When Miracles Replace Jesus: Rethinking Charismania

Hello and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast. I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research at William-Branham.org and with me I have my co-host and friend, Christian Thomason, host of Sanctum Artifact. Christian is good to be back and to talk more about Charismania. I don't know if you've noticed but the podcast that you and I are doing, people are just really enjoying it. The feedback is incredible, so it's praise to you but this is this is something that's really interesting to me to hear what's happening in Germany. Which is why I chose the topic for today. I

wanted to talk a little bit about the signs and wonders and miracles and basically the difference between what the Pentecostal Charismatic Movement has created as a so-called supernatural experience versus what you see in the Scripture. I'm saying this, I qualified that on purpose not to offend anybody but I'm not saying that everything within those movements are technically bad or that even my opinion is that I'm against them. However, the focus, I think the hyper focus on the miracles, the signs, the wonders, I think this is problematic to me and it makes me question how much of it is real, how much of it is false,

which is interesting when you think about the gospel because in the gospel, the gospel is to tell others of the gospel, to spread the gospel, be disciples among men. If you have that focus that you want to teach other people about Jesus, well how can you say that you're doing this when you're saying something that they too have to question instead of just simply saying the gospel and what has happened over time, people in these movements, they think that the miracles are the gospel. In fact, whenever we left the Brandham cult, they didn't say, are you leaving Jesus? Are you abandoning the

gospel? What they said was, well what about the divine healing? If you leave, you're not going to have access to this divine healing. So they think they alone have the ultimate authority on Scripture, truth, healing, miracles, et cetera. But it's something for me that it's fascinating from a historical standpoint because the way this developed in America, I think if it were to have spread in the same way that it did in the 40s and 50s, there are many today would just say, no way, I'm not going to do it.

This is all fake. And we'll get into some of those examples, but I really want to hear your perspective on this. Yeah, thanks for having me. Again, I learn a lot when we do this.

And I think what's so interesting for most people is that my approach or my language is very generalistic and therefore funny sometimes. But it's not too far away from everyday normal life. Yeah, I think that's a good thing to talk about experiences.

Not to go too deep into it. There's a place for theology. There's a place for deep fonts. And there's a place for our common shared experiences as well. And I think many people gather around that because they share the same experiences as you and I.

Part of the reason that this is so interesting for me, whenever I left the, you know, the Branum Movement, which was focused on divine healing, miracles, et cetera, which was a precursor to the Prosperity Gospel.

It was a health prosperity. I studied the Bible. And one of the passages that really stood out to me was in Matthew 12, an evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign. And if you continue reading, it says, but no sign shall be given them but the sign of Jonah.

See, I grew up in a world where we read that verse continuously. We would say an evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign. And we're in a sign that wonders Miracle Religion. They never read down to that.

You never heard them read that verse about Jonah because what they were trying to do, they were trying to separate between our group and their miracles and the other groups and their miracles. So what they were trying to say is we have the true miracles, they have the false miracles.

And in the end, it's all the same thing. It's an evil and adulterous generation seeking after a sign. Now, in Jesus' day, when he says this, Jesus is performing miracles. So it's not that he's saying there are no miracles.

What he's saying is those who seek after them, that is the evil and adulterous generation. So I began to think about this and think about the hyperfocus on miracles. It seemed to me that in many cases miracles had just simply replaced the Gospel.

You're describing typical tribalistic behaviors, like what's your favorite soccer club? My soccer club is better than yours, yeah? And the interesting point is many people would say, you guys are just bashing, charismatic, bashing Christians from other denominations.

No, that's not what we're doing. We are not looking for that's better, that's worse. We are looking for the common ground. We are looking for a good relationship, for a good common ground between all Christians, and that common ground should be the Gospel.

common ground should be Jesus and not signs and wonders. I think that's one of the main critiques that's a headline if you go through all of your messages and interviews and dialogues you have had and in the past already. It's not bashing other Christians, it's what's the common ground?

That's the gospel. So let's talk about the gospel. That's the main point. That's the most important part of our faith. Let's present Jesus as he is. And the part in Matthew you were referencing to is especially interesting in that regard because the Jews hated Jesus because he was not the Messiah they wanted. And that's basically the fight we are fighting until today because those spiritual leaders that think they have to soften, they have to change the message, they have to give a different picture of the messenger which is Jesus. Do so because they think the real Jesus is not appealing

for people. They would not like Him Jesus if they don't change the language, change the meaning, change the Messiah to a person that is more likeable to the people. The Jews of his time, of Jesus's time, wanted a like a war Messiah defeating the Romans. So he wasn't giving them that.

He was there to heal the relationship between them and God. And that's again the word healing what are we looking for healing. The thing that needs to get healed is our relationship with God basically. That's the greatest wonder you can look for. Whenever I begin reading the Bible over and over again, that's one of the things the other things that stood out to me is that most of the passages that we use to apply to faith healing or divine healing, we're really talking about healing as the body of Christ as a whole. And specifically many of the passages we're talking about the healing

of Jesus's relationship or God's relationship to the Jews because in the mosaic law there were approximately 300 blessings. If you obeyed the law and then approximately 300 curses if you did not obey the law and they had fell under all of these curses, many of these curses. And so there needed to be a spiritual healing. So most of the passages are talking about spiritual healing.

There are some that are specific to physical healing. But whenever you consider the miracles, when Jesus is performing a miracle, it isn't so that it can be a show. when there can be entertainment, he's not doing it in a tent, in a tent revival like the, you know, the post-World War II healing revivalist, he's not calling a big convention and all of these people are coming to see, can he guess the names and addresses like they do in some of the new apostolic reformation?

But what he's doing essentially is he's there, there's a need and he supplies the need and he's showing that he is the supplier of the need if you read the gospels. But what it has turned into is, through the manifested sons of God framework that most of this developed from, the idea that we are gods started to just spread throughout the movement.

So they started thinking, well, if we're gods, we can do the same miracles that Jesus did. And then that developed as a foundation upon that foundation was built the idea that we are actually doing more miracles than God ever did.

When Jesus was on earth, and in fact, this is a direct quote on what Jesus was on earth, he only performs so many miracles. In my ministry, this is William Brandham speaking, in my ministry, I performed so many more miracles than Jesus.

So what they did, they took different passages, the one that was used for that, they used the passage where it says, greater works than this will you do. And they try to say that this implies and suggests that you are going to do nothing but miracles.

But that passage is actually talking about something much different than a sign or wonder a miracle. And it all comes back to what I said earlier. It's only the evil and adulterous generation that are seeking for a sign.

Those who are seeking the only thing that are going to get is the sign of Jonah when Jesus was there. Yeah, what's the need there, right?

What we really need is God Himself, not what we want from Him, like rubbing the genie, right? But God Himself is the one we want. We want this relationship. I think that's the most powerful expression of the Holy Ghost within us, giving us that need, that urge to seek Him, to love Him.

It makes us want to be with Him. I think many grown mature Christians often thought about how easy it would be to just leave the world and be with God because everyday Christian life, but everyday normal life as well, is really a struggle.

Most of life is, most of life is about death, struggle, fighting for basic needs. And even the people, you may say, yeah, but the rich don't have all those problems. No, they have the same problems or sometimes different problems, but the money doesn't saturate

the things you are looking for, like... real love and real truth, yeah, that's what's missing. So I think it's very important for us Christians to give people a good first expression or a good first impression of who God is.

That's our quest, if you will, as ambassadors of Christ. So we better get the message or the messenger, which is Christ, right. And don't spin narratives to please people. I just experienced this with my younger daughter in Germany. We have a very strict school system because it's based still based in its original law upon the laws that were given by Hitler and the national socialists. They thought of schools as environments where they could build up new Nazis.

So the school system was a tool for them to either produce willing Nazis or to make those visible that weren't willing to fall in, to fall in step, right. And this is still the case.

Today was with my daughter for a school visit. You are legally forced to do that. And it's like going to the zoo with your daughter. There are some school specialists and you are presenting your daughter or your son to them. How well behaved she is, how she can talk, how she can read, how she can think, how she can dance, stand on one foot, etc., etc., that feels so strange.

It feels wrong. It feels like you're going to the zoo and showing your daughter off to strange people that you don't like. You don't want to be there, but you are legally forced to do it. Otherwise, there are heavy consequences. And I thought to myself, isn't it strange that when we in our everyday normal life go to a job interview or go to this event, we show up in our best clothes, well-behaved, well-spoken, best manners. But in Christianity, when it's about God,

suddenly, that's irrelevant. We paint a picture of God, wishing to please people. So we are showing them a God that is not compliant, what a strange word, but I don't have any different word for it.

That is not compliant with our God from the Bible, with our Jesus, with the real Jesus Christ from the Bible. And that's problematic. I thought to myself, how strange it is that we do this, that so often we count this opportunity of first impression as so important to us.

And when it comes to situations where we can present the gospel and present Christ, we do it in a manner that would even, yeah, that's, that's below that. What we would do to present ourselves.

Absolutely. And that's hitting on the point that I mentioned earlier. So in the New Apostolic Reformation today, there is the concept of God's Generals, which is really weird when you think about it. Because in the Bible, there is Jesus and then there is everybody else.

There is no generals over armies. There is no Joel's army concept. But that's what they're teaching. They're teaching God's Generals. And if you read this account and God's Generals or if you hear any of the New Apostolic Reformation prophets apostles, they say, brand name was a, brand name was a really strong force.

He's part of the reason why we are, what we are today. And then he went astray. So the average listener who listens to this who's unfamiliar with history would say, okay, so brand name was a good man.

He brought the spirit of God, the spirit was moving among the crowds. And that developed into what we see today, the charismatic movement. If you're a charismatic, if you're in the New Apostolic Reformation, you think, well, this is part of our lineage.

And they went astray and we can see that they went astray because there is a destructive cult that exists today called the message, the followers of brand name. However, as this thing was being birthed in, and we're going back to the 40s, the late 1940s, whenever the Lateran movement was being birthed, this was during a time when spiritualism was very popular.

It was a craze in the United States. The, you mentioned the circus. You had the circuses coming around. You had the, you know, different types of shows that would come in a, in a tent because that's the only entertainment that people had, especially on the rural areas.

So this tent would come in with either circus or singing or they had different types of speeches that would come through. Well, these ministers in the revival were competing against this. They're competing against specifically spiritualism and the circus.

So one of the things that they introduced was the idea that this little child named David Walker, they called him little David Walker. They claimed that he had actually had a vision of heaven or was in heaven for seven minutes or something like this.

So he would give this testimony of what he saw when he was there. And people would come as though this, child is their crystal ball into what heaven looks like. Very much like the spiritualists.

And one of the, I don't know if it was the climax or how they did it, but this kid would levitate before the crowds, as though this was a Christian thing. And people, still today, I get emails asking, how did little David levitate? The way that it worked, William Branham would come, and his attraction was he would pray for the sick. And little David actually did the preaching. So this, this tour, they called them the dynamic duo or something like this. As they're touring through cities, you have some healing of the sick, which is miracles. You have a boy who

can levitate, which is a sign and a wonder. And they would advertise it exactly like this. Signs, wonders, miracles, whenever these people went through. That was the early years. That wasn't the years in which people today would say Branham went astray. But if you think about what's going on there, take that exact framework of a ministry and try to make it work today. Take them out to in front of a bunch of people today. And people would look at this and scratch their head and say, what on earth is this mess? And why are you calling it Christianity? And new converts. If you were a

person who was curious about Christianity, had no idea what it was coming to this thing. And saw a kid levitating, you're going to think, oh my gosh, these people are a bunch of nuts. But that's how the movement started with a bunch of nuts. And I go back and forth on my opinion on this.

I do believe that there's a lot of people back during that day that were just naive, who really believed this kind of thing could happen. And so they just accepted it. I also wonder how much of it was really accepted and how much of it was simply permitted. They show up. Yeah, this is kind of weird, but this is our only form of entertainment. But it's not distinction. Yeah, we're not going to speak out against it. I think it was actually the latter. I think people showed up and they're like, you know, this is not of God. This is a bunch of nonsense. But they are preaching the gospel.

And this is the traveling entertainment for our city. Let's go hear it. And there you go. I think by those examples, you exactly see that those spiritual leaders

outright understood that impressing people, appealing to people is more important than a message yourself. So they would change it. They understood it very well. And nowadays we would laugh about that because it sounds ridiculous. But the fact is there was a huge movement after that.

People sticking to those persons, to those leaders. And as a you will find a story or this in various variations about how in the animalistic kingdom there are some animals or in dragon stories, dragon tales. There's like the hero and he's out there to find a dragon egg because

if the egg cracks open and the little dragon sees the knight or the hero, he will be bonded forever to the first face he sees. The underlying story is the first impression counts. So the story you just told about a random and his narrative, his manipulation, the way he did it, he changed the message of course, painted a picture of God and that is not coherent with the God from the Bible. That should be you wanting to ask because it shows how those first impressions really count and how people stick to it maybe for a life and that's problematic. That should be

wanting to us but also an encouragement because we see that's a negative example but we can be a good example in telling the gospel outright, telling it honest, straight and leave the rest to the Holy Spirit. We are just the messengers, we are just the ambassadors really and our job is to express the gospel, express who God is in an honest, outright way and the rest is up to the Holy Spirit and you got. I mentioned my opinion was the second one that there were people who just really didn't believe it. My opinion is usually based on something that I have found in my

research and this really gets interesting when you think about it. I have a lot of Pentecostal friends. After leaving the cult, I have fewer than I had before but I do have Pentecostal friends, some of which were not ever in Prandomism and there's this weird thing in Pentecostalism.

You find the groups that are in favor of this, they believe that Prandom was a true prophet of God but like New Apostolic Reformation, he went astray. They're usually within the Apostolic network of the New Apostolic Reformation. You have the other ones who say, no, this was ridiculous. This man had a levitating boy in his stage act and that's not of God and United Pentecostal church, for example, they would look at this and frown on this. This was ridiculous.

However, when you go back in history and you understand what was going on, Prandom was in a movement He was actually in a cult before any of this happened. The cult was led by the second-in-command of the most notorious domestic terrorist organization in the United States, the Klan.

Led by the Klan, trying to infiltrate the Pentecostal groups in Indiana because they were led by GT Haywood, a black minister, and Haywood had died, but this was a very mixed-race religion, and lo and behold, the second-in-command of the Klan comes to Indiana.

Well, this is happening during the time when all of these various Pentecostal groups were trying to establish a way in which they could organize and create a cohesive unit. So their talks were in place to create basically what became the United Pentecostal Church.

Well, as the UPC is being formed, and they're being formed in St. Louis, one of the Pentecostal historians who has worked with me in the past, he noticed the article of the levitating boy, the biggest advertisement they have.

He says, John, this is held in the key auditorium in St. Louis. Do you realize the significance of this? And I said, no, it's just an auditorium, right? And he said, no, this is the place, if you were Pentecostal, if you were in the UPC, this is where you held all of your conventions, every single one of them.

And then he started going through the names that I'm giving him, and he says, this is a United Pentecostal minister, this is one who was attempting to join, and he's going down through this list, right?

So what this tells me, yes, they didn't accept Brannum, but there was a period of time where they did. And there was a period of time when they overlooked this thing that was happening, where there's literally a levitating boy as part of the Christian stage act.

So what I understand from all of this, the men back then, men and women who were part of this movement, just for my own understanding, they did it because they saw the gain for them, for themselves.

They wanted to use Brannum and his movement and his, the Brannum experienced the levitating boy for their own gain, because they wanted access to those groups, yeah, and in the end, those paying believers, right?

So I can't, as a historian, you can't say intent. You don't understand because nobody's alive. I can't go ask them, hey, did you choose Brannum because he's your mascot? But what I can see is that he's part of their biggest showmanship at the Keele Auditorium.

But more to the point, what it tells me is that in that era, people were aware that there is entertainment, it is fake entertainment, it is not of God, but it is attracting the crowds, and they advertise it in that way, it's attracting the crowds.

separated that mentally from the ministry. They would say, yes, this is entertainment. There's no way that this is real. This kid can't levitate. But this kid is leading other children to the gospel. Whether his story is true or not, he's leading people, leading children to the gospel.

Then Brannum comms and he preaches a little sermon, which if you go back and you study those sermons, they're far from the gospel. But they ignored even that so that they could get to the sign wonder miracle, the basically the miracle at the end.

If you can build up the people's faith to a certain climax of faith, then they will believe in the healing and in doing so, they will be healed. Then God moves in the ministry.

So what I'm trying to say in all of this, it wasn't that the levitating boy was the focus. It wasn't that the gospel was the focus. And it wasn't even so much that the miracle was the focus.

It was the atmosphere of excitement that brought them into what they would consider to be a greater faith. In other words, greater faith was the focus. The question that you have to ask, if your greater faith is built on a boy who's pretending to levitate, which we know is not real.

A man, William Brannum, who's claiming that he knows the names and addresses that you write on your prayer cards and you give the usher when you walk in the door, which everybody knows this is not real.

And you go through all of these elements of faults, things that have nothing to do with the gospel. And they all know that all of those aren't real. But in the end, it's the end justifies the means.

It did elevate their faith. So we're going to allow it. We're going to accept it. Because if you can boost their faith, now we can come in and it's like an open field for a minister to harvest.

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 Brannum Historical Research's website, William-Brannum.org.

On the book's page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins, Charles Paisley, Steven Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others with links to the paper, audio, and digital versions of each book.

You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those movements. If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute button at the top.

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When people stay in that environment because they understand faith some kind of struggle you have to go through because in the end there's the reward of, you get rewarded because you were faithful. So like there's a certain amount of faith that you need to have or a certain amount of days that you have to be in the faith and then you will be healed, then you will get the money, then your struggle will end. And again, the first impression

when I encountered God before I was a Christian, I think that was the moment when

yeah, when God gave me the Holy Spirit, let's say like this, it's hard for me to describe, but it was a total normal day. I have read some books. One of those was a book from Paulic Eryu.

He's an esoteric writer. And in one of his biographic stories, he would warn that the Santiago de la Compostela, it's a famous Catholic road, excuse my language there. He was wandering around and meeting in Hermit in the mountains. And they were talking about love.

And they did their classic examples like Filia Agape Eros. In my head, I was doing like a checklist. Eros are okay. I know that concept. Filia are okay. I know this concept. And then they started to describe Agape as a blue ball that encapsulates the world and the people. Everyone is connected.

Painting this huge picture of all encompassing love, all connecting love. And I thought to myself, like doing a little prayer, like God, if you are real, I want to experience that kind of love.

And by that time, I was still a rocker, a jazzer. I was a drug addict. I was a worldly person as much as someone can be. And as the days went by, I went to Dortmund. I lived in Carmen. That's like 60 miles from, not 60 miles, like 20 miles from Dortmund and found. Dortmund is one of the main cities in Western Germany. And I traveled there by train to go for shopping, for some new t-shirts or whatever. And as I went back, I was alone from myself at the train station. And suddenly I can't describe it. It was really like my eyes were open for the first time in my life.

My thoughts were just like God is real. He is real. He sees you. He is there. He hears you and I felt a love. I can't describe until today. But it was so. I was never the same person again after that moment. I immediately stopped taking drugs.

And I mean we were regularly. I was a daily pot smoker like wheat, daily, like other people smoking cigarettes. We were pot smokers taking other chemical drugs like amphibians over the weekends. I never took drugs again since that day. Never, never a single time.

And of course that brought me out of my environment and my circle of friends because the one component that we shared that was most important was of course the drugs. And when I stopped taking drugs I couldn't be part of it anymore. Everyone around me was taking drugs constantly stoned, smoking pot.

I couldn't be there anymore. I couldn't partake anymore. I couldn't do music with them anymore. Yeah. And yeah another interesting part of it is we grew up in Carmen. And at the main center of Carmen there is a big scape, excuse me, but it's a really interesting part of the story.

I have to tell it. When we were like 14, 15, everyone of our teens was known to each other. Like some were your relative close friends, others were a bit more far apart, but everyone knew each other.

We were taking drugs, riding our skateboards, doing breakdance, whatever. That was my childhood there in Carmen. And after a time when we were around 18 or 19 started to work, we grew apart and never saw each other again.

I encountered God when I was around 23 or 24. So by that time I haven't met those guys I grew up with for three or five years. Interestingly, after I encountered God at the train station, I met two guys again, Michael and Dennis.

And both totally apart from another. from each other came to faith, but they were longer in the faith than I, and they brought me into the church, was sadly a charismatic church, but nevertheless, they shared the gospel with me.

I accepted Christ as my king and my savior. I started my journey. Yeah, that's part of my testimony, but here's the point I want to make. The encounter I described to you is hardly ever a part of me sharing the gospel. I've told this story maybe two or three times in my life. It's unexplainable even to me, as I'm explaining it, and it's not the gospel. But I experienced others sharing those stories as the gospel. As the churches in my environment grew, the charismatic churches grew, those churches were filled up with people not searching for God or looking for God,

looking for that relationship to him, wanting to serve him, but it was more like they were coming for the signs and the wonders, the good feeling, the good life in the church, in the community.

And those narratives took over the entire language they were speaking. It wasn't about the gospel anymore. It was about sharing superficial stories of how they experienced God. Today, I was at the shopping mall, and then I was like, God was telling me stuff like that, and that's not the gospel, and that's problematic. So I don't know why, but I was aware of that. And I think I took the right road at a certain point to stick to what I thought were mature, very well-educated Christians. I must have just read the Bible as it is, plain and simple. So that experience was never a part of

my first impression, me telling the gospel because it isn't a gospel. And if we make our personal experience or our own feelings, then the gospel is about us, another about Jesus, and therefore not about God. So I was actually hoping that you went where you did. You and I didn't compare notes before we spoke, but this was a point I wanted to make. There is an experience that people have that is a true experience. There are experiences, many plural, that the movement tries to say our true experiences, and in the grand scheme of things, even if...

They are real. They mean nothing. When you're comparing what you described to a kid levitating, the kid levitating actually means nothing. It's trivial, right? Yeah. Think of the theology that is built because of the false thing. And I use the word false. I'm going to change that word. Think of the theology that's built because of the thing that is questionable.

I'll say it like that. That theology progressed into things and was built upon things such as positive confession. So what is positive confession? It is lying within yourself an actual lie that you're healed when you're not yet healed. And these faith healers would do it. They would say, you must you must believe if you don't believe that thing that you're healed of will come back to you when you go home. So these people will go home sick telling everybody I'm healed. I was in this wonderful meeting. I get healed. And it goes back to the point I tried to make earlier.

It's all about the hype. If you have a if you have a lot of people who say, yes, I went and I was prayed for and I was not healed. Well, then everybody starts to question, wait a minute. He told me I was healed. Am I not healed? And everybody starts to doubt. And it doesn't build this faith that they're trying to promote. And the psychological pressure that grows within the group itself because of the narrative that's above everything, right? Exactly. So you're you're basing a theology which is literally a theology built upon a lie. Yes. Whether you're healed

or not, I'm not even questioning that. My father was healed. My father had his healing in one of these ministries. So he went to be prayed for by William Brannum. He goes home and healed. The family will say that William Brannum healed him. I will say no. If there was a true healing, it came from God. But the problem is that example is exactly what I'm trying to say here.

When you're in that type of environment, when you're trying to focus on a miracle, there's always a human element to that miracle. It was a minister on the platform he healed me. So therefore he must be the one. He must be filled with God. He must have divine power.

And think of the way that this began to spread. You had all of these so-called divine healers. The average person who's sitting in their home, who's suffering, has the same access to God in their home. Then they do right there in all of this meeting, right? So there's not even a need to go in the first place unless you believe that this healer has something that you do not have or some access to God that you do not have. So this created a movement where people were dependent on humans. That dependency, when given to the wrong hands, especially when somebody

has narcissistic personality disorder, or if they have the mind of somebody who wants to be authoritarian over other people. people. Well, now you've opened the door for the wolf center to the sheepfold. So for me, if you have this so-called gospel that's based off of these so-called signs, wonders, miracles, and you're ignoring what the Bible says is the gospel, what happens is you open the door for people who don't even know the gospel to come preach to you.

You were just recently a guest on the Messed Up Church podcast. Let's take those, for example, Joni Takita, Justin Peters, they don't care if they are here. Joni Takita would even say that her accident falling off the horse, being plagiarized for her whole life, was the best thing ever happened to her because that was the only thing that would overcome her pride. How strong is such a statement? And even for me, I'm sorry, a levitating boy or a Bill Johnson with his gold glitter coming from the clouds in his plane that wouldn't have prevented me from taking drugs. I'm a kid from the streets. I needed that miracle.

That isn't to say that everyone meets the same experience. No, not at all. I have three children and my children. I think that's some very important thing I have learned over the years. And again, if you would ask me what are the three most important topics in your 10 to 15 years of Christianity, I would say it's language. It's what's the word for it? Your congregation, finding the right congregation and the difference between

quote unquote, born again, Christians like me who were like pulled out of the deepest darkness. You can't imagine. And Christians like my children growing up in a Christian environment, a loving Christian family, they are struggling with faith and holding on to God is totally different than mine. They don't need that miracle because they are blessed through and through from the very beginning. Their religion is full. They have a loving, loving parents, really loving parents, not pretending just for the kids, right? Stuff like that. That's a blessing already you could say.

And you can even take a historical perspective like the second, third, fifth generation of the Israelites coming out of Egypt, haven't experienced God. They never needed to. They were at asked to hold the line, hold fast to the testimony of their fathers and to God's word.

That was their quest. And that's the same quest for my children. Again, they don't need the same faith experience as I had. I needed that experience because I was deep into darkness. And I needed something that was more than a narrative or a good story.

Exactly. And it creates this false dichotomy, right? So the cults train you in this black or white mindset. It's either true or false to honor off, me or the world. They want you to create a false dichotomy so that they can say that they have the answer the others do not.

And where it ends up with, you see it in the comment feeds. People will just hound me trying to find out, are you cessationist or are you continuous? You must be one or the other.

I have come to the conclusion after all of this. You don't have to. No, there's a middle ground, right? You're creating a false dichotomy. I've come to the conclusion that those two themselves people are starting to worship this.

You are worshiping the God of cessationism or continuism. If you do not believe in miracles, how can you believe the gospels? That's really how this comes down to. But if you try to believe that the miracles are important enough that you will condemn another Christian for, you are in error of Jesus when he says that a false evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign.

That's really where it comes down to for me. So I don't purposefully follow the middle ground, but I see that there is a middle ground. And for me, the entire thing is irrelevant because of exactly what you just said.

Those things aren't important. Like you mentioned the lady that's on the messed up church. I don't, I've not listened to her podcast, but I have the same exact thing happening with me. I'm diabetic.

And if I was in that random cult, my number one priority would be to be healed of this thing. And so my mindset, I remember this, I remember people who went through this. They would go constantly time after time to the altar, can I be healed, can I be healed?

And then they would leave and go home, God has healed me, God has healed me. Many of them would go off of their medications and they would actually get worse. Some of them might die.

I know people who have died. So that false dichotomy, one or the other, on or off, it's totally irrelevant because what's happening in my body has nothing to do with whether or not I've read the gospel and believe the gospel.

But you become so obsessed with it as a human because you're seeking after that sign, you're seeking after that miracle. You should see God. I mean, that's my main drive, my main energy, every single day.

Really, it is not because I am forcing myself to, but because I have no other choice, like I'm doing my own in a dialogue with myself before God, every single day, asking myself into question every single day before God.

Here's an interesting example. However, for the false dilemma between cessationism and the questions are miracles still for today. Most people will think of John McArthur, for example, as a very unloving, harsh person, he doesn't believe in the Holy Spirit, in the wonders, et cetera, et cetera.

The truth is, he did the right thing. His entire preaching was based on the Bible. The first impression, you will always get, no matter which message you are attending to from John McArthur, you will receive the gospel in straight terms from him.

But below that, I would say just for simple terms, just for simple terms, I would call it outward encounter with John McArthur. It goes so much deeper. I had certain group calls with fellow students from the Master Seminary.

And the stories from some of those students, like one Russian guy, one guy from Russia, was able to study at the Master Seminary. And when those guys shared their testimonies on how they were able to study there, I mean the cost, the cost of studying, the cost of living, how they traveled from Russia or from Romania or from China, just to study here there in the US at the Master Seminary, unbelievable, wonderful testimonies of how God provides for those who seek him and his word.

No signs of cessationism there. True authentic human beings who are seeking for God and God will find a way for you to hold fast to that testimony, hold fast to his word. I'm really glad that you brought up John McArthur because I had forgotten this and in what I said previously.

The other thing that this leads to is hero worship. And interestingly, there was a podcast when I mentioned something and I don't recall what, but I mentioned something that John McArthur said, which I believe was true, what he said was true.

I got this instant backlash, you're in the cult following of John McArthur. I don't know if you saw it in the comment feed, they just, they pound you because they think you must have a hero figure in your worship.

That's the way that this cult mentality has trained people to believe. The irony of all of this is, I actually don't like to listen to John MacArthur. When he was alive, I never did.

I have read some of his statements. I've read some of, I've actually listened to a couple of his sermons. I just personally, I wasn't a fan of it. And not because anything that I really strongly disagree he just didn't connect with me like some of the other people did.

So I'm not, I'm not a MacArthur fan at all. But when he says something that's true and it's something that supports what I believe is true, I use it, especially if it's a historical fact because I'm documenting history.

In the same way that I have said things that, I'm certain came, I gave some, an example that Stephen King had written in a book one time. And it doesn't mean that I'm in the cult following of Stephen King or in Stephen King religion.

But if he says something that's true or historically accurate, it's a quote. It's a quote that you can use, all right? So the problem that I see, even the fact that I mentioned Stephen King, you'll find, it'll trust me.

It'll happen in the comments. People are gonna say John is following Stephen King. He's in the Stephen King cult. Reading demonic books. Reading demonic books, which, I will say the 11, 22, 63 greatest book ever.

It is a good book. All of that aside, it creates this mindset of hero worship where you either must like somebody or you must dislike somebody. And I'm not like this. You can't tell me who I must like and you also can't tell me who I must dislike.

I do like Stephen King books. I do like some things John MacArthur said. Do I like everything that Stephen King wrote or said absolutely not? Same with John MacArthur. But the point I'm trying to make is, the focus has been distracted.

They look at these hero figures. If you want to say something is all right or all wrong, why don't you look towards the Bible if you're Christian, that's the Christian book. Stephen King book is not the Christian book.

John MacArthur is not the Christian book. He's a person who is pointing you to it. Read what he's pointing you to. Yeah, that's true. I always, I experience the same, especially about John MacArthur because he's in Germany, he's perceived as some strange kind of hardcore carvenist, like hyper-carvenism and stuff like that, which is untrue.

But because of those superficial views of him, I don't mention him. Yeah, he's a very controversial guy in how people, yeah, he really... Um, uh, mange, a trendy spree from Weizen, um, the, the chair from the wheat, uh, and how people, either like him or dislike him, just because of his personality.

It's funny, John, you mentioned Calvinism. I had a guest on one time who, I guess they were Calvinist. They had, they said some things that really leaned Calvinist and the same exact thing happened.

John must be a Calvinist because he had a Calvinist guest on, on his podcast. Oh, yes. And the funny part is for me, like, I, I actually, there's very few things that I'll say I'm adamantly not, and that's one that I will say I am adamantly not this.

I do not. I, I was in a cult and there are so many similarities between a cult mindset and what I see in Calvinism, not saying that all Calvinists are cult, but I have experienced situations that I can say we're very cultish in a church that promoted Calvinism.

Yeah. Isn't that called guilt by association? Exactly. We call it contact, should contact guilt, like, just, just how you described it. It's so, it's so funny. I mean, it works very often in a political environment, but if you're a, anyway, a Christian, a reader, a somewhat humane person, don't fall for it.

Yeah. Absolutely. Well, this has been incredible fun. And I was, I was hoping that you had a lot to say and apparently you do. So this is a thought that we have some common interest, but I hope the listeners find something useful and hopefully they don't fall into this false dichotomy that we've mentioned.

Because if you're seeking after a sign, you're falling into that error. So thank you so much for doing this. Thank you too. Well, if you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the web.

You can find us at William-Brandom.org and Sanctum Artifact. 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 Auroble.

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