- 6 months ago
John invites Kim to share her story about her experience with YWAM (Youth With A Mission), opening a conversation that navigates between admiration for the group’s mission work and criticism of its internal dynamics. As they reflect on Kim’s time with the organization, the discussion reveals concerns about spiritual manipulation, emotional suppression, and a culture of fear that often mirrors the psychological control seen in high-control groups. John draws parallels to his own background, offering a layered perspective on how theological systems and institutional structures can distort spiritual life.
Throughout their exchange, they explore the broader implications of missionary training, inter-group politics, and the uneasy entanglements between influential Christian leaders and questionable figures. They highlight how good intentions can be overshadowed by unhealthy leadership models, lack of preparation, and covert forms of coercion. The conversation closes with Kim’s reflections on what she wishes she had known at the beginning of her journey, offering a sober and thoughtful conclusion to a candid and revealing dialogue.
00:00 Introduction
00:31 Kim’s Early Calling and Nursing Career
03:46 Guilford Baptist and David Pawson’s Influence
05:13 Shift Toward Charismatic Experience at Holy Trinity Brompton
07:26 John Wimber Conferences and Growing Discomfort
08:25 Entering YWAM Through HTB and Early Red Flags
09:06 Spiritually Manipulative Environment in DTS
10:35 Deliverance Teachings and Misuse of Emotion
12:05 Connecting YWAM to Broader Charismatic Movements
13:00 Emotional Control and Demonizing Human Experience
14:51 Failing to Conform and Leader Manipulation During Outreach
16:05 Being Denied Mission Access and Growing Inner Conflict
19:05 Initial Contact with India Missions and Arrival in Kolkata
23:31 Leadership by Unqualified Individuals and Medical Concerns
25:43 Cults and Criminal Networks: Structural Questions
27:04 Simplicity of Scripture and Relief from Spiritual Burdens
30:33 Controlling Rules and Leadership Immaturity
33:36 Adoration of Leaders and the Cult of Personality
36:53 Poor Vetting, Cult Takeover of a YWAM Base
37:59 Strategy and Mission Mismanagement
38:13 Local Mission Success: Dolly and Leblau’s Ministry
40:00 Leaving Cults and the Theology of Rescue
42:40 Foundational Problems Within YWAM’s Decentralized Model
43:50 Group Identity, Language, and Pressure to Conform
45:21 Health Crisis, Surgery, and Life-Altering Impact
47:00 Final Struggles in India and Decision to Return Home
48:28 Toronto Blessing and the Breaking Point
49:54 Finding Biblical Stability at Grace Church
50:08 Reflections on Marriage, Singleness, and Healing
51:06 Helping Others: NAR Support Group and Seminary Study
53:15 Final Advice: Test All Things Through Scripture
______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
___________
Throughout their exchange, they explore the broader implications of missionary training, inter-group politics, and the uneasy entanglements between influential Christian leaders and questionable figures. They highlight how good intentions can be overshadowed by unhealthy leadership models, lack of preparation, and covert forms of coercion. The conversation closes with Kim’s reflections on what she wishes she had known at the beginning of her journey, offering a sober and thoughtful conclusion to a candid and revealing dialogue.
00:00 Introduction
00:31 Kim’s Early Calling and Nursing Career
03:46 Guilford Baptist and David Pawson’s Influence
05:13 Shift Toward Charismatic Experience at Holy Trinity Brompton
07:26 John Wimber Conferences and Growing Discomfort
08:25 Entering YWAM Through HTB and Early Red Flags
09:06 Spiritually Manipulative Environment in DTS
10:35 Deliverance Teachings and Misuse of Emotion
12:05 Connecting YWAM to Broader Charismatic Movements
13:00 Emotional Control and Demonizing Human Experience
14:51 Failing to Conform and Leader Manipulation During Outreach
16:05 Being Denied Mission Access and Growing Inner Conflict
19:05 Initial Contact with India Missions and Arrival in Kolkata
23:31 Leadership by Unqualified Individuals and Medical Concerns
25:43 Cults and Criminal Networks: Structural Questions
27:04 Simplicity of Scripture and Relief from Spiritual Burdens
30:33 Controlling Rules and Leadership Immaturity
33:36 Adoration of Leaders and the Cult of Personality
36:53 Poor Vetting, Cult Takeover of a YWAM Base
37:59 Strategy and Mission Mismanagement
38:13 Local Mission Success: Dolly and Leblau’s Ministry
40:00 Leaving Cults and the Theology of Rescue
42:40 Foundational Problems Within YWAM’s Decentralized Model
43:50 Group Identity, Language, and Pressure to Conform
45:21 Health Crisis, Surgery, and Life-Altering Impact
47:00 Final Struggles in India and Decision to Return Home
48:28 Toronto Blessing and the Breaking Point
49:54 Finding Biblical Stability at Grace Church
50:08 Reflections on Marriage, Singleness, and Healing
51:06 Helping Others: NAR Support Group and Seminary Study
53:15 Final Advice: Test All Things Through Scripture
______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
___________
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00Transcription by CastingWords
00:30Hello, and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast.
00:36I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research at william-branham.org.
00:44And with me, I have my very special guest, Kim Spicer, former member of YWAM.
00:49Kim, it's good to have you on and to talk about youth with a mission.
00:53As I was mentioning to you before, and I've mentioned on the podcast, I'm really, really curious about the group because I get so much feedback.
01:02Recently, I've had people who were in the group, and they want to say that it's a very good, good agenda, and I can't argue with this.
01:12But I also have people that tell me this was very cultish or cult-like, and they describe their experiences.
01:18I can't argue with their experiences.
01:20So I'm very glad that you're coming to share your story, and I don't know which one you are, if you're leaning towards the critical or the non-critical.
01:29But in either case, I'm very glad to have you.
01:32Maybe you could tell everybody a little bit about yourself.
01:36Yes, well, from a very young age, I wanted to train as a nurse and be a missionary in India.
01:46And so that set my path for myself, you know, at school, choosing what subjects to do and so on so that I could go into nursing.
01:57And so I did that.
02:00I trained as a nurse and a midwife.
02:03I got a diploma in tropical health, and my aim was to go work in India as a missionary nurse, which was great.
02:15And I thought I, well, I had prepared in professional terms very well for it.
02:23And growing up, I read books about India and tried to find out as much as I could about it.
02:31So that was the path I sort of tried to take.
02:37But it all got a little bit like tangled spaghetti, I suppose, in the end.
02:45And when it came to deciding who I should work with, and that's where YMAM comes into it.
02:55I like your term, tangled spaghetti.
02:57I'm probably going to use that in the future because looking at all of this mess, there's no better explanation.
03:04This is a tangled ball of spaghetti.
03:06And, you know, through my history, I've studied all of these different groups and how they're interconnected.
03:14Often, whenever I publish information about a critical group, I get these sudden emails, the surge of emails, and people are saying, you can't link those two.
03:23That's guilt by association.
03:24But when you understand it's all the same plate of spaghetti with different ends of spaghetti, you have to understand that maybe they're not acting like the group, but there's influence there.
03:35And it's that influence that really, it just fascinates me.
03:39The plate of spaghetti fascinates me.
03:41Well, I was brought up at Guildford Baptist Church.
03:46This was, it was 1967, we started going there, so I was six years old.
03:53And the reason I remember the year is it's the year of the great flood in Guildford, and the river overflowed.
04:02So it's something that sticks in people's minds.
04:05And we had a teacher, Bible teacher, David Pawson.
04:11I don't know if you had ever heard of him.
04:13No.
04:13But he was good.
04:15He was very good.
04:18And so my parents decided to start going to Guildford Baptist Church, which was great.
04:25We had solid, contextual Bible teaching.
04:31And snippets of what David Pawson said often come back to my mind.
04:38And I always remember him saying this, never believe something, because I've told you it's so.
04:46Always test it for yourself.
04:48Always look into it yourself.
04:50It's still with me now.
04:52But did I do it?
04:53No, I didn't.
04:55And there are a few reasons for that.
04:59It's not an excuse.
05:00You know, I grew up having been taught this, but I didn't do it.
05:06And that's partly why I ended up where I did.
05:10And so, yeah, so I moved to London.
05:14I did my nurse training, trained as a midwife.
05:17I got lots of paediatric experience.
05:21And I was planning at one point on working with the leprosy mission.
05:27And I like people who have leprosy.
05:32They have a certain character about them, and they are lovely to nurse and to help.
05:40So I was going to go with them.
05:44But then I joined Holy Trinity Brompton.
05:49I don't know if you've heard of HTB.
05:52It's a big church in London.
05:54And I was there for years, but they were starting putting together the Alpha Course,
06:02which is a very charismatic-y type of thing.
06:07And I don't know.
06:10All this stuff started creeping in.
06:12You were talking about influence, and all this stuff started creeping in.
06:17We had, when I started, we had a vicar there called John Collins.
06:23Hence his name was.
06:25I would, yes, I would think that he's probably going to be the Lord now.
06:31He was very elderly.
06:33But when he retired, the curate, Sandy Miller, took over.
06:38So we had Sandy Miller, and we had Nicky Gumbel.
06:41Nicky Gumbel was running Alpha.
06:43And under their influence, things started to become less focused on Scripture
06:55and more focused on experience.
07:00And it was a weird environment.
07:04You know, everybody was acting like some kind of psychologist.
07:12There was a lot of inner healing going on, and we were all expected to have this inner healing.
07:18And it became very strange.
07:21But because I was a member of HDB, and I'd been there for years, I jumped in to it all.
07:31And personally, I didn't do inner healing for people.
07:35But I went to the John Wimber Conferences, and we loved them.
07:40We thought they were great.
07:42But again, I didn't test it.
07:45All the things that happened.
07:46And I look back now at Wimber Conferences, and I just think, Kim, I don't know why.
07:54But maybe the Lord let it happen for his reasons, and maybe that's why I can now help other people
08:05who've been embroiled with it all and who have come out.
08:10But I'll tell you a bit more about that later.
08:13So, yeah, we had the Wimber Conferences, and we all went every year and thought it was brilliant.
08:21And in the meantime, I'm getting more nursing experience.
08:26And it was my small group leader at HDB who mentioned YWAM to me.
08:33And that was the first time I'd ever heard of it.
08:36So, she told me a bit more.
08:38And because of the teaching we were getting at Holy Trinity then, it seemed like a good fit.
08:46You know, this is just a natural place to go.
08:49So, I applied to a DTS, discipleship training course, in the UK.
08:56I live in the southeast of England, and YWAM has a base in the southeast.
09:02So, I applied there.
09:06And it was ghastly.
09:11It was absolutely hideous.
09:16And it's really hard to untangle the spaghetti because there was just so much wrong with it.
09:25But this is the whole cult thing.
09:32We just went along with it.
09:35And if you question things, we were questioning God himself.
09:40And we could even be committing the unforgivable sin, both of which are nonsense.
09:46But that's what got me into a lot of trouble on my DTS.
09:55And we would have this thing where they'd have a visiting speaker or maybe one of the leaders would say, teach us about anger.
10:05I don't recall the Bible being opened, and it's been spoken of from a biblical perspective.
10:15But we'd have, say, all this teaching of anger.
10:18And then after a few days, we were all supposed to be delivered of these demons of anger.
10:25You know, there were demons behind every tree and ready to trip us up.
10:31And it's just so wrong.
10:33One of my favorite parts of the Bible is Job 1 and 2, when Satan has to go to God and say, can I do this?
10:42And God says, that's okay, but you can only go this far.
10:46And all power, God is omnipotent.
10:49All power belongs to him.
10:51Now, he shares it out sometimes.
10:53He will give a bit of power to a king or to Satan.
10:57But he sets the limits.
10:59Satan is on a leash.
11:00So, you know, we don't need to fear because Satan can't go beyond what God has said for him.
11:10My dear mother is very charismatic.
11:12I love her dearly.
11:14But, you know, like a lot of people, she'll say, Satan is doing this and that and the other.
11:18And, okay, God might be allowing him or one of his demons to do something, but the power, the ultimate power is in God's hands.
11:31And Satan can't just go gaily along and doing what he likes.
11:36It just doesn't happen.
11:37But, yeah, so we were all supposed to be delivered of all these demons of anger, for example, or pride the next week.
11:49Hideous.
11:49Everything you say is so fascinating to me because as I'm piecing together all of this history and trying to understand the world, the Christian world as it exists today,
12:01and then look at it through the lens of how was it created.
12:05You have people like Paul Kane, who was basically William Branham's protege.
12:10He helped start the, you know, the Kansas City Prophets, the International House of Prayer.
12:14Well, he was deeply seeding some of the Branham themes in the U.K. prior to everything that you're describing.
12:22I am familiar with the events that you're talking about.
12:25I studied John Wimber as I was trying to figure out the intersection between him and the Kansas City Prophets.
12:32And you have to understand, in the United States, John Wimber is this hero that's untouchable.
12:38They believe that he's this perfect, unflawed individual.
12:42But yet he's promoting these false prophets, and he's working with these false prophets in the U.K.
12:48And all of that history is just kind of whitewashed.
12:51So I'm looking at this and everything that you're describing, the fear, the control, the – I had this conversation.
13:00This is a side story, but it is related.
13:02When I left the Branhamite cult, and it was a highly controlled environment, high levels of fear, that's how they manipulated you.
13:10And when I broke away from this, I began to understand how that manipulation worked.
13:15They loved to attack the things that you could not control as a human and say, those are demons because everybody has these problems.
13:24It's like a monopoly on spiritualism.
13:27So they would attack emotions often, and they would say this emotion is a demon.
13:32Well, after I left this, I realized what they were doing.
13:34This is just manipulation, pure and simple.
13:38And we went to a mainstream denomination after leaving, and I'm sitting there in one of the men's groups, and they said,
13:46today we're going to start a study on human emotion, and we're going to focus on the sin of anger.
13:52And he goes off into this tangent where he's just condemning anybody who has an angry thought.
14:00And I couldn't help myself.
14:02I'm that type of person.
14:03I couldn't help myself.
14:04In front of everybody in this room, I said, but how does that apply when Paul says, in your anger, do not sin?
14:12And how can you have these two, right?
14:15Yes, absolutely.
14:17Absolutely.
14:18I mean, it really exposes the teachers in these kind of movements, their lack of proper, biblical understanding,
14:29because we know that it's right to be angry at sin.
14:35Righteous anger has a place, but they lump everything together, and then we're all supposed to walk around with these smiles on our faces,
14:44and that's not found in Scripture.
14:47You know, look at Paul.
14:49He's a good example of getting righteously angry at people sometimes.
14:56Well, Jesus, you know, and the Pharisees.
14:59But, yeah, it's weird.
15:03But what I found really hard was, while all these people were being delivered,
15:10they'd be rolling around on the ground and screaming.
15:13And I just don't do that.
15:18I don't like it.
15:21Yeah, I don't like it.
15:23And that was one of my biggest downfalls, because we went to Thessalonica for our outreach part,
15:31and one of the leaders, I should never forget her, but for all the wrong reasons,
15:39she had decided that she kept saying she'd seen no change in me since the beginning of the DTS.
15:49But the problem was, I wasn't doing the DTS to change.
15:54I was doing it because I wanted to work in India with Waiwap.
15:58And to do that, you have to do the DTS.
16:01Yes, they will accept people for short-term missions, just a few weeks without doing the DTS.
16:10But I wanted longer term.
16:12And I didn't dare say that to her, because just imagine seeing no change in you.
16:18And I would have said, yeah, but I didn't do it to change.
16:21That would have been fuel on the fire.
16:24But every night, I had to go for a walk with her.
16:27And she just basically demolished me.
16:31But in the name of submission, I went.
16:36I was, my heart was broken.
16:40I just didn't know what to do.
16:42But I didn't know how to react.
16:45And she was just tearing me apart.
16:48It was so, so hard.
16:50I was blessed because I had a little group of friends, Rolf, Mark and William.
16:58And the four of us stuck together.
17:00And they were great.
17:03They were really good.
17:05And they didn't do all the rolling around and screaming either.
17:08So they were really supportive.
17:11But, yeah, and it was really weird.
17:13Because at the end of the DTS, I decided for some weird reason, you could choose to go on another short-term missions.
17:24And Rolf, Mark and William were going to go to Cyprus, which I would have loved.
17:31But no, I don't know why.
17:33Or maybe I do.
17:34So I chose to go on this leader's short-term mission to North Wales.
17:43Well, I've been to North Wales many, many times, which is fine.
17:47It's lovely.
17:48But why?
17:49Why didn't I just say, no, I want to go to Cyprus?
17:54Actually, I think part of the reason was because this is another thing people do.
18:01They say, I need to pray about where I should go, what I should do.
18:04That is right.
18:06We need to bring things before the Lord.
18:09But that lovely verse from somewhere in Corinthians, does it go something like this?
18:18All things are permitted.
18:19If it's helpful, you can do it.
18:22If it's not sinful, you can do it.
18:24We're given a lot of freedom.
18:26But this was part of the thing that you didn't do anything unless first you'd asked the Lord about it.
18:35So I should have actually just said, no, I want to go to Cyprus.
18:39Anyway, so I was going to go to North Wales.
18:43That was fine.
18:44But at the last minute, she decided that I wasn't allowed to go.
18:50And she spoke to the leaders of the base.
18:53And they said, no, you can't go.
18:58So, yeah, that was a big disappointment.
19:02So I was left then with not having another mission trip to go on.
19:07But maybe that was just as well.
19:10That verse that you're mentioning, I think it's 1 Corinthians maybe.
19:14All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful.
19:18That's it.
19:19And that was one of the things that really, really hit me.
19:21So we came out of a fundamentalist-type religion where it was rules-based.
19:26It wasn't about what God could do for you.
19:28It's about what you could do to make yourself more holy to be saved.
19:31That's the essence.
19:33And I realized after reading the Bible over and over, this was basically taking the gospel and putting chains on it.
19:39And then for me, it was putting a ball and chain on me.
19:42But yet I kept coming back to that verse because I had heard that verse before.
19:48And it really took reading the New Testament over and over and over again without thinking about how they told me I should believe.
19:56Just read it for what it says.
19:58You begin to understand that that's one of the most powerful things that are found in the New Testament.
20:04All things are lawful, but not all things are helpful.
20:07So don't do the things that aren't helpful because you might regret it.
20:10It's that type of mentality.
20:13But the way that it's taught, they want to put balls and chains on you because if they can control you, then they have power over you.
20:21And I realized very quickly I do not want this.
20:24If God tells me this, I don't want their power to control me.
20:29Yeah, absolutely.
20:30Well, it was weird because I was still working in London.
20:36When I came out of my DTS, I was still working in London and living in London.
20:43I'm just trying to think of the sequence.
20:46I then left London and came home to the village where I grew up.
20:56And I got a job in a local farm shop, which is great.
21:01It sells cheeses and all sorts of exotica.
21:05So that was fun to do.
21:07But I was finding out where I could work in India with YWAM.
21:12And I had to look around and decided this is 1989.
21:20So really pre the Internet.
21:23So it took a little bit of research to find it.
21:26But I decided to go to Calcutta, Calcutta as it was.
21:33And so I wrote to them and said, look, I'm a qualified nurse, a midwife.
21:39I have years of paediatric experience.
21:42I have a diploma in tropical health.
21:44Have you got anything I could do?
21:45And they said, yeah, great.
21:47Come and work in Ullabaria, which is a town about 30 kilometres southwest of Calcutta.
21:58And we're starting a new health programme there.
22:04So this was all done by post.
22:07So it was waiting for letters to come and go and so on.
22:11So I went off to Ullabaria in 1989, January.
22:17And I was really excited because I was finally there.
22:22I'd been working in nursing one way or another for 10 years, you know, and really preparing myself.
22:30So I was really excited to start it.
22:32And so I flew into Calcutta Airport and I was met by a couple of the boys from the house.
22:44And that was great because it was a bit of a journey to get from there into the city and then get a train down to Ullabaria.
22:52And I arrived at what they called the Mercy House.
23:00That was an experience in itself, which is all a little bit of a sideline, but it was very, very basic.
23:07We had intermittent electricity, intermittent water supplies and very little to eat.
23:15We ate rice and dal twice a day.
23:18Occasionally, we'd have chicken or some eggs.
23:23But the main thing was, the leader of the house, I'll just call him E, was this chap called E.
23:36And his background was that he had been converted four years before then.
23:43Before that time, he had been the leader of a drug cartel in the Philippines or Malaysia, Southeast Asia somewhere.
23:55So anyway, he was saved and went through YWAM.
24:00And then he was the leader of the Mercy House.
24:04But because of the emphasis on submission, the fact that he was a leader, what he said went, even when it came to professional decisions, and I found that beyond troubling.
24:24He actually called himself Dr. Panadol, and I'll never forget this.
24:30He said, if somebody comes to the house with a headache, I can give them some paracetamol, acetaminophen.
24:41So he said, I can give them paracetamol, but how would he know they didn't have something else going on?
24:49It was just awful.
24:50And on the team, we had two registered nurses and an enrolled nurse.
24:56So we had formally trained professionals.
25:00But his attitude just demolished all our years of training and experience.
25:05I found out fairly recently that he had started this health thing in Ulubaria based on the first aid training he had had as a boy scout in Malaysia.
25:27Well, I'm sorry, that's children's stuff.
25:32But for some reason, he considered himself more than qualified to oversee the medical side of things.
25:43It's really interesting whenever you're talking about the mob boss, because I don't go too far with this research, but there are certain things that you just cannot ignore.
25:52And all of this began when I began to realize that there were mafia individuals in William Branham's campaigns.
26:01And he even openly admits that he had a mafia hitman, or I can't remember how he worded it.
26:06But then in, I think it was the year 2015, Antonio Montella hit the news all across the United States.
26:16This was an Italian mob boss that was found in this weird religious cult.
26:20And the way that they found him was his baptism was on YouTube.
26:24And I go look it up, and oh my gosh, he's with the Branhamites.
26:28And he's like the kingpin of the, what was it, the drug underworld, I think it was, in Italy.
26:35And you find all these weird connections.
26:37What do you do with this?
26:38It's like there's this big plate of spaghetti for the religion, but then there's another bigger plate of spaghetti that sits under this.
26:45And what do you make of this?
26:46I know, it's like a spider's web, isn't it?
26:52And you can pick up a thread and follow it, but it's not going in a straight line.
26:58It's not being joined by other bits.
27:01You're literally doing this.
27:03And it's really hard to deconstruct.
27:06And I think maybe overall, we can't deconstruct it, but we do get a feel for when something's not right.
27:20You know, obviously, our main test is scripture.
27:26And not feelings.
27:28I just feel this is not right.
27:30But our main test is scripture.
27:32And since the Lord has been so gracious to me, and since he has rescued me, it's like I don't have to carry it all.
27:48You know, it's just like being lightened.
27:51And it's simple.
27:52All I need to do is read scripture and live it.
27:56Now, that is hard.
27:58Sanctification is a very hard process.
28:00But the Lord doesn't weigh us down with all this other stuff.
28:06You know, I found the same thing.
28:08It's actually, this is going to sound funny, but it's actually more difficult to be a Christian than it is to be a non-Christian in one of these groups that call themselves Christian.
28:17Yeah, it is.
28:20It is.
28:20This, the person who was leading the house, before I got there, they had been given a big fridge, you know, a tall fridge for keeping drugs in, which was great.
28:35But we didn't have a lot of drugs to put in it.
28:39So it was mainly empty.
28:41And I wanted to keep some cheese and milk in the fridge, but I wasn't allowed because I was told that wasn't what we were given it for.
28:53It was given for drugs.
28:54So we must only use it for drugs.
28:57And when I came home, I'll tell you a bit more about Dolly and Le Bleu in a little while.
29:05But when I came home, I decided if I'm ever able to give them anything, I never specify how they can use it.
29:15But, you know, it's up to them.
29:18And so, yeah, it was really weird.
29:22The other thing was he was engaged to a Dutch lady, and she did come and join team for a while after they got married.
29:33And while he was away, I had asked if we could get a notice board and put it up in the house.
29:42Because a lot of us had photos with us, and we just thought, that would be nice.
29:48And if we had visitors, we could say, oh, yeah, this is so-and-so.
29:53But when he came back to the house, he wasn't happy at all.
29:59And we had to take all the photos down.
30:02And he said it can only be used for timetables and things relating to the house.
30:09And he was very, I suppose, emotionally immature as well.
30:18You know, literally, you can only use the fridge for drugs, because that's what he was given for.
30:23You can only use the notice board for house matters.
30:29And, oh, I don't know.
30:31It was a mess.
30:32Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started, or how the progression of modern Pentecostalism transitioned through the latter reign, charismatic, and other fringe movements into the New Apostolic Reformation?
30:47You can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website, william-branham.org.
30:53On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins, Charles Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others, with links to the paper, audio, and digital versions of each book.
31:08You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those movements.
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31:21And, as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening to or watching.
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31:33I'm jumping forward a while now, but after I came back home, he and his wife left, and they went to, I think it was Malaysia, not the Philippines.
31:44And for a long time, they were in senior leadership in Waiwam, in Malaysia.
31:54And I would dip in and out every now and again to see what was going on.
32:00And what I found interesting was this adoration.
32:04You get this a lot in cults as well, an adoration of the leaders, and there was a thing where they were doing a meal for him and his wife and family, which is lovely.
32:22But do you know Catherine Crick?
32:25Some.
32:26I don't have a lot of research, but I have come across the name in my research.
32:29Yeah, she's just another one who, her congregation, come and kneel before her and tell her how much they love her and she puts her hand in the head.
32:40It was very like that, you know.
32:44So, yeah.
32:47But the weird thing was, sadly, I found out, actually not long ago, that he died in 2020.
32:56Now, I have been told that he had Hep B as a result of his drug use years ago, but it's now been reported that he had cancer of the liver.
33:12So, I don't know which is true, and I don't know what his wife and family are doing.
33:18His family, they're not little children anymore.
33:21You know, we're talking quite a while ago now, so they are grown up.
33:26But, yeah, as far as I know, he just stayed in my one and carried on doing that.
33:36Like you said, it's a big plate of spaghetti, and it's so weird to me.
33:40When I look at the missions themselves, you're describing going to a very unprepared place.
33:47It's not even prepared with food to sustain the people properly, malnourishment, et cetera.
33:54And I had this conversation, I think it was with Jed earlier, recently.
34:00We were talking about these missions that are by these cult groups that are unorganized,
34:05and yet they're going to territories where often there are other missionaries already there.
34:11And so, it's really odd to me that these Christian groups aren't collaborating together and saying,
34:18we're all going to work together, we're all going to help the people.
34:21And you come to realize that it isn't so much about the people that they're going to help,
34:26so much as it is each individual group.
34:29And I have to look at it from the cult mindset.
34:33If you give somebody a mission, they feel more empowered within the group.
34:37And so, they stay with the groups much longer.
34:39I don't know that that's what YWAM is doing, but if I look at the concept itself,
34:44it does not seem to fit the pattern of somebody who's legitimately trying to help the people.
34:50No, I think, I don't know if you have this in America.
34:54In the UK, we have a thing called a gap year.
34:57So, do you have something like that where young people finish their education,
35:02and then maybe they take a year off before starting their job or whatever they're going to do next?
35:10And I think that in some ways, YWAM is a sort of Christian gap year for people.
35:18And so, you do get people doing it for just a year for much shorter times in general.
35:25Now, as you go up into leadership, obviously, people stay longer.
35:29But I'll never forget this.
35:30This was crazy.
35:34We had a letter sent to the Kolkata base once,
35:39and it was asking us to pray for a YWAM base in the US
35:44because what had happened, they had land, they had a building,
35:52but people had applied to join the base,
35:57but they were members of another cult.
36:01So, bit by bit, they had joined the base until they reached a majority.
36:08Then they declared who they were and took over the base
36:12and basically threw out all the YWAMers.
36:16And we were asked to pray about this,
36:18and I can't remember what the outcome was
36:21because, again, it was very slow.
36:24It was letters, not the internet.
36:27But I thought, how can you – I know YWAM's a mess –
36:32how can you accept people into your organisation
36:38and not question them?
36:40They were doing all sorts of weird and wonderful things,
36:43but they accepted them to work with them.
36:47I mean, if I'd gone with the leprosy mission,
36:51they would have scrutinised me.
36:53They would have said, why do you want to do this?
36:55What's your training?
36:57What's your background?
36:59But YWAM doesn't do that.
37:02They take people on face value, and it's not helpful.
37:06It's really not helpful.
37:07And that's my point exactly.
37:10You know, even in the military,
37:13whenever you prepare to send people out,
37:16troops who are going to – maybe it's not war,
37:18maybe it's for some humanitarian effort.
37:21You don't just randomly send them.
37:22You give them some training, some background.
37:25Yes.
37:25And you select who are the individuals suited for that task
37:29because not everybody is suited for the same task.
37:32Not everybody has the same skills or personality.
37:35It's just so odd to me, and I look at this,
37:37and I'm wondering what is the strategy here.
37:40I'm very much – my mind is very much as a strategist,
37:43and I'm thinking in leadership,
37:46it doesn't take a smart person to know that that's not a good strategy.
37:49And I have to believe that the leadership is aware that this isn't a good idea.
37:55So I arrived at the Mercy House,
37:58and on the team was a married couple who were born in a Liberia
38:04and grew up there, so they were locals.
38:07They were called Dolly, that was the wife, and Le Bleu.
38:09They had two little boys, Biku and Papu.
38:13They all lived together in the house, in one room,
38:18which I don't think is necessarily the best thing,
38:22but anyway, that's what they had.
38:24They ran the children's ministry, and it was brilliant.
38:31We served three Bengali refugee camps.
38:35They were there illegally.
38:39Yeah, it was different than it is now.
38:42But to come to India from Bangladesh was seen as a step upwards.
38:49So Dolly and Le Bleu, since 1989, have run a children's ministry,
38:56and it's done on a first-come, first-served basis.
39:00So when the academic year arrives, parents can go line up,
39:06and the first, I don't know, 30 children get accepted to do two years' schooling,
39:13and they're taught to read and write, do basic maths.
39:17If they are particularly able, Dolly and Le Bleu do keep them on,
39:24and they get further teaching.
39:25And one of them, Armit, he has been able to go into something to do with IT,
39:33with computers.
39:35So they're still carrying on.
39:37But what's interesting is that I left after about a year,
39:44or just over a year, and not long after that, Dolly and Le Bleu left.
39:48And I think that if you are the Lord's, he doesn't leave you in a cult.
39:56I know some people who say, yes, but I want to stay in it because I can,
40:02you know, hopefully draw other people out.
40:06I personally don't think that's a good strategy,
40:11because you're not being fed, you're not being strengthened on solid meat.
40:16And why would the Lord leave you devoid of the true church
40:24and all that you're supposed to do within the church
40:28and to serve other Christians?
40:33So personally, I think that if you are the Lord,
40:38or he does rescue you, he pulls you out of a cult.
40:43He doesn't leave you there.
40:44So Dolly and Le Bleu came out of YWAM.
40:48And they're still, since 1989, they're still serving the Lord,
40:53doing the children's ministry, which is really lovely.
40:58They get discouraged.
40:59Things are, it's a very dark place.
41:02You know, there's a church there, Christian church,
41:07and Dolly and Le Bleu help out there.
41:09But since I was there, there's a big Hindu temple now built right in front of it.
41:16And it is a very dark place in Olive area.
41:21But they carry on.
41:23They serve the Lord.
41:24And they've been so faithful, even though it's been hard for them.
41:30I don't know that you use this term,
41:31but people can say there's good YWAM and bad YWAM.
41:37And it's very tempting because it's so decentralized.
41:44Some vases, admittedly, are good, which is fine.
41:50It depends on the leadership you've got.
41:52But what's it, Psalm 127.1 says,
41:56Unless the Lord builds the house, workers labour in vain.
42:00And I think the foundations of YWAM are extremely shoddy.
42:07They weren't laid by the Lord.
42:12And even though there might be a few good bricks there on top of them,
42:17in the end, when the Lord shakes everything,
42:21it will all come tumbling down.
42:24So, yeah, I think the Lord does not leave his own within a cult.
42:31And I think even though there are some good bits about YWAM,
42:36the foundations are very unsafe.
42:40You were talking about how people want to stay in it
42:44because even if they realize that it might be destructive,
42:48they want to help the people there.
42:50What I have found is that because of the framework
42:53that is created by these groups,
42:56whether YWAM is one of them or not, I don't know.
42:59But a cult group will make it such that,
43:02number one, it's very comfortable to be in it.
43:04They want to give you this false sense of comfort and security.
43:08But number two, it's very difficult to leave it
43:10because when you do, you're severed.
43:13All of your contact, everybody basically cuts you off.
43:17And so people inwardly realize this.
43:20And I know that I've talked to people in the support groups
43:22who their decision to leave was hindered by the fact
43:27that it was just too easy to stay.
43:30It was more comfortable to stay.
43:32Yes.
43:33I mean, they do create very close-knit groups.
43:36And like a lot of cults, you develop your own language
43:42that sort of excludes people who aren't in the group,
43:48but you all understand each other.
43:50One of the things on my DTS that was stressed
43:53was about not speaking things out.
43:57It's the whole idea is that we create reality.
44:01That's what it boils down to.
44:03So if we were on the DTS and we were going to say,
44:06I am so tired, because we were,
44:09people would jump in, don't speak it out.
44:12Because if you didn't say it, you're suddenly not tired for some reason.
44:17But if you speak it out, you've created your own tiredness.
44:20And I think that, so groups like this do develop their own language
44:26and their own phrases.
44:31And somebody listening into them wouldn't necessarily understand
44:35what on earth is going on.
44:37So, yeah, that also helps the closeness, I think,
44:44and the wanting to stay.
44:46I, but I, after I'd been there six months,
44:55when we had to leave to do a visa run,
44:57I went to Thailand and we stayed on the base in Bangkok.
45:02And that was great.
45:06But I came, we went down to Hua Hin
45:11and had some time down there, staying at a retreat place
45:15for missionaries who were serving overseas.
45:19And went back to the base in Bangkok.
45:22And I suddenly became very ill.
45:24And I had to have surgery.
45:29And I was told, when I woke up,
45:34that they'd had to do some stuff.
45:37And if I wanted to get pregnant,
45:41I should get pregnant within the next six months or so,
45:45because they'd left me with very little
45:48that would make pregnancy possible.
45:52Well, by this time,
45:53I was engaged to Rolf,
45:58who had been on the DTS with me.
46:01And we had decided that I should go to India
46:05because I'd done all this work for it
46:07and worked there just for a year.
46:11And he would come out and visit me.
46:13Then he would go home.
46:14And then when I came home,
46:16we would get married.
46:17He's Swiss.
46:21So, you know, that was great.
46:23So, I had this emergency surgery.
46:26And suddenly, I found out
46:28that I wouldn't be able to have children.
46:32I had to stay on the base in Bangkok longer.
46:37And my family had sent me money
46:39to get some Thai silk fabric for my wedding dress.
46:44I gave all that money
46:46to the YWAM base in Bangkok.
46:49You know, it was just
46:51because I was there longer
46:52and I felt I should.
46:54It was for my wedding dress.
46:56You know, it was crazy.
47:00But after that,
47:02went back to India,
47:03became ill again
47:05and gained a lot of, you know,
47:07sudden changes.
47:08And I see the hand of the Lord in it now
47:10because I was in
47:13the Assemblies of God Hospital
47:14in Calcutta
47:17over Christmas.
47:18and my doctor
47:20was called Bobby.
47:22And I'll never forget
47:23the question he asked me.
47:24He said,
47:25I'm not saying
47:26that YWAM is a cult,
47:28but are you under
47:30a cult influence?
47:32Of course, I said,
47:32no, no.
47:34He was absolutely right.
47:36Because by this time,
47:37I was talking about
47:39staying on in India
47:40instead of going home
47:41to get married.
47:42You know, it was,
47:44I look back at it now
47:45and I think,
47:46oh, wow.
47:48Just,
47:49I don't know why I did it.
47:53I just don't know.
47:54But the Lord
47:55got me home
47:56and a lot of things happened
47:57very suddenly
47:58and
47:59I hadn't planned
48:00to go back home,
48:02but I did go back home.
48:05So I went back
48:06to London
48:07to start working there.
48:09I was travelling
48:10between the UK
48:11and Switzerland
48:12because Rolf and I
48:13were trying to sort out
48:14this marriage,
48:15you know,
48:16what language
48:17do we have the service in?
48:18Do we get married
48:19in Switzerland?
48:19Do we get married?
48:20You know,
48:20it was crazy stuff.
48:23But I landed back
48:25at HDB
48:26and then Toronto arrived,
48:28the Toronto blessing.
48:30And it was that
48:33that finally gave me
48:34the courage
48:35to say this
48:37whole thing is wrong.
48:38Sandy Miller
48:40had
48:41he was going to
48:43show us
48:44what the Lord could do.
48:45So he had asked
48:46this lady
48:46to go up to the front
48:48of the church
48:49and he was going
48:51to pray that prayer,
48:52Holy Spirit come,
48:54which is not a prayer,
48:55but that's what
48:56he was going to do.
48:57So he did this
48:58and she fell to the ground
48:59and she was again
49:03rolling around
49:04making very
49:06inappropriate noises
49:07and her skirt
49:09was going
49:09nothing had been
49:12set in place
49:13to preserve her dignity.
49:14And I suddenly thought
49:16this is not
49:18the Holy Spirit.
49:20This is not
49:21what the Holy God
49:23does.
49:24And suddenly
49:25I realised
49:27by saying that
49:28I wasn't committing
49:30the unforgivable sin.
49:31you know,
49:33I was right
49:34to say it
49:34and it was
49:35that point
49:36where I decided
49:38to leave it all
49:39and come out.
49:42So that was
49:43a blessing,
49:43that was such
49:44a blessing.
49:45And I ended up
49:46back home
49:47going to
49:49Grace Church
49:50Kilford,
49:51which is where
49:51I've been,
49:52gosh,
49:52for years now.
49:53and
49:54they teach
49:56the Bible
49:57properly
49:58in context
49:59and they don't
50:01jump around
50:02using proof texts
50:03and it's
50:05such a blessing.
50:06Rolf and I
50:07didn't get
50:09married.
50:11You know,
50:12there was
50:13a whole mess
50:13of YWAM
50:14that really
50:15messed my head up.
50:17And the thing
50:18about children,
50:20lots of reasons,
50:21but I'm glad
50:22for him
50:23that he is
50:25married
50:25and he has
50:27two lovely girls
50:28and a lovely wife.
50:29So that's a blessing.
50:31And I've been
50:33blessed with
50:33the gift
50:34of singleness.
50:36Once I wouldn't
50:37have been able
50:37to say that
50:38was a blessing
50:39but I can.
50:41And when I look
50:42back now,
50:42I think,
50:43wow,
50:45God has been
50:47so
50:48gracious
50:49to me.
50:50you know,
50:51I have messed
50:52up time
50:53and again
50:54but he has
50:55rescued me
50:57time and again.
50:59And I've been
51:00helping out
51:01in a Facebook
51:02group
51:02called
51:03Leaving
51:04the NAR,
51:05the New Apostolic
51:06Reformation.
51:09And so
51:10I've been doing
51:11that for some
51:11time.
51:12And I've
51:13also
51:14enrolled
51:15with
51:16Third Millennium.
51:18Have you heard
51:18of them?
51:19I have not.
51:20It's
51:21a seminary
51:23in
51:24the US
51:26that they
51:26provide
51:27accredited
51:29training
51:29for
51:32people
51:33but it's
51:34free.
51:35So
51:35people all
51:36over the
51:37world,
51:37if they want
51:38to be a
51:38pastor,
51:39if they're
51:39in a poor
51:40country,
51:41they can
51:41access all
51:42this
51:43training.
51:45It's great.
51:46it's hard
51:48work but
51:49I love it.
51:51I'm loving
51:52learning about
51:53the Lord
51:54but in a
51:56right way
51:56and
51:58of course
51:59I'm not
52:00going into
52:01church
52:03leadership
52:04in the way
52:05a man would.
52:06we have
52:08a group
52:08there's
52:10one of
52:10us from
52:10New Zealand,
52:12one from
52:12Finland,
52:13I'm in
52:13the UK
52:13and then
52:14there are
52:15three from
52:16the US
52:16and our
52:17learning group
52:19is led
52:19by a
52:21man in
52:22the US
52:22so we
52:23have to
52:24watch a
52:24video and
52:25then we
52:25discuss it
52:26and we
52:27have to
52:27do
52:27tests.
52:29So
52:29I'm
52:32really
52:32loving
52:33to use
52:34scripture
52:35as God
52:37meant us
52:38to use
52:39it,
52:39you know,
52:40within
52:40context
52:41to learn
52:42more about
52:43him.
52:44So yes,
52:45I'm doing
52:46this third
52:46millennium
52:47course at
52:48the moment
52:48and we've
52:49finished first
52:50year,
52:51we've just
52:51started second
52:52so that
52:53that's a
52:53blessing as
52:54well.
52:55That's quite a
52:56journey.
52:56I'm very
52:56sorry that
52:57you had to
52:57go through
52:58all of
52:58those things.
52:59Like I
53:00said,
53:00I've had
53:00other people
53:01contact me
53:02who have
53:02came out
53:03of YWAM
53:04or been
53:04through it,
53:05I guess,
53:05is a better
53:06way to say
53:07it.
53:07And many
53:08of them
53:08share similar
53:09stories.
53:09Not all,
53:10but many
53:10do.
53:11And it
53:11makes you
53:12wonder,
53:12what is the
53:13strategy?
53:14Why is it
53:14like this?
53:15If you're
53:16going to rob
53:17people of
53:17their lives
53:18like this,
53:19then there
53:20has to be
53:20some point
53:21at which
53:22leadership
53:22stands up
53:23and says,
53:24well,
53:24we do
53:24have a lot
53:25of people
53:25that are
53:26having
53:26issues.
53:27So I'm
53:27very sorry
53:28that you
53:28went through
53:28that.
53:29If you
53:30could go
53:30back in
53:31time,
53:31when you
53:32first joined
53:33the movement
53:33and you
53:34started to
53:34have just
53:35a little
53:36question in
53:36the back
53:37of your
53:37mind,
53:37something
53:37might not
53:38be right,
53:39and you
53:40could go
53:40back in
53:40time and
53:41give yourself
53:41some advice,
53:42what advice
53:43would you give
53:43yourself?
53:44I would
53:45advise myself
53:46to remember
53:47and apply
53:48what David
53:48Paulson said.
53:50Just because
53:50I say
53:51something doesn't
53:52mean it's
53:52true, and
53:53you need to
53:54check it out
53:54for yourself
53:55through scripture.
53:58And that's
53:59where I went
54:00wrong right at
54:01the beginning.
54:02I didn't bother
54:03with that.
54:04It's easy to
54:05say, oh,
54:06yeah, but
54:06that's what was
54:07happening in
54:08London at the
54:08time, which it
54:09was, but
54:10that's no
54:10excuse.
54:11And it's
54:12made me a
54:12lot more
54:13cautious now
54:16to test
54:18things, to
54:18test the
54:19spirits for
54:20myself and
54:21say, is
54:22this spiritual?
54:23And if it's
54:24not, I
54:25don't want to
54:26play with it.
54:27Well, that's
54:27very good
54:28advice.
54:28Thank you so
54:29much for
54:29sharing your
54:30story.
54:30Thank you
54:31for listening.
54:32Well, if
54:32you've enjoyed
54:32our show and
54:33you want more
54:33information, you
54:34can check us
54:34out on the
54:35web.
54:36You can
54:36find us at
54:36william-branham.org.
54:38For more about
54:39the dark side of
54:40the new
54:40Apostolic
54:41Reformation, you
54:42can read
54:42Weaponized
54:43Religion from
54:44Christian Identity
54:45to the NAR.
54:46Available on
54:47Amazon, Kindle,
54:48and Audible.
55:10william-branham.
55:12Sign up on
55:12the moon.
55:14Weaponized
55:15give me a
55:15name for
55:16the new
55:16Marcella.
55:16The new
55:17woman or
55:18She지를
55:19william-branham.
55:20He
55:21william-branham.
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