John Robert Stevens

John Robert Stevens was the central figure of "The Walk", a splinter group of the Latter Rain version of William Branham's "Message".  Stevens was an Assemblies of God minister raised by his parents according to the doctrinal teachings of Aimee Semple McPherson,[1]  and a disciple of William Branham.[2] When the Assemblies of God denounced Latter Rain in 1949[3] and the Assemblies began to split, Stevens chose the Latter Rain side of the split.  As a result, he was defrocked in 1951.[4]

Stevens began his career at age 14[5] as a youth evangelist for the Foursquare Church. He was trained in the ministry by his father, William J. Stevens, according to McPherson's Foursquare cult theology.  William Stevens was a graduate of McPherson's LIFE Bible College.[6] In 1946, Stevens moved to Los Angeles and became the pastor of the Lynwood, California Assembly of God Church.[7]  After the Latter Rain Revival broke out, Stevens adopted several key concepts from the movement including restorationism and the very destructive Manifest Sons of God.

A major proponent of this doctrine in the 1950s was John Robert Stevens, a disciple of William Branham. Stevens was the 'apostle' of the Church of the Living Word in Redondo Beach, California. Though discredited by many scandals (which has been the bane and plague of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement throughout its history), the Manifest Sons of God theology has been revived by various Pentecostal 'prophets.'[8]
- David Cloud, Latter Rain and Manifest Sons of God

In 1951, Stevens founded The Living Word Fellowship, the headquarters for his cult of personality collectively called "The Walk."[9] The movement is widely recognized as a destructive cult.[10]  Living Word Fellowship closed in November 2018 after several allegations of sexual misconduct.[11] Lawsuits were filed claiming that underaged girls were sexually abused.[12]

Stevens's theology included attributes of the biblical Elijah account, which was likely a result of Branham's doctrine.  He claimed that "the greatest thing that has come in this generation is the Word of God being preserved on cassettes",[13] a statement familiar to those in the "Message" who purchase recordings of "The Spoken Word" of Branham from "Voice of God Recordings", or the recordings of Kenneth Hagin's "Rhema" (The Spoken Word).  Members of The Walk listen to recorded sermons of Stevens nonstop.

Stevens claimed that like Elijah, he would be lifted from this world to the next. He predicted that his cult of personality would through "convulsive prayer and spiritual intensity" cause him to rise into heaven.

If the word is living, then God is not dead, the Bible is unfinished, and a new day is coming. Stevens predicted that day would be in 1979, when his followers, through convulsive prayer and spiritual intensity, would lift him into heaven and he in turn would leave the gates wide open, granting the faithful 'resurrection life': immortality[14]
- Andrew Marzoni.  I Saw Satan.