Faith vs Reality: Unpacking the Prosperity Gospel of Faith Assembly

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, Cheno Ross, pastor, and the voice of the understanding scripture and truth by Cheno D. Ross, YouTube channel.

Cheno it's good to be back, and I'm glad we got through the series of very uncomfortable episodes that we had to do, and looking forward to getting into some more of the unusual doctrines that are associated with all of that, and today you brought up that we're going to be talking about the prosperity gospel.

I can say as somebody who was brought up in it, and we weren't tied to the money prosperity gospel. When you think about prosperity today, that's what you think about, but we were brought up in the precursor to that, which was the help gospel, which is the same thing.

It's prosperity, God will prosper your health, which that transitioned, as you know, into the full-blown prosperity gospel. Give me your money, and God will give it back to you, and the word of faith, name it, and claim it, all of that stuff, all of that centered around what I escaped, and it really took a long time for me to piece all of that together.

In my latest book, I actually cover some of that, because it really all goes back to John Alexander Dowey. You too can be healed, just believe, you too can be blessed, just believe, just say it, just say that you're blessed, and all of this stuff pre-existed, and these guys turned it into a movement, and then there's some funny stuff that happened with oral robberts, which really made it blossom into the money thing that happened.

A lot of people don't know this. Oral robberts was working pretty closely with William Brannum, right up to Brannum's death, and you can even find a photograph that's out there of Brannum, and I think it's William Brannum, I think it's his wife, Oral Roberts, maybe Oral Roberts wife, but they're there at the Ramada Inn at one of Brannum's big revival meetings.

I think it was probably for the full gospel businessman, but anyway, it's good to be back. It's good to get into all of this. Well, thanks for having me on again, John. Good morning to you.

What we have been looking... it in the past was some of the things leading up to what I felt was the actual decline and finally death of Faith Assembly. The first of those being that I thought Hobart was losing his marbles mentally, believing his own propaganda, and as we went through the last several podcasts, just documenting these odd and strange and weird legalisms that he began to put everyone under.

The second thing that I think was very instrumental in leading to the downfall of Faith Assembly was a civil lawsuit that was filed through a Michigan attorney by a couple over in Ohio. They were seeking not criminal prosecution, that was going to happen in some other regards in Indiana with the death of Pamela Menz, which we will talk about in the future, but they were seeking

monetary punitive damages, and what the lawsuit was after was a disclosure of the assets of Hobart and June Freeman personally and Faith Assembly as a business entity. Of course, Hobart always tried to say that it wasn't a business, that this is a church and a church is not a business.

And so before I give the details of that, I think what we all find fascinating is this whole prosperity gospel. And I don't know that I'll say things new to you. They may be, it may just be interesting to you to see how this weaves in with your understanding of William Brownham's background and John Alexander Dowey and everyone else. But absolutely, there's evolution involved, and there is similarity and connection from these earlier ministers to the ones we're talking about today. Part of the legend of Hobart Freeman, which he has told countless times, his followers will be well aware of this,

is his story of how he went through college and seminary on faith. And his big passage that he always used was Matthew 6 versus 19 to 34, especially verse 33, but that whole end of the sixth chapter of Matthew, where he said, God said, Jesus said, take no fault and your heavenly Father will supply your needs. So he's very famous for telling this story, and then building upon it, and you know how early cult stories can be, they have a little germ of truth hidden there somewhere, and then there are just these barnacles that accumulate on top of it, and it becomes way more than what it ever really

was. But I think it was dishonest and I think it was dangerous. It was a terrible approach to finances. It was not as bad as his approach to divine healing because that can cost you your life.

His prohibition against medicine and doctors, that is very serious because you can die over that. But his false and weird and dangerous and deceptive teaching about finances just makes you lay pain in your rent at the end of the month. Maybe you get evicted but it doesn't cost you your life. But the story that he told and he told it hundreds of times. So many times that you wondered, do you not remember we already know that? Do you not remember you have already told us that?

I just became part of the cult legend. But here's what he would say. He said, God save me on the way home from a nightclub in Florida, St. Pete Florida in 1952. And then God took this high school dropout and he was a high school dropout. He didn't finish high school. Took him through college and seminary, never made less than an A, never worked five minutes during that time period.

God didn't send me to seminary or college to shoot the ball or to play sports or to work 40 hours but he sent me to school to study to prepare for the ministry. And he would say Matthew 633, seek you first the kingdom of God and all these things that the Gentile seek after will be added unto you. So that's a story and he stuck to it for several years claiming that I never made less than an A. And that's probably true. But we talked last time. He studied what 14 to 16 hours a day. I think the dumbest person in school would probably never make less than an A if you actually

studied 14 to 16 hours a day. You and I kind of doubt that he did that seven days a week and to the degree that he did that his family life also definitely suffered. But anyway, yeah, you know, I studied 14 to 16 hours a day. He said, Hobart, didn't work. I was just there to study and to learn. God didn't sent me to work. God sent me there to learn. He even said, God took some tests for him and that all the students mocked him and made fun of him. Oh, you're going to school on faith and then Hobart mocked them. He said, you know, they're trying to work 40 hours a

week and trying to go to school. And he said, that's just a lack of faith. If you have faith, you just believe God and God will take care of you. God will supply all of your needs.

That is a very dangerous teaching that Hobart gave for years. actually seen that there were people whose parents were in college and seminary with Hobart. And they tell a different version of that story. They tell a very interesting version of that story. And I've alluded to this before, but there are people on record now who say my parents were in college and seminary with Hobart. And as far as him saying, he didn't work and all the students were mocking him. And he just lived by faith. They said, no, no, no. That's not how that happened. How that happened was my parents saw the Freeman

family threadbare in their clothes and no food in their kitchen. And because my parents were Christian parents, yeah, they were working hard and studying. They were having to do both because that's what reality tells you life has for you. That's just the way it's really going to happen if it happens at all. So they said, my parents out of the generosity of their heart would provide clothing for the Freeman girls and would carry food over the house for June. And what is just so evil in my opinion, John, is that when Hobart tells the story, like he did a little series on Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd. I

shall not lack. And he turned the whole Psalm into financial prosperity. All of those verses in Psalm 23 have to do with driving new cars, eating not hamburger, but steak. And one of the verses in there says that God will set a table prepared table before you in the presence of your enemies. And Hobart would then add, and God will even call your enemies to put food on the table for you. And he was talking about these people in college and seminary like they were enemies of Christ in the gospel and enemies of his.

And so God was somehow manipulating and massaging their minds. And even though they didn't want to help Hobart force them to help Hobart so that the scriptures could be fulfilled. And Hobart's faith life would be intact. But that's not the way the story went down at all. Those people were good people who were genuinely disturbed at the irresponsibility of Hobart Freeman when it came to taking care of his wife and children. And so as a result out of the goodness of their heart, they would provide some food and clothing. So, I mean here's a very big part of the cult legend. And it's just not true. And another part

of it. That is not true, is if you listen to tapes from say 1975 or 1976, what I've just told you preceded that, then you found out, oh, he actually did hold some jobs and he would tell what those jobs were.

Now he actually has verbatim on multiple early tapes. I didn't work five minutes while I was in college in seminary. In a few years later, on some later tapes, we found out that he and June were house parents for a Kentucky children's home.

It was a home of delinquent young ladies and they were house parents of that. We also found out that he graded papers that he was a student assistant teacher, which is not uncommon in seminary and he was paid for that.

He said, he cleaned latrines. Now when I was first listening, that was 17 years old. I had no idea what a latrine was. No idea. That must be old person's terminology. I had to look that word up or ask my parents, what is a latrine?

I knew it, what a toilet was or what a urinal was, I didn't know what a latrine was. That was his phrase, John. He cleaned latrines and he also was a night watchman at a high school.

So what are we finding out as we go a little further along with these tapes in the years in which he's teaching? Here's what we find out, that there was some probably planned deception and dishonesty involved.

You know, I find it really funny, funny odd, how all of the different podcasts series that I'm doing. There's always this intertwining theme that seems to weave all throughout and it's not that I plan this as a strategy.

Literally, we're just having open conversations and dialogue. You know that we didn't plan any of this out before we started. Same with the other guys. I just had the conversation and I can't remember if it comes out today or if it comes out next time Bob is talking, but anyway, we were talking about how similar these religions were to in the ancient world, you probably know this history.

You had the cults of Dionysus and Bacchus who, you know, ancient Greek and Roman, well they had the theater of Dionysus and Bacchus. And it was one of the earliest known theaters in the world.

And you go there, you hear a play, et cetera. But what happened is they, because the religion and the, you know, there was no separation of church and state. So religion was often part of the themes.

Well, what they put in the plays actually entered into, often into the mythologies of the different gods and goddesses that they had the place for. So they're literally creating a state. jacked and it became the mythology, the mythology entered the worship and we were talking about how similar that is to laterane, new apostolic reformation, all of this stuff and I don't think it is a planned strategy, but I can assure you I have been in situations with people of respect in at least the brand I'm called and I was with them when the naturally occurring event happened

there was no supernatural in it whatsoever I can tell you all of the details I can tell you here's the cause here's the result here's what happened in between and I go sit in Sunday and I hear this fabulous mythological story of how the angels and demons were fighting each other and here was our beloved whoever this person is right in the center of it and I'm sitting there scratching my head well I was there too man that's not how it ain't that's not at all how it went down and it reminds me of these theaters man because they they make a presentation for this for

their stage act they write their own stage the congregation are the people who are watching their plays at unfolds and I you know I don't know that they have ill intent when they do it but if you think of the consequences of what they're doing it has a disastrous effect on the religion as a whole because people start believing the fiction rather than they do the real thing absolutely John and it had an effect on me um Howard had a fascination with luxury cars with especially Lincoln town cars Cadillacs and back in the 60s the big Chryslers and as I studied his life I think that

sprang from the fact that he came from poverty you know he came from a very poor and very sickly background and so if you are hearing from Kenneth Hagen and these other faith teachers that you can be healed of everything and that you can have financial prosperity you know that's just a huge draw on on a carnal mind and yeah you can find verses third John 2 beloved I wish above all things as you prosper and be in health even as your soul prospers you can find a verse approve or to take you down any path you wanted to go down you want to go down does it mean that your theology

that you take from that ends up squaring with the whole revelation of what God said but as far as the effect look I'll share very very embarrassing personal story John you have done a great job you're always sharing personal stories from your past in the cult that are very embarrassing you know you say here I'm a whatever age man and I'm a member of a cult that doesn't make me look very good does it not at all and and I and I appreciate your honesty and your your humility and I think you've been maybe more humble

with me and I don't want you to outhumble me so I need to tell a story from my background that'll make me look like the actual absolute idiot that I was. But it will also show, and you know, the thing about our past, Sean, is it is what it is. You can either hide it or you can deny it or you can just say it happened. So what? That was then and now I'm living today. I find that these cult leaders want to hide and deny. They definitely wanted to see.

And normal people are willing to say, hey, it happened. I wish it didn't, but it did. And you know, I've got a t-shirt that said that says something along the line of bad decisions make for great stories. And how true that is. So here I am being influenced as a 17-year-old junior in high school. And I'm listening to Hobart teaches false perverse prosperity gospel that, oh, it's just all you have to do is have faith. What you have to do is you find a need that you have, you locate a Bible verse, it covers it, you claim it, you confess it,

you act it, and then God will deliver it. God will manifest it to you. Just as simple as that, it is the good old-fashioned faith formula theology. And I didn't even own a Dodge Rambler or Ford Pinto. I owned nothing. But I'm hearing him talk about God owns a cattle on a thousand hills.

All you have to do is ask. You have not because you ask not. Ask and you shall receive. And I knew the verses because he told them and then he told the stories of how he drove his Lincoln in his town car and his caddy and his Chrysler. And I thought, well, man, I want a Lincoln town car too. So maybe I need to read his Facebook that gives you the five steps of faith. If you check them off, then you get to have it. So here's my really embarrassing story. I'm 17 years old.

I have a summer job at a motorhome lot that my dad who was a banker in Memphis had helped me get through a friend of his. So my dad knows all of these business owners. I'm just a kid.

My boss happens to drive a Lincoln Continental at work. Well, he's an owner of this big company, you know? He has the means to do that. But by me listening to Hobart Freeman and that false theology of name and enclaim it, he had all the verses. He had all the Bible to back him up.

So I decided, you know what? I'm going to claim me a Lincoln town car. But then claiming it's not good enough, you have to confess it to everyone. So I went around my high school saying I had claimed and God had given me a Lincoln town car. I'm 17 years old John.

And I wasn't embarrassed at all. I thought, you know, I'm just doing exactly how I've been taught. I'm doing just what the Bible tells me to do. But that's not enough. You also have to act your faith.

So on my lunch break, I drive down town Memphis. I'll never forget it. To Schillingon Union. To a Lincoln dealership. One that also was doing business through my father at NBC Banking Downtown Memphis.

I can't imagine how embarrassed my poor father must have been with this 17-year-old son of his. Back in those days, it's not like buying cars today. Back in those days, you could just place an order.

I placed an order for a brand new. I picked out the leather seats, this sparkle in the paint, this light blue Lincoln town car. The gentleman there, and I sure the gentleman, the elderly gentleman, salesman, that yes, I have full funds to pay for that because I serve God in heaven. Poor guy.

He ordered it. John, I wait, you know, a few weeks. The car comes in. I get a call at work saying, your car is here. We've got it all cleaned and ready for you to pick up.

And I drive down there and I have zero money to pay for that darn car. And I had to tell the guy, I'm sorry, God's faithful. That's what we were taught to say. God's Word is true and God is true to His Word.

I don't have the money now, but I will, and I'll come back and pick it up. Well, of course, I never got the money for that as a 17-year-old. That would be an absolute miracle if somehow I ended up with whatever the cost of the car would be in that day.

But that's the very thing. I mean, that's the true story about myself, and it's very embarrassing to tell it. The only good thing I can say about it is I was faithfully following the theology that I was taught.

I would dare say that most of those ministers under Hobart who were older than I was at that time and who did end up driving some luxury cars, I bet they never did it the way I tried to do it.

I bet they waited until they had a large enough offering come in. So they were claiming a big car, but they waited for the offering, then they took the offering down there and bought them a car.

I never fell for it to that level, but I have friends who did. In fact, I have a very close friend who I'm going to try to avoid giving too many details, because I don't want to embarrass him if he hears this.

But he got caught up in the prosperity gospel thing. He liked me, had a consulting business, and one day he suddenly says, my business is going to explode, John. I said, well, what happened? He says, I prayed.

I said, okay. That's good, you know, welcome to pray and he says, I claimed it too. And I said, oh, really? And so long story short, he goes out, he takes out, he rents this business property, which if you're a business owner, you know how expensive that can be, without the clients to support the business property, he goes and buys a land rover, which in today's world, it would be like the equivalent of your Lincoln back then, maybe exponentially more, and did not even have oil to, did not even have money to pay, to have the oil changed in the dang thing.

He somehow had enough money for the down payment, but he couldn't keep it up. Well, apparently the engines in those things seize up if you don't change the oil in one year's time, which is a, it's an astronomical expense in those things.

I mean, we're talking tens of thousands of dollars just for the component, not putting the engine in. And anyway, ended up, it put him in the hospital with a heart attack with all of this stuff that hit him.

So what he claimed, whenever he named it, was he claimed that he was gonna lose everything that he gambled with, because it is a gamble when you do this. So he gambled, he lost, and ended up in the hospital with a heart attack.

That's how bad it can get. And I realized that there are people with worse stories than that off of this prosperity gospel. Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started, or how the progression of modern Pentecostalism, transition through the latter reign, charismatic and other fringe movements into the new apostolic reformation?

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

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And I've heard a lot of the stories of people from these satellite churches told me that the ministers, that was one thing they all wanted, so desperately, was either a link in our Cadillac because that's a status symbol.

And your founder, your leader, Daddy had one, Hobart Grove, Hobart said that it's not difficult, that he said, he would say on his tapes, God is not in the used car business. God is not in the hamburger business.

Cowl's were made out of states, not hamburger. That's what he taught, but no one could put the pieces together obviously right in the book. In front of them, the reason you can teach that and live that is because of the number of people in your church.

You obviously didn't live that back in college in seminary days. So, the reason that Hobart had to come clean, he did have to begin to come clean on this in 76 and 77 was because of people like me.

Young men and young ministers there in the glory barn took him at his word. And figured, well, I don't have to have a job. All I need to do is claim Matthew 633. As long as I am seeking first the kingdom, then according to Hobart's reading of Matthew 6, God is going to supply all of my material needs.

The only condition for me is to seek first the kingdom. So, there were young men who just saw, I'll just stay home and play with my children and stay with my wife and study my Bible and listen to Freeman tapes. I don't need a job.

The young ministers who were trying to get their feet on the ground trying to establish a satellite branch somewhere and had five people showing up, well, they can't contribute enough so that you can do that full time.

But they didn't care. They just said, you know, we're going to claim it all by faith. And so then, what happened then is Hobart had to say, hey, there is also a verse in 2nd Thessalonians 310.

If a man doesn't work, he doesn't get to eat. You're worse than an infidel if you don't provide for your family. And then and only then, John, did he begin to tell these little snippets of, when I said I didn't work, what I meant was, you know, as a night watchman, I could make my rounds real quickly and then go back to the guard house and study for the next hour and then make my rounds again.

You know, then he began to tell us, oh, I actually did have jobs, even though he said I didn't work five minutes through college or the seminary. That was a deception. He exited it just like you said, you know the true details of the story and it wasn't a miracle at all.

Hobart going through college and seminary, not working, was number one, not true. And number two, it wasn't a miracle because he did work. Things didn't cost much back in those days. He did have some income and people out of the goodness of their heart gave him things.

So I can distinctly remember by the time I got to college, my freshman year, my sophomore year, I'm hearing some of these other things in Hobart's messages. I've already gone through my debacle ordering the link and it chilling on Union and downtown Memphis.

And I can distinctly remember feeling that I had been to see. I can't just... Stinkly remember there was some high level of deception that Hope Barton had practiced on me and everyone else by telling half truths.

He didn't hold a 40 hour a week job, but he definitely worked. He definitely had income. And as you and I have said a thousand times, we just didn't, I didn't have the critical thinking ability to really process all of it.

And then to reject all of it. Even though I felt I had been deceived because there wasn't some miracle that I didn't create money, rein it down out of heaven for Hope Art to go through college and seminary without working.

Even though I saw that there was an explanation for it, he just still talked about it over and over and over. But I began to see that there was, it was explainable. It wasn't something that was totally supernatural.

But to give you some illustrations of how this was affecting the other ministers there, we've talked about Jerry Birkitt before. Jerry Birkitt was one of the big time ministers. Hope Art mentions him on several tapes, mentions him by name.

And I talked about him in the past. He's passed away here not that long ago, but I've talked about him in these podcasts in life of the fact that his wife Sally was trying to give birth to a child, was wanting to go to the hospital.

Jerry said, no, and she bled to death. So that's who Jerry Birkitt was. And I met Jerry. He came up to Minnesota. I was living in Wakonia, Minnesota, pastoring a church and I had asked Hope Art, why are you got these guys coming up here?

You know, there is a church that is somewhat similar to yours. And that day I was somewhat similar to him. You know, representing your faith teaching. Why you have this, you know, up here to Owen and Chuck and Allison dots this place and you're sending Jerry Birkitt up here.

So Jerry came to talk to me about that. So I actually met the man. Well, you know what happened a few years later? Jerry was put on one year church discipline, suspended from ministry one year church discipline.

You know why? He had fallen that far behind in his rent. He wasn't paying his rent. And I'm sure he was doing what? He's practicing Hope Art's teaching on Matthew 633. You know, he wasn't going to get a job to come up with the funds.

He actually rented a trailer from Don Nye. Don Nye was a big time farmer in the church who owned the property where the new building was built. He had a trailer court with lots of traders and a lot of people from faith assembly.

Rented their traders from Don Nye and Jerry Birkitt was one of them and Jerry Birkitt, one of the menace. put on church discipline for a year because he was behind in his rent on his trailer and you know that wasn't broadcast to me and to other people. Someone recently who was a minister of faith assembly told me this story. He was a minister after Hobart's death. He held the message for a number of years. He doesn't any longer. He said he actually had three different little groups that he traveled the minister to. And he said even traveling to those three groups. He said

he did not, he could not earn enough money to pay his way through life. And I asked him not that long ago. I said well how many people are represented in you know these three. He said a hundred people. I said a hundred people and that's not enough to provide you if you're their teacher. They're traveling teacher. That's not enough to provide you a means of living. He said he would leave some of those meetings and he would have a twenty dollar bill in the offering. And that was it from however many people were in that group. But he said he would sometimes travel the circuit

with some of the other ministers. And one in particular whose name was Jim Mansfield. And I met Jim because he came to my study in my church a couple of times in the mid eighties mid to late eighties when I was still living and teaching and pastoring in Vermont. He said he would travel with Jim Mansfield on the circuit. And I think this was true of so many of them. He said one time when we were getting ready to leave it was he was traveling with Jim and Jim had a partner Jerry Reader. They normally went together and there may have been another person or two on the trip. And Jim made

the comment that you know we got to get to these meetings and get an offering because you know we don't have any money. And a comment was made well you know you're leaving your wife and kids you know what's going on there. He said all she's got to have faith just like the rest of us do.

She's got to trust God for food in the house just like the rest of us do. And they would leave those women behind trusting God to provide food for them. But see John they had heard stories of Hobart telling like George Mueller who operated the orphanages in England how God would pull the wheels off the bread wagons as they had drive in front of the orphanage when they were out of food and George Mueller's down on his hands and knees praying God please send food God would pull the wheels off the wagon of the bread truck and there's enough bread for the kids for that day or

that week. I don't even know whether that ever happened but those stories the stories are the bane of this whole movement because rather than teaching actual Scripture, biblical doctrine, they're just telling these anecdotes.

These stories over and over and people hear these and they have these delusions of grandeur. They sound so wonderful. They are a cheap and expensive lazy way to provide for yourself. Let's just claim these things by faith.

Another story I can say, a person I won't mention their name, I think they're still alive and they're family, a well-known family at faith assembly. Someone who actually was, I don't know, somewhat of a bodyguard, quote unquote, for Hobart.

When you saw, if Hobart went out, he would be leaning on this man, depending on, you know, this man's help if he was actually out of his confines and like the days when he had to go to court.

And so I don't know that the rest of the church found this out, but you know, I have all of these people who were contacting me, telling me all of these stories. And they say that man simply went to the offering box in the back of the church and just stole money out of it because he was short on rent.

And this was a man who was a right-hand man to, now that happened after Hobart died, a right-hand man went Hobart was alive. And one who worked back there in the faith ministries and publications, and you stole money out of the offering box, I mean, I don't even hear of those things happening in normal churches.

I can tell you it happened at the brand of tabernacle. I can't give details because it implicates a few people who are close to me, but anyway, there are some messes, some real messes.

And I also can't think of too many churches that require a bodyguard, but that's another thing at the brand of tabernacle when Grandpa walked out. He had bodyguard A and bodyguard B right by him as he walked to his car and even when I was in it, that seemed odd because I had noticed some things that just unusual.

It's unusual. Why did Grandpa need a bodyguard? It was apparently something that I guess William Brannum also did and when we left this, started attending normal churches. You don't hear of too many people stealing from the Thai baskets or boxes and you don't see the minister leaving with the bodyguard.

In fact, I was a little surprised because at the brand of tabernacle, the way the exit happened, you would start exiting. It was very, very orderly, it was very, I don't know how to put it, it felt rigid and as you were rigidly walking out of the building afterwards, you walk out in complete silence.

You're not allowed to talk to anybody when service is over. You get out. And by the time I made it out, because I was kind of in the middle, Grandpa had already been escorted with his two bodyguards to his car, and he was gone. So nobody got to see the pastor afterwards. I was a little surprised at the very first church service that I had after cult, and the minister actually walked down the aisle and he walked to the door, and he turned around and faced everybody and shook everybody's hand as they walked out of the building.

And I was like, what is this? Doesn't he know he's supposed to be the holy righteous man of God? He's supposed to be escorted by bodyguards, but that was the difference, man. They set all this stuff up in such a way that the creating mythologies, the creating themselves, I don't even know how to describe what it is. It's like they're demigods. They're not really gods, they're mortal, but you have to go to them because they're the special source to the divine. And then you go to a normal church and it's a humble pastor who wants to help you learn how to get closer to God.

Yeah, and I hear that from all of these people about the ministers and the satellite groups. They had copied the persona of Hobart Freeman, that the way you rule your flock is you create this aura about yourself, and the way you do that is you keep distance between yourself and the people, which is never what a shepherd would do with his sheep.

You know, a shepherd is always going to be out mingling with the sheep, checking on every hoof and every nostril and every ear to make sure that this sheep is healthy. And that's not the way these ministers were at all. They were little hitlers just marching around keeping this air of invincibility. And you know, if you don't let people get to know you, then they don't really get to know you. And as long as they just see you for an hour up there preaching, you know, just regurgitating, parroting, whatever Hobart had said, and a much

worse fashion than Hobart did, then they just see you. Yeah, as a demigod, and you don't let down your defenses, you don't mingle with them. They don't get to know you as a person.

So they assume that you don't have any flaws. You know, because they never see you in a situation where maybe they see your short temper, or they see your lack of generosity, or they see something that all of us human beings possess. We all, every one of us, possess all of these things, some people to a greater degree than others. And as a Christian, we're all working to rid ourselves of that. But, you know, none of us have done it perfectly, except these ministers, or at least, you know, they want to come across that way. So no, it's just terrible,

the way this whole prosperity gospel was set up by Hobart Freeman. Speaking of that offering box, so, so faith is assembly was not incorporated, there were actually several boxes back there, but there was a main box that was for the church, for the ministry, for Hobart Freeman. And people would put their offering in there. And that did not include all of the mail-in offerings because he had following, a following from people all around the world. Hobart's view of the church was extremely, extremely unbiblical. Hobart taught that the church, just like in his mind, O Testament Israel, was not a democracy, it was a feeocracy. And if I could show this

to your people, this is the only complete copy. This is called the faith and practice of the church in Winona Lake. This goes back a long time, way prior to the church in Claypool and Hobart's house, way prior to Jerry Irving's garage, way prior to the glory bar, goes back to Winona Lake, Indiana, 1964, Hobart E. Freeman, the pastor. And what we have on our hands when he left the Brethrenary Church and got fired by the seminary, this is a 50 page written by Hobart himself, church creed, a church doctrine, that this is in one man's view and opinion what

all Christianity is about and what a church is to be like. And you know, any of the creeds and confessions, and there are a lot of them, with minister confession of faith, they're all kind of Baptist confession of faith, the Heidelberg, these were written by a group of men, a very smart man, you know, dozens of men. You can't have church creed, church doctrine written by a long ranger, because there are no checks and balances, you know, and guess what, that's the way he set it up.

And he followed the principles in this 50 page book for the rest of the time in the church. But one of the things he said was, the church is a theocracy, and it is to be controlled by Jesus Christ.

Well, yes, we would like for that to be true, but since Jesus isn't here, we can hear His voice, and we can't ask Him a question, then how are we going to follow just Jesus? Well, Jesus speaks through the pastor. The pastor is the head of the church, and what the pastor says goes. And in Hobart, as most of these groups have done, John, just took this to a terrible extreme.

of it was a theocratic government. He did, that he had ministers around him, they had no say so in what was going on in the church. Hobart word was final, it was ultimate. If he said it, that's what had to be done.

Now, I don't know that people realize that he wrote this up and I think I have the only copy because I have all of Hobart's letters, all of his correspondence, all of his sermon notes and so forth.

But whenever they did go into the new building, they printed up their own little 10 rules for requirement, 10 rules for fellowship within faith assembly. So they just called it the requirement sheet.

And one of those is the churches at theocracy. And Hobart was big on, we're not a denomination. Denominationalism is all wrong. We are just a local church. We don't have a creed. We don't have a church membership role.

But yet what he did was rather than come in the front door, came in the back door and brought all that stuff in, right back into the church, they did have their own creed, it was Hobart's creed.

They had their church membership, that was Hobart's requirements for church membership. And not only was it something that they had that was kind of understood, it was actually written and printed. And Hobart was going to rule that church with an iron rod.

Let me give you a quote. I haven't given you this to play, John, but I'll give people a quote off of one of those terrible, deeper deliverance and discernment messages. This one was entitled, trying, lying spirits and discerning deceiving demons.

It was taught on August the 9th of 1981. And if people want to go listen to it, they can. He's talking about just all kinds of problems that people have, multiple personalities. He says, early in this message, the Lord is going to show you things that you've never even seen before.

And they had never seen these things before. And he said, they're things I didn't even know until the Lord gave them to me.

And then he ends up talking about the Jesus died spiritually, Heresy. And he ends up talking about, does it say by name, but it's actually a son-in-law, it's Dave Freeman, who was married to his youngest daughter, Becky Freeman.

And Dave Freeman began associating with Lester Sumrell and some of the Fort Worth and Tulsa people who were teaching the Jesus died spiritually teaching. And at the 49 minute, 29 second mark. or he says this.

And we don't play favorites because one was in the family, the one that I just mentioned. So we're not going to play favorites with you if we don't play favorites with the family. And listen to this last sentence, I would put my own daughter or wife out of this body until they got straightened out.

Wow. You can go listen to it for yourself. You would put your own daughter, that's one thing. You would put June out of the church if June sinned. Oh my goodness, would it not be better if you've got that kind of sin in your family for you to step down as the pastor?

Is that not more in line with what first Timothy teaches if your wife and your children aren't in divine order, quote, quote, unquote, you don't get to be the minister anymore. But no, Hobart says, I will stay here and I will excommunicate from the church, my own daughter or my own wife.

I've never heard such. He learned it from the master, Brantum. Brantum took it a step further. He would say things like two before, as I would take a two before and beat my women with it if they didn't get into line.

So he actually went towards physical assault. And I published a book recently, not recently, a couple years ago in Dauy, militant Christian extremism had to look up the name of it. And it was kind of funny.

Dauy's entire ministry started because he stole the church and he liked what you're describing. He wanted to set up theocracy in the church. Then when he got into the United States, he wanted to set up the theocracy in the United States that was basically, I mean, if you really take a step back and think about it, which I just did now, it mimics the model that the new apostolic reformation wants to set up, where literally the apostles of the NAR are the ones who are governing the United States and the president just becomes a figurehead.

That's what they want to establish. Dauy wanted the same thing back in the early 1900s. He wanted a theocracy to be established. He tried to set it up in the state of Illinois and it didn't fail.

They even ran, they even created a government party. I can't remember what it's called the theocratic party or something like this, trying to set this up. And the model was that up in Zion City?

He was operating it out of Zion City, but they actually were going towards the nationally. They were trying to create a national theocratic party. And actually they did. They tried to vote, set up a voting system and then voted in.

And obviously the state of Illinois just kind of rejected this thing, but they were trying to set up exactly what you're talking about at a government level. If you really take a step and think back about what's happening, you've got dallyism.

Then out of dally's camp, you had Gordon Lindsay, started Christ for the Nations. You had FF Bosworth who trained and mentored Brannum. They transitioned this into the Latter-Ein and from Latter-Ein birth to an NAR.

So the history all points back to dally as creating the structures that you're describing. And ironically, as it relates to the prosperity gospel, all roots trace back to dally. That's how weird this gets.

And what I want people to understand through all of this is it's not as though God is not willing to prosper his people, but he does it through the normal ways it's the scripture teaches with intelligence and schooling and training and hard work and personal discipline and wise planning and wise investments.

That's what all of the Bible teaches. The Bible doesn't teach any kind of raining down money from heaven or anything like that. That is just, that is a false gospel. But that is what Hobart taught.

And that's what the church learned under him. And that's why it did create problems within the young men because they want to emulate what their pastor has done. I want to go through school and never have to work also.

And they didn't understand Hobart has deceived them. He did work. He did have an income. There was no divine money as mana that came down from heaven. He did deceive the people into thinking that the way he first told the story was the way that it happened.

And that's simply not true. And what the people didn't understand is because they're under this bondage to the leadership that the only way, they'd say, well, look, Bruce, he drives this big car and he's building a new house and Steve Hill has the only way that people didn't understand this.

They just weren't thinking the only way that those tier one ministers who were just sitting in butter got to have these cars and these homes and all of this stuff, I mean, it's obvious.

It's because they had a large enough following to fund it. It's as simple as that. This is not anything supernatural and it's not anything mysterious. This is simply the way that it was. And so I was just greatly offended.

And I told the story before, John, that I end up within two years of me being in ministry. The way I got in ministry was really God sent me out. That wasn't following on anybody's coattails.

I didn't pick up a satellite group. God sent me to a place 500 miles from home. I didn't know a person, not a person there. or knew me and God raised something up. And within a couple of years, I did drive a Lincoln town car and I've told the story.

I kept it six months and then I got rid of it because it didn't feel right. That's just not the way you're supposed. I was still at that time following the way I had been told.

You know, you gotta have more and be more and then that keeps the people underneath you and then that causes them to respect you more and they don't get to see any of your human side.

And you know, I, within a couple of years, I transitioned away from that quickly. I evolved away from that. I can tell you another personal story if we have time here that actually has a good ending.

We had in our small church. We had a small church. I did not work outside of my ministry calling at that time. I have over all these last decades, but I didn't back then.

And, you know, I never got rich, but we were able to make ends meet and I was just so blessed to be a minister that even though I didn't have a lot of money, you know, I never thought about that.

I never cared. We had one family in our body who was, they were, the husband and wife were older. So he had a business career behind him. He was financially, you know, stable and established, more so than a lot of the younger people in our church at the time.

And so there came a day. I had not been a minister, John, but I'm gonna say four years when this family gifted me, and I hadn't even claimed this, and gifted me with a home.

I mean, I was just renting up until then gave me a home with some property. And I thought, wow, you know, this is God's favor on me. I didn't even ask for it. And now I'm in my mid 20s, and I'm a homeowner, but, you know, I'm one of the only ones in the church because everybody else is young.

They're trying to get established. And, you know, they don't have the money to do this. I'm a homeowner.

Well, I kept that home for about three months through the summer of that year. I only had one child. One of my children was born during that summer, but when I was first given the home and property, my wife and I just had our one child, our oldest son.

And I just got thinking about the situation that I was in, and I didn't feel comfortable. And it wasn't that I wasn't grateful for the gift. And when I gave it back, I had to explain to them, you know, I don't wanna offend you.

That was just so generous of you to do that. But I said, in my heart, I just don't feel comfortable having been given such a huge gift. And I'm not an... special person or anything, John, but I will say, but I am proud of myself for my morality and spirituality at a young age to be able to make those decisions. But I'm no better than anyone else, but I can guarantee you that those ministers at Faith Assembly, they were given all kinds of things. And it was just, gimme, gimme, gimme, my name's Jimmy. I'll take all you can give me.

They wouldn't give anything back, you know, they, because this is a sign of God's approval of your ministry. It is no such thing as a sign of God's approval of your ministry. Look at Hobart. He died sick. He run people's lives. His Cadillacs didn't prove anything. And neither did the wealth of some of those ministers at that time. What I got thinking in my mind is this puts me in somewhat of a compromising position. I was aware of all the Old Testament's teaching that one of the qualifications for some of the judges, like the 70 elders under Moses is whenever they rendered

a decision when two parties came with a quarrel before them, they had to do so with impartiality. And one of the things that will prevent impartiality are bribes, what we call bribes. Which, listen, that family was not bribing me. That was a good Christian family and they did not have any evil intent. And some people by giving a gift, they definitely do intend it as a bribe.

This was not a bribe. This was a gift. But the Mosaic law said that a gift can blind the eyes. Because here you are, let's say that a situation arises in the church between that family and maybe another family. And I, as a pastor and the leader of the church, had to resolve the difficulty.

Will you see the position that puts me in him? And you see what everyone else in the church is going to think. If they ever have a beef with that family, they can hardly bring it to me.

That's just common sense. It's just common biblical understanding. It's just, it's just a way you're supposed to live your life. You can't go through life receiving gifts from people like that. So it was a wonderful freedom for me to graciously turn that back over to that family, walk away from it. I had to move to another town close by and find something to rent. But

the point that I did not know, John, that happened more than 40 years ago. That story that I just told you happened more than 40 years ago. But what I didn't know that I've just found out last fall, one of the men in that church that I have stayed friends with and stayed up with and he lives outside of Chicago. And so I've known him for 45 years. He was a part of- the church when that had been happened.

He was not a part of that family that gifted me that home and property. He came about this time last year and visited me and we were just talking about old times. And he said, you know what, you know, you know, he said, I've always had a lot of respect for you.

You gave us all these teachings, you were so smart. So, you know, I really looked up, but he said, you know, the thing that gave me the most respect for you was not all of your teaching, not all of your intelligence, not you going to seminary, not you passing all those exams and seminary, not you winning the scholarship.

You know, all of this academic intellectual stuff, he said, the thing that gave me the most respect for you is when you turned that home back over to that family. And I said, really, wow, thank you for telling me that.

He said, I've never told you that, but he said, that said more to me about you as a person than anything else I knew about you. Just that one thing that you did because most, he said, let's face the fact, most prosperity preachers, most anybody wouldn't do that.

You know, if someone wants to give you a home and property, you're just going to take it. And he said, that told me that I could trust you as a person and as a teacher and as a pastor that I could trust you.

And, you know, I didn't know that I just found this out 39 years later when he came and visited and told me that story last fall. And it just really blessed my heart. Yeah. I think I've told you, I've mentioned a few times, I think that I'm a big fan of cartoons and way more than I should be, I'm open to admit, but cartoons have a story that tells of something that is happening that isn't really good.

And then there's a moral to the story. People learn their lesson. And it all goes back to children's fables, right? Jack and the Beanstalk. So in some versions, Jack and the Beanstalk, Jack is greedy and he learns that greed and overreaching have these big consequences.

You know, there's a consequence to your actions. And whenever I look at this prosperity gospel, it's hard not to think of children's fables because it's really the same thing. You've got a minister who is greedy as greedy can be preaching prosperity gospel.

He's warning people to give them all of his money. But the problem is unlike the cartoons, unlike the children's fables, his consequence doesn't come until he gets exposed for something else. He will continue to get that money as long as he's greedy and as long as he can convince people that they too can be greedy and they can get something in return for giving him their money.

I mean, it really all comes down to greed. The participants in the prosperity gospel, they're greedy because they want more money than they have. not content with what they have. And so it all comes back down to it's, you know, tying it back to the, you know, the cults of backess and Dionysus, the theater.

It's much like that. They've created a theatrical display of what is a new version of a religion. It's not even Christianity. Give me your money and let me be greedy and you too can be greedy and you'll get something in return for giving me money for my greed.

That is essentially in a nutshell, that's the religion. That's the prosperity gospel. And before that, it was the health gospel. It was very much the same thing, but in a different spin on it, you know, you too can be healed.

Just come and give me your money and you too can be healed. Same exact thing. I just want the followers of Hobart all these years later and a faith assembly to realize that the reason that Hobart had the things that he had financially, he didn't have anything to do with faith, didn't have anything to do with promises in the Bible.

It had to do with the large number of people following him. And I don't think that people listened carefully enough to his messages where he would tell stories and not realize that you actually have explained how you got the money and it just went right over people's heads.

Whenever he first got baptized in the Holy Spirit in 1966 and he went down to Christ for the nations that same summer, he went to Israel and he told this story many times. He went with a fellow friend named Larry Delaney.

He said, he was still in his little church in Claypool, you know, had no following at the time, you know, just rattling around with the dozen people in a basement or living room. He said, but I claim the money.

I claim the money to go to Israel. Rather than, you know, go get an extra job or work two jobs, do what's responsible and what's normal, what everyone else has to do to come up with the money to do what it is you want to do.

He said, I claim the money, half of it came and I still needed the other half to make the trip. He said, well, I'm going to act my faith. So he left from Claypool, made it to New York cities, told this story many times.

And he said, but I was confessing the whole time that I had the money, I had the money, I had the money. 45 minutes before the plane left New York city, he said an anonymous donor, Larry or someone, might have been Larry said, an anonymous donor wants to pay the balance of your trip, which is $700.

Well, guess what? It's somebody feeling sorry for him. It's not a complete stranger at the airport that I can guarantee you that God somehow spoke to them audibly and said, look, that man over there in the ticket line needs $700.

That would be a miracle if that happened. I guarantee you, that's not how it happened. Holbard had been confessing... to everyone around him, hey, I'm going to Israel and, you know, I've got half the money, don't have the other half, but I've claimed it by faith and God's faithful, God's going to send it, one of those people felt sorry for him and gave him the money.

That's how these ministers had what they had while the rest of the people lived in poverty and that just should not have been. No. And I think that's a good point. I'm glad that you mentioned it to prophets what I was building up to because when people look at Hobart Freeman, when people look at William Brannum, they're looking in the eyes of today's prosperity gospel ministers who have these luxurious mansions, private jets, whatever.

And they say they don't match that pattern, so therefore they must not be the prosperity gospel. That's, I hear that argument over and over, Brannum was not greedy. We have to understand greed manifests itself in many different ways.

And I can assure you, so Brannum, he didn't, he didn't live in a luxurious mansion. His house is not far from me and it's smaller than my house, it's not that big of a house.

But he could take six months out of the year and go on a hunting trip, all expenses paid and meanwhile his wife and his children are getting food for their table. Greed manifests itself in many ways.

They travel. I was looking through, I just did a scan one day through Brannum's recording transcripts just to see if he named any hotels. The hotels he's mentioning in, I may never afford to stay in.

Wow. They're, we're talking about what was it? It was not the rich, it was Carlson, it was one of the big hotels in London. He stayed at all expenses paid. And so he's living a luxurious lifestyle away from home, but then it comes back home and he has the appearance of a humble, genuinely poor minister, well he's not poor, I can assure you that.

He died with millions. But they present this persona of being humble and poor and not having much money, not having greed. And yet there's some of the greediest people I've ever studied, it's hard to believe.

But anyway, this has been incredibly fun. Like I said, I'm very glad we moved past the hard stuff and moved to the fun stuff, so thank you so much. You're welcome John. I hope people will learn and benefit from this, but their lack of having Hobart's prosperity in their life was due only to one thing they didn't have as large a following as he had.

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 more about the dark side of the new Apostolic Reformation, read Weaponize Religion from Christian Identity to the NAR, available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.

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