During the last few weeks, I have been considering some further questions about Peoples Temple and Word of Faith Fellowship (WOFF).  Did Jim Jones, leader of Peoples Temple, participate in the recruitment of church members from other congregations? How do we know? (This is commonly referred to as “sheep stealing”.)  Did/does Jane Whaley, leader of WOFF participate in recruitment of church members from other congregations? How do we know? If both leaders did recruit other church members, were the techniques similar or different?    

    From the “Raven” by Tim Reiterman with John Jacobs (copyright ©1982 Tim Reiterman, Introduction copyright 2008 by Tim Reiterman, ISBN 978-1-58542-678-2); the authors tell of several attempts of Jim Jones to recruit members from other churches. Let’s look at a few examples.

    “Jones’s expansion attempts were those of an impatient and aggressive man. While on a quest for new organizational techniques in the late 1950s, he had read extensively about Father Divine, spiritual father of the gigantic Peace Mission movement. In typically direct fashion, Jim Jones drove to Philadelphia to meet the black cult leader in person.” (page 59) Father Divine has been mentioned previously on this blog. Here is another link to read about the sharecropper turned “self-proclaimed “Dean of the Universe,”..(page 58)  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctrine_of_Father_Divine

  

    Father Divine had tens of thousands of followers and was reportedly “lord of a religious empire worth millions of dollars….Jones hoped to acquire Divine’s throne; he was acutely aware that the elderly evangelist soon would be departing this earth.” (page 58) Reiterman writes of Jones’ first attempt to secure the Peace Mission kingdom. He failed in his first attempt. Jones left the encounter with a new excitement about the doctrines and teachings of Father Divine. “Jones prepared for his inheritance by studying the tape recordings of Divine’s sermons.”(page 59) The encounter with Father Divine affected Jones for years to come.

    In July 1971, years after Mother Divine succeeded Father Divine on the throne of Peace Mission; Jones took several buses of followers back to Philadelphia. He attempted to secure his “inheritance” one more time. Temple members began “jotting down names of Mother Divine’s followers.” (page 139) Later, when arriving at the elaborately decorated burial chamber of Father Divine, Jones made a sarcastic comment which Mother Divine glossed over in an effort to keep the situation in check. “Then as the others cleared out, Jones informed Mother Divine that his five-foot-ten white body was in fact the reincarnation of the cherubically black Father Divine. Jones was staking his claim to the Kingdom of Peace.” (page 139) Sounds ludicrous- right? Mother Divine denied Jones’s twice spoken claim, “No one can take Father’s place…. You’re no more [special] than anyone else. (page 140) Jones would later repeat his claim openly in a joint meeting of the groups and be asked to leave the meeting. Peoples Temple would later take in about a dozen members from the Peace Mission. This attempted “coup” would prove to be a failure for Jones.

    Before 1971, Jim Jones had other ventures in recruiting members of other churches. Between the two attempts on the Peace Mission, he had attempted to steal members from the Church of the Golden Rule. “During the summer of 1966, the Temple moved a piano to the Golden Rules school and started to hold services there… Like the early visits to Father Divine, the relationship between the organizations was harmonious at first, with swimming for the children and communal dinners. But it soon became apparent the Jones had designs on the Golden Rule… Then the Temple tried to recruit more. That violation of the “Rule”, made elders suspicious of Jones’s motives when he made a gradual merger move. The church voted down the merger proposal, partly because the Temple revolved around the worship of Jones’s personality.²⁵” (page100)

   Reiterman documents another attempt of Jones to recruit members from other churches. In 1968, after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “…Rev. George L. Bedford, black pastor of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church invited members of Caucasian churches to come and worship…. Jones brought fifteen of his Temple members to services and asked Bedford for permission to continue the fellowship. (page 138) Next time, Jones showed up “… with about 150 in all.” (page 138) From here, Reiterman describes how Jones went into his healing act at one service and wooed several members away from the church. Temple members openly recruited netting “an estimated 150 to 200 of Bedford’s people… Jones committed “sheep stealing” on other black congregations in San Francisco, though not always so brazenly.”(page 138)

    Reading the paragraphs about Jim Jones combined with this statement he made, “Jones always said that religious people made the best members because they were the most easily conditioned to self-sacrifice, devotion and discipline” (page 137); caused me to consider my time in WOFF. Had I seen Jane Whaley do the same thing to other churches?  We can start with the obvious facts known about the members of WOFF. When my time was up at WOFF in June of 2008, I had these observations about the membership. Only a small percentage was from the surrounding area. Most were from other cities in North Carolina, other States in the U.S. and other countries from around the world. For years, this observation was recounted with awe as a badge of honor and a certain stamp of endorsement by God. We must me doing something right. Look at all these folks that have come from all over the world. God must approve of what we are doing…

    In my thinking, I thought that this was true because Sam had traveled into so many countries with Kenneth Hagin Ministries and made contacts in those places. As God had given him the new message of deliverance through Jane, others had heard and then been led to WOFF, right? That is all that happened, right? It was by some leading of the Holy Spirit, right? Folks were just hungry for Jane’s gift, right? In my open-hearted, religious thinking, I never asked any further questions and thus never learned any more accurate answers. How had so many folks from so many different churches decided to pick-up and leave their homes and come to the mountains of North Carolina?

    First, let me make a few statements about the locals that attend WOFF. Many are somehow related to Jane or have known her or one of her relatives, for years. Few are “new Christians”, as I suspect that the lengthy rules and heavy-handed controls are hard for new believers to stomach. How can this be “Freedom in Christ” when I am told what to do and how to think and what emotions I should have and where to spend my money? And furthermore, don’t read your Bible too much; you could give over to a religious devil? Can the majority of new believers take all that in so quickly?  In retrospect, WOFF burned through several new believers and they ended up leaving for whatever reason. Maybe they are not yet “religious” enough according to Jim Jones, – who knows?

   Now, about the WOFF members from other places; those from other cities in North Carolina were mainly from the Wilmington area. Just as I was leaving, Jane had convinced another church from the Wilmington area to move and be a part of WOFF. As second church from that area had collapsed a few years ago and a few of those members had come to WOFF. This process had/has been a regular occurrence over the years at WOFF. After all, I came from the Word of Life Church in Greenville, SC. Almost everyone in that group sold homes, changed jobs and moved to WOFF in 2002. A few were spared.

   Concerning the WOFF members from other parts of the United States, I remember meeting folks from New York, Texas, Florida, Georgia, Virginia, Tennessee, Montana, Wyoming, New Mexico, California, Indiana, Connecticut, Oklahoma, Oregon, Illinois and of course South Carolina. Many, if not most, came out of churches in those states. Each had their story that went something like this:

    Sam and Jane (or just Jane) came to our church and preached about loud prayer and deliverance. The pastor did or did not go along at first. Right away or eventually, the pastor denied that Jane was teaching Truth. I talked to Jane and I felt like God told me to come here, get deliverance and be a part of WOFF.

   The other version included Jane hearing from God that the whole church needed breakthroughs and needed to move to WOFF. So the methods may not be exactly like Jim Jones, but what about the net results? Was this “sheep stealing”? Could it be wrong even if you got the whole church and the pastor, too? What do you think? Does this “feel right”?

   For the folks that came from other countries, I will list a few countries of origin that I remember. Members were from Ireland, Scotland, Finland, Sweden, Poland, Russia, Brazil, Ghana, Mexico, Ecuador, Germany and others. When you speak to these folks, many times the story goes like this:

    Sam and Jane (or just Jane) came to our church and preached about loud prayer and deliverance. The pastor did or did not go along at first. Right away or eventually, the pastor denied that Jane was teaching Truth. I talked to Jane and I felt like God told me to come here, get deliverance and be a part of WOFF.

   Sound familiar? While I was inside WOFF, I never put this together as being less than an honorable way to recruit new members. My thoughts on this subject have changed. WOFF is for the most part full of stolen sheep. As mentioned, new believers seem to have a hard time with the rules (don’ts) and intense “…self-sacrifice, devotion and discipline”. People already in church and familiar with the concept and even very religious about their religion seem to flow better at WOFF. That must have been me for many years… Right?

   So, the methods may differ, but Jim Jones and Jane Whaley had/have yet another thing in common- sheep stealing. I doubt if they are the only ones and I am sure there are other methods. Also, I am sure there are incidents of sheep stealing to fill WOFF chairs that I know nothing about.  But, the skill does come in handy when you are running a tight-knit religious community that many have labeled a “religious cult”.  I must add that this is not the best information that I have gained by learning about this technique. The question of Jane’s closed pulpit has now been answered! Jane does not allow other preachers to come in and preach because she is afraid she will reap what she has sown. If another preacher comes in, he or she may steal some of her stolen sheep. Then what would happen to the tithes and offerings? Who would pay for her $600 a month salary? How would she buy all those clothes?  How many times would she have to pass the plates to “meet the budget” then? If/when WOFF runs behind in offerings, what could/would Jane resort to in order to raise money? That could be an interesting subject for another post. For now, we press ahead in the search for answers.

   Thank you, for taking time to visit and read this blog.  Please, consume the information on this site responsibly. The author is not a licensed mental health professional and encourages those that need professional help to seek it. The intent of the material is to inform and be a resource. Be sure to tell every member that you know at WOFF about this blog. There are readers at WOFF. Comments are invited from all readers, including present or former members. Polls are not scientific and no private information is gathered.

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      (Please, take time to read the Terms of Use for this personal blog. As mentioned, the information about WOFF is from my memories and recollections as perfect as that may be or not be. ) Scripture references are Amplified Version unless otherwise noted. (Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation ) This is post number 218.