Following is the e-mail that we received from a graduate of the Gap (Momentus for teens) training (curiously—and perhaps suggestively—in the middle of a letter-bomb attack on our site):

 

Ahhh...Another site professing to know the exact nature of the Breakthrough trainings.  And what's worse, they accuse a legitimate organization of sending them a virus!

 

Okay, you say that it was possibly an accident, or that the virus simply attatched itself to their address book.  But before that, you blatantly attack the leaders of the Momentus training, saying that they maliciously attacked your server with a virus.  So, which is it?  Are you accusing them or not?  Was there even really a virus?

 

I will leave you to your ranting now, because I have better things to do than listen to you go on about how bad a Group Awareness Training is (even though you have never experienced it).

 

Okay, I will not say much about Breakthrough, because I have not yet gone either.  The reason is this:  I am only sixteen, so I went to GAP, the Momentus training for teens.  Though small differences exist, most of the training is the same (GAP also has the Lifeboat, the "Be on Time" rule, the counselors that never give up trying to get to the root of a person's problems, the "Buddy System," and many other things that Breakthrough has).

 

I will be joining the team in October.  It has only been three weeks since I completed GAP, and I am already completely changed.  I am finally living my life for God instead of for myself.  I now know that I matter, and I am worth something for God.  And I now have the confidence to be 'real' with people.

 

Though you probably are not paying much attention to this email, I will still wish you the best of luck in finding the truth, which is that Momentus is a program that is helping far more people than most ministries.  In our GAP training, over one-third of the participants publicly gave their lives to God during the last night of the training.  Can you boast that any four-day awareness meeting has converted one-third of the people there?  If so, tell me about it, so I can go to it, too!

 

Sincerely,

 

Kyle "Serophis"

"Walk Uprightly"

 

Following is our reply. (Some may question whether we could have reproved and corrected this poor, gullible lad with greater meekness or gentleness. That’s assuming, of course, that his address was legitimate and he received our replay. Still, we thought long and hard about our answer and took it to the Lord. His direction was to reply as we did. Sadly, this youngster has so given himself up to deception that gentleness and meekness can’t reach him—all he understands after setting through one of these ungodly trainings is brutal frankness, because that’s the example set by the Momentus trainings—at least the brutal part, that is. Nothing that any human can do can reach him now—only the Lord can. Our prayer is that our directness will cause some of what we’ve said to lodge in his mind, where it may eventually grow as a seed that he can recall when he finally begins to see the truth about the Momentus trainings and what they really do to Christians. He may recall our words with contempt, but perhaps he’ll recall them at a time when the Lord can begin to work in his heart again. Please join us in prayer for this lad’s eventual deliverance.)

 

Well, this is probably a waste of time, as most Momentus supporters who write tend to give a phony e-mail address so that they can engage in hit-and-run attacks and avoid responsibility or any repercussions. Maybe you're different, although seeing as how you claim that the Gap training has given you "the confidence to be 'real' with people" and yet you fail to even sign your complete name to your e-mail makes us question that. What kind of "confidence" do you really have after all?

 

Hmmm, you say that we "accuse" a "legitimate" organization of sending us a virus, and then question whether there really was a virus. Are you now claiming, as a result of your Gap training, to be omniscent? If not, and you were not involved whatsoever in the incident, you must therefore be speaking out of ignorance. Is that something else that the Gap has done for you? Incidentally, we have a copy of the notification TXT file about disarming the virus that was sent to the helper that we mention. (Our IPS simply disables such viruses automatically, without notification—although the disabled e-mail comes through. We saw no reason to keep it, as we know that scoffers wouldn't believe it even if they saw it.) We may post that to our site, although we're sure that wouldn't convince you. Judging by what you wrote in your e-mail and the way in which you wrote it, your Gap experience has apparently so indoctrinated you that, sadly, you are no longer capable of believing the truth of anything unless those "counselors" who "never stop trying to get to the root of a person's problem" (even if none is really there to begin with) tell you to believe it.

 

For the record, one of the viruses came directly from Dan Tocchini's e-mail address. As noted, Dan Tocchini has never contacted us by e-mail, so let us ask you: Why, then, would he have our address in his e-mail Address Book? (If it were a virus that infected his computer, it would have sent itself out only to addresses in his Address Book. It wouldn't pluck our address out of thin air and send itself to us, now would it?) The same is true of the virus sent to the e-mail address of our helper--although we have reports that Tocchini makes all sorts of accusations against him behind his back, never bothering to approach him as outlined in Matthew 18 about any imagined "wrongs," he's never once contacted him by e-mail. So why would Tocchini have his address in his Address Book for a virus to latch onto? Really, the answer is quite simple if you put aside your Momentus-based preconceptions and try to think logically.

 

By the way, we don't simply "profess" to know the truth about Momentus/Breakthrough. We know it. Why? Because, unlike you, we've done our homework on it. We've examined both the glowing propaganda from supporters of the training, such as yourself (even though you admit that you haven't taken Breakthrough itself yet) and the heart-felt testimonies of those who've seen it for what it really is--often after being seriously hurt by it. More important, we've compared what the Momentus trainings do and teach against how scripture says Christians are to conduct themselves--and it's come up very wanting. In fact, we find it to be totally unscriptural. We think it's quite telling that, in your entire e-mail you never once quoted or even cited scripture. Nor did you ever once mention (much less give praise to) the Lord Jesus Christ. Yet you rave on and on about the Gap and Breakthrough (the latter of which you haven't even taken), idolatrously putting them in the place of our true--and only--savior. So who really is your savior, Kyle (if that's even your real name)? The Gap--or the Lord Jesus Christ? Based on who/what you talk about, we can guess the answer. But you need to pose it to yourself and give yourself the hard answers. Let us ask you: If the Momentus trainings are as wonderful as you seem to think, how did Jesus Christ ever manage without them for 2000 years?

 

And before you leave our "ranting" (as you put it--a real "Christian" way to characterize it, isn't it?), why not ask yourself some more hard questions:

 

If you are indeed so "completely changed," is that change really an improvement? If so, in what way? Do you think you're more like Christ now? If so, what in your e-mail to us reflects that?

 

You say that you're "finally living [your] life for God now"--in what way exactly? Is attacking those who are trying to protect His people from spiritual deception how God would want you to live your life? Is helping others be indoctrinated into an unscriptural belief system what God wants? What "God" exactly are you living for?  The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? Or the God of self (self-government, etc.)? Your e-mail seems more self-centered than Christ-centered--what you've gotten out of the training, how it's helped you, how much you matter, how important you are now. (Of course, all we have is your e-mail to base our perceptions on, and you deal only in generalities, not specifics, in it. But you mention yourself more times than you do God or others—and especially the Lord Jesus, who is completely absent from your words.)

 

And in just what ways are you being "real" with people? What exactly does that mean? Okay, let us guess based on what we've seen and heard from Momentus grads who've bought into the training: Are you telling people what you think is wrong with them? Or what's "missing" from your relationship with them (that you believe is their fault)? If so, are you basing those judgments on scripture--and are you speaking and acting as scripture tells us to? Are you reproving people with meekness and dealing gently with the people of God, as scripture says to do? Or are you just blurting out anything hurtful that comes to your mind and joining in group attacks on people who don't measure up to how you think they should behave (regardless of what scripture describes)? We've seen all that—and worse—in the actions of those who've swallowed the training whole. Is that how you're being "real" with people? And is that how Jesus would conduct himself? (If you think so, please support it with scripture. Not for us—we already know the answer. But for yourself.)

 

Now we ask you—exactly how do you judge that we are not paying attention to your e-mail, as you claim? Again, do you believe that the Gap has made you omniscient so that you knew what we are going to do before we even got your e-mail? If so, you'd better ask for your money back. You see, we do pay close attention to everything that people write to us, just as the Lord would—but we also compare it all against scripture, as he would, too. You see, as he does, we care deeply for God's people. That's why we've taken a stand against such harmful spiritual deceptions as Breakthrough and the Gap. (Before your letter, we didn't really have a lot to go on about the Gap—now, after reading your e-mail, we see that it is just as toxic and harmful to those who take it as Breakthrough.) If you could take your focus off yourself for a while and dig into what harm these trainings have done to others, maybe you'd finally see the truth, too. If you can truly sit there and gloat over how you think this training has "helped" you (an illusion, as you'll eventually find out if you ever again become capable at all of independent and rational thought), knowing how it's seriously harmed other believers, you have apparently been damaged beyond the capability of feeling anything for others at all and have given yourself over to lies, as one whose conscience is seared as with a hot iron. Nothing that is truly of Jesus Christ or his Father is harmful to believers, as these trainings are to so many. Just as with those who ask of Him the Holy Spirit, he won't give some of His people stones or serpents or scorpions. The Momentus trainings have done that and more to people. If you put two and two together, you'd see that Momentus, Breakthrough, the Gap—whatever—none of it is of the true God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

We've already found the truth about Momentus by searching the scriptures. It ain't there. Why don't you try being a Berean and search the scriptures yourself to see whether you find any of the exercises or anything else about the Gap in them? If you do so honestly and with an open heart to learn the truth, you'll find out that there's a huge gap between the truths of scripture and the "truths" of the Momentus trainings.

 

You claim that "one-third" of the participants in your training publicly "gave their lives to God." We suppose it's just your youth and inexperience that makes that seem like such an accomplishment. Go to any meeting of any living evangelical ministry that's teaching the Word of God and you'll see numbers far in excess of that. And they don't even need any "four-day awareness training"—just a few hours teaching the pure Word of God, unadulterated by psychotherapy and New Age visualization exercises. We could name several, but you seem already to have made up your mind that only these trainings can do such a thing. How sadly uninformed you are. But again, we have to ask: Just what "God" did these young people give their lives to? The scriptures say that we are saved by faith—and faith comes by the word of God. Except where it's used as props on the walls or twisted by the trainers, the Word of God is absent from these trainings. The only Jesus discussed is another Jesus, who "breaks the legs of the sheep," and not the Jesus of scripture, as more than one grad has reported to us. If you really want to go where the word of God is being taught, forget about the Gap or Breakthrough and make a real breakthrough with the only thing that can truly fill the gaps in people's lives—the Lord Jesus Christ. Although some are dead, many churches are still teaching the Word. Go to one of those. It may take you a while to find it, but it'll be far easier—and much more rewarding spiritually—than sitting through more of these ungodly trainings.

 

Again, based on the evidence of your e-mail, which is all we have to go on, we doubt that you're listening, but we have a duty to you and to the church as a whole to speak. So we urge you not to "join the team" if that means serving on the crew of one of these trainings. So far, you're guilty primarily of being gullible and letting yourself be indoctrinated by your training. But if you actively participate in them, bringing other people into them or helping to inflict them on others, you become a partaker of the evil that is done to those who are hurt by them. Then it becomes your sin as well. And if you fail to finally recognize and repent of what you've done, you'll have to face the Lord Jesus at the Judgment Seat and answer for what you've done. We urge you to turn back to the Lord and repent of participating in these trainings. Jesus said that even as you do unto the littles ones, you do unto him. So if you talk someone into taking the Gap or Breakthrough who is hurt by it or you actively participate in a training in which anyone is hurt, you've done the same to our Lord. Is that really what you want? We will pray for your deliverance from this deception, as we do for all those so deceived—and even more so for those victimized by the clever craftiness embodied in these tools of the devil.

 

And we will continue to speak out against such spiritual deceptions, as long as the Lord continues to call us to such a ministry. We don't expect for those of you so deceived to appreciate it--Israel wasn't too thrilled by the words of the prophets when they called God's people to repentance either, which you'll see if you forget about the Gap and just read God's Word. (Try it—you'll be surprised at how much better it is than pretending to be saved in a lifeboat while others "drown" or dead in the water while some are puffed up because they were "saved.") So letters such as yours are to be expected. Perhaps, someday, however, if you manage to throw off the bonds you've let the enemy shackle you with, you'll understand. If you do, thank and praise God for His love and mercy toward you—and stand against such spirituation deceptions as you're currently involved in. We will pray for you.

 

Keep Seeking the Truth!  (Because you sure didn't find it in the Gap and you won't find it in Breakthrough—only in God's Word.)