Until earlier this month, Bryan Riley of Brandon, Florida, worked as a security guard at a church. He was an ex-marine sharpshooter, and had served in Afghanistan and Iraq. He suffered from PTSD.
Like many do, he believed he could hear God directly speaking to him.
He told his girlfriend that “God was telling him” to go rescue a girl named Amber, who he believed to be suicidal and a victim of sex trafficking.
During the day on Saturday, September 4th, Bryan went to a home near Lakeland, Florida, where he believed Amber was being held. He spoke to a man mowing the lawn- Justice Gleason. He demanded to see Amber. The family’s grandmother came out, and threatened to call the police. When Bryan didn’t get the reaction he wanted, he left, angry.
According to reports, he spent time later that day arguing with his girlfriend about whether or not he could really hear God.
At 4:30am the next morning, he got dressed in full armored gear. He went to the home. He laid glowsticks out on the driveway- he believed Amber could use them to escape in the dark.
First, using an automatic weapon, he shot through a window and killed the family’s grandmother in her apartment. Then, he shot through the back glass door to enter the main home. He shot and killed the family dog. He then shot and killed Justice Gleason, his wife, and their 3 month old daughter as they hid in the bathroom. Their 11 year old daughter was hiding between the toilet and a cabinet. He shot her multiple times, demanding she tell him where Amber was. She played dead, and survived.
There was no Amber.
Bryan had no prior criminal history. He did have meth in his system, and later evidence suggested he used steroids illegally.
As far as I’ve read, he has shown no regret.
Maybe he still thinks he was obeying God.
My heart goes out to this family, and especially to the surviving daughter of the family. What a complete and utter tragedy.
I think that the horrific events of this day warrant reflection from the church. It would be easy to say, “Oh, he had PTSD, so that’s why it happened” or “He took drugs, that’s why it happened.”
Presumably, he also was taught to open his mind. To have blind faith. To obey.
I’m not saying that obeying God isn’t important, or that we shouldn’t trust God, or have childlike faith in Jesus. It’s easy to write off this situation and just say, “Well, clearly he didn’t have discernment, and wasn’t living in accordance with the rest of scripture.”
But it isn’t that easy.
He believed he was rescuing someone. I’m not condoning what he did AT ALL (it’s the job of law enforcement to deal with human trafficking rescues, not independently acting citizens). I’m just trying to imagine what he must have been thinking and feeling.
His girlfriend heard his thoughts. But how in the world are you supposed to convince somebody that God ISN’T talking to them? Once someone has opened their mind to that?
And what about when you combine that situation with mental illness? Mental illness is VERY common. It is not unusual. If you go to church, your church is full of mentally ill people. It’s just a fact of nature. People have PTSD, they have depression, they have anxiety. They have schizophrenia. They have a million other things.
And what about drugs?
Churches are full of users, too.
Many Christians support culture within their church that emboldens people to use weapons to “take matters into their own hands.” Had Bryan encountered that, and if so, was it a factor?
I think that there is a real danger in the lack of safety net, and lack of checks and balances that can occur for individuals who are taught to blindly open their mind to God, trust completely in the messages they hear, and legalistically act on them, lest they be “disobedient.”
For someone who has no trauma in their past, no mental health issues, a relatively boring subconscious, never does drugs, and doesn’t spend much of their time “opening their mind,” that church teaching and practice is likely safe.
But most people don’t fit into that box, and have at least one risk factor. Though people might not feel “led” by God to shoot people, they may do other harmful things. They may hurt relationships. Neglect their own families or their own children. Put undue pressure on other people to do something they felt God told them someone else should do.
How can we protect against a similar tragedy?
How can we protect against a similar tragedy? It’s overly simplistic to say “He just should have not done drugs.” Overly simplistic.
People who have similar risk factors FILL churches in America.
Preachers, when you talk about hearing God, make sure to give some caveats. Make sure to encourage people to seek out qualified local law enforcement, not “take matters into their own hands.” Encourage churchgoers who own weapons to implement their own checks and balances if they might struggle with mental illness- such as giving a spouse the code to open the safe.
Make sure to tell people that they might THINK God is telling them something he isn’t.
Importantly, make sure to tell people that they might THINK God is telling them something he isn’t.
Make sure you say that, loud and clear.
Don’t brush it away with “just be discerning.”
Don’t brush it away with “just don’t do drugs.”
Don’t brush it away with “this only counts for mentally ill people, and mental illness is rare.” It isn’t. Plus, many are undiagnosed.
Don’t brush it away with “the church has no say in this because clearly this guy was *insert label that makes him seem different.*”
We need responsible preaching on this topic that acknowledges its complexity, and the role the church plays in preventing similar events.
We need responsible preaching on this topic that acknowledges its complexity, and the role the church plays in preventing similar events.
We need improved treatment, especially church-endorsed, psychology and science-based treatment for PTSD and other mental illnesses.
We need church-endorsed, medicinal and science-based (non-repentance based) treatment for drug addiction.
We need better functioning checkpoints, checks and balances in our circles.
How many people heard Bryan talk, and he was not forced to get psychological help? Was he encouraged to go to the police with his allegation, so that at least someone else could investigate it?
We need to challenge each other with discernment, rather than fearing we’ll offend people or make them think we’re questioning their faith.
We need to make it NORMAL to talk frankly about the fact that people may think God is telling them something, but he isn’t. We need to challenge each other with discernment, rather than fearing we’ll offend people or make them think we’re questioning their faith.
We need to force people to dig deeper, and rely on the safeguards in our society to deal with suspicions or fears. We need to fiercely question, within the context of loving, prayerful community, anything irrational that someone believes God is telling them.
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Catharine, A couple of corrections.
First, this man was not under the teaching of this church. He was only a security guard there and a temporary one at that. So there was no opportunity for him to receive any instruction about obeying, blindly or otherwise.
Second, every church I know of that teaches about hearing and obeying God includes instruction on how to discern God’s voice. Blind obedience to any voice in your head has never considered a good thing in any church I have visited. Part of that discernment is knowing that if God is telling you to kill, it is not God.
I do not know the teaching on hearing God at that particular Church, but you do not know it either. Be very careful using your imagination to put words into a pastors mouth.
Maurice,
Thank you for chiming in.
I have found the teaching that one must blindly open one’s mind to God, and to obey, even if it doesn’t make sense, to be pervasive. Where he encountered that idea first is impossible for us to know.
Given the fact that people with similar risk factors fill churches throughout our country, I believe the warning for responsible preaching is important and urgent. The discussion around the reluctance many have to question whether someone “really did” hear something from God is important, too.
This is not the first time someone has killed someone in the name of obeying God. People will even use Old Testament examples of God’s calling for a nation to overtake another nation, or to implement the death penalty, as support for doing this. That is partly why it is so incredibly dangerous to teach people to blindly open their mind and to legalistically obey, and it is also dangerous for there to be church culture that neglects to provide appropriate checks and balances. Calls for discernment, on its own, are unlikely to prevent similar tragedies.
I do see that I said that this happened “within the context of church community”. I do not know how connected he was. I do know that he had multiple people he was speaking with about what he thought God was saying. I’ve edited that part since I don’t know the extent of the community was in.
This was a good article and the concerns are known to many Churches. Perhaps it will lead others to consider their teaching.
Godly counsel in that discernment of any word from God is essential. Where any church fails to carefully prepare the congregation to make that discernment there is room for problems. Many Churches do teach the need for caution and more need to do this.
My caution is with the ‘I do not know how connected he was’ part and then drawing conclusions in spite of that lack of knowledge. You are drawing conclusions and offering remedies without an understanding of the details and that can lead to ‘solutions’ that do not help.
Thank you for that feedback. At the very least, he was talking to his girlfriend. Later reports have detailed that prior to this he ordered $1,000 of cigars “to help Hurricane Ida victims” because he felt God told him to. There were missed opportunities for intervention. I know that his girlfriend tried- they got into a fight about it.
It is my hope that people who find themselves in similar situations will feel emboldened to question what someone says they are hearing, and that resources will be created to provide additional assistance. Mental health professionals may need preparation to get involved when someone is willing to do things in the name of “obeying God” that don’t make any sense. Some things may seem benign, but others can be harmful. Once someone starts down the path of blind obedience leading them to do things that don’t make sense, danger increases as their judgment is increasingly removed from the equation. That’s my warning, as I know many hesitate to intervene in another’s faith journey, even when there are warning signs that personal judgment has been removed from the equation.
However the idea of blindly obeying God was presented to him, we can see how it influenced him to act. It could have been at that church, listening through the doors, it could have been from conversations with members as they entered and left, it could have been in a Christian book, or listening to the radio in the car, or a preacher on tv. He might even have misinterpreted the Bible, through a legalism about leaning not on “one’s own understanding” (from Prov. 3:5-6. NIV) There’s no way to know, and he may have encountered it multiple places. It’s a teaching I’ve found in numerous locations and sources, and it often lacks the warning I’m suggesting it contain. I haven’t interviewed him to find out where he heard the message first. I think it would be a mistake to say that since we don’t have evidence of exactly where he heard it first, or the extent of the community he was in (other than his girlfriend), that the implications of what needs to be done change, given that people with similar risk factors fill our churches, and are likely similarly susceptible to the message that God speaks to people directly, and one must blindly obey, no matter what, even when it doesn’t make sense. As I said in the post, people have been hurt by others “obeying God” in ways that are less drastic, as well. Church culture often prevents these people from being challenged by others, because of respect for the faith journey of others, and a hesitancy to contradict what someone says God has told them.
I don’t have a criticism of the church he was guarding. I don’t know if he learned anything there or not. At the very least, his girlfriend was placed in a terrible position of hearing someone going off the rails in terms of what he thought God was asking him to do, and I can only imagine the challenge of that situation. She needed better support and tools for dealing with the situation. A boyfriend buying $1,000 in cigars wouldn’t qualify for police intervention, or other restraints being placed on an individual’s freedom. Him driving to another town to interview people in their lawn about whether they’re hiding someone was another opportunity- I read recent reporting that Gleason did call the police, but he was gone by the time they arrived.
There needs to be an intersection between faith and mental health where people are trained to deal with situations like this, and then that information needs to be freely available to people like Bryan’s girlfriend. A hotline? I’m sure someone can come up with some good ideas. At the very least, we as individuals can work to change the culture of the churches we are a part of, and those of us who teach can do so with increased sensitivity to the risk factors our church members may have, as the message that became perverted in Bryan’s mind is something I’ve seen all over the place. It’s just as true for book authors and musicians who have influence with their messages.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this.