Chapter Five: How This Is Not at All Like the Old  "Shepherding Movement" or the vestiges of it remaining in many independent churches and ministries

By Dr. Steve Davis

What you will get out of this chapter:

1) A basic understanding of what the “Shepherding Movement” was, and some of the basic extremes it embraced.

2) How scriptures and Biblical authority were twisted in order to have submissive people ruled over and abused by power grabbers and control freaks.

3) The Scriptural balance. How authority is balanced in the Word of God to prevent leaders from abusing those being lead, and to protect leaders from people with an anarchistic mindset!

Origins. Many years ago, during the early years of the charismatic revival in the 1960's there was a movement called the "Shepherding Movement" which brought perversion, division and destruction to the church.  A premise of this movement basically was that there are those who are "spiritual coverings" and are in authority over the rest of the body of Christ. These "shepherds" were set up over different areas of the lives of the church members, or "sheep."  The "sheep" were totally responsible to these "shepherds" in every aspect of their lives. Some of their teachings were based on Scriptural truths, but they took their applications of certain Scriptures to the extreme. 

How did this teaching find people to buy into it? First of all, many of the early adherents to the charismatic movement were from mainline denominations where the ministry was basically a “hireling” ministry. In other words, their pastors, ministers, priests were placed in their churches by a hierarchy, and would be with the people for so long as the denominational oversight deemed that he should be there. A large portion of these people were ignorant of biblical principles, and were hungry for the things of God. For the most part, their ministers were functionally biblically illiterate, and had little interest in the deeper things of God.

Then, there were the Roman Catholics who made up a large part of the charismatic movement. They were taught to respect their priests and to obey them in all things. And, like their protestant counterparts, they were largely biblically ignorant. But, they understood the concept of “the man of God,” and were looking for teachers with authority to bring them the things of God.

So, when these people began attending the various house meetings, prayer groups and meetings in hotel ballrooms and in church fellowship halls, they found a new type of leader. These were men primarily, who were excited, happy, loving, filled of the Holy Spirit and were avid students of the word of God. These men spoke the Word of God with joy, knowledge and authority. They would discuss the things of God openly with any and all and were quick to pray with those who needed prayer. Then, there were the specific characteristics of the charismatic movement: healing, tongues and prophecy.

If you were a person who was hungry for God, and your minister seemed ignorant of the Scriptures, and even doubtful of his own salvation (if there was such a thing),  and unsure of the literal existence of God, you would be exhilarated to find a charismatic leader to help you in the things of God. That was the position that I was in. I ran in to men who answered the questions that I had and that my minister had ridiculed. I found men who were knowledgeable of the Word of God, and respected its infallibility. Add to this the literal physical sensations that occurred when one would put his hand on my head – and pray for the Lord to touch me! I could feel totally empty and confused, and after “having hands laid” on me, would feel the presence of the Lord and completely at ease and full of reassurance.

Moreover, when I needed counsel, my mainline minister would stumble, fumble and do his best to placate me without offending me (and without helping me!)  My charismatic leaders would open their bibles and give me counsel from the Word of God – and many times during prayer would give me a word from the Lord. And, with the word from the Lord would tell me to judge it by scripture. So far, nothing actually wrong with any of this. But, it set me and others like me up for the handful of leaders who began to claim too much for themselves.

See, a basic tenet of the Shepherding Movement as it developed was that ALL sin came from being out from under authority. Again, this had developed in the late sixties (before my time in the things of God) and throughout the seventies and eighties. By the time I got exposed to this movement, it was very clear that so much of what happened in the sixties was based on rebellion. Rebellion against parents, rebellion against authority, rebellion against the government and rebellion against the church.  Repeatedly, we would hear statements like, “Think about it. Wasn’t every time you got yourself in trouble a time when you were in rebellion, doing what you KNEW was wrong?”

In the same way, on a functional level, all righteousness came from submitting to those over you. It was a matter of faith. What if the person over you was in error? Well, God knew who would be the person over you way back when He established His principles of authority and submission. Even if the person over you was wrong, you still had to submit, as unto the Lord. “For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee . . .  (1 Samuel 15:23). If you did not submit to the authority that "God has set over you," you were rebelling against God, which was the same as practicing witchcraft, and was a sin worthy of death, (Exodus 22:18: “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.”) and you would be rejected by God. 

The leaders, some of whom took correspondence courses in ministry, while others took two and three week courses offered by other leaders, often started their own churches. Why? Because the people needed the word of God, were hungry for the things of God, and quite frankly because their ministers and priests still showed no interest in spirituality or the things of the Holy Spirit. Independent Spirit-filled churches sprang up in every community. In some of these churches, the pastors submitted only to God, except where a more clever and persuasive Pastor had arranged to get himself promoted to Bishop, Presiding Bishop or some other title. Then, the "Bishop" submitted only to God and the Pastors submitted to the Bishop. The people were not allowed to challenge the authority of the Pastor. The peoples' job was to submit to their Pastor. He was God's gift to them, and to complain or question their pastor was to be complaining against God.

Verses like 1 Peter 5:6, "Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time" were taught along these lines: "I am your Pastor, and God's hand is on me for you. So, to humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, means for you to humble yourself under me. Then, God will exalt you in due time, if you're faithful. God has given me the vision for this church, and there is no vision but mine, because I am the overseer. I see above you all. Your provision is in MY mouth, so you better keep my mouth open for you, if you want God's provision released into your life . . . and, NO, I don't have to be right all the time for you to submit to me. You submit to me because God has set me over you. Don't let the devil get you into that witchcraft spirit!" 

As it developed, in an “ideal” situation, the church members submitted totally to the Pastor, the wife submitted totally to the husband, and the children submitted totally to the mother. Single, separated and divorced women had their Pastor as their "spiritual covering," which led to predictable problems. If a wife had a husband was not born again, she still had totally obey, even if he told her to sleep with his boss in order that he would get a promotion! The Pastor would say something like, “Sister, the Lord KNEW you'd be married to an unsaved man, and your husband will answer for this to the Lord. Your obedience to him will draw him to the Lord, as the Lord sees your submission.”  I remember in my circle of friends, a leader who was involved in wife swapping would have his wife sleep with his own brother! It was a matter of her submitting to the Lord in her husband! She contacted me in tears after more than two years of this, just confused and depressed – yet hoping to not be in rebellion against the Lord!

Children submitted to their parents, especially to the fathers in "all things." It does not take the spirit of prophecy to figure out what kind of people would ultimately gravitate to a movement like this. Before long, the Shepherding Movement became a caricature of itself, led by power hungry "control freaks" and composed of submissive, dependent victim types. It became a haven for manipulative husbands and abusive fathers. As one leader said to me in a private conversation, "some sheep are just made to be eaten."

 The Biblical balance.  The position of the Elder, overseer, pastor is to direct the local Body in spiritual life so that it can be conformed into the image of Jesus Christ.  This office was not set up by God to dominate the people, or do all their thinking for them.  The ministry of Elder was not created to remove the believer's power of choice.  The Elder does not choose where the believer can go on vacation or what kind of car to buy or lease. The Elder is not given to pick out what kind of clothing the Believer can buy or what taste in music the Believer should have. 

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