Beware the User

Warning. You may not want to read this. There may be harsh words, you don't want polluting your ears.


This comes out of my own recent experience that I felt compelled to share with my brethren. This is about a man who seemingly desires the Lord, seemingly reads the Bible, spends lots of time conferencing with the pastor as though seeking personal advice and yet....he is not.

I have said for years, that it seems we have among us some who are not quite altogether human at all. This recent experience has me pondering those thoughts again.

This is one of those posts I can't take to my site at Calvary Corner blog,  on that site, I want to minister to the lost not pollute and confuse. On this blog, I expect there are Christians reading and so I will write about things that takes discernment to understand and learn.

This involves a son in law. You don't know my family so I feel I can tell the story without bringing harm to any one particular person. We all belong to the Lord

I'm ashamed, now, to say that I put a lot of money into the marriage situation of my daughter. If it had not been for the fact that she felt she could love and trust this man, I would have run the other direction. But for the sake of family, I helped.

I have a huge tendency to look for the good in all people. I see them through God's eyes and uplift. This also makes me a prime target for cons, manipulators and conniving thieves. I say target but that doesn't mean I fall for every little trick. I thought I was better, or should I say wiser, at pinpointing the liar. In this particular circumstance, I'd have to say the surrounding situation influenced my thoughts.

I've been with my daughter, helping to raise a son, since he was 6 months old. Why? Because I knew my daughter(divorced) and I knew she couldn't make it on her own.  Of course, my original intent was to stick it out with her until she found her own feet and stood on her own. I was with her when she met this man and we happened to be living 3 states away from our home town and were miserable in this place.

I struggled for years with the decision to simply run away from the situation, only to realize all over again that my daughter would fall through the cracks if I did and I stayed. There was a child involved and I cared that much about him.

My daughter was miserable and wanted to move back home. I had a choice- I could stay with my present job, knocking down $1000 a week or give up the job and move with the family. The new couple had no money to move and I was well aware of that.

This new son in law most definitely raised my eyebrow, the more I learned about him, but went along with the plans because my daughter seemed determined to be with him. Before they were married, I had asked what he did for a living and the answer I got simply tilted my head. He was 40 years old and going to a college to study graphic designing. He was working in a little ice cream shop that his own sister owned. Don't you know I questioned why a 40 year old man still was fishing around, looking for a direction in his life. This made no sense to me.

It was my daughter who suggested working for Schwann's.Something he had never considered and he did go to work for them. How easy it was for him to simply switch directions in mid-stream. It had seemed to my daughter that this man whom she wanted marriage with, had been held back in life by a manipulative sister and she wanted to help him to find a better world. All seemed very appreciated by my new son in law and he loved his new job. I was still pondering him and his situation, which made no sense to me.

I'm the one that had the money in the bank for a move. When we first moved to this state, we only took essentials because we weren't too sure if this would become a permanent move. Our things were in storage back home, awaiting the next decision. Those things we added to the home didn't amount to the cost of moving it and would make sense to simply sell or get rid of those things. Now, though, there was an addition to the family who had a trailer load of his own. So I was facing moving his belongings and of course, the cost.

I had no intentions of hiring a truck for the move. There just wasn't that much to be moved. There was no way to attach a trailer to my car, so while I worked on the road, I had my daughter seek out a used pickup that could make the trip. At the very least, I would have a vehicle for the money instead of turning it in at some rental.

About that time, my son in law's old car gave out and wasn't worth the money to fix. That of course, pushed up the plans for me to buy a pickup so that he would be driving that to work instead of my daughter making 2 round trips across town, every day, taking him to work.

To boil it down, I footed the bill for a move, purchased a used vehicle to tow a trailer, footed the bill for a trailer to haul his things, not ours. Then, out of necessity, put down a deposit on a rented home and paid the first months rent.

The expenditures didn't stop there. Since I was now stuck with living with the family, as I had no job and was going through my savings, I stayed and put in more than my share each month, on the expenses.

With my dollars, I put in a garden, rented a tiller, bought the seed and spent hundreds of hours tending the garden. So that summer, the entire family ate very well off my efforts.

Over the course of that first year, things began to happen. More than once, my son in law came to me in private to tell me that my daughter had sent him to talk to me about my putting in more money into the family expenses. Each time I replied with something like "$400 wasn't enough?" That plus the $200 per month I was putting into groceries. He would act as though my daughter hadn't told him about that and he was sorry to have to talk to me about this.

It took over a year for the truth to come out on the table and when it was out there for the whole world to see, I was reeling over the fact that my son in law had played me, like nobody else in my lifetime. In fact, I've never known a human being like this one. How he can call himself Christian is beyond me.

You see, I was in a separate building on the property, had created myself a little living space in the corner of a huge garage. I didn't want to become that interfering mother in law and what's more, as far as I knew I would be going back out on the road and seldom see home. So at the time, it seemed to me to be a perfect solution. For that reason, I was not within ear shot of most of the things said in the house.

How was I to know that while this man was eating my food, sitting at the table my money paid for, driving my vehicle to work and using my clothes washer, was threatening to not set a place at the table for me, because he thought I was mooching off him and should be gone?

It was also revealed that every time he came to me in private to talk about more money from me, my daughter knew nothing about it. One particular time, he had told me that if I just at least give my daughter $125 a month that it would help, I told him if that's all she wanted then that's all I would give her. He went to her and told her, 'mom said she would only put in $125 a month from now on'. Of course, this puzzled my daughter because she knew where half the money was coming from all along and wondered why I would say such a thing.

I now realize this was a game this man played. This is how he lives his life. He takes other peoples money, using all sorts of strange whining games. He manipulates.

He was coming to me as though my daughter was asking me for more money and she was not. He was going to her and telling her that her mother didn't want to help out with the expenses. All the while causing all sorts of hard feelings within the family, turning daughter against mother and it worked!

Before long,  I was hearing outbursts from my daughter, things like 'living rent free' (in my direction) and then out right 'moocher', as though she had completely forgotten all the things I had done for her and the child, through the years.

At this point, I was trapped. It was my daughter that convinced me to go on disability. Oh yes, definitely but I'm bull headed and would not face the fact that I was suffering from a breathing problem and some horrible name for some arthritis something, in my back. I was a cripple but wouldn't stop. I was pushing myself beyond my capabilities, taxing my heart to the max and most mornings could hardly move. So because of her pushing me toward it, I applied for and immediately was approved for disability. I hate to tell you what that monthly income is but certainly not enough to house a dog, much less a human.

So here I was, trapped with living with the family now that I had spent my savings on them and had no other means of supporting myself, except to continue to help out with the monthly expenses. All I wanted to do was run, go back out on the road driving truck but all these blocks were in my way.

The situation grew and became so intolerable, I was eying my guns and disappointed that I only had a shot gun and a .22 pistol. Neither one, a sure kill and I certainly didn't want to be more of a cripple than I was already and not able to run.

Depression hit its bottom. I couldn't understand why my own daughter could turn against me in this way. Not only had I sacrificed my entire existence for her for the past 14 years, we were Christians!

The truth was finally exposed and healing began in the family, despite what this man wanted and tried and that was his dooms day. I'd have to say that my daughter and I exploded on this man, using text messages while he was working. We bombarded him with the truths we were exposing, sharing little secrets with one another that neither of us knew about. We had come to realize what a manipulative, conniving, s.o.b. he really was.

Now I understood that while he was coming to me for advice, and I pointing him to Jesus all the way, just never seemed to get it through his head - never seemed to change - never seemed to follow any advice. He didn't want to. It was all a game.

As an example of his game playing, this was one story that came out, when my daughter and I began to reveal all his little secrets. He had come to me one day and told me that he and my daughter thought it would be nice is I bought him a cell phone and put his on my service. Since I was already paying for my own service and had put my daughter on mine, it seemed a simple request to add one more.

Now my daughter was telling me her side of the story. He had come to her and told her, "Your mom wants to buy me  a cell phone. Isn't that nice?" It turns out that the reason he caught me away from the rest of the family was so that he could lie about my daughters intentions. It was a manipulation.

This game, he took all the way to our pastor, whining at him and thinking he was getting the pastor to agree with him. This game he carried on and on until even the pastor gave up on him. It seemed that no matter how many times you repeated the same message, this guy just didn't have the capacity to understand. Odd things that you would expect a Christian to hear and obey. It just wasn't taking root.

After having been bombarded with the truth from both my daughter and me, via text messages, he just didn't come home that night,nor the next day, which was Saturday. We never told him he wasn't welcome in his own home. I imagine he finally got it through his head that he had been exposed and was afraid to face us.

So somehow, even on a Saturday, or did he do it yesterday, he had a lawyer freeze my daughter's bank account. He had called his sister who is now footing the bill to support him and a lawyer. Presumably now, there is a coming subpoena  to retrieve his personal things. Evidently his game has carried over to his sister now, as he can come get his things any time he wants and he knows that but instead, he's acting as though we've thrown him out of the house and barred the doors. That's not true.

As I see it now, this guy is going to come out smelling like a rose, through this situation. He will, and evidently already has, gotten more money out of yet another person so that he can play his games and live like a king while pointing an accusing finger at his wife. Now he's back to soaking his own sister.

If you have delicate ears, you need to stop reading right now.

I'm pretty sure that the reason he didn't come home and is afraid to face me, is the fact that I let him know in no uncertain terms, that my daughter finally told me why she had refused to share a bed with him ever again. He was demanding and getting sodomy and was hurting my daughter and telling her that if she didn't she was going against God. Somehow, I just have a feeling that was the final blow, for him to hear it coming from me.

He's the one that got me involved in the marriage problems, so he has nobody to kick but himself. While he thought he was gaining a cheering team, he was actually going too far with his constantly coming to me for so-called advice. Our family had become so twisted with some evil spirit in the house, that my daughter thought I was siding with her husband and did not share with me, the whole story. Now it was out.

I confess I'm furious with myself. What I could have done with $15000 for myself, so that I could support myself instead of this trap. Instead, I invested in what I thought was a family. Yes, I realize what a fool I was and that I had been played big time.

Now, why am I sharing this story?  Simply because if I could be taken in by such an evil spirit, so can anyone else. It seems the enemy is wiser every day. He can wear such a sweet, Christian face while brutalizing, lying, conniving and stealing. It's hard to explain to others that they can be so taken in by such a twisted monster, even while believing they have enough discernment to keep themselves from such harm.

The only symptom, I can offer up, is that of a person who seems to hunger for truth and yet acts as though they didn't understand a word you said and continues down a path that no Christian will follow. They will lean into your words, listen intently, seem to be repentant, then walk away still the same as they were before.

It gets grueling, when they come back again and again for the same advice and you give the same advice over and over and it still doesn't 'take'. This, until you're weary with repeating yourself.

The fact is, this evil spirit is accomplishing exactly what it wants. For you to waste your time on him, and not have time for anyone else. The point, I believe, is to keep your attention on them, so that you can't see something happening just beyond your site. Something like that.  This same spirit will use you to get what they want out of someone else.

It's tricky, I know. Boy do I know. But I'm telling you that we are living in a world with this sort. My advice? If it makes you uncomfortable - run. If something invades your home that is causing hard feelings among family members, get rid of it. What ever it is, it's not there for your, it's there to destroy you. There are times when instead of you ministering, you need to protect those around you instead.

Signs and warnings mean something. We tend to overlook them, in favor of seeing the good. Be aware that the devil is on a rampage. His time is running out and he will destroy in any way he can.