Gothard | Recovering Grace

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Articles about how Bill Gothard mishandles the Bible to support his legalistic viewpoint.

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Finding the Key

18 January 2012, 06:00

Ileata

When my husband and I were courting, we carefully set our “line” of physical touch. There would be no kissing until our wedding day; handholding was ok after we were engaged. Yes, we were following the “courtship model,” albeit loosely. We had been friends and had a lot contact before we were officially courting. We […]

Clear as Mud

11 January 2012, 06:00

RyanR

Several years after I ended my formal association with IBLP (the Institute in Basic Life Principles), I did something wrong. What it was isn’t the point of this article. At first I didn’t think much about it, but later that evening, I began to feel guilty. Very guilty. As I had been trained to think […]

Snooping, Spying, and Snitching: A Training Center Status Quo

10 January 2012, 06:45

Moderator

Former ATI students share stories of how they were watched, spied on, and tattled on regularly At Advanced Training Institute (ATI) training centers, students and staff quickly learned not to expect privacy in any activity. E-mail, telephone conversations, and even letters and packages from home were monitored for contraband and for forbidden contacts, especially with […]

PTSD for Christmas

20 December 2011, 06:00

Moderator

Moscow, Russia. December 1995. — I sat in the lobby of the Moscow Training Center (MTC) orphanage, watching the snow fall. The red carpet and chandeliers cast a cheery glow upon the white blanketed view beyond the windows. I could sit and watch the snow fall for hours. As one unaccustomed to snow, I was […]

Body, Soul & Spirit: An Alternate View

2 December 2011, 06:00

Moderator

If you spend much time listening to Bill Gothard, it doesn’t take long for him to bring up one of his favorite beliefs: Body, Soul, & Spirit. Bill claims human beings are comprised of these three elements and each element serves a distinct function. This approach is technically called trichotomy in systematic theology terms. Over […]

Breeding Relational Immaturity

18 October 2011, 06:00

admin

It is no secret that Bill Gothard and the Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP) have a bizarre outlook on male/female relationships. In a world where falling in love means losing a piece of your heart forever, relationships are a spiritual distraction, and in a place where marriage is a last resort, it is no […]

Barbwired Heart

15 October 2011, 04:10

Moderator

I was reading the “Living as God Designed” post on Recovering Grace and started crying (something I almost never do). Here’s the part where the dam burst: “Just as the deer glorifies God by being swift and agile, the elephant glorifies God by being strong and loyal, the flower glorifies God by being beautiful and […]

A Tale of Two Abigails

7 October 2011, 08:57

MatthewS

The first Abigail is a wise and beautiful hero, an inspiration to women and men everywhere. Her quick thinking, deliberate action, and diplomatic speech saved many lives. We meet this Abigail in a delightful story told in 1 Samuel 15. Sadly, many of us raised under the Institute in Basic Life Principles and ATI’s teachings […]

When Analogies and Anecdotes Dictated the Music Standard

21 September 2011, 06:30

RyanR

Anyone who has spent significant time under Bill Gothard’s teachings can tell you that he likes to use analogies to illustrate his points. While there is nothing wrong with analogies per se, they are a terrible basis upon which to build doctrine. Why? What happens when you come across two analogies that advocate opposite conclusions? […]

Who Is God? . . . a Follow-Up

17 September 2011, 01:00

Moderator

I hadn’t planned to do a “follow-up” on this topic. But over the past few days, my thoughts keep returning to it. Through the years as I’ve interacted with other former students of the Advanced Training Institute, I’ve seen most of them go through a phase of what would seem to be spiritual shutdown. We […]