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Some thoughts on Spiritwatching .. our ministry future
Dec 24, 2025
29m 45s
A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Final Of The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 10
Oct 4, 2025
2h 20m 44s
A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 9
Sep 27, 2025
1h 43m 05s
A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 8
Sep 20, 2025
45m 11s
A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 7
Sep 13, 2025
1h 19m 42s
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| Date | Episode | Topics | Guests | Brands | Places | Keywords | Sponsor | Length | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12/24/25 | ![]() Some thoughts on Spiritwatching .. our ministry future✨ | spiritualityministry+3 | — | — | — | Spiritwatchingministry future+3 | — | 29m 45s | |
| 10/4/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Final Of The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 10 | “𝗕𝗮𝗯𝘆𝗹𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗴𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝗳𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗻, 𝗶𝘀 𝗳𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗻, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗵𝗮𝘀 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗮 𝗱𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗰𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗱𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗻𝘀, 𝗮 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝗳𝗼𝘂𝗹 𝘀𝗽𝗶𝗿𝗶𝘁, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗮 𝗰𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗻 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗵𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗯𝗶𝗿𝗱! " 𝗥𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟭𝟴:𝟮The legacy of Remnant Fellowship, as Michael S. Black has been sharing, is that it has become a demonic haunt of unclean birds as vividly depicted by he and Steve Lomas for his FallenChurch.com site in this graphic. It is a congregation of vicious pecking orders. false teaching, and abusive socialization all under the gleeful control of Elizabeth Kauffman, his sister and heir apparent to their late mother. In this concluding episode to our Spiritwatch conversations, Michael shares with us how he exited the cultic movement, his personal and ongoing transition out of a lifetime of cultism and a razor sharp retrospective on the future of Remnant 2.0 as he puts it. This is an illuminating episode of over 2 hours length. If you are a victim of the deceptions of Remnant, confidential and compassionate sharing and counsel are available. EMAIL us at help@spiritwatch.org. | 2h 20m 44s | ||||||
| 9/27/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 9 | Our ongoing conversation with Michael S. Black now proceeds into sharing about the darkest days yet in his life and those of the cultic Remnant Fellowship church created by Gwen Shamblin Lara, Aware of an upcoming HBO Max documentary on their sect and pursuing a new political passion leading them to more gullible souls, Gwen, Joe and their retinue instead met their Maker beneath six feet of water in Percy Priest Lake after a 300 plus mph entrance on May 29 2021. An event no one expected, the crash of their jet sent shock waves throughout the Remnant culture which Michael tried to ride for the good of all, only to realize what a futile juggling act it had become. | 1h 43m 05s | ||||||
| 9/20/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 8 | During 2018 and beyond, the years that changed everything in the Remnant Fellowship cult, Michael did his best to weather the firestorms of transformation which Gwen Shamblin Lara had been stoking for years. Her marital missteps became her cues for stoking a Remnant congregational conflagration as she socially reengineered the Remnant culture to an unimaginable degree. Our conversation is a gripping look into their nose-down descent into an authoritarian anarchy. | 45m 11s | ||||||
| 9/13/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 7 | Michael's painful narrative continues as life in the Remnant Fellowship cult continued to pile a lot on his plate. Then in 2017, everything changed: when Gwen Met Joe. Her carnal deviance into her libidinous self-delusion and how it escalated the already heightened megalomania and religious abuse of the movement is unsparingly recounted here. | 1h 19m 42s | ||||||
| 9/6/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 6 | We continue our discussion with Michael S. Black as he continues a painful reverie of how his time in Remnant Fellowship became completely orchestrated by his mother Gwen Shamblin Lara. He recounts how Gwen's connection with reality began to be lost as she became what she preached against, and how the encroaching socialization within the cult further poisoned the lives of his sister Elizabeth and father David. | 1h 11m 59s | ||||||
| 8/30/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 5 | Michael S Black's conversations with Reverend Rafael Martinez continue about how life in the hothouse of the Remnant Fellowship inner circle of cultic leadership became a gilded cage he fought in vain to escape. A 90 minute episode, it traces one of the darkest fields of brokenness Michael was compelled to cross. | 1h 34m 14s | ||||||
| 8/23/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 4 | Michael S. Black continues his unflinching retrospective look back at his time as a leader of the Remnant Fellowship cult founded by his late mother, Gwen Shamblin Lara. As the movement's social boundaries hardened by self-deceptive excess and inner immorality, Michael's struggles to know the difference between right and wrong intensified. | 1h 25m 22s | ||||||
| 8/16/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 3 | Our conversation with Michael S. Black continues, as he shared how, from a place of privilege respected by thousands as a leader of the Remnant Fellowship cult, the cracks in the walls of the New Jerusalem became impossible to ignore. His disillusionment with the hypocrisy, abuse and exploitation of those within his movement became a cognitive dissonance he could not ignore any longer. | 1h 06m 34s | ||||||
| 8/9/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 2 | Michael S. Black, son of the infamously late Gwen Shamblin Lara, continues our discussions about his past involvement in the Remnant Fellowship, | 1h 11m 11s | ||||||
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| 8/2/25 | ![]() A Chronicle of Zion It Needs To Listen To: The Michael S. Black Conversations Part 1 | He was the Psalmist of Zion, a gifted young man whose musical and vocal abilities were wholeheartedly devoted to the leadership of worship at the Remnant Fellowship Church as it launched in 1999.As the son of the late Gwen Shamblin Lara, he was appointed by his now sadly infamous mother as a leader of the movement whose spiritual direction included the creation of music that advanced the Remnant worldview most creatively and was adored and followed reverently by hundreds of thousands in Lara's Weigh Down seminars and crusades.But the story didn't end there. His disillusion, his dysfunction and ultimately his departure from it is a testimony that "Zion", as the church culture with Remnant characterizes itself, needs to hear and is a cautionary tale as to how the love of absolute power, as well as the love of money, absolutely corrupts as the root of all evil.We are privileged to host this first of several interviews with Michael S. Black, formerly known as MIchael Shamblin. In this episode, he reflects on his family's ordeal as Gwen's lifelong obsession with flaunting authority became a megalomania that birthed her Remnant vision. | 1h 03m 56s | ||||||
| 7/26/25 | ![]() The Heat Is On - Xenos/Dwell's Neverending Spin Doctoring Of Reality | While Xenos/Dwell, as any cult, may have good points and even laudable points, they are more than negated by it's disconnection from the plain reality that it is underpinned with an authoritarian and abusive culture. Our brief summary about this movement's ongoing spin cycle in regard to its questionable history and present state of corrupted affairs includes a review of Xenos/Dwell leadership evasion and an examination of the movement's ecclesiastical machinery it uses to attract and retrain new prospects in the same way any other cult works. | 28m 34s | ||||||
| 7/19/25 | ![]() Through The Xenosverse 6 of .. | This is our podcast edition of a previously streamed Spiritwatch livestream episode series called "Through The Xenosverse". It is the sixth livestream that was done and four previous ex-Xenos/Dwell members provided thought provoking consideration of a unique line of query: what positive and even beneficial influences did the Xenos/Dwell culture provide for them and others? And how did such constructive community ultimately contribute to even deeper deception? | 1h 32m 32s | ||||||
| 7/13/25 | ![]() Impurity In A Dry Place : One Perspective On The Ongoing Abuse At Pure Life "Ministries" (explicit) | We are restarting our podcast and are grateful you've returned: tell others! For this first episode of our fourth season, our focus today on our podcast is upon the Pure Life Ministries parachurch bandwagon - a residential program where addicts to pornography supposedly receive intimate personal spiritual direction to be freed from it. This coerced formation is a travesty of compassionate spiritual direction and is an abusive and damaging organization that empowers the hand of the Gladstone/Madison cult in Cincinnati by serving as a recruitment front for it. We're thankful for the testimony of Chris Johnson, a former participant of PLM who has become one of many survivors who is breaking a silence about it's aberrant and wicked activity guised in the robes of "toughlove". WARNING: EXPLICIT CONTENT MAY CAUSE TRIGGERING FOR SURVIVORS OF RELIGIOUS AND SEXUAL ABUSE. | 1h 53m 42s | ||||||
| 12/16/24 | ![]() On The Burden of Truth - The Testimony of Stephen Ketter, Ex-Xenos Survivor | Stephen Ketter's desire for truth in his life led him to the Xenos/Dwell movement back in the days when it was still calling itself the "Fish House." He joined it as an old warehouse on Sinclair Road in Columbus, Ohio was pressed into service the "non traditional" church's growth. Like so many, it all provided a place of profound spiritual impact until he began to understand what the nature was of the kinetic force behind its' power. And it was that love of Biblical truth that helped him see that oh so critical difference. We're glad to have him unpack that for us here. | 1h 09m 03s | ||||||
| 11/27/24 | ![]() In And Out Of The Kingdom of Love - The Testimony of Ge'Cobi, Ex-Remnant Fellowship Member | The Remnant Fellowship (RF) cult of Franklin, Tennessee was likened to being the exclusive "Kingdom of Love" by its deceased founder, Gwen Shamblin Lara. And she and her coterie of leaders there were the most charming, the most engaging of recruiters for what they also called "Zion", beckoning people searching for God, community and meaning. Our guest, Ge'Cobi Pittman and her family found this draw irresistible as people of faith seeking refuge and being persuaded Lara's Remnant vision as the place to find it. We are grateful to have her share an enlightening and deeply personal reverie about her journey into what would become a travail of authoritarian community where love, when it was found, was in quite short supply. LIke our previous podcasts and streams with other ex-RF members, the journey is painful to listen to yet a testimony to a young woman's determination to seek the truth, no matter where it led her. | 1h 52m 14s | ||||||
| 11/9/24 | ![]() She Took The Wrong Way Home - The Testimony of Cyndee, Former Way International Ambassador | Sadly, it’s when the light shines brightest that the bugs fly in. Right alongside the genuine revitalizing of the 196o's Jesus movement came the deception of false teachers who organized massive movements all of their own design aimed at drawing away and exploiting hapless "Jesus people" to their sectarian cause. The Way International movement founded by Victor Paul Wierwille was one such group and it attracted hundreds of thousands of people in the 1970's into its fold which was definitively cultic to its core. Among them was a lively young Texan girl named Cyndee who was seeking answers to her questions about life and eternity. Wierwille convinced her to pursue them along his primrose path and this podcast is the story of where it would lead her .. and how she finally found the real Home she sought. | 1h 28m 38s | ||||||
| 10/13/24 | ![]() A Look At the Misuse of Scripture In Aberrant Christianity - Dr. James Bjornstad, 1996 | On today's podcast, we're sharing Dr. James Bjornstad's talk entitled "A Look At the Misuse of Scripture In Aberrant Christianity" He offers keen insight on how abusive religion found in cultic churches stems from their twisted misinterpretation of Biblical principles. If you want to understand how cults twist the Scripture and distort its truth to support their lie, Dr. Bjornstad pulls no punches. Get ready for a timeless talk needing to be remembered today, even as this world's order prepares to end in a flurry of lies and deceit. | 1h 12m 27s | ||||||
| 9/28/24 | ![]() Toward A Surer Hope - The Testimony of A.J., Ex-Xenos Survivor | Every testimonial we've shared on our podcast is hauntingly compelling listening and A.J.'s sharing from the heart, lively and cautionary, is certainly no exception. She shares freely about her journey into and out of the Xenos/Dwell cult and her story is so incredibly familiar. It's how a young woman of faith, finding herself drawn to an exciting community she thought embodied her hopes and dreams of a deeper spirituality, would have to resort fighting for her ideals against a system that militated against them "in the name of Jesus" | 2h 23m 51s | ||||||
| 9/21/24 | ![]() When Grace And Mercy Aren't Enough: The Testimony of Suzanne, Ex-Xenos Survivor | Suzanne, while a member of the Xenos/Dwell movement, visits with us to provide a perspective on a profoundly warped side of its existence they deny exists. The most excruciating abuse a cult member can experience is when those whom they trust there are so caught up in it's disciplinary spirit that they associate grace and mercy with whatever its leaders decide to dish out to those they think should be "disciplined." She found the infinite mercy of God in Christ, the heart of the Christian Gospel, laid aside for the indulgence of a lurid voyeurism from people playing God. In one of the most disturbing testimonials to the abuses of cultism I've ever heard, somehow, Suzanne's indomitable will to move beyond it shines through. WARNING: EXPLICIT CONTENT MAY CAUSE TRIGGERING FOR SURVIVORS OF RELIGIOUS AND SEXUAL ABUSE. | 1h 45m 15s | ||||||
| 9/14/24 | ![]() A Voice Of Many: The Testimony of Alex Craig, Ex-Xenos Survivor | Alex Craig was among the first of many who we met who'd survived a traumatic life that she had completely given to Xenos/Dwell with all of the hope for purpose, fellowship and destiny it supposedly offers. Her voice to her passing through X/D's cultic crucible which she found there which almost destroyed her is a poignantly all too familiar one. We're glad we reconnected and finally have been able to present this cautionary and personal word Alex shares. WARNING: EXPLICIT CONTENT MAY CAUSE TRIGGERING FOR SURVIVORS OF RELIGIOUS AND SEXUAL ABUSE. | 1h 19m 10s | ||||||
| 9/8/24 | ![]() When You Won't Go "Home" Again: Revisiting The Gladstone/Madison Controversy | A Spiritwatch Conversation. The Gladstone/Madison community, an abusive church movement based in Cincinnati, Ohio is being rocked by changes challenging the power of its secretive leader Zac Kijinski and a shrinking pool of sycophantic elders. Their increasing instability and deceptive example have led many members and other elders to leave their religiously cultic ghetto there. It's important to really understand why. Some survivors, all of whom have shared their stories in part on our "Where Are We Going" podcast came back to help us understand.WARNING: Explicit content and language about religious abuse could cause triggering to cult survivors. Viewer discretion advised. | 1h 16m 16s | ||||||
| 7/2/24 | ![]() Doing What We Do: Why A Christian Perspective On Spiritual Discernment Matters | A few emails this week about our work in exposing deceptive spirituality are in mind as we share upon the privilege to shed the light of truth upon the dark of deception that Spiritwatch MInistries strives to provide. We do what we do for a reason -- and speaking truth loud and clear is behind that commitment. | 24m 09s | ||||||
| 6/8/24 | ![]() The Broad Road Ahead | Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Matthew 7:13 NKJVWe are still going somewhere. We briefly revisit that chief concern about our dangerous times and give an update and what we will be soon doing in our ongoing discerning of them. | 14m 14s | ||||||
| 4/10/24 | ![]() The Unsentimental Journey of Megan James, Ex-Xenos Survivor (part 2 of 2) | Megan James was quite literally born into the Xenos movement, when it was morphing from it’s original early 1970’s Fish House Fellowship days into the form of an actual church complete with polity, budgets and a primal need to start replicating its vision through private church educational institution. Her parents were caught up into the social and intellectual draw of the group, and she was one of the very first specimens that were dissected in the religious machinery cobbled together by Xenos to educate it’s young, even calling herself and her childhood peers the “prototypes” of their work. This ominously mechanistic verbiage, sadly, would be all too accurate as we shall see. This is the second of 2 90 minute parts. WARNING: EXPLICIT CONTENT MAY CAUSE TRIGGERING FOR SURVIVORS OF RELIGIOUS AND SEXUAL ABUSE. | 1h 45m 44s | ||||||
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