Former Southern Baptist Preacher Testimony - Part 5
Here is part 5 of The Way Interview with Jason and Amanda Towe. This is the final one.
I decided to post this as a way to show how the Spirit of God is moving among His people!
If anyone is interested in the documentary you can find more information about that below.
https://www.thewaydoc.com/
▶️ DTube
▶️ IPFS
sir simms50! this guy again? what in the world? haha! I guess you gotta laugh or cry, I choose laugh.
I laugh and then shake my head!
The Way International is a cult that follows a mere man. I could tell right away in their video at their website when they claimed that their leader has knowledge that was lost since the first century.
As with all cults there are allegations of financial mismanagement, a leader who acts like he's God, rampant sexual sin including gang rape and adultery.
http://www.rapidnet.com/~jbeard/bdm/Cults/way.htm
Considerable criticism has focused on the founder. During his lifetime, Wierwille had been elevated to the level of a living legend in the minds of his followers, according to former adherents. Most of the criticism by former Way leaders, however, has been directed at L. Craig Martindale. Wierwille, fighting cancer, installed Martindale as president in 1982. Born in 1948, Martindale had served as youth minister in a Southern Baptist church in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, and had been president of both the local Fellowship of Christian Athletes and Baptist Student Union at the University of Kansas before joining The Way in 1971 (Profile: Rev. L. Craig Martindale, published by The Way, Int'l.). Dissidents have questioned and even rebelled against Martindale's leadership amidst violent turmoil and shocking controversy. Especially troubling to many former members are "widespread reports of rampant adultery and promiscuous sex in The Way, including the highest levels of leadership. One ex-member said the [Way] Corps' resident training was sometimes like a 'bordello,' with promiscuity, adultery, orgies, wife-swapping, and even gang-rape" (Christian Research Journal, Summer 1996, pp. 6-7). [These scandals apparently took their toll -- in April of 2000, Martindale resigned from The Way's board of trustees. Way's vice president, Rosalie Rivenbark, became The Way's new president.]
The Way is also battling charges of rampant homosexuality. In 1994, The Way ended the WOW Ambassador program (Word Over the World) at its annual "Rock of Ages" festival, fearing that nearly 10 percent of that year's applicants were homosexual. [Martindale's restructuring of most of the sect's traditional programs may have been intended in part to deal with this issue. Martindale said, "We have flushed homosexuals and 'homo' fantasizers and sympathizers out of our Way Corps and Staff." One Way staffer reported that by January of 1995, "163 sodomites had been purged, marked and avoided" (Ibid., p. 6).] Later in 1995, The Way began the "The Way Disciples Outreach Group" program to replace the WOWs. The Disciples were to find new recruits for The Way as the WOWs did, but serve only four months instead of the year the WOWs served. But the Trustees now limit the Disciples to only Advanced Class graduates in order to assure that they are more entrenched in Way practices and more answerable to leaders. Amid these and other charges, the loss in followers has been paralleled by a drop in finances, and many former Way members are flocking to break-off organizations (some of which are led by well-known and respected ex-leaders: Christian Educational Service (CES) led by John Lynn; Pacific West Fellowship; Great Lakes Fellowship; and The Way of Great Britain headed by Chris Geer.
Although The Way holds services, commissions missionaries, performs weddings, and other functions associated with churches, technically, The Way does not consider itself to be a religion or a church. -- "The Way International is a biblical research and teaching organization concerned with ... the inherent accuracy of the Word of God ... The Way is not a church, nor is it a denomination or a religious sect of any sort" (This Is The Way, pamphlet). Yet, it has been successful in attracting recruits via a time-tested cult technique known as "love-bombing" -- in The Way's case, the showering of unconditional love and acceptance through its "Twig fellowships."
One of the most damaging aspects of The Way is the ability of its leadership to control many of the thoughts and actions of its followers, using tactics of mind control. This is not strictly speaking "brainwashing" (which uses physical abuse), but is the use of emotionally manipulative tactics to direct a person's attitudes and behavior. The Way also routinely condemns everyone outside the organization of being "possessed by devil spirits." The Way member often tells the children of divorced parents to be wary of, resist, not obey, or avoid the fallen-away parent (the one who has left The Way) to protect themselves from the influence of the parent's devil spirits. The most common and vicious claim is that people are possessed by "homosexual devil spirits."
Anyone who closely views the lives of Way members is amazed and shocked by how every aspect of a follower's life is controlled. Way members are also taught that the President of The Way is "The Man of God" and that they must give allegiance to and obey him in all things, no matter how insignificant, and even if it appears that he is in error. Way members are also told to obey local leadership, especially the "clergy" and "Way Corps" who have graduated from The Way's leadership program. Leadership tells followers whom to date, whom to marry (and not marry), when to separate or divorce, how to spend their time and money, when to sell their house, where to live, when to change jobs, how to discipline their children -- the list goes on and on. In recent years, leaders have told Way members to vacate certain towns and move close to leaders (sometimes hundreds of miles away, as when Way members in Saint Louis were all told to move to Columbia, MO, in 1998) to be under their "protection."
@barncat are you familiar with the Hebrew Roots?
Jesus is The Way, The Truth, The Life.....The documentary is talking about people trying to live "THE WAY" that Jesus did, at least the best that they can!