February 5, 2025 • 55 mins
Send Me Questions on Attachment
A chance encounter with a mysterious Bible verse in an old Puritan graveyard set the stage for Dr. Paul Cook's spiritual journey, which he shares with us on this episode of the God Attachment Healing Podcast. Raised in a Jewish family in Houston, Dr. Cook embarked on a path marked by questioning, exploration, and ultimately, involvement in a cult. His story takes us from the snowy landscapes of Vermont to a surprising meeting with a carpenter in Texas, offering a deeply personal glimpse into the ways people search for divine connection and meaning in their lives.
Dr. Cook's narrative challenges us to consider the courage it takes to leave behind familiar paths, especially when entangled in the complex dynamics of a cult. We discuss the pivotal moments that led him to question his upbringing and how these experiences shaped his understanding of spirituality and truth-seeking. This episode is an eye-opener for those interested in the intersections of faith, personal transformation, and the human quest for divine connection. Don't miss this compelling discussion, and remember to subscribe and leave a review to support our exploration of diverse spiritual experiences.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
All right, everyone, welcome back to the God
Attachment Healing Podcast.
I've been on a mission here togather a good number of
interviews to discuss thedifferent ways in which people
try to connect with God, andtoday I have Dr Paul Cook, who's
going to to be joining me, andwe are going to be discussing
(00:27):
what it looks like to be part ofa cult and what it looks like
to get out of a cult as well,and Dr Cook has a really great
testimony and story around this.
We're going to answer somereally great questions on the
topic and, again, this alwaysgoes back to how people try to
heal by trying to connect withGod in any way that they can.
(00:47):
So we'll explore some of thattoday and, as always, remember
to subscribe to the podcast.
Leave a review rating.
I thank you guys for tuning in.
I'm glad that you guys haveenjoyed the topics that we've
covered so far, but, yeah, thisis going to be an interesting
one.
This is probably the secondtime that I've addressed the
topic of cult, of being involvedin cults and so on, and, dr
(01:10):
Cook, I'm looking forward tohearing you share and, yeah, so
is the audience.
So, typically, what I like todo is just kind of give you a
couple minutes just to introduceyourself, and then we'll jump
into our topic.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Okay, very good, sam.
Well, I'm very pleased to behere and have you invited me to
speak to your audience and toyou about my experience?
I was raised in Houston inTexas.
At age 18, I went up to thenortheast, to Rhode Island to go
to college in 1967, a long timeago.
(01:46):
And after three semesters Ifound that I just didn't agree
with college and it didn't agreewith me, and I went on a trip
up into the mountains, up intoVermont, and I ended up in a
graveyard in southern Vermont.
It was an old Puritan graveyardand there were gravestones
(02:15):
there that had quotes from theBible on them.
I'm from a Jewish family, so Igrew up not knowing much at all
about Christianity, but one ofthe gravestones.
It had just snowed, it was abeautiful morning.
I'd spent the night in thislittle town of Putney.
One of the gravestones had averse on it which I later
memorized.
It was Behold, I show you amystery.
We shall not all sleep, but weall shall be changed in a moment
(02:37):
, in the twinkling of an eye, atthe last trump, for the trumpet
shall sound and we shall bechanged.
At the time I was 19, uh, I hadthree semesters at school and I
I said to myself, the peoplewho were uh burying this person
believed that there was aresurrection and I'd never
(02:57):
encountered anybody who spoke tome of that before.
And I thought the stone, thegravestone, was actually, in a
way, witnessing to me that therewas such a thing as a
resurrection.
And I told myself I don't wantto be in school.
I want to find out about thetruth about these things.
So I decided that morning thatI would drop out of school.
(03:18):
I had an argument with my momand dad on the phone the next
day when I went back to RhodeIsland.
That's always fun, don't do it.
I said my mind is made up.
So I dropped out and, longstory short, I ended up back in
Houston.
I met a carpenter who at thetime I was reading Gandhi's
(03:41):
autobiography and he didn't eatmeat.
I wasn't eating meat and I wasworking at a job site as a
carpenter's apprentice, and oneof the other carpenters said
well, why?
I told him what I was doing andI was not eating meat.
He said well, you know, jesusate meat and I was interested in
anything to do with Jesus.
I didn't go to church foranything, of course, or pick up
(04:01):
a Bible.
And so I listened to that andwe talked for a while and he
said you know, jesus ate me.
So he said why don't you cometo church with me?
And I said well, I'm Jewish,jews don't go to church.
But he was very persistent andgentle and so I went to church
with him a couple Sundays laterand afterwards he wanted to take
(04:22):
.
I don't remember anything aboutthe sermon, but afterwards he
wanted to take.
I don't remember anything aboutthe sermon, but afterwards he
wanted me to meet the pastor andI didn't want to be impolite.
So he took me up front and thepastor we waited for, everybody
wanted to talk to him.
And after we came up to him andI said I enjoyed being here but
I'm Jewish, and he said just asecond.
And he ran to his office andcame back with a little tract
(04:42):
with the Star of David on it andhe witnessed to me, ran to his
office and came back with alittle track with the Star of
David on it and he witnessed tome with that track.
It was called Four SpiritualLaws.
It's an old track and he saidwould you like to pray and ask
Jesus to be your Savior.
That's too big a decision to dothat right now.
But he said well, you take thisand you think about it.
So I did, and I came to see himon Wednesday, three days later,
(05:04):
and he said well, have youdecided?
I said no, I've got somequestions.
And I asked him some questionsand then on Friday after work I
went again and sometime betweenWednesday and Friday I stopped
resisting believing and I prayedwith Pastor Wall, who went to
be with the Lord just a fewmonths ago.
(05:26):
We've been friends all theseyears and so on August afternoon
, back in 1969, I officiallyreceived the Lord, though I
think I started believing in himeven before I prayed.
And so a few months later hewent to India on a mission trip
(05:46):
and he asked a couple at thechurch to just keep an eye on me
.
I was a new believer and theydid.
And they went to church onDecember 7, 1969.
They said did you read aboutthe hippie Christians camped in
the park?
I said no, it was in the frontpage of the Chronicle.
We're going to go out and visitthem and take them some
blankets.
It was cold at the time inHouston in the winter.
(06:06):
It was December.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
Would you?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
like to have dinner or lunch with us and come out to
the park to meet these people,and I said okay.
So I went home with them andhad lunch and then we drove out
to Bear Creek Park, which isabout 10 miles west of Houston,
and there were about 80, 90people camped out long hair,
hippie looking, Everybody waswearing a little lanyard with a
(06:29):
Bible or Bible quotes.
They were all quoting the Bibleand it looked great to me.
It was so interesting.
I was completely taken bysurprise and I joined them the
next day.
They said don't you know thatthe Bible says in Luke 14 that
you can't be a disciple unlessyou forsake all?
They're taking it out ofcontext, right?
(06:50):
You have to just leave your joband leave everything and come
and follow Jesus, be reallyserious about Christianity.
And I was naive andinexperienced.
He showed me the verse in theBible.
He said look at this, in Acts2.44,.
All that believed were togetherand had all things in common.
See, look, the early Christianswere all living communally.
(07:11):
We are living communally.
Are you living communally now?
I said no.
Well, if you really want to bea serious Christian, you've got
to live communally.
So I went home thinking aboutthe whole thing.
Meanwhile the couple that hadbrought me out were very quiet.
They didn't say much, but Icould tell they had a few
objections.
But I remember the guy saidwell, somebody has to witness to
(07:34):
the people in the skyscrapers.
He had a job in an officebuilding in downtown Houston,
but they didn't.
They didn't.
No red flags went up, but Icould tell they were not that
interested.
But, I was, and the next day Iliterally joined them and I was
with that group for nine years.
But as time went on, thingschanged.
(07:56):
You know the story of if youwant to cook a frog, you don't
throw him immediately into theboiling water.
The water warms up andeventually he's cooked.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
He doesn't even realize he's cooked a little bit
like that way to do it or oneother.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
one other quick anecdote is that an old english
um epic poem by edmund spencercalled the fairy queen, and it's
about knights and ladies anddragons and all that sort of
thing.
And there's a knight who hashis true love and he serves her,
but he runs into an evilmagician who wants to ruin him
(08:32):
and he's served by a witch whouses magic to turn into a
beautiful woman, and so this hemakes him have a dream that
makes his true love, whose nameis Una, it's like one him have a
dream that makes his true love,whose name is Una, it's like
one, seem unfaithful, and thenso he leaves her.
And then he meets Duessa, whichis two, she's two-faced who's?
(08:53):
actually a wicked, evil witchwho's been made into this
beautiful woman and he falls forher and he goes with her,
except one day, accidentally, hehe sees her bathing.
When her clothes are off, hertrue identity is revealed she's
this horribly ugly witch.
I forsook Una that is who Jesusreally was for me and I went
(09:16):
after Duessa, this group thatlooks so beautiful.
But one day, nine years later,he wrote us a letter about
Jonestown, which had justhappened a few weeks before, and
in the letter he always wroteus letters guiding us.
In the letter he defended whathad happened in Jonestown.
He said that they had beenpersecuted and they took the
(09:36):
only way out mass suicide.
And when I heard that for thefirst time this beautiful duessa
, I saw her naked, so to speak Isaw there was something ugly.
I couldn't buy that that thepeople at Jonestown had done
something that was okay, it washorrible.
They'd been exploited andcoerced and in some way murdered
(09:59):
by Jim Jones, their leader,though they had been persuaded
it was a holy suicide and allthat and so.
But then our leader wrote ussaying go home and show your
parents we're not like Jonestown, that you're free to come and
go.
And so I wrote my parents andthey sent me.
I said send me a round tripticket.
And they did, even though we'dhad all kinds of going.
(10:21):
We had all kinds of argumentsbecause they didn't want me to
be in the cult.
We've had all kinds ofarguments because they didn't
want me to be in the cult.
But they sent me the money fora round-trip ticket and about
early January of 1979, I'd beenin for nine years and 26 days I
flew home to Houston fromSantiago, chile, and I wasn't
sure what was what.
I was still very confused, butsomewhere deep inside I realized
(10:45):
that I might not be going back.
And sure enough, I didn't goback.
But it took me I think I was infor nine years.
It took me just as long to sortof come out of it, to sort of
realize that I'd been in a cult.
I mean, I didn't Cults did nothave a?
sign out front saying you arenow joining a cult.
(11:06):
The leader does not have alittle thing on his forehead.
It says I am a cult leader or Iam a sheep.
I'm a wolf in sheep's disguise.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
There's no sign that says that yeah, but I don't even
describe themselves as a culteither, right, I mean, it's they
.
They would say what?
What?
Their church or their gatheringof people?
What do they describe it as?
Speaker 2 (11:25):
Well, it was called the Children of God.
Okay.
And we lived in little communes.
Well, first there was only 80or 90 of us, but we began to
grow.
We had some good publicity.
Nbc came out.
This was their first Tuesdayshow.
Every first Tuesday of everymonth they had this national
(11:45):
television news documentary andthey came out to see us.
We were camp.
We find a sort of a ranch inWest Texas and they publicized
what we were doing and how kidswere joining and before long and
they were not 80, they were 500of us.
Oh, wow, and we had anotheroutpost in LA and an outpost in
Kentucky, and before long therewas 1000 of us.
When I left there were over8,000 people in the group.
(12:06):
So it grew.
But then my parents were almostimmediately suspicious and my
behavior towards them changed.
The group told me that againthere was so much misquotation
of Scripture.
They used Matthew 10, 36,.
A man's foe shall be they ofhis own household.
(12:29):
He that loves father or mothermore than me is not worthy of me
.
And so the group almost seemedto invite you to make that come
true.
You know, make your parents.
I mean it is true, but youdon't need to go about making
your parents into your enemies.
If they're going to oppose you,they will, you don't have to be
(12:50):
mean to them.
So my father actually began agroup called Free Cog Free Our
Children from the Children ofGod.
After I'd been in for about, hecame out to visit us in our
commune in West Texas and I wasvery upset that he'd come.
And I met him in our visitor'sroom out there at the ranch and
(13:12):
I said, dad, I want you to geton your knees.
This is my Jewish father.
Get on your knees and ask Jesusto be your Savior.
You don't do that.
You know, if you witness tosomebody, that's not how you do
it, but because the truth isthat I didn't really.
What I wanted to do was proveto him who I was I wasn't that
interested in him being saved.
(13:33):
uh, I was a selfish, stupid kid,uh.
And there was one of the othermembers of the group in the same
room, one of the leaders, and Iwanted to impress that leader
with what a true guy I was sure.
So my father, instead of sayingI'm done with you, he said I
don't know what's going on withyou, but I don't like it and I'm
going to fight it.
And he left and before longhe'd started this group.
(13:54):
He was more of a Christian thatday than I was, in that he was
gentle and patient andreasonable, and I was being
extreme and un, unkind andunloving, even though, of course
, he didn't know the Lord.
So they fought the children ofGod.
(14:19):
My dad spent a lot of money andtime.
Finally he quit.
He quit doing that because thegroup hired a lawyer and sued my
father and three other leadersfor a million bucks Wow.
But after a couple of years thegroup realized that they didn't
have a case and they droppedthe case.
But my father in the meantimehad to fight them.
He had to, you know, deal withthat.
And he got discouraged.
He said if you want to be withthem, do it, but I don't
(14:42):
understand why, you know he said.
He said if ignorance is bliss,you must be so happy.
That's what he said.
He said, and he reminded me ofthe guy in Mad Magazine, alfred
E Newman.
He said what me worry.
He said why don't you think foryourself?
Don't you see what you're doingIn the long run?
He was right.
(15:02):
I wasn't thinking for myself.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Now let me ask you, dr Cook, I mean that's really
interesting, just the wholebackstory there, because it is
scary to think that they reallygo through this for nine years
and not realize what was goingon.
And one of the things thatpiques my interest about what
you're sharing is that there hadto be and then, especially
growing up in a Jewish home,there had to be some view that
(15:29):
you had of God prior to joiningthis cult.
I wonder, did that change foryou at all?
I know they were misquotingpassages.
I know that that shapes the waythat you think about God as
well.
So I wonder did your view ofGod shift from the way you view
God before joining the cult andthen afterwards?
And what was that shift like,if anything?
Speaker 2 (15:51):
The only way that the group would have worked that it
did work is that it makes thegroup doctrinally, when I first
met them was right off.
They had the doctrine right andthere was great love between
them, the people.
There was a lot of camaraderie,which was so attractive,
whereas the church I was goingto was a solid church.
They were a gospel-believingchurch.
(16:11):
The pastor was a nice guy, butthey had their other lives
People.
They were not as seeminglycommitted as this group was and
my view of God didn't change,but my view about how committed
I was to him changed when I metthe group.
I was embarrassed that I wasn'tas committed as they were.
(16:34):
They said you want to forsakeall.
How much have you Now?
I realize, forsaking all meansit's a daily thing.
It's not something you do onceand you sell your stuff and you
get rid of your extra stuff andyou contribute your money to
charity and you go off.
No, it's daily.
You say no to that old nature.
That's selfish.
It's a much longer.
(16:55):
It's not a one-time thing.
Sure.
My view of God didn't change,but my understanding of what it
meant to serve him changed.
Of God didn't change, but myunderstanding of what it meant
to serve him changed.
And then it changed again,slowly, because then the group,
after a few years, the leader,began revealing his heart.
And there were things in hisheart that were not good.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
You know, a thing that comes to mind about this is
there are people who are driven, sometimes emotionally, to join
a church, a group, somethinglike that, right, so when you
say that your view of God didn'tchange, did your experience of
God or did you feel closer toGod after joining the cult?
(17:42):
And just, I guess, just for ouraudience too, can you define
just quickly what a cult is andthen dive into that?
Speaker 2 (17:48):
Well, a cult is a very easy, easy thing to
describe and it's a verycomplicated thing the easy
description is that his sonjoined a cult and disappeared.
You know, um, a cult, it has twoingredients it has a leader,
who?
Who is in some way disguised inother words, you can't tell who
he really is and it also hasfollowers who want to be led.
(18:11):
Yeah, in other words, you can'ttell who he really is, and it
also has followers who want tobe led.
In other words, a cult will notwork unless you've got people
who are really looking forsomeone to show them the way,
and so you put those together.
You know, pt Barnum said, orsupposed to have said, there's a
sucker born every minute.
Well, in a way, people are.
(18:33):
You know, he's like.
Well, that couldn't happen tome, I couldn't be.
Well, it could.
If you're in a place in yourlife where, all of a sudden, the
rug is pulled out from you.
You've just been rejected byyour girlfriend, you've just
gone through a divorce, you'vejust lost your job or who knows
what happened.
You can be in a certain placein your life and suddenly you're
vulnerable and along come thesepeople who show such interest
(18:55):
in you and are so encouraging toyou and say, ah, but once
you're in, then there are allkinds of ways to keep you in.
But then later on thosewonderful things may fade a
little bit and other things areintroduced.
Things may fade a little bitand other things are introduced.
One of the great signs of acult is a misuse of human
(19:17):
sexuality.
You give somebody too muchpower and he's got a lot of
followers and they have aweakness.
Along that line it'll come out,and that's what happened in my
group.
I mean it happens in.
I mean you see it in theCatholic Church, you see it in
leading Protestant conservativechurches.
You can read Proverbs 6 and 7and 5.
(19:40):
You see all those warningsabout not being led astray by
your physical desires, becauseit's easy to do if you're not
sticking close to the Lord, youcan get stripped up.
Well, our leader apparently hadhad that issue for long before
he started the group, but it washidden, except from some of his
(20:01):
closest advisors.
He began revealing to them thatChristians are this is
antinomianism In other words,free from the law.
If you're a believer in Christ,you're free from the law, which
is not true.
You're not justified byfollowing the law.
You're justified by God's graceas a redeemed sinner, but
(20:21):
you're saved, so that then youcan follow the law.
Jesus turns up the heat and theSpermion on the Mount.
He says not only what you do,but what you think.
If you even look at a woman andlust after her, you're guilty
of adultery.
That's just.
The thinking is a sin.
So we're not told to forget thelaw, but we're told to live it.
We can only do it by God'sgrace and his forgiveness when
(20:44):
we fall, but in the children ofGod.
We were beginning around threeor four years after I was in our
leader.
His name was David Berg, but headopted a Bible named Moses
David.
We called him Mo and Mo beganto tell us that we were free
from the law, that everygeneration of believers has been
(21:04):
more free and we're in the lastgeneration.
This is the end time and we arefinally.
God can trust us with thisfreedom and as long as you're
done and do it in love, you cando anything.
Well, that's not what the NewTestament says, but we took his
interpretation.
You know the New Testament saysflee fornication.
I mean the Old Testament.
Look at Joseph with Potiphar'swife.
(21:26):
When she started to, you knowshe liked this handsome young
man and he ran away from herbecause he said I can't do that
to my master.
So the Bible makes it veryplain.
(21:47):
But you get somebody who youbegin to trust teaches you the
wrong way, then you can beseduced into the wrong way, and
that began to be more and morethe case.
That began to be more and morethe case, and so my view of God
didn't change, but my view ofwhat I was doing for him.
I suddenly realized there'ssomething wrong here.
It took me a long time torealize it.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Did you ever have like little inklings or feelings
about it, Like oh, something'soff?
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Yeah, many, many times.
But we learned in the groupthat doubts were sins, doubts-
about the group times.
But we learned in the group thatdoubts were sins, doubts about
the group, and so you learn topush them down and hide them and
not let them rule you.
And I was pretty good aboutwith that until this.
The thing that finally, as I'vesaid before, jonestown really
(22:26):
freaked me out.
But when I first heard about itI said I said well, we're not
like that.
Even though they called theirleader dad, the children of god
called mo dad.
I said we're not like that.
Then, a month afterwards, hewrote us this letter justifying
what jones had done with hispeople and for the first time I
looked at him like oh, you know,it's like a little in the movie
(22:50):
Wizard of Oz, when the littledog Toto pulls the curtain
behind and there's a guy runningand he
Speaker 3 (22:56):
says in the microphone pay no attention to
the man behind the curtain, butI saw him for the first time
there was this guy and Mo was alittle guy, you know, he was
only five foot six.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
But I suddenly thought am I being taken for a
ride?
But I've been in it so long itwas hard for me to really
believe that.
Took me a long time to finallyrealize I sure was taken for a
ride wow, that's crazy, sir.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
I, I and I, I know that.
I mean you hit it on the nailwhen you said, um, when you hit
a very dark spot in your life,like everyone is vulnerable to
bad teaching or just any typebeing involved with the wrong
people, and yeah, that's reallywhat we find.
I mean, this whole concept ofGod attachment is really an
exploration of that is that,when people hit rock bottom or
(23:49):
they hit a very difficultsituation, is that they start
searching for what's gonna keepme afloat, whether it be money,
whether it be vices, sex,whatever power, and at some
point, for those who arebelievers, they're like God is
are you really here?
And they hit these dark andthey'll choose anything that
gives them a semblance of whatthat could be.
(24:10):
And it seems like the peoplewho joined cults are in that
stage, like they went throughsomething difficult and they
find this community that'saccepting them, that's giving
them teaching, mentoring them,and that's appealing for a lot
of people.
Yes, yeah, so.
So, as you were going throughthat, you mentioned that a lot
(24:30):
of the stuff that they weredoing was kind of this
brainwashing and thought control, right?
What did that look like?
Were there any specificmessages that were told to you,
because I imagine the first oneof the passages that came to
mind was Acts 17, 11, when it'sdiscussed about right and the
Bereans studied the word day andnight to make sure that what
(24:50):
Paul was saying was true.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
So I'm guessing, and you correct me if I'm wrong that
cult leaders typically do notask you to read the Bible for
yourself.
You're so right, in fact, whenI've been in the group for about
a year and two of the leaders Iwas in LA in our house in
downtown LA.
About 70 of us were there.
It was Christmas time and theleader's daughter and her
husband had met a guy namedRichard Wurmbrand, who was a
(25:22):
Jewish guy who became aChristian in Romania and was a
pastor.
The communist authoritiesarrested him and put him in
prison for 14 years for being aChristian and the Norwegian
Lutheran Church ransomed him.
They paid the Romaniangovernment communist government
$15,000, and he was ransomed,came to America, he testified
(25:44):
before the US Congress aboutpersecution of Christians behind
the Iron Curtain and then hesettled in LA and he wrote a
book called Tortured for Christabout how he didn't give in, how
the communists.
Really, if you stand your ground, some of them can even be
converted.
And he talked about how thathappened.
(26:04):
So the leader of the LA communeand his wife, which was Mo's
daughter, bought 100 copies.
We all had a stocking forChristmas.
We all got an orange and anapple and a copy of Tortured for
Christ.
And Mo, her father, found outabout it and he said don't read
(26:27):
anything but my stuff.
Nobody else has the proof thatthey're the true church for the
end time, except us.
Why are you wasting your timereading Richard Wurmbrand or
anybody else?
Just read your Bible and readmy letters and I'll tell you.
And so reading outside of thatwas banned.
And I said well, mo's, ourleader, he's right, right.
(26:49):
And so I.
For many years I didn't readanything.
And and so, and if you, if youhad a thought?
this is what thought control andyou learned that that one of
the one of the leaders had asaying.
He said if you think, think,think, you'll sink, sink, sink,
because you stink, stink, stink.
(27:10):
In other words, you can't trustyour own thought.
Now the big leader, moe, saiddon't say that, don't use that
saying.
It doesn't sound right.
It's not that he didn't believeit, it was too honest, right
right.
You're not supposed to thinkfor yourself, because you'll go
off the wrong way.
You can't trust yourself.
But you can trust us.
Just follow us so that's how itworked and you learn to casting
(27:34):
down.
You know misuse of 2Corinthians, 10 and 5, casting
down imaginations and everythought that exalts itself
against the knowledge of God.
And bring into obedience everythought, bring into captivity
every thought misappropriatingScripture.
To keep or how?
About this.
It was said that God chose.
Moses to lead the children ofIsrael, misappropriating
scripture to keep, or how aboutthis?
It was said that God choseMoses to lead the children of
(27:56):
Israel, and when they murmuredagainst Moses, they complained
against Moses.
They weren't really complainingagainst Moses, they were
complaining against God, right,so okay, so now we have a Moses,
moses David, our leader, and ifyou murmur against what's going
on, you're not murmuringagainst Moses David, no, you're
(28:17):
murmuring against God, who chosehim to lead us.
So you see how you paintyourself into a corner and you
can't think.
You're not allowed to thinkoutside the box.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
It's a lose-lose.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, there's a word that's used in cult studies, now
called bounded thinking.
You, you create boundaries andyou can't get outside you're,
you're stuck and the only thingthat can uh free you is if
somebody comes in and breaksthose boundaries.
Um and uh there's another storythat goes with that After I
(28:52):
left the group it was maybe 20years ago.
I left the group in 1979.
That was what is that?
50 years ago?
40 years ago a long time ago 45years ago, something like that,
about 20 years ago I read JohnBunyan's Pilgrim's Progress for
the first time.
Yeah, and in Pilgrim's Progressfor the first time.
(29:14):
Yeah, and in Pilgrim's Progresshe and his friend Hopeful are a
little bit lost.
And they come to a crossroadsand they don't know which way to
turn.
And suddenly this guy appearswearing a white robe and says
I'm going to the heavenly citytoo.
And he said oh really, we aretoo.
He said, well, follow me.
I said okay, and they do.
(29:35):
And it turns out this guy is afalse teacher, he's called the
flatterer and he's in adirection in which they're going
exactly the opposite direction,away from the heavenly city.
And then he leads them to a netand they're caught in a net and
they're trapped and then heruns away.
He leaves them trapped in thenet and they could have easily
(29:56):
died there.
But the story says along camethe shining one who's the Lord
and he cuts them out of the netand they can follow the truth
again.
So if you're looking for theright way and you get a little
lost, somebody can come alongand say I'll show you the way.
And he may be dressed in white,he may look like he's your
champion and your friend, but hecan lead you into a net and
(30:20):
you'll be caught there.
And so this is what happenedthe the group used flattery said
you god has really blessed youthat you have all the people in
the world who could have runinto us.
You were chosen, you, you, youwere chosen to be part of this
group.
That has the full truth.
(30:40):
Nobody else does.
You're special, um, you'regod's green berets, and so by
telling you stories like that sobrainwashing doesn't
necessarily look ugly it can bea way of making you think you're
something special when reallyyou're just a saved sinner.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
That's your point about them being at the lowest
point of their lives.
That's a good esteem boost forthem and it makes them feel that
more accepted and part of thegroup too.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Yeah, and they were believers I mean hopeful and
Christian are on the way and, asyou know, when you reach
Pilgrim's Progress, they runinto all these things that are
trying to stop them to gettingthere.
And so, when you become aChristian, you don't stop having
battles.
In fact, you really starthaving them because you're going
against the way of the world.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Yeah.
So, yeah, that's true, sir.
You know there's a lot of talkin modern day about either mega
church pastors or cultishleaders.
One of the words that's beingused for them often is
narcissist, right, and you knowsome characteristics of a
narcissist could be dominant,very charismatic, friendly, good
(31:56):
stage presence, all thosethings right, and they're
characteristics.
So just being careful with notusing, because a lot of people
do this.
They say, oh, he hasnarcissistic personality
disorder.
That's different than havingnarcissistic characteristics or
qualities.
So I'm curious, as you talkedabout some of the
characteristics of a cult leader, did you find that to be a
(32:17):
pretty common thing among cultsduring that time where you know
typically they're verycharismatic, they're they're
friendly people, they can speakvery well, very articulate and
so on?
Um, and they just have thismessage again, this kind of
authoritative or authoritariantype of approach to leading.
Did you find that?
What are some characteristicsof co-leaders, so that the
audience can know what thatcould look like?
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Well, I would say, the word I would use first is
charming.
And not in a positive way.
But charming, you have a, youknow if you remember seeing the
Music man with Robert Preston,you know he goes to a town and
he gets everybody to believethat he can teach them to play a
(33:02):
musical instrument using thethink method.
Just think you can play thatinstrument.
And he gets everybody tobelieve that.
And he sells them, all theseinstruments.
And then he collects the moneyand says the main instruments
will be coming soon and then heskips down with all the money.
But he's so charming that theywillingly give him the money,
believing the story that whenthe instruments come they'll
(33:24):
learn to play just like that,with the think method.
So that's an example ofcharming.
You know, you persuade peoplethat you've got something that
they want or that they may notknow they want it, but you teach
them that you really need thisoh yeah, okay, like salespeople
almost yes, they're a goodsalesman and they're charming.
(33:45):
They can be uh, they know how toread people.
Well, a charming person knowshow to read his audience.
He knows what to say to getthem to believe in him.
Yes, it is in some way.
Of course, a salesman can sella good product, or he can sell a
lemon.
Some of these cars that you getsold are very good cars and you
need someone to help you buy it.
(34:06):
But a lot of salesmen can tellyou well, this is a wonderful
car, but actually it's got someproblems.
They're not telling you aboutso, but if you're charming
enough, you can get people tobuy something like that.
And so a cult leader, in hisway or her way because it can be
a woman too can be charming,though you can push charm too
far and it becomes harsh andpushy, so you have to.
(34:30):
And another thing is that theyuse other people to charm and to
attract.
Our cult began the children ofGod with his adult children who
were his followers, and theywere young and attractive and
friendly, and they won a fewhippies and college dropouts and
veterans.
This is out in California in 68.
(34:51):
And they looked like 60sradicals, except they were
Christians and they attractedpeople to him.
So the cult leader uses hislieutenants, and they can be
pretty girls or handsome guys,nice guys.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Is that intentional?
Do you see it as it being anintentional, like I'm training
these people to do this, or isit more of those who hit that
position because they're closeto him?
They kind of take on that samerole, Cause I usually see that
when you follow a leader, youwant to become like him or her
right.
So was it more of anintentional thing, like I'm
(35:31):
teaching you these thingsexplicitly, or was it more
implicit?
Speaker 2 (35:34):
It was implicit, because the cult leader is not a
pure cynic.
Maybe the guy who foundedScientology said well, I'll
invent this religion, I can makea lot of money.
I don't know what he thought,but I think the leader of our
group or Jones, I think, to acertain extent they believe
their own propaganda.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
I believe our leader really believed he was God's end
time property.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
There must have been times when, because he knew the
Bible fairly well, there musthave been times, on occasion,
when he wondered if, when he wasconvicted, you know of you're
not doing the right thing, butyou know the Bible talks about
you can become hardened,calloused, you know, so that
(36:20):
your conscience no longer feelsconviction.
And so I think that whathappened to Mo was that he had a
lot of good intentions and hereally did believe in what he
was doing, but on certain thingshe knew it was wrong.
(36:41):
He knew that sleeping withgirls early on, because he had
been visiting prostitutes beforehe even started the group he
confessed later on that it wasokay because he was done in love
and so on and so forth.
Well, the bible makes it veryplain that's not good, but he he
said, no, that we're free fromthat.
This is the word antinomianagainst the law.
(37:01):
We're free from the law.
One other thing that comes tomind is I read John Bunyan's
autobiography.
It's called Grace Abounding tothe Chief of Sinners, and in
there he talks about runninginto a guy.
This is around 1650.
(37:21):
You know, we're talking 400,almost 400 years ago.
He ran into a guy who hadbelonged to a group called the
Ranters R-A-N-T-E-R-S and theRanters were also antinomian.
They believed that you could doall kinds of things sexually
and it was okay.
And so his friend joined theRanters and said this is the
(37:42):
truth of Christianity.
And Bunyan said I wasn't sure Iwas a young believer, so I
prayed.
I prayed, lord, I'm a foolishperson, I don't know how to go
in or go out.
If this is of you, show me, andif it's not of you, show me and
keep me, protect me from this.
And I said, oh, that I had hadthe wisdom of a young John
(38:05):
Bunyan when I ran into thechildren of God, because the
first thing he did was truly goto the Lord and say I can't tell
, I'm ignorant, I'm stupid, Idon't know enough to know.
Help me.
And, of course, the answers ofall the questions are in the
scriptures, but you've got tofind them and believe them.
(38:26):
And if you're new in the Lord,who do you trust?
You've got to trust him to helpyou by his Holy Spirit.
And then you know, join a groupof believers, a church in which
you can, you test it out.
Like you know, there was nogreater teacher than Paul.
But, as you said before, theBereans, even though they were
being taught by Paul, went backevery night after hearing from
him and said check the OldTestament to make sure that what
(38:48):
he was saying was right.
So if they had to test Paul,how much should we test our
teachers?
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Absolutely absolutely , that's a great point, sir.
You know, in your book or inone of your talks, you talk
about the cult leader or thephenomenon of the cult leader
and the true believer.
Have you touched on that aswe've been talking, or is that
something you wanted toelaborate on?
Speaker 2 (39:10):
I'll say one thing about that.
I read a book by a guy namedEric Hoffer.
He was a stevedore.
He used to work at the docks inNew York or in California, but
he used all his spare time toread and he was sort of a
people's philosopher and hewrote a book.
His first book was called theTrue Believer.
It was published around 1951.
(39:34):
And he talks about the kind ofpeople who join groups.
He was talking about joining aMarxist group, but it could be
any group and they're lookingfor an escape from what is
ordinary and what makes themfeel ordinary.
They want to be special.
(39:54):
They're so unsure of the valueof their own lives and they're
looking for something that willmake them feel good about
themselves.
A challenge too.
They're looking for a challengein which they can prove
themselves to be a somebody.
And you get this group thatcomes along saying we are
(40:16):
denying the easy way, we'regoing to live hard, difficult
lives because we're living thetruth, and the truth is
challenging and difficult, andso there's an appetite,
especially, I think, among youngmen, for a cause to believe in,
to give yourself to, and that'sthe true believer.
But the trouble is you've gotto find a cause that's worthy of
(40:36):
that, and a lot of causes sellthemselves as that but they're
not really.
They don't live up to theirpromise, and I think, to some
extent, this is what.
Well, I think in a way, thechurch needs to be seen as that
(41:01):
calling, that high calling.
And if you are running intoother believers who just seem
it's an adjunct to their lives,it's not the main thing, it
doesn't make you feel excited.
So you want to run into peoplewho believe the life of Christ,
the following Christ being adisciple is really important,
it's the center of their lives,and if you can find that, then
(41:26):
you want to be part of that, Ithink.
So that's what, really, when Ileft my job and joined those
people, there were only 80 ofthem and they were living.
They were all memorizingscripture.
You joined, you had to memorizefive verses a day.
Uh, everybody was all for oneand one for all, like the three
musketeers.
It looks so attractive, butafter after a while, it took a,
(41:48):
took me a while I I swallowed alot of things that I shouldn't
have, but finally God, in hismercy, got me out, because I
knew people that stayed in alltheir lives and died in there.
And I knew another guy.
When I left, I left.
Around the same time another guyI knew left and he was out for
(42:09):
about a year In the group.
He was a special guy.
He was kind of a leader, amusician.
He had a music group that heled and outside the group he was
just doing construction.
He, a music group that he ledand outside the group he was
just doing construction.
He was just a regular guy andwe were so programmed against
the established churches hewouldn't go to church.
So after being out for a yearhe went back in and he stayed in
for another 15 years.
Wow, then finally, so he was inall he was like 24 years in the
(42:32):
group.
But finally he left too.
But his whole life was in there.
It was, I think, a very sadthing, and I was in for nine
years.
I can't be too hard on him,because it could have been me
too.
I mean, I realized that it wasGod's grace that got me out of
there.
I could have stayed in law.
It was just his mercy.
Speaker 1 (42:53):
Absolutely, sir.
You know I keep on thinkingabout the shock factor that you
may have experienced afterwardswhen you come to a realization.
I'm assuming that thesequestions may have come into
your mind where you think toyourself how could I be so dumb,
how could I believe this?
How did I even trust this man?
Look at how he's done all thesethings.
So I wonder, what was therecovery process for you?
(43:15):
Like to reshape in some ways orheal from your view of God, of
the church, maybe even yeah,what was that process like for
you?
So you get out, you go throughthat initial shock factor, like
did I really believe all of this?
That would just happen.
So how did you recover?
How did you restore yourrelationship with Christ after
(43:36):
that?
Speaker 2 (43:36):
Yeah, good question.
How did you recover, how didyou restore your relationship
with christ after that?
Yeah, good question.
Um, the first thing that whatcomes to mind is that I was able
to come in contact with otherpeople who were also from the
group, who were leaving and wecould talk to each other in the
group.
You'd never express doubts toanother member yeah, never did.
But outside of the group, afterwe've been out for six months
(43:57):
or a year, I met with some ofthese folks, just went over for
coffee or met them at theirhouse or their apartment, and I
was shocked to hear them talkabout doubts.
I was still afraid to expressdoubts myself.
I listened to them and I agreedwith them, but it was so hard
to express yeah, moe's a fraud,he was a false prophet, he was a
liar, he deceived us.
(44:18):
I said we can say this, and youknow, lightning doesn't come
from the sky.
So that helped me realize howseriously I had been hemmed in.
And so and then I began readingbooks.
There's a whole lot.
There's a whole industry ofbooks.
(44:38):
In fact.
I just wrote a note to a womannamed Alexandra Stein.
She was a British woman, younglike I was at in my.
She's not a religious lady, butshe had the same realization
(45:02):
that she was being taken for aride, and she is now a professor
of sociology in England andshe'd written a whole book about
, and I think the title of hernewest book is like.
I think it's called Love,freedom and Terror, something
like that.
Uh, because you're terrified ofdoubting the group and until
(45:25):
you can get free, you say youcan doubt, you don't have to be
afraid uh be.
In fact, if some group functionsalong the lines of using fear
to keep you in line, that's asign that you're in a group
that's not good.
Yeah, that's a good point.
So I began by reading peoplelike her book and she read a
(45:48):
book of another guy who had beena Mooney and he wrote a book
about it.
So there's a lot of things incommon with cults and to realize
that you've trusted somebodywho, uh, was untrue to you, in a
way, promised to be somethingthat they weren't.
So, uh, it was a long process.
(46:09):
It's been a long process and,uh, I wrote a memoir of it, uh,
when I've been out for fiveyears.
It never got, but just writingit was therapy.
And I went back to college andI shared it with some of my
professors and one professor.
He was a professor of thehistory of religion.
His name was William McLaughlinand he knew a lot about the
(46:33):
history of American religion andhe was a very nice guy, nice to
me.
He read my book and he said itwas so interesting me.
He read my book and he said itwas so interesting.
But you know what?
You still don't know what hityou.
This is five years out, you'restill too fresh.
It may take you another 20years he was wrong, it took me
another 40 years how profoundlysusceptible we are and how you
(47:03):
know cults can be as small as afamily, a husband and a wife.
A husband can become as abusiveof his wife or as big as a
country.
The guy who runs North Korea,he's the cult leader.
The Bible even talks about theAntichrist, you know, in
Revelation 13.
He's the supreme cult leader,right.
(47:23):
In some way he is because we'resupposed to follow Christ.
He is our leader, right.
But cult leaders are falseChrists and someone's going to
come along who wants the wholeworld to worship him.
So the kind of cult I was in wassmall potatoes, according to uh
uh, uh, when you consider thepotential using, you know,
(47:46):
modern technology for yeah,that's true yeah so, uh, I
realized that what happened tome is not just some thing that
happens in a corner that I wasof dupe of, but it's something
that human beings have alwaysbeen susceptible to.
And so what you need to do isyou should be.
(48:07):
It's not easy to think foryourself.
All kinds of people tell youwhich way to go.
All kind of people telling youwhich way to go.
But learning to think foryourself is so important, and
the first thing you need to doto think for yourself is you
need courage.
Courage is um it's not theabsence of fear, it's um being
(48:31):
willing to make a stand in spiteof fear and so learning to
think for myself about all kindsof things.
I can't say I've mastered that,but I know that I need to be
working on that.
Another lesson that I'velearned is that if you're part
of a group and the leader is notchecked, there's no elders,
there's no checks and balances,there's no.
(48:53):
He does whatever he wants andnobody could say no to him.
That's not good.
You want to stay away fromgroups in which there and nobody
could say no to him.
That's not good.
You want to stay away fromgroups in which there's there's
nobody can say no to the leaderyeah um and uh, the very
importance of spending time ingod's word, having, you know, a
personal relationship with thelord um and um, because the
(49:14):
whole world conspires againstyou.
Having that.
That's a good, it's a vital, infact it's the most important
thing.
You can do it all kind of ways.
In my particular life, I try tospend some time in God's Word
and prayer every morning, andthen, of course, you have to
make sure your doctrine's right,but then you have to make sure
your life is right.
(49:34):
Keep an eye on your doctrine,yes, but also on your life, that
you're living what you're.
You spend an hour reading andpraying.
That shouldn't be the end of it.
That should be the beginning ofwhat you do that day,
absolutely.
Speaker 1 (49:48):
Yeah, sir, and you kind of alluded to this already,
but it reminded me of thepassage I forget where it's at I
want to say Corinthians, but ittalks about if any man thinks
he stands, let him take heedlest he fall right.
And, to your point, that ideaof when we think that, oh no, I
got it, I got it together.
All you need is just that darkmoment, that horrible situation
that you go through, and you'regoing to be vulnerable to this
(50:10):
and to your point.
That's why we need to becontinually in community in
God's word, in prayer, to beable to identify when things
seem off.
And usually we get that littlered flag inside of our hearts,
like we see it.
But because it's so hard tobelieve that that's actually
happening to us, that pride kindof kicks in a little bit right,
it can't happen to me, and sowe ignore them and we continue
(50:35):
on.
And again, I understand to yourpoint like we are susceptible
to things, and I think that'sjust part of human nature on
both ends.
People are susceptible to beingconvinced or tricked or
manipulated, and other peopleare prone to do that, to
(50:55):
manipulate, trick and, you know,confuse other people.
So very interesting thoughtshere on just human nature, but
everyone is trying to find a wayto connect with God and you
know, thankfully, sir, I reallyreally appreciate, as we've been
talking, you have a reallyhumble, soft heart, kind of
(51:18):
talking about this experience.
That was very painful andshocking, I'm sure, and I really
appreciate that, sir, I thinkthis is going to speak to a lot
of the audience, because I don'tthink we think about this
enough.
You know, there's so manypeople going to church, so many
people kind of put it on thename or the label of Christian,
but you look at their lives andyou touch on this, the aspect of
(51:40):
, okay, you're being taught, butyour life is not lining up with
your values, with what youbelieve about scripture, about
Jesus.
So so, yeah, I appreciate allof those points and, just to
kind of close out here, is thereanything that you'd like to
share with the audience that youfeel we didn't touch on or that
you think it's important forthem to know, maybe even some
resources that you have oranything like that yeah, let's
(52:04):
see.
Speaker 2 (52:07):
Well, I think the thing I would leave with the
christianity first of all isabout who jesus is and what he's
done and what he's going to do,and it's not about how we
earned anything we are savedsinners but that relationship
(52:31):
with him.
To think that the king of kingswants to have a personal
relationship with usindividually is such a
incredible thing.
But it's credible, it'sbelievable that it's real and I
think that that should be, as abeliever, the the first and most
(52:53):
important thing that personalrelationship with him.
And yet I believe, um, as uh,somebody else, I'm fond of
reading Oswald Chambers LoveOswald.
He says the whole worldconspires against that
relationship.
The world, the flesh and thedevil all conspire against you
having that personalrelationship with the Lord.
(53:15):
And, as you said before, youneed fellowship and you need
prayer, you need the Word of Godand you need the doctrine, the
right doctrine, and God hasprovided all.
But you have to be aware thatyou need all those things.
You need to be in a goodfellowship, you need to stay in
the Word, you need to have aprayer life and you know,
(53:39):
someone said recently to me prayuntil you pray.
Speaker 1 (53:45):
Yeah, that's good.
I like that Because.
Speaker 2 (53:48):
I'm guilty, right, I pray all the time, I've done
that, but there's not that peacethat you really have been
praying right, which comes withreally.
Ah yes, lord, you're there.
Thank you, lord, and so that'swhat I would leave.
Is that it's all about him,knowing him, that he loves you
and he cares about you and he'llprovide for you, and in doing
(54:11):
all that, then you are free tolove others and serve him.
And doing so, beware that thereare wolves and sheep's clothing
out there who would like tosuccess to reach us from I love
that, sir.
Speaker 1 (54:25):
Um, dr cook, I appreciate your time so much
being on the show.
I I know that this uh episodeis going to be a blessing to a
lot of people.
Um, again, I just thank you forsharing your story as well, and
I would love to have anotherconversation with you, just
talking about a different topic.
I think this was a really goodconversation.
I think we I think we flowedwell too.
(54:46):
It was a really good ebb andflow, so I appreciated that.
I'll definitely shoot you anemail and we'll try to catch up
again.
Speaker 2 (54:54):
Thank you, I'd love to do that.
Thank you, sam.
That's awesome, so have a goodday you too.
God bless you.
All right, everyone, welcome back to the God
Attachment Healing Podcast.
I've been on a mission here togather a good number of
interviews to discuss thedifferent ways in which people
try to connect with God, andtoday I have Dr Paul Cook, who's
going to to be joining me, andwe are going to be discussing
(00:27):
what it looks like to be part ofa cult and what it looks like
to get out of a cult as well,and Dr Cook has a really great
testimony and story around this.
We're going to answer somereally great questions on the
topic and, again, this alwaysgoes back to how people try to
heal by trying to connect withGod in any way that they can.
(00:47):
So we'll explore some of thattoday and, as always, remember
to subscribe to the podcast.
Leave a review rating.
I thank you guys for tuning in.
I'm glad that you guys haveenjoyed the topics that we've
covered so far, but, yeah, thisis going to be an interesting
one.
This is probably the secondtime that I've addressed the
topic of cult, of being involvedin cults and so on, and, dr
(01:10):
Cook, I'm looking forward tohearing you share and, yeah, so
is the audience.
So, typically, what I like todo is just kind of give you a
couple minutes just to introduceyourself, and then we'll jump
into our topic.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Okay, very good, sam.
Well, I'm very pleased to behere and have you invited me to
speak to your audience and toyou about my experience?
I was raised in Houston inTexas.
At age 18, I went up to thenortheast, to Rhode Island to go
to college in 1967, a long timeago.
(01:46):
And after three semesters Ifound that I just didn't agree
with college and it didn't agreewith me, and I went on a trip
up into the mountains, up intoVermont, and I ended up in a
graveyard in southern Vermont.
It was an old Puritan graveyardand there were gravestones
(02:15):
there that had quotes from theBible on them.
I'm from a Jewish family, so Igrew up not knowing much at all
about Christianity, but one ofthe gravestones.
It had just snowed, it was abeautiful morning.
I'd spent the night in thislittle town of Putney.
One of the gravestones had averse on it which I later
memorized.
It was Behold, I show you amystery.
We shall not all sleep, but weall shall be changed in a moment
(02:37):
, in the twinkling of an eye, atthe last trump, for the trumpet
shall sound and we shall bechanged.
At the time I was 19, uh, I hadthree semesters at school and I
I said to myself, the peoplewho were uh burying this person
believed that there was aresurrection and I'd never
(02:57):
encountered anybody who spoke tome of that before.
And I thought the stone, thegravestone, was actually, in a
way, witnessing to me that therewas such a thing as a
resurrection.
And I told myself I don't wantto be in school.
I want to find out about thetruth about these things.
So I decided that morning thatI would drop out of school.
(03:18):
I had an argument with my momand dad on the phone the next
day when I went back to RhodeIsland.
That's always fun, don't do it.
I said my mind is made up.
So I dropped out and, longstory short, I ended up back in
Houston.
I met a carpenter who at thetime I was reading Gandhi's
(03:41):
autobiography and he didn't eatmeat.
I wasn't eating meat and I wasworking at a job site as a
carpenter's apprentice, and oneof the other carpenters said
well, why?
I told him what I was doing andI was not eating meat.
He said well, you know, jesusate meat and I was interested in
anything to do with Jesus.
I didn't go to church foranything, of course, or pick up
(04:01):
a Bible.
And so I listened to that andwe talked for a while and he
said you know, jesus ate me.
So he said why don't you cometo church with me?
And I said well, I'm Jewish,jews don't go to church.
But he was very persistent andgentle and so I went to church
with him a couple Sundays laterand afterwards he wanted to take
(04:22):
.
I don't remember anything aboutthe sermon, but afterwards he
wanted to take.
I don't remember anything aboutthe sermon, but afterwards he
wanted me to meet the pastor andI didn't want to be impolite.
So he took me up front and thepastor we waited for, everybody
wanted to talk to him.
And after we came up to him andI said I enjoyed being here but
I'm Jewish, and he said just asecond.
And he ran to his office andcame back with a little tract
(04:42):
with the Star of David on it andhe witnessed to me, ran to his
office and came back with alittle track with the Star of
David on it and he witnessed tome with that track.
It was called Four SpiritualLaws.
It's an old track and he saidwould you like to pray and ask
Jesus to be your Savior.
That's too big a decision to dothat right now.
But he said well, you take thisand you think about it.
So I did, and I came to see himon Wednesday, three days later,
(05:04):
and he said well, have youdecided?
I said no, I've got somequestions.
And I asked him some questionsand then on Friday after work I
went again and sometime betweenWednesday and Friday I stopped
resisting believing and I prayedwith Pastor Wall, who went to
be with the Lord just a fewmonths ago.
(05:26):
We've been friends all theseyears and so on August afternoon
, back in 1969, I officiallyreceived the Lord, though I
think I started believing in himeven before I prayed.
And so a few months later hewent to India on a mission trip
(05:46):
and he asked a couple at thechurch to just keep an eye on me
.
I was a new believer and theydid.
And they went to church onDecember 7, 1969.
They said did you read aboutthe hippie Christians camped in
the park?
I said no, it was in the frontpage of the Chronicle.
We're going to go out and visitthem and take them some
blankets.
It was cold at the time inHouston in the winter.
(06:06):
It was December.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
Would you?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
like to have dinner or lunch with us and come out to
the park to meet these people,and I said okay.
So I went home with them andhad lunch and then we drove out
to Bear Creek Park, which isabout 10 miles west of Houston,
and there were about 80, 90people camped out long hair,
hippie looking, Everybody waswearing a little lanyard with a
(06:29):
Bible or Bible quotes.
They were all quoting the Bibleand it looked great to me.
It was so interesting.
I was completely taken bysurprise and I joined them the
next day.
They said don't you know thatthe Bible says in Luke 14 that
you can't be a disciple unlessyou forsake all?
They're taking it out ofcontext, right?
(06:50):
You have to just leave your joband leave everything and come
and follow Jesus, be reallyserious about Christianity.
And I was naive andinexperienced.
He showed me the verse in theBible.
He said look at this, in Acts2.44,.
All that believed were togetherand had all things in common.
See, look, the early Christianswere all living communally.
(07:11):
We are living communally.
Are you living communally now?
I said no.
Well, if you really want to bea serious Christian, you've got
to live communally.
So I went home thinking aboutthe whole thing.
Meanwhile the couple that hadbrought me out were very quiet.
They didn't say much, but Icould tell they had a few
objections.
But I remember the guy saidwell, somebody has to witness to
(07:34):
the people in the skyscrapers.
He had a job in an officebuilding in downtown Houston,
but they didn't.
They didn't.
No red flags went up, but Icould tell they were not that
interested.
But, I was, and the next day Iliterally joined them and I was
with that group for nine years.
But as time went on, thingschanged.
(07:56):
You know the story of if youwant to cook a frog, you don't
throw him immediately into theboiling water.
The water warms up andeventually he's cooked.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
He doesn't even realize he's cooked a little bit
like that way to do it or oneother.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
one other quick anecdote is that an old english
um epic poem by edmund spencercalled the fairy queen, and it's
about knights and ladies anddragons and all that sort of
thing.
And there's a knight who hashis true love and he serves her,
but he runs into an evilmagician who wants to ruin him
(08:32):
and he's served by a witch whouses magic to turn into a
beautiful woman, and so this hemakes him have a dream that
makes his true love, whose nameis Una, it's like one him have a
dream that makes his true love,whose name is Una, it's like
one, seem unfaithful, and thenso he leaves her.
And then he meets Duessa, whichis two, she's two-faced who's?
(08:53):
actually a wicked, evil witchwho's been made into this
beautiful woman and he falls forher and he goes with her,
except one day, accidentally, hehe sees her bathing.
When her clothes are off, hertrue identity is revealed she's
this horribly ugly witch.
I forsook Una that is who Jesusreally was for me and I went
(09:16):
after Duessa, this group thatlooks so beautiful.
But one day, nine years later,he wrote us a letter about
Jonestown, which had justhappened a few weeks before, and
in the letter he always wroteus letters guiding us.
In the letter he defended whathad happened in Jonestown.
He said that they had beenpersecuted and they took the
(09:36):
only way out mass suicide.
And when I heard that for thefirst time this beautiful duessa
, I saw her naked, so to speak Isaw there was something ugly.
I couldn't buy that that thepeople at Jonestown had done
something that was okay, it washorrible.
They'd been exploited andcoerced and in some way murdered
(09:59):
by Jim Jones, their leader,though they had been persuaded
it was a holy suicide and allthat and so.
But then our leader wrote ussaying go home and show your
parents we're not like Jonestown, that you're free to come and
go.
And so I wrote my parents andthey sent me.
I said send me a round tripticket.
And they did, even though we'dhad all kinds of going.
(10:21):
We had all kinds of argumentsbecause they didn't want me to
be in the cult.
We've had all kinds ofarguments because they didn't
want me to be in the cult.
But they sent me the money fora round-trip ticket and about
early January of 1979, I'd beenin for nine years and 26 days I
flew home to Houston fromSantiago, chile, and I wasn't
sure what was what.
I was still very confused, butsomewhere deep inside I realized
(10:45):
that I might not be going back.
And sure enough, I didn't goback.
But it took me I think I was infor nine years.
It took me just as long to sortof come out of it, to sort of
realize that I'd been in a cult.
I mean, I didn't Cults did nothave a?
sign out front saying you arenow joining a cult.
(11:06):
The leader does not have alittle thing on his forehead.
It says I am a cult leader or Iam a sheep.
I'm a wolf in sheep's disguise.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
There's no sign that says that yeah, but I don't even
describe themselves as a culteither, right, I mean, it's they
.
They would say what?
What?
Their church or their gatheringof people?
What do they describe it as?
Speaker 2 (11:25):
Well, it was called the Children of God.
Okay.
And we lived in little communes.
Well, first there was only 80or 90 of us, but we began to
grow.
We had some good publicity.
Nbc came out.
This was their first Tuesdayshow.
Every first Tuesday of everymonth they had this national
(11:45):
television news documentary andthey came out to see us.
We were camp.
We find a sort of a ranch inWest Texas and they publicized
what we were doing and how kidswere joining and before long and
they were not 80, they were 500of us.
Oh, wow, and we had anotheroutpost in LA and an outpost in
Kentucky, and before long therewas 1000 of us.
When I left there were over8,000 people in the group.
(12:06):
So it grew.
But then my parents were almostimmediately suspicious and my
behavior towards them changed.
The group told me that againthere was so much misquotation
of Scripture.
They used Matthew 10, 36,.
A man's foe shall be they ofhis own household.
(12:29):
He that loves father or mothermore than me is not worthy of me
.
And so the group almost seemedto invite you to make that come
true.
You know, make your parents.
I mean it is true, but youdon't need to go about making
your parents into your enemies.
If they're going to oppose you,they will, you don't have to be
(12:50):
mean to them.
So my father actually began agroup called Free Cog Free Our
Children from the Children ofGod.
After I'd been in for about, hecame out to visit us in our
commune in West Texas and I wasvery upset that he'd come.
And I met him in our visitor'sroom out there at the ranch and
(13:12):
I said, dad, I want you to geton your knees.
This is my Jewish father.
Get on your knees and ask Jesusto be your Savior.
You don't do that.
You know, if you witness tosomebody, that's not how you do
it, but because the truth isthat I didn't really.
What I wanted to do was proveto him who I was I wasn't that
interested in him being saved.
(13:33):
uh, I was a selfish, stupid kid,uh.
And there was one of the othermembers of the group in the same
room, one of the leaders, and Iwanted to impress that leader
with what a true guy I was sure.
So my father, instead of sayingI'm done with you, he said I
don't know what's going on withyou, but I don't like it and I'm
going to fight it.
And he left and before longhe'd started this group.
(13:54):
He was more of a Christian thatday than I was, in that he was
gentle and patient andreasonable, and I was being
extreme and un, unkind andunloving, even though, of course
, he didn't know the Lord.
So they fought the children ofGod.
(14:19):
My dad spent a lot of money andtime.
Finally he quit.
He quit doing that because thegroup hired a lawyer and sued my
father and three other leadersfor a million bucks Wow.
But after a couple of years thegroup realized that they didn't
have a case and they droppedthe case.
But my father in the meantimehad to fight them.
He had to, you know, deal withthat.
And he got discouraged.
He said if you want to be withthem, do it, but I don't
(14:42):
understand why, you know he said.
He said if ignorance is bliss,you must be so happy.
That's what he said.
He said, and he reminded me ofthe guy in Mad Magazine, alfred
E Newman.
He said what me worry.
He said why don't you think foryourself?
Don't you see what you're doingIn the long run?
He was right.
(15:02):
I wasn't thinking for myself.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Now let me ask you, dr Cook, I mean that's really
interesting, just the wholebackstory there, because it is
scary to think that they reallygo through this for nine years
and not realize what was goingon.
And one of the things thatpiques my interest about what
you're sharing is that there hadto be and then, especially
growing up in a Jewish home,there had to be some view that
(15:29):
you had of God prior to joiningthis cult.
I wonder, did that change foryou at all?
I know they were misquotingpassages.
I know that that shapes the waythat you think about God as
well.
So I wonder did your view ofGod shift from the way you view
God before joining the cult andthen afterwards?
And what was that shift like,if anything?
Speaker 2 (15:51):
The only way that the group would have worked that it
did work is that it makes thegroup doctrinally, when I first
met them was right off.
They had the doctrine right andthere was great love between
them, the people.
There was a lot of camaraderie,which was so attractive,
whereas the church I was goingto was a solid church.
They were a gospel-believingchurch.
(16:11):
The pastor was a nice guy, butthey had their other lives
People.
They were not as seeminglycommitted as this group was and
my view of God didn't change,but my view about how committed
I was to him changed when I metthe group.
I was embarrassed that I wasn'tas committed as they were.
(16:34):
They said you want to forsakeall.
How much have you Now?
I realize, forsaking all meansit's a daily thing.
It's not something you do onceand you sell your stuff and you
get rid of your extra stuff andyou contribute your money to
charity and you go off.
No, it's daily.
You say no to that old nature.
That's selfish.
It's a much longer.
(16:55):
It's not a one-time thing.
Sure.
My view of God didn't change,but my understanding of what it
meant to serve him changed.
Of God didn't change, but myunderstanding of what it meant
to serve him changed.
And then it changed again,slowly, because then the group,
after a few years, the leader,began revealing his heart.
And there were things in hisheart that were not good.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
You know, a thing that comes to mind about this is
there are people who are driven, sometimes emotionally, to join
a church, a group, somethinglike that, right, so when you
say that your view of God didn'tchange, did your experience of
God or did you feel closer toGod after joining the cult?
(17:42):
And just, I guess, just for ouraudience too, can you define
just quickly what a cult is andthen dive into that?
Speaker 2 (17:48):
Well, a cult is a very easy, easy thing to
describe and it's a verycomplicated thing the easy
description is that his sonjoined a cult and disappeared.
You know, um, a cult, it has twoingredients it has a leader,
who?
Who is in some way disguised inother words, you can't tell who
he really is and it also hasfollowers who want to be led.
(18:11):
Yeah, in other words, you can'ttell who he really is, and it
also has followers who want tobe led.
In other words, a cult will notwork unless you've got people
who are really looking forsomeone to show them the way,
and so you put those together.
You know, pt Barnum said, orsupposed to have said, there's a
sucker born every minute.
Well, in a way, people are.
(18:33):
You know, he's like.
Well, that couldn't happen tome, I couldn't be.
Well, it could.
If you're in a place in yourlife where, all of a sudden, the
rug is pulled out from you.
You've just been rejected byyour girlfriend, you've just
gone through a divorce, you'vejust lost your job or who knows
what happened.
You can be in a certain placein your life and suddenly you're
vulnerable and along come thesepeople who show such interest
(18:55):
in you and are so encouraging toyou and say, ah, but once
you're in, then there are allkinds of ways to keep you in.
But then later on thosewonderful things may fade a
little bit and other things areintroduced.
Things may fade a little bitand other things are introduced.
One of the great signs of acult is a misuse of human
(19:17):
sexuality.
You give somebody too muchpower and he's got a lot of
followers and they have aweakness.
Along that line it'll come out,and that's what happened in my
group.
I mean it happens in.
I mean you see it in theCatholic Church, you see it in
leading Protestant conservativechurches.
You can read Proverbs 6 and 7and 5.
(19:40):
You see all those warningsabout not being led astray by
your physical desires, becauseit's easy to do if you're not
sticking close to the Lord, youcan get stripped up.
Well, our leader apparently hadhad that issue for long before
he started the group, but it washidden, except from some of his
(20:01):
closest advisors.
He began revealing to them thatChristians are this is
antinomianism In other words,free from the law.
If you're a believer in Christ,you're free from the law, which
is not true.
You're not justified byfollowing the law.
You're justified by God's graceas a redeemed sinner, but
(20:21):
you're saved, so that then youcan follow the law.
Jesus turns up the heat and theSpermion on the Mount.
He says not only what you do,but what you think.
If you even look at a woman andlust after her, you're guilty
of adultery.
That's just.
The thinking is a sin.
So we're not told to forget thelaw, but we're told to live it.
We can only do it by God'sgrace and his forgiveness when
(20:44):
we fall, but in the children ofGod.
We were beginning around threeor four years after I was in our
leader.
His name was David Berg, but headopted a Bible named Moses
David.
We called him Mo and Mo beganto tell us that we were free
from the law, that everygeneration of believers has been
(21:04):
more free and we're in the lastgeneration.
This is the end time and we arefinally.
God can trust us with thisfreedom and as long as you're
done and do it in love, you cando anything.
Well, that's not what the NewTestament says, but we took his
interpretation.
You know the New Testament saysflee fornication.
I mean the Old Testament.
Look at Joseph with Potiphar'swife.
(21:26):
When she started to, you knowshe liked this handsome young
man and he ran away from herbecause he said I can't do that
to my master.
So the Bible makes it veryplain.
(21:47):
But you get somebody who youbegin to trust teaches you the
wrong way, then you can beseduced into the wrong way, and
that began to be more and morethe case.
That began to be more and morethe case, and so my view of God
didn't change, but my view ofwhat I was doing for him.
I suddenly realized there'ssomething wrong here.
It took me a long time torealize it.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Did you ever have like little inklings or feelings
about it, Like oh, something'soff?
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Yeah, many, many times.
But we learned in the groupthat doubts were sins, doubts-
about the group times.
But we learned in the group thatdoubts were sins, doubts about
the group, and so you learn topush them down and hide them and
not let them rule you.
And I was pretty good aboutwith that until this.
The thing that finally, as I'vesaid before, jonestown really
(22:26):
freaked me out.
But when I first heard about itI said I said well, we're not
like that.
Even though they called theirleader dad, the children of god
called mo dad.
I said we're not like that.
Then, a month afterwards, hewrote us this letter justifying
what jones had done with hispeople and for the first time I
looked at him like oh, you know,it's like a little in the movie
(22:50):
Wizard of Oz, when the littledog Toto pulls the curtain
behind and there's a guy runningand he
Speaker 3 (22:56):
says in the microphone pay no attention to
the man behind the curtain, butI saw him for the first time
there was this guy and Mo was alittle guy, you know, he was
only five foot six.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
But I suddenly thought am I being taken for a
ride?
But I've been in it so long itwas hard for me to really
believe that.
Took me a long time to finallyrealize I sure was taken for a
ride wow, that's crazy, sir.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
I, I and I, I know that.
I mean you hit it on the nailwhen you said, um, when you hit
a very dark spot in your life,like everyone is vulnerable to
bad teaching or just any typebeing involved with the wrong
people, and yeah, that's reallywhat we find.
I mean, this whole concept ofGod attachment is really an
exploration of that is that,when people hit rock bottom or
(23:49):
they hit a very difficultsituation, is that they start
searching for what's gonna keepme afloat, whether it be money,
whether it be vices, sex,whatever power, and at some
point, for those who arebelievers, they're like God is
are you really here?
And they hit these dark andthey'll choose anything that
gives them a semblance of whatthat could be.
(24:10):
And it seems like the peoplewho joined cults are in that
stage, like they went throughsomething difficult and they
find this community that'saccepting them, that's giving
them teaching, mentoring them,and that's appealing for a lot
of people.
Yes, yeah, so.
So, as you were going throughthat, you mentioned that a lot
(24:30):
of the stuff that they weredoing was kind of this
brainwashing and thought control, right?
What did that look like?
Were there any specificmessages that were told to you,
because I imagine the first oneof the passages that came to
mind was Acts 17, 11, when it'sdiscussed about right and the
Bereans studied the word day andnight to make sure that what
(24:50):
Paul was saying was true.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
So I'm guessing, and you correct me if I'm wrong that
cult leaders typically do notask you to read the Bible for
yourself.
You're so right, in fact, whenI've been in the group for about
a year and two of the leaders Iwas in LA in our house in
downtown LA.
About 70 of us were there.
It was Christmas time and theleader's daughter and her
husband had met a guy namedRichard Wurmbrand, who was a
(25:22):
Jewish guy who became aChristian in Romania and was a
pastor.
The communist authoritiesarrested him and put him in
prison for 14 years for being aChristian and the Norwegian
Lutheran Church ransomed him.
They paid the Romaniangovernment communist government
$15,000, and he was ransomed,came to America, he testified
(25:44):
before the US Congress aboutpersecution of Christians behind
the Iron Curtain and then hesettled in LA and he wrote a
book called Tortured for Christabout how he didn't give in, how
the communists.
Really, if you stand your ground, some of them can even be
converted.
And he talked about how thathappened.
(26:04):
So the leader of the LA communeand his wife, which was Mo's
daughter, bought 100 copies.
We all had a stocking forChristmas.
We all got an orange and anapple and a copy of Tortured for
Christ.
And Mo, her father, found outabout it and he said don't read
(26:27):
anything but my stuff.
Nobody else has the proof thatthey're the true church for the
end time, except us.
Why are you wasting your timereading Richard Wurmbrand or
anybody else?
Just read your Bible and readmy letters and I'll tell you.
And so reading outside of thatwas banned.
And I said well, mo's, ourleader, he's right, right.
(26:49):
And so I.
For many years I didn't readanything.
And and so, and if you, if youhad a thought?
this is what thought control andyou learned that that one of
the one of the leaders had asaying.
He said if you think, think,think, you'll sink, sink, sink,
because you stink, stink, stink.
(27:10):
In other words, you can't trustyour own thought.
Now the big leader, moe, saiddon't say that, don't use that
saying.
It doesn't sound right.
It's not that he didn't believeit, it was too honest, right
right.
You're not supposed to thinkfor yourself, because you'll go
off the wrong way.
You can't trust yourself.
But you can trust us.
Just follow us so that's how itworked and you learn to casting
(27:34):
down.
You know misuse of 2Corinthians, 10 and 5, casting
down imaginations and everythought that exalts itself
against the knowledge of God.
And bring into obedience everythought, bring into captivity
every thought misappropriatingScripture.
To keep or how?
About this.
It was said that God chose.
Moses to lead the children ofIsrael, misappropriating
scripture to keep, or how aboutthis?
It was said that God choseMoses to lead the children of
(27:56):
Israel, and when they murmuredagainst Moses, they complained
against Moses.
They weren't really complainingagainst Moses, they were
complaining against God, right,so okay, so now we have a Moses,
moses David, our leader, and ifyou murmur against what's going
on, you're not murmuringagainst Moses David, no, you're
(28:17):
murmuring against God, who chosehim to lead us.
So you see how you paintyourself into a corner and you
can't think.
You're not allowed to thinkoutside the box.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
It's a lose-lose.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, there's a word that's used in cult studies, now
called bounded thinking.
You, you create boundaries andyou can't get outside you're,
you're stuck and the only thingthat can uh free you is if
somebody comes in and breaksthose boundaries.
Um and uh there's another storythat goes with that After I
(28:52):
left the group it was maybe 20years ago.
I left the group in 1979.
That was what is that?
50 years ago?
40 years ago a long time ago 45years ago, something like that,
about 20 years ago I read JohnBunyan's Pilgrim's Progress for
the first time.
Yeah, and in Pilgrim's Progressfor the first time.
(29:14):
Yeah, and in Pilgrim's Progresshe and his friend Hopeful are a
little bit lost.
And they come to a crossroadsand they don't know which way to
turn.
And suddenly this guy appearswearing a white robe and says
I'm going to the heavenly citytoo.
And he said oh really, we aretoo.
He said, well, follow me.
I said okay, and they do.
(29:35):
And it turns out this guy is afalse teacher, he's called the
flatterer and he's in adirection in which they're going
exactly the opposite direction,away from the heavenly city.
And then he leads them to a netand they're caught in a net and
they're trapped and then heruns away.
He leaves them trapped in thenet and they could have easily
(29:56):
died there.
But the story says along camethe shining one who's the Lord
and he cuts them out of the netand they can follow the truth
again.
So if you're looking for theright way and you get a little
lost, somebody can come alongand say I'll show you the way.
And he may be dressed in white,he may look like he's your
champion and your friend, but hecan lead you into a net and
(30:20):
you'll be caught there.
And so this is what happenedthe the group used flattery said
you god has really blessed youthat you have all the people in
the world who could have runinto us.
You were chosen, you, you, youwere chosen to be part of this
group.
That has the full truth.
(30:40):
Nobody else does.
You're special, um, you'regod's green berets, and so by
telling you stories like that sobrainwashing doesn't
necessarily look ugly it can bea way of making you think you're
something special when reallyyou're just a saved sinner.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
That's your point about them being at the lowest
point of their lives.
That's a good esteem boost forthem and it makes them feel that
more accepted and part of thegroup too.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Yeah, and they were believers I mean hopeful and
Christian are on the way and, asyou know, when you reach
Pilgrim's Progress, they runinto all these things that are
trying to stop them to gettingthere.
And so, when you become aChristian, you don't stop having
battles.
In fact, you really starthaving them because you're going
against the way of the world.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Yeah.
So, yeah, that's true, sir.
You know there's a lot of talkin modern day about either mega
church pastors or cultishleaders.
One of the words that's beingused for them often is
narcissist, right, and you knowsome characteristics of a
narcissist could be dominant,very charismatic, friendly, good
(31:56):
stage presence, all thosethings right, and they're
characteristics.
So just being careful with notusing, because a lot of people
do this.
They say, oh, he hasnarcissistic personality
disorder.
That's different than havingnarcissistic characteristics or
qualities.
So I'm curious, as you talkedabout some of the
characteristics of a cult leader, did you find that to be a
(32:17):
pretty common thing among cultsduring that time where you know
typically they're verycharismatic, they're they're
friendly people, they can speakvery well, very articulate and
so on?
Um, and they just have thismessage again, this kind of
authoritative or authoritariantype of approach to leading.
Did you find that?
What are some characteristicsof co-leaders, so that the
audience can know what thatcould look like?
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Well, I would say, the word I would use first is
charming.
And not in a positive way.
But charming, you have a, youknow if you remember seeing the
Music man with Robert Preston,you know he goes to a town and
he gets everybody to believethat he can teach them to play a
(33:02):
musical instrument using thethink method.
Just think you can play thatinstrument.
And he gets everybody tobelieve that.
And he sells them, all theseinstruments.
And then he collects the moneyand says the main instruments
will be coming soon and then heskips down with all the money.
But he's so charming that theywillingly give him the money,
believing the story that whenthe instruments come they'll
(33:24):
learn to play just like that,with the think method.
So that's an example ofcharming.
You know, you persuade peoplethat you've got something that
they want or that they may notknow they want it, but you teach
them that you really need thisoh yeah, okay, like salespeople
almost yes, they're a goodsalesman and they're charming.
(33:45):
They can be uh, they know how toread people.
Well, a charming person knowshow to read his audience.
He knows what to say to getthem to believe in him.
Yes, it is in some way.
Of course, a salesman can sella good product, or he can sell a
lemon.
Some of these cars that you getsold are very good cars and you
need someone to help you buy it.
(34:06):
But a lot of salesmen can tellyou well, this is a wonderful
car, but actually it's got someproblems.
They're not telling you aboutso, but if you're charming
enough, you can get people tobuy something like that.
And so a cult leader, in hisway or her way because it can be
a woman too can be charming,though you can push charm too
far and it becomes harsh andpushy, so you have to.
(34:30):
And another thing is that theyuse other people to charm and to
attract.
Our cult began the children ofGod with his adult children who
were his followers, and theywere young and attractive and
friendly, and they won a fewhippies and college dropouts and
veterans.
This is out in California in 68.
(34:51):
And they looked like 60sradicals, except they were
Christians and they attractedpeople to him.
So the cult leader uses hislieutenants, and they can be
pretty girls or handsome guys,nice guys.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Is that intentional?
Do you see it as it being anintentional, like I'm training
these people to do this, or isit more of those who hit that
position because they're closeto him?
They kind of take on that samerole, Cause I usually see that
when you follow a leader, youwant to become like him or her
right.
So was it more of anintentional thing, like I'm
(35:31):
teaching you these thingsexplicitly, or was it more
implicit?
Speaker 2 (35:34):
It was implicit, because the cult leader is not a
pure cynic.
Maybe the guy who foundedScientology said well, I'll
invent this religion, I can makea lot of money.
I don't know what he thought,but I think the leader of our
group or Jones, I think, to acertain extent they believe
their own propaganda.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
I believe our leader really believed he was God's end
time property.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
There must have been times when, because he knew the
Bible fairly well, there musthave been times, on occasion,
when he wondered if, when he wasconvicted, you know of you're
not doing the right thing, butyou know the Bible talks about
you can become hardened,calloused, you know, so that
(36:20):
your conscience no longer feelsconviction.
And so I think that whathappened to Mo was that he had a
lot of good intentions and hereally did believe in what he
was doing, but on certain thingshe knew it was wrong.
(36:41):
He knew that sleeping withgirls early on, because he had
been visiting prostitutes beforehe even started the group he
confessed later on that it wasokay because he was done in love
and so on and so forth.
Well, the bible makes it veryplain that's not good, but he he
said, no, that we're free fromthat.
This is the word antinomianagainst the law.
(37:01):
We're free from the law.
One other thing that comes tomind is I read John Bunyan's
autobiography.
It's called Grace Abounding tothe Chief of Sinners, and in
there he talks about runninginto a guy.
This is around 1650.
(37:21):
You know, we're talking 400,almost 400 years ago.
He ran into a guy who hadbelonged to a group called the
Ranters R-A-N-T-E-R-S and theRanters were also antinomian.
They believed that you could doall kinds of things sexually
and it was okay.
And so his friend joined theRanters and said this is the
(37:42):
truth of Christianity.
And Bunyan said I wasn't sure Iwas a young believer, so I
prayed.
I prayed, lord, I'm a foolishperson, I don't know how to go
in or go out.
If this is of you, show me, andif it's not of you, show me and
keep me, protect me from this.
And I said, oh, that I had hadthe wisdom of a young John
(38:05):
Bunyan when I ran into thechildren of God, because the
first thing he did was truly goto the Lord and say I can't tell
, I'm ignorant, I'm stupid, Idon't know enough to know.
Help me.
And, of course, the answers ofall the questions are in the
scriptures, but you've got tofind them and believe them.
(38:26):
And if you're new in the Lord,who do you trust?
You've got to trust him to helpyou by his Holy Spirit.
And then you know, join a groupof believers, a church in which
you can, you test it out.
Like you know, there was nogreater teacher than Paul.
But, as you said before, theBereans, even though they were
being taught by Paul, went backevery night after hearing from
him and said check the OldTestament to make sure that what
(38:48):
he was saying was right.
So if they had to test Paul,how much should we test our
teachers?
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Absolutely absolutely , that's a great point, sir.
You know, in your book or inone of your talks, you talk
about the cult leader or thephenomenon of the cult leader
and the true believer.
Have you touched on that aswe've been talking, or is that
something you wanted toelaborate on?
Speaker 2 (39:10):
I'll say one thing about that.
I read a book by a guy namedEric Hoffer.
He was a stevedore.
He used to work at the docks inNew York or in California, but
he used all his spare time toread and he was sort of a
people's philosopher and hewrote a book.
His first book was called theTrue Believer.
It was published around 1951.
(39:34):
And he talks about the kind ofpeople who join groups.
He was talking about joining aMarxist group, but it could be
any group and they're lookingfor an escape from what is
ordinary and what makes themfeel ordinary.
They want to be special.
(39:54):
They're so unsure of the valueof their own lives and they're
looking for something that willmake them feel good about
themselves.
A challenge too.
They're looking for a challengein which they can prove
themselves to be a somebody.
And you get this group thatcomes along saying we are
(40:16):
denying the easy way, we'regoing to live hard, difficult
lives because we're living thetruth, and the truth is
challenging and difficult, andso there's an appetite,
especially, I think, among youngmen, for a cause to believe in,
to give yourself to, and that'sthe true believer.
But the trouble is you've gotto find a cause that's worthy of
(40:36):
that, and a lot of causes sellthemselves as that but they're
not really.
They don't live up to theirpromise, and I think, to some
extent, this is what.
Well, I think in a way, thechurch needs to be seen as that
(41:01):
calling, that high calling.
And if you are running intoother believers who just seem
it's an adjunct to their lives,it's not the main thing, it
doesn't make you feel excited.
So you want to run into peoplewho believe the life of Christ,
the following Christ being adisciple is really important,
it's the center of their lives,and if you can find that, then
(41:26):
you want to be part of that, Ithink.
So that's what, really, when Ileft my job and joined those
people, there were only 80 ofthem and they were living.
They were all memorizingscripture.
You joined, you had to memorizefive verses a day.
Uh, everybody was all for oneand one for all, like the three
musketeers.
It looks so attractive, butafter after a while, it took a,
(41:48):
took me a while I I swallowed alot of things that I shouldn't
have, but finally God, in hismercy, got me out, because I
knew people that stayed in alltheir lives and died in there.
And I knew another guy.
When I left, I left.
Around the same time another guyI knew left and he was out for
(42:09):
about a year In the group.
He was a special guy.
He was kind of a leader, amusician.
He had a music group that heled and outside the group he was
just doing construction.
He, a music group that he ledand outside the group he was
just doing construction.
He was just a regular guy andwe were so programmed against
the established churches hewouldn't go to church.
So after being out for a yearhe went back in and he stayed in
for another 15 years.
Wow, then finally, so he was inall he was like 24 years in the
(42:32):
group.
But finally he left too.
But his whole life was in there.
It was, I think, a very sadthing, and I was in for nine
years.
I can't be too hard on him,because it could have been me
too.
I mean, I realized that it wasGod's grace that got me out of
there.
I could have stayed in law.
It was just his mercy.
Speaker 1 (42:53):
Absolutely, sir.
You know I keep on thinkingabout the shock factor that you
may have experienced afterwardswhen you come to a realization.
I'm assuming that thesequestions may have come into
your mind where you think toyourself how could I be so dumb,
how could I believe this?
How did I even trust this man?
Look at how he's done all thesethings.
So I wonder, what was therecovery process for you?
(43:15):
Like to reshape in some ways orheal from your view of God, of
the church, maybe even yeah,what was that process like for
you?
So you get out, you go throughthat initial shock factor, like
did I really believe all of this?
That would just happen.
So how did you recover?
How did you restore yourrelationship with Christ after
(43:36):
that?
Speaker 2 (43:36):
Yeah, good question.
How did you recover, how didyou restore your relationship
with christ after that?
Yeah, good question.
Um, the first thing that whatcomes to mind is that I was able
to come in contact with otherpeople who were also from the
group, who were leaving and wecould talk to each other in the
group.
You'd never express doubts toanother member yeah, never did.
But outside of the group, afterwe've been out for six months
(43:57):
or a year, I met with some ofthese folks, just went over for
coffee or met them at theirhouse or their apartment, and I
was shocked to hear them talkabout doubts.
I was still afraid to expressdoubts myself.
I listened to them and I agreedwith them, but it was so hard
to express yeah, moe's a fraud,he was a false prophet, he was a
liar, he deceived us.
(44:18):
I said we can say this, and youknow, lightning doesn't come
from the sky.
So that helped me realize howseriously I had been hemmed in.
And so and then I began readingbooks.
There's a whole lot.
There's a whole industry ofbooks.
(44:38):
In fact.
I just wrote a note to a womannamed Alexandra Stein.
She was a British woman, younglike I was at in my.
She's not a religious lady, butshe had the same realization
(45:02):
that she was being taken for aride, and she is now a professor
of sociology in England andshe'd written a whole book about
, and I think the title of hernewest book is like.
I think it's called Love,freedom and Terror, something
like that.
Uh, because you're terrified ofdoubting the group and until
(45:25):
you can get free, you say youcan doubt, you don't have to be
afraid uh be.
In fact, if some group functionsalong the lines of using fear
to keep you in line, that's asign that you're in a group
that's not good.
Yeah, that's a good point.
So I began by reading peoplelike her book and she read a
(45:48):
book of another guy who had beena Mooney and he wrote a book
about it.
So there's a lot of things incommon with cults and to realize
that you've trusted somebodywho, uh, was untrue to you, in a
way, promised to be somethingthat they weren't.
So, uh, it was a long process.
(46:09):
It's been a long process and,uh, I wrote a memoir of it, uh,
when I've been out for fiveyears.
It never got, but just writingit was therapy.
And I went back to college andI shared it with some of my
professors and one professor.
He was a professor of thehistory of religion.
His name was William McLaughlinand he knew a lot about the
(46:33):
history of American religion andhe was a very nice guy, nice to
me.
He read my book and he said itwas so interesting me.
He read my book and he said itwas so interesting.
But you know what?
You still don't know what hityou.
This is five years out, you'restill too fresh.
It may take you another 20years he was wrong, it took me
another 40 years how profoundlysusceptible we are and how you
(47:03):
know cults can be as small as afamily, a husband and a wife.
A husband can become as abusiveof his wife or as big as a
country.
The guy who runs North Korea,he's the cult leader.
The Bible even talks about theAntichrist, you know, in
Revelation 13.
He's the supreme cult leader,right.
(47:23):
In some way he is because we'resupposed to follow Christ.
He is our leader, right.
But cult leaders are falseChrists and someone's going to
come along who wants the wholeworld to worship him.
So the kind of cult I was in wassmall potatoes, according to uh
uh, uh, when you consider thepotential using, you know,
(47:46):
modern technology for yeah,that's true yeah so, uh, I
realized that what happened tome is not just some thing that
happens in a corner that I wasof dupe of, but it's something
that human beings have alwaysbeen susceptible to.
And so what you need to do isyou should be.
(48:07):
It's not easy to think foryourself.
All kinds of people tell youwhich way to go.
All kind of people telling youwhich way to go.
But learning to think foryourself is so important, and
the first thing you need to doto think for yourself is you
need courage.
Courage is um it's not theabsence of fear, it's um being
(48:31):
willing to make a stand in spiteof fear and so learning to
think for myself about all kindsof things.
I can't say I've mastered that,but I know that I need to be
working on that.
Another lesson that I'velearned is that if you're part
of a group and the leader is notchecked, there's no elders,
there's no checks and balances,there's no.
(48:53):
He does whatever he wants andnobody could say no to him.
That's not good.
You want to stay away fromgroups in which there and nobody
could say no to him.
That's not good.
You want to stay away fromgroups in which there's there's
nobody can say no to the leaderyeah um and uh, the very
importance of spending time ingod's word, having, you know, a
personal relationship with thelord um and um, because the
(49:14):
whole world conspires againstyou.
Having that.
That's a good, it's a vital, infact it's the most important
thing.
You can do it all kind of ways.
In my particular life, I try tospend some time in God's Word
and prayer every morning, andthen, of course, you have to
make sure your doctrine's right,but then you have to make sure
your life is right.
(49:34):
Keep an eye on your doctrine,yes, but also on your life, that
you're living what you're.
You spend an hour reading andpraying.
That shouldn't be the end of it.
That should be the beginning ofwhat you do that day,
absolutely.
Speaker 1 (49:48):
Yeah, sir, and you kind of alluded to this already,
but it reminded me of thepassage I forget where it's at I
want to say Corinthians, but ittalks about if any man thinks
he stands, let him take heedlest he fall right.
And, to your point, that ideaof when we think that, oh no, I
got it, I got it together.
All you need is just that darkmoment, that horrible situation
that you go through, and you'regoing to be vulnerable to this
(50:10):
and to your point.
That's why we need to becontinually in community in
God's word, in prayer, to beable to identify when things
seem off.
And usually we get that littlered flag inside of our hearts,
like we see it.
But because it's so hard tobelieve that that's actually
happening to us, that pride kindof kicks in a little bit right,
it can't happen to me, and sowe ignore them and we continue
(50:35):
on.
And again, I understand to yourpoint like we are susceptible
to things, and I think that'sjust part of human nature on
both ends.
People are susceptible to beingconvinced or tricked or
manipulated, and other peopleare prone to do that, to
(50:55):
manipulate, trick and, you know,confuse other people.
So very interesting thoughtshere on just human nature, but
everyone is trying to find a wayto connect with God and you
know, thankfully, sir, I reallyreally appreciate, as we've been
talking, you have a reallyhumble, soft heart, kind of
(51:18):
talking about this experience.
That was very painful andshocking, I'm sure, and I really
appreciate that, sir, I thinkthis is going to speak to a lot
of the audience, because I don'tthink we think about this
enough.
You know, there's so manypeople going to church, so many
people kind of put it on thename or the label of Christian,
but you look at their lives andyou touch on this, the aspect of
(51:40):
, okay, you're being taught, butyour life is not lining up with
your values, with what youbelieve about scripture, about
Jesus.
So so, yeah, I appreciate allof those points and, just to
kind of close out here, is thereanything that you'd like to
share with the audience that youfeel we didn't touch on or that
you think it's important forthem to know, maybe even some
resources that you have oranything like that yeah, let's
(52:04):
see.
Speaker 2 (52:07):
Well, I think the thing I would leave with the
christianity first of all isabout who jesus is and what he's
done and what he's going to do,and it's not about how we
earned anything we are savedsinners but that relationship
(52:31):
with him.
To think that the king of kingswants to have a personal
relationship with usindividually is such a
incredible thing.
But it's credible, it'sbelievable that it's real and I
think that that should be, as abeliever, the the first and most
(52:53):
important thing that personalrelationship with him.
And yet I believe, um, as uh,somebody else, I'm fond of
reading Oswald Chambers LoveOswald.
He says the whole worldconspires against that
relationship.
The world, the flesh and thedevil all conspire against you
having that personalrelationship with the Lord.
(53:15):
And, as you said before, youneed fellowship and you need
prayer, you need the Word of Godand you need the doctrine, the
right doctrine, and God hasprovided all.
But you have to be aware thatyou need all those things.
You need to be in a goodfellowship, you need to stay in
the Word, you need to have aprayer life and you know,
(53:39):
someone said recently to me prayuntil you pray.
Speaker 1 (53:45):
Yeah, that's good.
I like that Because.
Speaker 2 (53:48):
I'm guilty, right, I pray all the time, I've done
that, but there's not that peacethat you really have been
praying right, which comes withreally.
Ah yes, lord, you're there.
Thank you, lord, and so that'swhat I would leave.
Is that it's all about him,knowing him, that he loves you
and he cares about you and he'llprovide for you, and in doing
(54:11):
all that, then you are free tolove others and serve him.
And doing so, beware that thereare wolves and sheep's clothing
out there who would like tosuccess to reach us from I love
that, sir.
Speaker 1 (54:25):
Um, dr cook, I appreciate your time so much
being on the show.
I I know that this uh episodeis going to be a blessing to a
lot of people.
Um, again, I just thank you forsharing your story as well, and
I would love to have anotherconversation with you, just
talking about a different topic.
I think this was a really goodconversation.
I think we I think we flowedwell too.
(54:46):
It was a really good ebb andflow, so I appreciated that.
I'll definitely shoot you anemail and we'll try to catch up
again.
Speaker 2 (54:54):
Thank you, I'd love to do that.
Thank you, sam.
That's awesome, so have a goodday you too.
God bless you.
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