The Living Word Fellowship

ABOUT THIS EPISODE

John Robert Stevens wrote when he was just 14 years old: “My joy must be in doing His will, in being His slave, in the confidence that whatever comes to me, when following Him, is His doing. In a real sense, I make Him responsible for my life.” He was writing about Jesus Christ, but it would turn out in the decades following that he could well have been writing to his future devotees as to how they should feel about himself.

UPDATE: The Oops! I'm in a Cult podcast found that John Robert Stevens' 'To Be a Christian' was plagiarised word for word from this text, published in 1897.

EPISODE LINKS

• I Saw Satan: Breaking away from a Boomer Christian cult — by Andrew Marzoni, The Baffler, No. 44, March 2019

• Vain Glory — documentary film by Tony Cox, 1986

• Sacrifice Builds Training Area For Prophets — by Ann Grauvogl, Quad-City Times, 25 February 1979

• A Brief History of The Living Word Fellowship — internet archive of The Living Word Fellowship’s now defunct website

• The Life of John Robert Stevens — website about John Robert Stevens by The Living Word, “a California nonprofit corporation”, accessed February 2020

• Frequently Asked Questions — Shiloh website, accessed February 2020

• An Open Letter to The Living Word Fellowship Congregation — from Shalom Abrahamson-Caples, 24 October 2018

• Shalom Abrahamson-Caples’ Facebook post — linking to the open letter, 25 October 2018

• Comparison of ‘To Be a Christian’ and excerpt from ‘The Call of the Cross’ — comparing John Robert Stevens’ 1933 text and George Herron’s 1892 text

• How Did Christian Tabernacle of Washington, Iowa Go from Christian Church to Cult? — by Malika Bourne, No Non-cents Nana, 18 January 2020

• TIME MACHINE: The Walk & Shiloh — by Diane Langton, The Gazette, 17 November 2018

• Developer presents initial plans for Shiloh property — by James Jennings, The News, 23 January 2020

• WALK TALK Lexicon — glossary of terms used by The Living Word Fellowship from user kBOY, Cult Education Forum, updated 24 December 2018

• The Vineyard, the Charismatic Church, and the Cults — an analysis of The Living Word Fellowship by an anonymous former member, September 2002 (updated January 2005)

• Experiment in End Time Apostasy: The Walk of John Robert Stevens — by Woodrow Nichols, SCP, 1980

• Three Victims of Childhood Sexual Abuse File Lawsuits Against Living Word Fellowship Church — press release from Zalkin Law Firm, 29 May 2019

• Golden Threads — by Kelly Daniels, The Sun Magazine, July 2015

• Re: The Living Word Fellowship, The Walk, John Robert Stevens — Cult Education Institute forums, with 1089 pages on the subject when accessed in February 2020

• Gary and Marilyn Hargrave BIO — 28 October 2013 archive of the now defunct ‘Gary and Marilyn Hargrave: Maturing God’s Sons’ website

• Gary Hargrave website — bio archived as at 11 July 2018, compared to current site accessed February 2020

• Gary Hargrave’s apology letter — 1 November 2019, with Caleb LaPlante’s response