"We are stepping down because we didn't see it."

[David Mauldin]

Tim Geftakys states that the leaders in Fullerton  stepped down because "we didn't see it" (Georges sin)   This phrase seems to be at the same time an admitance of guilt on their part or  also an excuse (How can someone be held responsible for something they couldn't see?)for which they may not be, in the future, held responsible.  Anyone like to comment?

[Nancy Newswander]

If the men in positions of responsibility didn't see the open sin, that in itself is an indictment to disqualify them from any leadership position in the future.  Remember, the little ones in the flock had enough spiritual discernment to see it.

[Arthur]

Oh yeah, just like the higher ups in the mafia don't have a clue what their crime boss does.  Sweet little angels they are.  Same with the cardinals in the Catholic church.

Let's see what some eyewitnesses had to say

I got this from the paper "How It Happened That the Irons Left"

>quote<

Sunday morning (September 10th), Just before worship, Lee came and told Jim and Mark that he was leaving fellowship. He left courteously, not "defiantly" as George expressed to me months later. That same evening before the leading brothers from Placentia and Fullerton, George dictated the letter of excommunication. I quote the letter in its entirety. It is addressed to Lee, as you can see, but the letter is actually written with another audience in mind.

September 10,1989
To Lee Irons:
"...not gainsaying; not robbing [their masters ], but shewing all good fidelity, that they may adorn the teaching which [is] of our Saviour God in all things." (Titus 2:10 Darby).
By these credentials let it be known that Lee Irons, who has been a brother in fellowship since his youth in the local assembly In Fullerton, California has been engaged In very disorderly and ungodly behavior, which we have had with great sadness of heart to continually address with him over a period of about the last two and a half years. This has included immoral behavior. Over this period of time, instead of being entreatable, he has been in general with the Lord's people increasingly
adversarial, argumentative and hostile. We continually have had to exhort him about his pride and arrogance and obnoxious behavior which, incidentally, he has agreed to all of these charges concerning himself. We have become very dismayed with his foolish and unsubstantiated accusations against brethren which, when called to his attention, he has not been able to confirm with facts the statements he makes. At no time has the discussion of any of the brethren with Lee been about doctrinal issues. He has indicated by letter in the past. That he has seriously thought of bringing division in the assembly over doctrinal issues which has been a cause of real dismay that he would entertain such considerations.  We call these issues to public acknowledgment with real burden of heart; trusting that Lee Irons upon serious consideration will come to repentance in light of his behavior."
"(As for) a man who is factious -a heretical sectarian and cause of divisions - after admonishing him a first and second time reject (him from your fellowship and have nothing more to do with him). Well aware that such a person has utterly changed -is perverted and corrupted; he goes on sinning (though) he is convicted of guilt and self-condemned" (Tit us 3:10-11 Ampl.)

"Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil." (1 Tim. 3:6-7)

"This is the third time I am coming to you. In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established." (11 Co. 13:1)

The signatures of 9 leading brothers, including my own are at the bottom of the letter. I signed the letter as a rebuke to my son. Actually, it wasn't clear what the letter was for until Tim asked George that same night if the letter was a letter of excommunication.

From notes I took at that meeting, George gave the following explanation for the letter.
"Lee can't pick off the brothers in the assembly .He is to leave them alone. Nor is he to say anything bad about the brothers and assembly. If he does I will blow the whistle about his immoral behavior and expose
him."
This, in George's own words, is the reason for the letter and explains why it was not read immediately to the assembly in Fullerton on Lee's departure. It would be publicly read as a letter of excommunication if Lee attempted to disaffect or influence brethren in the assembly. The words "immoral behavior" were necessary to achieve George's purpose. This was underscored by the fact that when Tim questioned him on what possible bearing "immoral behavior" had on Lee's argumentative conduct, George insisted on keeping these words in the letter.
...
While George was on his fall Journey, I was in great distress.  At one prayer meeting, Tim publicly prayed for Lee and how he was in darkness and not walking with the Lord. I was shocked by his prayer, so right
after he finished, I prayed publicly, contradicting his prayer. This, of course, concerned the brothers because I was not "standing" with the decision regarding Lee's discipline. So at a leading brother's meeting they talked to me about it. When I raised my concerns about the purpose for which the letter was used (Lee called it "blackmail" I told them), they urged me to take the matter up with George when he returned.
...
Mark, Jim, and Dan did meet with Leethat same weekend (Sunday night) for which I was grateful. This was now mid-February. However, I was not invited; nor did George come. My hopes were high that the brothers could come to some sort of peaceful terms with Lee.

The brothers came to my home in Mark's van to pick up Lee. When Lee stepped into the running van, Mark said, "We will talk if you want to repent of everything in the letter." Lee was ready and willing to repent of calling the leading brothers false teachers but when he asked for an explanation of the general statements in the letter, the brothers refused saying, "This would be plea bargaining." They admitted that all the particular instances of Lee's wrong doing had been forgiven. Now they wanted Lee to repent of his character.

This went on for over an hour in front of my home with the motor running for most of that time and Mark taking his foot off the brake and jerking the van saying the whole time, "We can talk if you repent of everything
in the letter." Nothing was achieved: no common ground, no mutual understanding, no concessions. When Lee refused to be beaten down, they parted. Afterwards, Lee rushed upstairs and audibly wept on his bed, frustrated, because he was unable to make reconciliatlon.
...
On Saturday afternoon, the time Mark Miller arranged with me to meet with the brothers, there was a stream of brothers walking up the street to George's home. When I realized George had convened brothers from Fullerton, West L.A., and Placentia, panic set in (I was already wavering on whether or not I should go in) and when I saw all the brethren, I had Albert Viramontes tell George that I wasn't walking into a "power play".

I didn't expect him to treat me, his friend, this way. His actions cut deep into my heart and friendship. I drove down the street to the nearest phone and called George's home. I got Betty, and asked for George, and got Jim instead where we set up the possibility of another time with fewer brothers. That night I called George to ask him why he was hiding behind the brothers. He put me off and told me he didn't want to make this a personal issue and that I would get my chance to talk on Sunday night.

Sunday evening (Mar.4th) I met with Tim, Dan, Jim, Mark, and George.  George explained he had no recourse to read Lee's letter of excommunication because I was vacillating and because I failed to produce a letter of apology.
>end quote<
.... and the story goes on.

[Arthur]

Here's some more evidence from the paper entitled George Geftakys' Spiritual Abuse.  The quotes are taken from tape transcripts of workers meetings.

>quote<
Then George gets the husbands involved and makes them feel like jerks for not putting their wives in their place.

"I want to say to you husbands in particular.  If your wife isn't looking quite the way she ought to look, it's your fault. You're the one to blame. Your wife dresses pretty much the way you want her to dress. And if your wife has real short hair, it's your fault, because you want her to have it. If you're a worker you change your way and you talk to your wife and you say, " Apple dumpling" or whatever you call her. You tell her, "That's not the way we're going to cut our hair." You hear me? Do you hear me husbands on that? I want you to listen to me, because we're not going to have that around here."

He mocks the sisters who wear excessive make-up by likening them to parrots and to circus clowns, and mocks the wives by calling them "apple dumpling".
"I got nothing against sisters if they want to wear some makeup. I got nothing against it. But when I see some sister walk into the assembly) and she looks like a parrot, you know'? She looks like she just came out of the ring of the Barnum Bailey circus. And she's got this thick goop on her eyelashes, you know. And I feel like telling her not only does it look bad but its not healthy. Did you know that'? Read the nutrition books you'll see what they say about it."
....
Public Shaming

Periodically, one of the workers will run afoul of George in some way, perhaps by speaking to others of a disagreement the worker has with him, or perhaps by instituting in a ministry a practice or policy which George doesn't like. In any case, the usual treatment in a workers' meeting is that at the very beginning of the meeting George calls out that person's name, or tells them to come sit in the front row, often with a comment such as, "I want you here where I can see you." Then he proceeds to address the problem without mentioning the person's name, but unmistakably identifying them as the subject, doing so with statements and descriptions filled with contempt.
George did this to my wife over counseling practices. He attempted to humiliate her before the workers by implying that she was counseling to feed her pride, because she had her own "private clientele." George began his remarks after calling her to sit in the front row by me.  
"In the workers' meeting we are open. When papas and mamas are talking about the family of God they don't bring in the kids. Now we want to talk about avoiding cliques, which are little power groups. They begin with special friendships where someone sets themselves up that someone can come and spill their guts out to them. Sisters are especially vulnerable to this. It feeds your ego and you become god. In counseling you don't have a private ministry, a private clientele. Is adultery worse than pride? The greatest sin is the sin of pride."
 
Having only the counselor know about the problem fed pride in the counselor, so George gives the directive to all the leading brothers and workers that there was to be no confidentiality in counseling. The leadership wants to know about the failures in people's lives so that a pattern can be established and the past held over them.

"Don't agree to confidences. If a person has a failure in their life, we are going to know about it. If they get over it, but then they have another [failure], then there is a pattern. If they turn to wickedness all the past will be held against them.  He then made reference to Ezekiel 33: 11-16.
...

Raising the Ugly Specter of the Past

The workers had just suggested that Don and his wife be sent to the East coast. In order to convince the workers that Don was not a suitable candidate, George raises the specter of his past.  
"We remember Don in the past. He really lacked the courage of his convictions. He was wishy-washy, compromising, everything. He's not a bad brother, but I never thought he was a strong brother... The problem we've always wondered about Don, in the past, has been that Don was a brother years ago (without going into detail) who always believed that we owed him something... and we had to sort of reimburse him in some way. We don't want that in the work, we want people in the work who are willing to count all things but loss and to make real selfless sacrifices. Because in the work we don't guarantee anything as you know."  

Upon hearing Don's compromising character and selfish attitude, the workers immediately suggested another couple (Don and his wife were not present at that worker's meeting.)
...
>end quote<

[Arthur]

Here's from a paper documenting the abuse of one of George's secretaries:

>quote<

<her name> had been his secretary for eight years already and had graciously asked George again and again to find someone else to do his secretarial work for him. At one point, she even wrote a formal letter
and took the time to show the letter to Bob Ford and myself for our comment before giving it to George. We both felt her request had merit, because she was very skilled at editing, writing, and overseeing the
production of the magazine and George's books. In fact, it was Bob's initial acknowledgment of her skills and recommendation that George brought her into "the work. " <her> desire all along was to edit and write for the publications; she did not want to be George's secretary.
When she first started out as his secretary, George made her believe that the position would be temporary (at most two weeks) until he could find someone more permanent. The two weeks stretched into years.
George repeatedly denied her requests to be relieved of her secretarial duties, telling her, "You don't like anybody telling you what to do." He made her the problem when all she wanted to do was something more suited to her skills.
The situation was aggravated when George would embarrass her publicly for a Scripture passage incorrectly referenced on the seminar notes <she> had
typed for him. If <she> would attempt to show him the error was his by showing him his own written notes, he would not take any responsibility for his error, he would not apologize for blaming and embarrassing her.
In fact, he would further demean her by comments such as "You're always defending yourself, you're not humble, etc."
As time went on, she became increasingly frustrated and distressed, so she left the Assembly. Her leaving was short lived, however, for within a week she returned, realizing that it wasn't the assembly or her other responsibilities or the Lord she wanted to leave, but only her position as George's secretary.
The Saturday after her return was to be a joint workers' meeting with the workers coming from all over California even as far north as Humboldt County.
Before this meeting, George had <her> write a letter of repentance and apology to the workers. George began the workers' meeting with ministry about the awful sin of walking in pretension and its inevitable demonic consequences.
"When you're walking in religiosity, you're walking in externalities, you're walking in pretension...there is a veil that lies on your heart... If you will get real with God and you call sin for what it is, you will find, if you are open with God and your fellow man, your life will be flooded with light. ..Start giving the glory to God instead of pretending to be something you're not. And if you continue in that way, you're going to end up being a demon. You're going to be possessed by unclean spirits. You're going to be a demon... You'll be like the man who had one demon ill his house and he went out and he swept and garnished his house through his self-reformation. Then he went out in the wilderness because he had no reality. When he came home he brought back seven demons worse than the first... I see people living today demonic lives. Now why? Because you live pretentious lives. Because you pretend to be something you know you're not."
This is George's usual method of dealing with a problem. In ministry, he would make horrendous statements about the person on the "hot seat." In this case, he was preaching to <her>, who was present in the workers' meeting. If she continued to pretend everything was fine outwardly, but inwardly harbored resentment toward him, she would become a demon. In actuality, <she> was not pretending outwardly; all along she openly admitted she did not want to work with him.
After the ministry, he tells the workers that he believed "in discussing things out in the open." This had been his practice all these years and that he was not going to change. He then proceeds to read <her> letter of repentance. When he's done, he addresses the "toxic poison" which was apparently coming out of her.
"I'm sorry to have to read a letter like that. We could sweep it under the rug I suppose and don't say anything and then afterwards it erupts out like a bad boil because someone has a lot of toxic poison in their
body... Every so often I hear someone say, "I want to tell you something, but don't talk about it." Now when you meet that in the work, my dear friends, and you listen to me, when you meet that in the work, you tell
that person if you can't tell the others about it, then don't tell me.
And you stop this -- whoever does it. You know, "There's something I don't like. There's something that's bothering me. Or whatever, but don't
tell anyone about it." If you have something to say, you say it to the individual that's bothering you or what's bothering you or say it before all the workers. You speak it out. Because when you do that sort of thing
you're just doing the work of the devil. And what you don't realize is, especially if you say to people outside the work. It's bad enough you say it to other workers.
Are you listening, friends? Listen, I want your attention. I want you to listen to what I'm saying, because I'm talking to all of you. Now one of the commitments we make in the work is that we don't talk about things in the work outside. Are any of you ignorant of that? Do you all know that? You all understand that? And things that are said --if you've got a problem in the work, you know you're in a school in the work, my friends. You're not in the work because you've arrived and you're suddenly perfected and you're canonized. You're in the work, my friends, to be perfected. And there are things you're not going to like. Especially, some of the things I say and do, you're not going to like. But the Lord is trying to teach you."
He tells the workers,
"This is not the first time this has happened. And that's the reason <she> is not my secretary any longer. This is the second time, and the second time is two times too much already. This summer we had a big donnybrook up at the workers' conference. And at that time she was supposed to be very repentant and gotten over her problems, which she hasn't."
Then he addresses <her>.
"And I'm going to tell you personally, <her name>, I want you to know and the rest of you, I still don't think you're over it. Now you say you've been broken. And I don't believe it. A person who's broken doesn't behave
the way you behave."
He describes to the workers the "donnybrook." According to George, she was "kicking her heels over Bob Ford and Dan Notti."  Actually, she had
no issue with Bob or Dan. Her issue was the same issue of not wanting to work any longer in close association with George. She had spent the two days prior to the seminar alone, praying for direction and strength to
confront George with her lack of desire to continue with him. This was a critical turning point because there had been talk all summer of <her> discontinuing her outside job and working full time in George's ministry.
She came to the workers' seminar convinced in her own heart that she needed to be true to her own convictions and make known how she felt God was leading her.
She made the "mistake" (because, later, George accused her of talking to all the workers) of asking several other women workers who were aware of her struggle to pray for her as she planned on talking to George. Before she got a chance to talk with him, these "confidants" had already informed him.
George stormed to her cabin, asked the other cabin roommate to go for a walk, and began an hour or so of verbal abuse and insults.
He was visibly angry and said, "You're fired! Go look for a full time job! " He could not handle the fact that she did not feel called to serve him personally, so he turned the tables and "fired" her. He made demeaning remarks such as, "You're inept anyway." She asked, "Why, if I'm inept, were you planning on putting me full time in the work?" and "Why would you employ an inept person for 8 years even against my preference?" His reply was, "You were the only 'thing' we had around." At that point she did become angry with him.

In contrast this is how George tells the story to the workers.  
"And I told her I wasn't going to put up with it. And then I got up to camp and found out she was talking to other people about it. And I called her in and I gave her a good talking to and then she blew up at me. So I told her as long as you're going to behave this way you're no longer my secretary.  I fire you right now. You're finished." [He laughs and snickers.]  
The next day he asked her through a messenger to come to his cabin to talk with him and Betty.  She agreed, encouraged and hopeful that he was going to respect her wishes. Instead, he had deceived her. When she walked in, there were about 15 other workers sitting in a circle, all of them rallied to support him. For the next two hours, she was persuaded to repent. And she attempted to do so. Everyone was "rejoicing" at the end that <she> had seen "the error of her ways."
She was reinstated from being "fired." She was told again there was a need for her to be in the work full time.  In essence, <she> left the seminar "convinced against her will," as the saying goes.
...
>end quote<


"We didn't see it"?!!  My you-know-what they didn't see it!   If Tim said that then he is a liar. These guys make me sick.  They are first hand witnesses as well as supporters and contributors to the abuse of George Geftakys -- for decades.

To put it in the words all may understand:  Liar, liar, pants on fire.  Hanging from a telephone wire.

[TGarisek]

What Tim didn’t see, Keith saw very well and steered himself and his wife away. The foot rubs, the back rubs, etc.  

Keith now calls George a psychopath. Can Tim say that? I know it hurts sooo bad to be named Geftakys but instead of appealing to sympathy Tim should demonstrate real brokenness and sorrow. Instead he's making excuses. After reading all the worker's transcripts it's truely sickening that we sat there and (all of us) listened to that drivel for so many years.

If any Fullertonians are reading this, why aren't you insisting on chasing the money trail? Oh, you didn't know that there was a huge delta between incoming monies and the outgoing payments for building rents, full time workers, etc. You didn't know? Or, you're too afraid? Or, maybe you are resorting to the old faithful line - the saints gave the money in good conscience and the Lord knows how to deal with misuse. Well, one of the ways is by using bold, courageous servants that pursue righteousness.

It's not the money Anne Marie and I gave over the years because we basically paid Tim's milk money, but there are others who gave huge sums for certain specific purposes and that money should be accounted for.

[moonflower]

Wow! I'm overwhelmed by the spirituality of these workers' (syndicate) meetings.  Tell us more.......

[sfortescue]

If the men in positions of responsibility didn't see the open sin, that in itself is an indictment to disqualify them from any leadership position in the future.  Remember, the little ones in the flock had enough spiritual discernment to see it.