Saturday, June 21, 2008
When I was in Israel in ’95, I printed up business cards that advertised me as a Cultbuster and now, I post on this forum. I was angry at the Carlebach movement and felt that they needed to be exposed.
Years ago, around the time I got married, my sister gave a television to me and I caught this show called Success N’ Life run by Robert Tilton. He claimed that if you gave him a thousand dollars, he would “break the curse off your back”. He went after old people with big retirement funds because his show was on during hours when only people who weren’t employed would be able to see the show.
Bill Ashpaugh was a national level bodybuilder and I saw him on The 700 Club one day. He said he took anabolic steroids (his mom said, “I don’t think you should be taking them blue pills.” The pills were Dianabol – methandrostenalone - the so-called “Breakfast of Champions”) and got cancer but he “got saved” and he was healed. “The cancer came out my body!” was the way he put it.
I have been going to Faith Fellowship Ministries World Outreach Center on Friday nights for Victory in Jesus run by Pastor Vinnie Longo. He gets about 50 people out of FFM’s 6K families. I went last Friday night and have a few comments on the event.
I used to go to the Thursday night prayer meeting and Bible study. One time, Pastor David T. Demola was screaming, “This is Faith Fellowship, Faith Fellowship!” Really I find this congregation to be too much.
First of all, 2 weeks ago, Vinny bragged about the IRS absolved him of over 25 thousand dollars in income taxes that he should have paid. He invoked the holy and powerful name of Jesus and the collector let him off the hook. Damn, he’s good! I told the BBB about it and we will see what’ll happen from here.
Also his wife Nancy, told me about 5 weeks ago that I would experience a miracle in my life by June 6th. Of course it never came to pass and I talked to my former counselor in my housing program and she backed me up on my negative attitude.
Friday night, Longo got into a whole rap about how Ancient Israel demanded a king because Samuel’s sons were corrupt and wanted to be ruled like all the other nations. God told Samuel not to take it personally, because the people weren’t refusing his council but they were rejecting God.
Longo also got into a talk about how he’s the man of God and if someone doesn’t listen to him, the person isn’t rejecting him but is rejecting God in similar fashion. See what is going on here?
They actually do a song at VIJ called “Welcome Holy Spirit” as Longo claims he talks based on God’s will and counsel. In other words he’s a prophet.
Longo also made claims that he has seen people with brain injuries having openings in their skull close up due to faith. I find this impossible to believe and I don’t understand why people can be this gullible. Then again, I was in Hickman’s cult for 5 years.
Today, at the library, I sent an email to the Better Business Bureau about all of this. I want the Better Business Bureau to do an analysis of FFM and haul all these guys over the carpet for corruption, fraud etc.
FFM also spends a lot of time talking about how important it is to pay tithes. They go into this whole rap about how you “sow a seed…” really they need to be scrutinized. Of course, the say, how you have to have faith for it to work.
I mean, I sowed seeds when I went to college and eventually worked as a computer programmer. Then when I got sick, I worked in mental health facilities and I broke away from all of it. Recently, I took courses in freelance writing and I am using websites to publish my wares.
They also got into this whole rap about how you can supernaturally heal someone through faith in Jesus as J gives authority and power to his disciples. They quote the “by his stripes, we are healed” clause and they take it literally.
Well, I have extensive injuries from weightlifting and am on 5 medications for my psychiatric condition and internal medicine problems. One of my friends was told by FFM to stop taking his psychotropic meds and I remember him telling me that he got sick over it. I don’t believe my physical and mental problems are going to stop by being involved in Christianity. This is a cult.
My dad found out about my involvement with Ben Yishai when he went looking for a tool that I borrowed from him and he went through my dresser drawers. He found a tithing envelope and it hit him like a lightning bolt as Hecht said in his book, Confessions of a Jewish Cultbuster.
My father told Shea, “Tithing! Such a goyishe thing!” Hecht replied, “Mr. Green, tithing is Jewish in origin and we taught the rest of he world this idea.” My dad only seemed to know the stuff about honoring parents and the remedy of the incorrigible child by stoning him to death. You can stone a false prophet to death too and I am reserving my rock for Longo.
Also, when I was at this church some time ago, one of the congregants at VIJ tried to order me and coerce me to give tithes. I told him off. And let me tell you something this guy is about 1 foot taller than me and outweighs me by at least 75 lbs. I back down to no one.
I had a buddy years ago who used to go to FFM and they scammed him out of about 3K dollars with this approach. He told me he hates this church like I hate Chabad and that is saying much. I am trying to work on getting him a refund. He never came out and did anything about it.
My only are from friends from FFM and the housing program I am in. I’m also getting into a program for people with mental illness. The only people I know who hang with me from the area are my old next-door neighbor and people from FFM. Last night I copped a free dinner from one guy. By the way the local Taco Bell also gave me free food yesterday.
These myth-based problems seem to emanate mostly from the charismatic, Pentecostal/Full Gospel organizations. Most orthodox Baptists don’t believe that miracles are happening today and they don’t go in for faith healing. Neither does the Presbytery although I know the Catholic Church has an exorcist.
I got into an argument with someone I know at FFM and he asked me, “Don’t you believe that they were doing miracles in the Apostolic age?” See where I am right now?

One of the reasons that I wrote again about FFMWOC is that the organization may be going ballistic. Some time ago, they dispatched a team to go to Joel Osteen, a prominent TV preacher and the leader of the largest church in the USA (about 30K members and millions of TV viewers for his Sunday morning show), to learn the most modern and up to date techniques of evangelism.
As a side note, Osteen is an author and my church studied his book, Your Best Life Now, some time ago. That was a few yeas ago though.
While FFM’s 6K families is a sizeable number of people, with television and the Internet as technologies to extend this church’s reach, they can theoretically get to millions of people. As of yet, it really isn’t a “world outreach center,” as its name says, but it could become such and as such, it could become a bigger problem than the International Church of Christ was before that cult disbanded their World Sectors.
The ICOC never had a TV show and Pastor David T. Demola may be gearing up to do such. Also, the ICOC had about 176 thousand members. Not as much as even the Presbyterian Church USA (about 2.4 million which is less than ½ the size of the Lutheran Church) but still a sizeable group. I am not saying that PC (USA) is a cult, I am simply analyzing the numbers here.
As far as I can tell, this church is promising people the type of Christianity that the first church had, replete with miracles stopping only short of walking on water. I find all of this to be a problem that would be investigated by the Rick A. Ross Institute and also the federal government. I don’t know if Rick wants to get involved directly but through this forum, I can relay all the information.
I think their claim is that you won’t see any great miracles unless you have the faith to believe they happen. As usual, they play head games with you.
There’s enough problems with the cults that already exist. I would like to nip this one in the bud.