In the first few years after moving to WOFF, I worked for a property management company owned by a family in the church. Though, I had many years experience in consumer finance, I had no experience in property management. That new experience in itself will proivde material for more posts at a later date. Sufficient to say that even with another part-time job at a credit union, the personal finances were tight.
If my memory serves me correctly; these events occurred during the summer or fall of 2003. I had heard of a job opening in sales and was quite impressed with the chemicals sold by the company. I called for an interview. Later, I went to a hotel in the same city in South Carolina where I worked in property management, to speak with the regional manager of the chemical company. After leaving the interview, I did not particularly want the job; but just looking for other possibilities for income gave me hope.
The very next church service I was called outside to speak with some “leadership” in front of the church. One of the owners of the property management company began, “I heard about the job interview.” He went on to tell me that going to the interview was not “gotten ahold of in God”. Up until that point I did not even know why I had been called out. As best I remember there were at least two other “leadership” folks there. One was the person who would eventually become the Holocaust teacher who is big on keeping people from books, TVs, magazines and newspapers.
(see previous post – https://religiouscultsinfo.com/?p=284 )
The teacher began by saying she had just gotten off the phone with Jane. (Jane was in Brazil (?)) “Jane was very grieved that you would do something like this without getting ahold of this in God. We don’t do things like that out from under authority. You need to find a place of repentance for even allowing the thought of going to that interview.”
At this point, the pressures mounted up more than I could take and I began to cry, slowly at first. I now realize that the “leadership” there may have taken that as a sign that I agreed. That could not have been further from the truth! As I am writing this post, I can still feel the emotion of being told I needed to repent for not asking before looking for another job! The financial pressures were too great to just ignore. Later, I found out that many at WOFF were in the same predicament, barely paying their bills. Even with the part-time job, we had taken a cut in income to move to North Carolina.
Again, the owner of the company spoke up and asked if my wife was getting paid for teaching in the Christian school? I said “No”. He said, “I have been carrying it that she should get paid.” He would talk to Jane about that…..
Looking back, I should have recognized that “getting ahold of things in God” meant asking Jane for permission to do something and “being out from under authority” meant you had not asked Jane for permission. Any delusion about how things worked at WOFF, should have gone out the window! I had just been scalded for seeking employment outside the church. I went to an interview for a job that I didn’t really want. But, the pressures were too great to stay in the job I had at the time. The hours were very long and the pay was limited.
Another thing that should have jumped out at me, the people in that meeting thought that what had just happened with me being pulled out of the church service to be told that Jane was upset with me, was normal! Apparently, everyone else there in that meeting had already been shown how critical to life at WOFF was to not “be out from under authority!” That meant they had already been shown who ran the church! It would be five more years before I would exit from this church. Apparently, I was a slow learner.
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