Maggie’s Story

I was an intern with Teen Mania Ministries in 1995 and 1996. It has been a long time since my involvement with Teen Mania, and my memories have faded considerably, I felt compelled to sound my voice, mainly as a part of my healing process, but also out of concern for future potential interns.

SHOCK AND RELIEF

6 months ago, I came across a blog dedicated to helping people heal from their experience at Teen Mania. As I began reading through some of the posts, I experienced two extreme emotions surging through my body: Shock and relief.

I was shocked because others had experienced Teen Mania in the same way I had. For many years, I had assumed that I was a loner in this experience, a black sheep, a wayward backslider for thinking that the Teen Mania system was wrong both in principle and application. It was absolutely mind-blowing to discover, after 15 years, that I was not alone. It was also shocking that someone had summoned up the courage and strength to write about their experience in a public way. As you may or may not know, the leadership at Teen Mania shames and shuns anyone who challenges them. This was true 15 years ago, and it is one of the repeated themes on the blog.

The relief I felt was overwhelming. All the feelings I had been bottling up for years came spilling out. As I read, I wept. People were saying what I had needed to say for many many years. It was like discovering the treatment for a forgotten festering wound.

NOT GOOD ENOUGH

As I continued reading and participating in the blog, old feelings and emotions started re-appearing. Shame, fear, anger, sadness. In that order. I began to analyze what this meant and wondered how, after all these years, I could feel these emotions again so strongly. I thought I had let go of that piece of my life. My response had been to run a far away as possible. I had disconnected from most of my contacts there, save a few close friends. As the years passed, I stopped thinking about it so much. I went to university, studied music and languages, and made new friends. I assumed I had let go and moved on. So why then, 15 years later, was I experiencing a surge of negative emotions about Teen Mania again? What was it about reading the blog that prompted such a strong response in me?

I began replaying that year in my mind, thinking about situations that came up during that year and how they affected me. Here are a two of the scenarios that still resonate strongly.

Scenario 1: Ropes Course

As part of the introduction week, interns go through a series of challenging events, supposedly to serve the purpose of binding the group together and learning to work as a team. One of the events was a ropes course. I was not one of the stronger ones, but I did my best, despite the fear coursing through my body. I remember lots of encouragement from fellow interns, and it was a lot of fun to work on a challenge with a peer group. So far, so good right? If only it stopped there. As it turns out, the Teen Mania leaders were using the ropes course and every thing else that week as a sorting process for the Teen Mania hierarchy. We were judged right off the bat based on a series of pokes and prods. The kids who had less fear or were more physically fit increased their chances of becoming an elite among the elite . . . apartment leaders, personal assistants, ect. While I have no problem with trying to analyze peoples gifts in order to place them properly in the ministry, it was very disheartening to know that just because I struggled with fear of heights, I was thought of as a weak person overall. It didn’t seem like a wholistic approach to individual growth. I somehow felt I was not good enough, despite the fact that coming out of high school I had ranked in the 90 percentile in the SAT scores and had given hours of piano practicing the works of Chopin, Gershwin, Beethoven and Poulenc. It felt very quickly like they were sorting us into intern favorites and non-favorites. The feelings of somehow not being good enough, or strong enough, or spiritual enough, began THAT week, and continued throughout the year. While some might point out that those feelings might have come from my own insecurities, I would challenge them by asking what 18 year old is completely secure? All the more reason for Teen Mania to create an environment of nurture and teamwork, instead of competition and shame! I also want to point out that according to some of the stories on the blog, my experience has been repeated over and over in the lives of other young, vulnerable, eager interns.

Scenario 2: The Spying Game

As the year progressed, we settled into our routines, which were based on a standard 9-5 office job. Mornings began very early with a run and then we were to have breakfast and quiet time. We ran in apartment teams. Each apartment had a leader, who was responsible for encouraging us in our run and in our daily enforced quiet time with God. I think it is a wonderful and reasonable goal to teach people the merits of physical activity and daily meditation! I trusted my apartment leader and looked up to her. What I didn’t realize until later on in the year, was that in the name of “accountability,” our apartment leaders were instructed to report on our progress to the higher ups without our knowledge or consent. While working late in the office one evening, I was searching for staples and came across a file with my name on it. Inside, I found the “reports” with strong detailed opinions from both my apartment leader and my small group leader on who they thought I was, how spiritual they thought I was, what they thought of my quiet times and personality. I felt betrayed by my apartment leader, who I thought was there to help me if I struggled, not REPORT on me. I also was shocked to read the opinions of the small group leader, who I had spent very little time with, but who had written very strongly about me. Judgment. Shock. Betrayal. Tears. Sadness. And again. The feeling that even though I was trying really really hard, I was not spiritual enough. Teen Mania’s efforts to help kids learn the incredible benefits of exercise and meditation were being taught in an environment of fear and shame, not nurture and trust.

In defense of my peers who were apartment leaders, I recognize now that they were also just trying to do their best and this translated into doing what they were told to do by the Teen Mania leaders. For this reason, I exhort you to examine the Teen Mania structure from the top, with particular attention to the leadership practices and ideals of David Hasz, who I believe is at the root of these issues.

In closing, I would like to say that the year I spent at TM was not all bad. Eventually, they recognized my musical gifts and placed me on the summer missions worship team. I made some dear friends, laughed a lot, and got to experience the beautiful river that runs through Tulsa. But when I look back on that year as a spiritual experience, I don’t see growth and change and beauty and joy. I see fear and shame, judgment and legalism, loneliness and isolation.

31 comments:

April Jan 96 said…

I have to say that coming from the Tulsa years myself, Jan. 96, I have struggled with those same defeating emotions….in fact, my husband just commented to me how we have a very performance-based marriage! I work at trying really hard to prove I’m lovable and worthy (cause this is what I was taught and learned really well) but come the end of myself way too quick.

I too am learning about grace, mercy and most of all love. I have operated way too long in a formula based system and need to break out of that. I feel that my experience with TM also included a lot of if you do__________, then you will get _____________. Which only enhanced my formula based performance belief.

Thank you RA, and everyone for sharing. May healing continue to flow………
March 23, 2010 8:51 AM

April S Jan 96 said…

Oh one other thing….I started reading this site over a week ago and my experience was one of grief and relief!
March 23, 2010 8:52 AM

Shannon Kish said…

I hated the monthly report cards that our ACAs and CAs filled out on us. How can you judge someone’s spiritual growth and general growth on a scale of 1-5? Thankfully, they told us about them and reviewed them with us, but it was horrible nonetheless.
March 23, 2010 8:58 AM

Anonymous said…

I still wonder about the “incident reports” and notes in my intern file…oh the memories!
March 23, 2010 9:27 AM

Anonymous said…

I never did understand how we got debits. . . but no credits.
March 23, 2010 9:33 AM

gc1998 said…

everything about this resonated with me!
March 23, 2010 9:46 AM

Anonymous said…

I still can’t have a conversation with someone in Leadership (even at my church) without feeling like someone is sizing me up somewhere. In many ways, I get paranoid if a leader even tries to come hang out with me because there’s no way they would just like to get to know me or know the insight that God may be giving me on things. There must be a reason. I just realized today that this is a major reason why I won’t “step up” and do somethings that God has asked me to do for my Church and my community.
March 23, 2010 10:12 AM

Anonymous said…

I was speaking about the “report cards” above. It’s like everyone at the HA gets on a power trip after being there awhile. I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s because it feels better to point out others weaknesses so we don’t have to look at our own. And in many cases at the HA, so that others won’t come confront us about our imperfections we go find someone else to hide behind and say, “See I AM Worthy because I just confronted so and so and they are going to improve.” In other words, We get tired of being Picked on so we go find someone else to hold the spot light for a moment.
Or you could just be a person like me at the HA and start getting so aware of how “horrible” I was that I caved and couldn’t grasp my own weaknesses because they seemed to be too many. I also thought that everyone was better than me so I didn’t have the “RIGHT” to confront anyone. Especially, Not the ACA holding my “Report Card.”
Praise God I’m not in that Self Hatred anymore.
That’s just one of my experiences at the HA.
March 23, 2010 10:35 AM

Anonymous said…

as a former Core Advisor back in 00-01, I hated giving those little report cards a number. I never hated it enough to challenge the system at the time but after getting to know the beautiful core of girls, I always felt like a score card didn’t do them justice.

Truly, there is something so special and unique about each individual there. a 1-5 score card is insulting considering the very nature God created in us…..
March 23, 2010 1:47 PM

JMillerFam said…This post has been removed by the author.March 23, 2010 1:48 PM

Anonymous said…

This blog sounds like a gossip column.

So much for being the Church. We have no resorted to being no different from the world.
..Satan wins again!
March 23, 2010 1:48 PM

JMillerFam said…

sorry the anon comment at 10:35am was from me….but I clicked anon by accident. LOL!
March 23, 2010 1:49 PM

Recovering Alumni said…

Actually, I think Satan wins when abuse in the name of God goes unchecked.
March 23, 2010 1:49 PM

JMillerFam said…

I mean at 1:47pm. geesh, i am a clutz today!
March 23, 2010 1:50 PM

Anonymous said…

Satan wins when we use PEOPLE as our means, before the LORD.

Man fails us all too often. It’s part of life. Praise God we have him and he heals all wounds and is the only justification to be used.
March 23, 2010 2:01 PM

Eric P. said…

Anon @1:48 – Since you think gossip is so un-Christian, how do you feel when you read in Maggie’s account that her spiritual leaders were systematically required to express negative opinions about her behind her back? And that they were taught to do this in the name of Jesus?

Not even the meanest secular employers I’ve had would stoop that low, by the way, so I’d consider that worse than the world.

Satan wins when we develop log-in-eye disease.

Recall that one symptom of spiritual abuse is a diminished sense of irony and humor. Oh, people…
March 23, 2010 3:59 PM

Shannon Kish said…

I fail to see where the gossiping is at. Are you suggesting that Maggie’s story is gossip or a specific or series of comments are gossip. And just because I find it fun to do, Why didn’t you follow Matt 18 and confront those that you felt were gossiping individually?

JMillerFam- I hear you! I never gave report cards, but I sure did feel like a failure every time I got one. Especially when it came to the question about quiet times. How can you know what goes on in my quiet times and therefore give them a grade unless you were there?
March 23, 2010 4:56 PM

carrie said…

as an ACA, i filled only two “report cards” out on my girls b/c that was all i was ever asked to do. everytime, i gave them an outstanding review, and talked with them about WHY i thought they were doing so good. it really never had anything to do with their actual performance (i took melissa king’s chapel talks to heart, even if she had a challenging time taking her own advice about performance mentality), it had more to do with encouraging them, and extending the love that they needed.

i do remember being taken aside by my adviser, and she grilled me about two girls in my core, one in my room, and one in the room next door. she was fishing for information to get this girl sent home, and that was obvious. i took the whole “speak no ill of TM” to heart as well, and refused to speak badly of this girl. my adviser asked me to speculate on her motives, quiet times, reported “illness”, and general integrity. i said i could not, but she was still dismissed two weeks later.
March 23, 2010 4:59 PM

Anonymous said…

I have been to “slam” sites before. . in fact somebody created one about me!

I can say with authority: this is not a gossip circle. This isn’t a whine fest.

This website is in fact an extremely respectful response. I hope it is taken seriously and the offended parties can really listen to the hurt, that they can lay down their pride and look into their own souls and say. . . “What have we done to create this amount of hurt?”

And as somebody noted on a different post, they need to thank God that their rebuke is so kind and thoughtful and take this opportunity instead of waiting for the otherwise louder and less kind wake up call.
March 23, 2010 5:04 PM

Elizabeth said…

My journey to grace and freedom from formula based faith and legalism.

Reading Maggie’s Story and then April S’ comment made me realize that I had been more than a perfectionist. I lived a performance based life; and, if I wasn’t confident or didn’t feel I could succeed but instead would be judged for my failure I wouldn’t even try.

Even before TM I was raised in an environment of conditional love and praise based on my grades, obedience as a child, works, etc. This same family environment also raised me in formula based evangelism and faith. So entering TM was just another home away from home. So instead of providing an environment where I could learn the truth of God’s love for me and the grace and gift of Jesus my works, legalism, and formula faith were reinforced.

Sadly, this environment only sets one up for failure and not freedom or success. It teaches that you are never good enough and that love is conditional. These environments leaving you insecure and continually seeking approval, acceptance, and with a fear of abandonment or judgment.

I adapted to both environment by becoming a legalistic perfectionist — add that prickly combination with a New England Victorian etiquette and you go me a woman — with no grace for myself or others until a year or so ago.

2 years ago I was diagnosed with a brain tumor located between my optic nerves. I was pregnant at the time of the diagnosis. Although my neurosurgeon was insistent upon operating within a month or so, I decided to delayed the surgery till after my son was born and weaned, which was another year. During that year of waiting for the surgery, I prayed and hoped and prayed and spoke “in faith” that God would heal me so I didn’t need the surgery. I asked everyone to pray in agreement with me for healing.

It was just 3 months before my surgery and God began to perform a miracle. He had, for a few years, been trying to speak to me on redemption, restoration, and grace. While I was getting the first two messages, grace was still not in the picture. But during the year I waited for brain surgery I finally BEGAN to understand. So 3 months before that surgery I would look at my husband going off to work and my infant son and I would thank God for every moment I had with them. And it was then that I began to understand grace because instead of obsessively cleaning the apartment as I would have a year before I stopped and spent that time with my son. I cleaned what needed to be cleaned but in the grand scheme of things the toilets, floors, floor boards, etc. didn’t need to be cleaned nine ways to Sunday. My family — and even I — was more important and slowly grace began to fill my heart.
March 23, 2010 5:11 PM

Elizabeth said…

Dec. 29, 2008 I went to the hospital hoping I would have an MRI that would reveal that miraculously I had been healed and wouldn’t need the surgery. But when time came and they wheeled me off to the OR I was heart broken and a few tears filled my eyes as I put on a brave face for everyone. Surely I had prayed enough, surely I had enough good works on my side to make me worthy of being healed. (These were further revelations to me that works and formula faith were lies.) Well, I had the surgery. The neurosurgeon successfully removed 75% of a benign tumor from between my optic nerves. But some time during the surgery I suffered a stroke and was experiencing partial paralysis. My wonderful amazing husband, also an alumni, was anxiously waiting and juggling our son authorized the doctors to do what was needed to address the paralysis. I woke with biggest dull/blunt headache ever *L. Once I was awake and the effects of the anesthesia and other drugs began to wear off they began to evuate my motor skills. While I could walk and climb stairs and hold objects my speech was slightly slurred and my vision was a little blurry and I couldn’t remember how to write:print or cursive or type. After I was released to return home (4 days later) I couldn’t remember how to change my son’s diaper or perform some basic tasks and my short term memory was impaired. After seeing an eye specialist she stated that the surgery had caused me to loose 50% of my left side vision.

All this being said I was still learning grace and it was only through grace that I could accept myself and my inability to perform as easily and fluidly or as perfectly as before. I eventually practiced and remembered how to write and type and change a diaper. As I continued learning about grace I found myself re-prioritizing and not focusing on my obsessive perfectionist behavior, but accepting myself and seeing how I can live in grace and so I have been learning to see and accept and give grace to others. It is a long road but God is patient and merciful and gracious and I am thankful.
March 23, 2010 5:11 PM

Anonymous said…

Thanks to the CA and ACA above. I was the anonymous at 10:12 and I would like to apologize for sounding too judgmental about what you guys had to do while serving as ACA and CA. I know there was much put on your plate back then and I’m sure you did the job well. Thanks for sharing your heart. Not everyone is on a “Power Trip” at TM.
I am just getting started with this healing process and it seems like so much of my life has been affected by my short year at the HA. It’s a bit frustrating to have to go sort through what I’ve spent 10 years building apon.
A Big Smile to you all. And Thanks again.
March 23, 2010 5:16 PM

Elizabeth said…

I am not saying I don’t think God can’t or won’t heal me, but what I am saying is that I accept myself as I am all the while knowing that God is good and faithful and he desiresand will see me made whole – emotionally, spiritually, physically.
March 23, 2010 5:18 PM

The Cult Next Door said…

That’s sick- having a file on someone’s spiritual life!?!?!
I came from a church, as I’ve mentioned before, where the pastor tapped phone lines and had her ‘spies’ looking into church member’s houses to see if they were hiding TVs- but even monster that she was didn’t keep actual files on people’s devotions.
Sick!!!!
These leaders need an intervention.
March 23, 2010 5:31 PM

dark ages intern said…

Elizabeth, thanks so much for your story. It was very meaningful to me. I have a son with special needs, and it has been difficult to adjust my entire life to this new reality. Although the vast majority of people have been extremely sympathetic, there have been those who have said extremely cruel things in an attempt to get us to have more faith or to get the sin out of our lives. I have to admit that entering motherhood with a strong “save the world” mentality has always been a struggle for me. The mundaneness of it all never seems satisfying. And, of course, I am tempted to feel that my family’s extra issues are “limiting my effectiveness.” So much guilt, so much sadness. I’m sure you know. So, thanks for sharing your journey.
March 23, 2010 7:14 PM

Mary Beth (Johnson) Tyson said…

I would love for a TM leader to fill out a report on some of the great men of the bible who were spiritually bankrupt as we know it today. My heroes!

I’m sure my report would be failing today when compared to my days at TM and then I was an ugly legalist who was impressed with my own good works and lack of sin.

Now i’m nauseous.
March 23, 2010 8:24 PM

JMillerFam said…

Wow Elizabeth. wow. Your journey is one to be admired. Thank God for your courage and your faith. I will pray for you tonight – how beautiful to give yourself grace and know that God’s hand never left you even in the darkest times. How scary a road you’ve traveled.
March 23, 2010 9:41 PM

Recovering Alumni said…

Elizabeth – Wow, what a harrowing story. I can’t imagine the myriad of emotions you and your family have gone through. Thanks for your honesty and vulnerability. Strangely, I think that learning to accept ourselves as we are is one of the hardest things in the Christian life. And most freeing.
March 23, 2010 9:45 PM

Shannon Kish said…

Mary Beth,

I can only imagine what my report would say now that I am an atheist. 🙂
March 23, 2010 10:01 PM

Mary Beth (Johnson) Tyson said…

Shannon,

Nooooo telling what “they” would say! 🙂 Could be interesting!!

mb
March 23, 2010 11:45 PM

Maggie said…

hey there.
Maggie here, just writing to say thanks to everybody for the affirmative comments on my story. Great stuff to realize. The spiritual journey is not a series of reports and grades, but is one of discovery and evolution. No one has all the answers on how to be the “most” spiritual person. Quiet time, (aka meditation aka self reflection) is a beautiful concept but I don’t think there is a formula for it on which ones own personal spirituality can be graded. My quiet times vary based on the season and space I am in. In the summer, I love to lay on a blanket out under the stars, watching them sparkle and shine, listening to night sounds. When I was in Tulsa, I liked taking a free day and biking downtown along the river, my thoughts filled with peace and love and god as the wind whipped through my hair. In the winter, I bundle up and explore an area that is deserted and empty, maybe an industrial area or an ice covered creek. These moments are priceless to me and are between myself and god. No one can report on these moments or grade them.

As for this being a gossip column, I would have to agree that I am very much gossiping about myself. I don’t have any words of chastisement for whoever wrote that comment. Truthfully, it made me laugh. Thats how happy and free I felt when I woke up and read my story on this blog.
After all these years.

Love,
“Maggie”
March 24, 2010 8:27 AM