Our Stories: An Interview With James Rozak

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 very special guest, the one and only, James Rosack.

And together, we're discussing leaving the message, morning mercy, so many good things that James has going on. We recently, I've had many people, James, contact me and was asking about you, wanting you to come on and do a podcast with me.

And gosh, I can't remember how long this has gone back, but you and I have a long history. And not many people are aware of this. We met, gosh, what year was that? Was it 2013, I believe it was?

Yeah, it was 2013. 2013, and then we've met in person beyond that, we're going to try to help people out of the message call. But anyway, we, not two hours ago, somebody asked me, can you please get James Rosack on and talk to him and in our stories?

So I called you up on the Facebook chat, and here we are. Just like that. Yeah, it was a legal, pretty far back there, John. It's, I've, of course, been watching your work and the things that you've been doing for a long time and appreciating it because it's helped me a great deal.

And, you know, we all have our own journey to take. And so in my little part of the world, I was trying to do what I could do through morning mercy and, but also feeding on the information that so many other people had provided.

And you've been like a wealth of information that, that I've been able to use in my own, leaving the message experience. Because I was trying to make sense of everything that had happened to, to me and, and to the people around me, like, you know, my wife and my family.

And, and so yeah, between you and the other resources out there, it's, it's been appreciated very much. Yeah, and I'll let you in on a little secret. I've never said this and I'm guessing he's okay with me saying it because it's, it's kind of funny.

But whenever we went to, I won't give the names, but we went on a mission to try to rescue a person who is trapped in the random call. And, Dr. Steve Hasen called me and he asked me, is there anybody that I recommend to bring with me? And on the trip, you were the first name that I came up with.

And, I think there with Peter Dyser went. you know, but anyway, Dr. Hassan was saying, you know, I was a little bit hesitant to bring you John because you were still in the, in the world of angels and demons and everything that you were saying was, it was like you were still in the cult mindset, but you're trying to help people out of it, which is absolutely true. I look back at that. But he said, can I bring somebody more stable like? And he recommended you. Can I bring somebody that's a little more stable like James

Rosak? Well, it's funny how perception is because I was reading your stuff. And I knew what you're trying to do, you know, you're trying to speak the language, I think, of the people still in the message, you know, so because if you leap off too far, then it's hard to make that connection.

But I looked at you as somebody who was far more knowledgeable, far more kind of schooled in the issues that we were exploring. So yeah, I was, I'm flattered at that. But yeah, it's, it was neat meeting you. Let's put it that way. It was pretty surreal to think that we actually got to hang out. And I was actually looking at pictures the other day. I was cleaning up some photos and have a picture of you standing in the hotel, you know, with your arms up like it was kind of funny to reflect back. It's been quite a few years. Time goes fast.

Yeah, it's been a while. It really has. Yeah. And the other thing I'll admit, and I'm okay with saying this, but especially for the people in the video feed instead of the audio only, one of the reasons it's really helped me back from you getting on here is your background is just so much cooler than mine. I'm just a redneck man. Yeah, well, like I said, we all have our story.

And it doesn't feel particularly cool. You know, I was a nobody preacher up here in Canada who happened to get to travel a little bit. And, and I guess at the time of my leaving, I felt like I was actually reaching, you know, there's, in my mind, there was like tears of preachers in the message, you know, and I think this is a true statement to say this. But I think the ministry and the message are like our version of celebrities. Because people revere the ministry so much. And so I had my celebrity preachers that, you know, I hold in high regard.

And and I was not in that tier whatsoever. I was just a nobody. But at the very end, I felt like I was actually getting known and then lo and behold, brother James had a revelation that William random wasn't who he said he was. And I was on my way out. So yeah.

See, I came from the Colin's side of things. And we looked at everybody who was Gaga, I'd over all of these, these cold masters. And we thought they were all nuts. I mean, even in the whole, we thought they were all nuts. It's so funny. But why don't we, you know, not everybody who's watching our...

podcast even came from the message. That's what is really funny about this because once we connected it to the new waves of Pentecostalism and the charismatic movement, etc., the new apostolic reformation, we've got all of these listeners coming to the podcast because they want to see the foundation for what developed into this weird thing. So maybe if you could just tell a little bit about your backstory for people who are unaware, who is James Rosack? Sure. So I feel like I have a little bit of a unique story in the sense that I was born and raised in a message family.

I live in Edmonton, Canada and at that time, the message was beginning to spread out. William Brown had visited Edmonton and various places in Canada and my family, greater family had come in contact with the message. My grandmother, my great-grandmother, and thereby, you know, great uncles and aunts and all of that. And my mom, of course, was then born into a message family. Or no, she wasn't born into it, but her family came into it when she was young. And so she met my father in the early stages of the message in Edmonton, Canada, where the first churches were being formed there. And then I was

born. I was a 1977 baby. Of course, the prophecies around 1977. I have actually never asked my parents what they felt about that. You know, whether they were nervous, whether we would have a life, I'm not sure, but I was raised up until I was about seven years old. And there was a major church split in Edmonton. And that resulted in, you know, a division of the churches. It was very ugly.

My father, in particular, was very disenchanted with the way the follow went. And so my family ended up leaving. Through the course of time, though, I ended up coming back to the message because I was under the influence of the extended family, my grandmother and other family members. And my parents never talked to me about leaving. Not one conversation. We just stopped going to church. And there was no explanation why no longer saw my friends, why we no longer went to church. There was no discussion about the change in lifestyle that might unfold. So I was very, I would say I was very ripe for

being brought back into the message. And that's what happened. I was, I was unable to fit into the world because I was still, it was very deeply imprinted on me. Just, you know, following the rules, trying to be a good boy, I'm not wanting to.

step the grace of my parents because I always thought I was going to get in trouble, you know, because that's what it was like being a child in the message, you know, making sure you were always following the rules and obeying the authorities. And so I was very depressed and all of those things and very susceptible. My grandmother definitely fed on my fear and I ended up coming back to the message at 21 years old. It felt like the answer to making sense of the confusion that I had felt for years and years. And so I left the message twice because I was in the message then

until I was 35 years old and had become a minister very, I would say fairly quickly after I came into the message because I embraced it. I jumped in head first. I was very zealous. The ministers in the church recognized that I was just on fire. And so they started giving me a platform, you know, song leading, being a youth kind of leader among the young people, you know, because I was coming in hot and I was consuming the message rapidly just trying to learn everything that I could learn.

And so the next thing I was ministering and I did that for, of course, many years and then had my time of just recognizing that there were issues. And at 35 years old, I left for the second time. So I had kind of the experience of leaving as a child and leaving as an adult. And so I can see a lot of, I guess I have a lot of experience in what it's like to leave the message from a family standpoint. And the way that I would, because I had children too when we left the message. And of

course, I was very, I was not going to leave my children without information. So that's something I'd like to speak about. And it's important to me, you know, to make sure that my kids are very well informed themselves. But that's kind of the trajectory. I know there's a lot of stuff that happened through the course of the years of being in the message and why I left. But yeah, it was a, it was quite the journey for me. You know, it's so unfortunate that you went back in it for yourself, but for every single person that you've helped, it's very fortunate. I like I said, I get

contacted many times by people who have came across what you're doing with your morning mercy website or your podcast. And it's helping a lot of people. So on one hand, I'm really sad that you got back in it. And on the other hand, I'm like, wow, this is, this is a good story, right?

Sure, sure. It's, it doesn't feel worth it, John. You know, I would have, you know, it's bittersweet. I have to say that, you know, because because I was in the message, I have a family that I found. You know, I got married. I have children. And of course, you can't, you can't be unhappy for that.

But for the, you know, there's a there's a profound sense of loss that that you feel and and I guess that's That's the theme of redeeming the time, right? You know, you're you're trying to make the most of what happened and and to be able to turn around and and be able to say something about What I learned what I've experienced You know, and now it's been several years since and that's kind of been my mindset with morning mercy from the For the in the duration of of the time I've been making content and You know, it's just I want to be able to

Say something share something help somebody on their own journey. I don't speak to doctrine like what you do John, you know You get into the historical Information about William Brannum and and the greater world that he was living in For me I look at you as doing that work and that's that's your part to play for me. I'm very focused on You know, the kind of the emotional follow that people have the confusion that they have Because that that was that's kind of where my heart is I guess it's I'm I'll let you talk to

So the people about things that you're learning and I'll share what I know and that's kind of where my focus is Yeah, and it's much needed because when you Come out of something like this and deconstruct it is the most thing is the single most painful thing that you will experience in your life Yeah, I'm going through that deconstruction I remember whenever I started to go through it. I Wanted to help people because I realized because of who I am and because of my grandfather at the Brannum Tabernacle I could have a big impact if I tried to help people and in doing so I prolonged my deconstruction

And so that and that was exactly what dr. Hasen was alluding to he said you're you're stuck in this world of angels and demons What the time he said that I thought it was a compliment And now you know years later I understand what he was saying We thought everything was a demon if I stumped my toe on the sidewalk I thought a demon had pushed me man. That's right literally how we were so manipulated and Now on the other side of it, I realized there's this really big psychological need I I would really love to do that, but I'm just not the person for it. I'm

I'm more of the suck it up buttercup I kind of got right now. Right. Yeah. I think that was the I'm actually currently in my podcast sharing my story the last couple episodes

I felt like it would be valuable to explain why I came out of the message and part of my story was near the end I began doing a lot of counseling Again, even in the course of my ministry I wasn't as fascinated with the doctrinal teaching some people are prone You know, they're very apt to teach in that way doctrine and that but I even while in the message I really saw the absence of emotional support.

And in the message, of course, it was a gaping void of,

there was no help for somebody, let's say, who's been sexually abused or physically abused or in the course of life, in the course of being a part of the message. Sometimes it's extraneous to the message.

It's just living life and we didn't address human need in that way. And so you have people in the church and they're criticized for not being able to fully commit themselves to the gospel, to the teaching and they were criticized in the way that they were somehow lacking spiritual aptitude.

You know, they needed to commit themselves more, they needed to read more, they needed to pray more. And the bottom line that I began saying was, there's people who, you can't, you can't medicate somebody like that with platitudes and with quotes.

Like they actually need support from somebody who's trained, you know, and as message ministers, we claimed to have the spiritual insight and wisdom. But my gosh, we were so incapable of helping somebody with that kind of need.

And so near the end of my ministry, I was very aware of that and I was really trying to help. And that was part of my leaving the message. It was recognizing that we're hurting people.

Like we're not able to really help people. And I received a lot of criticism for having that kind of heart. And that made me open my eyes like I'm doing something that's desperately needed and you're trying to shut me down.

I had a problem with that, you know? And so when I left, of course, my heart didn't change, you know, and I tried for a period of time, I also felt incapable. So I actually didn't continue to counsel after.

I recognized my, my lack of, it's kind of like being a minister in the message. Anybody can be a minister, you know? You pick up, you just have to be able to read quotes.

But people, when I went to my first church after I left the message, you know, those people were trained. They went to school. They spent time actually learning the history and the facts. And so for me to stand up and say, I'm gonna be a minister.

I was like, nope, I'm gonna sit down. And that's how I felt even in terms of counseling. It was like, no, there's people qualified. At the same time, I have a level of insight into what somebody in a cult emotionally has to deal with.

And so there is a place. And that's where I'm starting to speak a little bit more on morning mercy. And I wish I would have done more in the past. But like you were saying, John, like I needed my time to heal as well.

And I had to step away and be silent. Yeah, you know, I was joking. I said suck it up buttercup, but the actual reason why I can't do it is because I become so emotionally connected to whoever I'm working with that I feel they're paying I feel exactly what they're feeling when they're when I'm trying to help them and it would it would absolutely kill me. I think I've mentioned this in one of the previous podcasts, but one of my clients required that I take this personality test before I work with their team and I took it and they had they had these scales that look like gas meters and it was like green to or red to green or I can't remember the colors, but anyway, the altruistic gas meter was like off their chart and the afterwards it was so unusual that the psychologists who did this testing came to me and she said, John, do you realize that you will actually kill yourself to help somebody before you take care of yourself?

And you know, kind of shook me and I realized at that time I was trying to do all of it. I have never ever had any desire to be a minister ever, but there are so many spiritual problems with the message and just basic biblical flaws. I'm not talking about deep doctrines. I'm talking like the simple gospel and the simple history of the Bible, the simple statements in the Bible.

They had just ripped it out of the Bible and changed it and spoon fed it to people as though it were truth and people were listening to these quotes instead of just actually reading the book.

So I started reading the book and people said, you're preaching, John, have never been called to be a preacher. I've never I've never had the calling to help somebody psych with a psychological need, but there is a deep need.

And one of the real needs that I see, which is so important for what you're doing, because I think you help with this to a large degree, is revictimization after you go into a group like this, they have warped your mind in the way that you think such that when you leave it, there's this void. When you're in it, you have this really unhealthy level of closeness that after you leave, you're like, you feel empty and lonely and why are they not in my business?

When I was in it, everybody was in my business. And then when nobody's in your business, you're like, I feel lonely and alone and sad and depressed. And there are fertile grounds to be revictimized. And it wasn't quite like that for us, but to some degree, we had a to a smaller degree, we had it.

One of the first churches that we attended post-message, there was, there actually happened to be another lady from a cult who was in the group and she was going through a severe dramatic experience with a husband that was abusive.

And it had thrown her into depression deeply into depression. And she did not have a chemical imbalance that was causing her depression. She had situational depression. And there were other people who did have bipolar or many of the other mental health issues.

Those people actually needed the medicine because without the medicine, you really can't function. And the medicine, it was so absurd, man, because we left a divine healing cult. We go to a new church and we were there, not a year, maybe a year and a half.

They started, they set up this institution. It was supposed to be a Christian mental health institution. And their doctrine was such that if you had mental health issues in your life, it's because you have sin.

And we, your pastors, are going to work with you and get rid of that sin in your life. And I was like, oh my gosh, I went from out of the frying pan into a different fire.

And what really hit me is I started watching these people knowing that this was the wrong solution for these people. And it made me so angry that I wanted to help them. I just, I'm not really capable of the psychological aspect.

I turn it over to the professionals like yourself. I'm hardly a professional, but I agree. Like it's a way to carry, for sure. I think in a different life, had I been able to live the trajectory of life that I might have had without falling into the message, this might have been an area that I would have pursued.

Certainly is, I feel like I'm apt to it, is the temperament, the ability to handle the emotional side of it without drowning myself as well. But yeah, it's, I agree with what you said also in the revictimization, it's a danger.

It's genuinely a danger for all of us to come out and we're very vulnerable emotionally, psychologically, and I worry. I do worry for, I think that's part of the reason why I create the content I do is just to, it's to validate the feelings of people when they're first leaving because there's a great amount of anxiety, confusion, anger, bitterness.

You could go down the list of emotions and all of it is valid and there's no one path either. There's no, the way that you came out, John is, and the feelings that you felt in particular might have looked a little bit different than what it looked like for me, and even between you and your wife, and between me and my wife, and my, children. It's different for everybody and all of it is valid because we're having real feelings about real experiences and that journey to making sense of it. Part of it just starts with recognizing that what you're feeling is very valid and now let's begin looking

at what we can do about that, where we can go with those emotions and what the future could look like because it will get better, it does get better. I can say I had somebody asked me just the other day in one of the videos that I posted, you know, like how are you doing? It's not a question I get very often, you know, like, and I, you know, legitimately I am doing very well and I couldn't say that two years out of the message. I couldn't, I was lost as lost can be in emotionally purpose. I just didn't know where I belonged

anymore, you know, but with time, with healing, you know, you do gain traction, you get your feet under you, you start feeling good about your footsteps and life gets better. And I don't know how are you doing, John? Yeah, it's funny. I got asked that just last, one was it last week by somebody and I, it was a struggle. It took me years to find that footing and a lot of people don't realize this. I've walked away from this thing so many times because I do get emotionally connected and it is a burden, it is a weight that will

bury you if you're not capable of doing it. I too, I probably would have become a psychologist had I been and not in this offensive religion that is anti-education, anti-psychologist, anti-everything that is mental health. Because I am fascinated with psychology, I actually study and read psychology. It's one of the things that fascinates me, how the mind works.

But I can't, I can't take those burdens on from other people without just feeling burdened myself. And for years, I was struggling to find that footing because I was trying to do not to the level you're doing, but some of the same things on the website. Also, like I said, I was trying to do some of the doctrinal things and I found that if I disconnected myself from all of that because I'm a very analytical person, if I focus on the history, I can analyze the history. And so it opened the door for me in ways that, you know, it helped me find

my own footing and helped me to overcome all of the cult baggage that I had. I no longer have that, you know. And I can now engage with a cult member who's, we've seen it in the comments. So just aggressively pounding you with, like a parrot, the same phrase that you hear from 10,000 other cult victims. It's the same insults they give you over and over.

And now I look at it like, you know, it's, it is a mental health disease. It is a cult disease, but I look at it as though it's like a, you know, like diabetes.

These people just need insulin and they're slapping my hand away as I try to give it to them. And if I put it in that frame of mind, I can kind of disconnect myself from it, you know what I mean?

So that helped me to overcome all of the, all of the weights that was put on my shoulder trying to help people. And then really the only thing that I struggle with from time to time is just burn out because I am one of these people that I give my 500 percent instead of by, like everybody out 75, 50 to 75 percent, I will go 500 percent, man.

So I do burn out from time to time. We've seen the amount, the volume of work that you've done and that's, I find it astounding actually the amount, I can't imagine the amounts of time.

It has to be, yeah, incalculable. It's just impressive because the little that I've done, I know how much time I put into that and the sheer volume of works that you've done for the benefit of other people, it's just commendable.

It truly is remarkable. I was just turning to look and see if it's still, I think it's in the drawer in my bedroom, but I actually have a splint that was given to me by one of the most famous hand doctors in this area.

I type so fast I break fingers. And I have, since I've been doing this, I think I've broken my finger probably 10 times. And I got to the point where I go to the doctor, the first time it happened, I was, I was typing and just pounding away and my leg felt wet.

And I looked down, there's no water or anything and it's just really weird. And it wasn't until the next day my hand locked up and I went to the hand doctor and he grabbed my pinky and he wiggled it like a snake and he said, John, did you realize that none of these joints are connected to the bones in this finger?

And I'm like, no, I didn't notice that and so it broke. And then when it kept happening, I'm just going so insanely fast on my keyboard that eventually I just have this splint and when I break it up with the splint on and I, I shared this with the guys at Cultures recently, but I bought this keyboard that is, it forces me to slow down.

It's really high action. So I slow down, but somebody asked me how many miles of 10 point font have you written and I've lost count. It's so much. I believe that. Yeah. Well, I'm glad you bought a new keyboard because that means that you can keep doing what you're doing because we appreciate it and yeah, it's a labor of, it's hard to call it a labor of love because I don't know if I can say I love doing all of the work that I've done.

certainly not love for the work, but I'm probably like you. I feel like I can't let it go. Like there's always something, maybe that's the curse of leaving this. It will be forever attached to the way that we think, to the way that we observe life.

The story will always be playing in our mind about what we've been through. And yeah, on a dime I can flip to cult mind and back and then you're navigating that in between and trying to put yourself in the position of what are people thinking?

Like what are the things that you can do to bridge that gap between the cult mind and the non-cult mind? So in a way that's what we're doing, right? We're just trying to create bridges between those two personalities that I know I have still.

I feel like I could walk into a message church today and preach a sermon because it's still all there. It's just always will be there. And it's, but that's the story that we live with, right?

It's just there. Let's talk about that a little bit because that part, I think, for the people who are never in it, I think that's the most fascinating thing because I've talked to many people who are studying what we were in.

We're like getting pigs. I don't know if you realize that or not, but in this cult, they're like, what is this weird thing and how did it develop into what it is today? And ministers in this, they have a way of preaching that is not like you would find in any other quote unquote normal church.

They will take a passage and they'll usually take a phrase from that passage completely out of context. And then they'll wrap that around with several quotes for the brand, I'm said this, for the brand, I'm said that and try to make a sermon out of it.

And what you end up with, if you actually go back and you read the passage that whatever was snipped out of was taken from, it really means nothing like, well, it was in the Bible.

So tell us a little bit about how it is for a minister in this to prepare for a sermon, deliver. Like you said, you could go back today and you could do it. I know other people who have laughed and I said, John, you know, anybody can preach this.

Your six-year-old child could actually get up and preach a sermon. All he needs to have is a handful of quotes and maybe one phrase of the Bible. And he can go for two hours on that.

So let's talk a little bit about that. It's absolutely true. I know for myself, you position yourself as we're taught as we're taught that I don't have a thought. Like my thoughts are not valid.

So you're, we're taught to elevate. William Branham and his quotes to the height of understanding. So for me to preach a sermon, I might have thoughts, but then you bring it through the message filter.

And you end up, I would say most, well, a non-message preacher doesn't have that resource of information to draw from. They don't go through that filter. So they're going to the text in the scripture and they're finding some passages that they're going to, expand on and talk about and break down from a scriptural point of view.

The message preacher starts with the quotes and he'll find a quote or a series of quotes like you said. And you'll, I know I would take the message search program. I would look up, I have a topic that I feel that I'm inspired to preach.

I'll take a quote from William Branham and then I'll begin looking at other things that he said. And the funny thing is, as you know, John, you'll find five, six quotes on a subject.

Three of them don't make sense together because they contradict. So you brush those aside because you can't quite make sense of how they fit, but you have these three quotes that seem to work really well together.

And so you take those three quotes and now you begin to find, no, William Branham will take a text at the beginning of the service heal. He might read a scripture. So you're taking that as your source text and you're using William Branham's interpretation for it.

But of course, that's my source text as well when I start the sermon is I'll read that same scripture that William Branham read. Then I'll take his explanation for that and I'll pick it from five, six different sermons.

Yeah, you're constructing a thought that has to align with William Branham. And so that's why if somebody from the outside came in and they'd hear all these quotes and all these and William Branham said and brother Branham said and brother Branham said, you're repeating that over and over.

I've had people who were not message believers come in and they'd be like, who's this brother Branham? Like, you know, they're just confused at what that is. And even if it felt like it kind of made sense, but you know, they're trying to, you know, they're people have this sense of trusting that the guy at the front knows what he's talking about.

So they're thinking, well, that sounded like it kind of made sense even though it might not. But, you know, they're trying to piece together what it is that you're trying to say. And yeah, I've sat in many message sermons too, where, you know, you're trying to follow the thought of the preacher and my wife would always say this, she'd say, if I could walk away with one thought, like one thing that I could take and apply because the rest of it is this hoj poj met, like, mash of thoughts and ideas and quotes.

And you're trying to, the people are left trying to interpret it and make sense. And yeah, it's a, It's a unique experience being a listener if you're an outsider, especially, and then, you know, as a minister, yeah, I feel like anybody, I've sat in service services where the speaker never gave one thought of his own. He literally put on the PowerPoint presentation five, six, seven, eight, ten quotes, and he's just reading them. You know, he's not even really, and he might throw his little thought in between. And then he'll, he might throw a couple verses in there that

seems to make sense. Did they make sense? They're just stripped out of context from wherever they, you know, that's the way it went. And it somehow seems to make sense to message believers, but beyond that, I'm sure people are just like, what is this? Like, it's so weird because you get, as a cult victim, you get so wrapped up in the mindset that when you, when you hear the phrase brother, brand, I'm said, your mind goes numb and you really don't care what comes next in the sermon. You're at comfort that, well, okay, brother, brand, I'm said, and I'm going to run with it.

And they could literally say that brother, brand, I'm said, everybody who goes to Disney World goes to heaven. And they're so wrapped up in it that the cult mind just kind of latches on to it.

I've worked with several, not several, but quite a few ministers who've left the cult like yourself. And I remember this one minister telling me that he began to feel convicted because he realized, and what, what was happening was he was waking up, but he began to realize that his sermons were so filled with brother, brand, I'm said that he felt like he was devaluing the Bible. So he said, for the next sermon, I think I'm going to just preach from the Bible. And I think God will bless me for it. And the people will love it. Well, because he wasn't using that phrase, they actually

ran him out of the church, man. And they, they want to hear that because that's how they've been programmed and coerced to believe that you have to, you have to say this because if you don't say this, this is entirely wrong, my brother. And then on the other end of the spectrum, I've heard, I have actually sat in cult churches where they would say brother, brand, I'm said, and I'm 99.9% positive that William Brandham never said the thing that they did.

But that church actually believed it. And that became a core doctrine to that church. And then they formed this weird splinter group and they go off on their own because you can say this and you can make anybody believe anything once they have been programmed to brother, brand, I'm said.

It's the appeal to authority. And, and of course, William Brandham was the highest authority. So I've actually never thought of doing, I've never thought of that, but that's alarming, you know, to think that you could say anything and attach a brother, brand, I'm said. And people would would elevate that.

to truth without even thinking twice, because if Brother Ram said that, then I guess that's right. Yeah, I can say for fact that near the end of my own ministry, and there was significant things happening for me, I was bothered by the lack of gospel, and I began to do the opposite of what I described earlier.

I would take a sermon, I would get it from the Bible. I would find other sources of ministers outside of the message who, because I wasn't educated either, like in the proper context of scripture, we only knew what William Brown said about whatever that scripture verse was, and I could do my own research, but I also felt compelled to validate it a little further by what other, you know, and I would go back to a variety of sources just to see what other ministers had to say to describe the original text, what it meant, the context.

And then I would do the opposite. I would go and find some William Brown, I'm quotes that aligned with that thought that I had from scripture just to, again, appease the, and I did tell people that I'm preaching from the Bible.

I'm going to be doing this for the next while, and yeah, I was, of course, it was near the end of my ministry, and people were picking up that I was, I obviously was maybe not treading, I was treading lightly, I guess, on the fact that there was controversy about William Brown, I'm out there.

And whenever somebody wasn't holding to that line, that straight, straight line of messageology, people were then suspicious that maybe I was being influenced. And I suppose I was. At the time, I didn't, I didn't think I was, because I was still trying to blend Bible with message and somehow make it come together and work, because I didn't want to leave the message.

I didn't want to leave the equivalent of doing that was blowing up my home, right? What, who would want to blow up their own home? And I knew the cost of like leaving the message, I didn't want to, I wanted to figure out how to make everything somehow make sense.

And so, yeah, my ministry was certainly affected at the end, significantly, but I was trying to deliberately say, I'm going to say, brother Brannum said, less. And I actually talked to some other prominent ministers in the message, and I was, I was explaining to them a little bit of my concerns.

I wasn't telling them that I was, I wasn't doubting. I just felt like we needed to somehow progress from where we were, so that we could preach from the Bible alone. And I had another very prominent, I'm not going to name names, of course, but that minister said, he said, he thinks in about 10 years, we won't be quote, in quotes anymore.

We'll just be preaching from the Bible. I found that, actually I felt that very encouraging to me at the time because I felt like, why should we have to always say brother Bram said, if we are the bride and we're the revelated ones, shouldn't it come to a point where we're just speaking?

We're just speaking, we're just quoting the scriptures because we have that revelation. When we have to qualify it with brother Bram said, it's like I don't really understand it myself. So I'm referring to this, so do we understand it or don't we?

And can we quote the scripture or can't we? And if we have to always rely on that crutch, brother Bram said, then it feels like something's wrong with that. That's how I felt. So that minister was like, yeah, I think in about 10 years, you won't hear brother Bram said.

I was like, oh, good. That sounds positive. It sounds like a positive change. And so happened that, yeah, the only, I don't believe that for a second, of course, but so. Yeah, not now, yeah.

You know, like I said, I have a very analytical mind and I do study psychology a good bit. And I've come to conclude that the brother Bram said that is used in the sermons, it really is a security blanket for the minister because he's convincing himself that what he's doing is right in his head while he's doing it.

And in some cases, if there's even a question, say brother Bram said, and that doesn't matter what you've said because brother Bram said it too. So therefore, it must be. And I went way back to early church history trying to understand all of this.

And there were, I was surprised and shocked to learn that the same exact thing was happening in the early days of Christianity. Men were creating books that had the title of some apostle that the apostle didn't write it because if they could use his name and say, you know, that was their brother, Bram, the apostle Paul said, X, and I'm going to give it to you.

And now I have the authority to tell you this. And so there are, you know, I don't have the list in front of me, but there's all kinds of these nostic gospels that came out.

And they, they're just abusing the people's mind and they're name dropping because they realize the power of using that name. That's the same exact thing that these ministers are doing. What would you say?

So you were a minister in this and you came to the point where you realized that, hey, I want to go back to the Bible. What was the turning point for you to actually leave the message?

It's, again, I have a bit of a unique story I feel because I was doing a significant amount of counseling at that time. I had been, I had been partly trained to do this form of counseling called caring for the heart.

And so I was, intimately, um, counseling with people in regards to their own abuses, traumas, different things like that. And so, in tandem with the fact that there were some controversies surrounding William Brannum, which were inconsistent and alarming because they were rocking the very core of what we claimed to believe. Um, but in tandem with that, I was also hearing these, these stories of abuses. And the last sermon I preached was in a, in, I was invited to speak out of Tennessee youth meeting. It was a well-known youth camp, people from all over the United States would come. And, um, I spoke very honestly at that camp. And I think

that was very much the turning point for me up, up until that point, I was believing that I could bring this form of counseling into message churches and begin to really, and when I, I, I can't speak specifically about the, the things that I was hearing people tell me about things that were being done to them, all manner of abuses that, that had been done in the, in by ministers, by families, by, I had kids in that camp come up to me and tell me the, and confess that they didn't want to go home because when they got home,

they, they would once again be in the atmosphere of their, their parents, particularly their father. And they, they mentioned some things that were happening at home. I mean, heartbreaking, you know, um, and I was being told by other ministers to shut it down from that meeting.

It, it, it caused, I got reprimanded and I was told basically cease and desist from, from trying to do what I'm trying to do. And that was a, that was alarming to me, um, because if we as the people who claim to be the epitome of Christianity, the culmination of God's plan, um, the people who claimed to be under the, the capstone, which was according to the message was, uh, was love. And we were the embodiment of that as the bride. And we couldn't care for our own children enough to be willing to go to dark places to do counseling in a way

that would actually help them. And we're going to protect the ministers and the parents and these, um, the, the institution of the message. Like that made me stop. That was a resting to me. I was like, this can't continue. I can't continue. Um, and it made me at that point, uh, step back and say, okay, I'm willing to look at everything now because at that point, I hadn't.

really dug into the controversies, but that's when I began saying, okay, I need to dig into the controversies. And that put up to debate everything that we believed. As a minister, I'm preaching, do I actually have any understanding of what it is that I'm saying when I'm preaching from the message or even from the Bible?

I had to question my own thoughts, in terms of what I actually knew. So yeah, that was, then I went into looking into William Brownham's ministry itself and things that he said, things that didn't make sense.

And I had to acknowledge and say, okay, we have a problem. And then I began going to my pastor and different things like that and recognizing that there's no answers. There's no one, there's no one who is even willing to look.

And again, just alarm, I left, I actually wrote out and posted on my website. This is what I believe at the time that I'm leaving. Posted it on my website. I still believed. I had no reason to, I had no substitution for the things that I believed, about serpency, for example.

What did I actually know about that teaching in terms of what happened in the Garden of Eden? Did I have a new teaching that I could offer? No, God had the Trinity. Could I actually offer a substitute way of understanding that water baptism?

Could I offer a different, no. I couldn't offer something different. I just knew that everything was under debate now because everything seemed rotten. So that was, for me, that was my personal turning point.

I call it integrity. It's just integrity, right? Like if I look at what a man says, and I can look and know he's absolutely lying to me. My integrity has to, no matter who he says he is, no matter if he says he is a prophet from God.

In fact, that behooves me even more to say, wait a second, because you're exerting such authority over all of these people, including me. And I'm raising my family to trust you. Like I now have to stand up and say, my integrity compels me to call you into question.

And I don't care if you say you're the prophet, because I'm not so sure, you know. And there's nothing, there should be nothing wrong with my saying that. That should be any good man should be able to stand up and do that.

And the fact that we weren't allowed to stand up and do that. I was like, something's wrong. Like we're drinking from some bad water here, because I'm, and like I said at the beginning, I'm a nobody in the context of the message.

Like I'm not one of the powerhouse speakers, very few people would know my name. But as a nobody, I have the integrity to do this and these people that I esteemed and looked up to, they don't.

So, yeah, it was scary to be the one to stick my neck out and say, I'm stepping back and I'm bowing out, but I was willing to do it and it was not fun, but I went and I don't regret it because I feel like everything that I was concerned about approved to be a problem. Yeah, integrity and accountability seem to be lacking in many of the circles. I won't blankantly say that all of them because I do know some really good men who are just sincerely duped, but they're in it and there are some good men, but integrity and accountability,

see, whenever I first, you and I've had this discussion many times, but when I first did this, I was trying to prove William Brannum correct and I, you know, ended up where it ended up, but there was a point in time in which I was not in the cult. I still believed him to be a prophet.

I believe that some of his prophecies had failed. I didn't realize that there wasn't a single prophecy at that time, but I thought he was a prophet. I thought some prophecies had failed, but there came a point in which I realized that not only did some of them fail and I had just put off to the side the ones that I thought maybe happened, but I realized that he was manipulating the people with false information. And at that point, that's when everything began to shift and I began to shift from trying to prove it to now I'm more critical. And honestly, I thought all it would

take is just one thing. I published this one thing and, you know, you know, and say, hey, look, I found this guy is really manipulating the minds and he's duping the people. I thought there'd be this massive flood, everybody. Well, why would we want to be in that? Because I assumed everybody had the same level of integrity and it was then that I realized that I was programmed with the cult mind that was so black or white that I didn't realize that there were varying levels of integrity. And mine was up here. And yours was up here as well. So it was sad to watch

because we wanted to help people and honestly, the only reason I even started this pathway was just to help people and recognizing that I could give them good solid information to help to a better life. And they would reject it because they're so programmed. But you have now set up a whole elaborate website and podcast for helping people to get that better life. And maybe if you could tell everybody how they can access your content. Sure, I have a website called morningmercy.com.

It's more or less, it's just a personal blog where I just share my own thoughts and you can see some videos that are posted there which lead to... my YouTube channel where I'm only beginning to post videos.

It's only been in the last few months that I've actually decided to go ahead and do that. Throwing myself back into the fire, I told myself I wouldn't do it, but here I am.

And I actually have taken down a great amount of content from my website over the years, just because it didn't, things I said early, don't align with how my mind works now, because I've grown a lot.

So it's not that my website is full of information, but it's there. And it speaks with a certain tone, just of caring compassion for people. And that's more of us what I'm aiming to do.

I'm very glad that you came on today to talk through this. And I'm sure listeners are going to be really encouraged to hear your story. So thank you so much for coming and doing this.

I'm just grateful for the opportunity to speak on your podcast and talk to you, and just share a little bit of my own experience and story. And if there's anything that people want to ask me, by all means, they can come to my website and ask me.

I've been saying this for the last little while. If people want me to talk about a subject, kind of like I'm just, we're just having a conversation here, John. And if somebody wants me to ramble on about a certain thing, I'm happy to make a video about that on my channel.

And yeah, I'm just here to help the little bit that I can. Well, thank you again for coming on here. And like I say, people are going to be so encouraged. If you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the web.

You can find us at William-Branum.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 and his message, available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.