Posted by Detractor on July 18, 2009 at 22:50:45
In Reply to: Re: re. "other side of the dispute" posted by Larry Eskridge on July 07, 2009 at 04:59:40:
Having been in the family since the summer of 70, I remember when some of the Jesus People orgs. were taken over by COG. The way it happened was via infiltration. The COG sent some of its more charismatic members to visit House of Judah, Jesus People Army and other orgs.
The COG was an ultra controlled environment and a self described (by top family leadership at the time, who parroted Berg) "dictatorship". Because of the extremely controlled environment of COG, those JP orgs were impressed with the appearance of a zealous group of youth (COG) whose emphasis at the time was personal "witnessing". The impression given Jesus People groups was of a more dedicated, and more effective group, rather than a more controlled one.
This period in COG history pre-dated literature sales and FFing.
David Hoyt was lead to believe that the two groups (House of Judah and COG) were melding, but the truth was, HOJ was absorbed by COG and Hoyt was treated as a "king" and separated from his followers while engaging in speaking at different COG bases. One of those was "Zion" which was a "babe's ranch" located near Brenham TX.
While he was taken to various areas his followers were indoctrinated into COG. This was an intentional effort to absorb his following and spit out the leader because Hoyt liked top dog role, too, and when it became obvious to Hoyt that he had lost control of HOJ and his followers were now either COG or left altogether, he eventually left. I don't know the details of that.
I remember seeing Linda Meisner in Germany in about 71. She had left Jesus People Army but I don't know what happened with any of her followers. She was not the only leader of JPA and others did not like COG.
David Wilkerson was very anti-COG at the time and not happy that she joined.
She had worked with Wilkerson at the time that Nicky Cruz (The Cross and the Switchblade) was converted to Jesus People-dom.
She is someone that was absorbed into COG and was eventually put into a leadership position in Scandinavia. Then the letter "Kings" came out, which was a death knell for any charismatic leadership including some of Berg's immediate family.
It seems they were a threat to Berg and some were developing their own mini followings within.
Thus started the "Visiting Servant" categorization. These were not necessarily people who were better educated than some original COG members, but they didn't have much personality and were devoted to carrying out Berg's suggestions (which were understood to actually be "orders"). Berg didn't like big personalities who might threaten his position.