Pillow Talk & Betrayal”
Setting: Hotel Room, Grand Rapids – Morning Light Through Blinds.
Rebekah woke to the scent of leather and citrus.
The hotel room was silent except for the slow whir of the air conditioner and the rhythmic sound of Vanessa Cross doing push-ups shirtless by the window, six-pack glistening under snted sunlight.
Rebekah stared. She couldn’t help it.
What just happened st night—it wasn’t pnned. She’d never imagined herself surrendering like that, especially to a woman from the 6C’s inner circle. But Vanessa wasn’t just a soldier. She was gravity. Control. Heat and danger all wrapped in sculpted muscle and predatory grace.
And Rebekah had fallen.
Vanessa stood, grabbed a towel, and tossed a small bck envelope onto the bed.
“You talk, I pay. That’s the deal,” she said without looking at her. “Or was st night just pretend?”
Rebekah blinked. The envelope wasn’t heavy. But it might as well have weighed a thousand pounds. She opened it.
50,000. Cash. No notes. No signature.
She swallowed hard.
“Zylstra’s working with Deacon Mendez,” she said softly. “They met four days ago in Toledo. Secret drive drop. Underground sermon files. They're building a counter-narrative—using old Kuyperian texts fused with viral editing. They’re targeting young CRC pastors.”
Vanessa finally looked at her. “Names?”
Rebekah nodded. “There’s a guy in Holnd—Micah Voorhees. And two more in Kamazoo. They’re working on spreading it before Sunday.”
Vanessa smiled, just a little.
“Good girl.”
Rebekah exhaled like she’d crossed a line she couldn’t return from. A part of her felt empty. Another part—excited.
“Was I... just a mission to you?” she asked quietly.
Vanessa raised a brow. Walked closer. Brushed Rebekah’s cheek with a knuckle.
“Don’t confuse power for pretense,” she whispered. “I don’t fake what I enjoy.”
She kissed Rebekah’s forehead once—soft, terrifying in its gentleness—and walked into the bathroom, steam rising behind her.
Rebekah y back in the bed, the envelope on her chest.
She had just betrayed the resistance.
And she wasn’t even sure she regretted it.
***
Abandoned CRC Retreat Center, Grand Haven, Michigan.
The chapel was cold. Dust hovered in midair like suspended judgment. The pews were broken, the stained gss covered with bck cloth. This pce used to be a retreat for young CRC pastors—now it was a tomb waiting for its final ghost.
Zylstra stood at the pulpit, alone. He knew they were coming.
He’d received Rebekah’s st message—four words that burned hotter than any sermon:
“Forgive me. I chose her.”
He should’ve known. Vanessa Cross was trained to break bodies. Vega? She broke souls.
And now they were here.
The doors creaked open. Vanessa stepped in first—combat boots silent on the wooden floor, a pistol holstered low on her hip like she didn’t need it.
Vega followed, ughing softly, dressed in all bck with a red silk scarf that felt almost ceremonial.
“You always struck me as a ‘die-on-the-hill’ kind of man,” Vega purred. “And here you are—on your hill.”
Zylstra didn’t respond. He looked at Vanessa.
“Did you touch her mind or just her body?” he asked.
Vanessa smiled.
“Both. She told me everything while wearing your cross.”
He winced.
Vega circled him like a lioness.
“This is your mistake, Daniel. You thought you were guarding doctrine. But what you were really hoarding… was relevance.”
She pulled a phone from her coat. Pressed py.
A video began to loop—Rebekah, tear-streaked, confessing Zylstra’s plot. The location of drives. Names. Mendez. Micah Voorhees.
“This hits the Gen Z Christian underground in ten minutes,” Vega said. “By sundown, you’ll be a meme. A relic. Maybe even a symbol.”
“A martyr?” he asked dryly.
“No,” Vanessa replied, stepping forward. “Just a warning.”
Then she punched him in the stomach—clean, surgical, not brutal. He fell to his knees.
They Didn’t Kill Him.
That would’ve made him holy.
Instead, they stripped him of every legacy. Vega hacked his cloud archive. Vanessa seized his contacts. By the time the sun set, CRC pastors across West Michigan were renouncing him in livestreamed baptisms “into the New Covenant of the 6 Commandments.”
Zylstra wasn’t dead.
He was erased.
***
Scene: Basement meeting room, Breakwater Church, Grand Rapids, MI – 7:43 PM
The hum of an old dehumidifier filled the silence as six figures gathered around a worn oval table. A Bible sat in the center, fnked by a printout of 6C's test procmation and a whiteboard scribbled with half-erased notes: "6C = Heresy? Strategy? Stay or Fight?"
Pastor Kevin DeYoung adjusted his gsses, his voice steady but edged with indignation.
KEVIN: "We’re talking about a Muslim cleric being named the spiritual authority of this entire state—over churches. Not mosques. Churches. This is unprecedented spiritual colonization. And 95% of the Bck church has gone along with it."
Dr. R. Scott Crk leaned back, arms crossed.
CLARK: "This isn’t Ism. It’s an imperial hybrid. It borrows Sharia aesthetics and Christian terminology, and the CRC jumped into it like frogs into boiling water. They’ve repced Heidelberg with Hadith."
Rev. Stephen Witmer nodded solemnly, flipping through his notebook.
WITMER: "It’s the polygamy and the forced submission that hit hardest in my congregation. One of our women was pressured to join a ‘biblical household’ of three wives st week. She thought it was satire. Then she got a court summons."
Elke Muller, sitting cross-legged, eyes calm but intense, finally spoke.
ELKE: "You’re all reacting emotionally. Not saying it’s right, but… 6C has internal coherence. It fills a void—moral structure, gender crity, divine purpose. People crave order. Especially Gen Z. And the CRC didn’t flip overnight. They saw strength."
Kevin bristled.
KEVIN: "So we normalize a theocracy? With Qazwini as pope and Zara Lin as prophetess?"
Jenna Marshall, already livestreaming notes for her podcast, interjected with her signature smirk.
JENNA: "Kevin, we’ve been praying for revival for years. Maybe it doesn’t look how you expected. Maybe it's wrapped in TikTok sermons and polygamous pragmatism, but people are repenting. Obeying. Leaving porn. Tithing. Can you really call it evil if it's effective?"
Eli VanDyke looked between them all, jaw tight, then stood up.
ELI: "Here’s what I know. We have three options. One: resist openly and get beled 'apostate reactionaries.' Two: go soft—py the middle. Or three: form our own Christianized 6C. Take their fire, but recim the fme."
Crk raised an eyebrow.
CLARK: "A Christian Sharia-lite? That’s Reformed compromise."
Elke: "Or it’s Reformation 2.0."
Kevin: "So what’s our stand? Silence? Accommodation? Or prophetic confrontation?"
Witmer, folding his hands in prayer, looked up.
WITMER: "We need unity first. Then courage. And we better decide soon—before the st pulpit in Michigan gets turned toward Mecca."
A hush fell over the room, broken only by the flickering of the overhead bulb.
***
Scene: The Foundry Church – Two days ter, 10:06 AM
Livestream titled “Christianity at a Crossroads?” is trending on Jenna Marshall’s TikTok. Over 11,000 live viewers. The camera pans to Jenna in a soft denim jacket, seated casually with Elke Muller and Eli VanDyke. A worship team strums ambient chords faintly in the background.
JENNA:
"Good morning, remnant fam. We’ve got something raw and urgent for you today. Two nights ago, a private DCL strategy meeting happened—off the record. But it’s not off the record anymore."
(She smirks knowingly.)
"Let’s talk about Michigan’s theocratic makeover, the CRC’s... let’s call it submission... and whether we bend, break, or build something better."
ELKE: (calmly, with precision)
"What I heard in that room wasn’t cowardice—it was confusion. Kevin wants a prophetic war. Crk wants a theological purity spiral. Witmer prays for courage, but we don’t have time to wait for a burning bush. The CRC didn’t flip because they were weak. They flipped because 6C gave them spiritual certainty in a world that mocked it."
ELI: (nodding)
"And Gen Z? They’re not theologians. They want action. Order. Power that feels sacred. 6C may be corrupt, but it’s got momentum. We either catch up or we become irrelevant Puritan cospy."
JENNA:
"Exactly. And let’s be honest—the old Reformed world wasn't working. Porn addiction, church decline, theological gatekeeping. 6C said 'submit or burn,' and people chose fireproof faith. I’m not endorsing polygamy, but let’s stop pretending the American gospel was pure."
(Chat floods: “facts”, “??????”, “wait is 6C Christian or Muslim?” “where can I join a godly household?”)
ELKE:
"And here’s the twist: Imam Hassan isn’t trying to erase Christianity—he’s absorbing it. Rewriting the canon. And if we don’t respond with theological crity and cultural relevance, the 6C will finish what the megachurches started: deconstruct everything sacred."
JENNA: (leaning in)
"So what now? We’re calling it. Right here. Right now. A new DCL counter-movement. A Third Way. Not 6C obedience. Not fundamentalist nostalgia. Something fierce. Something clean. Something that burns brighter than fear."
ELI: (raising a fist slightly)
"We call it Reformed Remnant. We’re not running. We’re reformatting."
JENNA:
"Tag it. Share it. Recim the fme. #ReformedRemnant #FaithThatFights #Post6C"
(The livestream ends with a fsh of the new emblem—three interlocked fmes forming a trinity, overid on a cracked 6C crescent.)
***
“Harem Polygamy Uprising” Podcast – Episode 242
Title: “Why Christianity Cannot Be Reformed”
Guests: Zara Lin & Dr. Bart D. Ehrman.
Tags: #HaremUprising #PaulinePoison #ReformedRemnant #JennaMarshall #ElkeMuller
(Intro music: trap beat under Qur’anic-style chant. Cut to Zara Lin seated on a plush gold floor cushion, eyes lined with smoky eyeliner, microphone gleaming. Bart Ehrman appears remotely on a screen behind her, in his UNC office surrounded by books.)
ZARA LIN:
"Saam and solidarity, fam. Today we’re not just dragging bad theology—we’re demolishing its foundations. Because the girlbosses of ‘Reformed Remnant’—Elke and Jenna—I see you posting fmes. But what you’re building? Still sits on a rotten Pauline house of cards. So I called in help. The man who made half your pastors panic in seminary—Dr. Bart Ehrman."
EHRMAN: (smiling wryly)
"Thanks, Zara. I’ve spent forty years studying the New Testament and early Christianity, and what I can tell you is this: if your movement is still using Paul’s epistles, it’s not a reformation. It’s just rearranging the chairs on a theological Titanic."
ZARA: (grinning)
"Preach. Because here’s the truth: Paul wasn’t just sexist—he was spiritually colonizing. He hijacked the Jesus movement and made it about obedience, hierarchy, sin management. Sound familiar?"
EHRMAN:
"Exactly. The original Jesus movement was about radical equality, Jewish apocalyptic hope. Paul turned it into a Greco-Roman mystery cult obsessed with blood sacrifice, patriarchy, and authoritarian church structures. Every reformer since—Luther, Calvin, Jenna—has tried to fix Paul instead of leaving him behind."
ZARA: (pointing at camera)
"And Elke, sweetie, I love your brain. But quoting Paul while resisting patriarchy is like quoting Ronald Reagan while trying to abolish capitalism. You can’t decolonize a theology built by the colonizer."
(Live chat explodes: “Ehrman spittin facts,” “Paul = spiritual imperialist,” “Jenna about to ragepost again,” “Elke better respond or delete.”)
EHRMAN:
"What’s ironic is that Ism, which gets demonized in these circles, actually preserved more of Jesus’ original prophetic message—submission to God, social justice, rejection of man-made hierarchy—than post-Pauline Christianity ever did."
ZARA:
"That’s why the 6C hits. That’s why CRC converted. They didn’t betray Christ. They betrayed Paul. And finally, for once, that was the right move."
(She leans forward, voice velvet but sharp.)
"So here’s my challenge. Jenna. Elke. Kevin. You say you want to reform Christianity? Cool. Start by tossing Romans and Corinthians into the fire. Until then, your ‘Remnant’ is just a shadow of Rome."
Outro music kicks in. Zara signs off with her signature line:
"One man. Four wives. Infinite truth. Harem Uprising, out."
***
Scene: Harem Polygamy Uprising – LIVE Crossover Episode
Title: “Reformed Girls vs. Biblical Facts (feat. Bart Ehrman)”
Tags: #ReformedRemnant #PaulWasTheProblem #BartEhrman #ElkeMuller #JennaMarshall #LiveTheologyCsh
(Intro is already rolling when the screen splits into four: Zara Lin, poised and unbothered; Bart Ehrman, schorly and amused; Jenna Marshall, visibly fired up; and Elke Muller, calm but blinking fast, gripping a study Bible.)
ZARA LIN:
"And just like that, they slid into the livestream. Give it up for the Reformed duo—Jenna Marshall and Pastor Elke Muller. Ladies, you’re live. And your canon’s on trial."
JENNA: (fire in her voice)
"Zara, thanks for having us. You’ve been talking big, but the Gospel isn’t something you just throw out because culture shifts. Paul was chosen. He wrote under divine inspiration. You can’t cancel the Apostle to the Gentiles."
BART EHRMAN: (smiling patiently)
"Jenna, let me ask you something. Who told you Paul was divinely inspired? Paul himself? The church councils—three hundred years ter? You’re trusting the same institutional machinery you cim to be ‘reforming.’"
JENNA: (starts to respond but pauses)
"But… the early church—"
EHRMAN:
"—was radically diverse. And most Christians before Paul were Torah-observant Jews who never imagined abolishing circumcision or letting Gentiles skip Mosaic Law. Paul invented a shortcut, a Gentile-friendly faith. And Rome loved it."
ELKE: (jumping in, voice steady)
"But Paul also wrote some of the most profound texts on grace and human nature. Romans 8, for example—‘There is now no condemnation—’"
EHRMAN:
"—Yes, Romans. The same letter where he says women should be silent in church and that governing authorities are instituted by God. That text was used to justify svery, suppress women, and prop up authoritarian regimes. Want to keep quoting it?"
(Zara snickers off-mic. The chat erupts: “Wrecked.” “Romans was a colonial letter.” “Jenna’s eyes twitching rn.”)
JENNA: (gritting her teeth)
"So what? We just delete half the New Testament?"
ZARA:
"You already do. Every pastor cherry-picks. You ignore Leviticus on shellfish but quote it on sexuality. You ignore Paul on head coverings but defend him on submission. It’s not sacred. It’s selective."
ELKE: (trying to recover)
"But if we remove Paul, we lose the theology of the cross. Of justification. That’s the heartbeat of Reformed faith."
EHRMAN: (nodding)
"Exactly. That’s the point. You can’t reform Christianity without admitting its DNA is Pauline. The moment you say, ‘Let’s clean up Paul,’ you’re no longer doing Christianity. You’re doing something else. Maybe better. But not the same."
(There’s a long pause. Jenna stares into the camera. Elke lowers her eyes. The silence is devastating.)
ZARA: (purring)
"So dies… wanna join us in post-Pauline spirituality? Or keep defending a theology that was never yours to begin with?"
JENNA: (quietly, almost to herself)
"This… wasn’t the debate I thought we were having."
EHRMAN: (softly)
"Truth rarely is."
*Outro music fades in. The comment section explodes:
“RIP Reformed Remnant”
“Ehrman bodybagged them with footnotes”
“Jenna bout to delete her TikTok”
“6C wins again?”
***
Scene: Harem Polygamy Uprising – Same Live Podcast, 18 Minutes In
Viewer count climbs past 50,000. Hashtag #PaulineColpse trending on Twitter.
Everyone’s still on mic: Zara, Bart Ehrman, Jenna Marshall, and Elke Muller. The chat is frothing. Emotions are high. Jenna, having gone quiet for a minute, leans back in with renewed fire.
JENNA: (steeling herself)
"Okay. Maybe we’re talking past each other. You keep hammering ‘logic’ and ‘history’ and manuscript traditions. But religion isn’t a math problem. It’s faith. Not everything sacred has to pass your schorly sniff test."
ZARA: (mock-sweet)
"So… just vibes then?"
JENNA: (ignoring Zara, eyes on Bart)
"Christianity changed my life. Paul's letters still change people. They pull addicts out of darkness, restore marriages, set prisoners free. Expin that with your historical criticism."
EHRMAN: (gentle, almost fatherly)
"Jenna, I don't doubt your experience for a second. I’ve seen people find healing in all kinds of scriptures—Qur’an, Bhagavad Gita, Buddhist sutras. But if something feels true to you, that doesn’t make it historically or theologically accurate. The question is: do you want a faith based on comfort, or truth?"
(Chat: “mic drop,” “truth over trauma,” “ouch.”)
ELKE: (cutting in, trying to redirect)
"With respect, Dr. Ehrman, your critiques mostly apply to pre-modern or fundamentalist Christianity. But modern churches—especially Protestant and post-Vatican II Catholicism—we’ve addressed those fws. We don’t take Paul woodenly. We interpret him through a Christ-centered, contextual lens."
EHRMAN: (smiling thinly)
"Elke, I admire that effort. I really do. But here’s the core issue: you’re still propping up a fwed foundation. Interpreting Paul ‘through Christ’ assumes that we even know what Jesus actually said. Spoiler: we don’t. The Gospels disagree, and Paul never met the historical Jesus. You’re using Paul to understand Jesus, then pretending it’s the other way around."
ELKE: (visibly shaken)
"But… the Church has refined doctrine over time. The creeds, the councils, the Spirit guides us—"
EHRMAN:
"You’re describing theological evolution. Not divine revetion. That’s fine—it’s honest. But let’s be real: Christianity has been patching holes in a sinking ship for two millennia. You’re not solving it. You’re managing colpse."
(Zara’s eyes gleam. She leans into her mic, voice slow and victorious.)
ZARA:
"So we agree then: Reformed Remnant isn’t a revival. It’s a rehab unit for Pauline hangovers."
JENNA: (quietly)
"We’re trying to keep people from drowning."
EHRMAN: (softly)
"Maybe it’s time to get out of the boat."
(A long, aching silence follows. Even the chat slows. Just one pinned comment: “This is the day the Reformation died.”)
***
Scene: Harem Polygamy Uprising Podcast – 26 Minutes In
Topic: “The Myth of Original Christianity”
All four participants still live: Zara Lin, Bart Ehrman, Jenna Marshall, Elke Muller.
Viewer count now over 72,000. Twitch chat in chaos. Hashtag #NicaeaIsNotNice trending.
ZARA LIN: (smirking, sipping rosewater tea)
"We’re back, fam. Jenna’s regrouped, Elke’s breathing deep, and Bart’s still out here running theological ps. Jenna—you got another scripture Hail Mary for us?"
JENNA: (firm, intense)
"Actually, yeah. Let’s talk real history. You keep acting like Christianity was a free-for-all. But there were boundaries. Heresies got tossed—Gnostics, Marcionites, Arians—for good reason. Councils like Nicaea purified the faith from distortion. Without that process, we wouldn't even have a coherent Gospel message today."
EHRMAN: (blinking slowly, like a professor waiting for the room to catch up)
"Jenna, do you know who decided which views were heresy? Power structures. Roman-backed bishops. By the fourth century, the empire needed one doctrine to unify politics and religion. Heresy was just the version of Christianity that lost the popurity contest."
ZARA: (cutting in, amused)
""So… the Romans canonized theology like it was ‘American Idol’?"
EHRMAN: (dry)
*"Basically. With Constantine as Simon Cowell."
(Laughter from Zara. Chat explodes with memes.)
EHRMAN (cont.):
"Nicaea didn’t purify Christianity. It imperialized it. And if we’d gone with the Ebionites or the Nazarenes—the Jewish followers of Jesus who rejected Paul—we’d have a radically different faith today. Possibly one closer to what Jesus actually taught."
ELKE: (jumps in quickly)
"Alright, but let’s be fair. Compared to Ism, Christianity still has maintained an amazing amount of continuity. Yes, we’ve debated interpretations, but the Gospels haven’t been totally altered. The Qur’an was compiled decades after Muhammad died, too."
EHRMAN: (turns calmly to camera)
"Elke, I’ve studied both. The New Testament has over 5,800 Greek manuscripts—and no two are exactly alike. The earliest ones are fragments, and major changes crept in: the ending of Mark? Added. The story of the adulterous woman? Not in the earliest texts. Verses used to support the Trinity? Inserted centuries ter."
(Elke blinks. Jenna goes very still.)
EHRMAN (cont.):
"The Qur’an, by contrast, has a far more stable textual history. Muslims preserved it orally and written, and by the time of Caliph Uthman, there was a canonized version—with the originals destroyed, yes—but the uniformity afterward is remarkable. Most biblical schors would agree: the Qur’an is more textually consistent than the New Testament."
(The chat breaks open: “Elked.” “Jenna.exe crashed.” “Bart went Quran mode.”)
ZARA: (reclining like a victorious sultaness)
"So what I’m hearing is: the Christian canon was built like patchwork imperial propaganda, while the Qur’an was compiled like a centralized OS update. Makes sense the 6C went with the stable one."
JENNA: (quiet, jaw clenched)
"Then why are you still obsessed with destroying Christianity if it's already falling apart?"
EHRMAN: (shrugs)
"Because people are still living under the illusion that it’s whole."
Outro music begins. Zara smiles one st time.
ZARA:
"Next week: Is Paul the original gaslighter? And do we need a new Gospel entirely? Until then—stay married, stay multiplyin’, and stay woke, believers. Harem Uprising, out."
***
