Beyond the Rules: Overcoming Legalism and Embracing Grace - With Chino Ross

Hello and welcome to another episode of the William Brandham Historical Research Podcast. I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Brandham Historical Research at William-brandham.org, and with me I have my co-host, minister and friend, Chino Ross, pastor and the voice of the understanding scripture and truth by Chino D. Ross YouTube channel. Chino, today we're still continuing in the rules.

We could probably go for a thousand episodes on just the rules of this and other similar cults and the cults that sprung off of it, but whenever you're dealing with a group that places their faith in salvation based on rules, there is never an end to the rules and the new rules because you can never save yourself by these rules. And so over time they grow, they change, they morph into new rules and many times like I'm in my 40s and I can remember rules that as I was a child changed into new rules and the old rules were forgotten. And then after leaving

the cult I'm talking with some family members and what not who are at dinners and gatherings. And the rules that they have now are different than the rules one I left and some of the rules that we had when I left were so critically important to your salvation that if you broke them you were doomed to hell and now they're just nobody cares, everybody does it. So they evolve, they change, they disappear, new rules come and what do you do? You talk about it on a podcast.

Yeah well we've been looking at a list of don'ts, they didn't really have a list of do's because they were at least Dr. Freeman was so busy taking things away from people that we have this list of don'ts and there's certain careers, certain occupations you were not allowed to participate in and your clubs and your hunting and competitive sports and because they didn't believe in gambling then that leaked down to cards you couldn't even play card games that were just just innocuous.

They didn't have anything to do with with risk as far as a loss of money or gambling or you know you're not a part of a crime syndicate this isn't going to lead to boot lagging and prostitution. They were just so afraid of so many things but Hobart had the list and as you well said John, it never stops It always grows. They're always trying to refine and purify themselves. He would say that you have to do these things in order to be an overcomer. And an overcomer was the most important thing that all of them were after. And I said last time that ethicists, professional people who teach in this

area refer to all of these things as audiophora or audiophora, however you want to pronounce the word. It's just a Greek term that means things indifferent. And there's a long history of this. This is not particular or peculiar to William Brannum or to Hobart Freeman. There is a long list. A checkered past, I would say, in American evangelicalism, just in the broader American church of at least the last hundred years of this whole area. And I think the term that people normally use is the term legalism. And it is a good term. And it has to do with, you know, dancing and drinking alcohol,

even in moderation. You know, that's definitely forbidden. Women wearing makeup or jewelry or doing their hair in a certain way. This way would be allowed. This way is not, is disallowed. And it just varied from group to group. Maybe men not as much. But there was some of that short sleeve shirts, long sleeve shirts, short pants, long pants. I mean, there's a long and checkered history in the American church. And it has not been healthy. And if we go back, you know, a hundred years, the very name of these churches becomes very revealing. They were often called holiness churches.

And that tells you right away that in their mind and in their teaching, there is some type of connection between one's personal holiness and these legalisms, don'ts, and laws that we're talking about. And I think that the number one problem that it brings up in people's lives is, is it teaches Christians a lie because it encourages them to focus on these trivial matters. These audio offerer, these audio forer, these things indifferent, teaches them to focus on these matters. And it leads to the next step. It teaches them to equate successful execution of the cult rules equals holiness, which then leads to yet more problems. And that's generally,

I mean, I would say really without fail, criticism of your brother and sister who does not abide by this. So it's just a whole horrible, terrible mess to come to come into the church.

To think that in keeping these rules, you have somehow become acceptable to God, or that you have become holier, or that you have become a better person. And it just takes our focus off of what the New Testament's focus is, and that is on Christian virtues.

And there are lists of vices. Paul gives lists of vices. These are the things not to do. Let me just grab Galatians 5, verse 19, the works of the flesh, or manifest which are these. And notice what you're not going to hear. You're not going to hear car playing. You're not going to hear of that stuff. Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, sedition, terracies, invings, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like of the witch. I will tell you before as I told you in time past, those that do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. And why Christian ministers

can't just stay with what the Bible says. Why is it we feel this need to somehow improve? Why is it we think we're smarter than God? You know, we obviously aren't. But for some reason, you know, people, these ministers have thought that they were. And as you said earlier, John, they layer upon layer upon layer. And it's like I think that maybe the ministers are unhappy with the progress of their church. Maybe they think they see things. And rather than leaving room for the power of the Holy Spirit in his role to convict sinners and his people of things that

they're doing wrong and that they should correct. Rather than leave that ministry to the power of the Holy Spirit, I guess, I mean, I don't know. I've never thought like that. I'm just supposing these ministers look out there and think, well, if I could just, if I could just be more explicit in what I think it is that's wrong and I can get the people to do this, you know, then we'll have a better church, we'll have a holier church, but it just never works out that way.

No. And let's not forget the insults that come with the rules. Only in a church will you hear this. If you are a parent and you're instructing a child and you want them to be a better child, you don't insult them and offend them and make them not want to listen to what you have to say.

You encourage them. You show them the right way and you help them learn the right way to be. And, you know, the fruits of that are very good if you're a parent. You know how this works, right?

Somehow ministers in these groups have lost all touch with reality in so much that they really truly believe, I have no doubt that they believe this, that they can insult the people in the pews and the people will become better.

Because if you sit and listen to a legalistic sermon, that's the way it works. Here are the rules and let's insult brother Joe or sister Bertha because they're violating the rules. We grew up, you probably heard this, I'm certain this is more common than just the random call, but if a woman was wearing something that didn't adhere to the cults and doctrinated rules, they were Jezebel.

It could be makeup, it could be, you know, whatever it is, you've heard it, right? So I have a very funny mind, you know this by knowing me now, my mind is always filled with humor and I can't help it.

And it's bottled up, all this nonsense is bottled up, it's got to come out somehow. And I was releasing these funny videos on my channel and people asked that I separate them. So I spun off a new channel that is called the NAR comic news and it's satire news.

And each time I have one of these thoughts of this nonsense coming my head, I can create a little, you know, funny video and just get it out of my head. One of them that I created that will come out soon is women in the cult were called Jezebel, if they violated the rules.

And the rules were heaped high upon their shoulders. The women had more rules for their appearance than you could possibly imagine, but the men did not. The men only had just a few rules.

And I was driving down the road one day thinking about this and the idea for the little comic short came in my head, well, what happens if gender equality comes into the equation and the pastor suddenly decided, okay, we're insulting the women, we should now also insult the men.

So we're going to introduce a new term called Jeze Mail. And that's a short though becoming out soon on that channel, but the way that they enforce these rules is not by encouraging you and showing you the logical reason why the rule exists.

And that was really my biggest problem because I'm a logical person. Explain to me how the rule matches the Bible. Explain to me why, you know, if you take anything that's in the Bible that is good and healthy for you to live, every single one of them, you can apply critical thought to.

That should not kill. Obviously, it's a bad thing, right? Should not commit adultery, well, you know what happens to your wife if you commit adultery. All of these things have a logical sense to them.

But when you're in these courts with these legalistic rules, none of them make sense. I've told someone recently you never had to be afraid of challenging anything because the truth by its very nature will always stand up under the closest group.

Under the closest scrutiny, but that's one thing they don't want. They don't want you to scrutinize their beliefs, because when you do, air can always be exposed sooner or later if you just spend enough time with it.

Yeah, I guess it should be a Jezebel in an A-hab. We should have those two spirits in the church, but you're right, I never heard of an A-hab. I think this guy has an A-hab spirit, it's always a Jezebel spirit. I'm getting off topic, because as you talk, my mind wanders too.

And one of the things everybody who's heard Dr. Freeman will know this, will know this, will know this. He said this so many times, John, over the years in his ministry, he would say he'd be getting onto the people.

He would be talking about it being the context of church organization, and church structure, and the roles, and the church, and his role as leader, and his problems as leader. And he would say this, he would say, in all the churches that I've ever pastored, this would go back to his Baptist days as well.

In all the churches that I've ever pastored, the people, the group, who caused me the biggest problem, were the women. He would always say it was the women, and so the men and the young ministers, under the sound of his voice, would heed that, and would not apply any critical thinking to it, and would just say, wow.

Brother Freeman had all these problems with these women in his church over all these years. I mean, he said that over and over, and it was patently false. That is not where he got most of his problems.

Look at the aftermath of faith assembly. The problems have come from whom? From men. They've come from the 40 plus word ministers. That's where the problems have come from. All these satellite groups, and all these splintered groups, they are not controlled or pastored or taught by women.

Women were teaching there. The problems in Hobart churches were caused by men. I would say the problems in most churches are caused by men. It's caused by the elders, caused by the deacons, it's caused by the other ministers. That's just a ridiculous statement that he always made.

Yeah, my trouble in churches have always been with the women, because they're always gossiping and running their mouth. I would think that is simply not true. Yes, I'm sure there have been problems caused by women, because we're all human beings. I'm sure women have gossiped. I'm sure there are verses that talk about that.

But there are just as many verses that put that on men as it does on women. Again, if you go back and look at all these ministers, you'll see they're the ones who call the problems.

and it was, it was made, they were men out there teaching not women. So, you know, here we are, John. It's just, I just shaped my head at the reality of the fact that we're 40 years after Hobart's death. We're 40 years after this. I mean, you're in your mid-40s, you were just a child when Hobart died and little did you realize you'd be sitting behind a microphone with this platform, addressing all this nonsense all these years later. And I, for my own self, I was making a fuss about it 40 years ago. You know what? Didn't do a bit of good. I mean, it helped the people in my

church. Didn't do a bit of good. People didn't pay a bit of attention. Hobart wouldn't listen, other ministers wouldn't listen. As soon as they hear any type of critical remark, as soon as they hear anything where you're raising a question which turns into an objection, then they just say, well, you're not listening to Holy Spirit. You know, you are just approaching things from an intellectual point of view. You know, a couple of months ago, after you and I had been doing several of these podcasts, I get this message from somebody I have no idea who it is,

never heard of them. And I'm not giving out any name. I don't want to embarrass or hurt anyone's feelings, although I think this gentleman would probably be fine with it. He said, Mr. Ross, this is, this is cold. This is just out of the blue, John. Mr. Ross, we don't know each other.

And it's one of the quirks of Facebook that we get a series of people that we might know in our feed because we have similar friends. When I saw your name in my feed, your name triggered memories from long ago when someone named Cheno Ross was speaking on a cassette tape sometime in the early 1980s. You want to talk about a long time ago. The audience was laughing as the speaker listed the various sins and follies of faith assembly. The odd thing is, I had forgotten except Cheno is an unusual name, never heard of anyone else with it. The other thing was we shared three people

in common friends on Facebook. And that's all he said. And so I said in response, I said, hello brother, I suppose blessings and curses come along with a name like mine. He responded, curiosity got the better of me. I heard that tape after I had left faith assembly. It was unsettling at the time. Was that you? Question awkward.

The picture in my head is someone younger than I'd expect. The faith assembly thing is decades behind me, but I still have connections that I can't get away from.

From 40 years ago, you know, we traded texts back and forth. He was very hesitant, Larry, to talk with me. I told him, you know, no problem. Call me if you, here's my number.

Call me if you want to call me. And if you don't like where the conversation goes in 60 seconds, you can always hang up. I've had it happen before. I had it happen last week.

I said, that doesn't offend me one bit. It just gives me more time to go about the rest of my day. You know, they think, well, I'm going to really hurt his feelings. I'm just going to hang up on him.

I've been hung up on before. Haven't you, John, that doesn't bother me. I mean, I don't want to be hung up on. I want to continue the conversation. But if you don't have a good feel or goodbye, you know, I'm still waiting on a few other people who are this close to picking up the phone and calling.

But they're probably afraid of curse from Hobart's grave is going to fall on him or something. If they talk to me because I'm the one who started talking about all this 40 years ago, I can't even imagine being old as you are and doing this because I'm easy.

I've been doing this for 10 years and only five years ago, I've had stuff come back that I really got wrong. And you know, I'm learning as I go. And I think that's how we all are over time.

So doing it for 40 years, I can't even imagine going back 40 years ago and finding something that I said. Everybody as humans, they learn and they grow and they become better. And that's really, honestly, that's why I do this because when we were in the cult, we weren't allowed to grow.

And I think if people have contacted me who have escaped these groups and they say, you know, they robbed so much from us. I don't have a retirement or I gave them every last bread crumb I had in the tie the basket.

And a lot of people are really concerned about the money they lost. But when you take away the personal growth that people lost in these movements, it far outweighs the money. Yeah. Yeah, and I've learned a lot of stuff, John, over my, yeah, I'm way smarter and wiser than I was 40 years ago.

I will say this, the majority, probably not all, but the majority of my questions and critiques that I had 40 years ago, they're identical today. You know, because Hobart died. So he didn't teach more things that I could become critical of.

I only had up until 40 years ago whenever he died. Now, I have some more additional things to criticize the ministers who survived him, who then went down some other rabbit trails. But... That is, that is for something in the future.

Hope art was just, I mean, he was, I don't know John, a megalomaniac. He just thought so highly of himself and he thought so poorly of the people. You know, he thought he could contradict himself and people would let it slide.

And they did, they did let it slide, but not anybody who had any brains, you could hear that he was contradicting himself. You could hear that he was making up stuff on, on the fly.

But he just loved this power. He loved this adulation. He loved the following. I know he would deny it. And people would say, no, he wasn't doing it for that. But, you know, he said on early tapes that I have referenced in the very first tape in his series on the Book of Acts.

They only had a couple hundred people in their church and he said, you shouldn't let your church get bigger than this. If it does, you should split it up and divide because of all the biblical reasons, of body ministry and shepherd and sheep.

You know, he said that himself, but did he practice sad? Absolutely not. Why? More people makes you feel better about yourself. A bigger ministry, bigger influence, widespread influence, a bigger offering. But while when I go back and read the Bible, John, which is what I encourage everyone to do, I know it's what you encourage people to do.

I think I've heard you say, one of the things you just had to do whenever you exited the brand on background is you just had to throw all of this stuff away and just read the Bible, nothing else.

Just read the Bible because that's where all the truth is, any of us who are teaching truth, that's where we're gonna get it from. We're not getting it from a vision or a dream or an angel standing beside us.

We're not getting it from that. If it's doctrinal, biblical, eternal truth, it's gonna be in the pages of scripture. And so when I read the Bible and I see people wanting to make Jesus a king, what did he do?

He ran from that. That's not what you see today. Soon as the minister gets a platform, if you wanna make him a king, he said, where's my crown? I'm ready. I wanna be a leader of these big people.

I had another person, John, give me a prophecy, quote unquote, that Dr. Freeman prophesied. I don't have the date, maybe someone out there in video, audio, land will have the date for this, but they had it transcribed.

And I was just, it's just another one of the things, okay, let's just spend a moment looking at this and looking at more additional proof of how ridiculous, all of this really was. So I'm just gonna read a few words, and if you wanna put this up on the screen, people can look at it, but here's how it begins, for thus saith the Lord, to take offense when my servant speaks is to take offense against me.

Here's Hobart Freeman saying, God is now speaking through me and God is speaking about me to you, but I'm the one speaking, oh my gosh. I mean, you just wanna go slap somebody with a wet noodle whenever you hear this.

To take offense when my servant speaks is to take offense at me. For have I not said in my word, he that receives you receives me and he that receives me receives him that sent me and he that receives it not does not receive me.

I mean, they're using Bible verses, right? Jesus said that to the apostle, when he sent him out, he said whoever receives you receives me. So Hobart is up there in front of this group of people, prophesying this is God, the Holy Spirit speaking out of his mouth telling those people, you better receive me because I am him and he is me and I am him and he is I, I mean, it just is shocking to hear this.

And it's Brannum Playbook 101. Brannum used to do things like that and one guy, I can't remember who it was that shared it with me, but they found this transcript where Brannum is quote unquote letting God speak through his mouth and he's saying, thus say if the Lord yada yada yada and he says, and I have, he has and he stumbles over the words.

And so you can tell, God's not gonna fumble through his mouth, right? So I have another phrase that I use for those kind of prophecies and it's just pulling it out of your back pocket.

And he did it. I mean, this was just one someone sent me. He did it all the time and you can find it on tape. Why he even said it on the Bruce Kinsey prophecy.

You know, that was God saying, don't talk against my servant, but my servant is the servant who's uttering the prophecy. And I know, yeah, Isaiah did that and Jeremiah did that. They all did it, but you're neither of those.

And neither am I. They just think because they've seen it in the Bible that somehow they have the right to do it. But listen to how this prophecy ends. He said, I say unto thee, I counsel thee, sayeth the Lord to fall on thy face and repent before me, lest I come in my wrath and cut thee off.

And I say unto thee to be cut off from faith assembling is to be cut off from the channel of life and truth that I am speaking in. this end time to men and women who will listen and he.

Cut off from faith assembly, that's the channel of life and truth. There is no other channel beside life and truth. And the person that sent me this said, what about the Bible and the Holy Spirit?

You know, when I read that, I just love other people's humor. Like, okay, I got cut off from that channel. Isn't there a Bible still available? Isn't the Holy Spirit still alive? You're saying I got cut off from the channel of life and truth because I'm not a part of your church.

Who in the world do you think you are? To make a statement like that. He was the grand wizard of this cult. I mean, this is a cult of cult. Not because he had a lot of heretical doctrine in Orthodox areas, but because a person thinks that they have the legitimacy to stand up there and threaten God's people.

I mean, it's a fearful thing and I would say to fall into the hands of the living God after threatening God's people. A whole lot of those people out there were God's people. They were hungry sheep.

They were there because they loved the worship. They were there because you had advanced degrees, you had the ability to teach and communicate. You did have some good teachings. They're there because they're hungry, John.

They're there because they want to follow God. Learn what his will is and put it into practice. And you know, lo and behold, you just fall into a cult. And it wasn't your choice.

You weren't planning on it. You didn't wake up the morning before. So let's go find a local cult to join. You think you are doing God's will. And then you've got this bogus clown up there threatening you that if you leave faith assembly, you've left all the channel of life and truth.

Just terrible. You know, that's one of my biggest problems with these groups. If you leave, they collectively believe that no matter whether or not you're following Christianity or not, if you leave, you have left quote unquote Christianity, even if you remain a Christian.

And so I was asking somebody, I just simply asked him, what does it mean to be a Christian? And everybody, you know, whether you're in a cult or not, you say, well, that means I'm going to follow Christ.

Well, then you ask them, well, why if they leave and they follow Christ, are they no longer a Christian? And you should watch the look in their eyes, man, because you can't answer that question.

And that's just, that's how they've been indoctrinated to see their religion. Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started or how the progression of modern Pentecostalism transitioned through the latter reign, charismatic and other fringe movements into the new apostolic reformation?

You can learn this and more on William Brandham Historical Research's website, William-Brandham.org. On the book's page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins, Charles Paisley, Steven Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others, with links to the paper, audio, and digital versions of each book. You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those movements. If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute button at the top, and as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening to

or watching. On behalf of William Brannum Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support. Well, the last time we got way off the subject, but I guess it's all part of the subject. We were looking at forbidden forms of speech, and we had talked about how women are not allowed to say gut feeling, and no one can say that she's pregnant, and men can't say they're thrilled or excited, and then the list just continues to go on. I got a text from someone this morning said, I definitely agree with what you're saying about deception and misleading

positive thinking in confession. He said, we couldn't even call the children kids, because they might turn into a goat. I mean, I can't even list all the words, but one of the big no-nose was something cherished in most American families, and that concerned childhood nursery rhymes.

So these Hans Christian Andersen, these Jack and Jill Humpty Dumpty, whatever these nursery rhymes, that most of us heard and learned as children. Our mother said them to us as she talked to us in bed at night, could over us with them. Maybe even in going to bed at night, she would pray, or teach us to pray. Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. Well, that was a huge no-no at faith assembly.

With Dr. Freeman's weird views about words that if you just say the wrong thing, then somehow all of these terrible things would happen to you. Of course, that's a very negative confession. And I've heard him talk about that particular nursery rhyme. He said, you're encouraging your children to talk that they might die at night or something. But you know, John, the way I look at all of that is that, I mean, it is possible you'll die at night. What better time to die than in your sleep? If and when you die, what better time to die when you're asleep? But that aside,

all that nursery rhyme is showing is that this child and this parent, now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die, before I wait, I pray the Lord my soul he'll take.

All you're saying is you have committed your whole soul, your life, your being to God. What better thing to teach a child? That's not teaching them to worry that you may die at night or something.

Because of Hobart Freeman's false teaching on confession, negative thinking, positive thinking, negative confession, because of his false teaching on that. People were terrified of being sick. They were afraid of getting sick because they knew based on the experience around them that they had witnessed that if I get sick, my manifestation for my healing will be a long time in coming.

Everybody was afraid of sickness, they were afraid of dying. They just taught such a fear-based message, but I don't see that at all. I just see that as teaching a child that everything about us is in the hands of God.

Paul himself said, whether we live, we live unto the Lord, whether we die, we die unto the Lord, but whether we live or whether we die, we belong to the Lord. And that's what you're teaching your child and saying that.

Now if you don't want to do that nursery rhyme, I don't care. I'm just using that as an example. There are other bedtime prayers. You can say, I don't know, I love you Lord Jesus.

Look down from the sky and stay by my bedside till morning is night. You have to change cradle to bedside since we don't sleep in a cradle anymore. But no, it's not full of complex theology, but how beautiful of a prayer.

I love you Lord Jesus. Look down from the sky. It's actually something I often say before I go to bed and stay by my bedside till morning is night. I'm receiving them of God as a little child.

Jesus said, you will know why I enter the kingdom of God. You can make it all complicated and you can box yourself in with all these rules and legalisms, but you might find out that you're missing the forest for the trees.

And you know, something else in this regard, John, I can never tell you look like you want to sometimes interrupt, you laugh and you roll your eyes and you can always raise your hand and just interrupt me if you want to.

But I was talking to some, I was talking to one of my kids over the weekend. My kids are all grown late 30s, early 40s and we were talking about some of these issues that we're talking about and he made a great observation.

He said, well, you know, in light of what the New Testament teaches. wouldn't we have to classify Dr. Freeman as a weak brother? I said you're right. I said you are exactly right because Paul and Corinthians and Roman says it's the weak brother who has the screwpals. It's the weak brother who could need to meet offer to idols where Paul said there's no idol there's only one God I can eat the meat. You know, get out of my way. I'm hungry. I can eat the meat. The ones who have the most screwpals are the weakest brother in the church. That's

according to the New Testament's teachings. In other words, the more screwpals you have and we're just reading off a list of these at Hobart Freeman had, it puts you down at basically the level of a baby Christian. He wasn't, he was by his practice and by his fear of so many things and of not understanding God's love and God's grace and God's mercy in his own life. You know, if you don't know that, if you have an experience at in your own life, how can you share that or teach that to other people? And if you don't understand it, if all you see is

fear and judgment, then that's all you know how to preach. And the way that these people protect themselves from fear and judgment is coming up with this list of legalisms, thinking as long as I can check the box on all of these, I'm gonna be okay. But I told my son who told me this, I said, you know, you're spot on there. Definitely Hobart would show himself to be a weak Christian. So in Paul's day, in Paul's day, if Hobart Freeman were a part of the Corinthian church, John, he taught series on first and second Corinthians. If he were a part

of the Roman church, he taught a series on the book of Romans. If Hobart Freeman were a part of either either one of those churches, he would have been critical of the Apostle Paul, because the Apostle Paul was free. The Apostle Paul would not have, he didn't follow any of his nonsense that Hobart Freeman taught. He would have been critical of the Apostle Paul and the Apostle Paul would have had to carry him along as an infant, assuring him, a listen Hobart, it's okay. It's okay. It's okay. You don't have to be afraid. Everything's okay. You're gonna make it into the king if you don't have to worry about

mispronancing that word. You don't have to worry about clubs. You don't have to worry about hunting. You don't have to worry about cards. You don't have to worry about drinking a little wine with your meal. That's not a sin. Drunkenness is a sin.

Drinking a little alcohol is not... You don't have to worry about any of those things and you can still make it into the kingdom. There's the irony of this all, John. The other issue is not even scriptural or theological.

If you study psychology, which I'm no expert, but I do like to study it, the weaker-minded humans try to get their way by insulting others and using words in the way that these men do.

So it's not just that they're weaker-minded spiritually. I think mentally they are also weaker-minded. And what's interesting is whenever they train themselves to do this. In other words, they're doing it and they get a reaction and they see that the reaction is working, so they continue doing it.

Well, over time, their insults and their commandments, like they're using, turns into incantations as we've discussed. And I got in a little bit of backlash. I don't know if you saw it in the comment threads, because I picked it random out of my head, just one of the different practices of witchcraft.

So today, I'm going to use Houdu, which is basically the same thing as I said last time, but it was the same religion that migrated into Louisiana through Haiti, I think it was. Anyway, it's a religion of incantations where you can say something and in some of the Brannamite churches in the south, ironically, where Houdu resides, they call it marking your child. You could say something and mark your child.

Similar like you're talking about with the goats. And the Brannamites had it even one step further than I think the Freemanites, because a person could get marked so bad that the name itself was marked. We were not allowed to name our children Elvis because they would be marked as a cat. And they could not be marked, they could not be named Ricky because they would be marked as a rat. So you had all this weirdness, right? And it's nothing but spiritual mumbo jumbo, it's all nonsense. But what happened is it was created because a weak-minded quote-unquote

prophet was using insults to further his religion and those insults turned into incantations. I did see that you got a little pushback and I just thought it was great response. You gave very kind, measured response that you gave. Because you didn't mean any offense to anybody, it's just because of your background, it's just what came forth. And I surely don't mean offense. That's why I don't use people's names. I don't, I'm not trying to hurt anyone's feeling.

I'm not trying to embarrass anyone. I know that there are a lot of tangled relationships out there because you know we're talking about for the most part, relatively large families, relatively large families in which a person or two in the family has married into another family. So you just have all of this intermingling. And so there are a lot of relationships where some people are a lot freer than others.

We got we got strong brothers and sisters and we still have weak brothers and sisters and you know I don't want to be sympathetic. I don't want to cause any unnecessary additional harm to relationships where As you can tell some of these people have already distanced themselves But yet they've got part of the family or part of the in-laws or somebody in their you know in their family familial circle who has not been willing to call Faith assembly a cult or who has not been willing even to call them call-tish and so those people are still trying to

Walk carefully, you know I don't have any family members. I have to worry about everybody in my family agrees with me Everybody my family knows what I believe, but that's not true with all the other Families out there and I don't want to run rough shot over that and everybody has to just find their own speed With which they make an exit from the group if they Ever do and their own speed with which they want to share some of this with with with friends and maybe with with close family members but I'm I remember one of my favorite

One of my favorite speakers shown in my life one of my favorite Christian writers and ministers was Dr. RC Sproul Senior not junior a junior has been into all kinds of problems, but Dr. RC Sproul and the Protestant American church world. I would say is probably in my opinion one of the top Ranking seaologians he's died a few years ago one of the top theologians of the past 50 years He just was he was a Calvinist he was a Presbyterian there'd be some things that I would differ with him on but his The bulk of his ministry the thrust he was a profound

Apologist he was a profound trained in and In the Netherlands a profound theologian, but one thing that stood out to me about Dr. Sproul he also he was a seminary professor. He lectured in He founded a bible school a seminary just his pedigree is just amazing But he would also preach in churches and his wife whose name was Vesta Was present and for many of those sermons when he would preach in a regular church service rather than in a seminary classroom And something that I have never forgotten since I heard Dr. Sproul say this He said whenever he would get through with a sermon and

He and his wife were in the car on the way home or they were at lunch at home or at lunch out He said I tried to never fail to ask her Was I kind enough in what I said today and I thought wow That's coming from a leading theological mind.

Dr. Sproul, his mind was quick and sharp and deep and broad and wide and profound. And sometimes we tend to think that those types of people are just all about, you know, the nuts and bolts of their theology and their academic world.

And I mean, he was second to none. He debated all kinds of top ranked people. He was second to none in his intellectual grasp of the subject matter and of being able to defend it, argue it and teach it.

But at the same time, I mean, at the same time, that's not enough because you know the facts and because you're right. That's not enough. You have to be able to have a charitable spirit, a loving spirit, a spirit desiring that the people in your audience can grasp what you're saying.

Maybe it's a deep profound philosophical or theological truth and you can't short-circate that truth and reduce it to something that's so simple, it's simplistic. But you also want to be able to, the whole goal in teaching it, even though you might understand it in a profound way, is to communicate it where the people in the pew can follow it and can benefit from it.

And so I just have always loved that spirit that Dr. Sproul spoke with, that guess who did not speak with? And I pray to the Lord that I speak with that spirit that Dr. Sproul did. Dr. Freeman did, and it was harsh.

This is your last opportunity, thus saith the Lord. I will visit thee in my wrath. Would you like to hear that from somebody? I don't, I don't, I neither want to hear that nor do I want to give that to anybody.

And I've said before that the wake of destruction that followed the ship that Hobart was plowing through the waters is so terrible, the deaths of so many people. I don't think I could live. I mean, I'm, I'm glad Dr. Freeman didn't have to continue to live with, with the thought of the death of all of these people behind you where what you should be doing is loving these people and wanting to communicate God's truth to them.

And then you ask June on the way home, which I'm sure he never asked, was I kind and loving enough in, in what I said today? You know, one of the main primary objectives of a minister is to motivate his church, to motivate them to do what's right, to live better, to grow themselves, learn more scripture.

It's a motor. it's a motivational speech really when it comes down to its essence. Can you imagine a big crowd going into an auditorium to hear a motivational speaker and the guy just suddenly says, I will bring forth my wrath upon you. Everybody would get up and walk out, man.

And in some of the Brannamite sects, some of the splinter groups, they have taken it so far. There was one, I'm not going to give the name, but there's one group in particular. Their central figure said that, from my grave, after I die, I will come up and bring my wrath upon you. And again, I go back to the who-do. It is not a, not at all a Christian religion that these people are worshipping. No, if that's not witchcraft, come back from my grave and bother you. You know, I don't know what it is. Well, let me give this one more thing. Maybe we can wrap up with this

on our speech. This is really going to take you maybe by surprise. Let's go to a tape, a message entitled, are you a dripping falset or a deluge of rain? Starting at the 25 minute and 29 second mark, Hobart Freeman had run out of things to talk about, John. He had just run out of subjects to talk about. So he began saying how God is concerned about every form of speech. That's what we're on. Remember, every form of speech that the people in the church are using,

particularly opposed to what was in his mind, what was any form of lazy speech. This is so bizarre. Lazy meant that you wanted to simply abbreviate things instead of say the whole word and then what Hobart began talking about. You can go here, dripping falset or deluge of rain. It's just atrocious. What he began talking about is that this came from the hippie culture. This came from the hippie culture, just the laid back culture, the cool culture, the cutting corners culture, the non-working culture. He started calling it the hip language. Then he began giving a list

of things that you should not say. Here we go. He said, now hear people saying that they put in their job app, their job app, instead of their job application. He said, you people are talking about, he's a part of a corp, C-O-R-P, set of a corporation, the Fed, instead of the Federal Reserve, Condo, Sales Rep, Inc, Pro, Promo, US Ag Department. Then here is a direct quote. I quote, Christians are characterized by people who don't use that- type of language. To be a Christian, you can't say pro, you have to say professional, can't say promo, you have to say promotional, can't say US Ag Department, have to say United

States Agricultural Department, can't say you bought a condo, you have to say I bought a condo minium, he gave this long list, this is just the ones that stood out to me the most of words that were outlawed because they were abbreviations and abbreviations are according to Dr. Freeman wrong. Christians are characterized by people who don't use that type of language. That was part of his doctrine and you know, he didn't say this, nobody brought it up, but of course the way my complex mind works, my mind works in a complex way, I'm probably a little bit like you're Sean, as soon as I hear something, I'll always

just say, okay, and then I start analyzing and say, well, man, that doesn't make a business at all. Or I say, yeah, that's a really wise point. Like, when I heard Dr. Sproul ask his wife, hey, did I say that in the sermon in a kind and loving enough way? As soon as I hear that, my mind and my heart resonate right on, brother Sproul, that's what you should say as a minister. But when I hear Hobart saying all of this abbreviation is sinful, then I think wasn't the primary charismatic false teaching that he loved to attack the most.

He even wrote a book about it was the Jesus died spiritually, heresy that came from Tulsa, that came from Hagen and Copeland and all these people. That was a favorite topic he would talk about now. When these churches are getting off like the people and then he would go to this particular heresy and do you know what he called it? The JDS Heresy. That's an abbreviation, Dr. Sproul. That would be no, no, no. And he does it on tape after. He said, those people are teaching the JDS Heresy, the JDS error. Those are JDS people. That's a JDS church. And I would

go, the emperor doesn't have any clothes on and nobody's telling him, Hobart, you're contradicting yourself. You can't outlaw all of these other abbreviations and then talk about your favorite abbreviation, which was the JDS Heresy. As you were talking, I was doing a little search and try to find out abbreviations that have became standard and not just Christian language, but in language in general. How do you even put a mark on that? How many times did he say USA?

There comes a point of time. which you realize that the person who are saying these things, they're mentally challenged, something has gone wrong. And here's where honestly, and I know, I'm probably gonna get backlash for saying this, but here's where I actually take a little bit of sympathy for him, if you really consider the struggle that he was having physically with his health issues, leading up to his death, he had to have been in a lot of severe pain.

And he had to have had, you know, understanding the issues that he had in the complications, some of those things can get in the bloodstream and can go to the brain, infections and whatnot.

So if you've got that going on in your body, whenever you're in a constant state of pain, you become very disgruntled. And the things you say aren't really yourself, you say things just out of simply, I don't feel good.

So I say things that are awful. And ironically, so I have allergies, you can probably hear it in my voice right now. I've learned that at night, if I take two benadryl, it affects my head that way.

And the next day, I'm grumpy the whole day. And my wife will say, please don't do that again, John. And so I can explain to her, well, last night, I had to have two instead of a half dose.

So things like that, I can give him a little leeway, but the problem is the people who are under his control have not been empowered to stand up and say, no, that's wrong. You're welcome to think that if you want, Dr. Freeman, but I don't think that way.

And that's really the problem with these groups. Once it becomes to a destructive cult, whenever the leader says something that's just ridiculous, the people with common sense, and there's many in the crowd who have common sense, they're afraid to stand up and say, no, I disagree with that because they're going to lose all of their friends, all of their family, in many cases, they're shunned from some people, their employment is tied to the church.

So they lose their employment, they get to lose their house, they're everything, you know? So they're afraid, and the structure of the cult is what creates the problem. And I think if the people were to just wake up by and large and say, no, we all disagree, it probably would have changed Freeman, you know?

But where two or three are gathered under the control of the authoritarian figure, it's gonna always be that way. Yes, John. And I agree with you on some sympathy with regard to its physical condition.

The whole long point that I've been under for a while is mentally, I think he was getting over into Lala land and some of that is due to, I think the pressures around him, some of that was due to disappointment among church members and some of the ministry, some of that is due to physical issues where he was experiencing pain.

I think it was a combination of things and some of it was, he just believed his own rhetoric, you know, he had gotten to the place where, He was untouchable and unreachable, and he knew whatever I say, everyone's going to follow.

Yeah, I mean, it was just a mess. There's not a single thread we can trace everything back to. It was a combination of things, and I have said before, and I'll say again, I don't rejoice over Dr. Freeman's illness and his pain.

I think it was a good thing that he did die. I wish he could have died a peaceful pain-free, happy death, but I know. The only reason I say a good thing that he did pass off the scene is because apart from that, you're not going to have any hope of the freedom of these people.

Something had to happen, and unfortunately it was his death. I just wish he could have died in a more peaceful manner. Well, this was fun. There's more rules I'm certain we could get into, but we'll wrap it up for today.

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