Radicalized: A Friend of Vance Boelter Speaks Out

Hello and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast. I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research at William-Branham.org and with me I have my very special guest, Jeff Patrika. Jeff it's good to have you and this is going to be a little bit unusual for our stories because usually on the Fridays when we have these testimonies the people who are talking about coming out of a cult or leaving some sort of destructive group and it's about their story and their story of how they're escaping but

never we have the people who are on the outside looking in as people are being recruited into these cults and your connection is very special because you watch the recruitment of somebody and watch the shift and the change and can describe this and it's very clear what you witness when you describe it.

I think the audience will pick up on this but it is also a notable conversion because this is we're going to be talking about your connection to Vance Belter. Belter who was the person who murdered the Democratic State representative Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark Hortman and wounded was a John Huffman and his wife I think her name was your vet. So this is a notable conversion into a cult and we don't yet have all the answers. We don't know if the cult was the you know the cult extremism was the primary reason or if there

were outside factors all we do know is that Vance was connected to Christ for the nations he openly admitted this in a sermon and we have been digging into the archives of the church that he was attending and we found out that there is a strong connection to IHOP KC International House of Prayer in Kansas City. We were able to find sermons where the minister or the speaker was talking about books that was written by Mike Bickle and talking about you know the International House of Prayer in general. So there was this connection they were

in the same apparently the same apostolic network. So anyway it's good to have you on. This is going to be like I said a bit unusual but maybe you could just tell everybody a little bit about yourself. Well I'm Jeff Patrika. I live in North Dakota now but I went to St. Cloud State in 1985 where I met Vance Belter and he was just a typical freshman.

Just like I was, we were both, you know, we learned that we were gonna try out for the baseball team. So I got to know him right away, you know, probably the first day, you know, I moved in.

I mean, I met Vance and we started going to baseball practice together. He was a normal guy, you know, just really funny. I remember that about him, you know, he'd make me laugh all the time and, you know, make off-color jokes.

Never talked about religion or his faith or anything like that. We talked about baseball mainly and then, you know, all their things about school. So he was, you know, just becoming a fast friend.

Let's put us that way. And then about, I wanna say two to three weeks into our freshman year, Vance came to my room and wanted to quit the baseball team. And I asked him why and you didn't answer me and he wanted to sell me his baseball bat, which was really expensive at that time.

And I was like, sure, I'll buy it. But I only have like $5, I don't know what I had, but it wasn't much. And he said, that's fine, I'll take it. And was this odd?

And I said, Vance, what are you gonna do now? And, or why are you doing this? Because he was a very good baseball player. He was son of a, the head baseball coach of his high school.

And, you know, just a really good player. He had a better chance to make a team than I did, I thought. You know, he was very talented and didn't make sense to me. And he said, well, I met these people and they told me I have to sell everything and quit the baseball team and I'm gonna do it.

And it was like, you know, talking to a zombie at that point. And I thought it was weird. I said, well, why would you do that? You know, well, because I'm gonna be all in for Jesus now and they told me this is what I have to do and didn't make sense to me.

I bet it didn't. You know, we've been talking about radicalization with regards to Belter. And one of the things that happens whenever somebody becomes radicalized is there's this noticeable change, this noticeable shift in their personality.

And whenever it happens, there's different terms that they use. Some people will say, I'm taking off the old self and I'm putting on the new. And what it is essentially is they're giving up the things that are part of their makeup, their personality, like baseball.

And they're saying that they're trying to convince themselves that they no longer like it. And they become very condemning of others as they do it. So I'm certain that this had to have had an impact on you.

What did you do whenever he started saying these things? You know, this kind of shrugged it off, but I was disappointed that he was doing... You know, I kind of felt like he maybe was going through a phase, maybe a bad day or something but it wasn't, he was definitely gonna quit and he was done and he was gonna move out at the end of the quarter and I was in a room with three guys so he had just one roommate and when he was moving out I saw opening in his room so I asked Vance if I could have

his spot and he said sure but we after that point we weren't friends, he had nothing to do with anybody on the floor, he thought we were all heathens, we're all going to hell, his newfound faith was it, his sect that he joined was it and these people were off campus kept seeing him off campus for some reason, he never named them, he never named who they were like I was like well what church did you join or who are these people and he wouldn't tell us like he would you know he would just go into a zombie state let's put it that way

and every day it just got worse so I found myself arguing with him more as I saw him like why would you do this Vance you know and I think I actually if I remember I actually accused him of joining a cult or you are these cult members or what's the deal because you you're you're totally different than you were and he's like good I'm glad you see that and you know he was happy that he was a zombie now and a religious zealot and we argued and he just wouldn't have anything of it and then at the end of the quarter which is in November he moved out and his

roommate was from the same town he was sleepy I'm in a soda and his name was Bob Schumacher and I moved in with Bob and you know you're 18 at the time and we're all we just left home that's one of the odd things about joining a cult I think when you are recruited into a cult in the back of your mind you have to realize that something is not quite right because you'll never if you try to recruit other people or even interact with other people you never tell them who the leader is what the group name is you won't even talk about some of the more bizarre doctrines if you do talk

about it you just speak very superficially you'll talk about things that people aren't going to think you're crazy for because if you were to just unload and tell everything about the cult they would they would throw their hands up and say hey man you're in a cult so it matches the pattern I guess is what I'm trying to say were there other religious groups that were on your campus like was this an odd thing for you or did Did he have interactions with other Christian people there was campus crusade for Christ at the time?

You know, they were always out handing out flyers and asking people to go to their meetings But I never seen Vance like in his group, so We just are I Personally just said well, he joined the cult. He's gone never saw him again But I was it was so impressionable to me at that point Because of that transformation like he just Went from a really decent fun guy to be around and baseball player to this and I asked Vance I didn't tell this to Steve during his interview with dr. Hasen But I do remember St in one of our arguments

I asked and I said well, I thought you're following Jesus now Vance Why are you so unhappy because he was just a different person. He was not He wouldn't joke around he would just serious and This seemed really unhappy with me with everybody with the world with the college with everybody and I asked him why yes Why are you so unhappy Vance and he said well because I got live with you guys for November till I can move out And then I can go into my family. I said well, they're not your family. Yeah, they are they're my new family

You would say I remember that and that matches the pattern You know, it's odd because when you join one of these groups you start to replace your old family And it's not necessarily that the group leader is saying hey, you need to go replace your family But because of the doctrines that they're teaching do not align with your family's ideology You start to try to separate yourself from them and they will some of the doctrines they'll preach They'll say that we we need to separate ourselves. We are a separate people And people who are listening follow that out to its conclusion. Well, I have friends who don't believe this

I need to separate from them. I have family who don't believe this And after the fact whenever something bad like this happens whenever they go interview the cult You know the leaders in the cult They'll say why never told them to separate. I never told them to sever all their connections But they're preaching a doctrine that suggests that they should and so that's that's largely what happened Whenever all of this was happening With you personally were you a Christian at the time? I Professed to be a Christian at the time To I was Catholic at the time and I said you know, I

I believe in Jesus's fans and you just wouldn't have anything of that At all he's like no, you don't No, you don't we do in your in order to You know, he never asked me though. He never asked anybody on the floor. He never asked as far as I know To come with them, you know to one of his meetings with these people.

You never came up and shared the gospel with me. As far as I remember, you never mentioned anything of that. It was just like antagonistic attitude towards me all of a sudden. And I was definitely mad at the time because they took my friend away.

Here's a guy that I have friends with. Also, we're not friends anymore. We're arguing and never saw him again until 40 years later, seeing him on the news that he killed these people. I'm like, that can't be the same Vance filter because at that time he was, I don't know about the, you know, this cult that he joined, but he was Phariseic.

He condemned everybody. We were all the murderers and adulterers and liars and cheaters and I'll see who's going around judging everybody. And so that's the last impression I had of him, 40 years ago.

So 40 years ago, you were connected to Vance filter and you watched him become radicalized, watched him change, the shift in the personality, cutting off friends and family, all of the things that usually happen when you join a cult.

And then now, 40 years later, you're starting to see him in the news and tell me a little bit about that. How did all of this play out? How did you reconnect with the story of Vance filter?

Seeing the interviews with his roommate, things weren't adding up for me. And then I was this curious what the heck happened to him and I will, you know, went on YouTube and I did a search, you know, Vance filter and Christianity or I can't remember what the search was, but you guys came up and it said cult.

And I immediately clicked on it because I was like, that's it, that's them. That's gotta be them. And everything you were saying during that interview with Dr. Hassan was like ringing through like everything about what I experienced with Vance you know, at that time.

But the narrative of the, of him was that, I don't think the media had a grasp on where, you know, who this guy was, what is Christianity or lack thereof, you know, they had no clue on that.

No, they don't and I've taken issue with that. The way that they paint this and not all, but most of the news outlets is they want to connect it to Christianity and say that this is, this is just conservative Christianity gone wild and they're not really understanding the fact that he's been radicalized by a cult.

And if you trace the roots of the cult, like I said, we can trace it all the way back to groups that are connected to IHOP KC. We have him on record saying that he's connected to, Christ for the nations.

So he's definitely in one of the groups that is in one of these apostolic networks of the new apostolic reformation. So he's definitely been radicalized and you can't really say that all evangelicals are all conservative Christians meet this pattern.

So like I said, I take issue with that. I was just curious, like I said, that's how I stumbled upon you guys and how, you know, what cult did he join? And you guys shed light on that.

So that's basically a nutshell where I'm coming from on it. So after Steve and I did that interview, you contacted Steve and Steve and for me that you were aware that Vance Belter had connections to Serpent Seed, which is one of William Brannum's core doctrines.

If you're in the message following the William Brannum, you have to believe Serpent Seed because that's part of the mysteries that were revealed to the last and dying age according to Brannum. And it traces all the way back.

You can trace it all the way into Christian identity and we have Gordon Lindsay, the founder of Christ for the Nations Institute, who's speaking at keynote conferences for Christian identity groups. So we know that there is some connection in the history of Brannumism, but you mentioned that there was this connection to Serpent Seed with Vance Belter.

Can you talk about that a little bit? The guy from the New York Times sent me this book that Vance wrote that's no longer available on Amazon, it's called Original Ability. And then in the description, it said something about Serpent Seed and how the Serpent had, you know, studying original ability comes from the William Brannum, I think, Ideology, where the Serpent had sex with, sex with Eve and then they produced Cain and everybody from Cain is the Serpent Seed.

And that's the delusional theology on that and Vance wrote a book about it. So Vance wrote a book about Serpent Seed and like I said, it's one of the core doctrines of Brannumism, you have to believe this.

And so the people who aren't not familiar, Serpent Seed is the notion that in the Garden of Eden, that the Serpent made it with Eve to produce Cain and Cain produced this evil bloodline.

There's an introduced into the world. So you have literally the good guys versus the bad guys all throughout time. Well, those who follow that teaching out to its logical conclusion, it means that in today's world, we have these people, you can't detect them.

They, you don't know if they're descended from the evil one, if they're descended from the good one, but among us are evil people. And this leads to all kinds of problems, especially if somebody has mental health issues.

So Vance wrote this book about Serpent Seed. Let's talk a little bit about his radicalization, though. on a focus on that a bit more, because I don't think people recognize how odd this is whenever you're on the outside looking in and you see it.

When it happens to you, you don't realize it, but those around you can notice. Physically, you start to notice a change sometimes in their eyes or their behaviors. Talk about the radicalization. What was that like when you watched him become a different person?

When he took off the old man and put on the new, what did that look like? Physically, there was physical aspects to him. I mean, he would just, I think there's a picture of him when he got arrested, that zombie look.

That's basically how he looked in 1985, all of a sudden he was like that. So that to me was weird. And then his general attitude was dismissive, very argumentative, like all of a sudden, we never argued before that point about anything.

And he'd put you down like your faith is, no, that's not the right faith or, you know, you don't know who Jesus is. So you're fooling yourself and things like that. He, but just very dismissive.

So that's kind of, you know, that transformation to that from just an easygoing guy to that.

And very zombie like, like he'd stare right through you. Like you're talking to, I'm talking to you right now. You would be listening, you'd be looking like past you. I know exactly what you're talking about.

After I started to deprogram and get out of this mindset, I recognized myself actually doing this. And I noticed as, you know, we stayed in the cult a little bit after mentally I had escaped.

And I would watch others that would do that. They would just stare right past your eyes. And I think I read it in Dr. Hassan's book. He talked about, that's a form of mild hypnosis whenever you look past somebody's eyes, they're trying to make eye contact with you and they can't because you're looking past them.

But, you know, it's crazy. The way that whenever you are radicalized and this thing happens to you in your face, you can just, you can see it all over the person. But while you're in it, you don't, you know, you don't recognize that this is happening to you.

So, it's interesting to hear you talk about watching it happen to your friend and seeing all of the changes that are happening that he likely is unaware. You know, you can see it like I said, right all over their face.

The facial expressions like went from, you know, you can tell like someone that's unvery unhappy. Like he just seemed unvery unhappy and that's why I confronted him with that. I thought you're following Jesus.

I thought you'd be happy, joyful. And he's frowning. And just very, very serious looking and that, that stare. And I don't, that's why I asked, I asked Dr. Hassan. I was like, do they do some type of mind control or to make them act that way?

And he said, yeah, that's basically the transformation into that. But it was quick. John, it was like three weeks. And I don't know how long he was seeing these people, like how long they were recruiting him.

But it was like three weeks, he was gone. It's really sad. You know, as you're losing your friend, you're watching this happen to him. Deep inside, his authentic self had to have known that he was joining a cult.

He was crying out for help, but really couldn't get it. And inside, he has to know that something's wrong. So it's really sad. And when you compare this to Christianity, Christianity, I've watched in the churches that we've attended.

I've watched people convert to Christianity. And they become happy. They become joyful. They want to talk to people about Christ. They don't want to go into seclusion and try to keep it a secret.

They've joined this group and understanding that, you know, if they were to tell all of the things about the group, somebody might think that they're a little bit weird or off. Joining Christianity isn't like this.

It's so much different. If this was a Christian community that he joined, you would think he'd come back and try to share the gospel with everybody, you know. And this is, you know, you need to place your faith in Jesus Christ and believe on him.

Kind of what Acts 16 teaches with the Philippian jailer. You know, he never, he never did that. So that was just another indication. I knew he joined. It wasn't a Christian cult or he was just a cult.

I under the guise of Christianity. After he was recruited, did he share any of the doctrines that they were teaching him in this new group? I can't recall what specific doctrines, but they were out there.

As I remember, they weren't, you know, growing up Catholic. They, it was not anywhere near what I believed at the time. So it was totally, it was totally out there.

But I can't remember any specific doctrines. He would, the, the selling of things, I guess would have been something I really wasn't exposed to or heard of in my 18 years that you're supposed to sell everything and quit the baseball team, quit what you're telling, you know, God given talent.

You're supposed to just give all that up. I never heard of that, you know, being, so that was... That was a little different. I guess, you know, if you look at Mark one, you know, you could say that the apostles, when they met Jesus, you know, they dropped their nets and followed him. And I understand that they gave up everything.

But whoever Vance joined wasn't Jesus Christ. Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started or how the progression of modern Pentecostalism, transition through the latter reign, charismatic and other fringe movements into the New Apostolic Reformation?

You can learn this and more on William Brannum Historical Research's website, William-Brannum.org. On the book's page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins, Charles Paisley, Steven Montgomery, John McKinnon and others, with links to the paper, audio and digital versions of each book.

You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those movements. If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute button at the top. And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening to or watching.

On behalf of William-Brannum Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support. As I said, we've been trying to trace the roots back and understand from a religious standpoint what was happening with Vance Belter.

The moment that we found that he was connected to Christ for the Nations and Christ for the Nation is deeply connected to Brannumism. Gordon Lindsay, who founded the group, was Brannum's campaign manager. Lindsay helped publish the Voice of Healing magazine that literally created the revival scene that emerged in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

There's some deep connections here to Brannumism. From another angle, we're looking, as I said, at the church sermons and determining how much of it ties to Brannumism, how much of it is just casual commonplace charismatic preaching.

And we're finding names like Mike Bickle, International House of Prayer, so that brings them into a different category. Because the International House of Prayer, as we displayed in many of our podcasts, was basically Brannumism 2.0.

You had William Brannum's protege, Paul Cain, who is teaching basically a rebranding of Brannumism and Christian identity. He's bringing forward the Joel's Army doctrine, which was also deeply tied to Christian identity. And they're teaching this end of day's revival, this end of day's scene in a very militant way.

And we've talked about this in depth with Jed Hartley. Once you start bringing in those militant keywords and language phrases that they use when they're preaching this, if you're preaching it to somebody who is...

somewhat mentally unstable, they may act upon some of those militant phrases, which is very, very problematic. So I see this thing as, you know, multifaceted. It could have been mental health issues. It could have been a number of different things. The clue on that was the, like I said, the book that the New York Times reporter sent me. That kind of tied what the brand of Brennanism, and he never had what he call it. It's a deprogramming testimony where he ever left.

So, you know, looking back at some of the clips that I saw on stage and stuff, that was the same vance that I knew and, you know, after he transformed into this. But that original ability was a big clue, like that tied them to that. So, but I, I heard of nothing from him. I looked search the internet, you know, and you'd, I have a testimony and witness when I left, I left the Catholic church in 2010 right around there. And I provided a testimony on why and what I think I was deceived in and that type of thing. So, anybody that leaves, like an organization like you,

you were part of the Brennanism and you left and you have a deprogramming testimony, I call it, or a testimony that says, hey, you know, these guys, I mean, I woke up and they weren't telling me the truth. Then, you know, these guys were wrong. I didn't hear anything like that with him.

You know, that's just it. When you recruited into a cult, like I said, your inner self has to be aware. Deep inside, you have to know that something is wrong here. Whenever you get fully indoctrinated and you're in this thing, you start suppressing that inner self and it's like a coiled spring. It's just being compressed. When you escape and you leave the cult, that spring just bounces free and we've seen time and time again, people who just want to share their story, that's why we have our story's segment of the podcast so that people can do this.

You want to let people know that you're no longer part of this. That's the way it works. So, I'm like you, without having that, without having any clear separation between him and that group that recruited him, he's probably still of that same mindset, maybe even and still that same group. I'm absolutely certain he was because he did not change.

I mean, that's the same, the stuff that he was talking, you know, how he was behaving on the stage in Congo, the video clips of him, and the things he was speaking about. That was the same attitude seemed message that he was doing when I saw him transform. I mean he had he had changed at all. So I just assume it's the same thing.

So it wasn't like he went from one cult to the other. So I think he started there. And the people that he mentioned, I don't know if this is a standard practice in this recruitment, but he never...

like he never mentioned their names like what this name of the church was or name of the people that he joined. He never he never told me. But I knew it was a cult.

It's very common, you know, when you're in a destructive group and you have very very strange beliefs and ideologies, you don't want to share the stranger things with people so that they see that you're believing in these stranger things.

So often you won't mention the name. Like I was one time with a person who was trying to recruit into Branemism. Very unsuccessful. But they were trying to and they won't come out and say, hey we want you to join the William Branem cult.

They start out with phrases like, did you know that God sent a prophet? And they'll talk about, you know, almost talking in riddles. They'll give you just a little bit of information so that they might can hook you and drag you in and reel you in like a fish.

And then hopefully you will gradually become indoctrinated to the stranger things. But they won't go to the stranger things first because nobody wants to join a cult. And I think they recognize that. I do remember one other thing was that he did speak about their leader.

And I can't remember the name of it. Of the guy he would reference like so and so this prophet, you know, he talked to God and he told me this and I mean, he he told them that and then they told Vance this.

But he did reference someone as a prophet like part of that group. Yeah, I mean, that's exactly it. That's how you start out God sent a prophet. The whole premise of his existence was legalistic.

You know, very, very first the very judgmental condemning that type of thing. As you see, it's not just a group he joined, but some other groups are the same way. And this total line, you know, legally and everything.

And that fits too. I mean, branemism is basically what you can do to gain yourself and entry into heaven. It's all about the works that you do, not what Jesus did on the cross.

And they had to be, you know, pulling them off. I don't know how they... did it, but they did. And like I said, just the progression, so this helped yeah, where I'm coming from, is that he professed this Christianity. I thought it was a call all along. And I just let it go, you know, 18, whatever shrugging off, he written, he wrote me off or wrote him off. And that was the end of it.

Until this. And I was surprised to see that he committed these murders. And but when I saw clips on the internet and, you know, talking to the New York Times reporter and seeing the interviews with his roommate, I just, there's nothing that had changed with him. And that's just it. You know, if you read the news, they're trying to brand this as this is a evangelical Christian thing or a conservative Christian thing. And trying to basically paint all conservative Christians with the same brush, but they're not understanding the radicalization, they're not understanding the cult background. And it's all about the agenda.

If you read the news, unfortunately, you're going to get an agenda and it's usually either targeting religion or politics. So you're going to find with Vance Belter, they're either going to say, this is the evangelical or the conservative Christian community that's causing this or he must have been tied to Trump. Yeah, nothing to do with Trump. In my opinion, I think that's where I lost the New York Times reporter because you was trying to make this.

And, you know, something about MAGA and Trump and that type of thing. And I said, no, not the Vance that I remember because Vance, this part, this cult that he joined and the way he was is behavior, he looked down on everybody that wasn't that legalistic, like condent, you know, this Phariseic type thing. And I can't imagine him supporting Trump because of that.

So I said, it probably had nothing to do with that. It was more like some type of insane switch that went off in his head. But it wasn't Christianity. And as I explained to Steven, was that, you know, and I mentioned this earlier, a guy that says he's born again, 40 years ago, it does not commit something like this. If that was a Christian community, he does not do this. And the other two clues I said to Steven is that he, this was a Christian, actual Christian community. He went to have separated like he did. He would have came back and shared

the gospel with me and other people on the floor and joined the baseball team and shared the gospel to them. There's no reason to do what he did and leave. And never to be heard from again Because you if you love your neighbor as yourself you're interested in there's the good Of them, so you want to share you want them to join you in heaven not Say you all I'm done with you guys, but I think it had something to do you know if that's another clue for you on the serpent seat You may have thought that we were all

King's children you may be right, you know in Brannemism, it's like I said, it's really hard to identify The people who are of the serpent seed the only clue they give you basically is if they're in our group Then they're not the serpent seed if they're outside of our group if they don't believe that William Brannem is the prophet and They're the bad guys and they they don't teach you to go kill them like this guy did But if you follow the doctrines out to their logical conclusion, these are the enemies of God These are the these are people who deserve everything that you can throw at them

So I don't know if he made that connection or he made that leap it could be I don't know But it's just really sad when you compare that to Christianity It it changes you in a different way you want to help people you want to spread the gospel you want to teach them and Like you said he would have came back he would have done this I mean we were not You know worthy enough to hear the gospel from I guess Because he just made this determination that we were probably all keen seed and Maybe this is what he thought these people that he killed but nothing in the Bible would justify

sin You know doing what he did so That's why I say this is really not a issue of Christianity so much as it is just simply occult that to me It was very disappointing, but it just angered me

This knowing that these people back in 1985 took him like that and he never got out You never left and Then he ends up like this and we're and as I talked to the New York Times reporter About this is where is where are those people at that time?

Why aren't they coming out to condemn him? You know, I know Christ for a nation said something after they were pressed about it because they found out I think Stevens People found out that he went to that school and then they finally came out and said oh, yeah, we condemn what he did You know, we have nothing to do with it But where are the people like that he met in 1985?

I don't know who they are, but I haven't seen them and They would have known That what he did was wrong or maybe they don't think he did what he did was wrong I don't know those are the questions I had Well, it's hard to say, you know It's even hard to say whether or not this was branemism However if he's teaching serpent seed it's more than like a group that at least descended from Branemism.

This is one of the tale of signs of Branemism. So it's hard to say, but like I said, we did examine the sermons from the church that he was going to. We can find key elements that very similarly mimic what we had in Branemism.

One of the things that was common that just really stood out to us is that often very frequently they would refer to the group as the group as a whole, as the message, or often the speaker would say, I'm bringing you my message.

This is very common in Branemism. It's called the message cult. It's the message, the message cult following a volume of Branem. So they're using those phrases, but that doesn't really necessarily mean that it's Branemism.

I would say probably it's more a distant sibling of Branemism, especially because of the might-bickle IHOP KC angle. If they're tied into the apostolic networks that descended from that, you have this connection where it's like Branemism, but it has morphed into something else.

And it's very odd too. Like if you look at their website, they'll go into the church's website and I've just kind of browsed through it. There's almost nothing on there. And you go back, I was able to go back through some of the history of the website, and they're just really not much there.

They do have a statement of faith, but it's very minimal. And whatever this group believes and how they're connected to IHOP KC or Branemism, if they are, it's just really, it's very, very vague.

It reminds me of the group that you're mentioning recruited him where they're just not very open about what it is that they believe. I just read the statement of faith that they had, and I didn't see anything that came out.

I didn't do any more study on it. I just told New York Times guy on the phone after he sent that to me, I said, well, I don't see anything off top. I said, I guess if you study it, maybe there's something there, but I go, just reading a statement of faith, every church can put something like that out there to deceive you.

Yeah, that's just it. Like I said, I've been looking into the church. I can't say with certainty whether it is a destructive cult or not. It is odd that they don't have much information on their website and they don't really advertise what it is that they are.

Very much other than just a few vague statements, but it is odd. I find it odd and confusing at the same time. But anyway, this has been a fascinating story. Like I said, I'm very, very interested to hear from people who have watched somebody be recruited and all of the weirdness that goes with that.

It's almost like watching a sci-fi movie where somebody gets taken over consumed by some evil entity or turned into a zombie. You can see it on the face and that shift and that change.

People around you can see it, but you yourself don't even recognize this. happening. So if you could go back in time to, you know, right before you saw that shift and you could go back and you're 18 years old, you're looking at this person who is now being assimilated into a cult, being recruited. And you start to see that shift in his eyes. You start to see those things happening to him. If you could go back and give some advice to help him and try to warn him of what he's about to get into, what advice would you give him? Well, the first thing I would ask

him, what is the gospel? Share that with me. Share the gospel of Jesus Christ with me. And if he couldn't do that, that'd been, you know, number one thing I'd point out to him because the gospel is the power of God until salvation. And if you get the gospel right and get everything else wrong. So tell me what that is. And if he would have brought up prophets and, you know, these end time prophets, prophecies or whatever, I'd say point that out in scripture to me, you know, if I could do it all over again at that time, I didn't even think of things like this. But I would

ask him more questions, I guess, than argue with him or try to convince him that I'm right and you're wrong because we're probably both wrong at that time. And I would just ask him more questions like, you know, maybe I don't know if I would have done it, but I would just say, well, why don't you bring me along to one of your meetings? I want to see who these people are because it's very interesting bands, you know, I don't want to see who these guys are. And then question the whole thing, you know, and let's go to scripture. And let's, let's see where you're coming from and

what scripture's teaching. And where are you getting your interpretation from, you know, is that, is this this one guy in your cult or your church that you just joined? Let's go through it. Point for point. But the gospel is the big one. And I have a blog that I write, Christian blog. And I point that out constantly. If you, if you get that gospel wrong, and that's where you discern other people can say their Christians or their Christian church Christian organization, the members should all be able to recite the gospel. If you are saved by

that gospel because it's the power of God until salvation, you should be able to recite it. What saved you? What, what about the good news saved you? And they should be able to tell you and if they can't and they're not pointing you to Jesus Christ, rather they're pointing you to their leader.

That's another red flag. So I would ask him, why isn't there any directness with you with Jesus? Well, why do I have to join your organization? Why this person? There's nothing in the Bible that tells me to do that.

So, as I pointed out the Steve, if someone in your neighborhood or a church and says, we are the way, join us. That red flag should go up. But your question is a good one.

If I could go back in time and then knowing the gospel as I know it now, I would have questioned every single aspect of the gospel that he was pretending to believe. And I would go point for a point on that.

And then the one thing, I was Catholic at the time, so I would have probably agreed with it. But it's a works-based system. Sell everything. You sell everything, you quit everything. Well, why are you doing that?

Well, because I want to go to heaven. Well, that's works. You're placing works on the cross, and there's nothing that tells me to do that. It's supposed to be a resultant of your salvation.

So, there would have been a lot of questions I would have had of them. But I write, I mean, I wrote probably three or four blog posts now on what to look out for, because I was part of kind of the same system.

It was a passive-aggressive cult, though. It wasn't the same thing you could come and go as you please. There's passive-showning, if you ever left the Catholic Church, and you're going to get looked down on, but they're not going to disown you or anything like that.

The key thing we had in common, though, I was following a pope, and he was following his version of a pope instead of Jesus Christ. So, that's where I would probably have steered him and say, why aren't you directing me to straight to Jesus?

That way the apostles didn't scripture. Don't follow me, don't follow Paul, or Paul, follow Jesus Christ. Why aren't you doing that? I would have asked him that. Well, that's good advice. Like I said, deep inside, I think when people are recruited, they have to know inwardly something's wrong.

They have this feeling, something's wrong, and people who are in it, you know, time to time you get that feeling, something is wrong, something just isn't right. And it all comes down to what you just said.

You're giving too much authority to a human being, and if God sent the Holy Spirit according to the Bible, and this person is basically usurping the... authority of the Holy Spirit, can it even be called Christianity?

I'm making no excuses for myself. That was a long time ago, but it just, you know, my priorities weren't the same as they are now. I was, you know, you know, you had girls in baseball and school and your faith came way down on bottom of the list.

So it, you know, but that is a good question. If I could, and if I could have talked to him in the last 20 years or 15 years since I became a Christian, I would have pointed that out to him. I was said, you know, Vance, what's the deal?

You know, this whole serpent seed, where did you get that from? Exactly. You know, I was raised in this serpent seed nonsense. I was taught this was one of the divine mysteries of God to know that there were two bloodlines of people, an evil people and a good people, and that I could not tell them apart other than if you're part of our cult, you're of the good people.

That's all I knew growing up. And it's just, it's so problematic. I was shocked when I left the cult and I discovered passages from the Bible, such as, I think it's in the book of Acts, it says, God has made all nations, all peoples from one blood.

So how do you reconcile that? You come across that passage and you read that, no, there's only one blood, there's not a serpent seed. And you read other passages for God so loved the whole world. It doesn't say for God so loved the whole world that has the good blood. But that's how we were taught, unfortunately.

And it creates a very us versus them mentality, either in the cult or you're not. You're either of the good bloodline or you're not. And it's sad when you think about it, because of all of the friendships that you could have, all of the people that you could enjoy being around and not thinking that they're of this magical serpent seed. But I grew up like this. I grew up questioning which people have it, which people don't. How do I know? How can I tell? And then to hear your stories fascinating, because you're on the other side of this and you're watching

the people shift, you're watching the facial shift that happens. So you can see this change happening. And it's scary to think that a cult leader has the power to do what they're doing, that somebody can actually radicalize a person and make that shift. This is something that they make Stephen King makes money writing books on this, how that shift happens and the change whenever they become possessed.

Well, you're watching it in real life and then learning that this is a real thing. It is, this mind control is real. It's just, it's fascinating and scary all at the same time. And then to think that people like Belter who have been radicalized can go to the extremes that they do, that's even scarier because now on the outside looking in, I'm no longer in this cult, I began to wonder how many people are radicalized, how many people are in a cult.

You don't know from day to day, and it's like the opposite problem of this serpent seed. You're wondering which people are assimilated by the cult or not. And in the end, what it comes down to is if there is a true serpent seed, it's that these cults are that.

But again, God has made everything off of one blood, according to the Bible. So anyway, this was fascinating. It's not what we usually do, but I really wanted to hear the perspective of somebody who was on the outside looking in and watching that shift.

And when I heard that you had that conversation with Dr. Hassan, I wanted to have the same conversation with you and talk a bit more. So thank you so much for doing this. Okay, thank you.

Well, if you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the web. You can find us at www.William-branam.org. For more about the dark side of the new Apostolic Reformation, you can read Weaponize Religion from Christian Identity to the NAR, available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.