- 1 day ago
John and Brantley examine how money, support raising, housing, work expectations, and spiritual pressure shaped daily life during the IHOPKC years. The conversation traces how ministry culture normalized scarcity, guilt, and sacrificial giving, even when young students and workers were struggling to pay rent, buy food, or meet basic needs.
They also explore the long aftereffects: fear of spending, difficulty buying normal necessities, unhealthy views of work, and the social pressure that kept people trapped in groupthink. The discussion connects personal stories to broader themes in charismatic culture, including manipulative fundraising, martyrdom spirituality, and the lasting financial mindset people carry after leaving high-control religious systems.
00:31 Introduction
03:02 Car Guilt, Nice Things, and Financial Shame
07:05 “You’re Going Home Soon”: Eternal Currency and Self-Denial
11:43 Giving Away The Last $100
15:00 Tithe Doctrine, Giving Records, and Leadership Pressure
19:00 Martyr Complex, College Sacrifice, and Lost Earning Years
29:03 Food Insecurity, Ramen, and Fasting Because You’re Broke
35:30 The “Hero” Illusion and Rethinking Tithing
42:00 The Financial Mindset That Still Follows You
47:26 Support Letters, Dissonance, and Outside Concern
49:44 Class System, Gatekeepers, and Who Got Privilege
54:00 Retirement, Tuition Debt, and The Long-Term Cost
______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBSpezVG15TVG-lOYMRXuyQ
– Visit the website: https://william-branham.org
– Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilliamBranhamOrg
– Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@william.m.branham
– Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wmbhr
– Buy the books: https://william-branham.org/site/books
They also explore the long aftereffects: fear of spending, difficulty buying normal necessities, unhealthy views of work, and the social pressure that kept people trapped in groupthink. The discussion connects personal stories to broader themes in charismatic culture, including manipulative fundraising, martyrdom spirituality, and the lasting financial mindset people carry after leaving high-control religious systems.
00:31 Introduction
03:02 Car Guilt, Nice Things, and Financial Shame
07:05 “You’re Going Home Soon”: Eternal Currency and Self-Denial
11:43 Giving Away The Last $100
15:00 Tithe Doctrine, Giving Records, and Leadership Pressure
19:00 Martyr Complex, College Sacrifice, and Lost Earning Years
29:03 Food Insecurity, Ramen, and Fasting Because You’re Broke
35:30 The “Hero” Illusion and Rethinking Tithing
42:00 The Financial Mindset That Still Follows You
47:26 Support Letters, Dissonance, and Outside Concern
49:44 Class System, Gatekeepers, and Who Got Privilege
54:00 Retirement, Tuition Debt, and The Long-Term Cost
______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBSpezVG15TVG-lOYMRXuyQ
– Visit the website: https://william-branham.org
– Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilliamBranhamOrg
– Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@william.m.branham
– Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wmbhr
– Buy the books: https://william-branham.org/site/books
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00:31Hello, and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast.
00:00:36I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research
00:00:40at william-branham.org, and with me I have my co-host and friend, Brantley Smith.
00:00:46Brantley, it's good to be back and to talk about all things money, and I've got two opening
00:00:53stories for this.
00:00:54The first is, when my grandfather resigned, I don't think I've told you this, when he
00:00:58resigned, he was resigning under pressure.
00:01:03I think that's the best way to put it, from everything I can tell, he was resigning under
00:01:07pressure.
00:01:08And he says, I figured out what these guys are doing, and he was referring to the leadership
00:01:12of the cult.
00:01:13He said, what they're doing is they're setting up these children's things, these children's
00:01:19games and camps and etc.
00:01:21And he says, what I learned was, if you can get to the children, you can get to the parents,
00:01:26and if you can get to the parents, you can get to their money.
00:01:30So I left that, and I have to agree with my grandfather's opinion, but it's my opinion,
00:01:39and I'm welcome to that.
00:01:41But I left that, and I went to other mainstream churches, and I went to this really, really
00:01:47large church here in this area.
00:01:49I heard five really good, grace-filled sermons.
00:01:52They were talking about how we're no longer under the old covenant of law, and really explained
00:01:58it well.
00:01:59And this is something that I was unfamiliar with in the Branham cult, right?
00:02:02And then on the fifth or sixth time we're there, he says, now I'm going to talk about
00:02:07something that's going to make all of you just a little bit uneasy.
00:02:11We're going to talk about tithe.
00:02:13And then he brought us back into the old covenant to get money.
00:02:18And anyway, all this to say, money is an issue in the church that I don't think anybody, everybody
00:02:25thinks about it because they're giving the money out, but I don't think anybody really
00:02:29critically thinks about what is happening with their money.
00:02:32And I'm one of the, now that I've left this thing, I'm one of the open minds, man.
00:02:36If I walk into a building and they're asking me for money, I'm going to go get the financial
00:02:40report on my way out.
00:02:42And if they don't have a financial report, they're not getting a dime.
00:02:45And it's, as you're telling these stories, I'm having so many flashbacks of similar situations
00:02:51of preachers bringing up money in a church service, and you can just feel the atmosphere
00:02:56just like, just all the air sucked out of the room.
00:03:00Yeah, no, this is a fun conversation.
00:03:02It's been on my mind because me and my wife recently made a big purchase.
00:03:06And so we got ourselves a new to us car.
00:03:10And some people will laugh at me because it's a six year, six or seven year old car, but
00:03:16it's new to us.
00:03:17And we feel like we're so fancy.
00:03:19We've got a 2020 Subaru Forester.
00:03:22And we feel like that we are millionaires right now is how we feel.
00:03:26We have car play in the car, AC that works, somewhat of a leather seat, like it's seven
00:03:32years old, but you know, it's new to us, feels fancy.
00:03:34And we both realized that we feel like this kind of guilt around it and was ended up talking
00:03:39to another former IHOPKC member about a week after we bought ours that she was going through
00:03:45the same process.
00:03:47And she was like, I just feel like I don't deserve nice things.
00:03:51Like, you know, and so it's like this weird relationship with money.
00:03:55I think that's taught to us by the church because we're taught to give so much to the church.
00:04:01I mean, after you pay taxes on your income and then you add another 10% on top of that
00:04:08in the environments that are kind of legalistic about a tithe, I don't know about you, but
00:04:14I've remember sitting down doing my budget many times and trying to do that 10% number.
00:04:18And I'm like, how do people do this?
00:04:20Like, you know, but that's coming from IHOP and having less than $1,000 of income a month.
00:04:25Yeah.
00:04:27You know, I was of that same mindset.
00:04:30I have nice things, but it has changed over time.
00:04:34Whenever we were in the group, I never, ever bought a car that was newer than 10 years old.
00:04:39If it was more than 10 years old, it was too expensive and I wouldn't buy it because that's
00:04:44not the way John should be.
00:04:45John should be humble and not spend money and give it all to the cult.
00:04:50And that mindset, man, it sticks with you.
00:04:53After I left the group, I started getting into music a lot more after leaving because I was
00:05:00playing in one of the churches that I played for.
00:05:02And I was buying some new instruments and I have, I have nice instruments, but these
00:05:08are all mid-level.
00:05:09There's nothing like, I've got a, I've got a couple of Epiphones.
00:05:13I could have got the Gibson, which is five grand, you know, and musiciansfriend.com.
00:05:20One, one of my five grand Gibson guitars is an Epiphone knockoff.
00:05:24That's like, I want to pay, I want to say I paid 200 bucks for it.
00:05:27So it's a nice guitar, right?
00:05:30But I was of that mindset.
00:05:32But this mid-level that I have now, I had another set before this and I was buying cheaper
00:05:38things just because I was, it was indoctrinated, man.
00:05:43You don't buy nice things for yourself because you're not going to need it.
00:05:47You're going home soon.
00:05:48Give us your money instead.
00:05:49And so I'd buy these cheap guitars that wouldn't stay tuned and some of them I'd be halfway
00:05:55through a song and it would be out of tune and I'd be playing and you've probably seen
00:06:00guys do this, but they'd be picking with the right hand and tuning with the left.
00:06:05I've actually done that in a church service, man.
00:06:08It's pretty bad.
00:06:09And I came to realize, I was talking to another friend who is indoctrinated in the same way,
00:06:15but he came from a hardcore, I guess I won't give the denomination, a mainstream denomination
00:06:20that is fundamentalist leaning.
00:06:23I'll say it like that.
00:06:25And I was telling him about the guitars and he said, man, just buy a nice one.
00:06:28You buy one nice one, it's going to outlast two or three.
00:06:31And I started shifting my mindset.
00:06:33And anyway, long story short is, we were indoctrinated to think that we did not deserve anything.
00:06:41We should give it to the leadership of the cult.
00:06:44And then I'm looking around, the leadership of the cult, man, has children driving Range
00:06:49Rovers while I'm driving a 10-year-old beater.
00:06:52This is not right.
00:06:53Darrell Bock No, it's not at all, which we've talked about a whole lot about the theology of
00:07:00not deserving things and what that does to your mind.
00:07:04One of the things that you said was talking about leaving soon, so your wealth here doesn't
00:07:09matter.
00:07:10A big part of IHOP's messaging was buying things that were eternal.
00:07:16So we talk about buying gold refined from the fire from Jesus.
00:07:20And the big one, and I used to preach the sermon at youth events and stuff that we would
00:07:25do, was the parable about the 10 virgins from Matthew 25 of you got to get oil before
00:07:31it's too late.
00:07:32And so we saw, it was almost like that was a currency.
00:07:37It was a currency in our environment.
00:07:40Intimacy with Jesus was a currency, whatever that means and however you quantify that.
00:07:44But we always lived in this perpetual state of not having enough whenever it came to that
00:07:52aspect of like this eternal currency.
00:07:55And whenever it came to day-to-day needs, the way that we were taught to think was almost
00:08:03like that God was kind of like this divine ATM machine, like this divine exchange of you
00:08:11give $100, you'll get $1,000 back kind of thing is kind of how we were taught things.
00:08:16And I remember the first time that I was like very disappointed by this.
00:08:22And I think that I kind of like rewrote the narrative in my head to like kind of silence
00:08:26the dissonance and like make myself okay with it.
00:08:28But it was my first, yeah, it was my first summer after my first year in the Bible school
00:08:38at IHOP.
00:08:39And I had moved in the spring semester to a different house and was sharing a room with
00:08:45a guy.
00:08:46Almost all IHOPers in that period of time, there were certain IHOP leaders who would buy
00:08:51lots of real estate and they would rent out rooms to the members.
00:08:57And so, you know, we're talking 2008 to 2012 was when I was there.
00:09:02And you could buy houses in Grandview for under $100,000.
00:09:05Like it wasn't like, you know, that was around the stock market crash of 08 and all that kind
00:09:10of stuff.
00:09:11And so, um, you would have one of these leaders who'd own three or four houses and then they
00:09:16would be getting five, six guys in a house at 300 bucks a head.
00:09:20And like, that's how they supported themselves, um, was, was through that.
00:09:24But so I'd gotten this place, it was 250 a month, but I had to share it with a guy,
00:09:28but
00:09:28we had a master suite with our own bathroom and we had queen size bunk beds.
00:09:32So I thought I was like living high.
00:09:34We even like drilled a, uh, in table, like a side table to the, uh, upside down to the ceiling.
00:09:39I was on the top bunk so that I had a little end table up top and we thought we
00:09:43were cool.
00:09:43Then we were all in the music school together.
00:09:45So we were always playing music in the house and people were always coming over and play
00:09:48music with us.
00:09:49It was actually really fun.
00:09:50And that's what, that, that's some stuff that, you know, I mean, probably we don't
00:09:53talk about, I mean, not that we want to glorify that necessarily, but being in a cult's fun.
00:09:57It is at times like there's times like I don't get to go walk into my living room and
00:10:02play with 10 musicians anymore every day.
00:10:04Like that's not, that's not a thing, but, um, I remember I started working for the teen
00:10:08camp after school was out, uh, that summer and, uh, and I still have to pay my rent every
00:10:13month.
00:10:14I had my first year I'd raised support and that had lasted, um, almost the full school
00:10:21year.
00:10:21I think that people still supported me.
00:10:24Um, our, our, the church I grew up in was very involved in the Brownsville revival stuff
00:10:29and sent a bunch of people to that ministry school and supported them there.
00:10:33So there was kind of a little bit of a precedent that made it a little bit easier for me
00:10:36to
00:10:36get support from the church and people in the church.
00:10:39And I think if I remember right, I think I had raised like maybe six to 800 bucks a month
00:10:44or something like that.
00:10:45And my parents were paying my car payment insurance and my cell phone.
00:10:48And so I had to pay two 50 for my rent and everything else was just eating and surviving.
00:10:52And so I was able to live off of it.
00:10:54Um, but that summer I went to work for the teen camp and I think I made a thousand dollars
00:10:59to work for them all summer.
00:11:00I think it was like 12 weeks, 24 seven.
00:11:03And I think they paid me a thousand dollars at the end of the summer, which I thought was
00:11:06big money.
00:11:06Cause I don't think I'd ever had a thousand dollars in my bank account at one time.
00:11:11And, uh, but during that time, because we didn't get paid till the end of summer and
00:11:15my support was dropping off, um, I wasn't able to pay my rent.
00:11:19And I kind of felt bad because the guy who owned my house, he didn't own a bunch of
00:11:23houses.
00:11:23Um, he just had the people there and he was raising support.
00:11:26And, uh, and so I was $500 behind on rent just cause I didn't have any money.
00:11:32I think I had, I think it was like, I had like $125 or something like that in my bank
00:11:37account.
00:11:39And, uh, which I just didn't give him because I was like, I ain't got the 500.
00:11:42Like I got to eat, got to live off this.
00:11:44And I was sitting in a service during the teen camp stuff and they give this big call
00:11:49of like, you need, I can't even remember what the cause was for.
00:11:52Maybe it was for the camp.
00:11:53Maybe I was giving money to the camp that was paying me.
00:11:55I don't know.
00:11:56That's kind of how it baits and switches.
00:11:57But, uh, I remember very clearly feeling like I had to give a hundred dollars and if
00:12:02I gave a hundred dollars that everything was going to be okay and I would be taken care
00:12:06of kind of thing.
00:12:07And, uh, because, you know, God never leaves the righteous forsaken or a seed begging for
00:12:13bread.
00:12:14Like that's where I was, you know, like, I mean, I was like, so internalize this.
00:12:18And, uh, and so I, I give my a hundred dollars, I got my, you know, 20 bucks or whatever
00:12:23to
00:12:23my name.
00:12:24And, uh, long story short, I still owe that guy $500 to this day and I never got to pay
00:12:29it back.
00:12:30And, uh, I probably should send him some money sometime.
00:12:33Uh, I remember this.
00:12:35Um, but yeah, so like that was, that was weird, but I ended up getting a new house with some
00:12:42counselors that I worked with at the teen camp at the end of summer.
00:12:46And I think that's the way that I saw God's provision working was that we were able to
00:12:50get a different house.
00:12:51So I wasn't homeless.
00:12:52Um, and so you, you rationalize those things and jump through the hoops and like, I can't
00:12:57imagine asking a 18 year old is how old I would have been at that time with $125 in
00:13:03his bank account, asking him to give you a hundred of his last 125.
00:13:07Like, that's just, that's wrong to me.
00:13:11It's funny to me how much it's changed over the decades.
00:13:15My grandfather, my other grandfather was in the cult during the latter rain years and
00:13:21he had ministers.
00:13:23They were all talking about how we're going to be raptured tomorrow.
00:13:26You know, you don't need the things of today because we won't be here tomorrow.
00:13:30That kind of thing.
00:13:31Well, the preacher, I've told this story before on the podcast.
00:13:34The preacher got into this kick talking about how you don't need all of the things you have
00:13:38today.
00:13:38The Bible says, give it to the poor.
00:13:41And, um, my grandfather walked up to him after church and said, man, if I give all my
00:13:45money to the poor, then I become the poor.
00:13:48And how does that work?
00:13:49Right.
00:13:49And by poor, he meant give it into the offering plate and let me get to the poor because you
00:13:54can trust me.
00:13:55You know, that's, that's how it works.
00:13:58And then after this, you know, the prosperity gospel was birthed and give it to me and then
00:14:03God will repay you because no longer was there a immediate imminent rapture kind of theology
00:14:09that kind of went away when Branham died and it just turned into give me your money and
00:14:15I will, I will give it to God and God will bless you and you can trust me.
00:14:20This will happen.
00:14:20Well, people do it and they still continue to do it and they never, they never get like
00:14:26my grandfather, they become the poor.
00:14:28I know people that are in that gospel and it's just some quote unquote gospel, I should
00:14:33say, and it's just unbelievable.
00:14:35But money in both cases, money is treated more of a practical necessity.
00:14:41You have money and you should only buy the practical things because give all your money
00:14:46to God and by God, I mean, give it to the leadership.
00:14:50I did the math one day, I was sitting in church, but this was after I left the cult and
00:14:55I was
00:14:55allowed to critically think.
00:14:56I was in a church, not the big one, but just a smaller one, very small church that was preaching
00:15:03the tithe doctrine.
00:15:05And I did the math.
00:15:07Usually you give about 10% and some of them will even tell you, you must give 10%.
00:15:12But 10 people makes a salary, man.
00:15:15And if you're in a small building that's paid for, the only thing you got to pay for is the
00:15:20lights, the electricity, the water, that kind of thing.
00:15:22I know what those add up to.
00:15:23I pay for them at my house, right?
00:15:25So it's not that much money.
00:15:27Well, you get a hundred people, you've got 10 salaries.
00:15:30Does the minister really need 10 salaries?
00:15:33And you can argue, yes, but maybe he gives money to the poor.
00:15:37But where's the accounting of this?
00:15:40I'm okay with this, man, if you show me the books and show me which poor got it, right?
00:15:44But if it's going to your Land Rover, no, man, I'm not going to pay for you to have a
00:15:48Land Rover while I'm driving a 10-year-old beater, which is the reason why I chose actually
00:15:55the last vehicle I bought, which was, gosh, it might have been 10 years ago now.
00:16:00But I did buy a new vehicle for the first time ever after leaving the cult.
00:16:04And I felt so guilty about buying that new vehicle.
00:16:08I just, I still, to this day, I'm like, man, I shouldn't have done that.
00:16:12And I don't know that I will buy another new one after that.
00:16:15But it plays with your mind when you're in this type of group.
00:16:19Yeah, and it's crazy to see those churches that, I was listening to a survivor of a spiritual
00:16:29abuse environment, a religiously abusive environment, this week on a podcast.
00:16:35And they were talking about the pastor, they were on staff at a church, and they were talking
00:16:39about how the pastor would check the giving records.
00:16:42And in this particular story, what had happened was the pastor had called this lady after
00:16:49he had heard that she had not been, he'd saw the giving records and saw that she had not
00:16:53given in the past two months.
00:16:55And he picks up the phone and calls her and says, the Holy Spirit told me that you're having
00:17:00financial trouble.
00:17:01It's like, and she was sharing this story.
00:17:05She's like, did he not realize that I knew that he looked at the giving records?
00:17:08But she talked about that dynamic that happens, I think that both of us can relate to, of you
00:17:14kind of have this split of your rational mind tells you, he looked at the sheet of paper and
00:17:19he knows, but there's still that part of you that thinks that they're a prophet or something,
00:17:23that there's some kind of mystical power there, maybe they're right, you know.
00:17:28But that's like, I've seen that in so many environments, and I've seen that used as a
00:17:32way of prioritizing resource in a sense, based on how much someone gives is how much time
00:17:40and energy they get from the leaders in the community, which I think Jesus had very particular
00:17:45stories about that, and seats of preference, and you know, I think that's pretty easy to
00:17:51show how that's harmful in Scripture.
00:17:55Yeah, so these guys, they, I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one that's done the
00:18:0010% math, because as you said, I've done that same thing before.
00:18:04In backroom conversations in local churches, like, they have language for that.
00:18:09They call it giving units, is what it is.
00:18:12And like, a family is a giving unit, and they know how many giving units they need, giving
00:18:17money regularly to meet their budget, which is just, it's crazy.
00:18:23But I've looked at it the same way as you do.
00:18:25I'm like, if you need 10 people to pay us out, like, that is, that's a full-time income.
00:18:30And to be fair, it's going to be an average of your congregation's income.
00:18:35Like, you're going to be sitting in the middle, you've got 10% of the high earner, 10% of
00:18:38the
00:18:38low earner, like, it's going to average out.
00:18:41Yeah, so like, how we get so far from the mark, I'm not quite sure.
00:18:48But yeah, yeah, it's, the poverty mindset does a number on you.
00:18:52It does.
00:18:53Yeah, I was talking with Jenny about Youth With a Mission, and she was talking about how
00:18:59while she was in this, she was getting the martyr complex.
00:19:03And her martyr complex was basically the physical condition she was in.
00:19:08But I got to thinking about it, that martyr complex goes far beyond just your physical
00:19:13being.
00:19:14It goes to your financial being.
00:19:15You will martyr your own money, basically.
00:19:18I have friends, and I would say that they're not in a cult.
00:19:22They go to another really large church around this area.
00:19:26And if you did the 10 people math on that building, man, I can't tell you how many salaries
00:19:31are flowing in that.
00:19:33They're big auditorium, stadium seating.
00:19:35You do the math on that, and there's quite a bit of money flowing through that place.
00:19:39Yet, whenever there's a missionary trip, the missionaries are contributing financially towards
00:19:46their mission.
00:19:47And I'm sitting there thinking, now, wait a minute.
00:19:50If you've got that much money flowing through this building, why on earth do you need these
00:19:55poor people to pay for their mission?
00:19:57And then Jenny was talking about in Youth with a Mission, it's the same way.
00:20:01The children have to pay, gosh, I think she said it was like $10,000, if I remember right,
00:20:06to join this mission.
00:20:08I'm like, you've got to be kidding me.
00:20:10With that much money flowing through some of these organizations, why do you need to do
00:20:14this?
00:20:15And it really comes back to what she said about martyring complex.
00:20:18You will martyr your pocketbook to join this cult.
00:20:21And you think that you're doing it for God and that God cares about dollar bills, but
00:20:28I don't read that in the Bible.
00:20:30I don't read anywhere where God really cares about your money.
00:20:33That's just, it's turned into this modern thing, and I think that's part of the revival
00:20:37culture.
00:20:38We had such loaded language around, this is the big word, wasting our lives at the feet
00:20:45of Jesus, is what it was.
00:20:47And that applied to everything.
00:20:49And the story that they would pull from for that was whenever the perfume was poured over
00:20:53Jesus, and why this waste?
00:20:55Why this big waste?
00:20:57And that's part of what drew us into the prayer movement.
00:21:00We weren't thinking purely financial whenever we talked about it, but it was kind of like
00:21:03that martyr complex thing of the phrase that me and a friend were tossed around lately that
00:21:09was used as laid down lovers.
00:21:11That's like language that would be used.
00:21:14And then you looked at other things, which was a big message at IHOP, that one thing
00:21:19is needed.
00:21:20We had the one thing internship, the one thing conferences, and that was all Psalm, was it
00:21:2424, 27, four, or something like that?
00:21:26Of one thing I've desired of the Lord, that will I seek to live in his house all the days
00:21:30of my life and to gaze upon his beauty.
00:21:33And I probably butchered that, but it's the idea that you sit in the prayer room for the
00:21:36rest of your life.
00:21:37That's the one thing that's needed.
00:21:38And so you end up trading away all this financial potential even too.
00:21:44That's one of the things that people don't look at as the cost of being a part of these
00:21:50movements, which our engagement level, I guess, was a lot different than a local church being
00:21:57this parachurch ministry.
00:21:58We had a missions base.
00:21:59I mean, we practically had a non-fenced-in commune that stretched across South Kansas City
00:22:05is kind of how it was.
00:22:06We had houses all over neighborhoods and all this kind of thing.
00:22:10But there were people, whenever Mike Bickle got exposed with the allegations of CSA in
00:22:18October 23, there were families that wanted to leave immediately, but couldn't because
00:22:23they were so dependent on the system.
00:22:25They were hardly making any money.
00:22:27They were probably like my summer can't pay.
00:22:30They were probably getting $1,000 a month or something, $1,200 a month.
00:22:33And maybe their spouse was getting that too.
00:22:35And I don't know if y'all have looked at rent prices lately, but $2,200, $2,400 a month
00:22:40in a city in the United States, you may have $1,000 left over to live off of after you
00:22:47pay a rent or something.
00:22:48But these people had no work experience outside of this.
00:22:53So you would go to one of these one thing conferences as a teenager, young adult in college.
00:22:59You would hear Mike give this message.
00:23:02And then you would hear someone like Alan Hood say that you don't need to go to real university,
00:23:08that you need to invest in eternity and come get the education that matters and be heavenly
00:23:14minded so you can be earthly good.
00:23:16You have all those cliches.
00:23:18We talk about those promos all the time, how it sucked us in.
00:23:21They were expert marketers.
00:23:24But you do that.
00:23:25Like me, I walk in at 17.
00:23:27If I would have stayed there for longer, like some of these other people, they stayed there
00:23:30for a decade and had 15 kids because that's what IHOPers do.
00:23:35They have lots of kids and they have no real resume like to pull back and fall on.
00:23:41And so whenever they're trying to step outside that world, like the best you have is maybe
00:23:47if you were involved in media, we've seen people like who are involved in the media department
00:23:50be able to break out and go like in a local film industry in Kansas City and different places
00:23:56with like audio work and video work.
00:23:58And you see some people, there's one friend that I have who's become very successful at
00:24:06doing like cinematic movie music stuff and commercial music.
00:24:11And so some of them were able to take some of that invested skill and effort that they
00:24:16did during their time there and turn it into something.
00:24:19But the Annas is what we called them in the house of prayer.
00:24:23Those who were called to be intercessory missionaries, which was a thing that Mike Bickle
00:24:27totally made up, those who were called to do that and stay in the house of the Lord all
00:24:32their life, like all they did was set in that seat because they were in Anna and it was the
00:24:36one thing that they were supposed to do to be a Mary instead of a Martha.
00:24:40There's so much loaded language that when those people step away, like it's, you can't, even
00:24:46if you want to, you can't because you can't find a way to survive.
00:24:50And yeah, and it always gets turned back on, on those individuals somehow.
00:24:56As you were talking earlier, that was the last thing I was jotting down there was one
00:25:01of the, one of the verses that was weaponized a lot is where your treasure is there.
00:25:04Your heart will also be.
00:25:07And that was usually a whole lot had to do with money is what that had to do and how
00:25:11you
00:25:11don't need to be attached to money.
00:25:13Um, and I didn't know that we were Stoics, but apparently, you know, we're supposed to
00:25:17get rid of our attachments.
00:25:20Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started or how the progression of
00:25:25modern Pentecostalism transitioned through the latter reign, charismatic and other fringe
00:25:30movements into the new apostolic reformation?
00:25:33You can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website,
00:25:38william-branham.org.
00:25:41On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins,
00:25:46Charles Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others, with links to the paper,
00:25:52audio, and digital versions of each book.
00:25:55You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those
00:26:01movements.
00:26:02If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute
00:26:07button at the top.
00:26:08And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're
00:26:13listening to or watching.
00:26:14On behalf of William Branham Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support.
00:26:19You're talking about where your treasure is.
00:26:22I can't tell you how many sermons that I heard with that phrase in it.
00:26:26And we had, it wasn't unique to us.
00:26:30There, I've studied multiple cults that had the same type of mentality, but there's this
00:26:35idea that you can achieve spiritual perfection.
00:26:39And as far back as I can trace it, I can trace it all the way back to Gnosticism.
00:26:43The Gnostics believed that they could achieve the spiritual perfection through the divine
00:26:48mysteries or whatever it is they said they had.
00:26:51But as it relates to the financials, we almost became, I don't know what the word is.
00:26:58There's this fine line between faith and instability.
00:27:02You basically walked down this line, and if you could martyr your pocketbook, you were
00:27:08more spiritually mature than the next guy.
00:27:11And I look back at some of the people, man, I know people that made really, really good
00:27:16money.
00:27:17I don't know where all their money went, but they lived cheaper than I did.
00:27:21And I live pretty cheap on a tight budget.
00:27:24When we got married, I worked at a hardware store.
00:27:26My wife worked at Dairy Queen.
00:27:28And she made more money than me, which is a kind of funny story.
00:27:32And we live pretty poor.
00:27:34I mean, we had to.
00:27:34I know rich people who lived poorer than us while we were in that mindset because they're
00:27:40martyring their pocketbooks.
00:27:42And I look back, and it's just, you know, it's one thing to conserve money.
00:27:47And I'm all for being conservative with regards to your budget because you need a nest egg for
00:27:55when you retire, this kind of thing.
00:27:56But it goes beyond that.
00:27:58People are martyring them, sometimes their health.
00:28:01Sometimes they won't eat right because they're not spending enough money.
00:28:04Sometimes they might really, really need that one tool or gadget or whatever, and they'll
00:28:10make do and just suffer through with it.
00:28:12And they're suffering for no reason.
00:28:14So they're causing themselves to be martyred in ways beyond the pocketbook, but solely because
00:28:20of the pocketbook.
00:28:21So this mentality, and while you're watching people suffer like this, you're watching the
00:28:28ministers or the elders, the leadership, people are giving them not only money, but whatever
00:28:34they need.
00:28:34If they need a Makita drill, they're going to go buy the best drill that they can possibly
00:28:39get them, while they themselves will use the Walmart cheap tools, you know?
00:28:43I grew up with people like that.
00:28:45But again, not everybody's like that, but when you're preaching that type of martyr mentality,
00:28:51the people who are more spiritually in tune with what you're saying, they're going to
00:28:57try to go above and beyond what you say.
00:28:59And so they martyr themselves even further.
00:29:01Yeah, food is such a funny thing, which I hadn't connected that to money, but it really
00:29:06is a big thing.
00:29:08I remember hearing stories before I had people almost warn me, I feel like, I feel like it's
00:29:13going to mind of my friends who went to Brownsville, who were older than me, Brownsville School of
00:29:18Revival School of Ministry, that talked about not living off ramen, like don't eat ramen every
00:29:25day or it's bad for you kind of thing.
00:29:27And I really did have friends who did that and got sick and had to go to the hospital because
00:29:33they ate ramen like every day, 30 days straight kind of thing.
00:29:37And it was because they had no money is what it was.
00:29:40And I remember it brought back a memory of whenever I was working for the internship during
00:29:47my last year or so there, part of our compensation package.
00:29:52So they gave us housing is what I got.
00:29:54I got, so I got a free place to live, but I had to live with the interns.
00:29:58And so, but I had my own bedroom and, uh, and then they gave us three meals a week in
00:30:03the cafeteria.
00:30:04So the interns did get fed three days, three times a day, except on Tuesdays, because that
00:30:10was fasting days, but they'd put out PB and J's and stuff for the ones who couldn't fast
00:30:13is what it was, but they wouldn't cook on, on Tuesdays.
00:30:16And so I could go in and get lunch three times a week or whatever, but we would, we would
00:30:21save those and ration those because we didn't know day to day, like what things would look
00:30:24like.
00:30:25Um, and so, you know, so we, we, we rationed those, the three, we got a week, but I remember
00:30:31there being a period where, man, this is, this is hard because I hadn't thought about
00:30:36this a long time is I went on a fast one time and, and I think that one of the
00:30:42subconscious
00:30:44motivations of that was I didn't have money was, was part of the reason why I fasted.
00:30:48And, um, I had, I had went on a smoothie fast though is what it was.
00:30:53I told myself I was going to get, I bought a jar of peanut butter and a, and a contained
00:30:57and a thing of honey.
00:30:58And I think some like frozen fruit or something like that.
00:31:02Like a big old went to one of our, but somebody always had a Sam's club membership around or
00:31:06something that their parent paid for or something.
00:31:08And went and bought one of those like massive bulk size bags of fruit.
00:31:11And I had a little blender and I would throw peanut butter in there.
00:31:14I'd throw honey and, and, you know, top it off with water probably is what it was in the
00:31:19fruit and, uh, and would blend that up and drink one of those a day.
00:31:23And that was like, in my mind, I was doing a Daniel fast because I wasn't eating meat is
00:31:27what it was a smoothie fast, I guess.
00:31:29Um, and I remember I did that for like a little over a week or so, uh, just eat and
00:31:34drinking
00:31:34those smoothies.
00:31:35I went a good faster, but, um, then there was also that the other big time during the week.
00:31:42I wish I could remember what days of the week it was.
00:31:44Cause used to, that was like ingrained in my head.
00:31:46Um, we had our Panera bread drop-offs, um, both at the prayer room, the main missions
00:31:53base.
00:31:53And then I hop you where, which was, uh, up the interstate, just an exit.
00:31:57Um, but different days of the week, a different Panera branch would bring their stale leftover
00:32:02bread that they couldn't sell, but was still good and would drop it off at the prayer room.
00:32:07And man, I tell you like people would, there's a patio outside of the prayer room, um, next to
00:32:13the coffee shop at the bookstore.
00:32:14And they had maybe like six, eight cafe tables or something like that out there where people
00:32:19could sit and people would like just lurch out the, like, just like lurking, waiting for,
00:32:26it was a big garbage bag is what it was too.
00:32:28Like it was a big clear bag that the stuff was put in and they would drop it on the
00:32:33sidewalk.
00:32:34It's crazy to think about.
00:32:35It sounds third world, doesn't it?
00:32:38And, and everybody would just like collapse on it because everybody wanted to get the
00:32:42good stuff first kind of thing.
00:32:43Like if you, if you got there after the thing was, you know, parted, it was like all the
00:32:47crappy stuff that was left.
00:32:48If you wanted like a cheese bagel or something like that, you better get there right away.
00:32:51Like that, that stuff went quick.
00:32:53Um, and then we also had, and I remember I didn't know what it was for like the first
00:33:00year that I was at IHOP because there was so much shame around this subject.
00:33:04I think, because the other thing that was talked against was like government support
00:33:08and assistance.
00:33:08So like nobody was on snap, nobody was using, um, Medicaid or anything like that for, um,
00:33:15being low income.
00:33:16Um, thankfully during that time, that would have been like around the time when Obamacare
00:33:20was passed.
00:33:21And so we were able to stay on our parents' insurance or else none of us would have had
00:33:25any kind of healthcare either.
00:33:27Um, and, but they had every week they would send out these emails and they would talk about
00:33:32manna for you is what it was called.
00:33:35I just couldn't figure out what it was for the longest time until after that first summer
00:33:38and I lost my house and I moved in with those guys after summer, after summer camp.
00:33:42And I realized that they had been going and we started going at that time.
00:33:45So all of us were broke, um, was it was a food pantry set up and it was, I'll tell
00:33:49you
00:33:49who it was ran by.
00:33:50It was ran by Corey Asbury's parents is who it was.
00:33:53It was his mother and father and they ran it out of their garage for the longest time.
00:33:57Um, I think they ended up moving at some point later, um, but they just had these, these
00:34:01big shelves around their garage and they would put food in there and they had big deep freezers
00:34:06and, uh, you never knew what you were, what you were going to get or walk away with, but
00:34:11it wasn't a food pantry for the people of the community in need.
00:34:15It was a food pantry for the members is what it was.
00:34:17Um, which is, which is just crazy.
00:34:21That's, it's, it's crazy to me that you would think at that point.
00:34:26Somebody would have enough sense to assess the situation and say, something's not okay
00:34:31if we're having to do a food pantry for our people.
00:34:35Yeah, it's just not right.
00:34:36There's not many people besides me that can say that they remember beanie weenies and Kool-Aid
00:34:43was a good meal.
00:34:44Canned roast beef was a better meal.
00:34:47I remember, man, when we'd open up the canned roast beef, we were in heaven.
00:34:52But I look back at those times and so I, I know a minister, uh, won't give names, but
00:34:58I know a minister who every time he went out to eat and he would pick a different family
00:35:03every Sunday, he'd go out to eat with people and he would pay for the whole table's meal.
00:35:08And whenever we went, I was thinking, man, he is such a man of God.
00:35:13And now looking back, thinking through the tithe and doing that 10 person math, you know,
00:35:1710 people is a whole salary.
00:35:19I'm like, good Lord, they're, they're paying for their meal.
00:35:23They just don't know they're paying for their meal, but it looks like he's the hero.
00:35:26And that's really, it turns into a hero complex.
00:35:30After leaving, I started thinking about that.
00:35:33When I did the 10 person math in my head and just suddenly realized, wait a minute, we're
00:35:39in the matrix and they're stealing our money.
00:35:42I had taken the pill, right?
00:35:44I went back and I read the passages from the old Testament that talked about tithe because
00:35:50they're always preaching tithe.
00:35:51And even though we're supposed to be under the new covenant with regards to money, we're
00:35:55going to go back to the old covenant because that's the way it works.
00:35:58My brother, I started reading through that and there, there was never a give me tithe of
00:36:04your money kind of thing.
00:36:06It was always give me your goats.
00:36:08And I started thinking, I started laughing in the middle of the service because I was
00:36:12thinking, I wonder what this guy would do if I brought him a goat.
00:36:18And I went beyond that.
00:36:20You know, I'm reading in every, the way that the Jewish system worked, it was almost like
00:36:26a banking system.
00:36:27It was more for reserve, I think, than it was God doesn't care about the goats, man.
00:36:33That's just, if you think God is caring that you're giving the priest a goat, I think you're
00:36:38looking at religion altogether wrong.
00:36:40But it was more for, they would have, on the seventh day, they would not work, they would
00:36:47not go, you know, take care of the livestock, et cetera.
00:36:50There was a day of rest, right?
00:36:52Well, during the day of rest, the priest would take the, not only the goats, but the wine or
00:36:57whatever they had stored up, and then every seventh week they did it, every seventh year.
00:37:03Then there was the year of the Jubilee.
00:37:05Every, what was it, 49th year, I think it was, two whole years of rest, partying, relaxation,
00:37:12and I mean, they were breaking out the good wine during that.
00:37:15And I got to thinking, there was never a case where a minister was asking for tithe, where
00:37:21he gave it back, in which he did not come out to look like a hero when he gave it
00:37:28back.
00:37:29It was always that he was doing it something for you, like the guy who's taking people out
00:37:33to eat.
00:37:34And then it becomes more about the priest than it does about God, or even about tithe, right?
00:37:39It's more about making that person a hero.
00:37:42But then, if you keep, continue reading the tithe passages, at the end, he gave everything
00:37:47back to the people who had given it to him, except for he kept, I think it was like 10
00:37:52%
00:37:52he kept to live out the rest of his life.
00:37:55There was never a case where I've paid tithe, and they actually gave me money back.
00:37:59Now, they will count on me to go get some back from the government, back whenever the government
00:38:05gave you a good, healthy IRS tax benefit.
00:38:07But it was never done in the way of the tithing system.
00:38:12What it was, they were tricking the people.
00:38:14They would say, we're going to follow the new covenant, except for regards with money.
00:38:19With regards for money, we're going to follow the old covenant, but just the part that benefits
00:38:23me as the priest.
00:38:24Yeah.
00:38:25I think whenever we look at the Sabbath and how all those things were done, like it's
00:38:29so, I can't help but think that it's a better way of living, like to have those times of
00:38:35rest and have plans in place to be able to do those things.
00:38:40Like, I don't know anybody in America that doesn't have to work 40 hours a week to live.
00:38:43Like, I mean, sure, like low income on disability or something like that.
00:38:48But I couldn't imagine, I mean, I guess the closest thing we have is like the pandemic
00:38:51to a two-year jubilee of not doing anything.
00:38:55I guess that was the closest thing we'll have in our lifetime to that.
00:38:57But I had the thought too, kind of back to what I was talking about earlier.
00:39:03I'm just having all these memories flood back, if that's okay.
00:39:05So, I'm kind of just shooting from the hip on these, but I remember I used to do worship
00:39:11leading sets at Hope City, which was the inner city ministry in Kansas City.
00:39:15It was ran by Mike's sister, Lisa Bickle, and they would shuttle us down there to go help
00:39:23staff the prayer room and stuff.
00:39:24But I remember people tagging along with us and going with us and playing with us intentionally
00:39:30because they knew it was like that they were doing the soup kitchen that day and that we
00:39:34were going down there supposedly to do ministry to the inner city community, and we're all
00:39:39hoping that we can snag a meal when we go down there.
00:39:41Like, I remember that being common conversations.
00:39:45And I remember what my biggest treat was, like my splurge that I would do.
00:39:51And I probably did it once a week or so.
00:39:54It was my guilty pleasure, I guess, and people will laugh, but we had the coffee shop that
00:40:00was right next to the prayer room, and they sold food and stuff too.
00:40:04But one of the things that they sold, and they sold them at cost.
00:40:07I knew that because the operations manager was my roommate at one point.
00:40:11So they sold them at cost.
00:40:12They didn't make any money off of them, but they had Einstein bagels is what it was.
00:40:16And it was about $2 to get one.
00:40:19And I remember many times looking at my bank account and seeing I had like six or eight
00:40:23bucks in my bank account.
00:40:24And it usually happened on fasting days.
00:40:26Usually what happens is I'm sitting at the prayer room at eight o'clock at night and I'm
00:40:30not eating anything.
00:40:31And I'm like, I can't make it till midnight, like I'm supposed to be in here till midnight.
00:40:35And the higher ground's about to close.
00:40:37So you'd sneak over there and grab a bagel.
00:40:41And I think with like cream cheese and stuff, it was like $2.25, $2.50, something like that.
00:40:47And that was like my biggest treat.
00:40:49But I remember feeling guilty about that.
00:40:52And that's what's insanity.
00:40:54Like we had these little, like we knew every spot in the 10 mile radius of where we could
00:40:59get a cheap meal.
00:41:00We knew on Mondays or Tuesdays, CC's Pizza used to do the buffet for like $3.99 or whatever.
00:41:07We all thought we were living high.
00:41:08Whenever we would do that, we would eat way too many brownies from CC's Pizza.
00:41:13There was a little Asian place that had a Chinese place that had, it's called Peking Express.
00:41:20And we all, they would like load you up with a styrofoam box full of food.
00:41:23And it was like five bucks.
00:41:25And that was any day.
00:41:26So like whenever you had a lot of money, that's what we would do.
00:41:29Um, but it was, it was very rare.
00:41:31Like, you know, we would hear people, we would hear stories, we would hear stories of people
00:41:35going to the big buffets in Kansas city, the Brazilian steakhouses, like all these things,
00:41:40man, we were just like, man, maybe for our birthday, maybe for something special, you know?
00:41:45And, um, it, it very rarely happened.
00:41:47I could think maybe like three times, like my whole time there that we like went to somewhere
00:41:51like that, went to like this big Italian buffet and I never made it to a Brazilian steakhouse,
00:41:55but, um, yeah, man, it's, it's, it's, it's so dystopian, like look back on and think that
00:42:01that's how, how I used to live and that now it's still impacting me whenever I think about
00:42:05buying a car is like, and I've even been thinking about that like lately too, with,
00:42:10with like yesterday I was about my clothing that I wear.
00:42:14I'm always like, I'm, I always choose simple just because it's, it's like one of them like
00:42:20decisions I don't have to make nine times out of 10, when you see me, I'm going to be
00:42:23wearing a black t-shirt of some sort and blue jeans.
00:42:26Like that's, that's my, my daily, my daily uniform.
00:42:30And, uh, but I was like, I'm tired of buying old Navy t-shirts that like get holes in them
00:42:35after a year.
00:42:36Like what can I do?
00:42:37You know?
00:42:38And I did, I did splurge and get this Carhartt t-shirt at one point.
00:42:42And, uh, I was having a little conversation with Jim and I on my phone.
00:42:46And I was like, how could I like get better quality, longer lasting t-shirts?
00:42:50And it was like, you need to buy more Carhartt t-shirts.
00:42:51And I'm like, okay, and so I'm going to have to start buying $30 t-shirts and $10 t-shirts
00:42:55and, and feel okay about that because it's not as wasteful, you know?
00:42:59Um, it's, it's just crazy.
00:43:01Like the, the subtle ways that it shapes you.
00:43:04And me and my friends have conversations about it all the time.
00:43:06Like, you know, we feel like we're, we're walking in a totally different world from everyone
00:43:11else, but still to this day, and it's been almost 15 years since I left.
00:43:16So exactly.
00:43:17I'm embarrassed to say we were married and this, this continued after I had left the
00:43:24cult.
00:43:24Even you're in that mentality where you just don't spend money.
00:43:27And we were the clothing that we bought, we'd go to consignment shops or Goodwill or places
00:43:33like this.
00:43:33Right.
00:43:33And I remember the moment that it changed.
00:43:37I work in it, so we made good money.
00:43:39It's not that I couldn't afford it.
00:43:41It's that we had that mentality.
00:43:43I remember I was standing there when it finally clicked that this is wrong.
00:43:48I'm standing there and this really, really poor family walked in.
00:43:51You could tell that they just didn't have anything.
00:43:53And here I am making good IT money in a consignment shop and watching this poor family.
00:43:59I shouldn't be buying those things that I should leave the good things that I want for
00:44:04the families that need it.
00:44:05But we were in that mentality and you just stay in that mentality.
00:44:09It's, um, it's just so weird.
00:44:12You were talking about all the pizzas and I remember those locations.
00:44:16We, I spent a lot of time in Kansas too.
00:44:19So I remember those places that we went to a pizza hut buffet, however, uh, as a church
00:44:26group.
00:44:26I'll never forget it.
00:44:27It was kind of a funny thing.
00:44:29The, uh, one of the guys, he was flirting with a girl and she had left her keys on the
00:44:35table and he picked it up and she has pepper spray and he says, Oh, I wonder what that smells
00:44:39like.
00:44:39And he does this, but he does it away from his face, but just a squirt of it.
00:44:44And we learned that day you can empty a building with one squirt of pepper.
00:44:48Oh my gosh.
00:44:49They had to, they had to throw the food out.
00:44:51I mean, it was, it was a big deal, but, and that's a, that's a weird side story, but it
00:44:57relates in that we, we weren't raised to be normal.
00:45:01That's really the bottom line that normal people don't do stupid stuff like that, but
00:45:06we weren't raised to be normal.
00:45:07And in the way that we were raised to have this martyrdom complex, we need to forfeit
00:45:13everything we have.
00:45:15So the priest can have all of the good stuff.
00:45:18It also come, when you add the group think element, it becomes even worse because you're
00:45:23suffering.
00:45:24And if you see somebody else who's not, you're going to talk about them.
00:45:28And then you're going to talk to somebody else who's also going to talk about them.
00:45:31And eventually they're going to hear that they're being talked about.
00:45:34And then they're going to suffer too, because everybody else is suffering.
00:45:37Why shouldn't I?
00:45:38So it turns into this group think thing where you're actually watching all of the people
00:45:44around you.
00:45:45And the focus is just so much in the wrong place.
00:45:48The focus is on the people, not in God.
00:45:50And so the whole system trains people not only to martyr themselves, but to cause other people
00:45:57who might otherwise have a normal, healthy life, it causes them to be drugged down with
00:46:02them.
00:46:02Yeah, it caused also, I've seen about the support raising element of it, as you were talking
00:46:07about that, is it caused a resentment towards certain people as well, because there were
00:46:13certain people in the community who were connected and maybe not like on staff or something like
00:46:17that, may have lived in one of the IHOP houses, and they were like a realtor or had a real
00:46:22job of some sort to where they made money.
00:46:24And I remember hearing those people complain so much because all the time people were handing
00:46:28them support raising letters, is what it was, because they had a real job and real money.
00:46:33And so since they were in the, also another example of loaded language, because they were
00:46:38in the marketplace, you know, they felt like that they were called to, that God must be
00:46:44calling them to support intercessory missionaries and to be a Cyrus of sorts to help fund the prayer
00:46:53movement.
00:46:55And that put strain on relationships.
00:46:57And I remember coming back home for a visit and a family that I had, I may have shared this
00:47:06story before, I can't remember, but a family that their kids had gone to Brownsville.
00:47:12And so that they had kind of gone through, I think they had two kids, two of their three
00:47:15boys had gone to Brownsville School of Ministry.
00:47:18And they had gone on to do other successful things after that.
00:47:21So they kind of, kind of broke that cycle a little bit, at least one of them did.
00:47:26And I had sent them support raising letters and asked them for money and stuff.
00:47:29And I remember them being super generous whenever I was around and present.
00:47:34They weren't people who were sending me checks or anything like that when I was in Kansas
00:47:37City.
00:47:38But whenever I came to town to visit, like they were always buying me food, slipping me money,
00:47:42those kinds of things, just trying to like, look out for me in a sense, I think.
00:47:45And I remember this one time that they had bought a car, maybe about two, three hours
00:47:51away from where we were.
00:47:53And they asked me if I would go with them so that I could drive back one of the vehicles.
00:47:58And so they had me in the car stuck for two hours and they start asking questions about
00:48:02the prophetic history and what it meant and all these things.
00:48:05And, you know, and I'd gone to them asking for money, like their support letters and stuff.
00:48:09And I just remember like, I remember the feeling of dissonance because I remember thinking they
00:48:17just don't understand.
00:48:18Like they don't understand the prophetic promises.
00:48:21They don't understand what God's doing in the earth.
00:48:23They don't, you know, but there was also a side of me that was like, man, I really respect
00:48:28these people.
00:48:29Like, could they be right?
00:48:30Like, am I, am I deceived?
00:48:32Um, it wasn't enough to shake me out then.
00:48:35Um, but that, but that was one of those, you know, those moments that, that money, I think
00:48:41impacted those relationships and in a sense.
00:48:43And, um, I'm grateful for people like that though, who had enough sense and enough boldness
00:48:50for lack of a better term to, to be able to have those conversations with me, because
00:48:54I don't think that I would have ended up in the place that I was to be able to walk
00:48:57away,
00:48:57um, from it without those, that consistent, borrow Christian language again, seed planting
00:49:04that would happen, um, over the years.
00:49:07And, uh, and thankfully I had a little prophetic narrative around me leaving and I think that,
00:49:13that, that allowed me to step away as well.
00:49:15So, um, yeah, stuff goes deep, man.
00:49:19One thing I've wondered is if IHOPKC had this kind of dynamic, we had, so we had the martyr
00:49:26complex and the rank and file members there by and large martyring themselves in ways
00:49:31that I've described already, but within the cult structure, there was like this class system.
00:49:39It was odd to me that I was in the rank and file class because of who my dad was
00:49:44and his
00:49:44relationship to the leadership.
00:49:47But I clearly remember there was a class system.
00:49:49The ones at the very bottom, they martyred themselves a lot.
00:49:53They, even the people who were wealthy, they didn't have a lot.
00:49:55But usually the more wealthy were in a, another tier.
00:50:00So while you're in that tier, you didn't have to martyr yourself as much.
00:50:04And they did have nice cars.
00:50:05They did have nice things.
00:50:06And the people really didn't talk about them because they were in a separate class.
00:50:11And the class usually, I mean, when it comes right down to it, it probably was because
00:50:16that they had money, but they usually had some sort of a connection to the leadership
00:50:21that was beyond what the average person had.
00:50:23And so you looked at them differently.
00:50:25And so within the cult, there was a class system, but it defied all of the laws of what
00:50:30a class system would look like because it wasn't really based on whether you had money or not.
00:50:35You just martyred yourself further if you were in that.
00:50:37Did IHOP KC have anything like this?
00:50:39Yeah, and I think a lot of it had to do with the proximity to the gatekeepers, for lack
00:50:46of a better term, like the proximity to Mike Bickle or whoever it was, that the people
00:50:53that we saw in that class kind of structure would have been like those, those B, C level
00:50:59leaders that were underneath.
00:51:01And they were the ones who, that I kind of looked at, I remember looking at jealously,
00:51:06and I think a lot of people did because nobody flaunted money around IHOP.
00:51:11I mean, Mike, you know, he drove his old beater Honda and his same outfit every day and, you
00:51:17know, had this whole like false humility thing, allegedly false humility.
00:51:21Can I say that?
00:51:22I don't know if you can say that.
00:51:24Had this whole humility thing that he had that was part of his shtick that he was living
00:51:29in this simple life and it's, to look back on it now, it's just, it's funny because
00:51:36you can poke holes in it.
00:51:38I think listening to you talk about people walking up and handing gifts at Christmas time
00:51:43and different things like that has helped me kind of like see those things in our own
00:51:47environment.
00:51:48And one of those things was Mike would always, he would always take a sabbatical at the beginning
00:51:53of every year.
00:51:54He would disappear for a month.
00:51:56Um, every January he would go to Florida and it was like him going up the mountain for
00:52:04the year after we had just done the one thing conference.
00:52:06And so it was this time and he would always come back after he came back with some kind
00:52:09of big message, some kind of big idea for the year.
00:52:13Um, but so like most of us could not do that.
00:52:16Like we, we couldn't even take a weekend vacation, the day trip.
00:52:20Um, I, there was, there's parts of Kansas city.
00:52:23I, I lived there for four years, five, almost five years.
00:52:26And there's, there's parts of the city I've still not seen.
00:52:28And, and, uh, we, we ran, stay put, we didn't have any money, couldn't drive anywhere.
00:52:34And I had one of the few vehicles.
00:52:36And so like we, we passed around my vehicle and that, that bit me in the rear a couple
00:52:39of times, but, um, yeah.
00:52:42So the people got to travel and that was, that was B and C tier leaders.
00:52:45Uh, and let the, I hop you teachers or, um, the directors of certain ministries and internships
00:52:54and such, you would see some of those guys would get to, and it's usually guys, um, we'd
00:52:59get to travel on the weekends and go places.
00:53:01Uh, they would get to travel overseas and do conferences.
00:53:05Um, and then there were certain, I guess, folks like me who were in proximity to those
00:53:11people who were kind of like their, uh, I guess if you come from certain Pentecostal
00:53:17circles, I think the equivalent would be like an armor bearer.
00:53:20If people are familiar with that, like, I don't want to call them bootlickers.
00:53:23I feel like that's a little bit too, too, too derogatory, but, uh, but they were the people
00:53:27who were attached at their hip, but they got to go places with them.
00:53:32Um, but it was, uh, that, that's kind of how it was.
00:53:35It was like the opportunities and how much you got to get outside the community.
00:53:41I guess it's kind of a level of, I guess, a level of trust that you're able to leave,
00:53:46um, even though there's nobody like forcibly holding you there.
00:53:49But, um, I guess financially we were held there.
00:53:52Um, that's, that's the invisible fence.
00:53:56Yeah, it's really sad because there's so many aspects of life that goes far beyond the church
00:54:02and far beyond the present tense that it hinders.
00:54:06I was, how old was I?
00:54:09I was 37, 40, I think I was 47 years old whenever I first realized that, wait a minute, the
00:54:16rapture
00:54:17is not going to happen in any minute, like they were saying.
00:54:21And I have zero dollars in retirement, zero dollars.
00:54:24Yeah, yeah.
00:54:25And I started doing the math and even still today, I do the math like once a month or something.
00:54:30There's no way I'll ever get enough money to retire.
00:54:33And I gave so much money.
00:54:35I could have retired on the tithe money I gave, man.
00:54:38I wish I'd have done the 10% math back when I was 16, not when I was in my,
00:54:42in my late or mid 40s.
00:54:45But retirement's just one aspect.
00:54:47You have people who are martyring themselves while also paying tuition.
00:54:52And by paying tuition, I mean they get a school loan to pay their tuition and later have to pay
00:54:57the school loan back.
00:54:58Well, think about all of the money that they gave the church that they could have paid instead
00:55:03of taking out the loan.
00:55:05Now they're paying the interest on all of this.
00:55:08And that's just, I mean, those are just two examples.
00:55:10But think of all of the many examples where because, I hate to say, in my opinion, they're
00:55:16robbing people of money.
00:55:18If that's true, if they are stealing money, which is my opinion, well, think of the ways
00:55:24that they're stealing that goes far beyond just the tithe basket, man.
00:55:27It ruins every aspect of your life, especially as you get older.
00:55:31Yeah.
00:55:32As you're saying that, I all of a sudden had another memory come.
00:55:34I didn't find myself in this situation, thankfully, because I did have a scholarship to IHOPU, whatever
00:55:40that means, so I didn't have to pay tuition.
00:55:42But it was not uncommon for classmates or interns to be asking people, like other community members,
00:55:54being like, hey, I need to have my tuition paid by this date.
00:55:57I got to have $1,200 or I got to have $500 for this month's payment or whatever it was,
00:56:04which to me is just crazy.
00:56:06Like that one that you're paying to be forced labor is like one thing that just messes with
00:56:15you.
00:56:15But yeah, it really is.
00:56:20It really is robbery.
00:56:21And I know that there was also like this ostracizing of people who,
00:56:33who had to work, who had to work a job.
00:56:37And there was, you know, people in the community knew who IHOP was vaguely, and they just knew
00:56:41that we were all weird and really exuberant.
00:56:45And so there were some places that just wouldn't hire IHOPers.
00:56:49And there were some places that loved to hire IHOPers, like Starbucks loved to hire the eager
00:56:53starry-eyed IHOPers.
00:56:54And they saved a lot of people, Starbucks did, from the grasp of IHOP.
00:57:01But I like, I remember friends being almost like admonished, or not admonished, what's
00:57:06the word I'm looking for?
00:57:07Like rebuked?
00:57:09No, that might be too strong of a word.
00:57:11But like scolded, maybe might be a better word for going out and getting outside work
00:57:15to support themselves.
00:57:17In the South, we called it, we got a tongue lashing.
00:57:19A tongue lashing.
00:57:20There you go.
00:57:22Bless his heart.
00:57:24And so they would go and try to get jobs.
00:57:27But the thing was, our schedules were so rigorous.
00:57:30And whenever you would go and ask a leader, like, hey, can I switch my prayer room hours
00:57:36from this time to this time so that I can work?
00:57:40A lot of times that was met with a no.
00:57:44And I don't think that we realized how, I think it didn't set right with this, like when
00:57:48things like that would happen, or like some people would work in restaurants, you know?
00:57:53And so we always had our evening services on the weekends, and that's a high time for
00:57:57restaurant people.
00:58:00And they didn't want to miss in the services.
00:58:02Like they had to be there every Friday, Saturday night.
00:58:04And it's like, that's their biggest income times.
00:58:06And so that made it really hard.
00:58:09And I've heard a lot of people express, you know, harm and hurt over that aspect of, you
00:58:15know, I can't imagine even working like 15 hours a week, 20 hours a week outside of IHOP
00:58:23on top of everything else that I was doing.
00:58:25I was very grateful that my, I'd say 80% of my time there, it was kind of a little
00:58:32local
00:58:32church that me and my friends went to that they would pay us to come.
00:58:36I think I've talked about that before.
00:58:37They'd pay us to come lead worship for them.
00:58:39They'd pay me a hundred bucks a Sunday, and they would pay my friends, anybody would come
00:58:42with me, 50 bucks.
00:58:45And there are people that came and played with me for 50 bucks who are decently known music
00:58:53producers now, let's say, in the Christian circles.
00:58:56And that's how little money we all had.
00:58:59This guy had an album that was going like crazy in Christian circles.
00:59:04I don't want to out him, so I'm not going to name it, but songs that like a lot of
00:59:09people
00:59:09in charismatic stuff would know.
00:59:11They would know this stuff.
00:59:12And it's a lot of people's favorite worship album.
00:59:14This one album I'm thinking about, they'd just come out.
00:59:15And the guy was driving 30 minutes with me to go play at a church for $50 a Sunday.
00:59:21And he's having international influence in a sense.
00:59:27It's, yeah, it's a different world, different world.
00:59:31It's almost like slavery.
00:59:33It is.
00:59:34And you know, I'm sitting here thinking, how do you wrap this up?
00:59:37I don't know that we've even gotten anywhere.
00:59:39We just, we've complained for an entire hour.
00:59:42And the bottom line is, it's making me decide that maybe I need a second job.
00:59:49You've changed my life in the course of this podcast.
00:59:52Thank you so much for doing this.
00:59:53Yeah, absolutely.
00:59:54Well, if you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the
00:59:57web.
00:59:58You can find us at william-branum.org.
01:00:00For more about the dark side of the New Apostolic Reformation, you can read Weaponized Religion
01:00:04from Christian Identity to the NAR.
01:00:07Available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.
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