Converging Apostasy: Will The NAR Go That Far? - Episode 174 Branham Research
Support the show:
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John and Steve examine the complex historical and theological underpinnings of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) and its ties to earlier religious movements, particularly Christian Identity and the Latter Rain. The hosts discuss the emerging doctrinal themes of the NAR, such as dominion theology and end-time prophecies, questioning their alignment with traditional Christian beliefs. They highlight disturbing elements within the NAR, such as the militarization of theology and the conflation of Christian and non-Christian spiritual ideas, warning that these trends may lead to a false kingdom with a false Christ. The conversation reflects on how the NAR borrows from both New Age and Gnostic teachings, with figures like Jane Leade and Alice Bailey being cited for their influence on modern religious movements.
As the hosts explore these connections, they focus on the alarming parallels between the NAR and occult beliefs. They discuss figures like Aleister Crowley and his influence on religious thinking, and how some NAR leaders are adopting practices and ideologies that align with esoteric and Luciferian thought. The episode also reflects on how deceptive teachings can slowly erode the line between good and evil, leading believers into dangerous territory. By tracing the theological roots and contemporary manifestations of these movements, the hosts provide a critical analysis that seeks to expose their underlying dangers, particularly for Christians who may unknowingly be led astray by these teachings.
00:00 Introduction
02:00 Discussing Apostasy and the New Apostolic Reformation
04:45 Connections between Christian Identity and the NAR
07:30 Military Leaders and Theological Influence in Religious Movements
09:45 Theological Comparisons Between NAR and New Age Beliefs
12:00 Year of Jubilee Theology and Its Implications
15:00 The Role of Jane Leade and Esoteric Teachings in Modern Movements
19:30 Influence of Gnostic Beliefs on Latter Rain and NAR
23:00 The Power of Laying on of Hands in Religious Movements
27:30 Exploring the "Converging Apostasy" and Its Doctrinal Themes
31:00 Universal Salvation and the Reconciliation of Lucifer in Jane Leade's Teachings
34:15 Discussion on Sophia and Lucifer in Religious and Esoteric Thought
38:00 The Influence of UFO Theology and Signs and Wonders
41:00 Ongoing Revelation and the Influence of Esotericists on NAR
44:15 Influence of Satanist and Gnostic Teachings on NAR Ideologies
49:00 The Role of Angels and Spirit Beings in NAR Theology
53:00 Reflecting on the Impact of the Message Cult on Modern NAR Teachings
57:00 Book Announcements and Final Thoughts on Apostasy
The Converging Apostasy:
https://a.co/d/5zZiRRW
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.c
https://www.patreon.com/branham
Available on Spotify, Google, and Apple Podcasts:
https://william-branham.org/podcast
John and Steve examine the complex historical and theological underpinnings of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) and its ties to earlier religious movements, particularly Christian Identity and the Latter Rain. The hosts discuss the emerging doctrinal themes of the NAR, such as dominion theology and end-time prophecies, questioning their alignment with traditional Christian beliefs. They highlight disturbing elements within the NAR, such as the militarization of theology and the conflation of Christian and non-Christian spiritual ideas, warning that these trends may lead to a false kingdom with a false Christ. The conversation reflects on how the NAR borrows from both New Age and Gnostic teachings, with figures like Jane Leade and Alice Bailey being cited for their influence on modern religious movements.
As the hosts explore these connections, they focus on the alarming parallels between the NAR and occult beliefs. They discuss figures like Aleister Crowley and his influence on religious thinking, and how some NAR leaders are adopting practices and ideologies that align with esoteric and Luciferian thought. The episode also reflects on how deceptive teachings can slowly erode the line between good and evil, leading believers into dangerous territory. By tracing the theological roots and contemporary manifestations of these movements, the hosts provide a critical analysis that seeks to expose their underlying dangers, particularly for Christians who may unknowingly be led astray by these teachings.
00:00 Introduction
02:00 Discussing Apostasy and the New Apostolic Reformation
04:45 Connections between Christian Identity and the NAR
07:30 Military Leaders and Theological Influence in Religious Movements
09:45 Theological Comparisons Between NAR and New Age Beliefs
12:00 Year of Jubilee Theology and Its Implications
15:00 The Role of Jane Leade and Esoteric Teachings in Modern Movements
19:30 Influence of Gnostic Beliefs on Latter Rain and NAR
23:00 The Power of Laying on of Hands in Religious Movements
27:30 Exploring the "Converging Apostasy" and Its Doctrinal Themes
31:00 Universal Salvation and the Reconciliation of Lucifer in Jane Leade's Teachings
34:15 Discussion on Sophia and Lucifer in Religious and Esoteric Thought
38:00 The Influence of UFO Theology and Signs and Wonders
41:00 Ongoing Revelation and the Influence of Esotericists on NAR
44:15 Influence of Satanist and Gnostic Teachings on NAR Ideologies
49:00 The Role of Angels and Spirit Beings in NAR Theology
53:00 Reflecting on the Impact of the Message Cult on Modern NAR Teachings
57:00 Book Announcements and Final Thoughts on Apostasy
The Converging Apostasy:
https://a.co/d/5zZiRRW
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.c
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00:00You
00:00:30Welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast. I'm
00:00:37your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research at
00:00:42william-branham.org. And with me I have Steve Montgomery, the author of The Converging Apostasy
00:00:49and A Quick Outline of Hands-On Eschatology, a Matter of Timing and Agency. And together
00:00:55we're discussing the themes of apostasy in the New Apostolic Reformation and its history.
00:01:01Well, Steve, today is an exciting day for me. I finished my editing on my latest book
00:01:08and I received my proof copy of Weaponized Religion from Christian Identity to the NAR.
00:01:16And I've been, as you know, I've been, had all kinds of irons in the fire. So it wasn't
00:01:20until just early this morning I pulled up the notes for this episode and it relates
00:01:26very closely to the content of this book. So it's going to seem like this entire episode
00:01:33is an advertisement for this book. However, it's more actually of an advertisement for
00:01:38your book, which is The Converging Apostasy. So this is where the converging apostasies
00:01:45converge in our books.
00:01:48Yeah, how about that? And congratulations on the book. I know a lot of people will be
00:01:52looking forward to reading that. I will also be looking forward to it. And as always, I
00:01:57think it will spark new discussions, hopefully wake up some folks, open their eyes.
00:02:04It certainly will. As I mentioned right before this episode, it almost reads as though it
00:02:10is a direct response to International House of Prayer. But I started this book long before
00:02:17I even really made all of the connections between IHOP and William Branham, Latter
00:02:23Rain. I was aware of some of it, but nowhere near the depth of information that ties the
00:02:30two together. So as I was proofreading it, my wife and I were starting to see the name
00:02:36pop up everywhere. But definitely Christian identity swayed the movements of everything
00:02:43that has made up the NAR, which you and I have previously discussed. And you gave me
00:02:50the title for this episode right before we started the podcast. And the book, I wish
00:02:55I'd have ended it on that sentence, but will the NAR go this far? It's insane when you
00:03:02think about all of the doctrinal themes that have emerged into the NAR. Because everything
00:03:08that the Bible says that is going to play out in the end of days as it relates to Satan
00:03:15and his demons, we see the NAR is embracing it as though it's a holy thing. So you have
00:03:22to really ask the question, well, which team are they batting for?
00:03:26Yeah, that's right. And I've seen podcasts at other locations where this topic is being
00:03:33brought up quite a bit. And to throw in one of the NAR names, one of the younger generation
00:03:41guys, Lance Walnall, if that's pronouncing him right, seems to really, really be going
00:03:49this way. I saw a podcast recently that I already knew about Michael Flynn having been
00:03:56connections with the NAR. But actually, there's two other generals or retired generals that
00:04:05are directly associated with, I believe, Rick Joyner's spot. I'm not going to say stuff
00:04:12that's incorrect, but I saw something very, very interesting about that. Because when
00:04:18you have the ideas that the NAR has about the end times and the ideas of dominion and
00:04:26eventual purge, you really wouldn't want military leaders to be involved in that kind of stuff.
00:04:33So anyway, yeah, and that is funny, talking about how far things would go and what the
00:04:38Bible has to say, what Jesus said, what his apostles had to say. Every morning I'll get
00:04:44up and other things will come up to be done. But one of the first things I do is I get
00:04:50my Bible and I read at least a chapter. And I pretty much go through the New Testament,
00:04:56start over. I'll read other things, but I'll just keep circulating on that. And the reading
00:05:02I had this morning, ironically, was 2 Corinthians 11. And you know how there's things that it
00:05:12wasn't in the original writing, but a lot of translations of the Bible will put a little
00:05:19caption there for you. And this one says, Paul and the false apostles. So I said, yeah,
00:05:26you know, that's pretty apropos. But John, I think I have to preface some of the information
00:05:34I have here today with this comment. I can say this will probably be the most controversial
00:05:40and speculative podcast that I've ever done with you. It will outline the possibility
00:05:48that the NAR is actually leading to a false kingdom with a false Christ. And so I asked
00:05:58a question like, so I say, could this convergence with New Age goals of reviving the pre-Christian
00:06:07mystery of religions and establishing a world religion under a non-Christian leader referred
00:06:13to as the Christ? Of course, we see that in Alice Bailey and other New Age teachings
00:06:17quite a bit. And similar to the NAR and the latter reign, they put a high premium on making
00:06:27it happen through human efforts. Matter of fact, you can see that very clearly in Alice
00:06:32Bailey's writings. It's not like it's going to happen because we pray hard. It's going
00:06:37to be the work of those who are looking to establish the kingdom here on earth.
00:06:43So I guess you'll get a grin out of this one, having been so associated with William
00:06:48Branham. But the question comes up is, how seriously should we take the New Age author
00:06:54Alice Bailey when she says that the spiritual hierarchy and the reappearance of the Christ
00:07:01will be externalized in 2025? Well, I guess that could be a rabbit hole to go down. But
00:07:08anyway, John, what do you think about stuff like that?
00:07:11You know, I don't go much into the conspiracy theories, but you look at, what is it, Project
00:07:172025? There's all kinds of different weird things that are happening in the world. And
00:07:25you know, even though I don't go down the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories, I do entertain
00:07:30history and trying to look at instances where history repeats itself. And you mentioned
00:07:37it's odd that they're having military figures come in and teach the theology. Well, you
00:07:44go back to the birth of Christian identity. They were bringing in military figures, and
00:07:50they were introducing the Christian identity – actually, it was British Israelism in
00:07:57its inception – but introducing it into the religious world through military leaders.
00:08:02And they had key military figures involved. And in fact, C.A.L. Taughton was in the military,
00:08:09and he was one of the authors of the book called Strategos for Military Strategy. So
00:08:17you see the history repeating itself, and you see the types of things that the religious
00:08:23leaders will do. And I also, you know, I've looked at the Project 2025 – I think that's
00:08:30what it's called – but I've looked at some of the research, but not from the viewpoint
00:08:37of a conspiracy theorist. Instead, I look, well, what are their links between the religious
00:08:42leaders and Christian identity? And then once you find those links, suddenly you're like,
00:08:47oh my gosh, this might come to a reality.
00:08:51Yeah, and that's funny you mention folks that had the military background. I thought
00:08:57– you know, you can probably read too much into this – but I thought it was interesting
00:09:01that one of the central prophets of the latter reign, who was deeply influenced by Jane Leed,
00:09:11a 17th century mystic, Bill Britton, was a Second World War paratrooper, and so more
00:09:20power to him for serving his country. But it could have informed some of his ideas about
00:09:26the Judgment Day, and I don't know, it just strikes me as unusual in a way that you'd
00:09:33have those two currents together.
00:09:36So I ask this question, I say, what is the converging apostasy, and how is it predicted
00:09:41in Scripture? Well, we can pretty much say what it isn't, and this will probably sound
00:09:46similar to NARF. It's not a billion-person harvest of souls, rather than what the Bible
00:09:54says, falling away. It's not the lying signs and wonders, which anybody who's looked into
00:10:02Bethel Church and Bill Johnson would get a big dose of that. Like the biblical passage
00:10:09I was reading this morning, the chapter in 2 Corinthians, it's not these false apostles
00:10:16and prophets, which pretty much means all of those who say that they have been restored
00:10:21to the church today, as in C. Peter Wagner, just list any of the NARF prophets, and you've
00:10:27got that. Also, you've got that from the 1948 Lateran movement. It's also not this false
00:10:36kingdom set up and established through human hands, through human agency, who say that
00:10:44they will be ruling for Christ before his personal return. It's also not a control of
00:10:51the means of buying and selling. We hear about that in the book of Revelation. And for Peter
00:10:58Wagner and for Jane Lede, interestingly, Lede and C. Peter Wagner do talk about this year
00:11:04of jubilee in different languages from each other. And then six, it definitely is not
00:11:12a dictator-like false Christ. But, as I've mentioned in my books, and I think probably
00:11:19to you, John, what happens with that is when you align the end-time order of events, such
00:11:27as the saints being glorified, dominion is taken, ruling and reigning with Christ, and
00:11:34the judgment day, carrying out the written judgments of God as Bill Hammond and others
00:11:39say, then what actually happens is that both the New Age side, or whatever it's being called
00:11:47now, just esoteric thinking, and the Lateran, Gnar-ish sort of stuff, they both end up receiving
00:11:56whomever comes first. So, is the Gnar on the same path of apostasy that Jane Lede and others
00:12:05like Alice Badely have set before us?
00:12:09You know, when you mention the year of jubilee, that's loaded language for me out of the Branham
00:12:14and the Lateran cult that he spearheaded. Starting in, I think it was 1954, he started
00:12:20preaching year of jubilee theology. And considering that he had already embraced the Manifested
00:12:27Sons of God theology, now it becomes a militantly forced year of jubilee. And he was preaching
00:12:34that until 1964, I believe. And, in fact, I've got the quote up. In 1964, he's talking
00:12:42about the year of jubilee means that there will be a gathering together of the people.
00:12:47And he tied that to all different Bible passages. So, what the Lateran created, the Gnar, further
00:12:57used to adopt to their end of days revival scenarios. And they were just literally just
00:13:02copying and plagiarizing this thing from its inception. But the interesting part for
00:13:09me is whenever I see how they have taken the worst parts of what Branham taught and then
00:13:16chose the very worst parts as their core theology, now it becomes an even more militarized version
00:13:23within the Gnar than even what William Branham taught. Although Branham was tied to all of
00:13:29these different, you know, very sinister groups that we've mentioned, he never outright
00:13:34said some of the things that they said in the Gnar today.
00:13:37Dr. Darrell Bock Yeah, that's really amazing. And, again,
00:13:41I've been seeing some podcasts being produced by some other folks that really reflect what
00:13:49you're talking about there, John. So, a question comes up to me is, what does pave the way
00:13:56towards a false kingdom with a false Christ? Since we're talking about, or I'm saying convergence
00:14:02between two sides of the coin here. Well, the path starts as far as I can see with sort
00:14:10of like a multifaceted goddess, who I've mentioned is Sophia in the esoteric world. But it ends
00:14:19up with a whitewashed reframing of the devil as the so-called illuminating savior, called
00:14:26Lucifer, the being of light. So, one of the themes that helps to pave this way is the
00:14:34theme of the multifaceted goddess. That's what I call this idea in my books, is that
00:14:42she functions sort of like a midwife to the devil reborn. Another thing is ongoing revelation,
00:14:50because that definitely produces the mindset and the way of gathering new information outside
00:15:00of Christianity. And so, you can see this clearly from Jane Leed, from all the prophets
00:15:06of the latter reign, especially those that are directly influenced by Jane Leed. You
00:15:11see it with the NAR, obviously, and then esoteric folks like Alice Bailey. There's constantly
00:15:17this new thing, and you know all about that John. Where do you get new things? Well, you
00:15:21don't necessarily get them from the Bible. You get them from this other group that's
00:15:25already found those new things. Then, the third thing I think of is these
00:15:30two streams of convergence of apostasy have the same sources, and apparently point to
00:15:37the way of the same restoration of their version of whatever they're going to call the mystery
00:15:42religion, or maybe just trying to make it more baptizing Christian-like, to say the
00:15:47kingdom of God. But the more direct thing about the mystery religions, you definitely
00:15:54see that through the esotericist Helena Blavatsky and one of her disciples previously mentioned
00:16:04Alice Bailey. But John, you're probably aware that the Wesley Swift had a lot to say about
00:16:10Plato and the mystery religions as being ways that the truths about the race were conveyed
00:16:18and protected. For if Lucifer is presented in the guise of this goddess-like Sophia and
00:16:28not as the malignant Satan or devil of Hollywood, then you get this other thing that's kind
00:16:35of promoting, essentially going down devolution, hopefully not upon, but just sliding down
00:16:44the hill into things that are not going to work out well for Christians and for others.
00:16:50But five, oddly enough, something that really allows this stuff to flow is, it sounds like
00:16:58no big deal when you think about it, but as you see the words fleshed out in the teachings
00:17:03in the New Age, teachings from Jane Leed and some of her disciples, that is the reconciliation
00:17:12of all opposites. You say, oh, okay, that could be man and woman, sure. But whoops,
00:17:19that could mean good and evil. And literally in the teachings of a lot of these folks,
00:17:23it means the reconciliation of Christ and Lucifer. Well, if we think about scripture,
00:17:33not a direct quote, but how can there be a connection between good and evil? It just
00:17:40doesn't happen. It makes what could have been good evil and probably more evil because it's
00:17:46posing as something Christian. So I found something interesting about this
00:17:51in a piece done. This is by Bruce McLennan. It's called Dante and the Félix d'Amour.
00:17:59I have no French, so hopefully I said that close. And he says that the eternal womanhood,
00:18:10this spiritual being, a.k.a. Sophia, will reconcile all these opposites. Hmm, interesting.
00:18:17So this reconciliation of all opposites is spoken of directly by Leed by two of her disciples
00:18:25in the Lateran movement, Larry and Betty Podges, and they're at Shofar Ministries. It's also
00:18:35spoken of by Alice Bailey. This is a real zinger. It's also spoken of by Charles Manson.
00:18:42Not that he was a great theologian, but he made comments about joining Christ and the
00:18:48devil and that he exemplified this better than his disciples. But think of this too.
00:18:54So they were apparently on the right path for him.
00:18:58Then a very strange group out of England during the, you know, you could say the hippie years
00:19:04or the late 60s. That was the Processed Church of the Final Judgment. It was led by Robert
00:19:11de Grimstone and his wife, Mary Ann McLean. So they literally talked about the devil and
00:19:19Christ joining together, and this would be the end times, and this would bring about
00:19:25the judgment. And then, of course, you have it straight up from Alistair Crowley's Gnostic
00:19:32Church, the reconciliation of differences. So, you know, folks, when they think, ooh,
00:19:38you know, Alistair Crowley's got horns coming out of his head, and he's got a red cape and
00:19:44a pitchfork, maybe in some things, because he'd like to dress up oddly, if you ever see
00:19:50pictures of him, John. But he's talking about reconciliation. Oh, you know, somebody who's
00:19:58not in the church, even some folks who are in the church, if they didn't hear the name
00:20:04Alistair Crowley, they would say, yeah, Christ is going to reconcile all things. And so it's
00:20:12just the way it's spoken and the ends to which it points to that makes it bad.
00:20:18Yeah, I'm glad you brought up Alistair Crowley again. I get so many questions about all of
00:20:24these different movements, from Branhamism to the NAR and all of the movements in between.
00:20:31Once you tie Branham to people like Alistair Crowley or the NAR to Luciferian people, the
00:20:39instant question that comes in the mind of somebody who escaped this is that there's
00:20:43this secret cult where they're all wearing black robes and they're all practicing Luciferian
00:20:48seances, or I don't know what they do in these things. But there's this notion that there's
00:20:54a conspiracy that these people are Luciferians who are disguised as Christian ministers and
00:21:01they've created this movement. But it really isn't that black and white. You've got people
00:21:08who – the latter rain movement, you didn't have to have good solid theology. All you
00:21:14had to have was somebody who you could impress, a spiritual prophet or apostle, who was impressed
00:21:21with you enough to lay his hands on you and prophesy, and then boom, you've got a ministry.
00:21:25Well, some of these people who made it into the ministry, they came out of things like
00:21:30this. So they had the ideas of very pagan ideas, but suddenly they married their brand
00:21:38new Christian theology with their pagan backgrounds, and then suddenly they're a minister. And
00:21:44in their mind, their only frame of reference really are these ideas that we're talking
00:21:49about. So it starts to enter their ministry. Then you combine that with people like Jane
00:21:55Leed, who clearly had influences from Gnosticism, et cetera. And then those people, when they
00:22:02make that connection and they see this as a godly move, this Jane Leed and all of its
00:22:07splinter groups, suddenly they're tying their ideas that they gathered from Aleister Crowley
00:22:13and whoever else, they're tying that to the Gnostic themes from Jane Leed. And it creates
00:22:19what you've called the converging apostasy. But for these ministers, they see it as this
00:22:25new divine revelation. And for an entire audience that is trained to look for something
00:22:30new, that was one of the constant themes. You're always looking for something new, never
00:22:36just back to the Bible. Well, they could come up with these things that they heard from
00:22:42their past, such as Aleister Crowley, and then give it a Christian spin, and it's brand
00:22:47new. And suddenly everybody likes it. They're suddenly popular because they've quoted Aleister
00:22:52Crowley. And when you take a step back and you just think about that in and of itself,
00:22:58it's just mind-boggling that so many people adopted this and called it Christianity.
00:23:02Yeah, when you're talking about some of those things, I was writing down a couple of items
00:23:08here. One is that John Robert Stevens, who was considered a latter-rain prophet, he broke
00:23:16off and had his own cult, which we've talked about before. The Church of the Living Word
00:23:22and also The Walk, went by that name. But he actually had a very well-stocked esoteric
00:23:31library. And he said, you see, what happens is the devil counterfeits all this good stuff
00:23:37we get from the esoteric world. Well, lo and behold, he was well-versed in Aleister Crowley
00:23:42and Emmanuel Swedenborg was one of the other folks he really was interested in.
00:23:51So, oh, and you mentioned the laying on of hands, and then just presto, a very simple
00:23:59way that you become a prophet and you're part of this great move. I think it's very interesting,
00:24:07not only this easy into being a great prophet because simply somebody laid hands on you,
00:24:13but I think you may have seen this before, John, where it's like Dr. Bill Hammond. I don't really
00:24:24know where they're getting their doctorate studies, but I think I've heard of doctoral
00:24:32mills. Matter of fact, when I was a fifth grade teacher, I had this kind of spoof to make my
00:24:37kids think, wow, is Mr. Montgomery being serious or is this a joke? I had this very original,
00:24:43authentic looking document that said I had a degree in redneck studies. And so, I put that
00:24:50up on the wall. Sometimes parents would go, really? Because down here in Texas, you know,
00:24:57that rang a certain way. But yeah, it's like, let's have a doctorate mill where they can pick
00:25:03up all these great commendations. So, something I've heard others talk about quite a bit,
00:25:09but it kind of fits in what we're talking, is when you talk about some kind of horrible
00:25:18converging apostasy where it leads to a false Christ, well, the question comes up, yeah,
00:25:25but how could the whole world, including Christians, knowingly replace their salvation
00:25:31worship of God and then replace that and go to the devil? The easy answer is this process would
00:25:40come incrementally, step by step. So, here's some of the steps I think I've identified.
00:25:46First, if the devil or Satan can be dressed in the bright, shining, beautiful clothing of Lucifer,
00:25:53then it is a step made towards his rebirth, which I call the devil reborn.
00:25:59And next, if Lucifer becomes the fallen Lucifer-like Sophia, which is very pervasive in
00:26:07the esoteric world due to the influence of teachings of the 2nd century Gnostic
00:26:13Valentinus. That's another one. Next, if Christians would, they would need to be shown
00:26:20the balancing effect of introducing a feminine aspect to the triune godhead, because this is more
00:26:29democratically just and fair. Not that we need that in good scripture interpretation,
00:26:35but this is one angle that I've seen happen. Next, if she is introduced as either a reframed
00:26:44or revitalized Mary of the Catholic Church, or as the neo-Gnostic presentation of Sophia goes,
00:26:52then she can be seen as a logical result of following ongoing revelations. And
00:27:00without giving that whole talk, yeah, it's not, this is not speculation on my part. I already
00:27:06have instances of that documented in my book. So, next, if worship of Satan, which sounds so
00:27:14disgusting and far removed from Christians as it should be, but if worship of him becomes
00:27:22worship of Satan becomes worship of Sophia, then the only thing left is to remove any human
00:27:33impediments of the kingdom, meaning folks that don't go along with that and speak out against
00:27:41that and do their best to remain faithful to what Christ told us to hold on to as the gospel
00:27:49once delivered. Now, what about that removal of folks? Well, for the NAR and for their descendants,
00:27:57this could be done as carrying out the written judgments of God, as Bill Hammond and others in
00:28:02NAR say, and as Bill Britton and those folks said back in the latter length.
00:28:08For Alice Bailey's new, quote, world order, it would simply be the cleansing act of a sacred
00:28:15purge. So, in other words, they have both, both of them have the same kind of deal and the same
00:28:21in-time order of events. So, if both of them have this order of events that is aligned,
00:28:32then a sacred purge will prepare the world for the same false kingdom and a false Christ.
00:28:40Why do I say this? It's because their in-time order of events place both of them at the same
00:28:46point in time doing the same things for the same reasons.
00:28:51Darrell Bock You know, in the Branham cults,
00:28:54it wasn't that uncommon to hear a sermon from a minister where he said,
00:28:59God just sometimes likes a good killing. And whenever we left that, you know, looking back,
00:29:07that's clearly wrong, but looking back, we had so many people that I considered them to be good,
00:29:14humble, solid people who really wanted to follow Jesus Christ, but were just in a wrong movement.
00:29:21They were manipulated and indoctrinated. And they would have never, at least I hope,
00:29:27many of the people that I knew would have never taken that out to its extreme as was being
00:29:33proclaimed by the minister. But what really shocked me is whenever I started looking at the
00:29:38NAR that was influenced by this latter rain movement, the ministers are saying many of the
00:29:43same things. In fact, in the book, I've got a few quotes of them, but they're talking about
00:29:48how Jesus likes bloodshed. I think Mike Bickle is the one that I quoted the most. He's saying
00:29:54some very, very, very awful things, but they don't come out and say Jesus likes a good killing
00:30:03because that's, you know, everybody would stand up and leave his auditorium if he did.
00:30:07But he twisted in such a way where he's saying the same exact thing, but with much tamer words.
00:30:14And the problem for me is the way that these men have manipulated the way that the Bible is read
00:30:23in such that they can take a phrase from this book and a phrase from this book and a passage
00:30:28from this other book, marry them all together and make a new story, which is in effect a new Bible.
00:30:34But many of the times they're taking quotes from the Old Testament. And if you look at
00:30:41all of the wars that are described in the Old Testament, and many of them are picking some of
00:30:47those passages as well, well, they can very easily militarize an entire body of people.
00:30:54And after they have already been manipulated to believe God likes a good killing,
00:30:58well, now if they take those passages from war of the Old Testament and, you know,
00:31:05turn an entire group of people into extremists, there is literally no telling how far they will go
00:31:12in their efforts to conquer the kingdom.
00:31:14Dr. Gregory Poland Yeah, John, that's very pertinent what
00:31:16you're saying. And the two names that came to my mind instantly, one was George Houghton,
00:31:22the so-called father and chief apostle of the latter reign at its inception,
00:31:28and Bill Britton. Both of them said pretty much verbatim what you're just talking about.
00:31:34So, this next thing I have here, I don't think I've talked about it on any of our podcasts, but
00:31:43I just put, it goes this far, question mark, and amazingly, the same Jane Lee that has influenced
00:31:49some in the latter reign, and in ours, sometimes secondarily, but still influencing, she set
00:31:56precedence for what she called the ultimate reconciliation of Lucifer, his fallen angels,
00:32:03and all what she calls apostatized souls. She said that the saints above are waiting for a
00:32:11universal restoration to fallen angels and spirits. That's a direct quote from Jane Lee.
00:32:17She called this also a jubilee. And according to her, this will save all. It will include all who
00:32:26have departed from this body. Now, what I put in my book is I say, she most definitely has this sort
00:32:34of thought, which is universal salvation, including spirits. She has this out of one side of her mouth,
00:32:41and the other side of her mouth, she's talking judgment. And so, yeah, I usually think of that
00:32:48as a sacred purge with a caveat, because it's, well, sure, you know, we're going to carry out
00:32:53the judgment, but everybody's going to eventually be saved, even if we have to get rid of them.
00:32:59Maybe they'll have another chance from, you know, maybe they'll descend from the heavilies
00:33:05and come into some bodies that are waiting to be made perfect. And yes,
00:33:10that sounds quite odd, but you get that kind of stuff too. From Manifest Sons of God,
00:33:15teachers like Raul Cronquist, you hear that, and definitely from Jane Lee. So, she implies that
00:33:22those who are to descend will not be the angels of God. They would be, quote, the children of Sophia.
00:33:29And that they are called, she calls them spirits of light. Well, that sounds pretty close to
00:33:34something we hear in the scripture. And she identifies them as folks in the great cloud
00:33:39of witnesses. John, we've talked about that before, and I know Branham had quite a bit to say
00:33:44about that. So, moving straight into the esoteric world, I'm definitely going to not do a good job
00:33:53at this. It's French. L'Assomption de la Femme. Somebody's probably laughing at this moment.
00:34:03But this was a work of the Satanist Eliphas Levy, who greatly influenced Helena Blavatsky,
00:34:12previously mentioned. In this work, he says that there will be a revamping of Mary as Sophia,
00:34:19and he said that this would bring about the redemption of humankind, and it would also
00:34:25redeem and eventually rehabilitate Lucifer. Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal
00:34:33movement started, or how the progression of modern Pentecostalism transitioned through
00:34:38the latter reign, Charismatic and other fringe movements into the New Apostolic Reformation?
00:34:44You can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website,
00:34:49William-Branham.org. On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research of
00:34:55John Collins, Charles Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John MacKinnon, and others,
00:35:01with links to the paper, audio, and digital versions of each book. You can also find
00:35:07resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those movements. If you
00:35:12want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the contribute button at
00:35:18the top. And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that
00:35:23you're listening to or watching. On behalf of William Branham Historical Research, we want to
00:35:28thank you for your support. You know, that's incredible whenever you think that a religion,
00:35:35that everyone who escapes it wonders if it is Luciferian,
00:35:38is based on a religion that thinks they're going to restore Lucifer.
00:35:43Pete Yeah, no kidding, John. It's just,
00:35:46it's beyond ironic, and it's purely evil, of course. So, Valentinus, his version of Sophia,
00:35:55which actually is the version that got passed on to the esoteric world and to Gingley,
00:36:01his version of her and her prideful fall is very consistent with the biblical notion
00:36:08of the prideful fall of Lucifer and his angels. So, hmm, are we really talking about Sophia,
00:36:14or is this supposed to be Lucifer? Okay, here's another work that gets into that angle. It's
00:36:20called the Cosmic Shekinah, so we can figure it's probably coming from a New Age perspective.
00:36:26But Shekinah is also significant through Wesley Swift and other Latter-day Saint teachers.
00:36:33They say that they use Gnostic text to show that this Lucifer-like wife of God
00:36:42becomes the Shekinah as well as the Gnostic Sophia. So, I have these, you know, another word
00:36:49kind of with a lot of implications in the Bible is word legion. So, you have these legions,
00:36:56personalities, or different masks to, I'm this, no, I'm actually this, no, I'm actually this.
00:37:02So, I ask the question, so what to all this? Well, if the Shekinah is the great cloud of witnesses
00:37:11and a collective Sophia, which will be manifested as the sons of God,
00:37:18and if bodily union with them causes, quote, perfection, and if lead Sophia and her so-called
00:37:26spirits of light are a collective Lucifer with his fallen angels, then the union of humanity
00:37:34with Sophia and her children is the thing that brings about perfection. I've also seen
00:37:42in some recent podcasts, and actually, John, a fellow who was looking at one of our podcasts,
00:37:49and you pointed me to him through his phone number, he also is talking around this idea.
00:37:58So, it's not like, John, you and I are dreaming this up. It's surfacing in several spots
00:38:04and has a historical record. There it is. So, who talks like this? Alice Bailey again,
00:38:14Jane Leed, her latter re-disciple, Royal Cronquist, says it very explicitly,
00:38:21and it's more toned down, but it's still implied in other prophets that have been misled by
00:38:29Miss Leed. Wow, did I say that? They all share this spirit infusion as the means of perfection,
00:38:37and it goes straight back to Valentinus.
00:38:39Exactly. The New Age themes in this movement are mind-boggling. Whenever I left, there were
00:38:46so many things. You talk about the Shekinah glory. I almost can't remember a sermon that
00:38:52did not mention this, and they were talking about your body's made � William Branham
00:38:59called it meters � your body's made of light meters, but he was essentially saying that
00:39:03we're bodies of light. We have a Shekinah glory that flows through us. We have a celestial body
00:39:08that we will one day re-inherit. He's literally saying everything that you would hear if you were
00:39:14to open up a book by one of the New Age authors, but what he did was he pepper-sprinkled all of
00:39:21these different quotes from different passages of prophecies in the Bible that were very vague
00:39:30and symbolic, and he would marry one of his quotes about the Shekinah glory or any other New Age
00:39:36theme, he would marry it with some prophet in the Old Testament. So now whenever I hear those
00:39:41phrases, I immediately, through word association, I associate those to the Bible passages, and
00:39:48they're in no way, shape, or form the same, but I have been programmed this way, and even still
00:39:54today I have to work to unravel that mental programming. But then take this a step further.
00:40:00Many of the people, the leaders who are in the NAR, grew up in these types of circles, so they
00:40:06like me heard many of those phrases, and they too associate Bible text with New Age theology,
00:40:13and so they're bringing this new and wonderful thing that is the New Age, and they themselves,
00:40:19because they were indoctrinated very much like I was, they themselves don't even realize that
00:40:24they're doing this. Pete Yeah, well said, John.
00:40:27Something that I've been thinking also, it's really a question,
00:40:34is just how could these sorts of things come really more into the NAR when folks that have
00:40:43read things from the NAR would say, no, they don't really say that. Well, I'm talking about how things
00:40:48may progress, and that's the speculative part of this. So what would allow these things to progress
00:40:54other than the things I laid out? Ongoing revelation may someday allow the NAR to reach
00:41:01back to its Jane Glead-influenced predecessors in the latter reign,
00:41:06and even further back to the esotericism-influenced Lead. So what are some of the revelations that
00:41:13would be available to them if they went back and reached into the garbage pail of dogma?
00:41:21Well, one is just like the esoteric world's Lucifer, Lead Sophia is, according to her,
00:41:31the androgynous queen of all worlds who is, quote, not limited to male or female,
00:41:38but may assume either according to her good pleasure. Now, if you're thinking about deception,
00:41:44this is not something you hear all the time in Christian circles, obviously,
00:41:49but the idea of Lucifer being the being of a thousand masks, even gender, like, you know,
00:41:57it could be this, it could be that, it could be whatever it takes to deceive people.
00:42:02So that's why I kind of harp on Jane Glead and Valentinus's version of Sophia and the way it
00:42:09seems to be cropping into some of Lead's teachings. Lead also destroys the traditional
00:42:16Christian differentiation between good and evil and God and the devil. How does she do this?
00:42:23She asks, quote, how comes evil and sin to be awakened since from God all created beings
00:42:31have proceeded? Ah, I see where she's headed with this one. The answer that she gives is that,
00:42:38quote, the great and mighty God has both of light and darkness in himself,
00:42:45both good and evil, death and life, all bounded together in unity and harmony.
00:42:53Yeah, I don't think so. But that's where a lot of this stuff goes. And actually,
00:42:58I'm trying to remember it. There's a quote from just a regular, if you call him that,
00:43:05philosopher Hegel, which talks about this too. You know, he's got thesis, thesis,
00:43:11antithesis, all that kind of stuff, how ideas progress. And so he says something to the same
00:43:17effect that you can transform good into evil. And he literally calls it the devil through this sort
00:43:28of morphing and changing. So how is the devil reborn, showing up in laddering prophets that
00:43:36were influenced by Lee? Oddly enough, folks like Bill Britton and others, I mentioned him a lot
00:43:43because I think he's influential. They would say that Lucifer was the shining one and only a useful
00:43:50tool in God's hands to perfect the saints. So, whoa, you know, that's like chiseling away at the
00:43:58sharp points on Lucifer and making him smooth, shiny, appealing in some ways, a servant of God,
00:44:06even is where they put it. But amazingly, the totally influenced by Jane Lee laddering prophet
00:44:13J. Preston Eby says this, he says, Lucifer means the light bringer. And he says that Jesus
00:44:22called himself Lucifer. Now, again, don't think so. Can it get worse? I don't know. It depends
00:44:29on what we're talking about. If we go back to the esoteric world, there's a teaching that I found
00:44:35online. It's called the rise of the, but I have to preface this with, excuse me to our listeners,
00:44:44not really ready for prime time. It says the rise of the horror goddess Sophia and Babylon.
00:44:52And in this text, the Lucifer like Sophia, quote, loved her creation so much, that's in caps,
00:45:01that she plunged to earth to bring about a unity between her children on earth and those in the
00:45:07angelic realm. To bring about this unity, Lee said that spirits of light, again, must be incarnated
00:45:16in what she calls bodily vehicles of chosen vessels. She sounds similar to Rick Joyner,
00:45:23when she says that this would bring about, this would allow heaven to be brought down to earth.
00:45:32Pete And there we have the
00:45:34fullness of the latter rain theology. The moment in which the light comes, I look back,
00:45:41you know, I'm fascinated with things, science fiction, and the fact that we believe that the
00:45:46UFOs were angels of light that were coming down to herald the second coming of Christ was just,
00:45:53it's unbelievable that I fell for it. But, you know, that thought, I continue that thought into
00:46:00what I see in the NAR, because in the latter rain and all of the healing revivals prior to it,
00:46:07while the Bible says that an evil and adulterous age looks after signs and wonders,
00:46:13these ministers literally advertise in the newspapers signs, wonders, miracles,
00:46:18and they were attracting the masses to come see it. And so they were looking for something
00:46:24that was new, that was more exciting than the Bible, and that was what was attracting the
00:46:30people. And then whenever they ran out of, you know, fascinating miracles or people who could
00:46:38fall for such a trick that they were doing, they had to come up with new tricks, because
00:46:43the old tricks weren't working, so they invent new ones. Now you bring in all of the new age
00:46:49stuff that can bring it into the movement, because many of the people are uneducated,
00:46:53they're unaware that this is new age. Well, the question that has become forming in my mind
00:47:00recently is, what do they do when they run out of the new age stuff as new and exciting? Where
00:47:05will they go next? Because they have to attract the itching ears, and they've almost, I mean,
00:47:12from start to finish, they've almost covered the entire new age theology in the NAR. What do you
00:47:17pull up next? Yeah, no kidding. Good question. Again, I'm scrambling as you talk in the same
00:47:25old stuff. I thought of a song that I heard when I was a teenager by The Who, the rock band The Who,
00:47:33and it says, it talks about the new boss, same as the old boss. I don't know if, I can't remember
00:47:39the title of that one, but it was used on one of the CSI shows, that theme song. And also something
00:47:48that, John, you'd probably, okay, this is something that makes people discount as, you know, these guys
00:47:56are so wacky, so ridiculous. How could anybody take this seriously? Well, when I think thematically
00:48:04about what you're saying, the good UFOs, and Franklin Hall, and Brandon talking about,
00:48:11oh, there's good UFOs, and there's bad ones too, but let's go for the good ones.
00:48:16I think thematically, and I kind of bring that all together, because there's a great merger
00:48:23in the deep end of the pool, you could say, where it really doesn't matter what you call them,
00:48:29you can say UFOs, angels, spirits of light, whatever. And so I just kind of lumped that
00:48:38together and called it The Great Return, because it goes by many different names.
00:48:43But the idea is essentially the same, higher beings, what a new age, you know,
00:48:48you get the spirit guides, they would fit in this category too.
00:48:52I heard this, where there was some kind of connection between Christian identity,
00:48:58influenced by Swift. And they pretty much said, oh, yeah, they were trying to distinguish themselves
00:49:07from the neo-Nazism of the Nazi Party. And they talked about, okay, you know, let's make this a
00:49:17little bit more appealing. And they said something more like the Great White Brotherhood
00:49:25returning, or Enoch will return. Enoch, yeah, he's in the Bible, so he's going to return and
00:49:33kind of bring the kingdom in. Christ will be there too, but you know, Enoch's very important.
00:49:38So you get all that kind of nonsense. But again, it's sort of wrapped up into
00:49:42a category, which I think of as Angel's question mark. And, you know, go figure,
00:49:48there's like a gazillion different ways that they would express that.
00:49:53And if you're thinking biblically, then again, one of your guests, one of our viewers said
00:49:59something about this. If you're thinking biblically, probably not really UFOs,
00:50:06probably not the Great White Brotherhood, there probably is something else the Bible would refer
00:50:11to if there were any beings that were trying to bring about these ideas. So let that sit in your
00:50:18hat or whatever. So the next question I have here is a couple of questions. What do Satanists
00:50:25actually say about Sophia as the devil reborn, as I put it? How is it similar to any of the
00:50:32ideas and goals of the NAR? Okay. Well, there's a not very pleasant website, but I kind of went
00:50:40there and tried to find out what they had to say. So this is the Satanic Church of Zazel,
00:50:47excuse me, Azazel, there we go, Azazel. They literally say, they're not talking about the
00:50:54devil, they're not talking about all that kind of stuff. Well, they do, but they add in,
00:50:58as one of the other names, they say, Sophia is known in Gnostic text as the serpent of the
00:51:05Garden of Eden, who brought spiritual wisdom to humanity. Okay, so again, this is not the
00:51:12Hollywood version of, you know, you got pentagrams everywhere and people are drinking blood and have
00:51:18long black capes and so on. No, this is a straight up Satanic Church, and they're talking about
00:51:25Sophia, who some people think of as in union with Mother Earth and Gaia and all this kind of stuff,
00:51:32the goddess teachings. Okay, here's another thing that fits this question of mine.
00:51:39Similar to the NARs, Rick Joyner, the Satanist and Theosophist Helena Blavatsky,
00:51:48I can't get that one off my tongue, she said that we must restore paradise to the Earth.
00:51:56So, we must bring heaven down. Rick Joyner makes this very clear. And if you're talking about this
00:52:02great return, what are you really bringing down? If you go back to Jane Leed, what are you bringing
00:52:09down? She literally talks like NAR folks too. She says that the elite, which she gives different
00:52:19names, you know, basically elite Christians, have the power to speed up or slow down the return of
00:52:26the literal Christ, which comes obviously in her mindset after this false Christ and false kingdom.
00:52:35So, that kind of gives me pause to think. So, anyway, in Jane Leed's teachings, there are many
00:52:41references made to an opening of a portal-like womb of Sophia. That's interesting because that
00:52:49seems to sound very much like, again, Aleister Crowley's ideas about creating a channel for the
00:52:56descent of angelic beings. And he calls them all kinds of different stuff, mostly holy guardian
00:53:06angels is one of his phrases for it. And so, again, going back to speculation, a question
00:53:13might be this. Is the NAR on the same road to perdition as these more openly satanic streams
00:53:21of New Age teachings? Darrell Bock
00:53:22You know, out of everything that you've said in this episode, I think the most powerful,
00:53:27for me, is the satanic website. Whenever I first left the Message cult of William Branham
00:53:35and start to understand what is real Christianity, there came the question between the two,
00:53:42you know, where did it come from? Where did the Message come from? Where did all of this weird
00:53:47mystery religion come from? And I started going down paths that led me, as I've mentioned before
00:53:53this, into Gnosticism and trying to understand that. Once you start to study Gnosticism,
00:53:58you understand Sophia, all of this stuff, right? Well, as I followed the trail down to its
00:54:03conclusion, I'd forgotten about it, but I actually came across that same exact website,
00:54:09and the thought suddenly hit me. The original sin in the Garden of Eden, even though
00:54:15Branham and all the Christian identity people tried to twist it into something racist,
00:54:21and it was not, the original sin was simply that they were seeking knowledge, and Satan could come,
00:54:27and it was the tree of knowledge of good and evil. So the original version of Sophia was coming
00:54:34from the bad side of the story in the Garden of Eden. And that was the first website that I, or
00:54:41the first reference at all, that I found a direct link between Sophia and the Garden of Eden.
00:54:48And that began to raise the question for me, well, if the original sin was the entire premise
00:54:54of the religion that I escaped, then does that mean that that was a religion of Satan? And I just
00:55:00asked the question. I'm not going to try to answer it, but you can clearly tell this was not a
00:55:05movement of God. I'll just say it like that. Pete Yeah, John, that's one of my main themes
00:55:11that I use in my writings. I just call it deification based on the big lie, and of course,
00:55:16the big lie would fit what you're saying in the Garden. And you know, the thing about that
00:55:25Satanic group that I'm talking about, the Church of Azazel, I believe that I saw a very cheesy
00:55:35B movie, and it was taking up the name of Azazel. And it seems to me that also in
00:55:47Kabbalah or some mystical Jewish writings, he's considered one of the more powerful demons or
00:55:56something like that. So yeah, you know, you have the very clear comments in Scripture about
00:56:05being transformed into an angel of light to deceive Christians. It's just astounding, though,
00:56:14that people don't really see what it talks about. It's a very hard Scripture to hear,
00:56:23as Jesus said, you know, it's just too hard for you to hear. And as the apostle said,
00:56:28well, where else can we go? You have the words of life. But the idea, I forgot exactly where
00:56:35this is, John, but it says because of their hardened hearts, and they're seeking after
00:56:42miracles, as you said, God would send them a strong delusion that they might believe the lie.
00:56:50And of course, it's not like God is just being really mean unfairly. But I think that passage
00:56:58is being aimed at, if you will, folks who have already had, quote, the itching ears,
00:57:05and they really don't want to hear the gospel, which, you know, we say is once delivered,
00:57:10and in Scripture it says that. And if anybody brings you another gospel, Paul says
00:57:15some pretty hard words about that. So, yeah, there we go, John. Really appreciate all your good work,
00:57:25and I'm looking forward to the book. Sounds like a good one.
00:57:29Pete Well, thank you, Steve. This thought,
00:57:33the itching ears, and God will send them a strong delusion, that single passage really bothered me
00:57:41whenever I left the cult of William Branham because we were taught a very narcissistic
00:57:45version of God, a version of God that, you know, they always talk about the father-child relationship
00:57:53whenever you're talking about religion and God. But this was a father you wouldn't want in the
00:57:59message, very demanding, very much like the ancient Greece and Roman gods. They were
00:58:06narcissistic gods. And that passage plagued me. How could God send them a strong delusion if He
00:58:12so loved the world? But then after I had escaped and after I had taken some time to deprogram,
00:58:18I realized that I was so indoctrinated and so caught up in the itching ears religion that
00:58:28unless something pushed me down to see the depths of how bad it could be, I myself couldn't
00:58:35have just snapped out of it. And many of the people who have escaped and go through the
00:58:38support groups are the same way. They literally had to go to hell and back before they could escape.
00:58:44And so this passage can be read both ways. It can actually be a blessing to be sent a
00:58:50strong delusion so that you can see how bad that delusion could be and finally break free from it.
00:58:56So I'm no theologian, but that's the way I interpret that passage.
00:59:02I like it, John. I think you're hitting it on the head there.
00:59:06Thank you. Well, as I mentioned earlier, the new book is out. I think this podcast might come out
00:59:11before it is published. I've set it for September 1st. So I think this podcast might come out
00:59:17immediately before that. But September 1st, it will be available and there's all kinds of
00:59:23references with direct quotes. So anything that Steve and I have said as it relates to Christian
00:59:29identity, you'll find in this book. But anything with regard to the themes and the theology,
00:59:35get Steve's book, The Converging Apostasy, because it's much thicker than my book,
00:59:41but it's got a lot, a wealth of information. So if you've enjoyed our show and you want more
00:59:47information, you can check us out on the web. You can find us at william-branham.org.
00:59:52For more information about the dark side of the NAR, you can read the book Weaponize Religion,
00:59:58From Christian Identity to the NAR. And for more information about the converging apostasy,
01:00:03read the book, The Converging Apostasy.