffer to reinterpret

The events to reinterpret the words like they're a check it's kind of like mom It's like dad's a drunk and he's like beating the kids.

Look I know He's had a hard day at work. He actually loves you. He doesn't mean it and In this because mom loves that So she wants to the kids to have the love that led for for their father that led her to marry him

And so she in this sort of diluted commitment to him Reinterprets all these things that happen, right?

and And so you'll have like an assistant or an associate pastor or a deacon or some lay leader that has a lot of authority and influence

In the church that will argue the senior leaders case and say no. No, no, it didn't really mean that now

Sometimes people just misunderstand but every time this is the guy that's the advocate. He's the guy that like runs interference

For the manipulator. He's the guy that's out there like Like making sure people's doubts don't don't gain any footing and In terms of you know,

I've done this at times and this is a hard thing So if you're like an assistant pastor at a church

Part of your job is to help the senior leader Execute the will of the elders, you know, so the elders have

Trying to get things done You know Maybe their job is to get this new building done and raise up some deacons or deal with something issue or whatever and then those

Elders around the senior pastor come up with some sort of plan and you're an assistant pastor assistant, right?

So your job is to help that guy get that done. And so as an assistant pastor you can take well look,

I know this guy is just trying to do what's best for the church and maybe he's acting out out of like Not get arrest or whatever and then you start to rationalize you first rationalize his behavior and Then you communicate those rationalizations to anyone else as opposed to what a good assistant pastor should say.

Hey What gives dude like you can't talk to people that way, you know That's that's what a good assistant does like again.

I said this I think last episode but in our In our

Church plant we were having like our informational meetings before we started one Sunday I talked a lot about I was getting some hate on I had something go viral on Twitter and it made a lot of people mad and I brought it up and I was talking about it and Whatever I talked about it and then afterwards our worship pastors like hey, that's really weird man

No one talks about no one No one's like that not very many people have like a social media following like you do and they certainly don't think about Haters and death threats like you get maybe you should have bring that up, right?

That's a good leader. Yeah, he says you're being weird, dude. You're overstepping.

Stop it, right? That's what a good assistant does in those cases. They encourage but they also give you honest feedback

You want people around you that's gonna tell your tell you the truth Problem is with manipulators is they create what's called the bozo explosion guy?

Calla lot the doubt tell Saki tell Saki. Yeah He's a he was a the early marketing guy for Apple and read a good book called the art of the start

And he talks about in a lot of organizations. There's a sort of insecurity where this leader is insecure

So anyone underneath of him he wants to not be as equal or his superior and ability but below him inferior

So they're below him and then that becomes a culture and those people put people below them and below them and before you know

It's a whole organization built on a bunch of clowns

It's a bozo explosion and then when things happen it falls all apart because it's the book the foundation like a good leader opposed or appoints people that either have

Different giftings that he does that's superior to him or have a trajectory towards that Right.

He wants people the manipulator wants helpers advocates Enablers that keep him in power.

I have so that's good. Yeah. Yeah quick question on the manipulators helper so Could there be different types like are there some manipulators helpers that kind of like a

Stockholm syndrome that don't realize that they've been manipulated into being a manipulators helper or there's like there's the manipulator helper where they are trying to get something from the one that they are the helper for and then the

Other question would be what type of manipulator is the one that breeds the helper essentially?

Yeah I mean, those are great questions. I think yes to the first two. I think there's both.

I think there's both types you know look when you've put time and money and years and reputation online for some movement right for some church

There is a lot of pressure on you to just it's like some gloss Theory, right, you know, you got this car you keep putting money into it and the car is a piece of junk

But you're like I put $10 ,000 in it So I got to get my $10 ,000 worth and so you want to keep putting money.

Well, wait How about you only lose $10 ,000 instead of losing 15 sunk loss?

Just take the loss of move a $10 ,000 loss as painful as it is is better than a $15 ,000 loss

We have this tendency where we put time and energy and effort into something to like stick it out and think no

No, it's gonna turn a corner. It's gonna turn a corner I think a lot of those enablers are kind of guys like that that they've put a lot of time in it and they believed

In it and a lot of these movements Or churches have something powerful that other churches don't have

But I had a good friend Mark Robinson Follow him on Twitter guys under under followed great account

But Marcus he's really wise and he said he's been around a long time in that churches are like diets

You're at one church for a long time and they don't say have vitamin C in the diet

And so now like you get to this other church and then maybe it doesn't have protein or whatever It's got vitamin

C. Yeah. Oh, it's vitamin C's. I've been lacking. It's so good This is what the church needs.

It needs vitamin C, but it lacks protein. It's not like a year later You're like, well, no, you don't have protein, right?

And so I think a lot of these were drawn the churches Maybe a church that is heavy on apologetics or heavy on Masculinity or heavy on social against abortion or heavy on the doctrines of grace or whatever

But it's like it's not balanced, you know It doesn't have the whole ministry it's like very specialized and these people end up there and they and now they have to justify all the time and Energy they put into it and in these these churches that are imbalanced rarely have balanced individuals at the top of them

You know, they have people that tend to be Manipulators or or trend towards manipulative tactics

And so I think the enabler has to justify their decisions and their time spent, you know

Oh, that's that's really good. So let's go ahead and jump to the next tactic and I want to just Just blazing through here.

So the next one I think is very very important is flipping the script I think this is one of the typical examples when you're dealing with someone who's just Combative and just does not want it.

It's almost the person who does not It talked about fool does not receive any sort of rebuke and they always try and flip the script

And so maybe what's good as you jump into this Michael? Is that if you could just the word gaslighting that does get thrown around?

I feel like that almost in of itself is an emotional impact term That's almost like you're just gaslighting me and there's been times where I'm just like wait what do you mean by that because it seems like they're throwing it as Just an emotional impact term to sort of shut down the conversation so All that being said just go ahead and jump into the aspect of flipping the script and also start off by just defining

What gaslighting is for us? I'm excited to hear this next part So gaslighting comes from an old movie where this guy was doing some sort of something up in the attic he wasn't supposed to and it was pulling energy or gas or whatever from the lights downstairs and His wife was like man

I swear the lights are dimmer than they used to be is like no, this is totally normal, right?

And so I think it's called the gaslighter. I forget the name of the movie, but it's got gaslighting So basically trying to convince someone that they're crazy when what they're seeing is actually happening, right?

Yeah, that's what it is. And so you're right in our culture. It's like People gaslight you by or by claiming your gaslighting them.

Yeah It's like turtles all the way down man inception a dream within a dream within a dream so yeah, it definitely has

Diminishing returns as a as a word but going back to the original movie. It's helpful and there's actually a key key and peel sketch where this where one of them is dating this girl and he wants to break up with her and She convinces him that the reason he wants to break up with her is because he's controlling and she's actually controlling him

And it's it's got I think it's got some cussing in it. But man, it is Genius, they've got some brilliant sketches.

I'll give you that by the end of it. He ends up he stays with her He begs her to stay with him when he was breaking up with her

But so example flipping the script is basically anything you accuse them of They'll accuse you of and say look

I can't I can't these sermons man. These sermons are very arrogant Right.

There's a lot of pride in it and it's just not good Look, the reason you think the sermons are arrogant is because you're proud in your assessment, brother

Hey you guys like you guys are telling people about these things going on my life that I told to you in confidence and and I've warned people to not go to your church.

I've warned people because you're you're doing this. Well, brother You telling people that we gossip about you slander

It's like, you know, they're like making it they're making it all about you. It's a diversion tactic

Right, that's all it is It's to keep you on the hot seat to make you defend yourself and you learn after a while It's so social justice warriors love to do this, right?

They keep you on the hot seat They're always trying to get you an issue an apology Well, don't you think you should apologize to the people you offended and they did that with me a bunch of times on Twitter And I and I don't issue apologies on Twitter right now

Because I know like it's never gonna go anywhere, but they want me on the hot. Yeah That's how Jordan Peterson got famous, too

Yeah, he was super super wise and how he did that. Mm -hmm. So there's two um, they want it

They want to keep in the hot seat Here's the two reasons because they won't have to respond to your charge if you get distracted with defending yourself, right?

I'm not an arrogant What you know, that's what they're hoping you'll say that's what they want to happen

Also because you'll likely get emotional not make you look out of control, right? And when you get emotional they a manipulator tends to cool the calm and conflict

Right because they enjoy it because it's it allows them to gain control and So what they're like they flip it back on you hoping to get an emotional response, yeah, and and that's why the this is what

I always tell people is You kind of learn this in marriage, okay So in marriage think of a time you and your wife got in an argument and it doesn't really matter which one of you said

It but basically hey you sinned against me this way and then they say well you sinned against me this way, right?

And so what are we gonna do now? We can list everybody's sins and see who has the biggest pile of sins Is that how we're gonna deal with this, right?

And so you say in that situation you say, you know, let's say hey Sweetheart, I love you you sweet, but you did this and this is a sin and she says well you did this too you say well that may be and we should deal with that because sin should be dealt with and I want to get to my sin

But I'm talking to you about yours right now And let's deal with this and after we deal with this we'll get to that because we should deal with sin, right?

Right. And so what you do is you calmly Stay on topic.

Don't let them get you off of it Right, we can talk about maybe I am arrogant.

All right But me being arrogant doesn't mean your sermon wasn't arrogant, right?

Me telling people this being slander doesn't mean you weren't gossiping And and so we're talking about that if you can address this, let's just move on we can it

Maybe we can move through this quick, but let's talk about this issue They will not I guarantee they won't if they're a manipulator.

Yeah, if they're willing to talk about it They're probably humble and they're like, well, you're right, you know, cuz they fear

God they want to deal with it and and What you need to do is this like keep your wits about you stay calm.

And so the here's the thing Our battles not against flesh and blood but principalities and powers and spiritual weakness in the high places, right?

Our concern is that we honor God Who cares if the manipulators win? Let's say they got us right, but if we um

If we are guilty of a particular sin, we should be willing to repent of it and And so you always listen to the critiques of your enemies because sometimes or your opponents because sometimes they're more on point than others

That being said the issue at hand that generated the conversation was you talking to them about a problem?

And if you always go to a leader to talk to them about a problem and it always becomes your problem

It's fair to say it's a red flag You know, I mean I'm not saying that there might be times that it is your pride

Like hey, I think it's proud that you said that Jesus is the only way Well, that's your pride because you think you're above God's Word and God's Word says

Jesus is the only way brother And so you need to submit to God's Word and not to your feelings, right?

And your own standard Yeah, so there's a time to say that and that's the trick with all these things, right?

And that's like if they're going back to something objective like the Word of God as opposed to like just Anchoring it grounding it in personal relationship, which is where they usually haven't we loved you, you know

Whatever. Am I not merciful? Yeah. Yeah, I've been merciful. Yeah So I think that's that's the key with flipping the script.

They always try to any critique about them is really your weakness No This this is literally reminding me of probably the biggest manipulation tactic that cult leaders use

Right, like if you question the cult leader, what do they do to you? They flip the script.

You're not saved You know, you're questioning me who has all authority and knowledge revealed from God We can see it even with Joseph Smith and the

Nauvoo Expositor when some of his old followers were gonna out him for polygamy And they made that that newspaper and then what a

Joseph Smith did he flip the switch? Or flip flip the script and he had it burned down. You know what

I mean? He made it seem like they were the enemy. They were the ones doing the wrong thing to take off all of the The whatever the hot seat off of himself and give it give it back to them literally by lighting their their place on fire

I think this is a great a great analysis man of how to actually see something that's actually happening

Give it more an objective point of view in order to have a biblical resolution to things I think this is this is wonderful, bro

You can actually reach out to the people too. I was in I remember I was in a situation where a guy was like Michael haven't

I love you to which I said well so -and -so Haven't I loved you?

No, it's kind of like when you realize it's a game like I thought we loved each other

I didn't think the question was love I thought the question was this objective issue that we're trying to resolve.

Do you not want to talk about the issue? You know and you just have to learn in sales They call this looping where you always loop back to the issue.

You always find your way back Yeah, and these guys are gonna try to take you off the topic somewhere else and you gotta loop your way back

And I think that's why when you go into you have to know the issue and stick to it.

Keep it simple I see this a lot of times where people like are gonna rebuke a leader or whatever and they write these Really long

Emails really long and I'm like look if it's legit try to boil it down to a paragraph and just stick to it

Yeah, you know don't try to list everything that's ever been wrong Just try to like get to the heart of the issue and deal with it and perhaps you guys can reconcile

Which is obviously the the ideal. Yeah, it would be it's almost what you call Like Sun Tzu the art of linguistic

Aikido in a sense where you do have to do that and we've had that too when you do LDS outreach or even really when you're

Engaging into the kingdom of the cults because many of times they will and you're trying to stay focused on a particular topic there

They usually they only have their scripted answers So a lot of times they will try and divert and change the subject and you have to think very tactic

You have to have think with tactics. There's good time. You just because we're saying tactics and manipulate manipulators

Tactics again in and of themselves are not bad They're amoral, but it really depends on the arbiter of who's who what what are your intentions behind the tactics?

So you always want to stick back to the essentials and that's happened many a times effect I just had that with someone who is a outside heckling outside of our church this past Sunday, but it was a great conversation for sure

Yeah, so let's go ahead and just jump into the next Topic which is something that was interesting because we mentioned the postmodern society and we can't talk about the formulations of that So it caught my attention

Always keeping it subjective. Let's just go ahead and jump into that. How do Manipulators keep it subjective.

What are some good examples of that? so the thing about objective events is

They're difficult to revise if there's witnesses If there's emails if there's a sermon if there's something that some sort of fact

Anchored in history that you can refer back to you can't really revise them or a lot at least not easily, but the subjective can always be revised and The manipulator wants to be able to massage the truth the situation to control the environment

To point it towards his agenda his mission. And so they want to make everything subjective.

So hey pastor We notice there's a lot of funds there's some funds missing what's going on.

Oh, yeah. I was for this and that Do you have any receipts for that? We just need to square it up.

It's getting to the end of the year, you know Where is this mistrust coming from? Well, no, it's not a mistrust.

It's that there's money that's unaccounted for We need to have receipts or do you have some way he explained was it travel like did you stay at hotels?

Where was it? You give them a call or anything? Look, man. Have I ever misled you?

No You know, I'm kind of bothered you feel this way. I thought we had put some years in and you trust to me well

It's not an issue of trust is an issue of having receipts of knowing where the money went

And this is we have a standard operation, you know here is SOP way we go about these things.

It's so like when you're confronting them the manipulator To is gonna make it about you

It's gonna make it about your feelings. He's going to He's gonna it's gonna be like your sinful motives intentions and emotions and I've seen this before to like many times where pastors will and this is why

Pastors to be very careful. We have access to very personal facts about people

We know about some of their deepest darkest sense we know about some of their deepest darkest doubts and skepticisms and struggles or whatever and It's very you can't use those things.

You got to be very careful Like you factor them in to what's going on with people like you can't ignore the facets of their history that shape who they are

But you can almost use it like a member of the Mafia Where the

Mafia is like glad that Vito has a gay son that he's ashamed of that No one knows is gay because of Vito ever like screws over the family

They're gonna tell everyone that he's got a gay son, right? So they like having that access or if they knew that you once looked at some just terribly disgusting pornography like 15 years ago and you out of like just this

Anguish repented and told them it they might throw that out there to your wife or whatever Yeah, or to some other guy, but they want to always make it about your

They always want to spin actions in a way that best fit a narrative that will allow them to sidestep responsibility

So it's not about them. It's about you. It's about your feelings. Where's this coming from, man?

I thought yeah, I thought we were cool, man We put so many years in like, you know, like this is how guys do it.

They spirit responsibility like well We were cool, but this conversation Making it rough. Yeah, I mean, it's always everyone else's fault for sure

Yeah, no that that's that that definitely definitely I can definitely see that being I've seen that happen in fact and many a times in fact, you know,

I was thinking the example of financials like, uh, excuse me We've got six hundred thousand dollars that showed up like that a plumber found outside of a wall like a

Lakewood Church You know that whatever that's going on with that and I'll see all the memes and stuff like that But for sure, um any just real quick before you jump on to stand to something come to mind about what he just mentioned

Yeah, so this subjective Nesset you're talking about in the manipulators really reminds me of going back to to flipping that script

They're very much So interlinked in the sense that the manipulator is Coming into this conversation already with the goal that whenever you go to confront them

About this and about what they're doing there. They're already prepared to try to hit you with Emotion in this emotional feeling because they know that this emotion is going to get you

Off guard, it's gonna catch you off guard and then you're gonna start defending yourself there and I think that probably one of the best skills that we could learn whenever we're dealing with members of the cult or Abusive church leaders is that we should expect that these people are going to try to use emotion

They're gonna try to flip the script on us because the fact that that's the trait of a manipulator

That's a manipulator what they do just in the same way that a lady who is a busybody

She's gonna go and meddle in other people's affairs. A chef is going to cook. They are going to do the exact same thing

So we need to make sure that we're staying on point and we're just trying to be gracious but stay on point because we need to be calm and collected because the goal in that Situation is that we're trying to win our brother and sister back

Mmm, that's kind of ties into the

Jewish mother one, which was the next one Yeah, which is I noticed I noticed just a lot of people where there's

They really emphasize a very particular type of loyalty it's loyalty to person more so than principles and I called the

Jewish mother. So first off, I'm ethically Jewish Yeah, I grew up with the

Jewish grandmother. So I'm a little familiar with this But this is where they talk Endlessly a how about how everyone leaves them or betrays them or doesn't appreciate them or is ashamed of them on and on it goes right, right like And so when it's a form of poisoning the well, it's a preemptive

Where that way if you ever leave now, you're part of these disloyal miscreants, right

You're you're part of that and it's a way like yeah like we speak the hard truth that no one else is willing to hear and and You know and that always offends people they say they're with us, but you know a year later they leave and you're like I'm never gonna leave you right?

I'm always gonna I'm in this man. I want the truth I want to be hardcore and so it's a it says again

But what what the manipulate the the feature of it that makes it more manipulative is that it's about a loyalty to them

More than it is to the principles of Scripture, right? And again, this is the one tendency is that they always

Attack. So one thing you see in cultures. They attack the person of Christ in Trinity. That's common always another thing they do that's common that I think is undervalued as they attack the

Catholic nature of the church the Enduring the church is broad and it exists throughout history and we never fail to exist, right?

And so you see that with Joseph Smith you see that with the JWS whatever that these churches went fully apostate now

We're the only true church, but there's Protestant churches that in function act that way They act like there's no other churches you go anywhere else.

It's a dark day brother Maybe half a percent of the churches are biblical or whatever and so if you leave their church, you kind of feel guilty like you're going into apostasy or whatever and if you leave them you feel that way and I think

That's a tactic that those people use to keep people in their churches and to or to direct them the way they want to go

So so how would you go about like if someone uses? Tactics tactic the

Jewish mother tactic like how would you whether you're like a member of a church body and you're getting this? From the leaders of that church or from another family member like I'm trying to picture my head

What are the steps that you really go about like countering this? Yeah, yeah

You just tell people you love them. Hey, I love you, man, and I'm thankful that God is That Elijah found out that there was 500 prophets and about the need to bail.

I mean I would say if you start hearing stuff like that though. That is another one of those red flags anyone that's saying that is an idiot and They don't know what the heck they're talking about.

Like I in America, we don't We don't look at Australia right now

Look at look at from a spiritual standpoint. Look at Europe very few Protestant biblical churches

In America, you can drive at least an hour in any direction and find

What would be a biblical church? It may not be ideal and have everything would be biblical at the base

You know make kind of right preaching the gospel right administration sacraments, right exercise the church discipline

Not perfect in any of those things, but right you can find at the church anywhere It's usually just a bunch of these folks that have read all their

All their theology online and create a boutique Christianity in their head and they look for a church that meets it

Those are the people that are the problem The reality is there there are biblical churches in most counties

Maybe not all counties, but in most counties in America and these guys are trying to cultivate a scarcity mindset

You know, which is that they're the only one that has access to to the truth and They're the only ones that can guide you into that X to the benefits of that truth, right?

Which is having approval orthodoxy vocational Opportunities whatever they're the ones that can lead you there and no one else can write there's other churches

They might have this but they don't have what we have here Right, we have all the abundance all the other churches like churches like us

They're very few and far between where we're special and unique and look if you're around the church for a couple decades

You start to realize that Mark Driscoll was this Bill Hybels? that's what you realize and you realize that Rob Bell and Brian McLaren, they're just the latest model the same crap that's gonna keep rolling out over and over again yeah, it's like, you know, it just happens over and over again and And they're actually our faithful churches in our in our in our town in the

Cincinnati area I'm friendly with a lot of churches that I like tell people like hey, man, you shouldn't drive 45 minutes to our church

You know, I love you guys and you really want to be here. That's great. But have you considered this church? It's only 15 minutes from your house.

I know the pastor I can introduce you You know these guys and those guys rarely do stuff like that.

They want to hang on to people as long as they can and create a scarcity mindset because Losing you is losing a tool.

It's like losing someone off your chessboard and a chess master needs chess pieces. Yep That's good and just the question

I had because then there's a couple things you mentioned in the next tactic of the Jimmy that was of The Jewish mother the next tactic was cultivating us cultivating a scarcity mindset and I think you already kind of gave some examples in the previously, you know helping saying

I but um, you know, for example in Cultivating a scarcity mindset one of the examples

I would say just kind of looking at broadly at the cults in general Would be just the aspect of love bombing where you just show a huge amount of people

You know people with very deeply emotionally suited needs you show them a ridiculous amount of affection and so it almost conditions them into this very this

Psychologically conditions them to say that hey you stay in the group you stay under me you receive love if you leave this

Then you then you experience adamant rejection. So it's not just about receiving this this now my

Like my acceptance of you become like formulates like your very identity so that that's the thing that comes to mind that maybe

Maybe explain the commonalities that the Jewish mother has with cultivating a scarcity mindset and how they did.

How do they differentiate? so Jewish mothers Negative. No one's faithful to me.

It ties you to the person the scarcity mindset is everyone else out. There is bad

There's there's almost no one out. There is good and the truth So it's it's kind of like two sides of the same coin

I think really but the Jewish mother if you leave them Then you're been unfaithful to this person who loves you and if you go out there you're going into darkness

You're going into falsehood or apostasy Okay, that's good.

All right, that's good. And then uh, so the next tactic we had nagging always nagging

So that comes from an urban dictionary, which that whenever you whenever you had to pull out the urban dictionary

That's all that's always it's interesting. So tell us a little bit about that So nagging comes from the pickup artist community

Which I know more about than I should because when I was researching it's good to be a man I ended up talking to a lot of those guys because a lot of young Christian men were going to them

But so nagging is if you walk out and talk to a pretty girl you ask her

If What's something about you other than your looks that makes you special Right And that's a way of saying to a girl so you're negating her beauty first off and There's a

Neil Strauss does this you watch Neil Strauss do this on? to the chick that played mrs.

Invisible in the Original the Invisible Woman in the original Fantastic Four movie.

I can't think of her name Jessica something Jessica Alba Jessica Alba Yeah, so Neil Strauss goes out on to Conan I think it was and does this

Jessica Alba does this exact tactic and it's a way to take away an attribute of hers

That's strong. She's a very pretty woman and and now she has to defend herself to you

She has to say well, I've got a I've got a great personality or I'm really good at this, right? So nagging is a way to to negate someone's

Positive Attributes and put them on the defensive. It's a it's like a backhanded

It's a negative remark wrapped in a backhanded compliment and and it's a way to shake someone's

Confidence whether it's male or female so a manipulator will try to negate or devalue anything that makes you his superior or equal so what he's trying to do is

Make you always depend on him look for his approval that's what he's doing and I Had a guy would often tell me how you never thought

I Had I had this guy tell me like I never thought you would get as far as you have Michael, but you have right?

It's like an insult right like it wasn't like I always believed in you and I'm happy to see you did it man

There was times. I wonder but you did it you came through praise God right as opposed to and so And I would always laugh and the last time he said it, you know,

I see, you know I always kind of felt the same way about you It's like I started to learn like oh, this is a game is it you know?

this is a you're kind of knocking me down a peg and so the manipulator is always trying to like To bring you down or keep you controlled if a father though Part of me

I'm a father always wants to lift his son up right like we're always affirming him and the good things he's doing and like telling

You telling how much how far he could go I did this episode on it's good to be a man where I basically contrast

Rocky in One of I think it's like Rocky four or five five or whatever and basically he's rebuking his son

For being a victim and he's like look, I don't know what happened to you somewhere along the way you lost yourself

But this isn't you man. Yeah, you you you can do better than this Yada, yada, yada, and then

I compared it to Mark Driscoll where he's like, how dare you? How dare you sit in your shame right and Driscoll's like breaking them down and Driscoll's like wanting them to just like feel shame and Sit in it and feel bad where Rocky wants them wants his son to feel bad for Not being the man.

He could be the man that he's made to be like It's the difference between a father and a manipulator you see in the right point

Like it's actually there's a little bit of like sort of self -esteem nonsense mixed in there with Rocky But still you listen.

Yeah, that's the difference between a father and a manipulator. Driscoll was manipulating the men Right like, you know

I could go into Driscoll pretty hard on some of the things he wrote in real merits and say I don't think that's how husband should behave but um but I think you look you look at the two tactics and one is a guy trying to make you feel bad and like he's the measure of all things and You should feel terrible.

You don't measure up where Rocky's saying you have this in you son But you feel sorry for yourself and that's why you're failing you can do this.

Stop it. Come on, you know and I think that's the difference between The nagging and and actually trying to lift something up It's like you don't like hide their faults, but you like call them to better Yeah, just a quick moment of transparency and vulnerability.

I guess you'd say I remember exactly where I was when I heard the infamous How dare you it's kind of like where were you if you're like part of the you know, the early tooth

The the pre 2010s or the just yeah, it's around whenever that was like 2009

I just remember exactly where I was and I heard that on my iPod and it was and I remember

I had Whatever sins or whatever stuff I was struggling with at the time and I took that you know

What I had no clue what was going on at Mars Hill. I mean, I lived in Phoenix I remember just listening to my

I don't know my iPod Not only did I equated that with what the stuff that I was going through but then

I I then immediately said well This is just I guess this is just who I am So it was like he just left me there and like well,

I guess that's good, you know But there wasn't any like any of that rocky, you know, this is you're better than this that that sort of thing

So I definitely read that for sure well, the fact the matter is is whenever like for the mark

Driscoll situation there there was no Equipping like as Michael was talking about the difference between a father and manipulator

There's a really big focus with fathers to be able to build up their children They're so that they can go out into the world not only create their lives for themselves

But so that they can continue on with the Great Commission in Matthew 28 that they can go out into the world and that they can

Preach the gospel whenever you have these manipulators inside of the church. They're ultimately creating this Dependence on themselves and what that ultimately creates is a culture that's interior focused

You need to sit under my teaching because this is what's going to give you life there

You're not going to be able to survive so you're just like almost just cling to the IV whenever you're inside of that church under that manipulator instead of under a true shepherd who is going to teach you and disciple you and Send you out so that you can make an impact on other people in the world and do good deeds

I've actually got a friend of mine. He's an IV nurse. I like I like that analogy. Good job there. Thank you Yeah, so another question

I would just have to just kind of jump into the next topic I really appreciate taking the time to hang out with us Michael a little extra innings here

So the one tactic I'm curious about as we jump into an Andrew if you can jump in here, too If you got questions, but I know you're as always your minds always being blown as always.

So But when it talks about cultivating a spirit of rivalry We talked earlier

I can't remember if it was in the previous episode or a little bit before we started that when it talks to Manipulators, there's people who do it very intentionally

And very and very with tactic with tact But there are people who just they do it almost unconsciously as a defense mechanism

So I'm thinking of two different things. I think it was that movie Changing lanes,

I think was Samuel Jackson and Ben Affleck But there's a line in there where Samuel Jackson basically says that it's one of the two other care

No Character Samuel Jackson's character where he was talking about how he was addicted to chaos

So sometimes I think when it says cultivating a spirit of rivalry, they're just people who sort of They're just what they're like a bull going through a china shop.

Just who told the oblivious to it Not almost almost I'm not realizing that it's almost like you change

You can change the environment, but if you don't change the person They're still gonna manifest the same chaos because they haven't dealt they haven't took ownership and responsibility for it but there's also people

I think who will cultivate a spirit of rivalry in a very like Sun Tzu the art of war in a very in a very art of war sort of way as he

Says in the opening of Sun Tzu. He says all warfare is based on deception So there's just some thoughts I initially had just by kind of looking at the summary that she wrote

So I love to hear what what I thought you have on this sure, so So basically what they feed this spirit of rivalry

As a way to get people to internally desire their approval, right? So basically they're pitying you against other people

In one way or another and as you know This is why I was telling people that my hot take was that Mars Hill The rise and fall

Mars Hill was actually right about a lot of the problems in church leadership Even though it's like hilarious like I know

Cosper I actually know my Cosper, but I know a lot of people in that podcast is a weird trip down memory lane to be honest

But I know a lot of them would just hate my ideas on sexuality, which it's this biblical sexuality

But I listen I was like no as they were describing Driscoll kind of like telling people

Apparently is what they claim who knows what's true. They claim that Driscoll on occasion would say hey this guy

He's he's going after your job, man. He's doing all this stuff right to get a better output and and kind of like pit them against each other and That's the way that these manipulators always do it.

They're always kind of like keeping Keeping you wanting their approval and knowing that you're the best one

For the job or whatever and they'll often be surrounded by a bunch of guys that are very ambitious and competitive with one another

And they want his approval and he does it because keeping them Compete with each other

Always makes them think about what what he really wants to do is think like think his thoughts like what would what would he want?

You know and and that's it's funny These manipulators are so you this way you see like that PTSD or whatever when people come out of cults or come out of churches that are cult like yeah

Where years later these these leaders still have that power over them they live rent -free in their head right that whole idea where this leader is still saying things like Like speaking to them almost in their mind like I can't do this and make them so upset

Or the kind of flip side when someone leaves that like a girl leaves an abusive patriarchal home

It's like they still hear their dad and just to kind of show them that he doesn't have control over them It's an abusive dad.

They leave a bad patriarchal home and and they'll they'll like sin and sleep around and maybe even shave their head

Or whatever as a way just to kind of like react against that voice They're hearing right, you know

And and so this what these guys are doing and they're like really grabbing the hold of people's mind in a very powerful way and You know,

I'd love to think about it more and research it more, but I just I've seen it Myself and I've definitely seen the fruits of it of people who have exited churches like that.

Oh, wow Do you have you seen Jojo Rabbit? I? Have not okay.

Well, I'm gonna spoil it but it's there's a moment. There's a there's a segment It's really kind of life the vantage point of the younger boy

Who's around 13 to 14 years years old who grew up in Nazi Germany, and he specifically?

I don't remember the exact name of the cadets or Boy Scouts, but he was just part of that So it's almost a case study of how the younger people got propagated

I mean got just got indoctrinated and the propaganda and part of the story is that His best friend who's his imaginary friend is

Hitler. So Hitler will always kind of show up as his imaginary friend So he's actually living rents like rent free in his head, but it's done a very comedic satirical way and it's a brilliant movie, but I think that's another example to of Almost you know, it's almost it while it is comical and fictional there is a level of reality where this this

Caricature of Hitler was living in this kid's head rent -free, you know, and Hitler had no involvement with that It was just the it was just the

Nazi propaganda that influenced him to think that way Very powerful propaganda is very powerful.

Well, any thoughts you have really Andrew? Yeah, it's got a question So what's like the difference between cultivating a spirit of rivalry and like cultivating a disciple?

So I'm thinking about Jesus for as an example He's got his twelve disciples and you never ever see him once creating a rivalry between the disciples instead

You see the disciples kind of having a rivalry between themselves and Jesus quelling it when they're trying to figure out who's gonna sit closest to him in heaven, right like what's what's the difference and what's the spiritual implications of Of a leader who actually instills a spirit of rivalry amongst people that he should be then discipling

So Paul stood up to Peter's face and told him what he was doing is wrong because it was not in line with the gospel right and Paul and then

Peter Repents, right? We know he repents And Paul Paul was like it wasn't about Paul Paul was offended for the gospel offended for God and his rebuke was to realign

Peter back to the truth of Scripture to call him back to it and so when we're shaping disciples, we're we're calling them back to the truth of Scripture and I think this is

You know, this is difficult because a lot of our churches are personality ministries a lot of our churches rely on Podcasts to disciple our people as opposed to us actually being in their households and knowing them and having real community and all these things

This is a problem that we got to think through, you know Like my I've got people showing up to my churches because of my podcast

And and they need they need real pastors and you real people in their life that that real align them to the truth of Scripture So a discipleship is formative right shaping someone to into what they should be in restorative but you restore them to God's Word and and that's why

We have to be careful like I love the Presbyterian say that The powers of the church is ministerial and declarative

So ministerial it comes the power of the church is expressed in the ministries of the church

We can keep you from the Lord's table. We can do that You know, we can rebuke you it's declarative.

We can declare what the Word of God says and all these things But we have limits to our authority and I think what happens in the spirit of rivalry is that we're trying to Bend them to us in areas that are outside Like, you know,

I remember this one guy who's dating this girl and he should have been But she professed

Christ and I wasn't cool with it because he has he had an ex -girlfriend that had just died a couple months before that and I was like Thinking like maybe you should work through this stuff before you date again

But I wouldn't tell him not to date her I just said look I'm gonna be honest with you Here's what why why

I'm concerned and if you're my son I would tell you not to and even that's maybe going too far But this is your decision.

You have to make wise decisions. You have to ask yourself. Is this what you should be doing right now? Here's a few things to think through biblically, right and and that was on the line of my mind

Because I I don't want to control who people marry or date I just was concerned from him as a friend and I cared about him and I thought jumping right into your relationship

Right after something so horrific Probably a bad idea But even then I wouldn't say you can't because again,

I don't have that authority right I can't say that and And then people say well, it's what he needed.

Well, and it turned out it all worked out just fine and and God was good.

He's married to her with a couple kids. They got a great relationship but um But I said I said what

I could say we have to trust the Holy Spirit to work through the power of the Word of God our problems. We don't trust the

Bible. We don't trust the Holy Spirit Manipulators people that they think the Bible is not enough right in our preaching ministries and our teaching ministries and our discipleship

Bible studies and Sunday schools and in just like appealing to people from Scripture That's enough and sometimes people get it like I remember

I had my son He kept trying to grab my hot coffee and I kept trying to stop it in one day I thought to myself, you know what?

Gonna let him put his hand on my hot coffee and burned the tip of his finger And he never put his hand in hot coffee again, sometimes it's just like I Warned this guy within what

I could but maybe he's got to be burned a little bit, you know And and and I think these manipulators we kind of circle we talked about this at some point

They'll say hey, we're doing what's best for them, right? Well, look you just have to trust the Holy Spirit, you know

And I had a good pastor once Tell me we're talking and about this couple and this problem they're having we're concerned about it and I was like Well, should

I go meet with them? It's like well, wait, we haven't even prayed for them and see let's pray for them first and see what the

Holy Spirit does it's because it's not at this like Crazy moment. We've got time. Let's pray and see what the

Holy Spirit does and then they got convicted on their own I worked it out You know, I mean, it's like amazing because God you know what

God hears prayers and the Holy Spirit works in the hearts of Christians And so I think these manipulators ultimately they their problem is they don't trust the power of God The ones that are benevolent and at some level mean well

They where they need to be rebuked is you need to trust the Bible more man. Hmm okay, good, and then the last tactic which is the surprise meeting and Yeah, I think

I've I'm guilty of doing this one I and this is the thing too as we're as we're looking at this and as we wrap up here and we'll emphasize this in The last point is that many at times even as you're listening this you're probably you probably think of all these people externally

Oh, I know this person who did this I was in this sort of situation And I think the reality is is that we need to also like examine ourselves

So I know you guys like this content, but we're really hoping that not only this will help you be aware of people externally

But also it can allow you to examine yourselves internally and say well as much hurt that I've experienced people

Say I met people always say some that some pain they've hurt They've some pain that they've experienced and they say well,

I've never wished that on my own my worst enemy So I think if you if any of you are a victim of manipulation,

I think that You you need to look at yourself and say what what are flaws in me?

How in any way am I emulating this so I never? Impose or impute on to someone the pain that I that I have experienced

So that's something to consider. So on all transparency myself. It's a prize meeting. It was like ooh

Shoot I think I've may have done that subtly once or twice but talk about that just real quick We're real quickly before you wrap up here.

Yeah real quick So what's behind the surprise meeting is something that's as common to lots of manipulation tactics

Which is to create or to catch people in a dazed unprepared state

Right to create confusion to create to the flip the script to catch them off -guard or whatever

And so the surprise meeting is where like hey, man Can we grab coffee and to be fair if you're served as a pastor?

Congregants do this to you as well. Hey pastor. Hey, we haven't talked about can we get coffee? You go get coffee with them and they're like, here's everything that's wrong with you and wrong with your church.

You're like, right? I thought we're getting coffee man. I thought we're gonna talk about the no way home spoilers, right, you know, and now

I'm Now you're like ripping me for all these other things Really nice to kind of know that this wasn't gonna be an enjoyable time

I still came but you know, I would have came a little differently. Yeah And so these guys they call you into these meetings and what they'll do is they'll they'll change timelines a lot of times

Like they'll move the timeline up to gain an edge on you because it what's happening Is they're thinking that I can't deal with this straight up if I do if I deal with it straight up The guy won't show up Here's the thing the guy won't show up to meetings with his pastor and he needs to be corrected fine this excommunicated

You do that eventually Well, you you repeat Matthew 18 as many times as you possibly can you in your session other elders?

You you work through them to decide what you need to do But if but don't trick them into it, you'll never come to a meeting again the same

I once got called to a meeting. This is a true story. I got called to a meeting One or two of us want to talk to you

Yeah, so then as you guys can tell I'm okay with conflict and I'm not

I'm okay on my feet. So I kind of I kind of thought like I think this is a trap

And we're telling my wife. She's like, what do you think is about? I was like, I don't know some sort of intervention. I bet this is how they're gonna post it

So I show up and not only is it two pastors is the entire pastoral staff there's like six or seven people man, and And so I just thought

I said I as I recall I see you know where I come from they call this getting jumped Yeah Yeah, but And again, they it was all it was it was a weird mix of manipulation

And Noble intentions, you know, it's like hard to parse these things out for sure point is though when you do these

It's best just to tell people Hey, i'm concerned about your son or here's these concerns. I want to get together

Um, can you make time, you know, you just lay it out there um, because then it's not

It's not a trick. You want these people to trust you because you want to get to the heart of the issue. It's not

That I think the problem is is again. The manipulator doesn't trust In the means of god to accomplish these things.

Yes. He uses other means I think that's at the at the heart of the sin Of manipulation is not using god's ordained means to do these things

Um, that's good. I had a rasp in my throat had to grab some water there. But yeah, that's really good

I think too like a practical application would just be uh, You know, I think sometimes people have anxiousness or anxiety or they're trying to just control the outcome of something

And because they don't trust the lord whatever the situation is like as a christian Then I want to try and manipulate any external circumstances to try and coerce someone into this particular outcome

Rather than knowing that even if the answer is no to what i'm trying to achieve god's has it

For my good and good purposes and for his glory and that's something I think i've experienced In many ways like god's god has sanctified me on a very personal level

Um, so really as we wrap up here you have a great last section And maybe we can expound upon this in the blog.

I know you've gone extra innings with us And you got to get to your family. So michael, thank you again for hanging out with us. Yeah, this has been awesome

Uh, so I guess the question is I kind of I kind of set you up for this talking about The closing you put am

I a manipulator and I thought about the the biblical example that I gave Uh when talking before the show was a classic story of nathan the prophet when he's confronting david after his sin, uh you know after after committing adultery and then

Uh, you know Committing murder and then he talks about this parable Of this person who took this other other man's property and then killed him for it and he tells him the whole story

And david says why as that man lives he shall surely as the lord lives. He shall surely die and then he he turns the script

You're that person you are, you know, like I remember classic there's this book when I was a kid

God, it was just a bible storybook and there's a story like the picture.

I'm here as a kid It's like burned in my mind. It's of nathan the prophet just pointing the finger and here's david like up on his throne like in his

You know everything everything kingly that a king would wear just like hanging his head in shame um, and so all that being said it's one of those things where We're looking at all these different tactics and uh, and again, we talked about it.

We need to also look and examine ourselves Uh, how do we examine and that what are some practical examples of like how do we avoid ourselves?

Doing this because ultimately it has to begin with us Yeah, so I I gave a list of when you're trying to ask so there we don't want to treat all persuasion like manipulation, right?

Persuasion is good. We see paul make cases, you know king rippa You almost persuade me to be a christian and that's because paul's arguing from his personal testimony and also from the law

Um and and all the events that had actually happened this like not long before that with with christ in his incarnation

Uh, so persuasion is fine and we it's changing people's mind is fine

Right, but it's changing their mind through appeals That are biblical appeals um, so I always think about like paul says

If you go through galatians, some of it looks like manipulation actually at first Right. Hey, I you guys are ready to rip your eyes out for me last time

We talked and now i'm your enemy because I tell you the truth Right, you might say well that sounds a lot like it kind of a naked appeal to relationship and stuff

But it's it's sandwiched in all sorts of scriptural arguments, too And it's in the whole

He's he's trying to point out to them like how when did I suddenly become this terrible guy?

You know what's going on here like here's the truth here's the gospel I declared to you so he reasserts it

And so it's not that we can't even bring in Uh relational aspects, but it's still going to be anchored ultimately in the truth of god's word

Um, that's where you have to argue these things um, and so when you go into these situations with people that it might turn into Blossom into a growing conflict just ask why am

I persuading this person to change their mind? What is it about? You know, um, is it mainly for my benefit or for their benefit?

uh Have I listened to their reasoning for why they believe or behave as they do? You know, have you actually thought through it?

Have you listened? Um listening gets you really far in life And again, these are these things that we hear liberals say and so we like turn our nose at them

But that's stupid if jeffrey dahmer the serial killer Tells you you should look both ways

Before you cross the street That doesn't mean you should just walk across the street without looking both ways.

He's a serial killer. What does he know? Like look man, that's the genetic fallacy Like just because you know, something comes from somewhere.

So we need to like listen to people um and and figure out like man, is there something i'm missing here?

And i've learned to listen way more as i've gotten older Than I used to And try to understand where a person's coming from what they're seeing because sometimes there's just a facet

That you're missing that you actually are coming at the same goal from just a different direction Did I engage with their strongest points honestly or try to maneuver around them?

This is a big one Um, i've won arguments before without ever dealing with the arguments

You know, like, you know, you just kind of like get some just get somebody off their point They get all wound up and if you've been if like I I grew up on street preaching, you know,

I converted At 17 and from about 17 to about 20 21 I was out in the streets a couple times a week and you know

You really learn how to talk to people and navigate conversations pretty well And it got to a point where I didn't even have to engage with their ideas

I just could run circles around them in a conversation And that's that's not argumentation.

That's not dealing with their points. That's not that's not honest Yeah, you know, that's that's that's that uh, aristotle

Would uh was one of the early guys that debated Uh the difference between persuasion and manipulation and he more or less was saying that the sophists

Were manipulators because they use rhetoric To win people to their points, but never actually presented solid evidence

So this has been a long debate for a long time. So ask you that ask yourself um

Those questions and you can also apply the questions to a situation to determine whether you are being persuaded or manipulated

Was this guy why is this guy doing this right? you know, um Who's who benefits from this?

What is this about? Um, is he listening to me? um

You know when you when you listen to people by the way, you you build a lot of capital up with them

It goes a long way, but you can ask those questions. I think it's foolish to act like there isn't such a thing as manipulation

There is proverbs warns about it all the time um And it's also foolish to treat

Uh persuasion as if it's manipulation good pastors are persuading you to follow god

They're and the persuasion can come in the forms of naked commands. The bible says x y z

Right. They don't have like if the bible says it We shouldn't have to dress it all up Uh, not that there isn't you know pathos logos ethos all those things play a part when you're presenting an argument

But the bible says so should be enough if you fear god You know, um, and maybe you don't understand like show me how the bible says so well then show them how the bible says so But that should be enough and those a lot of times what happens is people just want to play the manipulation card

I had this guy that came to my church early on My first church plant, uh back about 15 16 years ago

Oh this other church I was at they're terrible and they didn't respect me and use me and all this stuff And I didn't really trust this guy

So I said, hey i'm gonna call your church And he said, oh, well, they're a terrible church and I was like, all right, so I called the church

And i'm like, hey, I got so -and -so at my church and this is seriously what the pastor does he goes And he was like, well good

He was like good luck with that And so I come back and I talked to that guy and I said, you know what man?

I don't know enough about your church to say one way or another but my gut says Uh that you have said this about other churches before in your past, right?

And it just turned out like and this guy wouldn't get a job. He wouldn't work He had like a psychology degree and I was like go get a job at mcdonald's.

They're paying like 12 bucks an hour It's better than zero bucks an hour. Well, I got a psychology degree Well, you can talk to them about their moms and stuff while you're at mcdonald's, right?

Like it starts somewhere And he wouldn't do it because he was proud And then he started asking people to give money to help him pay rent in our church forum at the time

And I was like, no, no, we're gonna give you the we'll give you uh, the treasure of go get a job, um and And so there are guys out there

I'm sure they said that we're big meanies and we made everything about money or something like they read Yeah, i'm sure they reset the narrative or whatever for sure.

And so that's that's what this is a tricky issue with us There's like really messed up manipulative things going on out there right now but also we have to say things that people don't want to have so It's funny

To be faithful right now. You have to be willing to be slanderously call it a manipulator

Just don't really be one Oh, that's that's so good. That's so good.

Thank you so much just real quickly. Can you uh, Tell me to tell everyone where they can find out about you

And find more about you and also you've got a new book that just came out It's good to be man mentioned the first episode of people want to get that copy or Of that book or just want to find more about you what you do.

Uh, you've got a podcast at work. Can they find you? Sure. Um, i'm most active on twitter. This is foster.

T -h -i -s -i -s -f -o -s -t -e -r on twitter Um, you can friend me on facebook.

I do like friend. I like accept those like every couple of months. So it might be I've got like 750 i haven't got around to Um, mostly from africa wanting me to support their orphanages

But um, I have a book called it's good to be man Like you said you can buy it on canon .com.

You can also go to amazon And get it in a hard cover on the 14th or kendall right now

And there's a website. It's good to be a man .com and we have a podcast that we're yeah, it's like it's petering along You know, uh, but it's got about 70 episodes on there that talks about issues

Uh, like kind of like the ones we talked about from but primarily from the perspective Of being a godly man, that's good at being a man

Excellent. And then andrew just real quickly just two minutes. Just tell me just what are your final thoughts on this? Oh, wow

Because I know your I know your mind's like in the background being blown. So tell me tell me just real quickly What's like two minutes?

What do you see as the ultimate? What's your biggest takeaway from all this? Yeah, it's kind of like paul he says follow me while I follow christ, you know what

I mean? Like a good leader is trying to be more like jesus and a bad leader is looking for every other way To shift blame on other people, you know

And I think that's one of the best ways we can analyze who a manipulator is to say Well, how is this?

How is this this this person who is leading me or these situations that i'm getting in? How is this person trying to shape me more into the image of christ or how are they trying to make me look like them?

In a sense, you know And what we have to do is we have to cut through All of the sin issues because all of us are sinners.

None of us are perfect If we say we're without sin, like we know the truth is not in us. That's what john tells us So we have to also be able to do is with our brothers and sisters when even if they're manipulating us

They're still our brothers and sisters in christ. And what the main goal is like stan was saying earlier is we want them back to christ

Right. It's not that you want to point a finger at a person You want to get them out of your life never speak to them again?

No, i'm, sorry, like that's not the way it works in christianity. We don't get to do that to one another Right, we need to we need to be loving and caring we need to be understanding

But at the same time we also need to rebuke sin And try to restore our relationships and our brothers and sisters like first love god, right?

First table of law second table law love neighbor can't do the second one without doing the first one properly uh, and we do fail at that all the time, so Those are some of my initial thoughts.

I don't know why my my light just flashed but It's like a rave you're having. I know. Yeah, i'm having a rave

Colossus and glow sticks, but that was a good. Yeah I don't know. My my uh, my light's been going weird lately. But uh, is that those are kind of my initial thoughts

Yeah gold rave Oh a cold Cool that was good.

I appreciate that man. Uh, so stand real quick two minutes. What are your final thoughts? Yeah, just uh some last thoughts from me in terms of things the second that any ministry from the church takes its eye

Off of christ just whether it's like one percent or 90 or whatever there's going to be some sort of manipulation that's going to come into that whether it's a preacher that's inside of the pulpit and Shift the focus is taken away from christ and it's being put on this preacher whether it's in some sort of weird children's ministry

Are evangelism there? So we just need to be very careful that we're Looking for those signs whenever it's about that person who's saying oh this person.

I have an amazing vision here Or i'm a really great leader This person is a great leader because ultimately we don't want to be the person who's following that leader because a good leader

Is going to be following christ. So if we're following a good leader that is following christ ultimately that is god

Leading his people and the second that we steer away from that and we're following this leader

Who is not following god or is using these tactics of manipulation? Very quickly, we're going to be steered in the wrong direction and that is when things get cultish.

Boom. Boom I that's the best way to end this episode. So, uh andrew stan great final points

And on that note, thank you all for listening. I definitely share this on our social media We're gonna have we should have by this time.

We should have a blog kind of expanding upon this conversation So if you all enjoyed this episode, please comment interact share with you examples of manipulation that you've seen

We'd love to hear about that. And what do you tell us what you think about? uh, michael foster's a

Tactics of manipulation his experience and the conversation that we have We'd love to get your feedback and as always a program cannot continue without your support

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