The last post by Nickleanddimed is extremely disturbing. He/she sounds like an absolute crazy person! Every time they post it's in these oddly broken up sentences, which only adds to the creepiness. WTF is his deal?!

I've been reading this forum for a long time and have wanted to post because I have A LOT to add, but I know for a fact that TLWF has their people monitor this site (the fact that they do that is very telling in and of itself).

It was very upsetting that one of their people sent Reepicheep's husband that threatening letter. It is disgusting!! Has anyone heard from Reepicheep? I noticed they have not posted again since the post about said letter. I find that alarming. It really pisses me off that TLWF is trying to scare people off of telling the truth.

Have any of the rest of you received threats for posting?

Reveal:
>Have any of the rest of you received threats for posting?

Other than being told my Gary I would be killed unless I supported a certain pastor, no. Oh, I forgot about Marilyn telling my wife to kill me unless I started submitting to her (this, during the "end the male spirit" phase in the early 90's).
What a wonderful, magical place!

And no, there are no audio tapes...or any proof of what I just wrote about the above death threats. Only two parties involved both times.

Dear fellow blowouts,

I’d like to begin by confessing that, like many newbie posters, I am a longtime lurker and Living Word survivor drawn to action by an unholy combination of confusion, fascination, and rage. Before I tell you why I’ve chosen this particular moment in time to dive into the pool, allow me to introduce myself according to local custom: revealing just enough information that you should be able to figure out who I am with some savvy Googling, while keeping things imprecise enough to maintain some modicum of anonymity.

I was born in a mid-sized 1980s Rust Belt city to a young couple lured into TLW by means of a local bible study and the halcyon days of Shiloh in the ‘70s. While still an infant, Gary & Marilyn sent our small family––which was to grow very large––to San Diego, where I became a child slave laborer and a pretty good musician (all things considered), picking weeds during school hours and jamming on classic rock grooves in worship services at Church of His Kingdom (plus the occasional weekend in the Valley and summers at Shiloh) through the 1990s and early 2000s. After I discovered punk rock, graduated from COHK’s insanely incompetent excuse for a high school, and a senior shepherd told me that I “read too many books,” I gave John Robert Stevens & Co. a stiff middle finger, went to college, moved across the country, got married, and even ended up with a Ph.D.

Before I left San Diego for the East Coast (where I currently live) in my early twenties, a small cohort and I succeeded in fomenting rebellion amongst a cadre of our still-entrapped peers; our numbers grew until they constituted an informal support group which, granted, mostly ever amounted to a lot of late nights drinking beer and talking shit. But I know that it’s helped a lot of people, including me. I’ve always taken pride in my ability to talk others down from the ledge, especially young people like myself, so treasured by the cult for their reproductive potentials, disposable incomes, and undereducated brains (this aptitude, among other things, led to a career teaching college students, which I did for a number of years until very recently).

It’s taken more than a decade, but I’m happy to report that through persistent needling, argumentation, and shouting in person and over the phone (but also patience, understanding, and countless changes within the institution itself), what ties remain between my family and TLW are almost entirely emotional: longtime diehards, my parents have begun to attend other churches, nostalgic for JRS & Marilyn, but also beginning to see (and perhaps even feel something like guilt for) the effects that the cult has had on their children’s lives, not to mention their own. One of my brothers, the last true holdout of my siblings, got “woke” earlier this year, which we’ve all come to see as a triumph for our family. We didn’t always get along so well (speaking only for myself, it’s taken dozens of hours of therapy to be able to forgive), but it’s likely that my family has never been closer than it is now: excluding myself, whom life and work have kept at a distance, everyone lives within a few miles of each other still, and a day rarely goes by that I do not talk to someone in my family.

But I know how privileged I am to bear such good news: many, if not most, have suffered in the wake of TLW to extents that I can only imagine. It’s true that parts of my life since leaving COHK have been wilder than others, but it was in the context of “church” that I first saw my peers die of drug overdoses and suicide, become teenage parents, sexually assault and be sexually assaulted. I’m certain that I first learned of adultery from the Ten Commandments, but the first examples of that it I saw were among pastors and other members of the spiritual aristocracy. “When else,” you may counter, “does a person gain knowledge of such evils than in the formative years of their life?” I’ve often asked myself this question and looked for answers in Dostoyevsky, James Joyce, and the annals of human history, but the responses I’ve incited by telling the story of my childhood––as I have hundreds of times––are what have convinced me without doubt that it wasn’t a normal one. The irony that the “soul realm,” which TLW has wasted so many miles of tape preaching against, while far from perfect, is not as monolithic in its embrace of greed, deception, power, and lust as the world that JRS, G&M, Silas Esteves, Rick Holbrook, ad infinitum down the hierarchy to the most fiery eyed and recently YASPed drone have invented has not passed by unacknowledged. You only need to hear Aretha Franklin to know that soul ain’t a bad thing: it’s transcendent, it brings people together, it’s maybe even the best thing we’ve got.

Today, I am a writer, and I feel responsible to bear witness to what I’ve seen, but I’ve done enough research on TLW––reading the forums and the rest of the Internet, talking to fellow survivors, tracking down every reference to the Walk, its theology, its power brokers, and their various schemes that I can in library catalogues and public records––to know that my story is a mere footnote, and I want to get the big picture right. It’s probably too early to publicly discuss my plan of attack except to say that like the best political artists of our time, I believe that the most effective way to indict evil is to give evil the room to indict itself. With that in mind, as eager as I am to talk to all of you––on the record or on background, to whatever extent you’re able––I’m also looking to expand my own library of primary sources that I’ve cobbled together here and there: tapes, This Weeks, songbooks, video footage, etc. If you have something to say to TLW leadership, I’ll help you say it, and though I can’t guarantee that they’ll listen, I’ll make sure that they hear.

If you’re willing to talk, please write to me at walkn.n.talkn@gmail.com. I promise that all correspondence will remain confidential; recent upsets to this forum have prepared me to prove that I’m not a cop (Bobby Kennedy was a good guy, and Elvis had some problems but he definitely wasn’t “nephilim,” etc.). If you want to talk but you’re not quite sure how, if you’re ready, or if you can: take your time, there’s no rush. But think about it.

In any case, thank you all for taking so many courageous steps in this forum and on FACTnet (where this journey started for me many moons ago) in the direction of transparency and justice. For more than half a century, John Robert Stevens and his sycophants have spread their insidious and self-serving lies by all means available. What better way to let the world know of the damage that they’ve done than to open the door so that everyone may hear what they have to say?

Love,

REDACTED



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 08/16/2018 07:53AM by walknntalkn.

Redacted,

Like you and many others, I’ve followed along for years. Earlier this year, when I read another new poster’s story (your brother) I created an account. It wasn’t until your post that I’ve felt prompted to speak out (at least planning to send you an email). Right now, I just wanted to post to let others know their posts are making a difference.


With love,

Original Yasper

I am overcome with joyous emotion. Well, as emotional as an old warhorse can be after living so many years as a sycophant and perpetrator of all sorts of acts of loyalty to the heirarchy, and as someone who didn't just drink the koolaid but tried to pour it on or down everyone else.

Thank you Redacted and I Woke Up. I'm pretty excited to have you posting here. I just began posting in the last several months and it is apparent that our ranks are continuing to swell and we are being effective. I'm so glad.

I would love to know who both of you are as I probably know you both and maybe your parents but I will be patient and puzzle that one out a bit.

For now, thank you for speaking. Your voices are heard. I want to know more.

Thanks for your incredibly well-phrased introduction walkntalkn! I'm pretty sure it was you who first told me about Factnet and this forum years ago - glad to see you finally post. I cringe to think about what communal home I'd be living in if it weren't for you and all those boozy shit talking sessions with our fellow blow-outs.

And welcome i_woke_up! It always makes my day to see a new post from another YASPer! Thanks for chiming in - better late than never :)

As the tape editor who handled the raw material that became the tape, Girls Turn It Off -- I would love to know how you relate your name "girls turn it off" to that tape. It is always nice to read your posts.

Former YASPers! Excellent.

Walkntalkn - I called you Redacted - Excellent mention of Lady Aretha. Excellent time to be grateful to her. "You only need to hear Aretha Franklin to know that soul ain’t a bad thing: it’s transcendent, it brings people together, it’s maybe even the best thing we’ve got"

Hi Onion. "Girls Turn It Off" was probably the most influential piece of Living Word material for my generation of young women. It encapsulates much of my experience growing up in TLWF: women and girls are shamed, blamed, and worked to the bone. If a man looks at/touches/treats you inappropriately, it's your fault because you can't control your spirit. "Keep it in your shoe" as Marilyn would say. Constant hard work and submission is what makes a Woman of Valor, oh and knowing when to keep quiet. In that message, female members of the congregation were simultaneously robbed of all agency while also being told that everything is our responsibility and in our control.

When I was a YASPer this tape was played to all the girls (I was also required to listen to this tape at the direction of my "shepherd" back home in San Diego). Similar to the way sex-ed is taught, boys and girls were separated. The girls were corralled into a room and sat around diligently taking notes and silently exchanging guilty looks. Who knows what the boys were doing... probably playing basketball, eating ice cream at Yottie's or goofing off at the Amphitheater. They definitely weren't being taught about controlling their spirits or their hands, that's for sure! Funny enough though, the boys knew the thesis of GTIO even if they never were forced to listen to it: whatever happens, it's the girl's fault.

So now, as an *almost* 30 year old woman who's *almost* mentally recovered from 20 years of mind control, I like to imagine that Girls Turn It Off is in reference to all of us women collectively turning off that f*cked up tape and Marilyn's controlling voice in our heads!

Girls Turn It Off -- YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!

OMG I can remember when I very first moved into the Blix House (February of 1972 when I was 21) I went over to my friends to socialize with a group of my age people - 3 couples and I was single because of course I was helping birth the Blix House. One of the guys got drunk and tried to make out with me. When I got home I told Marilyn about it because I was really upset that my good good friend would do this when his wife was in the other room. And that began the first speech from Marilyn on women learning to control their spirits because we caused it.

My friends were all the upcoming ministries of the day and the one who tried to make out with me was a really good guy. I was young and still hot at that time and I took that blame like it was made to order for me. I took on the condemnation for everything that had ever gone wrong in my life and I studied the subject of a disciplined spirit like it was water as I was dying of thirst.

Holly shit! Peeling the onion is just frickin' nonstop for me. Thank you so much for posting - and THANK YOU for ripping some chains off of my mind from all that damn conditioning.

Realizing that tape contains such horrible conditioning -- it should have been given to Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby. But interesting, it was made by the mother of the biggest sexual assault perpetrator most of us (luckily) will ever know. Gee, what a surprise....

Thanks GTIO! You rock.