Name It and Claim It Healing and Entertainment

Hello and welcome to another episode of the William Brannum Historical Research Podcast. I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Brannum Historical Research at William-Brannum.org, and with me I have my co-host, researcher, minister, and friend Charles Paisley, the founder of Christian Gospel Church.org.

And together we're examining the history and the intersections in history between William Brannum and other key figures that either influenced or were influenced by the post-World War II healing revivals. Charles, today we have an episode that I'm going to say right from the start is a complicated ball of mess. And I think it's very fundamental before we go forward with any of the other episodes to understand this and also to understand where the position that you and I take on this matter. But I'm going to be really honest, the Christian listeners who are interested in this podcast to learn the history of what became, you know,

these fringe movements of Christianity, the New Apostolic Reformation, whatever. They're going to listen to this and they're going to think, well, yeah, this is just plainly obvious that this is not Christianity, while people, we have also people who are actually in the message listening to this podcast and the way in which they've been manipulated to think about this, to them, is like reading the book of Acts. So you've got that big of a contrast between the two sides.

And we're going to try to dissect this. I'll let you describe what it is we're talking about. But I want to give some disclaimers up front where we stand is not where the people who are in the message is going to think we stand because they have been somewhat unduly influenced to believe that anyone who critically examines this is of the devil. So with that, I'll let you describe what we're talking about. Sure, John, you know, today we are going to look at

William Brannum's faith healing or divine healing practices and beliefs. And we're also going to examine some different cases of people who were healed and not healed during his ministry. And you're exactly right in your assessment.

John, you know, the message and where I come from, we were very guilty of this ourselves. We would tend to make a straw man argument out of this issue, right? If you looked critically at any of the divine healing cases in William Brandeem's ministry, well then you must not believe in divine healing.

Right, and you've got the devil, you know, but that's not at all, you know, where we're going today. What we're doing is we are looking at these things because we want to know the truth, what happened.

And, you know, we talked before this podcast, which recorded, we were talking about a Reverend Best and his debate with FF Bosworth at the Sam Houston Coliseum. And, you know, that's an incredibly interesting debate.

You know, I have, I've actually read through that and what's super interesting to me, John, you know, in my sect of the message, we actually believe divine healing the Reverend Best Way, which is incredibly interesting, right?

Yeah. And we did not believe divine healing the FF Bosworth way. So it's very interesting. But of course, when we look at that, we would say Bosworth was the good guy, best was the bad guy, and we would do that whole straw man argument.

Best don't believe in divine healing. And so he, but the truth is, John Best did believe in divine healing. He just didn't believe in, you know, buying a ticket and going to see a man and having greater access to healing because you bought the ticket to go see William Brannum.

And so that's an interesting thing. And I think that's in a lot of ways where I am with looking at William Brannum as well. You know, God will heal people when you ask him to.

And it's in his will to heal people. You know, God's a healer. But William Brannum, what he was doing here, there was a lot of cases where he told people they was healed. And then they died.

So there's clearly something suspicious. There's something going on here beyond what we have been told when we're on the inside of the message. Part of that's what we're going to look at today. Yeah, and I think the best example you gave was the best example.

For our listeners who weren't in this message cult, a personality, there's a halo photograph of William Brannum. It's got, you know, it's taking a picture of stage lighting, which we've covered and we'll cover deeper.

But it has this halo above his head that William Brannum said was the pillar of fire. And, you know, the message cult has manipulated to believe this. Well, this iconic photograph was the result of this debate.

And I can clearly remember as I was studying this debate and suddenly being shocked that it was... actually a man who believed in divine healing, but didn't believe in the stage act. I remember the struggle I had to understand that, and it took several years of processing and decompressing and basically taking all the indoctrination that was in my head out.

And then I suddenly realized that, wow, this guy was actually defending Christianity pretty good and he rose up against them and they basically branded him as the hero, or not even here, the villain who is standing against divine healing.

When all actuality he believed in healing. He did, and he was really, he was opposed to the abuse of divine healing, is really what he was, he wasn't opposed to divine healing, he was opposed to the abuse of divine healing.

And I'm going to preface this entire episode with this. We, you and I have talked, so I know where you stand, we are not against divine healing. The Bible clearly says that God heals the sick.

But there are a few problems with the way that the message cult and other, you know, this is one of hundreds of similar divine healing cults. The way in which they teach it is so dreadfully wrong that, you know, Christians who are listening this, they're going to say, well, why didn't you guys see this to begin with?

But you've got this man on the platform who's claiming that he gives you closer access to God and you can be healed because he's on the stage doing this act. And yet my own father was healed in one of these meetings.

I've never denied it. I still will not. I mean, it would be unfactual for me to deny that he was healed in one of these meetings. He went to the meeting very, very sick.

You can even find the recording of it. And years later, he or not even years, shortly after he was healed and years later, he will attest that William Brannum healed him. The problem I have is that he and my grandfather will protest that William Brannum had something to do with their healing when instead it was, you know, God who healed.

The real problem here though, we have example after example, you know, you're kind of in the same position being a minister. My family was at the top of this cult. And so my grandfather was a minister who went to the sick to pray for them.

People in this cult, you know, is an offshoot of Pentecostalism. And in mainstream Pentecostalism, they believe that speaking in tongues is the evidence of the Holy Ghost, well, in this cult, they're manipulated to believe that divine healing is somehow a evidence of the Holy Ghost.

That's part of William Brannum's teaching. Yet people who come to this thinking that they're getting this alleged Holy Ghost of healing, many of them, like all denominations of faith, get sick. and only a portion of those sick get healed.

And we watched people sick and die, and there are graveyards filled with them around this area. And people outside of this country don't realize this until they come to Jeffersonville to Mecca, and they realize, wait a minute, this is not at all what I thought.

And some of the people healed, are healed shortly before they die. What kind of God does this? And I've used the example before, it's like packing your bags to go on a vacation, and you're more focused on the suitcase than you are the actual vacation.

Because if we're teaching that these mortal bodies will receive immortality and go to heaven, the people are focused on these mortal bodies that are literally the suitcase you're gonna leave behind. So there are a lot of real issues that I have with this, but in preface to this episode, those who are in the message are going to think that we're also champions against divine healing.

And that is not at all correct. I'll put this out there right now. We're going to show you the problems with William Brannum's version of divine healing, which is actually anti-biblical.

So I think before we dive in, maybe we just do a quick little, bringing everyone up to speed on putting some of the pieces together from our last episodes.

William Brannum, we're still in the mid-1940s here in our thoughts. William Brannum has Roy Davis went to jail in 1939. William Brannum has did a little to distance himself from him, at least in his stories.

He's changed his life story, rewritten things. He comes into contact with Robert Dority. And he comes into contact with Robert Dority. He goes to St. Louis, praise for Dority's daughter, and she is healed.

We're going to talk more specifically about her case later on in this episode. But that healing, the news of that is quite sounded in the St. Louis area. Robert Dority invites William Brannum to some meetings in that area.

And there he meets, the UPC is coming together, right at that very same time. The preeminent leaders of Onus Pentecostalism are all right there. William Brannum catches their attention and certain of them start opening doors for him to tour in the Onus Pentecostal churches.

And at that point in time, W.D. Kitson of Houston, Texas, he is, he kind of takes a key role in in serving as William Brannum's first campaign manager in this period of time.

And he organizes revivals for him throughout the Midwest and into the Southern United States. And William Brannum tours all these churches in 1945. He does the same thing in 1940. He comes back, he tours through another set of churches in the Midwest, starting at St. Louis and into the South.

Kitson again is the main organizing arm to bring all these meetings together for him. And towards the end of 1946, he ends in Shreveport where he forges pretty close ties with Jack Moore, one of the key figures in the Pentecostal movement at the time.

And he then, at that point, becomes, Jack Moore becomes William Brannum's campaign manager. And Jack Moore does the same thing as Kitson, he's organizing revivals in Pentecostal churches. And in 1946, in Jonesboro, Arkansas, William Brannum has his first huge, really big revival meeting.

And 25,000 people are supposed to have come to that. This is his first, you know, blow out number crowd in that way. From there, as you come into 1947, Jack Moore makes contact with Gordon Lindsay, who's one of his friends.

And then William Brannum starts getting invited to tour and among the trainitarian side of the Pentecostal movement. You have the assemblies of God Churches starting to agree and allow him to come around at that point as well.

And that's when his fame just explodes. Gordon Lindsay is able to book these massive venues and crowds. By the time you get into 1947, some of his events are drawing 70,000 plus people.

And he starts to begin to tour internationally by the end of 1947 and into 1948. So this is William Brannum's just rise to fame. And the things that he's doing in this period are going to impact and set off the latter-rain movement are going to spark word of faith theology, are going to just touch all kinds of things and start movements that come all the way down to the present day.

This is the point in time at which his influence goes far and wide. Yes, and keep in mind, you know, William Brannum, we have evidence of him touring with Roy Davis in the late 1920s, probably even the early 1920s.

But we have evidence of the late 1920s. And Davis was, as you know, a charlatan and a grifter and there's a lot of bad things we can say. But one of the aspects of Davis that will touch on here slightly is that Davis held revivals that were divine healing revivals.

He held revivals to heal the sick because he was a Pentecostal evangelist. And when he came into Jeffersonville after having toured with William Brannum and trained William Brannum in the art of divine healing, he holds a healing revival and a Miss Laura Bell Eakin was allegedly healed in the Revival.

evil, very wealthy lady, who then allegedly deeded her entire inheritance over to Roy Davis, and that was part of the reason Davis got basically rein out of town. So William Brannum's early ministry was focused on divine healing through another stage act.

William Brannum's mentoring stage act went to prison, and then he assumed this role, and then he tries to reinvent himself several times, trying to basically perfect his stage act. And what's key here is the summer of 1947 date when he's transitioning over to his new campaign team.

There is a significant historical figure that's involved here. I'm certain that the listeners who are Christian, up to this point, they're asking themselves, well, how is this even different from today's televangelist who are, you know, slights, cameras, action, it's all for entertainment, and you've got these people who are willingly sending in their money so they can buy planes and whatever.

How is this any different? And then on the other side, you've got, you know, the people who are in the message that are listening to this are thinking, wow, this is holy, these men are holy.

You have to take a step back and ask yourself, you know, we were trained to believe, manipulated to believe that William Brannum was this old testament style profit, and you have to ask yourself, what old testament style profit has a campaign team, has men who are, you know, actively seeking, where can I get the biggest crowd, what auditorium can I get, how can I, what is the pricing to, you know, to sell tickets to this auditorium?

How can I generate enough revenue for the next auditorium? I mean, there's whole business strategy. What old testament profit has this? And what's interesting is immediately, or shortly before the summer of 1947, the Kardashian family, and I'll pause, and I'll say this again, the Kardashian family support it, a divine healer named Avok Hagopian, to come to the United States to heal this very wealthy owner of a vineyard son was sick.

And while he comes to, you know, do the faith healing act over the sun, they also are sending him on tours throughout the United States and generating revenue for this thing. And William Brannum himself says that the people who sponsored Avok Hagopian are the same people that sponsored me.

So immediately after Avok has this wide sweeping tour through the United States generating revenue, then suddenly William Brannum gets connected to that same revenue stream. and he gets connected to a the nephew of the patriarch, the Kardashian patriarch, was Demis Shekarian, the founder of the Full Gospel Businessmen's International, and Demis Shekarian would help organize William Brandham's tours for years and years to come. And Shekarian also, it's really interesting if you study it. It wasn't just about entertainment. They were actually getting involved with politics. And if you study the things called the family, the cult that's in

Washington manipulating the congressmen, etc., Demis Shekarian has also camped out in, you know, during this national prayer breakfast, he's holding his revivals there. And he's also gaining audience with key players in Washington. We actually have a photograph of William Brandham in one of these meetings with Richard Nixon at one of these Shekarian sponsor events. So this is really, really big. It's much bigger than people realize. Right. And the Kardashian family, you know, the patriarch of their family was at the Azusa street revival and was involved with Pentecostalism from its very earliest days, you know. And as William Brandham begins to rise onto the scene here,

he very quickly, you know, catches their eyes. They are, they're well to do. They're moneyed. And they are quick to jump on the bandwagon to finance and support what he's doing. And as time goes on, William Brandham becomes very dependent, you know, as you read his different biographies, I'll say them more scholarly biographies like the, like the biography by Doug Weaver, for example.

As William Brandham goes on, he becomes very dependent on the full gospel businessman to finance and keep his campaigns moving. So there, there are a lot of the money side of things. And you're exactly right, John. These, these meetings and campaigns that William Brandham was having were highly, highly organized. There was a large campaign team involved. You know, and when you, when you think about the real world, things like this, they really don't just spontaneously happen. It takes an organizing force to bring together a large meeting, to rent the venues, to sell the tickets, to do everything like that, to put the advertisements in the newspaper.

And then once you're there, you got to organize the whole thing. You need ushers. You need people to serve this and to serve that and to watch the doors and to organize the prayer. So there's a, there's a crowd of people just involved in pulling these things off. And as I mentioned, William Brandham's team went through several iterations. It started with Kitson. Then it went to Jack Moore. And then Jack Moore brings in Gordon Lindsay. And there's just this array of people that are leading this effort in there. And William Brandham is part of that team or the leader of that.

a team, depending on how you would look at it. So as these men would go about, they would organize this tour for him. They would book the churches, book the venues, run the advertisements, sell the tickets, and there were tickets to get him.

What they would do is they would book them basically three to five days in one city, and then they would move on it. They were rarely in the same place more than three to five days, so that's an important thing to remember, too.

They never stayed very long in the same place. They were moving from town to town. They were rarely in the same town from one week to the next. They almost always were in another town by the next week.

And so as this went on, the format of William Brenms meetings themselves through this period were really very standard. They kind of followed the same format from beginning to end on these things. The way it worked is that William Brenms would have an opening speaker, an opening act, however you'd want to term it.

And as in the early days, we know he was with little David Walker, right, and William Brenms was himself a part of that opening act, right? But as time changes, William Brenms becomes the main act if you want to put it that way.

And these other men come in as the opening scenes. What they would do in the first stage is one of his companion evangelists would preach and warm up the crowd and earn backster. He came on board and started doing this, I believe, in 1947.

And Bosworth came in in 1948 and they would travel with them and kind of take turns doing this. And the way it worked, they would come out and they would preach to the crowds.

And we have copies of their sermons of the different things. Generally, they would preach half faith, half faith, half faith. You need to have faith, half faith. You need faith. Jesus wants you to have faith.

And we have little brochures like this and stuff that they handed out as well. And a lot of it was about building the crowd up and you can even read like Bosworth sermons that he would preach to the crowd warms up.

It was all about getting them into the right frame of mind so they could then receive divine healing when William Brownham came out. So it's all about, these are the things you need so that you can then be healed when William Brownham comes out.

That was a lot of what they did. Now, earn backster, he would do a little bit of Bible teaching from time to time. And other people did this role as time went on. Paul Cain, who is another interesting figure, he did this role in later years.

Jim Jones did this role for William Brownham in later years. And William Brownham swapped these people out as time went on. But earn backster and FF Bosworth, I think, were the two most prominent men that did it the most frequent.

especially during the early period. It's really interesting because if you think about a circus, the circus doesn't draw crowds for the small acts. They've got one big act that everybody wants to come see and they can't fill the entire space with that big act and the big act itself would become less appealing if that's all you had.

So they have these smaller acts that builds up to the main event and it's very much this entertainment that was operating just like a circus. They were having people come in and build the audience up to the main attraction, which was William Branham on a totem pole and main attraction would come and then this sold crowds and they realized that this is the way in which you sell crowds.

It was a very, very good marketing scheme that they had set up. And you have two elements, two predominant elements of people at these meetings. So John, like you said, you have the majority of people who are there, who are there in an entertainment sense.

They've come to see some miracles. They've come to see some healings happen, right? So you've got that. But then you've got another crowd of people there. You have a whole bunch of really desperate people looking for healing.

And there's pictures we can share. They would line the aisle, some of these places with stretchers, people on death's door. So the larger segment is there to see miracles and be amazed. And then there's also a category of incredibly desperate people on their deathbeds at these things, just hoping that William Branham will do the right thing and they can finally be healed.

So you've got the two sides of it here. And as we go on, these people in these desperate conditions, these are the people that unfortunately end up the victims of some of this stuff that goes on.

And we'll look at a little bit of that as we go. And now, as William Branham would finish that his sermon, he would come out on stage after his warm up acts, warmed up the crowd, got things going.

He'd come out and he'd preach his sermons. And you know, as he would come out, John, I think you know this. William Branham really only had about 10 to 15 sermons that he preached.

He would just change the title, maybe swap some sections in and out, but for this period of time through all these healing revivals, there's really only 10 to 15 sermons that William Branham preached.

He just repeats the same, repackaged sermons over and over again. So there's not really any message, as we would call message at this point, it's just these sermons. And the truth is, some of them, he's just copied from other people.

You know, the people he copied them from. And he's just repreaching some of the... these sermons over and over and over as he goes from city to city. It's really interesting too if you think about it. I've shared with you some of this, but we get as you can imagine a lot of hate mail for our critique of William Brannum and one of the common themes is why don't you guys just preach the gospel? Why are you doing this? Well, if you take a step back during this time, if you examine these, there's a handful of sermons. I don't know how

many. There are 10 to 15 like you say, but there really isn't the gospel in any of them. It's mostly self-promotion. He's the main attraction. He's the one that's selling himself to build their faith in hymns so that he can heal them. That's literally the reason why there's a cult of personality because he is selling his personality. He's not selling the gospel of Jesus Christ. Right. You're spot on. The main focus of his sermons, he might use a scripture here there and then draw a point from it. But the main topic that he always comes back to in his sermons

is his life story and the gifts that God has given him. That is ultimately the main point that he goes to over and over again. I am God's prophet. I have these gifts and you believe and you will receive what I have for you. That's ultimately, that is the build up. Every sermon, that is where it ends at. I am the prophet that God has sent. You can be healed if you believe.

That's the point that every sermon ultimately ends up with and you're exactly right, John. These were not campaigns to win souls to Christ by and large. These were healing. These were the healing revivals. There was other evangelists in this period. You look at Billy Graham. Billy Graham was. He was out. His main focus was bringing souls to Christ and he took an entirely way. He had the same, you might say, from the outside it looks similar because it's a tent and people in a tent. Inside the tent, the way things went is very different. He was preaching winning

souls to Christ. In these meetings, the focus was not winning souls to Christ. The focus was we're going to heal people and if you have faith, you can be healed. Billy Graham has have faith on Christ and be saved. William Brannum has faith on Christ and be healed. It's a different thing that William Brannum is doing here. He's doing this before Oral Roberts has did it. He's doing it before these other men were doing it. His practices end up getting copied and spun off by these other men into what you see. You mentioned how this is very similar to televangelism earlier.

Your spot on, I mean Oral Roberts came to his meetings, looked at what he was doing, went out and started doing the same thing, right? And then eventually that morphs into televangelism, right? So William Brannum is the initiator of a whole lot of this stuff.

Yeah, and I think I'll pause to qualify because we've got quite a few listeners who have asked us several times to dig into Billy Graham because he's doing a lot of the same things.

For the purpose of this episode, we want to just show the difference between the two. It wasn't even that William Brannum was not selling Christ and he was selling himself. And it wasn't just that he was getting people to believe.

He specifically says, if you, he says that this angel, this alleged angel says, if you can get the people to believe in you, you'll get healed. Now Billy Graham never did anything like this.

So during this point of time, good or bad, what do you want to say about Billy Graham? Billy Graham actually has something that resembles the gospel and there were a lot of people that argued that it actually was the actual gospel at this time.

But regardless of all that, if you just separate the two, here's Billy Graham saying believe in Jesus and here's William Brannum saying believe in me. It's a stark contrast, right? And it's not to say that they never made an altar call.

William Brannum never made an altar call. It's not to say that they never preached have faith in Jesus and be saved, but it is to say that was not the focus. That was not the central theme.

That was an on the side thing that happened once in a while. So as William Brannum would, he'd preach a sermon and his sermon, like you said, John was, it was usually a sermon that had a lot to do with his personal experiences, his personal life, his life experiences and it would culminate with, you need to believe that I'm the prophet that I have a gift of healing and if you can believe that I have these gifts and that God gave them to me, then you can be healed.

And that's where his sermons would lead. And as he would build up to that, he would then call a prayer line. And the way the prayer lines worked is, before the meetings, they would hand out prayer cards that look like this.

And not everybody obviously had a prayer card, but there would be a few hundred prayer cards handed out to the people coming. And as you notice, they're all numbered. They all have a number on them and they would write their name, their address and what their affliction was, what their problem was that they wanted prayer for.

And all these things would be on here and they would turn these prayer cards into William Brannum's campaign team

and then they would choose some of these to be prayed for. And what they would do, a lot of these had a stub on the side that they would retain with their number and then when William Brannum would call people up to be prayed for, he would call a certain number range.

He would say, okay. Number A70 through A80 line up and we're going to pray for you and what would happen is they would they would get in line the campaign team the campaign manager the other people working there would organize them make sure they're in the right numbers I have I have several eyewitness accounts of people who watched how these things happen and how they line them all up and a lot of times as this stuff's going on William Brown say no everyone close your eyes bow your heads so a lot of this is nobody's even watching when a lot of this is happening

right like every everybody's eyes are closed and they're they're doing this what everyone's eyes are closed and so then they'd be in in line and then one by one they come up on the stage and William Brown them would pray for them one at a time on stage and we know what happens from there he tell them a lot of times their name their address what was wrong with them and he would in many times pronounce them pronounce them healed it's really interesting to the part you mentioned about closing your eyes William Brannum scared people about opening

their eyes he would actually tell these stories that obviously are not true about people who open their eyes and the demon came to them the demon that he prayed out of the people in the platform but when you take a step back from all of this this really influenced Christianity on a global scale I'm not aware of any you can correct me if I'm wrong I'm not aware of any passage in the Bible that says you have to close your eyes when you pray I've never seen it right so for me John this goes back to we did the episode on spiritualism okay yes now

everybody be very reverent everyone be very quiet while we wait on the spirits to come into the room and now we're waiting on the spirits to come into the room be very reverent be very calm okay the spirits are here now let's to ask the spirits our questions what William Brannum is doing is far more akin to the things that we read about in camp Chesterfield and the spiritualist movement than what you actually see in the Bible I will never forget I one of the churches we attended the pastor had some event at his house I can't remember

what it was but they're all standing around just a group of men and he started praying and he started talking as though he's speaking to a part one of us right but he's praying to Jesus and I was just in awe of this because all of our eyes were open and I was like oh no what do I do what do I do my eyes are open but wait all their eyes are open too we were manipulated to believe that you couldn't even pray with your eyes open or these double powers would get you William Brannum would say things like this he would say the Holy Ghost is

timid yes and my angel is is a shy angel like he would he would say things right along that line and now we all have to be very reverent yeah if we want him to come into the room right and yet they've got these prayer cards they've got ushers who are you know walking through the ushers know exactly who the people are what cards they've given what seats they're in what diseases they have I mean they've got all this information and they're asking you don't look at us it's unusual it there's there's things you know

when I look back on it now it's unusual John it is unusual and so so we know William Brownham has at least a large percentage of the people he's praying for he has their name their address and what they're sick with wrote down on a card somewhere and and there's lots of people sitting in the audience too who didn't get called into the prayer line who turned in prayer cards too right yeah that is wrote down somewhere what there's what what's wrong with them you know a lot of these faith healers the way that the way that would work is they would take

the prayer card they're the ones who keep the faith healers are the ones who keep the information they give you the stub and when the person comes up they pretend to have the discernment and then they lift their card up and show them what it is that they wrote on the card and say look it matches exactly what you wrote on this card and that was the gimmick people would say oh wow he knew what I wrote not taking a step back to think well wait a minute he's got the card that I wrote I know and you know there's there's a there's a thing here if

William Brownham if the angel could tell William Brownham your name your address and what was wrong with you why did you need that like why did you even need the prayer cards know what I mean like why why not just give them numbers okay and call the numbers why have them also write all this stuff down we were told by my grandfather that the reason why they had this was because without it there would be complete disorder everybody would be coming up out of order but I was sitting there one day I'm sure your church did this too we had literal

feet washing which some churches still do today and you got this crowd of 500 people so 500 people waiting to get in this little tiny room with there were probably seven to ten buckets of water to watch each other's feet 500 people is a lot yet people were able to maintain order there the ushers just went back all by island said okay this I'll go up and then they would wait to those cleared out you can keep order without having a card the card had a different purpose in these meetings exactly and you could do it in such a way

that you you didn't have to ask all this details and still keep order right you know it's right it's it's an it's an odd thing and here's the thing where I come from in the message John I never even knew prayer cards existed did you know prayer cards existed John I knew they but I did not know the extent of what was on them.

The way it was explained to us, it was literally just for the number. So in my head, the way that they represented it, the ushers had 50, A57, and then I had A57. I had no idea that I wrote all the information that was being discerned.

So you just thought it was just a number, okay? See, to me, on the same way, it would make sense, you know, it's just a number, but yeah, we did not even, yeah, we had no idea, and I have no idea why no one told us.

I mean, I say I have no idea, I suspect now I know why nobody told us. I can tell you why. Nobody told us that people were writing down everything wrong with them and submitting it on a card before the meeting.

Nobody told us that, and I look back and I realize now I think I know why none of them would tell us that. That was there because, yeah, that's a very obvious red flag of how this could possibly not have been miraculous, right?

Again, it's, I don't think like we, I have heard, so John, here's where I come, I have heard people who peaked when their eyes were supposed to be the clothes and heads about and saw people bringing papers to William Brannum, right?

I've heard, I've heard that from eyewitnesses, I'm sure you've heard similar. We also have one video, there's only one video of these prayer lines, and the same thing, there is some suspicious things that happen on that video, and you look back now and you wonder, again, we don't have, you know, conclusive proof of anything, but I am of the opinion, you know, that I've heard similar stories where William Brannum got the discernments wrong and he got them wrong quite a bit.

Yes. We can talk about that some more as we go along, but he actually got the discernments wrong quite a bit. I'm personally aware of cases in our own church where William Brannum got the discernment wrong, and there's cases on tape, there's actually cases on tape where he gets the discernment wrong as well, and then he gets corrected in the line.

I am of the opinion that absolutely a percentage of the discernments are definitely not authentic, and so if percentage of them are not authentic, to me it throws the whole thing into question. Well, there's a reason why there aren't more videos, because think about it.

This was a man who believed or convinced us to believe that this was a movement inspired by God and the tapes were like a literal book of Acts, yet no video. Why would you not have video?

They had recording equipment. Exactly. And as we have come up to this point and will continue to go... William Branagh was so dishonest. I mean, he is utterly dishonest about his whole life history. Okay? I have to trust that these prayer cards here. I have to trust that these prayer cards were not being filtered to him somehow and that all of his that all of his discernments were authentic. Well, I I can no longer take that leap of faith, especially when I can see so many red flags that there's something wrong with it. Now, can God read people's minds? Well, sure, he can. Of

course, he can, right? God can read people's minds, but that don't mean that this is what's happening with William Branagh, right? So here's the bottom line for me. If you have a gift, which he presented himself as though he did, and there are actual things that we can say were true about this gift. In other words, he actually heal people or he actually discern people. If if this was actually happening, if he actually had this, there would be no reason to plant fake ones. And even in people who've watched the credits of our podcast, there's this, you know, newspaper article that is talking about the came

in stretchers full of hope and they left in stretchers. Still full of hope. Yet we were told that all these people were healed. And we have clear examples of people, I think the most famous is Donnie Morton, who he claimed to have been healed, who died of those diseases. And if you have to invent fake ones, the question becomes, what is there a real one? You know, I'm not going to challenge that people were healed and this people were healed. But they weren't, they would have had the same opportunity to have been healed if they

just stood alone in their closet and prayed to God. You know what I'm saying? Yes. Yes. And I want to definitely go through some of these cases. Donnie Morton, Betty Dordy, Carol Strubler, Gene Dryer, there's so many people. The number is actually quite astounding when you actually look at all of the cases documented evidence cases where William Brannum got this thing wrong. And I definitely want to look at some of those highlighted cases. Maybe before we do, why don't we just summarize real quick what William Brannum's actual divine healing beliefs were? Like just how he framed them. And you know, there's, again,

we can get all these on tape, we can find the pamphlets. Again, I have this little pamphlet here that was published in his meetings. This is from this one, the person who picked this up got this at one of his 1949 meetings. I think this came from his meetings in somewhere in Florida in 1949. I'd have to go look by notes just to tell exactly where that came from. But he would come up these, these very clearly outline how healing works in his meetings and what you need to be healed.

And William Brannum's beliefs on this topic are, they didn't originate with him, but he popularized them. And they went in certain different aspects of the word of faith movement, the new apostolic reformation. These things spawned in many ways hypercarsmaticism, right?

I think in our next episode, we're probably going to go into the roots and effects of some of these things a little more. But these teachings by William Brannum, it started with the divine healing stuff is where these concepts kind of originated in his teachings that then ballooned into other areas outside of divine healing.

What he would do in his divine healing beliefs is he basically would tell you that the only thing standing between you and having the healing that you want is your ability to have faith and believe you can have it.

That's the only thing standing between you and your ability to be healed. And he'd make statements like this, this is from the living Jesus Christ, 1953. He would say, now that demon of unbelief, that's the only thing that would keep you from being healed.

He would, when he's talking out and speaking to the entire crowd, here's quote, the power of the devil from 1955. He would say, I'll challenge you in the name of Jesus Christ, stand on your feet and claim it.

God will give it to you right now if you've got enough faith to believe it. He would make these blanket statements to everybody there. You can have this healing, this thing you want right now, you just got to stand up, believe it and claim it.

And the only thing that will keep you from having it is the faith, the faith to have it. And he would tell people that his gift that he had from God, he would tell them it was an absolute, it was an absolute, even in his story of how the angel came to him, right?

He would tell people, if I can, if you can get the people to believe, nothing will stand before your prayer and he would repeat that a lot. If you can get the people to believe, nothing will stand before your prayer.

So William Brannum set up this belief that universally everybody can have this healing that he's offering and the only thing you need is to believe, only believe, only believe all things are possible, only believe.

And to sum it up for our Christian listeners, yes, I can already hear in your mind, you're thinking, well, this is a different gospel. Well, William Brannum himself says that this is a different gospel.

Well, he called it the gospel of divine healing and he even clearly says that the gospel of divine healing has the same results as the other ministry. So he's proclaiming a different gospel. He's saying that the different gospel has the same results as the real gospel of Jesus Christ.

So he is, you know, he's not even hiding the fact that he's not preaching the gospel. Right. Now what William Brannum does, William Brannum believed in a in a dual atonement and there's actually a line of theology for this dual atonement.

And in that in that theology, the dual atonement that Christ paid, he paid for your salvation by faith and he paid for your healing by faith. So healing and and salvation come in the same package, basically, both paid for, you know, on the cross by Christ.

And so this is the the background for where some of this thoughts are coming from. And but it takes a turn, it takes a turn and it goes in other places beyond just divine healing.

And William Brannum was a very strong believer in positive confession and you'll find that throughout the word of faith movement, very strongly in new apostolic reformation. You'll find that in a lot of places, positive confession.

And the the doctrine of positive confession is also sometimes what people will call name it and claim it. Yes. Okay. You you if you want something, you say you got it and you believe it and then you'll get it.

So if you're sick, you say I'm healed and you keep believing your healed and then you'll be healed, right? So you have to you have to name it, you have to say it's true and you're believing it into existence, right?

That's that's kind of how it that's how it works. And you just keep saying that, right? And so, you know, in in normative Christianity, and maybe again, I think maybe this will be better for the next episode.

But in normative Christianity, if I say I am healed, but I'm still sick, I would say that's a sin you're lying.

Right? So, so this is actually something sinful, I think, in normative Christianity, that is not faith. That's lying. That's that's something different, right? It's really, really sad to when you think about it because I've I'm sure that you've seen people like this.

I know I have there are people who are dying with terminal illness and they will say, but I'm healed. God has healed me and everyone around them who is not in this cult is just taking a step back.

And thinking, why are they even saying this? They're dying. They're literally dying. And then after they actually die, but they've been manipulated to think that they're not allowed to accept the fact that they're dying.

And as a result of this, just to touch on how bad and evil this is, many of them don't make preparations for dying. They don't have a grave plot. They don't, you know, some of them do, but a lot of them don't because they to buy the grave plot would be to accept the fact that they're not healed, which is against this alleged gospel of divine healing. They're literally, you know, all of the things that they should be doing during this time, they're not. And that cascades throughout the family who are in the cult. The family also will reject the fact

that they're dying because they're supposed to believe in their healing and yet they're dying. Yeah. And this, this name it and claim it as it relates to healing. William Brownum absolutely believe that name it claim it speaking into existence with your healing and you can have it.

Where this morphs is when some of the other evangelists that that follow him into the healing revival, they take this to even another level. And that's where it turns into word of faith. This is where it turns into the full on prosperity gospel because they're going beyond just name and and claim it with healing. They go into, you know, I heard a lady. I think her name is Hickey. I think I sent you a clip or her one time. Speak to your billfold. You are a good billfold.

You are a prosperous wallet. Bring forth cash, right? Like it, this, that ideology has its roots in William Brownum's ideology. And that lady who said that will even, she says that herself, right? She says, I went to the William Brownum meeting. This is where I learned this. I could speak my healing into existence. And now I can speak cash into existence. For the historians looking into this, it's not that William Brownum invented these ideas. You can find them. If you look at John Alexander Dowey, in many ways, Brownum was cloning Dowey's empire. And Dowey did this. And I'm

certain that Roy Davis was in the camps of people who were affiliated with Dowey. He learned this. And then he basically transferred or imparted this knowledge to William Brownum. And then on top of that, Gordon Lindsay and FF Bosworth were also out of the Dowey cult. So Brownum had this group of men who were basically teaching him what Dowey did. And this was Dowey's doctrine.

Right. And positive confession predates William Brownum. So positive confession is the foundation on which the name and claim it comes into existence. And it traces back through multiple figures before William Brownum. And what happens, though, is William Brownum popularizes it. He is like in this ideology, he's the middle man between the people who came before him. And then the huge popularity that came out of it with oral Roberts, A.A. Allen. And then from them on into the broader charismatic and hypercarsomatic movement where you'd see some of these things today. And One more quote, I'll just give one more quote of William Brannum along this line.

He's praying for a lady here, expectation, 1951 is the sermon. He says, you had a tumor, didn't you? Now, go off the platform and don't claim it no more. Be healed in the name of Jesus. You believe with all your heart.

And then he tells you, you go away, have no doubts, and the faith of God will make it happen. He'll make you well. This is exactly what he was telling people. They come up with a tumor like this lady.

You're healed, you go away, say in your healed, and it's going to go away. And so this is, this is what he's teaching people. And these things spawn and become popular as a result of his, of the fame of his ministry.

Yes, and you know, if you really think about it, this was entertainment. There were a lot of people being entertained. Entertainment doesn't work unless they're substance. And as you and I both agree, there are people who were healed.

And those small percentages of people that were healed are literally what drove this hype of William Brannum. It's basically hysteria. But once they enter into hysteria, it starts spreading word of mouth and things become much bigger than they actually were.

We've spoken to people in the past who will tell you that during this time William Brannum had the greatest miracle revivals of all time. If you went there, you were going to see miracles.

We also have people who attended those same revivals who were in those same events. And they will tell you that it was so much hype. There were a lot of people who were, I think we've mentioned in the past.

They were brought up in standing and they were given wheelchairs and they rose up and stood in the meetings. Well, they weren't actually healed of paralysis, but every single person and we're talking sometimes 10,000 people would watch this person rise up.

And just because they were in a wheelchair on the platform, even though they did not need the wheelchair, all of those 10,000 people said I witnessed a miracle tonight. So then that spread and this hype spread.

But when all of the hype is taken away, you've got people who are legitimately skeptics, the newspaper reporters. You've also got even people like Alfred Pol who was in William Brannum's ministry who helped bring William Brannum to Canada, who had to turn skeptic after he witnessed several people die that William Brannum said would be healed.

You've got the other side of the story, which tells a much different story than the hype that was basically attained by these stage acts, if you know what I'm saying. I know we have, I know we're already an hour in and we haven't even got to any of the cases we want to look at John.

But you know. Well, your spot on William Brannum claimed. William Brannum set this bar very high. You know, again, this is from a 1963 sermon called The Token. He said in that sermon that he did more miracles just in the Brannum tabernacle than Jesus did in his entire ministry.

Right, William Brannum made claims like that. He claimed to have performed in his ministry more miracles than Jesus, okay? This is where he puts it. But just like you said, John,

the people who were at these meetings, you know, they don't all come away with that perspective. You know, I've got one here that we've talked about. Here's a girl. Like, there was evidence that even some of these miracles were staged, right?

There was a girl that they found, for example, who had came to William Brannum's revival. She was in multiple cities and William Brannum prayed for her and she rose and walked in multiple cities, right?

So William Brannum, you know, did he, was that girl planted or just what? You know, we don't know. But there's things that reporters and investigators found where a lame girl was healed to walk more than once, okay?

So it's unusual stuff, right? And one of the articles, it might be that one that you're holding. One of the articles, they investigated also the parents of this girl and found that the parents were without work.

They were the perfect person to say, here, I'll give you a lot of money if you have your girl stand up. It's very, for me, it's very problematic because again, if you have a gift, why do you need fake people to heal, to pretend to be healed in these meetings?

Right. And what's really strange is it's, it's when the reporters go to the meeting. So like, there's this one here. The reporters go to the meeting, they say that there's been hundreds and hundreds of people healed at this meeting.

And so the reporters go and the, I believe it's Kitson. Kitson is still running this revival. Kitson from the platform calls out to all the people. If anybody's been healed, raise your hand.

The reporters would like to, to, to cure your testimony. Nobody raises their hand, right? There's nobody actually that was healed in such a way at this meeting that the, that the reporters could interview them.

Even though supposedly hundreds of people were healed. And, and they went around at, at this meeting, this is a vandalium meeting, I believe is what this is. And they actually could not confirm a single healing at it.

And that's literally the meeting that Rose William Branneman's a fame. The one that launched his career, nobody could find evidence of somebody who was actually healed. None of the investigative reporters could find a single person.

Right. And now, of course, there's lots of people who, who said they, people were healed and stuff. But again, there seems to have actually been zero evidence. of it. I have to qualify what I just said. There were hundreds of people who said they were healed.

What I'm talking about here are evidence of people actually healed. Because remember, you are not allowed to say, you're not allowed to say, I still have my disease. If you do, you don't have faith and you're not going to be healed. So these people would actually, they did not want to speak to reporters because the reporters would find evidence, well, here's a person who went to be prayed for for being blind. Well, they still can't see. Or here's a person who's lame and that well, they're still in a stretcher. But these people would tell them that I've been healed to,

you know, among the listeners of, among the population of people that attended these revivals, but they didn't want anything to do with reporters because the reporters could see they still have their diseases. Exactly. You take it back to positive confession, right? I have to say I'm healed so I can be healed, right? There were lots of people that were, that were listening to what William Brandham said. I'm healed. Yes, my tumor is gone. I'm healed. I'm healed. I'm healed. I'm healed. They had to, through positive confession, claim it, right? Because if they actually said, no,

I'm not healed yet. Uh-oh. You don't have faith. You just lost your healing, right? They, they could not, even if they were sick still and having symptoms, they had to say they were healed in order to in order to have what William Brandham had offered them. On the flip side, there were people who all actually were healed. There were people who went, they went to be prayed for. They left. They were not any better because they were prayed for in the meeting. But eventually, you know, they continued prayer. God healed them or I think in some cases, you know, our bodies healed ourselves.

So some people just because there were so many people there, a percentage are going to be healed anyway. Well, they attributed their healing to being in the meeting. So it wasn't an actual healing that was any any way shape or form related to William Brandham. But I believe that there were people who actually were healed after these meetings. As we go on, you know, we showed the article about, you know, some of the staged things that were healing. You know, this artist, this and one too. And there are so many newspaper articles and reporters that investigated these

things. I just pulled out some of the early ones. But, you know, this one, they actually did go and looked like there were several people that were supposed to be cross-eyed that were healed. But their eyes were still crossed. There were several people who were supposed to been healed of this or that. But they, they could, the reporters could visibly see that they were still suffering from what William Brandham said they were, they were healed of or what they claimed to be healed of. And the cross-eyed, I want to mention in one of the earlier recordings,

William Brandham, just to show how different of a gospel. He says, you bring any cross-eyed child to me and I will heal it without even praying for it. In other words, I'm not going to show with them, God, I'm not going to tell them the gospel, I'm not going to send them to God. I, William Brannum, I'm going to heal them without God is what he's saying.

Right. And when I look at these cases, for me, the very best ones to look at are actually the cases of the children who died. Because those are, for me, with the children, the lack of faith, excuse, don't work. The, you're a little center thing, don't work. Those excuses don't work for me. And I think with the average person with these children, right.

You, you take, you mentioned the case of Donnie Morton. And his, his, his thing was published in Reader's Digest. And this boy was four years old when, when these things happened, right. So, you know, you can't tell a four-year-old, it's your lack of faith. That's why you didn't, you know, you can't tell a four-year-old, you're, you're, God's killing you because you're center, right. Like that don't work. That don't work. And, but here's this, here's this, this story. And the title is the miracle of Donnie Morton. And it's not the miracle of his healing, because this boy actually passed away and died. How about the same diseases? He died of the same

diseases that he's prayed for. This article is about the miracle of his life, not the miracle of his healing. And William Brannum went, he came to paid, his dad paid a lot of money to bring him from thousands of miles away to come to a Brannum meeting to be prayed for. And this is all on tape. William Brannum prays for Donnie Morton. William Brannum pronounces him healed, thus say at the Lord. And William Brannum tells people for years and years about the great healing of Donnie Morton and how Donnie Morton put on shoes and he got up and he walked, he walked and stuff

after all this happened. Donnie Morton died. His dad took him home and Donnie Morton died. And that's the truth. And I know there's an interview not too long ago that was published with Donnie Morton's sister, where even the stories that William Brannum told about him putting on his shoes and walking was made up story. Well, Donnie Morton never even walked after that. And the whole thing was untrue, right? But William Brannum for years would tell people Donnie Morton was healed.

And it was a thus say at the Lord one. Yeah, it's really sad too, because the reader's digest article, it wasn't just a testimony to the miracle of his life. It was a testimony to the faith of his father. In other words, you know, William Brannum said that if you have faith, you can be healed. If you don't have faith, this demon of unbelief is going to prevent you from being healed. Well, this reader's digest article is a testament to the father's faith.

This father believed William Brannum so strongly that he took them, went, made this incredible journey to see him. And then sadly, his son died of the same- diseases yeah it's it's it's something and you know when you look at a case like that and you take William Brannum's claim that his gift is absolute and the only thing that stands in the way is faith why did Donnie Morton die yeah what you know that these stories prove that what William Brannum said about his gift is false people went they believed this man spent thousands of dollars he

left his job he was desperate to take this boy to get healed he had faith but the boy died you know that there's another case here the case of Carol Strubler I think she was nine years old this one is actually on videotape when William Brannum preaches the deep call the deep you can actually watch this whole thing on video where he prays for this girl you know he he prayed for her he said with the divine gift ministered by the angel as he prayed for her he invoked the gift when he's all done he could help he blesses her he says go

and be well she died I believe the very next week she died within two to three weeks I think for a parent it is gut wrenching to think about the mother in this case I mean this mother is being told her daughter is going to live yeah and if you if you read through these ones her parents believed what William Brannum said they took her home they took her off all of her medical treatment she's healed you don't need medical treatment anymore they took her they canceled her doctor appointments everything because William Brannum told them that she was

healed and then she died and I want to hone in on that took her off of her medical treatments this is actually common in this cult because you again you have to show your faith you have to name it and claim it there are people who severely suffer because they detach themselves from all medication that they desperately need sometimes even through the end of life medications and other words they could you know go through their journey to the other side without pain but they refuse the medication and so their suffering is so much worse than had they not met this William Brannum cult now when this girl died I know

actually a whole lot about this case John I think I'm the one who shared it with you our the pastor of our message church I'm talking Raymond Jackson William Brannum privately confessed to Raymond Jackson this is on tape Raymond Jackson sharing the story that his gift of divine healing did not work and he was very sad that this girl died he actually confessed to William Brannum William Brannum confessed to Raymond Jackson that his gift did not work when this girl died so again that's that's I don't see any reason that Raymond Jackson would have lied to us about that so will

Branum admitted himself that the gift did not work according to the way the angel told him. You know, another case, another another child, is Betty Dottery, who we've we've talked about already several times.

And you know, her case is one that I gotta be honest, John, it this one gets under my skin a little bit when I look at Betty Dottery, you know. This this one just makes me a little bit if I was if I had been around back then, I would have probably had some pretty strong words to say to William Branum about this because what he did to Betty was not okay.

What he did to her was very, very wrong. This is the girl that he prayed for and kicked off his whole ministry. And we haven't talked about it yet, but her initial illness that William Branum went to pray for her in 1945 was St. Vitus Dance.

We have that in her father's written testimony. We have that from William Branum's lips. We have that different ways that she had St. Vitus Dance. That is a condition caused by a human growth hormone and in almost all cases people spontaneously recover from that within two to six months from its onset.

It's it is not a it's an unpleasant thing when it happens it causes seizures, but it is generally not life threatening and almost always goes away on its own. That's what she had when she was healed in 1945.

So Betty though had a lot of illnesses in her life and that was not the only time William Branum prayed for her. We heard the we heard the final story the last time that William Branum prayed for her where she had got diabetes and William Branum prayed for told her she was going to be healed and then she went home to die.

There's another time there's an intermediate time that William Branum also prayed for her and this is on tape. And as Betty's diabetes on set she actually started to go blind and lose her sight. So here we got a young girl.

She's been sick a whole lot of her life. Her father's a preacher. She is from every account I've heard through coming back from her family and everything. She was a devout Christian, the child of a minister.

And William Branum gets her up in front of a crowd and I have to say I believe William Branum knows this girl is going to die and there's nothing he can do for her and he starts praying for her.

And this is from the sermon as I was with Moses so I'll be with thee from 1960. William Branum starts praying to her and I'm just going to read what he says. He goes it's the shame.

He says my you've made a fine pretty girl Betty. It's a shame to see your eyes go on like that. And then he goes on to say now is there anything down in life that you failed Betty?

Now do you? Just as a doctor would look over your physical body, I want to look over your soul. Have you failed God anywhere, Betty? William Brannum has this girl who has been sick for a lot of her life who is going to die.

He's got her on stage in front of hundreds of people who's lived a good Christian life from everything I've heard and he is accusing her of being a failure to God in front of all of these people.

You know, what does that do to a person? It's terrible. And amplify that by everybody, every child who's in these meetings that are given false hope whenever they see some person quote unquote be healed, even though they aren't really healed.

It gives them false hope that they can too be healed. But then a case like this where somebody, you know, he's literally pronouncing failure upon her, well, all those people who came with this hope to begin with, now they're also inwardly questioning their own lives, well, oh my gosh, what have I done that God might not like me for?

All right. And this young girl is gone to go to her grave and die. And as so many other cases that we've read, people, what this would trigger in people, again, we have all kinds of testimonies about this Alfred Paul goes into this in detail.

This triggers a collapse of faith in people, the way William Brandon would, it triggers an utter collapse of faith in people. And so now here, she's going to go to her grave, dying, believing that she's failed God, right?

That's why in the, in the preface to this, I said, this is anti biblical. This is literally a way to turn people to atheism, what he's doing. And so this is where we talk about, this is not a healthy use of divine healing here.

This is an abuse of divine healing. This is, this is an utter abuse of it because this thing does not help Betty at all. This hurts Betty, this hurts Betty, just like it hurt Carol Struebler, right?

Just like it hurt other cases that we're going to look at. What William Brannum did with his gift of healing actually hurt them and made them worse. And that's, I know that's so strong to say that John, but that really is, it's the truth.

Maybe go on and we might have to break this up into two episodes, John. Another case we have is Gene Dyer and this is another young woman who was sick and you can go on tape, William Brannum prays for her and I'll just read one quote.

This is from 1963, the evening messenger, William Brannum prays for her, says, I'm going to tell you, Gene, it's the Seth the Lord, see, see. Now, you want to be real sure of that.

See, that is the Lord. It's not an impression, you see. That's what I've said. You are going to live. This is another thus death of the Lord. It's just absolutely horrific what he's doing here to Jean Dyer.

Again, think of the family of Jean Dyer. You know, Jean Dyer is dying. Well, her family has given this false hope that she's not going to be dying. And what does that do to a person when they watch, you know, their faith is in God.

They believe that William Brandham is their access to God. And God just let them down. Yeah, and same thing. Here's her obituary. She dies just shortly after William Brandham has thus saith the Lord, pronounced her healed.

And she dies of the exact same condition that William Brandham pronounced her healed of. And so these are three cases of young people, of children. But these things litter his entire ministry, John. They litter his entire ministry.

If you read Holland Wager's book, the Pentecostal's Holland Wager was his interpreter on his European tours. He catalogs failed healings all across his tours in Europe. William Brandham published in, when he went to Africa, a man, a prophet visit South Africa.

Well, a man named Wymon Miller and several ministers in South Africa investigated his claims there and they catalog, I believe over 40 cases of people who failed to be healed and died after William Brandham pronounced them healed in his book.

It happened across his sermons in Canada. Here's a man Alfred Pol that we've mentioned several times. And he, again, reports case after case after case where William Brandham thus saith the Lord, pronounced people healed.

They went home and then they died. And a lot of them, he said, gave William Brandham large sums of money after being healed. It's not just a one off here or there kind of a thing.

And let me wrap up, John, with the last thing from Earn Baxter. Earn Baxter was involved in these meetings with William Brandham from the very earliest times, from 1947, 1948, and into the 50s.

And Earn Baxter, I'll just read one quote from him. This is an interview he did in New Wine magazine in 1978. They asked him about the healing revival. Here's the question. What brought about the end of that era of the healing revival and what prompted the decline of William Brandham's ministry?

He goes on to say, I remember in the beginning of the healing movement, simply to report a healing would produce great jubilation and praise from congregations. However, the cynicism became so deep that the people's confidence was diminished.

Even to this day, people are affected. People began to circulate healing testimonies which, when they were checked out by reputable journalists and reporters. even those who were friendly to the movement were found to be false. The percentage of healings that stood up after investigation was embarrassingly low. And that is William Brannum's right hand man who is right there on the platform with him through all of these things.

Yeah, he is the backster half of the earned back of the backster Brannum campaigns. And Charles, I'm just going to say this really, really angers me. Even backster's testimony. Backster is admitting it, but think about this. Backster was there when these things were happening.

Backster knew that these people weren't being healed. Backster continued it well, what was it? 1953 I think that he continued with Brannum. There were several people that everyone in this campaign was aware were not being healed when William Brannum said they were. And it isn't until those later years when backster's whole ministry is imploding, he blames William Brannum in this.

And we'll get into that history of the shepherding movement later, but it just really angers me because these men knew this. But yet they're still using it to build other ministries and other fringe movements of Christianity off of it. For me, my conclusion is that the legend of William Brannum is not true. There are many, many people. We looked at just three or four cases here. I have dozens on my shelf of cases that he prayed for. He told them they were healed even thus at the Lord. And they died. They died. And my conclusion is not that God can't heal people,

but there's something seriously wrong with the gifts that William Brannum claimed to have. And there's something seriously wrong with the way that the stories had been passed down to us in the message. We can just see so clearly they're not true. And there's something seriously, seriously wrong here. Yeah, I agree. And you know, I'm sure I'm certain that you're aware of this as much as my family was aware. These are just a small drop in the bucket to people that are off record that we will never get documented proof because their families just knew that they weren't

healed and they died. But the problem is this, as we'll continue in the podcast episodes, this continues to be a platform that many, many men built their entire ministries on top of. And the problem is that if they expose William Brannum as a fraud, it basically overturns the foundation that they've built their empires off of. So they will continue forever to lift William Brannum up as though he's this great thing. And as you and I can clearly see and I'm certain several of our listeners can see this whole thing from start to finish was a sham. We could talk

forever about this, but um, you know, I'm going to be honest, I'm quite angry just thinking about this and I think we'll end here and let's focus next episode on some of the, you know, some of the ministries and some of the doctrines that were built on top of this.

That sounds great, John. I'm looking forward to that. I know our next episode we're looking at and getting into restorationism and you're exactly right, John. You know, once we step back and the blinders come off, I know at my church there were many, many people who were aware of all these failed healings.

There are many cases I even became aware of that William Brown pronounced him healed and to this day they're not healed, but they're practicing that positive confession, right? And all of the positive confession does is it just, it masks the truth and positive confession turns into a lie at a certain point and it certainly has in the case for a lot of these people.

So I'm excited for the next episode too and we'll get into some fun stuff again instead of the angry stuff, but are the stuff that incites anger. If you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, check us out on the web.

You can find us at www.William-Branum.org and www.ChristianGospelChurch.org. For an overview of the historical research of William Branum and the healing revivals, read preacher behind the white hoods, a critical examination of William Branum in his message, available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.

Join us again next week. We've got a great episode coming.