- 2 days ago
John, Jenny, and Shelby discuss YWAM’s stated values, decentralized structure, and the gap they describe between official language and lived experience. The conversation explores themes of accountability, spiritual authority, “hearing God’s voice,” missions culture, Seven Mountains language, and how young people can be shaped by high-pressure religious environments.
They also examine concerns around DTS, parental awareness, liability forms, danger narratives, martyrdom language, and the way former members describe the long-term effects of their involvement. The discussion remains focused on the structure, theology, and practical outcomes described by former YWAM members.
00:00 Introduction
02:43 YWAM’s Values and the Seven Mountain Mandate
07:11 Decentralization Without Accountability
18:10 Hearing God’s Voice and Spiritual Authority
24:14 Danger, Protection, and Missionary Culture
33:28 Lauren Cunningham’s Lasting Influence
40:28 Martyrdom, Fear, and Harmful Recruitment
47:04 Death Waivers and Dangerous Missions
51:52 Advice for Parents
56:21 Closing Thoughts
______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBSpezVG15TVG-lOYMRXuyQ
– Visit the website: https://william-branham.org
– Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilliamBranhamOrg
– Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@william.m.branham
– Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wmbhr
– Buy the books: https://william-branham.org/site/books
They also examine concerns around DTS, parental awareness, liability forms, danger narratives, martyrdom language, and the way former members describe the long-term effects of their involvement. The discussion remains focused on the structure, theology, and practical outcomes described by former YWAM members.
00:00 Introduction
02:43 YWAM’s Values and the Seven Mountain Mandate
07:11 Decentralization Without Accountability
18:10 Hearing God’s Voice and Spiritual Authority
24:14 Danger, Protection, and Missionary Culture
33:28 Lauren Cunningham’s Lasting Influence
40:28 Martyrdom, Fear, and Harmful Recruitment
47:04 Death Waivers and Dangerous Missions
51:52 Advice for Parents
56:21 Closing Thoughts
______________________
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.
00:35I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research at william-branham.org.
00:42And with me, I have my co-hosts, researchers, and friends, Jenny McGrath and Shelby Hoffer, former members of YWAM.
00:49Shelby, Jenny, it's good to be back and to talk about YWAM.
00:53And we've been diving into the core values and how different they are from what people expect.
00:59I think that's really the key.
01:01For me, I'm actually, I got quite surprised in the last one that we recorded.
01:07I really didn't know that it had gone to the level that you both had described.
01:12And so this morning, I went back and listened to it again, and I'm still, like, in a state of
01:16shock after hearing some of those things.
01:19And what I've come to learn is YWAMs, their problem is not really the written values.
01:26The problem is the gap between what they say and what they teach and what they do, apparently.
01:31From everything you've said and from what others have told me, there seems to be this gap.
01:36And in that gap lies the problem.
01:39Because how can you send children to something, or youth, you know, teenagers and early 20s,
01:47into something that you expect is furthering the gospel and affiliated with all of these different churches.
01:54But once they get there, they conform and they change away from their church values.
02:00Usually, whenever I hear of these mission programs, and I've actually, we almost sent our children to one of them,
02:06but usually they're church independent.
02:09In other words, if you're, say, you're a Baptist and you go to this thing, your children could be Baptists.
02:14We're going to teach you how to get along with the Methodists or the Presbyterians, anybody who's joined in with
02:19their children.
02:19They don't try to indoctrinate.
02:22They try to help adjust and teach children that, from a very early age and from their youth,
02:29that even if you have differences in opinion, you can both work together for good and you can further the
02:35gospel.
02:35That's usually the agenda.
02:36But what I'm hearing, at least from the few podcasts that we've done so far, it sounds like the exact
02:42opposite.
02:42Yeah, even as we get started, I was looking at the second value, make God known, and how YWAM is
02:53called to make God known throughout the world.
02:56But I think even in what's written, there's these little hints of where the dissonance is.
03:02And I see that in, that it should result in transformation of societies obeying Jesus' command and making disciples of
03:12all nations.
03:13And that transforming society's peace, I think, is so important.
03:17I think that's so much of the Seven Mountains mandate that was something that Lauren Cunningham said God told him
03:26about and how he needed to change this society.
03:30And so, it's not about working with people and collaborating and co-creating a world together.
03:37It really is about dominionism and bringing this very specific view of who God is and how God is supposed
03:46to be known in the world that I think is really important to unpack.
03:51Yeah, it's actually interesting when you go to their webpage of YWAMvalues.com, I think, where they unpack the quote
04:01-unquote legacy words, their covenant words, and things like that.
04:06There really is that language of, well, it doesn't matter if we're talking about spheres or we're talking about mountains
04:11or whatever.
04:12Like, everybody, that's all cool.
04:15Because you have heard the different language, right?
04:17Lil Lance Wallnau, who, you know, turned it into the Seven Mountain Mandates.
04:22The Bill Bright, Lauren Cunningham side, that was, okay, we're going to call it the spheres.
04:27But the truth, the essentialness of it remains.
04:32And you can see that really played out.
04:34So, it's really interesting when you begin to engage with thinking around this, where, like you said, the dissonance of
04:41what the words are saying, but then how it actually gets lived out.
04:46And you'll certainly find a huge swath of people who are part of YWAM who would have no idea what
04:54the Seven Mountain Mandate is.
04:56They would not have ever been explicitly told that language.
05:00They might not even be talking about the spheres, the quote-unquote seven spheres of society, but it is still
05:08in that cake mix.
05:10You know, that is part of the DNA.
05:13And if you, I suppose, remained in one place, you might not get that, but it is absolutely a very
05:23important piece of the foundation.
05:25What I find really interesting, and I'm looking at this from a business perspective, as a person who has operated
05:33multiple teams, multiple projects, multiple customers, usually it works better if you give people the freedom to learn and grow
05:42themselves.
05:43That's a big part of growing business leaders.
05:47And that's something that I like to do.
05:49I like to take a team and give them the freedom to explore, learn, make mistakes, grow.
05:54But there is a process of auditing where you go and check, make sure, are they building what we need?
06:01Are they performing up to standards?
06:04Is the customers, the clientele happy?
06:07There's that auditing process that usually ensures that there's quality production happening.
06:14What I have heard is feedback, and this comes even directly from people who are even parts of Youth with
06:22a Mission.
06:22They'll say, you can't judge our base off of the other base.
06:26Every base is different.
06:28Yes, we have some problems.
06:29Yes, we know that there are some bases that are problematic, but our base is not.
06:34And that raises the question, are you really not?
06:37Because if there is no auditing process, how can you determine that this base will not end up like the
06:42other base?
06:43I'm trying to picture a case where I would go into business with multiple clients, give each of the teams
06:48that I have the freedom to explore and build and grow,
06:51and never check to make sure that they're conforming to what I myself have as business standards.
06:56I would be a very poor leader.
06:58And so now I, after reading all of that, reading the comments, hearing what you have told me,
07:04I actually question the leadership of Lauren Cunningham because of this.
07:08There was no, apparently, from what I can tell, there was really no auditing process.
07:13As you were talking, John, I was thinking about how I live in a van,
07:18and so we've been traveling around the country for a while now.
07:21And we used to have a Planet Fitness membership, and Planet Fitness is a franchise.
07:31And so anyone can open a Planet Fitness, which means that some we would walk into and they would be
07:37so nice,
07:38and some we would walk into and they were not as great.
07:43And there was a huge discrepancy in it.
07:47And so I think that that's also part of the problem is that it sort of is a franchise.
07:53It's like you do a discipleship training school, and then you can go franchise and start your own base.
07:59And there really is then no accountability to how each individual base is run.
08:07But it's also sort of funneled into like a pyramid scheme, basically,
08:12in that it just continues to funnel into the top where it benefits from students who are wanting to do
08:20these secondary schools,
08:22who are wanting to spend thousands of dollars and continue investing,
08:26but without the accountability and the protection to go with it.
08:31Yeah, it functions on personality and relationship.
08:35And that's something that, in terms of relationship, at least, they're very proud of, you know, that we network,
08:41it's about who you know.
08:44And while there is some certain pride around that, you know, of like, okay, I know so-and-so,
08:50like, you know, if you got to be on stage with Lauren Cunningham, like, you had arrived on some level.
08:56And that, yeah, there's microcosms of that around the world, you know, various regions.
09:01And there's the popular people in various regions that it could be like, oh, my gosh, like, so-and-so
09:06came to our base.
09:07Like, oh, my gosh, like, I got to hang out with, you know, so-and-so.
09:12And that, I think, is part of the challenge because, you know, we talked about this, I think, in the
09:18last episode,
09:19the phrase of God doesn't call the qualified.
09:22He qualifies the called.
09:24And that is sort of the mindset of, like, you leap first and you deal with the consequences later.
09:31The challenge is, though, so often the consequences are not being dealt with.
09:35Like you said, John, in a business setting, there would be parameters and guardrails for as you're trying to give
09:41someone the space
09:42to grow into their talents, right, to grow into whatever it is leading or, you know, running a project or
09:50whatever.
09:51But there have to be measurable outcomes that you can say, okay, you've done a good job.
09:55You've done a poor job.
09:56This is what we need to work on.
09:58This is what we need to do differently.
10:00And that does not exist by and large in the YWAM structure.
10:06And I think part of that can very much be linked back to Lauren Cunningham himself, like you said, John,
10:12and his view of what missions was, what should be required.
10:20You know, he was very young when he saw this vision of the waves.
10:24And, you know, he was 25, I think, when that happened.
10:28And he had been part of the Assemblies of God church.
10:33I think he was actually ordained at some point because he gave up his credentials at some point.
10:39But they wanted him, you know, to be a missionary.
10:42Now having, you know, worked with missionaries from the Assemblies of God, they have a very rigid structure.
10:49Like you have to hit like all of these certain marks to be considered a qualified missionary before you can
10:55actually go.
10:56You have to have all your money raised, all your money raised before you go.
11:00Why one would never.
11:02You know, you have to have certain amount of time in seminary.
11:06You have to have certain experience and references and things like this.
11:09So I am not a huge fan of the way that the Assemblies of God missions thing works.
11:17So please hear I'm not advocating for that.
11:19I just want to say that there are guardrails put in place supposedly to try to help see people actually
11:25qualify to go out and do those things.
11:27Now that was something that Lauren Cunningham in the 60s, if you think about the social political situation in America
11:33at that time, was very much a rebellion against that.
11:37You know, we don't have time.
11:39We don't have time to go to seminary.
11:41We don't have time to become educated.
11:42We just got to get out there.
11:44We got to get out there for God.
11:46Bring back, you know, make Christ come again.
11:48And there's so much you see the evidence of that through his writings, through the evolution of the legacy words
11:56and the covenant words, the large worldwide gatherings and things like that, that this was the waters they were swimming
12:03in.
12:04I keep hearing the word decentralized as it relates to YWAM.
12:08And I want to talk through that a bit.
12:09But first, I want to touch something that you said about the 60s specifically with the Assemblies of God.
12:15Just today, which you probably haven't seen it, I released a video on the rise of the Parhamite sect and
12:24how that was the central core of what happened at Azusa Street.
12:28Even though it's been largely ignored from Azusa Street, they're publishing a newsletter and they say Charles Fox Parham, who
12:35has had an array of issues that I won't mention on the podcast because it may trip some YouTube flags.
12:43He had some issues with children specifically, and he was he was kind of voted off the island after a
12:51while.
12:51But during the Azusa Street revival, they're publishing a newsletter saying that he is the father of the movement.
12:56And it wasn't until years later, they said, well, we can't really have a father who's doing this thing to
13:01children.
13:02And I won't go into that thing.
13:04You can research it on on Wikipedia, etc.
13:07But the point I want to make is this.
13:09There were leaders in the Parhamite sect who were clearly Parhamite from their histories from Zion, Illinois.
13:18They became Parhamites.
13:20They became some of the early practices of the deliverance ministry.
13:25There were some deaths involved because they tried to deliver people too hard.
13:30And then they became the core founding members of the Assemblies of God.
13:36Not many people know that history.
13:38It's sort of been erased.
13:39John G. Lake was one of these people.
13:41He was a Parhamite.
13:42He became an Assemblies of God leader.
13:44Parham did, F.F. Bosworth, who mentored Branham in the revivals.
13:49Fast forward to the 60s.
13:51Like you said, the Assemblies of God kind of had that same theme.
13:54We're going to be decentralized.
13:55Each church has the power to grow, etc.
13:59But it didn't grow in a healthy way in this one aspect.
14:03The core of Assemblies of God rejected the Lateran doctrine and eventually sanctioned Branham.
14:09They said, this is heresy.
14:10We can't do this.
14:11It's actually dangerous what you guys are doing.
14:13I'm paraphrasing greatly.
14:15But what happened is because of that decentralized nature and because there were no checks and
14:22balances to make sure that they're being properly audited, there was a large number of churches
14:26who still participated.
14:28And I still today come in contact with ministers who say, I grew up in Assemblies of God.
14:32We never rejected this.
14:34I know that the rest of them did, but we never did.
14:36And their churches, some of them went off into destructive cults that were very dangerous.
14:41So, the point I'm trying to drive at is this.
14:45Whenever you throw this decentralized word into the mix, what it is really telling me
14:51when I hear it is that we bear the brunt of responsibility for what each of these groups
14:56has.
14:57And I can't assume all of that responsibility.
15:00So, I'm going to decentralize and say that if this group goes rogue, it's their fault.
15:05It's not our fault.
15:06But yet, I'm going to dictate to them the doctrines that they must have, the way that they must
15:11teach, specifically this agenda of the Seven Mountains mandate.
15:15We have this mandate, this mission that we're going to conquer the world for God in this
15:21religious way.
15:22I'm talking about a spiritual conquering.
15:24But yet, we're going to decentralize.
15:26So, if somebody gets too destructive in their DTS, we're going to just, we're going to say
15:33that our hands are clean of this.
15:34That's their fault.
15:36I say, no, that's not right.
15:37Yeah, I have definitely seen this from like a micro scale, you know, within maybe one location,
15:46one base, you know, and then like a regional leadership has to get involved to, you know,
15:52regions having problems and challenges and sort of trying to figure out what's the next
15:59level of leadership that can maybe get involved.
16:02Um, and to sort of the global scale, where finally someone from the founders circle or
16:08the global leadership team, it's changed names over the years, you know, maybe has to write
16:12a letter or has to somehow like step in and be like, hey, other regional leaders, like
16:17you need to do something about this.
16:18So, again, I know we've said this in the past, but it's, it's often only once the mess spills
16:25over into the local community, that that level of leadership is kicked into gear.
16:31So, the decentralization is absolutely used in a plausible deniability so that we don't
16:38need to take responsibility.
16:39Maybe that's not the intent, but that is the consequence that decentralization leads to
16:45a plausible deniability that says, well, it's not my job to deal with this, to fix this,
16:52to, you know, try to get in there.
16:54Um, and that does a lot of harm.
16:56I'm just thinking about the discrepancy too, between none of the accountability, but all
17:03of the benefit, because these bases are so intertwined and you can pretty much go to
17:10any base and it has a hospitality room.
17:13And if you are in YWAM, you can stay there for free or for very little money for pretty
17:18much as long as you want to.
17:20And there is so much benefit that comes from being under this giant umbrella of YWAM.
17:28And so, it's only decentralized, I think, in terms of accountability, but in terms of mobility
17:35and where missionaries are going and how they're referring people to different bases and working
17:40with each other, that is very, very, very connected and intertwined with bases.
17:46And you just will continue to see the same teachers coming from one base to another to
17:53teach in a school and maybe they have a different rotation that they do.
17:57Um, and so, I, I want, I don't want to promote the idea that they all are these like radical
18:03free
18:04agents because they kind of are, but they also are very, very entangled with one another.
18:09Well, let's talk about that.
18:11I'm also wondering how can you have radical free agents whenever there's this idea that
18:18we hear God's voice and that, that authority of God's voice, if you've ever been under
18:23it, which I know there are listeners who have not, you really can't challenge it.
18:27Because if somebody comes to you and says, I, God told me that you need to go do this thing.
18:33How are you going to question that?
18:34God told them, oh my gosh, I must do it because that's God who spoke to them.
18:38And that's the language that is used.
18:40It flows through the movement.
18:42And hearing that Cunningham, all of this idea kind of emerged in the sixties when, when this
18:49was really at its worst and not only the assemblies, but in the broader post-World War II healing
18:54revival, it was growing, at least from the research I have done, it was growing spiritually
18:59corrupt.
18:59I think that's the best way I'll say it.
19:01They were mixing in political themes.
19:03They were mixing in heresy, everything from some of, we've even talked about some of the
19:09occult that was making it into the movement to just purely men who wanted to control their
19:14people and giving them platforms to control them.
19:18If that's the version of the doctrine that Cunningham picked up, which I don't know that
19:24it was or was not, but if it was, he would have heard this hearing God's voice because
19:29it was flowing through the movement.
19:30You had the Word of Faith movement, which was in its early development before it even
19:35became Word of Faith.
19:36Before that, it was the spoken word.
19:38I think Kenneth Hagin called it the rhema.
19:40There were different versions of this, but essentially it was the idea that God is speaking
19:45a new thing and you too can speak it.
19:48That was, that was really how the doctrine was spreading.
19:51So you had people in the congregations who said, oh my gosh, I can speak God's voice too
19:55and I can be an authority over somebody else.
19:58Well, those people eventually became leaders of movements and with that mindset, they started
20:04leading the movement claiming that what they said was divinely inspired.
20:08The problem for me is some of it we've been able to determine definitely was not divinely
20:13inspired.
20:15Looking at the legacy words, as you're talking about, you know, this hearing the voice of
20:20God and, you know, giving a new thing, I just want to read a little bit directly from the
20:26website about the legacy word of the waves.
20:33So God had spoken to Lauren through this vision of the waves.
20:36This remarkable initiative by God to share his dream with Lauren would lead to a launch
20:42of youth with a mission four years later with a generation, within a generation, millions
20:46of young people would have their lives touched by God because of this vision of the waves
20:50that God gave Lauren Cunningham.
20:52We are some of those young people.
20:54Our lives have been changed now because of how God met Lauren that day in the Bahamas.
20:59As we reflect back on that event, we realized that that moment had significant parallels to
21:05other moments throughout history, moments when God stepped in to share his heart and his purposes
21:11for the world.
21:12Indeed, we have come to realize that this vision, this unexpected encounter was a God initiated
21:18destiny defining foundational covenant that God gave Lauren in order to birth a new mission.
21:29So it goes on talking about youth, you know, it calls us to lead out apostolically to birth
21:38fresh entrepreneurial initiatives in the spirit in order to accomplish great commission goals.
21:44It calls us to a lifestyle of viral pioneering, co-creating with God, doing and encouraging others
21:50to do new things in new ways.
21:56That's very much this grandiosity.
22:00I think we've talked about in the past episode, you know, the, we're going to change the world.
22:05Like God wanted Lauren Cunningham to birth a new missions movement.
22:10Like why?
22:11There were so many already out in the world.
22:14But I mean, this whole hearing the voice of God thing on the Holly Pivick podcast, she breaks
22:20down really well, this NAR theology of hearing the voice of God.
22:24But if I want to link that back to the value number two that we were talking about, the
22:28foundational value of make God known, you know, know God and then make him known.
22:32That's the second one.
22:35Throughout all of the books that you read, all of the YWAM books, that theme comes time and
22:40again, it's the word, the word of the Lord, you know, God told us all of this sort of stuff.
22:45And as I was reading through a bit in preparation for our episode today of making Jesus Lord,
22:51the dynamic power flying down your rights written by Lauren Cunningham in 1988, he was
22:56talking about God speaking to him at some point, talking about all of the ways that like
23:03YWAMers, YWAMers specifically had been protected on these crazy trips and all this stuff.
23:10But then in 1976, the Lord spoke to me, he told me he had been extending unusual protection
23:17during the foundational years of our mission.
23:20But now we would begin to see a number of deaths.
23:24And he goes on to talk about young people started dying and all of this stuff that's
23:30happening just in this term of like, well, God spoke to me and told me he wasn't going to
23:36protect us anymore.
23:38And then three pages later, he tells a story about them being a group of people being attacked.
23:45Their van was being shot at.
23:48Everybody was unharmed.
23:50When I heard all of this, it was like God telling me, you see, Lauren, YWAMers are still
23:56under my protection.
23:57And there's a real sort of focus and insistence on YWAMers, you know, YWAM being protected,
24:06these people as part of a missions organization, because God told him.
24:11And that has crazy consequences.
24:13I know we've talked about this before, but I just recently reread the book Cell 58, which
24:20is written by Dan Bauman, who is part of YWAM lore.
24:24He was imprisoned in Iran in 1997 for them thinking he was a spy, which Iran had good reason
24:33to believe that a white American would be a spy.
24:37But he also had Swiss citizenship because of his dad.
24:41And the Swiss embassy was working with the Iranian government to get him taken out of prison.
24:49He was given a lot of, like, pretty, like, he was beat, yes, and he was also given some
24:56really decent treatment, honestly, more better treatment than most inmates in the United States
25:01would get, especially in black or brown bodies.
25:04And so, he keeps using this idea of don't listen to fear, God is bigger than fear, without
25:13looking at the nationalistic and racial privileges that enabled him to have his embassy get him
25:21out.
25:21And he talks about meeting a black man from Louisiana who had been in prison for, like,
25:2715 months and had no idea why he was there, how much longer he was going to be there.
25:33And so, it's this discrepancy of YWAM is protected, quote-unquote, I think, because a lot of the
25:41early and the most powerful people in YWAM are also white people who have a lot of nationalistic
25:48privilege, and that's taken for granted in how YWAM is able to move, even illegally proselytizing
25:55in Muslim countries, and all of the ways in which it is making God known throughout the
26:00world.
26:00And again, explicitly, he talks about, there's many stories in this book, again, referencing
26:07Making Jesus Lord, where he's talking about these horrific things happening, you know,
26:12these people go into the Amazonian jungle, one woman gets malaria, it's like weeks until
26:18the next boat comes, you know, what are they going to do?
26:21God tells them, like, don't worry about it, I'll take care of her, you know, they sort of,
26:26then the boat comes and she lived.
26:27And this was just one adventure, and they talk about this, like, ooh, fun.
26:33And then he says, I believe there are hundreds of thousands of young people who are just waiting
26:38for a really challenging, dangerous job that requires them to give up everything.
26:44You may be one.
26:46The reward?
26:47The reward being a part of the climaxing event of all history, taking the gospel to every
26:52person on earth.
26:54Like, so there's this, there's this idealization as well of being put in prison.
27:01I mean, that's throughout this book.
27:02He glamorizes martyrdom multiple times in this book.
27:06But it's the stories that feed.
27:08It's, you know, we've talked about the finances, how, you know, Grandma Jane gives you the money
27:13for your DTS, and you're like, that's the Lord, you know, sort of thing.
27:18He tells a story in here of how someone found money on a bush one time, and that was the
27:22Lord's, you know, provision.
27:23And it's, it's a very interesting way.
27:29And you see this psychologically, right, where stories draw people in, and it connects the
27:36truth.
27:36You begin to think, oh, this is, this is truth, you know, this happened, sort of like Jesus
27:41was telling parables.
27:44And that begins to be your motivation for, well, of course, I want to make God known throughout
27:49the world, and sure, I want to have fun, and, you know, have adventures, and, you know, do
27:55all of this stuff for Christ.
27:58And it's just like John said, like, if someone is out there saying, like, God told me to tell
28:03you, I heard the voice of God for you.
28:07And if a leader of an organization is standing up there and saying, wow, I heard all of these
28:11things, where was that confirmed?
28:15Who else had that vision?
28:17And, like, where else did this come from?
28:22And when we talk about the cult-like issues in YWAM, oftentimes people get very itchy, you
28:34know, they get very, maybe defensive, even.
28:38And that's why we get back to the decentralization.
28:40We don't have a central figure.
28:41We don't worship a central figure, you know, sort of thing.
28:45And I beg to differ.
28:47Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started, or how the progression of
28:52modern Pentecostalism transitioned through the latter reign, charismatic, and other fringe
28:58movements into the New Apostolic Reformation?
29:01You can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website,
29:05william-branham.org.
29:08On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins, Charles
29:14Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others, with links to the paper, audio,
29:20and digital versions of each book.
29:22You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those
29:28movements.
29:28If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute
29:34button at the top.
29:35And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening
29:41to or watching.
29:42On behalf of William Branham Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support.
29:47In the podcast that I'm doing with Bob Scott, we explored one day all of the different themes
29:52that were non-religious that helped enable this thing to happen with latter reign, the
29:58voice of healing, the post-World War II healing revival.
30:01Everything from vaudeville to you had these traveling lectures that people would go to.
30:07And back in the day, that was your entertainment.
30:10Back before radio was widespread, you had the traveling speaker who would come speak.
30:15And everybody, whether you agreed with them or not, you'd go to the town hall and you'd
30:18listen to them.
30:19And then that branched off into the tents, the tent revivals, et cetera.
30:24And what it gave the people was an idea that we are here to hear a story.
30:30And that kind of made its way.
30:33It crept into the post-World War II healing revivals.
30:36If you were going to be a true revivalist, you had to have a backstory.
30:40And the backstory had to be appealing to the itching ears, whether it was true or not.
30:44And so what you find, if you go to the voice of healing magazines and just read through
30:48any of them, every single person has either seen an angel, they've been spoken to by God,
30:54all of these different things.
30:55And you have to wonder, why did God have to speak to these individuals directly to give
31:01them these massive ministries and public fame?
31:04Why didn't he speak to the hearts of the people like the Bible says they will do?
31:08Well, the difference is the people, a large majority of them wasn't even reading the Bible.
31:12They did not know that God came to do this, that God said he would send the Holy Spirit
31:17to lead and guide them.
31:19So they thought, mistakenly, that these public figures who were traveling speakers, they were
31:26the ones sent to lead and guide them.
31:28And that morphed into all of the people who were doing it began to also think that, because
31:33sad truth is some of those did not, also did not read the Bible or even understand theology.
31:39So that type of movement was the background to what developed into what you're describing
31:45in the 60s.
31:47If a person was going to be anything in that type of movement, you had to have a backstory.
31:52God had to have spoken to you.
31:54The problem is, as I said, God did not always speak to these individuals.
31:58You have to take them at the word.
32:00But it really matters, because in the broader scope of things, I'm going to go back again
32:06to that word, I think you used the word franchise, Jenny.
32:11It's really what it is.
32:13There is no decentralization, per se.
32:16What there is, is a group of individual distinct units who are using many of the same coded language.
32:24So from the outside, if you don't understand the coded language, you think, okay, they're
32:28independent, they're not doing it, but you hear these things like the covering, or the
32:32anointing, or even the God spoke to me language, to some extent, depending on the words used
32:37when God spoke, that becomes coded language, and it is broadcast among all of the different
32:43units.
32:44So each unit is, in fact, connected back to headquarters, like it or not.
32:49And whenever Cunningham was alive, it would have had a central figure.
32:52He was the central figure.
32:54After his death, now, sadly, it's much like the message after Branham died, the code words
33:00themselves become the governing body.
33:03And when it gets to that point, it's really odd.
33:06I came from that environment, and I had people, well, even the church that my grandfather ran,
33:12they would say that people are going in here, and it's like a bunch of wax figures in here.
33:16They don't know what they're doing.
33:17They're just wax figures in a church pretending to be part of a church body.
33:21It's because after the death, the loaded language become the governing committee of all of the
33:27different units.
33:28Before Loren passed, as he was ill, there was a lot of scrambling happening internationally
33:35of what are we going to do?
33:37We need to prepare for Loren to pass.
33:40So, it's this sort of like, you know, paradox of, no, we don't have a central figure.
33:47You know, he's so humble.
33:48He doesn't want recognition or anything like that.
33:51And then this, oh, no, we need to prepare for when Loren passes.
33:56Like, what is this going to look like?
33:57Who are we going to be listening to?
33:58You know, what is the thing?
34:00And I always find it really interesting, John, when you talk about how in your church growing
34:03up, you guys would listen to the recordings of William Branham.
34:07And I'm like, this is what this is.
34:09Like, all of the covenant words that Loren Cunningham received, like all of the legacy
34:14words that Loren Cunningham received, all of the books that Loren Cunningham wrote.
34:19Personally, when we talk about the YWAM lore, you know, Loren Cunningham, when they came
34:25to Switzerland, I think in the 70s.
34:27So, YWAM began in the 60s, in the 70s, I think it was that they came to Lausanne, Switzerland,
34:33you know, got this building.
34:35And then God, quote unquote, told Loren Cunningham that he was going to give him a farm.
34:41And the farm that my husband manages today is that farm that, quote unquote, God gave to
34:48YWAM.
34:49So, there's a whole history and a whole story behind that.
34:52My in-laws had stewarded the farm for approximately 40 years, like as soon as the tenants who are
34:58currently in the farm, when YWAM received the orphanage that is here in our village with
35:02the farm attached to it here in Switzerland, they had tenant farmers.
35:07And eventually, when that contract was up, they left.
35:11And then they needed a YWAMer to come and take care of the farm.
35:15And they asked my in-laws and eventually they agreed.
35:18And they were actually employed by YWAM.
35:22So, they were YWAM staff, but they were paid a salary for all of this time.
35:26Anyways, there's a lot of this lore that's attached to this farm.
35:31Okay, so now we've taken over the farm.
35:34My father-in-law's retired.
35:35He still, you know, lives in the village and works on the farm with us.
35:39But my husband now runs this farm.
35:41And we rent our house and outbuildings and land from YWAM.
35:47And we're talking about investing and we need to invest.
35:51And YWAM is currently refusing to back an investment to guarantee our investment to say,
35:57you know, we'll allow this to you guys to invest.
36:00And if we don't renew your contract in five years, then we will give you a depreciated,
36:04you know, value of the investment that you make.
36:06And the reason for that is they haven't heard from God.
36:12They don't have peace from God about doing that yet.
36:15And they need two more years in order to catch a vision, their words, and to let it sink down
36:21into their hearts for them to think about what they want for the farm, because they have
36:27to think about the quote-unquote promises of the past that Lauren Cunningham received from
36:32God about this farm.
36:33Now, what's even more interesting is I have a very good friend whose parents are like,
36:37oh, gee, YWAM leadership.
36:40And they were in the room with Lauren Cunningham back in the day when they were talking about
36:45these things.
36:46And they said, actually, that Lauren Cunningham wanted a farm because he was very much in that
36:52mindset of sort of like, the world is going to end like really soon.
36:56God is going to come back really soon.
36:58And so, we need to somehow like be self-sustaining.
37:01We need to have a farm so that we can make our own food.
37:04Now, this was when there was like no YWAM bases.
37:06Like Switzerland was like one of the first YWAM bases in Lausanne.
37:10So, there was this sort of like doomsday mentality.
37:14And I've actually heard someone recently refer to the Assemblies of God as a doomsday church
37:19because it is this like, you know, the end is going to come, fire and brimstone, you know,
37:25this sort of thing.
37:26So, we're sitting here sort of very baffled that YWAM would put in jeopardy our livelihood,
37:36like our whole life, the lives of our children, our family, our support system, our livelihood
37:42because of this YWAM lore and whatever Lauren Cunningham heard from God back in the 70s
37:51about this farm.
37:53So, it's just, it's an interesting highlight that, you know, I know from whence I speak,
37:58like this is happening in our lives right now.
38:02The influence of Lauren Cunningham and the words that he quote unquote received from the
38:07Lord are deeply impacting our lives today.
38:13And it's wild to see and flabbergasting, really.
38:19You beat me to the question.
38:21So, in the 60s, think of what was happening.
38:24You had the Cold War.
38:25You had Russia rising.
38:27You had JFK who's building all of the defense system.
38:31You had all of these weird UFO sightings.
38:34All of these things were happening and making the people really, really afraid.
38:39And you had this community within this evangelical sect.
38:43I don't even know what you'd call it because the healing revival had basically died out.
38:47But the aftermath of this, they were capitalizing on that fear because it was the only way to
38:52maintain the crowds that they had before.
38:54So, world is ending.
38:56Be afraid.
38:57Come to our mission because we're the only one that's going to be saved.
39:00Your church down the street, they're not because they don't have what we have, my brother.
39:05That was the mentality of the 60s.
39:07And I was actually going to ask you, did they have a doomsday theme, and that answers the
39:12question.
39:12So, it shows which side of the Assemblies of God split they were on.
39:16The main sect of the Assemblies, I'm not going to say they did not have a doomsday theme,
39:21but they weren't as focused as the revivalist sects were.
39:26You had a wide swath of the Assemblies who just simply went rogue.
39:29We're not going to denounce this thing that makes everybody excited to come to our church.
39:33We're watching the tithe increase exponentially.
39:36Why would I not want this?
39:39Sadly, that's what they chose, the money over the gospel.
39:42And in many cases, the money came with this gospel of fear, which was a totally different
39:48gospel.
39:49So, for me, when I hear the gospel of fear used with the same type of mentality, and then
39:55still the same verbiage.
39:56You said exactly the phrase, catch the vision.
40:00That is the phrase that we use in Branimism, for the same exact purpose.
40:04So, it stems from the same thing.
40:06In fact, there is a, I think it's a publication that's printed by the sect that's called
40:11Catch the Vision, because it's such a widespread code word within our religion.
40:17And that came from that mentality.
40:19We're going to catch the vision, and if we catch it, we're going to be the ones who
40:23escape the wrath that is about to come.
40:24I know I already talked about this, but I just, I can't get out of my head how much
40:31it is a pyramid scheme.
40:33And I'm thinking about, like, Amway, or Mary Kay, or Tupperware, all of these things that
40:40sell a promise.
40:41And the promise is, if you just keep investing, if you just keep doing this, like, it's going
40:45to pay off.
40:47And you see the people that are on the top of the pyramid, and it's working for them.
40:51They're having favor.
40:52They're getting land.
40:53And so, I think it's just this sense of, well, why isn't it working for me?
40:58And the dozens of thousands of other YWAM missionaries that don't have those success
41:04stories, but still keep investing and giving their lives to it, thinking that there's a
41:11promise.
41:11And I remember, you know, again, holding nuance, and people will probably likely be in the comments
41:18being like, you only talk about the bad things.
41:20Like, one of my actually kind of catalysts for leaving YWAM was one of my YWAM leaders
41:26in South Africa.
41:28I was essentially, like, excitedly telling him how I expected I was going to be martyred
41:34in Uganda in the next few years.
41:36And I was like, I'm going to go back, probably going to get captured by Joseph Kony, and he's
41:40going to kill me.
41:41And I, like, had no remorse about that.
41:44I had nothing but excitement.
41:46And then I was like, and then my friends and family are going to see how dedicated I was
41:50to God and become Christians.
41:52And he goes, you know how messed up that is, right?
41:56And I was like, no, what are you talking about?
42:00And it was this moment, you know?
42:02And of course, not everybody in YWAM ascribes to all of the things that we're talking about.
42:07I think there are beautiful, good people who have solid hearts trying to do good.
42:13And as a reminder, what we're talking about is the system and how it gets infused and how
42:19it affects lives.
42:21Like, you're talking about, Shelby, it's affecting your life because of the way that the system
42:25is operating, regardless of people's hearts or intentions or experiences within the system.
42:32And I just want to highlight, it's a great point, Jenny.
42:34And it's not just mine and Jenny's or John's or the others who have come on to share their
42:41stories, opinions or experiences.
42:43Those matter.
42:43And that has power as well.
42:45But this is in Lauren Cunningham's own words.
42:50And that, I think, is what is really important to pay attention to as well.
42:54We're not inferring these things.
42:57These things are written.
42:59And he writes here, I have heard it said, Christianity that costs nothing is worth nothing.
43:07And Jenny, you're talking about sort of the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
43:11And he says, you know, conversely, Jesus promised that anyone who obeyed his commands would be
43:15loved by the Father and would see great miracles in his life, along with persecutions and hardships,
43:20of course, you know, and then he has in here a thing from Keith Green saying, if you stay in
43:28America,
43:28you had better be able to say to God, you called me to stay home.
43:32If you don't have a definite call to stay here, you're God.
43:34It's not God's fault that the world isn't being one.
43:37It's ours.
43:39So, you begin to see this glorification of martyrdom, like you were saying, you know,
43:46he says the gospel must be preached in every nation and then the end will come.
43:51But we will see more martyrs and more danger as we evangelize in politically hostile lands
43:57and countries torn by war and disease and Muslim nations and others currently opposed to Jesus Christ.
44:03And then he says, if God asks us to give our lives to spread his word, we will see the
44:09tremendous
44:10blessings he has reserved for those who give up the greatest gift of all.
44:15And he's talking about giving up your life, like your actual, like you're dying.
44:20And that's, that's the thing.
44:22So, it's like John was saying, you know, this use of fear to keep people engaged and then it's
44:29that carrot and the stick, right?
44:30Like there's the carrot, that's the glory and acceptance and belonging and for a lot of
44:41people, freedom to do what you need to do.
44:44And then there's the stick of, well, if you don't, this is going to be your fault.
44:49It's your fault that the world's not getting saved.
44:54And it's, there's so many implications.
44:55There's so many detrimental implications to that sort of theological understanding of who
45:02God is.
45:02But it's, again, it's, it's not just us pulling this out of our, the air.
45:08It's, it's, this is the waters they're swimming in.
45:11Pete I mentioned this before on another podcast and it's, I don't know how relevant it is to
45:16the crowd, but I used to watch the Beverly Hillbillies at my grandmother's house.
45:19And there was this recurring theme because of the age in which it was presented to the
45:24public.
45:25There was this theme where there would be these civil war guys who did not know the civil
45:29war had ended.
45:30And granny would come out and shoot them in the rear end with buckshot, which was in her
45:34case, beads of dough.
45:35I think it was, and they would jump and yelp.
45:37But the theme applies to what we're talking about here.
45:41And it applied to that other podcast.
45:43There are people that are just trapped in limbo.
45:45You had this destructive end of the world is coming, all the communist fears, you had
45:50the government who are literally, people like Nixon were literally working with the full
45:55gospel businessmen to tell them, we need to capture the minds of the people in your churches
46:00because this is a battle of the minds that we're fighting.
46:04That's directly from a Nixon speech.
46:06That's the type of mentality that they had.
46:09Well, they, they fought that battle, but nobody told them that the battle has ended.
46:13They just continue in limbo.
46:15They try to continue fighting it.
46:17The battle's in the minds.
46:18The problem is, I mentioned at the very beginning of this, I have, I explored sending my children
46:24on some of these youth retreats.
46:26In fact, I was thinking after I said that we actually did send them to one camp.
46:30There was not ever a situation where the camp director came up to me and said, now, I know
46:37that you're sending your children to be part of our camp, but I just want you to know that
46:41there's a, there's a chance they might be martyred.
46:44I have never had them say this to me.
46:47And I'm trying to picture a case where anybody who is recruiting for a youth with a mission
46:51would ever tell a parent this.
46:53But if that is the language that's happening inside of it, this for me, out of everything
46:58that you've said in every podcast you've done, that is probably the most problematic
47:02statement that I've heard so far.
47:03I think the closest thing to that was I joined, I signed up for my DTS when I was not
47:1018 yet.
47:12And so, not everyone has to do this, but because I was not 18, my parents had to sign a
47:18form
47:18that said if I died overseas, they would be responsible for getting my body back to America
47:25and YWAM was not going to cover the costs to get me back.
47:30And of course, it was like, oh, that's just, that's not going to happen.
47:34It's just in there.
47:36But the reality is that people have died on their discipleship training schools.
47:40They're like five-month entry schools as 17, 18, 19, early 20-year-olds because they're
47:48being put in positions that are very dangerous.
47:52You know, I was, my discipleship training school, a month of it was working in the red light
47:57district in Thailand and trying to build relationships with women that were being trafficked and bring
48:04them out and arguably doing way more harm than good, not only for ourselves, but for the women
48:12because we would put them in danger and some of them would have negative consequences because
48:16these hapless Americans were like, just come with us and come do jewelry and get out of here.
48:23And, you know, it's just, it not only put our lives in danger, but it puts so many of the
48:29lives of those we're going to save in danger.
48:32And similar to what you said, Shelby, of like, God doesn't call the qualified, he qualifies
48:37the called.
48:37I think another phrase is just kind of the ends justify the means.
48:42And if the end is saving souls for all of eternity, then it doesn't matter what your body
48:48or the bodies of those that you're going to minister to happens because you're not looking
48:55at that.
48:55You're looking to their salvation.
48:58100%.
48:59And everybody has to sign that release form when you're going on your DTS, you're going
49:03on an outreach to say, if you die, why will not be responsible for bringing back your body?
49:09That will be up to your loved ones if they want you to deal with that.
49:13So that's certainly, when you do a NICO, I'd love to hear the NICO people come out.
49:19Like, if you have a NICO story, please contact us.
49:24But yeah, these waivers, you know, waiving of liability and things like that for your potential
49:30death.
49:31And I, my own personal story, I was in YWAM for 18 years.
49:35Obviously, even though I'm out of YWAM, I'm still deeply attached to YWAM because of our
49:40situation.
49:42And my whole story is going to come out on the Bodies Behind the Bus podcast in a couple
49:47of weeks.
49:47So all the juicy details will be there.
49:49But I almost died multiple times.
49:56Like, and I was just left there like, okay, you know, sort of thing.
50:02And I'm just one person, you know, even of the three of us here, the two of us that have
50:08been in YWAM have experienced, you know, these extreme dangerous situations.
50:13But as we see, that's, that's the draw.
50:17That's often trying to be the draw.
50:19You want danger?
50:20You want adventure?
50:20You want fun?
50:21Come to us.
50:22We'll do it all for Christ.
50:24We'll do it all for his kingdom.
50:26And this is, I think, why it's challenging, because you can talk about the structural challenges
50:31of YWAM that a lot of people might agree with, like, ooh, that's not healthy.
50:35That's not good.
50:37And then when you begin to actually sometimes touch on the theological pieces of it that
50:43lead to dangerous and harmful outcomes, there are people who do believe that that is the
50:51way that we should believe as Christ followers.
50:54And so that is where you get a lot of pushback of people being like, well, I thought it was
50:58great.
50:58Well, if that's the cake that you're eating and it doesn't make you sick, then of course
51:04you would, you know, be fine with that.
51:05But it's sad.
51:10My heart breaks, I think, to see so many young people sucked in, give years and years and
51:18years of their lives to this organization.
51:21They say they're not an organization.
51:23They call themselves a movement.
51:24We're not an organization.
51:26We're a movement.
51:28And people give their lives.
51:30They don't have education.
51:30They don't have professional experience.
51:32They can't afford to leave YWAM because YWAM provides them.
51:35They don't have inexpensive housing or they have maybe government assistance because
51:39they're under the poverty line.
51:40Like, I know finance is a thing that we can totally talk about at some point as well.
51:45But it really, it breaks my heart.
51:47And my hope is that we can shine a light.
51:51I get parents who are concerned for their children write me in confidence asking for some kind
51:57of assurance that their child is okay.
52:00I really want to address that publicly.
52:02What advice would you give to parents whose children are in Youth with a Mission in a DTS,
52:07especially one that is abroad where there's limited contact?
52:11What advice would you give them?
52:12I think the hard thing is that there isn't assurance that they're okay.
52:18Based on my experience and the experience of many people I know in YWAM, there's a lot of
52:26harm and threat that can happen.
52:31And I don't say that to scare people.
52:34I say that to raise awareness.
52:37And I would liken it a bit to someone you love that maybe struggles with addiction.
52:46And they're not going to be ready to quit until they're ready to quit.
52:51And that's a really, really hard thing.
52:52If you see someone that you love that's going down a path that you're concerned about.
52:57And that doesn't mean you can't say things.
53:00That doesn't mean that you can't ask questions.
53:02That doesn't mean that you can't show that you will be there for them no matter what.
53:09But I do think that they are on their own path of agency and sovereignty, even if it isn't
53:17what you maybe would want or would choose for them.
53:20According to cult experts that I've been researching for years, because YWAM is decentralized,
53:27it is challenging to completely quantify it as a cult.
53:33However, there are a lot of cult experts that will qualify it as a dangerous authoritarian
53:38group because of the thought control, the emotion control, behavior control, you know,
53:43these sorts of things.
53:45A lot of people will identify it as like a high control religious group.
53:50There is a high level of control of your life, whether it is explicit.
53:58Sometimes it is explicit.
53:59And a lot of times it is just very implicit.
54:03It's in the air.
54:05It's in the water.
54:06It's in just the culture of the place that if you ask questions, if you dare to leave,
54:11if you ask for outside help, these are all things that will have dire consequences for
54:17you socially, relationally, spiritually.
54:21So, yeah, anybody who's thinking about sending their young person into YWAM, I would just say
54:27don't.
54:28It's a short answer, right?
54:30Just don't.
54:31Like Jenny said, though, when you're in it, there's almost nothing I feel like that you
54:38could say or do to get someone out of it.
54:43They have to almost arrive to that level of cognitive dissonance themselves.
54:50And I think that's the heartbreaking piece because for many people who come out of YWAM
54:57traumatized, they are traumatized and it is, it is years of therapy.
55:02It is, it is lifelong change.
55:05There's a, there's a profound change in your personality, in who you are, the way that you
55:10can trust yourself, um, the way that you can trust others and that, that, that will take
55:17years and years to, to heal.
55:20And so that's, I think what's heartbreaking for me is it's not a, oh God, that was crazy.
55:26Like I'm not doing that again.
55:27I guess I'll stay away from that.
55:29You know, um, there's profound harm that hop in happens often.
55:34I know there's people that would say I was not harmed at all.
55:37And I'm really happy that that's how those people feel, but there are too many people
55:43who are harmed.
55:44So I think like any high control religious group, uh, that you, that someone that you love
55:52is part of being there for them when they crash is unfortunately, I think sometimes all
56:02that we can do, um, showing up with curiosity.
56:05I know Steve Hassan talks about this a lot, like in his combating cult mind control, you
56:11know, stuff.
56:11I know you've mentioned him a lot, John as well.
56:13Um, just showing up with curiosity for those people and trying to love them through it.
56:21Well, this is all very concerning.
56:23And sadly, I think the further we go, the more concerning it gets.
56:26So I'll, uh, I wanted to end it on a happy note and instead I'll end it with, let's dig
56:32a little bit deeper and let's see what is at the bottom of this river.
56:35So if you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the
56:39web.
56:39You can find us at william-brannum.org.
56:41For more about the dark side of the new apostolic reformation, you can read weaponized religion
56:45from Christian identity to the NAR available on Amazon, Kindle and audible.
57:15For more information, you can find us at william-brannum.org.
57:55For more information, you can find us at william-brannum.org.
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