- 4 days ago
John and Jacob examine Christ Gospel Church through the lens of lived experience, tracing its similarities to William Branham’s movement and other authoritarian religious systems. They discuss exclusivism, hierarchy, secret-knowledge culture, prophetic authority, and the lasting effects of spiritual control on families and communities.
The conversation also explores how high-control groups can reshape the way people read scripture, relate to outsiders, and understand leadership, while showing how similar patterns can reappear in later charismatic settings. This episode is a personal and historical look at the mindset, structure, and doctrine that make authoritarian religion so difficult to leave behind.
00:00 Introduction
01:26 Jacob’s Christ Gospel Church background in South Africa
05:13 Reading the message, racism, and questioning the group
13:22 Leaving Christ Gospel and recognizing the same patterns
18:05 Denominations, hierarchy, and “who is your covering?”
31:18 Ranking, restrictions, and the worship of Sister Hicks
35:44 Christ Gospel studies, exclusivity, and searching scripture
38:08 From Branham to Bethel influence
42:08 Breaking down old lenses and starting fresh
47:48 Jacob warriors, infighting, and demonic worship practices
49:47 Advice for people trying to leave
53:44 Final reflections
______________________
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
The conversation also explores how high-control groups can reshape the way people read scripture, relate to outsiders, and understand leadership, while showing how similar patterns can reappear in later charismatic settings. This episode is a personal and historical look at the mindset, structure, and doctrine that make authoritarian religion so difficult to leave behind.
00:00 Introduction
01:26 Jacob’s Christ Gospel Church background in South Africa
05:13 Reading the message, racism, and questioning the group
13:22 Leaving Christ Gospel and recognizing the same patterns
18:05 Denominations, hierarchy, and “who is your covering?”
31:18 Ranking, restrictions, and the worship of Sister Hicks
35:44 Christ Gospel studies, exclusivity, and searching scripture
38:08 From Branham to Bethel influence
42:08 Breaking down old lenses and starting fresh
47:48 Jacob warriors, infighting, and demonic worship practices
49:47 Advice for people trying to leave
53:44 Final reflections
______________________
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
00:31Hello, and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast.
00:36I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research
00:40at william-branham.org, and with me I have my very special guest, Jacob Saul, former member
00:46of Christ's Gospel Church.
00:49Jacob, it's good to have you on and to talk about Christ's Gospel Church.
00:53I've mentioned a few times this is a church whose headquarters is literally two or three
00:59blocks that direction from my house, and it was one of two of the main, you would call
01:06it the main branches of the message, but they don't really recognize each other as that.
01:12They've separated so much that they're unaware that they came from the same thing.
01:17So I wanted to have more people on to talk about Christ's Gospel Church, and I'm very
01:21glad you did.
01:22Maybe if you could begin by just telling everybody a little bit about yourself.
01:26Okay.
01:27So before I even start, John, is whatever I'm going to say today, or contrary to what, I'll
01:36get a lot of backlash for this, because my family is very stoned, especially for my dad
01:42and my mom, they're very stoned, so I still believe in the Christ's Gospel teachings and
01:46message, and even my family members, although many of them are gone.
01:51So, yeah, I am Jacob Saul, and I grew up in a family, only son of four sisters.
02:00My dad, very involved in Christ's Gospel, South Africa, or mostly Western Cape.
02:06So in South Africa, you have different regions, Western Cape, Eastern Cape.
02:10There's about nine of them, we in the Western Cape.
02:12But because of my dad's involvement, we were very much known throughout South Africa.
02:19Even in America, the Americas, we also get known a lot, because my dad was superintendent.
02:28This is the word they use in America, superintendent.
02:31And it's been carried over into our culture as well.
02:36It's normally just director of whatever, work, Christian work.
02:42So, yeah.
02:44So I grew up in that background.
02:48I remember at about five, six years old, when we literally are full on Christ's Gospel,
02:55because it was still between the, there was different groups, and then one of the groups
03:02kind of broke away, and it just become full on Christ's Gospel.
03:06Most of our teachings came from there.
03:09And, yeah.
03:11So I was involved in Christ's Gospel a lot.
03:15And again, like I said, my dad was a superintendent.
03:17So I, being the only son, would travel with him to all these churches.
03:23And it's amazing how Christ's Gospel was so into the teachings.
03:30It was crazy.
03:32It is.
03:33I've looked through some of the teachings, and some of it sounds really familiar.
03:37She, Bernice Hicks, is the central figure who is now dead.
03:41But she went deeply into the manifested sons of God theology, which many of the people
03:48in the groups that have emerged from this can recognize.
03:52And there were a lot of different themes that we had, very similar to what you had.
03:58She would put a little twist on it, and it would be slightly different.
04:01So if you're comparing doctrine for doctrine, you would say, well, this is a completely
04:05different group.
04:05But if you knew the history of how it emerged, you would understand that this really came
04:12from the same backbone.
04:14And the weird part of it is the things that are common between the two groups are not the
04:19good things.
04:20They're usually the darker, more sinister type of theologies that enable people to create
04:27destructive groups.
04:29So this, for me, was really problematic.
04:31When I understood that she was working with William Branham, she being Bernice Hicks, she
04:37was his, I think, Sunday school teacher.
04:40I think she might have played the piano or something like that.
04:43Yeah, I believe so too, yeah.
04:44In the church, right?
04:45And then they had some sort of a disagreement.
04:47She splits off and then starts taking with her many of the things that Branham learned
04:53from other people that are darker and more sinister.
04:56So there's a lot to talk through, but the bottom line is, yes, the doctrines are a little
05:03bit out there, and they are not, in my opinion, they are not very scriptural, her twist that
05:11she takes upon them.
05:13Yeah.
05:13And just to carry on with my early years, because if you look at most of these things, I was
05:20just
05:20saying about traveling to different churches.
05:23Now, in South Africa, we would get what we call the message.
05:27They also called it the message, but it's like a, it's a transcript of what BRX used to
05:33preach, and we would get that transcript in like a study format.
05:38And most of those pastors actually read word by word by word what she was saying there,
05:45which to me was weird because like, I was also like, read through it, get a grasp of it,
05:51study it, and then put your little, what you understand from it, but they would read everything
05:57word by word what she was saying in there.
06:00It was weird because I would like, because this is what Christ's Gospel would teach about
06:08the now word.
06:09The now word is whatever BRX preached, that's the now word for the whole of Christ's Gospel
06:16international to preach.
06:19So, with me growing up, because, you know, South Africa had the apartheid years, that
06:24was very influential in, because I hear this a lot from the Branham side and also Christ's
06:29Gospel, there was a lot of, not in your face racism, but there was racism.
06:35There was like this division slightly.
06:37And it was very much in South Africa, because we had, if you look at South Africa's democratic
06:45graphic, it was a big amount of black.
06:50And then we had what we call the colored, I know it's a derogative word in the rest of
06:56the other worlds, but we had what we call the colored, the mixed race.
06:59And then we had a smaller group of what we call the white.
07:02So, the smallest congregation out of all of them were the white group, but they were running
07:09everything.
07:10I know pastors, there was a pastor in one of the, we call it Susanguve, which was in Pretoria.
07:16He had most, probably the most churches, church groups or churches that he built, but he wasn't
07:24recognized as a, he's not spiritual enough, because what would happen if we get the manuscripts,
07:30it would be sent to the son-in-law, and he would be coached on this stuff so that he's
07:38more informed.
07:41So, that is really what happened a lot.
07:44So, like I said, between four and five years old, we went to a church, which was mostly
07:50a mixed church in Anoval Park.
07:54My dad's brother-in-law, which was my mother's sister, they were sisters, he was the pastor
08:00there, 16 to 12 was Sunday school, which I loved, because I would love, I was part of
08:05the Bible quizzes, was probably, I would either come first or second, that was where I loved,
08:11because I would always be interested in it.
08:13But, 13 to 18, I got exposed more to other Christians, because now I'm at high school,
08:18which you guys believe called senior, and then I start seeing there's a difference.
08:24How can we be the only ones that's going to heaven, or being the bride?
08:30That was like a weird word, we're the only ones in the bride, but these kids love the Lord,
08:35and they are so sincere with the Lord.
08:38So, that was questions that I started, that came to mind, and I would ask them, I was always
08:46the, kind of on the rebellious stage, not stage, but I was always asked, so you're always
08:54rebellious, you mustn't ask questions, you mustn't ask questions about the leaders, if you see
08:59anything wrong, the Lord knows, he's placed us here for a specific reason, even if things
09:05go, not the way you think, and if it sounds wrong, do not question the Lord.
09:12A part they used to use a lot, and my dad used it a lot, is remember the David and
09:17Saul
09:18incident, where David would go to Saul, and cut off a piece of his garment, and he came
09:25back, and he said, like, no, you see, he got, he had the wars afterwards.
09:31So, these are things that were kept, and you were actually driven to guilt when you do speak
09:36up against these people.
09:38And then, 1992, I started working, that's when I met my wife, was that around about 19,
09:44no, no, 1992, I got, I met my wife at about 2017, but in that time, being out in the
09:53field,
09:54seeing things, I just got a different understanding, and I was always asking questions.
09:58But I was still, but as you will see, Branham, Message, wherever you go, these guys, your
10:06doctrine is so ingrained in you, that you've got this lens on, and whenever somebody preached,
10:13you look at it from a message, and like, oh, that's not right, or these people don't know,
10:18we better, it's weird, it was actually difficult.
10:22When I met my wife, the first time I went to her church, for three weeks, I was just sitting
10:26there and judging everything this guy was saying.
10:30And eventually, I just decided, listen, this can't happen.
10:33I said, Lord, how am I going to hear you if I continuously judge these people according
10:39to, and then I started phasing away from this whole Christ gospel?
10:43It's funny, I was just this morning thinking about this.
10:47Over the past few days, I had the opportunity to encounter somebody who was in my former
10:53religion, and I did not speak to them directly, but I watched them conversing with somebody
10:58who wasn't in the group, and I watched their eyes, and you can kind of tell what happens
11:03to their face.
11:05They look, they're not at all respectful of somebody who's not in the group, and they
11:09don't, you can just see it, it's apparent on their face.
11:12And I was thinking this morning about how different it was to treat people with respect, regardless
11:18of what they believe or don't believe, we thought that we could dictate to other people
11:25what they must believe and how, or we could treat them as though they were the scum of
11:29the earth.
11:30Yeah.
11:31And yet, at the same time, we were taught that we were humble and kind and gentle and
11:36meek and all of the gifts of the Spirit, not recognizing that the very things that we
11:41were doing were in rejection of the gifts of the Spirit.
11:45I was thinking about that this morning, and thinking of just the difference as it relates
11:50to me and my personality, because my personality is such that I don't care who you are, I'm
11:57going to like you and love you and treat you with respect, because I like all people, but
12:03I was in this religion that wouldn't let me do it.
12:06And worse, I was conditioned to believe that I was doing it while I wasn't.
12:11And all of this was just so odd to me as I was shaving and trying to think through this,
12:16right?
12:17But simply put, the freedom that we have now to treat other people as humans in a way
12:23that we should be treating them more closely matches the Bible than what we had in the
12:28group.
12:28Correct, yeah, true.
12:29And it was difficult, because like you said now, and what you're trying to say is that
12:36we are conditioned in that way to think that way.
12:40And it took a while for many of us.
12:42And like I said, many of my family members, because the church that I was, the congregation
12:49I belonged to was mostly family members and friends of the family that joined the church.
12:54So when I speak to them today, especially I spoke to a lady the other day, I'm like,
12:59oh, I see, she's not married yet.
13:00I said, yeah, if I said, oh, no, he's not in the message.
13:03I haven't found anybody that's in the message.
13:06And I'm like, knew what she was saying, but I'm like, just like fooling around.
13:10I'm like, so what do you, what do you mean?
13:13Because they don't even know what they're saying when they said they're not in the message.
13:16Yeah.
13:17Yeah, so it was like, it's difficult to speak to them about that.
13:22And I think after I left Christ's Gospel, I think the last, when I was in Christ's Gospel,
13:31was around about 2006, because I got married in 1998.
13:421998, then we moved to my wife's church.
13:46We sat there, which was most difficult because of the conditioning I had about how,
13:52how they need to preach, where they preach from, how do they understand the scriptures,
13:58the crucified message.
14:00You understand, you've heard about the crucified message already.
14:03Yeah.
14:03What they do with the crucified message.
14:05So what they do, every scripture is broke down in the form of the cross.
14:09So they start at one point and then say, oh, this is what it is.
14:12And the second point and the third point, they put all on the cross.
14:17Every, every congregation had to have this two pictures in them.
14:21I don't know if you saw the pictures.
14:22I'll send you, I'll send you the pictures.
14:23The one is the tabernacle and the other one is the three full nature of man.
14:29So those, those two things were, were constantly there.
14:33So you, you, you, you see this, if you walk into a church, I always have this picture.
14:39And this is what I told my dad when I, when I left and I hear them speaking.
14:45There's a, there's an old movie called Mississippi Burning.
14:49I don't know if you saw that, that movie, Mississippi Burning.
14:51In Mississippi Burning, the detective come to these guys and they have a meeting and he
14:56tells him this, he say, it might not look like a KKK meeting, KKK meeting, but it smells
15:02like one.
15:03And I told my dad, it, you might not be in Christ's gospel, but it still smells like it.
15:08You guys still have the same lingo, the same words.
15:12And by the way, they, they rate Branham very highly.
15:18They, some, most of the, the CGC people rate Branham very highly because of those, you
15:24know, those, those seven prophets.
15:27And, um, at times we would hear, no, Paul is excluded.
15:32Paul wasn't one of them.
15:34The others are, so Sister Hicks is now the seventh one.
15:36And now some guys, it's South Africa, it's weird.
15:40There's a guy called, he called himself Jehovah Rocco, Rosco.
15:46I don't know if you heard about him.
15:47Jehovah Rosco from El Tabernacle.
15:50He's like the, it's seal.
15:52I'm like, these guys are just one going, and it's all influenced by this teaching of Branham
16:00without them even knowing.
16:02It just influences and influences.
16:05Some of them goes way off, but the, the fundamentals or the foundation still stays the same.
16:11And interestingly, you mentioned Mississippi Burning.
16:14I have this in my list of movies to watch.
16:17I've, I've actually not seen it, but I know the context of it.
16:20And it ties directly to my clan related research.
16:24As I mentioned, there were some sinister figures behind the creation of Branham, which would
16:29have been extended to the creation of Bernice Hicks.
16:31And, and you know that history if you followed it, but the history created the mindset that
16:37you are either with us or you are against us and it, it wasn't necessarily even a black
16:44or white thing.
16:44I know Mississippi Burning focuses on the racial aspects, but there's so much more that comes
16:49with the clan ideology that was bred into this.
16:52You must be anti-Catholic.
16:54You must be firmly positioned against them as the rising antichrist or the enemy.
17:01And whether you agree with Catholicism or not, what this does is this trains you to act with
17:07hatred and I, I hate to say, but ignorant hatred towards the Catholic people, right?
17:13Because you, you really, you would not have a Protestant church without the Catholic church,
17:17if you understand the whole history of how this moved.
17:20So there were the anti-Catholic ideology, the Christian identity.
17:24There's so many different themes that came with that.
17:27Some of them may have been good.
17:29There were, there were things that even in its era, the clan were recognized across many
17:36newspapers and many magazine articles for some of the good things that they did.
17:40They, they truly did have good, but they also had evil and can you mix good with evil and
17:46call it good?
17:46That's really the problem.
17:48We'll take that a step further.
17:50Branham was created because of this.
17:52Bernice Hicks split off of this and what they brought with them were not the good things.
17:58They did bring some good, yes, but can you truly call what they have good if they're mixing
18:03good and evil?
18:05No, you can't.
18:06And that, that leads me to where I, where I am now in my life.
18:09You know, looking at all of these for, for a couple of years now, I've looked at where
18:14did the church start or not the church, where did denominations start?
18:18Because most of them are just denominations.
18:19It's not based on the foundation of the true church, the real church, the church that was
18:25formed in, in the book of Acts.
18:27And I look at even Pentecostalism, like if you're in South Africa, Cape Town, Pentecostalism
18:32is, it has got that similar root because it all comes from this tree that Branham and he's
18:40following as bold because that tree now looks at, when we look at the Pentecostal guys in
18:46South Africa, looks at the rest of the guys, they're like, we are right, you guys are wrong.
18:52We're going to heaven, you're not going to heaven.
18:55And even though there is so much evil in some of those congregations, and if you look at it, it's
19:02like, wow,
19:03these guys are really bad, but because they belong to a Pentecostal movement, they see themselves
19:09slightly more higher elevated than the rest of the other denominations, which also have errors.
19:18And this is, this is my saying on that.
19:20I'm like, all denominations got a truth, but because they have either a lot of evil or a lot
19:27of untruth, there is that mix.
19:30And what you just said now, you can't mix good and evil together and say, this is good.
19:35So, and that's where we've just started to decide, listen, we have to walk away from this
19:41stuff.
19:42We have to not be part of these things anymore.
19:45And there's a scripture that even when I mentioned it to a guy from the message the
19:50other day, I said, oh, no, but that's a Branham scripture.
19:52I'm like, how's a Branham scripture?
19:54You see that mindset?
19:56Revelation 18.4.
19:57Get out of my people.
19:59I'm like, before Branham even spoke those words, those words were in scripture.
20:03And we were always warned about it.
20:05So they always go back to, oh, Branham said this.
20:08And Branham said, in Christ's gospel, Sister Hicks, Sister Hicks.
20:11I was, as a kid, I was like, can't we just get this woman's name out of your mouth and
20:18just say Christ?
20:20Because this is what we do in fellowship now.
20:22We come together in fellowship in a little group wherever in Cape Town.
20:26And the one thing I told him, if you do not hear what the Holy Spirit is saying in this
20:30meeting, you haven't heard.
20:32You've heard what Jacob Saul has said or this guy has said.
20:36I said, if we don't, but what happens in those denominations, they want to hear what
20:42the B.R.
20:42Hicks, the Branhams, those guys are saying.
20:45And that is very important for them.
20:48And they don't grow from it.
20:49Exactly.
20:50And it's like I said, they brought some of the bad things forward.
20:54One of the biggest of which was this idea that there has to be a messenger for the age
21:01is what Branham called it.
21:02And I know Hicks probably had a different term, but essentially what they're describing
21:06is you must have a central figure.
21:09And I never really knew how much I had that buried in my being until I left.
21:15And people started asking me after I left and I'm experimenting with all of these new
21:19denominations.
21:21They said, well, if Branham is not your leader, who is your leader?
21:24And I'm scratching my head thinking, well, I don't really need one, do I?
21:29The Holy Spirit was supposed to be the leader, right?
21:31That's what the Bible said.
21:33And I was reading the Bible and I was understanding the difference.
21:36Well, I thought that that was going to be a one or two time question and people would ask
21:40it and just that would be the end of it.
21:42That is probably the most common question that I get from week to week across all of my
21:48social networks and my email.
21:50Every single person who's indoctrinated with this mindset thinks that you must submit to
21:55some authoritarian figure.
21:57They have to have a central figure.
21:59And worse, if they escape, if they don't deprogram from that mindset, they'll unplug from one
22:06cult leader and plug into another cult leader because they must submit to this type of authority.
22:11And it's clearly anti-scriptural.
22:13It is.
22:14And that leads us to the five-fold ministry.
22:17Because the five-fold ministry, when I read in scripture, the other day I had the conversation
22:22with the guys like five-fold ministry.
22:24I'm like, okay, some say four because pastor and teachers one.
22:27And then you go to second Corinthians and then you go to Roman 12.
22:31I'm like, there's more gifts.
22:33In Ephesians, it's just like put it down as four or five.
22:37And these guys, which came with these mindsets, they needed to push this five-fold ministry
22:44so much so that there is hierarchy and you need to look to somebody.
22:50You need to find a leader.
22:52And the question is asked in South Africa as well, especially among our mixed-race people.
22:58The first question they ask me is like, who's your covering?
23:02Okay, now, so if you're not in a church or congregation, who's your covering?
23:06I'm like, just because you asked that question, initially I'm like, Christ is my covering.
23:11But then I got to the place.
23:13I'm like, people that ask this question is actually not biblical because that is putting
23:20somebody else in the place of Christ.
23:22Because you said Christ is the head of the church and we are members of that body.
23:26So it just breaks down this whole mindset.
23:31And people think this way, which it sometimes baffles me to understand why have we, and now
23:40that I listen to a lot of your podcasts, I listen to a lot of, I go in deeper into
23:44where did
23:45the church really start, even South Africa's church.
23:47If you look at the church in South Africa, a lot of people use the excuse that, oh, the
23:53white man brought religion into South Africa.
23:56I'm like, there was a bad group to it that brought all this weird stuff in.
24:02But most of these guys were in Europe, Germany, all those places and were persecuted.
24:09And they fled with these guys and they started little missionaries.
24:13But then you get the guys at the Engie Church, which was very Freemason.
24:18Engie Church is Freemason based.
24:20Then you get the, I think it was the AOG or what was the church that also came here that
24:26started the Zion movement.
24:28The Zion movement actually broke away from them in South Africa.
24:31I'm like, our forefathers did not know God.
24:34Oh, but we serve God.
24:36I said, no, we serve trees.
24:37We served all these weird stuff.
24:40God was faithful to bring those people.
24:42But what happened is with this evil came in.
24:45That's why he said it's like now denomination and we have to have a structure and have to have
24:48to put place in here and this is your leader.
24:51We're actually busy now on other social media group discussing the old apostolic and the
24:58new apostolic movement in South Africa.
25:01And it's weird where they came from.
25:03All of them came from a break, break up or break away.
25:08And there was always something happening like in South Africa.
25:12South Africa is big, big, fair share of, of fights.
25:17So I remember my dad says they started off this one couple came to South Africa and then
25:23the next couple came and there was a fight so that to choose.
25:27And suddenly everybody sided with this one group, which is, I don't know if you heard
25:31this name, Francis, South Africa, Jeff, Jeff, Francis, they were the leaders in South Africa
25:40for a while.
25:41And then suddenly he's going to now stand off.
25:45His son needs to take over.
25:46His son needs to take, he says this whole family business.
25:49His son takes over.
25:50Suddenly the church is in arms like, this is not how it works.
25:54Your son's going to take over.
25:55There's more qualified people.
25:57Another breakup happened.
25:58And then suddenly my dad was on the one side, my, my dad's brother-in-law's on the
26:03other side, siding.
26:04And then everything just broke, broke up.
26:06We were literally sitting in a church for six months without a, what we call a pastor.
26:11You know, it's like a pastor because we, the pastor said, I'm standing off because I am
26:15not a pastor anymore, according to the books of Christ's gospel.
26:18And we just waited for six months.
26:20And eventually we just said, listen, there's not, nobody's coming.
26:23Nobody's coming to say what's actually happening.
26:25We continued.
26:26But there was also this hatred and bad things happening.
26:30Now you'll, in all denominations, I see this happening.
26:33There's always infighting.
26:35There's always a breakup because most of this foundation, these guys build on was not Christ.
26:40It was on a denomination.
26:42In the early seventies in South Africa, there was, then the one group would come and, and
26:48the other group would come and then the full gospel would come and then the Christ gospel
26:53would come and the message guys would come and it's this whole separation, you against
26:57us the whole time.
26:59And my dad was in the middle of that.
27:01And that's where he knew, knew Christ's gospel, not knowing the background.
27:09But it was so ingrained in him, our whole lifestyle.
27:12I hear a lot of people talk about clothing, about how you dress, what you have to do, the
27:19witness, you have to write to a specific.
27:21If I look at other denominations, it's exactly the same.
27:25The new and old apostolic, when you want to do something, you write the letter to the
27:29priest, they say yes or no, give you a, it's exactly the same culture that is being, being
27:36brought into, and it's mysticism.
27:39It comes from all these weird, weird teachings that came from the East, which is just crazy.
27:47Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started or how the progression of
27:52modern Pentecostalism transitioned through the latter reign, charismatic and other fringe
27:57movements into the new apostolic reformation?
28:00You can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website,
28:05william-branham.org.
28:07On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins,
28:13Charles Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others, with links to the paper,
28:19audio, and digital versions of each book.
28:21You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to the
28:27those movements.
28:28If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the Contribute
28:34button at the top.
28:35And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening
28:40to or watching.
28:41On behalf of William Branham Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support.
28:46You mentioned Freemasonry.
28:48And I will never forget, whenever I left the movement, I started looking at Freemasonry because
28:55I thought there must be some sinister evil plot that is behind all of this mess that I came
29:00out of.
29:01And it took me years to understand this.
29:05The sinister plot really was that people had mimicked the structure of the fraternal organizations.
29:13The structure was such that you had this secret mystery.
29:16You had to join to get into it.
29:19Interestingly, they would say if you joined a denomination, you're going to hell.
29:23So you still had to become a member to be able to learn the secret.
29:28And the only way that you could get to the secret was to learn more and climb up the pyramid
29:32of knowledge within the groups that we were in.
29:35And it's almost structure for structure, the same as one of the fraternal organizations.
29:41And it took me years to realize that it wasn't really that the fraternal organizations were
29:46behind everything that we're seeing as far as the mess of the cults.
29:50It's that this was like a cookie cutter stamp of how you would create a scheme to invite people
29:57in and attract them into your hidden mysteries.
29:59And so what you essentially ended up with, Christianity had morphed itself into becoming
30:05more like the ancient mystery cults.
30:08And if you want to know what this is, you can go on Wikipedia.
30:10You can type in mystery cult or mystery religion.
30:14You'll find some examples.
30:15But it's the idea essentially that we have the knowledge that the other people of our kind
30:20do not.
30:21And so therefore, we're better than them.
30:23In other words, we're Christians, but we have the secret thing that the Christians down
30:28the street do not have.
30:29And so what it does is it gives you this indoctrinated mindset that you are better than the other
30:36guy just because you have the knowledge.
30:39And sadly, because there are people who don't know how to handle this type of knowledge, they
30:45just speak down to the other people who don't have the secret.
30:48And that's why when I said the person, you could tell right on the face that this was
30:54not a good interaction.
30:55Well, it's because of this.
30:58It's because of the fact that they think that they have something special the other person
31:02doesn't have.
31:03And the funny part is, if you look at it more like the book, The Emperor's New Clothes, what
31:09they have are these clothes that the other person can see right through and see that I really
31:15don't want what it is that they have.
31:18When I look at this, I've just made some notes here, and I look at this.
31:22Once in one of our meetings, a letter was given to us.
31:27Apparently, this is what they said, but the Satanist has got a list of all the churches
31:33that they are afraid of, and Christ's Gospel Church was on top of the list.
31:40And I do not know how much truth there was to it, but that's the one.
31:44But the one thing that is scary, like you look down on other congregation or church that's
31:52not Christ's Gospel, but interdenominational, there was also looking down on it because
31:57you have this rankings, like you said, in the Freemasons.
32:00Like, you will see people were growing, we had the tabernacle that we looked at, and where
32:06you would always judge yourself according to the tabernacle, or I'm here now, and you
32:10always feel that you're not good enough.
32:12But then you would also look at your brother and measure him according to that.
32:16You're like, oh, you know what?
32:19He's struggling.
32:20Because when I look at our family, I would always, it was weird for me to see that things
32:27that we were told not to do when I went to my cousins, which was also part of Christ's
32:32Gospel, they were allowed to do things.
32:35They were allowed to play sports.
32:36They were allowed to have a TV in their house.
32:39They were allowed to have Game Boys.
32:41And we weren't even allowed to have any of this.
32:45I'm like, so there was this difference.
32:47And some of the women I would see, or the ladies, the kids I would see in the road, youngsters
32:52wearing pants.
32:54And I'm like, oh, this is not good.
32:57Why are they allowed this?
32:59So you would have this ranking inside the congregation itself.
33:05And it just, there was no growth.
33:11And in essence, it was more just infighting, infighting, infighting the whole time, because
33:17you will find one person to be good and another person to be bad.
33:21The one thing that didn't sit well with me all the time, Christ's Gospel believed that
33:29when Sister Higgs died, the Lord is coming.
33:31That was a known fact throughout.
33:35Oh, when Sister Higgs dies, the Lord, because she also said this.
33:39So there was worse.
33:40She spoke about this.
33:41It's like, when Sister Higgs died, and I'm like, I was actually waiting for her to die.
33:48It sounds bad.
33:50But I'm like, just to prove you guys, it's not true.
33:55Sister Higgs is not God.
33:57Sister Higgs is not.
33:58Not even Moses is God.
33:59Not even any of those guys.
34:00Not even Paul is God.
34:01Paul asked the questions.
34:03Now, who's Paul?
34:03Who's Apollos?
34:04Who's Cephas?
34:05And he asked us questions, and I'm like, if Paul can ask these questions, who is these
34:10guys that put themselves on a pedestal, I am rating them higher, because C was, you
34:17know, in the Muslim belief, they have, Muhammad is the best of all mankind.
34:23This is what they looked at this woman.
34:26And they started worshiping this woman, having pictures of her all over the place.
34:31I've mentioned this a few times, but as I was studying church history, I came across
34:36the works of Eusebius, and he's talking about how the ancient mystery cults came to
34:40be, and it was exactly this.
34:42There was some person who did some great thing, or was some religious respected person, who
34:49over time became the object of worship, and then later people were sacrificing their
34:54children to the dead deity, and they were representing the dead deity by stone, or some idol that they
35:01had structured.
35:02And I got to thinking about the group that I left.
35:04We were like one step away from this.
35:07No, we may not have sacrificed our children, but we did give this dead human guy so much
35:13respect that maybe he wasn't called God to us, but we treated him like he was.
35:20Whatever he said on recording or written transcript, it was superior to anything that we read in
35:26the Bible, and if there was ever a conflict, we chose what he said, and then we would dismiss
35:33this by thinking our minds just can't understand why he said that, but we believe what he said.
35:38He knows what the Scripture says.
35:40So in essence, we took his words above the Bible.
35:44Yeah, and that is what I always feared, and I don't know why me growing up in Christ's
35:52gospel, my only, because we in South Africa, we would get the magazine, I don't know if you
35:59know the little magazine, Jerry Phelps, I believe it's Jerry Phelps, or Phelps, he meant somebody
36:04else to wrote it, that was my information I got, because you have to do the Christ's gospel studies
36:13prescribed by PRX and a group of people there, and how far you've gone into this, that is your
36:20ticket, as I can say, to leadership, becoming a pastor, becoming a youth leader, becoming a
36:27whatever in the organization.
36:29So you have to go through that, and by studying any other, you actually, you're not in the
36:38message, if I can call it that way, if you study anybody else, if you listen to anybody
36:42else, we weren't allowed to go to other churches, we weren't allowed to go visit other people,
36:47we would always tell the people to come and visit us, and we were always the people that
36:52wanted to have the right answers to these things, because this is how it is.
36:59And just, oh, and many of the things, and I think you've done this over your years, and
37:05I can hear that, is that you had to now go and search scriptures yourself, done it in
37:1144,000, because Christ's gospel belief, they're the 144,000, we are part of the bride, we are
37:18the guys that's going to be in the bride, the rest is not going to be in the bride, they're
37:21going to be part of the new earth and the new heaven, we are going to be part of the
37:25new
37:25Jerusalem. And, and that is where we've, you see, you've, you, you as organization has
37:32now placed a higher rank on yourself, putting little marks on yourself, like, I'm better
37:40than them. And it becomes difficult to look at this as a child. And I know some of the
37:49other kids just accepted it, I did not. I was always like questioning, like, and although
37:54I love what I've heard there, it was good for a while. But I would always ask questions.
38:00Now, with this, there's, there's a, there's a recording you made on, from Branham to Bethel.
38:07That was me. So, I was in, I was in a, a spin-off of Branham, but I was in
38:18a spin-off of Bethel
38:19as well. We practiced whatever Bethel practiced. We did the, we did the prophecies, the school
38:27of prophecies. We did the, um, fire tunnels. We did all this, um, laughing in the spirit.
38:35Um, we, we, we, everything Bethel believed, that is what we carried over, the sozo, the
38:42weird stuff, the, and, um, me looking at it now, when, when that's the first, um, podcast
38:49I actually listened to because I, I never found anything on Christ's gospel. And then I found
38:53this thing, and I'm like, this is exactly my journey from the Branham understanding, growing,
39:01going to the other Pentecostal church, ending for seven years. I was part of this church.
39:06And I'm like, oh, so one day we, we in the, in the, in the band. So we did a
39:11secular, a
39:12secular, um, concert. And, um, it was, um, the 80s. So it was like on this Valentine's
39:19day that was just before lockdown happened. And I'm standing there playing and we're doing
39:24all this, um, 80s music and I'm playing. And I felt the same feeling I got when I'm in
39:31a worship set. This feels exactly the same. And then I started realizing this is, this thing
39:43is dangerous. This thing that we call worship in the Bethel, Hillsongs, movements, and all
39:51these things are very dangerous because we're going after emotionalism, spiritualism. We,
39:59we, all these isms we go after and we forget about Christ. Who's Christ? Who's Christ in all
40:06of this? Because it really becomes about we really are.
40:10Darrell Bock It's interesting that you mentioned that because,
40:13as I mentioned, one of the problems that people have when they're in one of these destructive
40:17groups, they unplug from one group and then they unplug themselves into another group that
40:22is just maybe not as destructive, but has the potential to become as destructive. And
40:28I have friends who were in Christ's gospel. That's exactly where they went straight to Bethel.
40:34And when you talk to them and you try to explain that, well, this, yes, it may sound better
40:40and prettier and more exciting. It's still the same foundation. And the, the answer that
40:46you usually get from anybody who that I've talked to, who went to Bethel and speaks highly
40:51of it, they'll say, yes, but we left this destructive group and they're trying so hard to do good.
40:58I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt because they're trying, they're trying to reach
41:02the lost. And for me, it's much like this. If, I don't know if you know what a sinkhole is.
41:08And in
41:09the States we have this thing called a sinkhole and what it is, it's near a river and the ground
41:13will just suddenly cave in and go into the river. Well, if you build a house on this and your
41:18house
41:19crumbles, your house is gone. It's just, it's demolished. Somebody could come along to the sinkhole and
41:25build a slightly bigger house and prettier and more exciting and say, we're going to feed the
41:29poor from this house. We're doing a good thing. But underneath you still have the problem. And for
41:35me, when I look at Bethel, when I look at, I mean, even right now I see Mike Bickle is
41:39about to come
41:40to IHOP KC. All of these things descended from the same root. And if you're building on that same
41:47root and you're not taking away the bad, the dangerous thing, pull the dangerous thing out and
41:53just replace it with solely only the scripture, only the Bible, you're going to end up with
41:59something that isn't the Bible. Because if you take the Bible and you add anything else with it
42:04and then say, here's our religion, it's not a Bible-based religion. It's something else.
42:08Yeah. And again, I think that the whole idea of doing these podcasts, I believe, is to say that,
42:18listen, look at where you are now and see how it, the Branham and the Lateran and those guys has
42:26influenced your thinking and your doctrine, because many of those, those thought patterns were
42:32influenced. We call it the rabbit hole. It's like literally just going down, you're going,
42:36what? You never get to the end of it. And it is, it's really there where, where people start
42:42break. It's like, you find something new, but it's exactly the same. It just looks different.
42:47You go to another place and this, I really believe these podcasts, I feel so strong in me and I
42:55wish
42:55more people can listen to this with an open mind and just say, let's just listen to what John and
43:02the guys are doing, trying to just, all we want to do is just show you guys, this is what
43:07it's all
43:07about. You guys all decide at the end of the day, what you have. Many of us, like myself, we
43:13came out of
43:14understanding like these things are bad because in 2000 and 2020, just when the full lockdown
43:25happened, sitting at home and I was looking at all of this. And the one thing I had to realize,
43:31because Christ's gospel is still in the back of my mind, it's still forming a lot of how I think
43:36about scripture and I read scripture and I break up scripture. And it's like, Lord, you have to take
43:40everything away that I know, good or bad. Even if there's a good thing in what Christ's gospel has
43:46done and a lot of people don't want to understand it. It's like, listen, if it's good, it's fine.
43:51Let it go. The Lord will then just remind you again of these little things and he will take all
43:57those
43:57bad. And that is where me and my family had to walk and say, listen, let's just forget about all
44:03these things. Let's start from fresh. Let's start from new because the Lord can rebuild in a day.
44:08He can give you everything you need in a day. And with that, I started looking at guys like
44:13David Pawson. I don't know if you know David Pawson. I started looking at a guy called Jacob
44:18Price. Jacob Price has got a very, he's a Jewish influence guy. But when I listened to their
44:24teaching, I'm like, this stuff is also because Christ's gospel really believed that they were
44:30teaching from the Old Testament, from the tabernacle. But a lot of it was mysticism brought into
44:37those teaching. And I was always worried because when I taught people in South Africa, Christ's
44:41gospel, nobody knew about Christ's gospel. Nobody knew about the teachings of Christ's gospel.
44:45Nobody understood the teaching of Christ's gospel. And I'm like, oh, I came from this church. They
44:49always thought when I say Christ's gospel, Christ's gospel, they thought I talk Latter-day Saints,
44:55you know, the church of, and I'm like, no. So then I had to explain to them where we were.
45:00And now I'm sitting with my family and cousins trying to break this down for them. They still,
45:08and I tell them the first thing you need to do is just break down these old things, put it
45:12aside
45:12for a while, six months, three months, a year, and just concentrate on reading scripture on how you
45:22see it. Don't take scriptures, read the whole passage, read the whole book, read all of them
45:29together. Now you understand what was actually, what, what Paul tried to say, what Peter tried
45:34to say, what Jesus tried to say, what was the mysteries, because that is the thing they talk
45:39about, the mysteries, the secrets. But the secret is Christ. The mysteries is Christ. It's not
45:50what Branham did, what we call the serpent seed, the gap theories, the eternity past and the
46:03eternity future. And these words are only recognized in the Christ's gospel setting. When you go out
46:10there, people don't know what you actually, then I have to explain it to them. There's certain words
46:15and lingos we have created, and it actually does not make sense to me. I sat the other day and
46:21I'm
46:21like, this stuff doesn't make sense to me anymore. I actually thank the Lord because he like wiped that
46:28hard drive, not even wiped it. He just took it out and gave me a new hard drive. It's like,
46:32yeah,
46:32this is what I want you to know. And now you sit down with people, speak about denominations. I speak
46:38to
46:38them clearly about denominations. Denominations is bad because it brings divisions. Even if you
46:44think your pastor is doing good, if it's a denomination, it's bad in the sense it brings
46:50division because you are this group. I am this group. That is just what it is. We can't sit
46:55together. We can't fellowship. So there's a scripture we use when we talk about fellowship. People always
47:02say, oh, we're in fellowship. I say there's only one scripture. And I believe it's in 1 John or 2
47:07John.
47:08He says, if you walk in the light as I'm in the light, then you have fellowship with one another
47:15and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses. I say that is our fellowship work, not in a denomination. It
47:20works when we are connected with Christ. We walk in the light of him. So it's a good journey that
47:27I'm on.
47:28I love the journey. I like breaking down. It's frustrating. And it's sad to see that some of
47:33my friends, my parents, my siblings are still so entangled in these things. And it's not bringing
47:45life. There's no fruit. Nothing to that sense. You've heard about the Jacob warriors in Christ's
47:54gospel. So I remember one year. So when the church was in this breakup, so the pastors would all come
48:02together from South Africa, all over. They meet in Cape Town. So when we have what we call our
48:08combined service, they would have a pastoral meeting. And in the meeting, my pastor's wife,
48:15where I belong to the last one, always came to me. Your name is again mentioned in the meetings.
48:20So I'm not even in a meeting. I'm a youngster of 23, 24, 25 years old. But my name is,
48:26yeah,
48:26he hates the pastors. Because I asked him questions. So I was always mentioned. So that
48:32morning, the pastors is in a big fight. They disagree with each other. The service goes on.
48:37But as the service start, the brother that's actually leading the service said, I'm not going
48:43to lead the service. We're going to make the music. I'm not going to lead the service. Get
48:46yourself a worship leader. They call me to the front. I'm standing in front. Now I have to lead the
48:52service. With all this commotion happening, the pastor is angry with his pastor. And they're all
48:57angry with each other. And I'm standing there. I'm leading the worship. The Jacob warriors acted up
49:03that morning. And I knew exactly why. Because now they're trying to break down whatever's happening
49:10now. You see how demonic this thing is? They would have the ladies with the long hair would come to
49:17the front and shake it around. And like, I'm like, this is not from God. What are you guys doing?
49:26And this is the questions. This is the stuff at the end. At the end, that just led me to
49:32a place
49:33to say, listen, yeah, I had enough. If you had some advice to give people who are in the group
49:39and can
49:41recognize that there's something wrong, but aren't able to find a way to escape, what advice would you give
49:46them? So from my, my, where I was, I had to first of all, forget everything. You have to emotionally
49:55detach yourself from it. So like, this is what I believe is right. I believe this woman is right.
50:00First believe that you're not going to be punished if you speak up against Sister Hicks. You are not
50:08going to be sinning if you speak up against Christ's gospel. The Lord himself said, let us reason
50:14together. He speaks to us. He speaks. He said, we need to get to the place. We say, I am
50:19willing to
50:20ask questions. If I'm wrong, the Lord himself is faithful and gracious and merciful to bring me.
50:27We know God is a God of love. We teach this stuff and he's willing to say, I will teach
50:32you this stuff,
50:33but take a season in your life and break this stuff down. Listen to podcasts like this. Listen to
50:41other people. Listen to these guys. Even David Pawson was a very, is very influential in me in
50:48starting to break down the Bible because all he does, he doesn't speak doctrine. He just speaks
50:52scripture. What does the Bible say? Why was it written? Because the lens that we had on all the
50:58time was a CGC lens and we read scripture. So he said, get out of there. The people that is
51:06contrary
51:06to what you are saying, because we hate when somebody is not believing the same we do. Sit
51:12with those guys and say, I don't agree with you, but let me hear you out and hear what are
51:16you saying?
51:17I'll go like a Berean and go home and study these things. We have the Lord. We don't, you don't
51:24need
51:24the witness. Although you believe the witness is still there, say, Lord, I want to hear directly from
51:30you. What are you saying concerning these things? And it actually, it takes a while. It took me a few
51:37years, but until the day I decided, and I had to go through that journey, which was good because now
51:43I
51:43can speak to people and say, guys, I know there's only one way and it's Christ. No other man is
51:50a
51:50mediator. If any man becomes the mediator, if any man stands in front and he's the one that is,
51:57he gets the divine revelation from God. That divine revelation, because many of these cults,
52:05and I call them cults, many of these cults started with a person that was alone in their room and
52:10heard
52:11from an angel, heard from some special intervention in a dream, and they came and they said, the Lord
52:18said this. In the church, in the body of Christ, where two or three agree on something, so shall it
52:26be.
52:26So this is the whole thing. That is where witness is. Witness is, you say, I've heard. The pastor
52:31said, I hear from the Lord. He comes and sits with other brothers. We speak about it and say, my
52:35brother,
52:36we don't hear the same like you say. We, I don't believe that is what scripture is, but because they
52:42have so much authority, people just run, and we have to be careful that we place certain people as
52:48authority over, over, over us. Nobody should be authority over us. Yes, we have people that are
52:55laboring. I read that scripture where Paul says, honor those that labor amongst you, that, that goes
53:02into the word and study the stuff, but most of the time, like in where I am in fellowship now,
53:07I sit in
53:08fellowship, and I say, guys, we need to hear from the Lord on this. You go home, you've heard what
53:14I
53:14said, what this brother said, what that brother said. You go and study your scriptures. If you're
53:19not in the word of God, if you're in the message book, if you're in the tapes, if you're in
53:23the
53:25magazines or the books those people are written, you are not in the word. You're hearing from them.
53:31Put that aside and listen to what the scriptures are saying concerning this stuff. You'll be surprised
53:38how these things are just opening up for you. Very good. Thank you so much for doing this.
53:44Now, I'm glad I could, and it's, to me, it's, it's sad. If I could, if I could save everybody,
53:52if I say save, if I can just change people's minds, everybody's minds, I know the Lord will be pleased
53:59at it, but he's saying everybody's got to have to choose for themselves. Everybody's got to have a
54:02decision to make concerning this. The one thing we need to recognize that most of these doctrines
54:08have an arrogant way of explaining that they are good. There's an arrogance to it. They, they don't
54:15listen you out. They're like, yeah, but I'm saying, okay, I don't want to hear about Branham. I don't
54:19want to hear about PRX. Let's speak about scripture. Let's speak about what does the Lord say concerning
54:25this? Then we go and say, what has this person said about it? Let's hear what scripture, let's read
54:30the whole scripture. I'm like, wow, this is actually deeper than what you understand.
54:36And then you break it down carefully. Too many people are stuck in these things because they
54:43are looking to somebody and not Christ. Too many. Well, thank you so much. If you've enjoyed our show
54:50and you want more information, you can check us out on the web. You can find us at william-branham
54:54.org.
54:55For more about the dark side of the New Apostolic Reformation, you can read Weaponized Religion
54:59from Christian Identity to the NAR. Available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.
55:30Gosh!
55:32Don't get caught in it!
55:33Like, then you can see on your screen. On you've ever heard of our song back then byей.
55:41You're the only way you noticed in your phone on YouTube isjourn. A double
55:45rate for me, because it's paid for you. That is why you can tell you. Because you
55:46know, a aspects of this camera that you don't come in with it, add out to happening on a person
55:47when
55:47internet友 ه... I don't
55:47have to see much info before you can read anything that it's good if you're knowing that you'reatzin.
55:50Yeah, you saw your eyes, but you truly know what? You're starting to see the difference,
55:51but you don't pan on some of myلك. And then you want to see on the
55:52whole conversation back there.
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