From Bible Church to NAR: Adriana Watched the Transformation

Hello and welcome to another episode of the William Browns, 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 very special guest, Adriana Lobo-Area, former member of the Charismatic Movement.

Adriana, hope I said it correctly, I have trouble rolling the Rs, but I did try. Maybe if you could tell everybody your name and a little bit about yourself. All right, well, Adriana is my name. I'm Costa Rican, so I was born in Costa Rica, I lived there for a long time and I moved to England about seven to eight years ago and I grew up in the Christian church since all I remember since I was a child, so and I saw these transitions from a very biblical non-charismatic to charismatic church, so that's kind of my story.

Well, I'm interested to unpack that. I was in a, when we left the movement that we escaped, the Brandham movement, I was in a church, a particular one that I could also see that it was going towards that direction. I don't think it ever ended up there, but I was alarmed whenever I was watching things happen that really matched some of the things that I saw in the Pentecostal Charismatic movement that were unhealthy. There were things that they could have matched that were healthy, but they chose to match the unhealthy ones, and so maybe you could tell us what brought

you into the movements and what you started to see. I didn't come into the movement by choice, it just happened. Basically, as I said, I grew up in a Christian church or Christian household, as far as I remember, that church was very biblical, non-charismatic, a bit legalistic if anything, and when there was a new pastor that came, things started to change, it was a younger and newer pastor. I don't recall this very well, this is more like my mom telling me, but I can remember to confirm what she taught me. This new pastor said the bringing guests speakers who

brought these ideas of speaking in tongues and healing, and then he started bringing new music and modern music, and more happiness. music I would say and all of these things like at the beginning some people were a bit opposed to it but most people liked it and they were sent to receive it with open arms and they really like it I guess enjoyed it but the charismatic gifts if I could say that was not practice at such but it was kind of like little by little being shared with the church it happened that several years passed and then people I believe we were being desensitized to it because it wasn't

like an abrupt transition it was very little and I think most people even though they had doubts about it based on the Bible they just felt like it was the norm it was normal and it was the thing to do next like everybody was doing it maybe that's right and we'll do it even though people who studied the Bible at my church perhaps yeah they didn't feel too comfortable about it but they still won they didn't think too much about it because at the end of the day everybody was doing it and the pastor was very charismatic in personality so if he said it was right we just

followed so that's kind of like my my story when I was my upbringing in a sense and eventually that pastor left and then a proper pentacostal pastor was brought to the church and the funny thing is he wasn't very open to crazy stuff he was very biblical and but still the church was already going on that route and especially when something that I'm not sure that happens in the U.S but there is something called inquinders it's called encounters it's a very popular thing and I don't know if you've ever heard of it we do have that here and it's funny because it goes in multiple

directions the pentacostal charismatic movement as I have been studying it there are certain aspects of it that match spiritualism and there there are encounters that are very spiritualist type encounters and then on the other hand we we have heard stories of people who have different types of encounters what specifically are the encounters you're referring to them it's a specific type of like spiritual retreat for a weekend among other things I'm actually studying spiritual warfare and I'm working with Franny Nance we're getting deep into the spiritual warfare stuff and they have all kinds of weird things we I was watching watching video yesterday

Lady said that there was a coven of witches circling around her Airbnb while she was trying to stay there, and that type of mentality just breeds this type of doctrine. Yeah, indeed. So yeah, we, I think we were okay, to some extent, like not still practicing the crazy stuff, but when these encounters came to the church, it was everything went down, I believe, because they just brought this new idea of the spiritual retreat, sober weekend.

They take away everything from you. You can't communicate with anybody while you are doing this retreat for the weekend. And it's incredibly emotional. It's, it's exhausting, emotional. They just bombard you with, you have to forgive and guilt, and they make you, they make you remember all your sins from the past.

And you are incredibly vulnerable on those retreats. And everyone is a target from children to adults, couples, everyone has an encounter, has the choice to go to an encounter. And there's a lot of frenzy and people shout and scream in, and a lot of it is like deliverance as well, people rolling on the floor because they were taking the demons out of them, it's very manipulative.

And then everybody comes back from it, all high for Jesus, high for God, and shout and scream in and, and jump in the church. And I said, notice in like a lot of those people, not the majority or all of them, after a couple of months, they were gone, or they were just not feeling it anymore because it was all feelings, it was all emotions.

And I think that really make it worse in that church because then we started inviting all this spiritual warfare thing and, and all this speaking tongues without interpretations and people interpreting things. I admit, I did have an experience with someone who gave me a word and I have no idea how they knew what I was going through.

So I, I, I'm not here to judge what happened to me, but that was one occasion and in, in that environment. But yeah, it was like, we went from a church that was lights on, hymns, with barely clap, to a church that was like lights off during the worship time and two hours of worship time and songs that were very personal, not about gospel, not about God, but we felt good.

And that's what mattered. And even though we were, that, that's one of the things that I was really surprised because it was a church that really did Bible studies. They really went deep into the Bible.

And yet, they started going into this. And I was really, I was caught up in it, but I've always had a very rational mind and very strong mind it. So I was always kind of like, there is something weird here.

Every time they do an altar call, there's the same people there, what happened to them? Why is it always the same people at the front? So I always had my doubts or out of respect, firstly to my mom and then to the leadership.

I try not to voice it out because, yeah. But I always had my doubts at that point. And then we had to move to a different church and that's when everything was getting worse, even.

You know, I'm trying to picture the Pentecostal minister who comes into that type of environment. I've known a few and still know a few Pentecostal ministers and they're not so much about the feel good songs.

They like the old hymns that are worshiped directly to God. It's not really about emotion or anything like this. I'm trying to picture him coming into a church that has this, how would he react?

What was he like? What did he do whenever he first encountered this? The curious thing is his wife was very into manifesting things like speaking in tongues. But that was the main thing. He was supposed to do it, but he didn't want to have problems with the strong leadership of the church because we were part of what is called the Evangelistic Alliance or a Evangelical Alliance, sorry.

And that Evangelical Alliance was the one, he was part of that too. But the church was in church voting for the pastor. So he is like, he let us know or he let know the leadership that he wasn't okay with that.

But he was like, I don't want problems with you, so I'll let you do it. To some extent, he tried to put some guards like bowling, I think. But still, the leadership at that point was very strong-minded too.

They sort of did it, but it was an extreme. I can only imagine. So after you started to feel this feel good music and you watch the people coming up to the altar calls.

And I remember very clearly what you're describing. I don't know if anybody else has ever seen a Pentecostal style altar call, but everybody goes up front, there's crying, there's weeping, the ministers usually come down, lay hands, and looking back, now that you've said this, it usually is the same crowd of people.

It's always the same people going up. And I'm not laughing because it's funny. I'm laughing because for me, I knew those people, and I knew that as they were going up, some of them...

We're very sincere and those are not the ones I'm laughing at Some of them they were going up just to make a show and if you've ever been in a Pentecostal movement where you have people who Are there to make a show?

It does get kind of funny and they're actually songs written about this type of person I knew this type of person What was your feeling about the people who went up to the altar cost? Do you think they were sincere?

Do you think they were just doing it for show? Yeah, I agree. I think both A lot of people I knew Very close and they I honestly think they were sincere And going that they wanted some sort of freedom or I think that was the Psychotherapy in a sense. That's that's how I saw it. I was was probably around 15 so I I wasn't fully mature but I had some grasp of That and I just thought why is it always the same people is it like they have a lot of problems emotional problems. I knew that

Especially the youngest ones. I think they were doing it for show some of them but Usually women Went to the altar called to them. Well, we call ministered as basically is not it's not about becoming a Christian is about Feeling something some sort of peace or Deliverance so I think there was a little bit of both knowing the people I knew but Yeah, it was it wasn't next so you started to see the altar call us people were starting to Get very emotional in church, which that would have been a significant change. What did you do next? I started to read my Bible

I was I think I was Funnily enough. I went to one of these spiritual retreats that was all crazy But it did work for me. I wasn't coming crazy But it did change something in me. I think I think I was born again there. I don't know Well, I said if I'm a Christian, I should read my Bible and I so read in my Bible like the whole Bible and start finding out that this is not in the Bible and and So asking questions, but

At that point in my life we have to so we have to change to another church Because we have to move to a different public country. So that church stay like that. I think it's still going at the moment. We move to a different church. So We already have this mindset that's what church is and at that point It's funny because when Protestantism came to Costa Rica is a Catholic country or Protestant Protestantism came to Costa Rica There was a lot of opposition a lot of violence and sometimes so majority of the churches were like Presbyterian Baptists, very formal churches, and then suddenly

at that point I would think in like 2010, majority of the Christian evangelical churches were having this sort of the style of service. That's what you were expecting, that's the idea, and it just spread it. Everybody was doing this in counters. Every single church had these dance ministries, which is like very Jewish type of dancing, which is something I haven't seen in other countries really. It's very Latin American. I don't know why, but almost you would see every Latin American service. They have a dance ministry of specialty girls who have this kind of dresses like Hebrew dancing style, and they try to justify all that they're doing with the

Bible, but it's not in the Bible. But for some reason it's very popular, and they mix that with the long worship time, and so that's what you expect from every church. So we move to this other church, which have all this, and more because this church has an apostolic coverage, and me and my mom were like, oh, we don't like my mom and I, we didn't like that idea, but the pastor was good, the sermons were good, and the rest looked the same to us. So I was saying, we inquired about the apostolic coverage, and they said it was nothing, it was just a name, they didn't control the church,

but we said noticing that every time that the so-called apostle came to visit, it was like Jesus was coming to visit the church. It was like, in this, this culture of honor that I've been listened to lately, especially in other cases in the years, that was what I was seeing, and it felt very weird and uncomfortable, but again, out of respect for my mom and respect of the leadership, I didn't say much, but I voiced out my doubts, and I try questioning, but it wasn't that bad at the beginning. I was very busy finishing my uni, so I wasn't there all the time, but it wasn't that

I started noticing when you, when we started coming more often and getting involved in the church, they started like ordering things, like controlling us in a very mild way, like, oh, you have to come to both services and Sundays, because you need to do this and that. Oh, they weren't like forcing us, but it was like expected of us. And then we started noticing there was a circle around a pastor that of these favored people he had, who were very, very loyal to him and his wife, at that point, and there were all these little details.

And it was bearable, I would say, to some extent, because the rest was quite biblical, in a sense. It was the sermons were biblical. The problem came when the pastor just disappeared one day, some five years after that.

And there was a lot of secrecy. The family of the pastor just didn't tell us what happened. Everybody knew he was not around. He was not showing up for like two months, preaching and teaching, and he was nowhere to see.

And the family was just, it's OK, he is fine. And they didn't say anything about what was going on. Until one day the apostle came and he appointed the pastor's wife as the new pastor, just because.

And I respect her, and I appreciate her as another fellow Christian. But to be honest, I do understand now. My understanding is that maybe we are not the best leader church. And but on the other hand, it was like she doesn't have all the, she's not a good preacher, a good leader to be a pastor.

But she had to be because she was the pastor's wife, so she had to be the next pastor. And then you started seeing all the family members getting these positions at the church, and getting away with sin, getting away in a sense, not all of them.

But most of them is like, oh, you just stop coming to church. Or you were like, we saw you doing these, and he wasn't right, but nobody said anything because he was the pastor's brother-in-law, or he was the pastor's wife, or something like that.

And then things just started, this new pastor started going to the US, to the seminars, all this retreats of, that I know now, that are very NAR style. And she started bringing a lot of those things, and the sappy music is that it come in during the sermons.

And I just hated that. It just doesn't, I want to hear the word been preached. But that was the thing. They stopped preaching. They were just appealing to emotions. They were just have this idea, and they tried to use verses to kind of support the idea.

And then they shouted for a now and a half, because it was a lot of shouting, which wasn't before. I didn't understand, why did I need to shout? Why did I need the sappy music in the back?

And now there were two. three hours sessions of worship and no preaching at all. And then I started asking questions. But the answer was, it's okay. We know what we're doing or submit. They didn't mistreat, or they were never quite rude, because they knew who they could be rude with, which people, and who, I would say who they could bully, because that's what it felt at some point.

But then I started asking a little questions because of that. I would have asked questions too. So let's talk a little bit about, you mentioned the spiritual covering, and talking about how controlling that was.

I want to know more because that's something that, as I'm studying this happening in the United States, I'm a little surprised that other countries even put up with it. If somebody comes up and says, hey, I'm going to control you, most people say, no, you're not.

How did that develop? What was that like when I entered your church? I think it was already that it's just magnified after this past the left, because the new female pastor really, as I said, and I respected her as a fellow Christian, but she was pretty insecure, I think, and she needed these accolades around her, in a sense, because that's what it looked like.

The faithful accolades would do absolutely anything for her. And she told them what to do, but it was so weird to see how willing they were. So I, for the rest of the people in the church who were not in that circle, it was very subtle, I would say sometimes.

I remember I came to England to do a master's degree. I went back with a boyfriend, but it was a long distance relationship then. And the only time of the week we have time to talk was on Sundays.

So when I was serving in the PA desk, that day that I was serving, I had to be on both services. But I talked to my leader and I said, well, this is my situation.

I'm still coming to one of the services to serve, but I don't think I can come to the second one because I want to have a chat with my boyfriend. And I actually realized I had that message that I sent to, when I was at that point, he told me that I had to choose between you and God.

So he quite, he made me think that if I didn't choose the church, I was rejecting God. And I remember that message, it made me feel guilty. It made me feel bad. And I said, oh, I can't, how can I not choose?

use God. I say I love God. I should go to both Sunday services. So it was these little things is like, oh, you shouldn't do that. It's like these expectations guilt. It wasn't abusive in a sense, at least not with everybody. I think there was abuse with some people closer to the leaders. Like they literally didn't allow them to go to the party of the grandchild because they have to be there for them. So for some people, there were abuse. But for the rest, I think there was more about very using guilt to convince us that this was the best thing to do.

And if we actually love God, this is what we're supposed to be to be in the church. I mean, I don't know, I know in the US, this is not very common, but in Latin America, especially, you usually have like two or three services during the week on top of the service on Sunday.

And it's like there is expecting you to be on all of them. And if you are not on them, they make you feel like you're not a good Christian. They don't even ask you if you're okay, if you have other responsibilities, if you're working, it's like you should be there.

And they make you feel like you're not a good Christian if you don't do it. And it's those kind of things that were not very, yeah, they felt very controlling. And I think in your podcast with the other with Christianity, he mentioned like this, I can't make decisions unless the leader approves them. I think that happened in some senses. But what surprises me is some of some of those people were actually happy to surrender everything for this person.

It was like an unhealthy love for the leader at the same time. And I just didn't like it. I mean, I did ask questions about it. And they said in noticing I was a bit of a rebel.

But because I was getting married, they just said, oh, good luck. So that's how I left because I got married, not because I had any disagreement. But I started noticing then that this was going in a bad direction, especially in finances. 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. You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those movements. If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute button at the top, and as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening to or watching.

On behalf of William Brannem Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support. Okay, so we've talked about what happened in Costa Rica. The church is being, there's the virus that's spreading through the churches in Costa Rica, according to what you and Christian are telling me.

This is something that I kind of knew. I actually have friends in Costa Rica as well, so I kind of knew this was happening. I don't think Costa Rica is the only place where this is happening.

I think large volumes of people are experiencing this, right? It's all coming from people who are in my history, that as I'm looking through the history that is leading up to the charismatic movement, some of those names are spreading overseas.

When William Brannem spread overseas, along with him came every face that was in that type of movement, and then when he died, they're still coming. So, Kenneth Hagen, for example, the Rayma, he's spreading William Brannem's spoken word, but he's rebranded it as the Rayma, and it's spreading throughout all kinds of churches everywhere.

What happens is, it creates building blocks of theology, and you can't really easily topple them. You look at the one, the doctrine that's the latest one on the top, well, to get to the root of the problem, you have to go deeper, and then you find, well, that doctrine's not quite right.

What's under it? You go deeper and deeper, and in the end, it's the leaning tower of peace, only it's actually getting ready to topple and fall. I think that's what I experienced a lot of that.

My story is a bit different because I wasn't really all in that, but I saw the process of changing of the church that I grew up in, and then moving to these other churches that had another process of even becoming more NAR, if I can say anything, if I can explain it that way, and just quickly, in terms of control and the finances they had, it was crazy, and they wanted to move to the building in front of the church, buy it, because they were renting at that point, and they were just getting money, just collecting money from

the people, but they became very kind of forceful and asking people to get loans for them, because they wanted this great, beautiful building, and I just said, we can't just move the way it is.

We don't need all this money, and I was one of the two people in all the assembly who objected to that in front of everybody and they just looked at me like I was like almost a devil which by the way they just believed that there were witches around the church all the times well so but yeah it was a it was a crazy process and I started hearing all these apostles and prophets and things and I was like what has this but I think my main in confrontational I get to know all this when I move to England and then I meet someone and

this person starts introducing me to all these things what a faith and I are all this the clear and decree and I sort of heard about that before because obviously that was in Costa Rica that point for all these names and all this spiritual warfare and all these courts of heaven things I'd never heard of it but these apostles really into it and especially because he wanted a breakthrough and they were promising a breakthrough to do in all these things and then I go I start going to a charismatic church in England and they practice the gifts

and they think oh you should be speaking in tongues and I tried but I come out because my mom taught me if it is if it's from God is going to happen you don't need to force it so I just follow that advice and choose she is a very wise woman who really stood the Bible and a lot of that is because I learned from her but but yeah she it was this idea that I needed to do this I was very confused but I had this concept in my head already that was kind of like implanted in

me when I was growing up like I think this is Christianity you start like a baby Christian just reading your Bible and singing hymns at church or eventually you start growing in the dark and you start speaking in tongues and that's just what happens in Christianity so I was also like well I already read my Bible a couple of times covered to cover why am I not doing those things I think I'm supposed to so I started getting very open to this and I allowed some people to kind of what they say minister to me and take me to the room in this building they have a heavenly portal

and they believe that they just put some sapi music in there and they prayed in tongues for me and they put their hands on my belly I would be speaking in tongues and being freed from traumas that they come up with because nobody has a perfect childhood. I didn't have a perfect child but I had a loving family.

I still have a loving family and they just made me believe that I had this kind of like terrible childhood because of a couple of things that happened and like I need to be freed from that and and I just I was very skeptical but I just thought you know what I think this is the next stop.

I should be doing these things and this is the next level of Christianity that I'm supposed to be in so I was getting very open to it at that point in my life. So yeah that's kind of like what I I go from a very again very biblical and charismatic to charismatic but still biblical to apostolic to now full on NAR but I wasn't going to an NAR church it was just the influence from outside and and it was it was all in with them but I couldn't there was something in me and I said

that's not in the Bible that's not in the Bible and I kept debating with this person like that's not what the verse mean if you read it in context I had no idea now I'm doing a I'm studying theology at the moment so I'm doing a degree but at that point I had no idea and I still think that's not what the Bible says I just don't understand why am I supposed to do this I just don't feel it and I was always skeptical about it. You said something that actually want to highlight because I don't know that anybody has really said this before and it is

actually true when you're in this type of movement they want to highlight the issues that you had in the past worse they want to continually bring them up so the things that you really really suffered with that you've moved on they will often try to find them they'll ask you what happened in your past and they want to find this I have been in sermons where they're actually calling it out the minister saying remember brother so and so back when you had this thing that you suffered within the past and what it's doing is bringing all of these horrific memories to the surface and

it's making people cry and once they cry the crying start spreading everybody thinks the move of God is there but to the person whose past has just been resurrected they're having to relive all of those memories and it is painful I've watched people just really struggle with this when you leave and you go to a new church it's one of the most freeing things that you don't have to keep looking backwards instead you start looking looking forwards at the future that can be brighter not the past that was less bright and is this idea of performance like you're I was I mentioned

before like I was about Christian if I wasn't going to church three times a week and I didn't have a good excuse to not come like I working something like that. Now it was like I wasn't a good Christian if I wasn't feeling stuff, crying at church, or just feeling very emotional. I'm not particularly emotionally in that sense. I'm very strong-minded and rational, I would think. And I just, if I don't feel it, I don't feel it. I don't force it. But I found myself, and that's what frustrates me about.

This part of my story at times. I found myself pretending, because I was so tired of being in that room for two hours, and these people forcing me to do or feel something, I just pretended. And I wanted to believe that it was true. I really wanted to, because it was tiring to be there, and they just, yeah, just expecting you to, this expectancy, this performance, it goes from one way to the other.

It's very frustrating at that time. And that's one of the reasons why they call it a high-demand group. It is so demanding of you to keep this mentality up. In fact, everything that you've mentioned so far, even the emotions in the songs, not many people think about this, but when you are, when you have heightened emotions, and those emotions are being heightened by something that is outside of you, it's really tiring, because you're having to connect with that thing outside, and your brain is is struggling to think, well, why am I like this? What is happening to my head? And people get into

that, and what happens is, over time, it's weird. You get actually addicted to it. You get addicted to the hype, because all of those endorphins are going through your, through your body, and you start to feel these senses going through you, and people get addicted to it, and then when they leave, the emotion's gone, and they don't know what to do with the absence of the emotion. I'll never forget, whenever I left, I went to a normal casual sermon where they just got up and they said, here's the Bible, we're going to read from the Bible, we're going to talk about this,

and I thought it was the most boring service ever. Where is the emotion in this? And you know, you leave, and you think it's a cold, formal church, but in reality, that's a lot healthier than what they were doing to our heads in the other church. And that's kind of like what happened to me.

I, I guess I said, I was never all in, because I always helped my doubts. I always was skeptical. I was like, yeah, I, I did my toes in the water, and I didn't like the temperatures. I just, they're bad. And eventually, and this is, again, from credential, I have to moving to England, I go to visit my family in Costa Rica, and my mom was listening to a sermon of a random guy from the stain, and...

At that, till that point, I've been majority of the sermons or the preachings I was listening on my own, where from this trend of this area of NAR, from recommended by those people who were introducing me to it and all that.

And suddenly I'm listening to this preacher from my mom was listening to it. He was just preaching the Bible, he was just teaching the Bible. And he was so refreshing, like he's not shouting at me, he's not condemning me, he's not, he's just preaching, if for some reason that sermon convinced me of something, that's just because that's what he was talking about, but not because he was trying to elicit any specific emotion in me.

And I come back to the UK, I was really touched by that, I was just, was this guy, I said, listening to this guy, and the way the algorithm works, so he recommended me other preachers similar to this.

And one thing led to another, and then I ended up finding, I think it was Justin Peters, and then his seminar about the word of faith, and I was like, that was, that's it.

That's why I felt so ostracized, that's because it's not biblical. And finally, I could put a name to all the doubts and all the skepticism I was feeling at that point. I guess to some people leaving or finding that out is just, it destroys them a little bit, but to me was a massive relief because I am a fixer, I think, the kind of person who if something is broken, I need to fix it.

I don't, I don't like to dwell on it. And if I have something painful, I need to know what this, so I can fix it. So to me, being able to put a name on it and to understand why I was feeling so uncomfortable about this all the time was such a big relief.

I went into a state of, all of that, you know, I was very crazy about it. Like I had to shout it out in not the very nice way to people I knew that were injured.

I learned from my mistake, but it was such a relief again because I could, I could now I could do something about it. And what I started doing, I went to study theology, I, I think, watch, I found your channel because I was just researching about all these things.

And just wanted to know what this was because I have people I love in this still. Not just here, but the people from my previous church in Costa Rica, and I just I Want them to to be able to see how Controlling how they high demand that that's not the Christianity from the Bible Christianity from the Bible is a lifestyle and I I I now go because I ended up I was going to a cosmetic church and

I was finding all this out They realize I wasn't feeling comfortable in that church anymore. I do I still have a lot of friends from that church because we're no gangs So we can still be friends and I actually work in that church, but It wasn't comfortable anymore It was I think in a sense it was that traumatizing the effect of I don't I just don't want to hear anyone speaking in tongues anymore I rather not to just I mean I don't think It's wrong if you do it the right way, but I just prefer not to be around that and

The good thing unlike us to recon that's that's one of the things that I find out It's very difficult to find like a non-charismatic or charismatic leaning church They all have this as I said dance ministries and and Outer calls and all these things they they all have that one way or the other is very it's very difficult to find a really good church or A non-charismatic church in all the sense England is the opposite and I think it has to do with the personality of the British people They're not extremely expressive So it's more likely to find a church that is

very formal very as you said boring But my goodness the relief of going to church and not having Anyone shouting at you or screaming or just just I mean that one of the things that I find very shocking when I move to this church is The piano it's on the side and the people who's singing on the side they're not on the sage So to me that was a first in my life because the music was central it became central in In in in my experience a church experience But to have the the music on the side and then you don't think five songs or one after the other because they don't want you to just

Get emotional they want you to sing because it means something and You understand the meaning of the song and to me that was such a great

Time and I'm enjoying it. I do miss a little bit the emotions and the Nice music and all that sometimes But I wouldn't change what I have now and the piece I it's peace. I think that's the word. I have peace I don't have all these demands and all these expectations You know, whenever you talked about leaving and being frustrated and not being able to express the emotions, that's so common when people leave these high demand groups because you're so connected to the emotions that when you leave, you were bottle, you realize you were bottling up other

emotions. You were showing the emotions they wanted you to feel, but all of the others you were suppressing. And it's like, it's like this coiled spring. The moment you leave, that spring is going to bounce. And if somebody's in the way, good lord, it's a mess. I went through the same thing and I wish I could do it over a differently, but to be honest, I don't know how you can do it differently because you were suppressing all of that. If you could go back and give advice to people who are still trapped in that type of movement, where they're towing with the people's emotions,

what advice would you give them? Get out, but it's not the best advice. I said try reading the Bible. Just simple. Without music in the background, without emotions in the background, try just to keep it simple. Read your Bible, find people around you who will help you studying the Bible, and people who are not from that environment. And I guess to me is to not see that people as the enemy, because that's something that I found myself, I was astounding to feel that way, that people who weren't in this emotional state or this mystical, spiritual

movement, they weren't the kind of my enemies. They're not your enemies. And some people worry, some people see that you're becoming controlled by these environments and they want to help, and they're not your enemy. Be open to other points of view, because I think you become so focused into getting that. I just want that. And also, I guess a quick one, because that's what I would say to someone I really know at the moment, I really love, is the honest is all these things that they promised you happening. All these things they told you that if only you go to this

conference, if only you see this preacher, if only you do all these rituals, you will be free. You'll find your breakthrough and it doesn't happen. So it's like reflective on that. And don't see all this as your enemies, because sometimes they really love you and they want the best. Well, that's very good advice. Thank you so much for doing this. Thank you. If you've enjoyed our show and you want more information or to share your story, you can check us out on the web.

You can find us at William-Brandom.org. For more about the Dark Side of the New Apostolic Reformation, you can read Weaponized Religion from Christian Identity to the NAR, Available in Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.

You can find us at William-Brandom.org, Available in Amazon, Kindle, and Audible. You can find us at William-Brandom.org, Available in Amazon, Kindle, and Audible. Available in Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.