What Bethel’s Crisis Reveals About Church Power | Ben Armstrong News | Jed Hartley | Episode 598 - video Dailymotion

William Branham Historical Research

John and Jed examine the latest controversy surrounding Bethel Church, including public allegations involving Ben Armstrong and the broader leadership culture that has drawn growing scrutiny. They explore how terms like "moral failure" can soften public perception, why honor culture can shield influential figures, and how victims can be left without meaningful paths to justice.  The conversation also traces the issue beyond one headline and into the deeper structure of New Apostolic Reformation style authority. John and Jed connect Bethel, IHOPKC, and related movements to a pattern of centralized leadership, miracle-centered credibility, weak accountability, and spiritualized power that can make serious allegations harder to confront.  00:00 Introduction 01:37 Jed Introduces The Bethel Allegations 04:38 Bethel’s Public Framing And The 2009 Incident 07:06 Sarah’s Story And The “Affair” Language 10:57 Bethel, Sean Bolz, And Repeating Patterns 15:00 From “Moral Failure” To Abuse 16:06 Why The Scandal Is Now Part Of The History 18:06 Five-Fold Ministry And Apostolic Authority 21:08 A Movement Designed To Enable Abuse 23:09 Unaccountable Apostles And Protected Leaders 27:24 Affair Language, Consent, And Whitewashing 31:38 Why The Foundation Needs To Be Questioned 33:46 Church Leadership As A Business Structure 35:25 What Good Leadership Should Have Done 37:48 Why People Do Not Simply Walk Away 42:05 Bethel As Brand, Business, And Community 45:07 Miracle Culture And Fear Of Questioning Leaders 49:09 Honor Culture And The Business Of Risk 52:52 Why Victims Have So Little Recourse 57:30 Why “Why Didn’t They Go To Police?” Misses The Point 1:00:51 The System Needs To Change ______________________ 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

Transcript

00:00:31Hello, and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast.

00:00:35I'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, Jed Hartley, son of a false

00:00:46prophet and former member of the International House of Prayer. Jed, I know you and I are going

00:00:51to sound like broken records today. We're going to be talking about yet another scandal that has

00:00:56hit the church, and we're talking today about Bethel, so it's in the eyes of the New Apostolic

00:01:02Reformation, this is kind of a big one, I guess I would say. And it's been ongoing. I had not

00:01:07heard

00:01:07about it until you brought it up, but apparently, as I'm looking through the news, this has kind of

00:01:13been going on since February and has grown to a bit of a head because there are some questionable

00:01:19things that are happening. I'll just say it like that. But anyway, I'll let you introduce it, and

00:01:24it's good to be back and talk about these scandals that just, I don't know what, for what reason

00:01:30they keep recurring. It feels a little like the Twilight Zone, like we're getting the, it's just the

00:01:34same story repeated, and that's what, like, I think that as we go, maybe even in future episodes,

00:01:44we could get into more of the details of this scandal that is popping up. But when I've been

00:01:53reading about it and researching it, I actually heard about it several months ago, and when I

00:01:59first was listening to one of the victim's testimonies, I had to shut it off. And I think

00:02:07for several weeks, I didn't come back to it because it's just the same story over and over again.

00:02:14And it was so eerily similar to stories with my dad and Mike Bickle and Sean Bowles and Bob Jones

00:02:26of

00:02:26yet another male pastor in the New Apostolic Reformation churches. Well, not even the New

00:02:36Apostolic Reformation, like we're not even casting a wide net. I really have just only been talking about

00:02:42IOP and Bethel, and it's just those two churches that I've personally been, I mean, I've talked a

00:02:49little bit about YWAM too, but just from those two churches, there's what, maybe a dozen or so

00:02:58sexual abusers who have been exposed for their abusive tendencies. And so yet, again, again, this is

00:03:08just, it's like a broken record, you know? So this, the man who is being accused, his name is Ben

00:03:16Armstrong. Now, I do know Ben Armstrong. I've met him and spoke with him before. I don't know him

00:03:23well. So I, while I am an individual who has been pretty tightly involved with both Bethel and

00:03:32um, the International House of Prayer through my dad. Um, this is, I'm not sharing, this is,

00:03:41the details of this event is just everything that I've gleaned from listening to different podcasts

00:03:46and, and, um, reading the news about it. This is not, I'm not giving sort of first person primary, um,

00:03:53uh, information or I haven't talked with any of the victims, um, yet. Although I, I definitely will

00:04:01want to be looking into this more because again, there are just some, some eerie overlaps with the

00:04:08way that Bethel handled this whole situation and whatnot. But the gist of it is long and short of

00:04:15it is, is that there was a man named Ben Armstrong who has been, um, involved in Bethel leadership for

00:04:23quite some time. Um, he, uh, is, I mean, if you've been at Bethel, you've seen him up at, um,

00:04:32speaking,

00:04:33um, from the pulpit several different times. Um, I mean, he was an influential leader in 2009. Uh,

00:04:42Ben was involved in what, this is how Bethel has framed it. So I'll first give the, the Bethel

00:04:49framing because in February, um, Bethel released, uh, a couple of statements about this. Um,

00:04:57apparently Bethel was aware in 2009 that there was a moral failure. That's how they described it.

00:05:04Um, and in 2009, he was removed from ministry. Um, he repented and, uh, he was restored to ministry

00:05:16a few years later. Um, this was, this is sort of the narrative that Bethel has been giving, uh,

00:05:23just in February, there is a woman who came forward who, um, talked about another incident that Bethel

00:05:31was not aware of, of grooming. Um, and that again, this feels like broken record stuff,

00:05:38the same sort of, um, find a woman who is within your ministry or within your church or within the

00:05:48church school, give her specific attention using the term woman loosely because it's, it's a young

00:05:55woman. Like usually this is in the twenties and in other cases in teens, but I believe this woman

00:06:02was in her twenties. Um, give her specific attention, um, single her out and then begin to

00:06:11try to groom her for, um, sexual purposes. And this is what was going on that a woman came forward

00:06:20and

00:06:20spoke about that Bethel was not aware of, and that they had not heard about according to their

00:06:26statement. Um, when they heard about it, they really statement that they're okay. We're, we're aware of

00:06:34it. We are aware of, um, what happened in 2009. He, this has been a known, you know, what happened

00:06:42in

00:06:422009. There was this known failure. Um, he's again, been removed from ministry, um, and, and

00:06:51restored. He's repented for these things. Um, and they labeled it an affair. So on February 13th,

00:07:00when Bethel releases this statement, um, the wake up and win, uh, podcast, which is hosted by two

00:07:08people who are actually from IHOP and who I knew and, and who were, um, very instrumental in helping

00:07:15expose some of, um, the, uh, scandal that was going on with Mike Bickle and everyone else at IHOP, um,

00:07:22in 2023, um, their names blaze and Christina. Um, they hosted on their podcast, uh, a woman named Sarah,

00:07:32who was the alleged victim, um, that Bethel was aware of in 2009. Now this is the woman who was

00:07:44involved with, um, Ben, who Bethel framed as an affair. Uh, that's how, that's how the situation

00:07:53with Sarah was what Bethel was again, aware of, and they framed as an affair. This podcast is released,

00:08:01um, the, the wake up and win, which I really encourage people to watch. Um, I'm, I'm a big

00:08:08fan of, uh, blaze and Christina. I think that they do an excellent job. Again, they were super

00:08:13instrumental in exposing some of the things, um, that were going on, uh, during with, uh, with IHOP in

00:08:192023. Um, and actually blaze has been, um, an advocate for reform. Uh, I remember back in 2010

00:08:27and, or, or even before that, I think, um, he was at IHOP and, um, he was, uh, he's a

00:08:35few years

00:08:35older than me. And I remember him being kind of one of the first voices that I remember who was

00:08:40speaking out against some of the stuff that was going on in IHOP. So anyway, um, really encourage

00:08:46you to watch that. Um, Sarah is very vulnerable and believable and genuine on that podcast. And

00:08:53she explains the story, um, really, really well and, uh, heartbreakingly so. Um, but the incident

00:09:02that Bethel labeled a fair was she, um, Sarah, um, alleged, uh, it was assault instead. Um, and, um,

00:09:14she talked about two different specific instances of, of essay. And it was a similar situation to

00:09:23something that we've seen in the past with others. Um, she was an intern for Ben. Um,

00:09:28she was connected through Bethel to, um, Ben. She was living with, um, the family. Um, and, uh,

00:09:36Ben Armstrong was, was married, um, during the time. He's still married. Um, and so she was,

00:09:42she was living with him, was interning for Ben, working with him, traveling with him. Um, he

00:09:50constantly was doing different grooming behaviors, telling her to, um, be more vulnerable, um, physically,

00:10:01um, touching her in ways that weren't initially sexual, but just trying to break that barrier

00:10:09down of, of physical touch. And, um, I mean, follows all sort of similar grooming patterns using both

00:10:18spiritual, um, and emotional, um, and emotional sort of coercive, coercive control, um, to eventually

00:10:26have, uh, allegedly, um, instances of essay. So that's the long and short of it. That's what's

00:10:33going on. I, I definitely encourage, um, people to, to watch the episode and hear it from her directly.

00:10:39And again, to, so there's this incident and then there was another incident, um, that has, um, of,

00:10:47of this, of grooming, um, that has been reported. And this is all what's causing the stir, uh, and

00:10:54attention on Bethel. If you haven't been paying attention to Bethel, or I, I know that of course

00:11:01you don't have John, but for people who are listening, if they, um, missed some of previous

00:11:06episodes, there was also, uh, the huge scandal that involved, um, Sean Bowles and him using

00:11:12prophetic, um, uh, his prophetic authority to, um, leverage himself into positions where he was,

00:11:22um, uh, abusing different individuals, um, and also interns, um, in, in those are, or people who

00:11:30were working with him or for him, um, um, was also abusing the prophetic was doing a whole list

00:11:38laundry list of things. Bethel came out and very tearfully, uh, uh, apologized for how they handled

00:11:44the Sean Bowles thing. And I'm biased by Bethel. I mean, um, Bill Johnson and, uh, Chris Vallotton

00:11:51came up to the front, um, and before a Sunday service, this was, I think only a few months ago,

00:12:00um, were genuinely like, or they appeared to be genuinely remorseful for the way that they handled

00:12:07the Sean Bowles situation and were extremely like, it looked very shook from the whole, um, uh, situation.

00:12:16Again, this is what it appeared to be. Now I'm not so sure because like more stuff is coming out

00:12:22and it

00:12:22just feels like if you genuinely were shook by these things, how is it keep happening over and over

00:12:29again? Now, to be fair, the Ben Armstrong incident happened in 2009. The incident with my dad, um,

00:12:37happened in 2010 to 2000 sort of 15 or actually 17. There was multiple instances. Well,

00:12:45and then again in 2023, so in that sort of like decade, decade and a half, there were several

00:12:53instances. Um, and then with Sean Bowles sort of the same in the 2010s, um, into the 2020 sort of

00:13:03same

00:13:03range. So within this like sort of decade, decade and a half, there was three different men at least

00:13:09who were all doing the same pattern of, um, using their authority that had been given

00:13:15to them by Bethel, um, to abuse interns that were all connected to them through Bethel and Bethel's

00:13:24leadership. So this is just, um, again, we're seeing a very consistent pattern. And, and I will say

00:13:31that, you know, I can speak very confidently about what I know with my own father's situation. Um,

00:13:37you know, the other two situations, uh, Sean Bowles, I have actually spoken to some of the victims and

00:13:45have, um, more firsthand information. All of this, of course, is alleged information that, um, is being

00:13:53told. But again, I would, I, there's many brave people who are speaking out and, uh, sharing their

00:14:00voices. I encourage people to listen to the, the victims themselves and don't just take my word for it

00:14:06and hear their stories because, um, it's, it's really compelling. And I think that there is sort of

00:14:14this weird campaign that's going on now where Bethel is trying to frame their problem as something

00:14:24small while trying to pull the rug out under some of these victims to lessen the impact. And I think

00:14:31that all of that goes back to the way that Bethel is a framing this all as enough, like the

00:14:37flame framing

00:14:38the, um, situation with Sarah as an affair rather than essay. Um, I mean, I think that at the heart

00:14:48of

00:14:48it, that's the biggest issue, at least when we're looking at Bethel and, and how they're handling

00:14:55everything, um, that needs to like, has to be addressed. Um, it's a pattern that I saw repeated.

00:15:03Um, this was something that happened with Bob Jones where, um, I always was told when I was young

00:15:12that Bob Jones had an affair and that was what caused his sort of, um, there was a, there was

00:15:19a,

00:15:20a moral failure, very similar to, to how they're framing it with, with Ben Armstrong. Um, but there

00:15:28was some moral failure that, that, uh, Bob Jones had committed that I wasn't aware of any of the

00:15:37details, but it, to me, it was always told that it was some sort of affair and it sounded very

00:15:42consensual. Um, and it was a, uh, lapse in decision-making that he spent several years

00:15:48repenting for. And although of course it's not good and you don't want your spiritual leaders to

00:15:53be rampantly having an affair, um, that's not the situation that we're dealing with. That's just not,

00:15:59that's how it's attempted to be framed, but it is not a situation of moral failures. It's a

00:16:08situation of abuse. I really don't dig into scandals very much because it's, it really turns into this

00:16:15weird head hunt where you're looking to find a scandal and I'm more interested in the history

00:16:20than the scandal. Yeah. So it puts me in an odd place though, because what has happened over the

00:16:26past few years, the scandal has become the history. It's not like there's a need to go try to find

00:16:33a

00:16:33scandal. Literally you can almost go to any of the big new apostolic reformation churches and the

00:16:40history is writing itself as we, as we're looking at it. I don't have to go be a heresy hunter

00:16:46to go

00:16:47find somebody who's having a scandal. So for me, the scandal isn't really Ben Armstrong as weird as

00:16:53that sounds. I, I realized that, that, you know, that's awful. What has happened? If it's true,

00:16:58it's at this point, I'm not going to say it is or isn't, but I've read through the news reports

00:17:03that

00:17:04exist. And the problem for me really is about the structure that enables it more than the individual

00:17:12scandals and how awful they are. Because when you look at the new apostolic reformation in the way

00:17:18that it's formed, it is an extension of what I came out of. When, what we were in, we claimed

00:17:26to be this

00:17:26divine healing movement that if you stayed in the movement, you had free access to healing,

00:17:33healing, that the outside churches did not have. And yet I knew several people who desperately needed

00:17:39to be healed and weren't. In fact, the batting average of those healed versus those who remain

00:17:45sick or afflicted or chronic diseases, it was like a 5% batting average. It was very, very low.

00:17:52And so that's really our only, that's really the only thing that we had other than this dead prophet guy.

00:17:58But we believed his prophecies were true. And when I found out that those were failed, what, what are you

00:18:04left with? There's not really much left. So of the fivefold ministry, we were in a onefold ministry, we had

00:18:10a

00:18:10prophet. But William Branham laid down the foundation that all of this is built upon. And he did build it

00:18:19upon the

00:18:20fivefold ministry concept, which was not the one that's mentioned in Ephesians, but it's a, it's a very

00:18:25authoritarian type construct. And the guy at the top, you, you might call them the general, those are the

00:18:32apostles, and then under them are lieutenants, all the way down to the rank and file privates, right?

00:18:38So he created this very militant structure in the model after Joel's army manifested sons of God,

00:18:45and then rewrote what each of these, he called them offices, each of these offices in the fivefold

00:18:51ministry meant. So an apostle is somebody who is sent out. It's a missionary who is an evangelist,

00:18:58but it's a missionary sent with authority, if you follow the biblical term of what an apostle is.

00:19:03In the way that it was rewritten for latter rain, it's more of a general who never leaves, who does

00:19:09all

00:19:09the strategic planning, who has a direct contact with the Holy Spirit, or Jesus, or God, or divine

00:19:16revelation, whatever is their, their gimmick that they claim to have, such that their church becomes

00:19:24operating as an office that the people who are Christian can come to and get access to God that

00:19:31they can't get in other places. Now they won't come out and say, we are, we are the only one

00:19:37where it

00:19:38don't go to the other churches. What they instead do is they will give you a little bit of reverse

00:19:44psychology and say, the other churches don't have what we have, and then go off into all of these

00:19:48things. Well, if you follow all this out to its logical conclusion, it means that God is present

00:19:54in the appointing, the leadership, the structure, and the control of the church. Otherwise, why would

00:20:02you want to submit your authority to these apostles and prophets, et cetera? So when you have a structure

00:20:09where you must believe that the leadership is appointed by God, what happens whenever one of

00:20:16them isn't? And that's really what we're facing here, because every scandal that I've looked at,

00:20:23it's reached the point where it has now become historical. This is a historical subject we're

00:20:27talking about. In every case, what I just described is the case. They believe that the leadership is

00:20:34appointed by God, because the apostle or prophet is the mediator between God and man. Because they

00:20:41have chosen the wrong mediator, now these mediators are choosing humans that are the wrong humans.

00:20:47And so in the end, the chain of command has deviated from what the Christian Bible says as a chain

00:20:54of

00:20:54command, the Holy Spirit will lead and guide you to now we have this human hierarchy of generals,

00:21:02lieutenants, all the way down to privates. So for me, it's more about the structure, the scandal itself.

00:21:07Yes, it's bad. Yes, it's awful. If you were a victim in one of these scandals, but historically

00:21:13speaking, you are in a movement that has been designed really to allow and create these.

00:21:20I think that's such a, it is a horrible truth, but a powerful truth that you're just, I mean,

00:21:28that's, it was created to facilitate this type of abuse. And we, I mean, when you were talking,

00:21:37everything you were saying, I think is really poignant of, it's not like, yes, we are seeing

00:21:47another scandal. This is not new to this world or to, I mean, the story of a man in power

00:21:58using that

00:21:58power to abuse a young victim is unfortunately a scandal that is prevalent in all sorts of

00:22:08communities and religions. And I mean, at university that this happens a lot in work positions, this

00:22:17happens, other churches like this, this is stuff that we've seen. And anybody who has their eyes

00:22:25open to see these things are probably going to know and see a lot of different instances of this

00:22:33happening in their own life, because it just is, is something that unfortunately happens a lot.

00:22:39But I think that what you're getting at is, okay, well, what specifically is happening in this new

00:22:46apostolic reformation that enables this story to, one, be repeated far more often than I would say in

00:22:58other communities and circumstances. And two, for it to be so much more intense like this, I think that

00:23:07this is some of the things that you're hitting on when you have an appointed apostle who is either the

00:23:14one who's committing the abuse or who's condoning or covering up in the case of like a Bill Johnson,

00:23:23who is not, he himself accused, at least from what I'm aware of, of abuse, but has been present and,

00:23:33and for a lot of, has been aware, made aware of a lot of this abuse happening under sort of

00:23:41his

00:23:41watching in his church and has largely worked to cover and protect the leaders that he sort of invites

00:23:51into his church and his community. Because these appointed apostles have unflinching and unwavering

00:23:59authority, they are the kings of their own castles. We hardly ever see any form of accountability in

00:24:14these situations. Even, so I think that even, let's take the example of the International House of

00:24:20Prayer. There has been an abundant amount of exposure that has happened about how Mike Bickle was abusing

00:24:30many people and had been doing that for decades. To this point, there has not been any consequence

00:24:42that is not just social consequence. I mean, so he was removed from IHOP leadership. There has been

00:24:50exposure online. And all of this, of course, is good and important. And I'm, I think I don't want to

00:24:55minimize the fact that a lot of this, just like people knowing and having this exposed to the public

00:25:00is extremely important. But Mike Bickle has not paid restitution. He's not been, there's been no civil

00:25:09suits. There's been no criminal actions against him because of this sort of long pattern of covering

00:25:18up and making it so victims in these communities do not have a voice. It is really made it difficult

00:25:29for victims to come forward and be able to get any sort of resolution, restitution consequences,

00:25:42especially with, in the Mike Bickle's case, because there's been several decades that have passed since

00:25:47many of the incidents, incidences occurred, because there wasn't really any opportunity for these women

00:25:56to speak out. Until now, there's this sort of like, well, what can we do about it now? And laws

00:26:04are being changed in Missouri to shift that, I will say. But right now, it is looking like it's

00:26:11difficult. Now, it's not the end of the story. There might be some consequences that are coming

00:26:17for Mike Bickle. Like it's the I know that there's several things that are happening. And whether or

00:26:23not, you know, we will see some legal consequences unfold is yet to be seen. But largely, even with

00:26:34the, I mean, the, probably the biggest representation of someone who has been abusing his power in this,

00:26:45this new epistolic reformation world that has many different, you know, corroborating testimonies and

00:26:53all sorts of evidence, I mean, even this individual, Mike Bickle, who has had all of this information

00:26:58about him, the fact that he hasn't even faced any consequences paints a really dire picture on how

00:27:08people are silenced in this and how victims are not given paths to find any sense of justice in these

00:27:21worlds. And with Bethel, this is the story. It's the story of how a church community has, one, enabled

00:27:30and structured itself to allow and condone these under the table abuses and grooming of vulnerable

00:27:43individuals by predatory leaders in their community. So it's the cause, but it's also the continuation of it

00:27:51in how by framing things as an affair versus assault, how the entire notion of consent and

00:28:07has been almost eradicated in these communities, because it's just sexual sin versus not, that's it.

00:28:17And if two people were engaged in a situation, who cares? I mean, I hate to say it in this

00:28:27way,

00:28:27because I obviously no one, no one would say it quite this absurdly, but it really seems to be the,

00:28:33the pattern. It's like, who cares whether or not it was consensual? They both engaged in something,

00:28:40whether she was coerced or he was coerced. I mean, these victims are not always female, but

00:28:48if the victim, regardless of whether or not the victim was coerced into the situation,

00:28:56whether they said no or didn't, whether they were young and didn't, were being manipulated,

00:29:04all of these sort of things have been completely like eradicated from the conversation.

00:29:10And then it's just a matter of, oh, well, he had an affair. And so instead the victim of it

00:29:15is his,

00:29:16Ben Armstrong's wife. That's the person who's like, oh, maybe he, he had an affair and, and maybe it's

00:29:23even Ben Armstrong himself. Like he harmed himself. And I know that that sounds crazy, but like, that is how

00:29:30I always heard frames with my dad. Like when I heard Bill or Chris or others talk with my dad

00:29:39about his own

00:29:40moral failures. And not again, moral failures is, is I don't want to repeat the same sort of

00:29:52whitewashing that I heard. It's really difficult for me to even have these conversations about these

00:29:57things without whitewashing it in my common, just talking about it because I've been so inundated

00:30:03in this world that does this whitewashing of it, but in what they would call his moral failures,

00:30:09it was always, Bob, look, what are you doing to yourself? Like you have such an, a mantle and such

00:30:15an authority and we want you to be used by God. And if you are getting distracted, if you are

00:30:22getting

00:30:22pulled away, if you are allowing yourself to be tempted by the enemy, you are lessening your power

00:30:32and authority that you have, which is just like an insane way to handle abuse. Have you ever wondered

00:30:41how the Pentecostal movement started or how the progression of modern Pentecostalism transitioned

00:30:46through the latter reign, charismatic and other fringe movements into the new apostolic reformation

00:30:53you can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website,

00:30:58www.william-branham.org. On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research

00:31:04of John Collins, Charles Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John McKinnon and others with links to the paper,

00:31:11audio and digital versions of each book. You can also find resources and documentation on various people

00:31:18and topics related to those movements. If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the

00:31:24podcast by clicking the contribute button at the top. And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to

00:31:30the audio or video version that you're listening to or watching. On behalf of William Branham Historical

00:31:35Research, we want to thank you for your support. Earlier I said the foundation needs to be in question

00:31:43and I think I should probably qualify that a little bit because for somebody who's new who hasn't read

00:31:49through all of the research or watched all the videos, there was this intent to change and morph

00:31:56the way the Christian religion was portrayed to the Christian people starting after latter reign.

00:32:02So after the history I was in, it started to change quite a bit. We believed in a pre-tribulation

00:32:08rapture.

00:32:09We were going up right before the atomic bomb hit and we were the ones who would be coming back

00:32:14down

00:32:14and walking on the ashes of the dead. That was our weird end of day, doomsday theology.

00:32:21But the New Apostolic Reformation has morphed it. What they did was they took the five-fold ministry

00:32:26concept that I mentioned earlier and they took the authority of leading and guiding away from

00:32:32the Holy Spirit to these other mediators, these apostles and prophets. So in doing that and the

00:32:39reason why they did that, they wanted to say that we are, they used the we are little gods theology,

00:32:46all of these things to say that we're the new breed of Christianity. And it's quite different

00:32:51than the old breed because we are the ones who will now rule and reign. We need to go take

00:32:56charge

00:32:56of our kingdom. So the theology shifted in that way. Well, what it does, because it puts it into a

00:33:04human

00:33:04perspective with human leadership, human appointing of these apostles and prophets and these mantles being

00:33:11past all of the weird stuff. In the end, what happens is you're running it as a human, as a

00:33:19business. And the sad truth of it is in the United States, for you to have a church, it has

00:33:24to run as

00:33:24a business from a small church to a large one, right? So logically speaking, you can't have it both ways.

00:33:32If you're going to be led by the Holy Spirit and let the Holy Spirit do the choosing, you go

00:33:36that

00:33:36direction. If you're going to govern it as a human who's running a business, you go the New Apostolic

00:33:42Reformation. It's one of two choices and you can't have it both ways. The problem is people don't think

00:33:48of all of the logic that goes with that. If you're choosing the human side and they're running it as

00:33:55business, now you have to think of these guys like your employers. Put yourself into the position of

00:34:01a boss at work. I have been over teams of people and I have worked with other team leaders who

00:34:08have

00:34:08been over teams of people. In the IT world, I have been at the executive level. So I can watch

00:34:16all of

00:34:16this from kind of like the apostle level of a business side. And people have people problems.

00:34:24There are some people who just, sadly, you put them with the opposite sex. And there's going to be

00:34:31this thing happens that either they behave correctly or they don't because they're human and humans

00:34:36have flaws. So as an employer, you can kind of recognize when this is happening. And as a leader,

00:34:43you will make things happen to make sure, A, if it's a female, she's protected. And oddly, in today's

00:34:51world, as a male, make sure he's protected because you might have the opposite. And you do things

00:34:58strategically so that there's nothing that can happen that is negative for either side. You're

00:35:05a leader, you're leading the people, and you're the one to watch over. You're the one in charge.

00:35:10Go back to my example. Either the Holy Spirit is in charge or these people, these apostles and

00:35:15prophets, they're in charge. Well, if they are, and that's what the people have chosen who attend

00:35:19these churches, they have to be thinking like this. They have to be watching these people.

00:35:24So here for me is where the real issue lies with this particular issue.

00:35:29As I understand it in reading through the news, this is an event that happened, well,

00:35:33like you just said, in 2009. Well, in 2009, that was the point, if you're looking at it like the

00:35:40employer, the employers found out, right? What did they do to protect anyone? What did they do to

00:35:47change and make sure that nothing was going to happen? Are they good employers or are they bad employers?

00:35:52Would you be at a job where you're knowingly unprotected from this type of risk by your

00:36:00employer? I know I wouldn't. I would be finding a new job. The problem is people can't logically

00:36:07make this connection. You're either led by the Holy Spirit or you're led by the apostle. It's one

00:36:12of the two. And scripture aside, there are Bible passages that talk about there is only one mediator

00:36:20between God and man. That's Jesus Christ. And Jesus said, I will send the Holy Spirit to lead

00:36:24and guide you. If you're wanting to just ignore all that part of the scripture and take the human

00:36:31path, you have to take the human consequences. So the other thing that I really struggle with here,

00:36:37we have a timeline that suggests the leadership may not have been good leadership. I'll say it like

00:36:42that and keep it simple. But then you have people who knowingly choose leaders who will do this to

00:36:49them. And when it happens, they stay in the church. They don't leave the job. They don't go find a

00:36:55new

00:36:55employer. They don't go find employment that is healthy. So this is a vicious cycle that I know that

00:37:01I'll get backlash for saying this. Yes, I see a problem with the leadership, but look at the people

00:37:07who enabled us. What world would you be in where a company would not have its employees riot if they

00:37:15saw that they're at this type of risk? No, man, you're not going to do this to me. You can't

00:37:20do

00:37:20this and be my boss. We'll all walk out and we'll stage a walkout. What church has had us walk

00:37:26out when

00:37:26one of these things happened? Instead, what they do is they want to go back to the mediator situation,

00:37:31and it's just circular logic. We're going to go back to the very thing that created the issue in the

00:37:37first place, and we're going to enable ourselves to be victimized. What business would not have their

00:37:43employees walk out after something like this happened? I think it's such a good question

00:37:52because it is really true. And I think there's a few different things that we can give as not

00:38:01necessarily answers, but can help understand why we're not seeing a mass exodus from Bethel.

00:38:09And perhaps there will be. We will see. There certainly was from IHOP to some extent. And so maybe this

00:38:18is

00:38:19just an instance where the larger congregation just was, their eyes were totally blind to what was going on

00:38:26in their community until hopefully now they're starting to see it. But I mean, this goes back to why Bethel

00:38:39needs to be a place of miracles, right? And that's why this goes back to why

00:38:47individuals can get, individuals who are heroes, miracle workers of the faith, get away with,

00:38:56I mean, right up to murder. You know, I haven't heard of murder yet, but I, you know, at some

00:39:05point,

00:39:05John, you're going to tell me a story and I'm going to fully believe it. But I mean,

00:39:09usually it's a euphemism getting away with murder, but we're really, we're really trending in that

00:39:14direction because it's just like the, I mean, truly getting away with, with some

00:39:22unbelievable things that a boss would never, you know, using, using your authority can only get you

00:39:30so far in conventional sort of circumstances. Um, your boss abuses you only to so much, uh,

00:39:36especially now that we have more structures of accountability, not that it doesn't happen.

00:39:41I mean, this happens in other settings too, but if it's widespread sort of systematic,

00:39:47you know, um, there's, there's methods of, of, of allowing people to get, um, to,

00:39:56just from a liability standpoint, like at, at, uh, I've worked at different universities and like

00:40:02when I was working as a, um, graduate teaching instructor at, at, um, Colorado state, I remember

00:40:07we had like a dozen, uh, what were they called? But a dozen like HR sessions. And it was just

00:40:17the

00:40:17entire time. It was just like, do not have relationships with your students in any way,

00:40:22like giving us, it was sometimes it was like, so repetitive and so like straightforward of just

00:40:29like, what about in this circumstance? The answer is no. What about in this circumstance?

00:40:33Answer is no, because clearly it was just like, okay, this opens us up to so much liability. Like

00:40:39Colorado state isn't, it was not like they were a beacon of, of, um, progressive and, and ethical

00:40:50understanding where they were like, we really want to make sure that we are not creating a culture in

00:40:56which people are, um, victims of, of, uh, abusers. I I'm sure that they cared about that too, but

00:41:04largely it was a liability thing. They were like, okay, we get sued if, uh, a teacher has a relationship

00:41:10with the student and there's any sort of improper relationship there, uh, that opens us up to million

00:41:16dollar lawsuit. So there are these systems in place because it's a business. And when you're working

00:41:21there, you understand a little bit, it's a business, you go home and you're like, yeah, sure. I, I, I

00:41:27went to this school and I learned some different things. I, you know, it was very big part of my

00:41:32life, but it was still like removed to, to, from my personal life in some senses. So there is those

00:41:39sort of like, there should be these sort of proper boundaries around a business. And, uh, the whole HR

00:41:47department is there to sort of structure it, um, so that there are proper boundaries in place,

00:41:54whether they do that well or not, obviously that, that depends, but that's the philosophy behind sort

00:42:00of, um, how these businesses are structured to handle these different things. But in these specifically

00:42:07in these new apostolic reformation churches and this latter rain movement, you have people who the

00:42:15followers don't know it's a business. The leaders do. The leaders are fully aware that this is like,

00:42:21okay, uh, a way of making money, a way of building platforms with the, this is structured. This is not

00:42:27like a church. And I know this, like, this is not me just saying this as if it's my opinion.

00:42:32I've had

00:42:32the conversation with leaders. Like I explicitly had a conversation with Chris Fallatin where he was

00:42:39like, Hey man, we're big, we're a big church. We can't be, um, aware of everything that's going on

00:42:46in our community and our, our congregation. And he, because he was telling me why they were not taking

00:42:54the situation with my dad very seriously and we're not, um, doing something about it. And he was just

00:43:01kind of like, yeah, yeah, because he was telling me without explicitly saying, Hey, we're a business and

00:43:06we're trying to sell our product. And like, we're not a church that cares about our community. He

00:43:12almost explicitly said those exact things of just being like, we're big. And we, we have, you know,

00:43:19he, he even talked about how many albums they sold, um, in that conversation and how many people were,

00:43:27were listening or, or, um, playing Bethel music where it was just like, it was basically Bethel is more

00:43:35than just a business is a brand is, is what he was telling me. And so like the leaders understand

00:43:41this, they understand that there is this dynamic going on, but the followers don't, they genuinely

00:43:47feel like it's a church community that they are being spiritually fed and that they're in a community

00:43:56and a place that cares about them. And in some respects they are, there are, is community that

00:44:01will center around it. Um, but then I think that that's probably the whiplash we're seeing is that

00:44:08there's a bunch of individuals who are now seeing that like, Oh man, Bill Johnson's not a shepherd,

00:44:14not in any sense of the word is he taking care of his flock. Like he's a businessman and that

00:44:22having that whiplash of, of, of changing that perspective on who the, their leaders are is something

00:44:30that like it needs to happen more. And I think that this is where I think it's right to call

00:44:35out

00:44:35some of the Bethel community and even the following Bethel community of like, we gotta, we gotta figure

00:44:41it out. I say we, I I'm obviously not a part of that community, but as someone who grew up

00:44:47and felt

00:44:48a part of that community as once, like, I do feel like this is a sort of, I feel I

00:44:54empathize with that

00:44:55feeling of being like, okay, I have to, I have to come to terms with what's going on in my

00:45:02community

00:45:02and it's a difficult thing to do, but like it has to be done. And, and so going back to

00:45:08the original

00:45:09point that I said, but that's why they need to be all miracle workers, why these leaders need to be

00:45:14miracle, miracle workers, because in these instances in which you now have a congregation or

00:45:21group of people who are starting to get wise to the abusive tendencies of their employers and their

00:45:27leaders, I cannot tell you how much the belief in miracles and these leaders as miracle workers

00:45:45helps put a severe lid on the freedom and the ability to question leadership. Because as soon as you do

00:45:59say, you're someone who's been at Bethel for a long period of time and who has seen some of these

00:46:04things happen behind the scenes and have never felt the sort of like courage to think about it.

00:46:11And now is being sort of forced to do so because you're hearing these testimonies where you like

00:46:18have to come to terms. You're either going to be like, okay, this happened or this didn't happen.

00:46:21And you can't, you can't just look away in this instance. I know how so many of individuals in

00:46:32this world think. And I know so many of them are being like, yeah, but I, I saw gold fall

00:46:38from the

00:46:38ceiling at Bethel. I saw and heard about a man getting up and walking. I know I've heard Bob Hartley

00:46:50give prophetic words that I, you know, I've seen people weep and double over because he called them out

00:46:58from a random crowd. And I saw Bill Johnson tell me stories of, of people being healed in Africa and,

00:47:09and the crazy miracles in Southeast Asia and all of these different things. This is, this is God.

00:47:19God has done all of this. And if I then recognize the flaw in these leaders,

00:47:26if I recognize them as abusers, all of that, that I've believed in disappears. And I have to contend,

00:47:37or I have to somehow square the circle and be like, oh, I guess God doesn't care about abusive

00:47:46people. Like I guess God is, is anointing these people who are some of the most horrible abusers that

00:47:53I've ever met in my life. And that's, and that's how we get a whole twisted. And that's how it

00:47:59repeats because then it's like, oh, okay, well, I guess God's okay with it. And if God's okay with it,

00:48:04why can't I do it? And, you know, maybe I need to do it in some, maybe I need to

00:48:11be in this place

00:48:12where I'm really allowing myself to, to give myself over to the power.

00:48:18Um, and the whole aura of being this like prophetic, um, abuser, um, which I know sounds

00:48:27again, sounds ridiculous, but like the allure of this like powerful person who, um, is able

00:48:34to get, uh, to take control over individuals and take control over like vulnerable people.

00:48:43Um, uh, it genuinely appeals to a lot of, um, a lot of, uh, a lot of individuals in these

00:48:53communities. And so you see sort of this pattern of, of the worst, the worst tendencies and the

00:48:59worst people are being pulled into leadership because there's this sort of allure of the power

00:49:04and the abuse. Um, so yeah, this kind of thing really angers me and here's why I'll be very

00:49:13blunt and I'm not usually that blunt, you know, me well enough to know that the heart of this

00:49:20issue is really the, the honor culture that exists. Yeah. And I'm going to go back to my

00:49:25business example, but because I think people will understand why this angers me so much.

00:49:29When I began my consulting business, I, I was the business entity. I was the face of my

00:49:36business. And whenever I would do executive level consulting with a company, they would

00:49:41interface with me and I might have a team under me, but I was the face of the business

00:49:47and whoever I handpicked for whatever project we had in operation, they would interface with

00:49:55me to appoint the right people. And I would choose the people that I felt were best suited for the

00:50:00job. And if any way along the mission that we were tasked to complete, if there was anything that

00:50:09put our project at risk, even if it was a good person I confided in and had full trust in,

00:50:15I would

00:50:16go to the company and I would, I would have to say, here are the risks that we have. Here

00:50:21is what's

00:50:21happening. And here's what I'm doing to mitigate that risk. There's always this complete control

00:50:27of the situation. And if you don't have it, you're not a good leader. The problem that I have is

00:50:34this

00:50:34honor culture has created an atmosphere where the leaders are operating the, these businesses in these

00:50:42new apostolic reformation churches, where they are usurping the role of the Holy Spirit so that they

00:50:49can handpick the anointed individuals to help them with their operation. And it doesn't matter how

00:50:55they come out and apologize and say, Hey, this happened. I'm so sorry. We didn't know that this

00:51:01was going to result in this. Yes, we knew this was a problem years ago. Yes, we continue to use

00:51:07this

00:51:07person, but we thought it was going to come out better because God is with us. There is no apology

00:51:15for

00:51:16this. If you're the face of your business, you're the one who handpicked them. But it's even worse for

00:51:22these guys than it is for my business. Say I did have an employee that did something horrific and my

00:51:28company had to eat the money and pay for the pay for the fix. That's bad. But look what these

00:51:34people are

00:51:35doing. They're saying literally that God is with us, leading us, giving us these miracles. And it's God that is

00:51:42appointing these people, not us. If you follow what they say out to their logical conclusion,

00:51:48that is what it is. They may say, I'm human, just like you. And then go do all of these

00:51:54things that

00:51:54they say are, are greater than any human. You in the seats can't do this because we're the apostle,

00:51:59we're the prophet. So they have elevated themselves into the status up here. That's fine if you do this,

00:52:06but you own each mistake that happens because you are the face of your business. The reason this

00:52:15angers me so much is because in the business example that I gave for my company, money was

00:52:22the risk. If I got engaged in a project, I might lose some money. I might go without food for

00:52:29a bit,

00:52:30but I can go get a job. There's really no human risk. But we're talking about the lives

00:52:36of people. Yeah. So if you want to find out how you can anger John, put somebody's life at risk.

00:52:42Yeah. While also you're making the money of the business and I will get very angry. Yeah. That

00:52:49is the one thing that will just make me irate. Yeah. And I think that's even in our legal system,

00:52:56there's like less, there's less recourse for people who have been taking advantage using their life and

00:53:04their beliefs as leverage versus money. Like if in a business setting, if you are, you have an employer

00:53:11who is sexually harassing you and then you get fired because you rebuffed their advances. Um, there's

00:53:18pretty good, um, systems of, of recourse for that. Now there didn't used to be, you know, 60, 70 years

00:53:26ago,

00:53:26but now that is something that there's, there's more structure around. I'm not saying that it always

00:53:31happens. Um, but, and, and I think that there probably should be more robust resources for, uh,

00:53:38individuals in those, uh, situations, but there is, there's a path, um, and, uh, a method for

00:53:46sort of restitution in, in those settings. But when, if you're a volunteer who's working for

00:53:55a religious leader who is in an unofficial capacity, you never signed anything. You never

00:54:01were, you know, there is no HR department. You just started there. And especially if you're young,

00:54:07um, I mean, there are, this is not like a, a very specific random situation. This happens.

00:54:14I mean, there are probably a thousand people in this situation right now in just like YWAM,

00:54:24IHOP and Bethel, just in those three sort of communities. Even right now, there are young

00:54:29adults who are totally giving their time. They're not being paid anything. They're finding ways to,

00:54:35to, you know, either work on the side or something like that. And then they're giving a lot of their

00:54:40time and energy to help a spiritual advisor, um, or a spiritual hero in the community. I mean,

00:54:48this is exactly what was going on with several of the victims of Sean Bulls, of, um, of Ben Armstrong,

00:54:56of my father, of, um, Mike Pickle. There are people who are saying, okay, this is, I am giving my

00:55:04life

00:55:05to this movement. Genuinely, they're devoting their life to a movement and they see these heroes

00:55:13in the community as the sort of personification of that movement. And so they're dedicating their

00:55:21lives to this person and they're young and naive and don't understand why that's a terrible decision.

00:55:27But, um, you know, because they're in their teens and twenties, this is something that

00:55:32everybody around them has said is really good because everybody in the, around them has told

00:55:37them that this community is, I mean, the, the, at the forefront, the forerunners for, for God himself.

00:55:45And so all of this time and energy is dedicated to it. They then are abused or

00:55:55manipulated, or let's say that they're, they even rebuff the advances of this, uh, abuser,

00:56:00which rarely is people are in the capacity, have the capacity to do because of these circumstances,

00:56:07but let's say they do, and then they get ostracized from the community. What's the consequences? Do you,

00:56:13do you go call a lawyer? Do you find someone who is going to take that case? Maybe,

00:56:21but the path, I will tell you, as someone who works in this world and has advocated for individuals,

00:56:27the path is not as easy for that. Now, I still think that there are paths for it. And hopefully

00:56:32we will see, um, some, some legal changes that, that, that enable that. But it's crazy to me that

00:56:44someone who's volunteering, who's not getting any money, who is in a situation where their

00:56:49whole community, they like risk social alienation, they risk, um, uh, spiritual alienation. Um,

00:56:58they're, they're very, like you said, their very lives are at stake, have little to no recourse for

00:57:04the abuse that's, um, perpetuated on them, uh, both within the legal system and obviously within the

00:57:12communities themselves. And I mean, this is, so this is what we're seeing, um, why we see it,

00:57:18our pattern and why we see it keep happening over and over again. And you're talking about what makes

00:57:24you mad. Obviously all of this makes me mad and I get mad far more often on this. Um, so,

00:57:31so maybe this

00:57:32isn't as rare, but one thing that really gets me upset is when, um, I, I think that even good

00:57:40-natured

00:57:41people who are listening to a podcast like this, or, um, well, I remember this happening a lot when,

00:57:47when I first was speaking up about the abuses that were going on with my dad, there's this question

00:57:52of like, well, why didn't they go to the police? Why didn't they get, you know, why isn't the legal

00:57:57system done anything about this? And this is the same, we will see this parroted by even leaders

00:58:03in the community. They're like, Hey, we're going to reserve judgment until like the legal system has

00:58:08played out. The entire legal system is structured in a way to make these things really, really

00:58:14difficult for these people to, um, be able to get any form of, of, of restitution or get any form

00:58:23of

00:58:23punishment. Um, because it's just one, there's a lot of freedom in religious communities. I mean,

00:58:30that's that is as American as apple pie is the freedom of the Christian religious movement.

00:58:38And I know that people don't want to agree or believe in that. That is just a fact of the

00:58:43matter

00:58:44of is like the, um, if you are a Christian pastor in the United States, your freedom to do some

00:58:54really

00:58:54gray things, both in like, um, abusive ways and, um, in financial ways. Like I have seen people get

00:59:03away with, uh, so much and use sort of the, the shield of a religious freedom to, to, um, really

00:59:14keep them, um,

00:59:17away from any sort of accountability. I mean, this, this is a whole, that's probably a whole

00:59:23different, um, podcast, so I'm not going to get on that. But when I get so upset when people are

00:59:29like,

00:59:30well, why isn't any, why aren't these men in jail? Why isn't there lawsuits? And one, there are still

00:59:38like, just because you don't know about it doesn't mean that there aren't some things like this. Not

00:59:43everything that is going on is public. And a lot of times when it gets into this now legal setting,

00:59:48people have to be more careful about how they talk about it. But to like, that is so incredibly

00:59:54difficult for there to be success. And it is so intimidating to go into that world. And so people

01:00:05are so nonchalant of, of what they think should happen in this world. And like, I agree. And this is

01:00:11where I think that there are some people like this are well-meaning where they're like, man,

01:00:15these people, if this is all true, these people should be in jail. And it's like, yes, they should

01:00:19be. That's not the world we live in though right now. And, um, I think that we're, we're going to

01:00:25see

01:00:25some of that play out with this too. And I, I am positive, positive that some of the people from

01:00:32Bethel will frame it in this, like, well, let's wait until the justice system plays out and everything

01:00:38and, and, and, and punt it to the justice system and be like, okay, well, we don't know. And Bethel

01:00:44hasn't, no one's gone to prison yet. So nothing bad really happened. I'm positive. That's going to

01:00:49be the strategy. I agree. And like I say, this, the whole thing really angers me. And it isn't that

01:00:55I'm pointing fingers at just the apostles, the prophets, or the people who are involved in the

01:01:01abuse. This is a systematic problem. It's really the system that needs to change. So thank you for doing

01:01:07this. Yeah, my pleasure. Well, if you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can

01:01:11check us out on the web. You can find us at william-branham.org. For more about the dark

01:01:15side of the new apostolic reformation, you can read Weaponized Religion from Christian Identity to

01:01:20the NAR. Available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.

01:01:59So you certainly are going to do that in time to many dimensions. You know, as soon as you'reходing

What Bethel’s Crisis Reveals About Church Power | Ben Armstrong News | Jed Hartley | Episode 598

Category

Transcript

Comments

Recommended