The Double Life By Michael Montoya

As I have intimated on my Facebook page, this next piece is going to be much harder to write than the first one because of what I am going to address. The first writing, "Where Are They Now," I joked, was mostly "What Were We Then?" It was a synopsis, as one on-liner put it, of our common experience in the group and only a little part of the writing was devoted to our life now, that is to say, our lives now. There is a difference; a difference that needs elaboration.

This subject for me is very difficult to describe. It seems to grow and expand every time I look at it. Let me get down to it now. We were in a group. This is a fact. The nature of a group affects the members of it. Certain things occur in all groups intentionally and sometimes unexpectedly, corporately and to individuals. Relationships are formed but not all of them will be the same in intensity or meaning and are not necessarily linked to the group’s purpose. As a group we shared common experiences but, unlike other groups our degree of commitment, attendance, and investment was not comparable to other churches, organizations, societies, or fellowships.

If you think about why a group is formed you might get a sense of its mission, goal, purpose, and identity and the will of its members. The leader of a group is appointed within the group, different from the rank and file, and performs and acts differently than the group's members. This is true of New Testament church leadership. But how church leadership is regarded by our Lord Jesus and Paul is different from the world. “The kings and rulers of the earth exercise authority and lord it over them, but not so among you. For whoever would be great among you must be your slave,” “slave of all and last of all.” Paul said that he thought God displayed the apostles as last and least in the church. As Christians, regardless of how we gather here on earth locally, we were first born again into the body of Christ globally. We are, by the Holy Spirit, spiritual brothers and sisters and our Father is God in Heaven. Our Chief Shepherd, our Lord is God. This is before we gather locally into a local expression of the body of Christ, a church or fellowship. God revealed to Paul the apostle “HOW” the Body of Christ was to be constructed locally. He wrote these instructions in letters to Timothy and Titus.

Churches vary in their composition based on doctrine; what they believe the scriptures mean. Hundreds of denominations and factions exist within the body of Christ. It is the Holy Spirit in us, who counsels us and guides us in the knowledge of God. He grows us in His grace. He unites us in our first love as members of the Body of Christ. His work is availability is to all Christians. The difference in Christians is how much they yield to the Holy Spirit. We bear the fruit of the Spirit which is not doctrine, it is demonstration that we are abiding in Him. This becomes important later when we discuss our dual membership.

One aspect of humanity that calls for the need to form a group or gathering is our innate dependency. Our awareness of this is felt in something called loneliness. The majority of humans, made in the image of God, suffer when "alone" and most need to connect to “another.” We need friendships, family, marriage. We are called to churches and fellowships. We see our Lord expressing in John 17 the ultimate "together" and one. Even outside God's intended life for us, the godless gather in groups and societies because they, like us, were also created dependent. In one form or another, they belong to something or someone. God said in the beginning that "it is not good for man to be alone." The exception is when God, according to Paul, bestows the gift of singleness on a person. He then does not have the need to marry but can devote his life to the Greatest Other, God. I am reminded of the older widow in Paul’s letter “who has set her hope on God” and does not intend to remarry. Her “other” is God Himself.

Whether you are a believer in God or not, the human condition just from a sociological and psychological perspective presents honestly our need to belong to "another," to be with "others." We need to commune, to fellowship, to not be alone. Why define the concept of "group"? Because we who were in the Forever Family and the Church of Bible Understanding were in a "group." There was bound to be an effect. Some haven't taken the time to think what the personal impact was being a member of such a group. Some haven't taken the time to examine the impact Traill had on them. Some have blended the group and the leader together. We were taught to blend the members, the leader, Jesus, and His will all together. This is one of the unique features of our specific group.

Dual Membership

Generally speaking all Christians have a kind of dual membership. We all were born of the Spirit and so we are members of the Body of Christ. Agreed? And most Christians are not alone but attend a local expression of the body of Christ, called a church. What made us different in our dual membership is that the leader taught the 2 memberships equal and one. Again, please remember the written and unwritten, the spoken and unspoken idea that "if you leave fellowship, '99% of them backslide.'" Remember all the talk of our calling, our high calling. Traill’s idea was that if you went to another church or another fellowship you would not be being faithful to what Jesus called you to in the FF and Cobu. It was language like this, year in and year out and Stewart's behavior toward, not only unsaved outsiders but Christian brothers and sisters outside his group which affected our thinking. We learned with our minds, saw with our eyes, and practiced with our lives this cult mentality. We helped him build the walls around us to shut out the world and shut out the rest of the Body of Christ.

We were not like other Christians and yet we were. It is because we lived 2 lives and 2 masters were operating concurrently. Christians outside our group also had a relationship with Jesus and they were members of a church, but their "not neglecting to meet together" was not taught conceptually to be equal to their faithfulness to Jesus; ours was. Your diehard ex-members still believe this equation and they still equate and blend as they were taught to. They treat "outside" Christians, even ex-member, with the same contempt. I ask again, why do some ex-members of this FF/COBU group still believe in Jesus and still serve Him WITHOUT THE GROUP, OUTSIDE COBU? They are no longer "in" the group. It is proof to me that our individual lives, relationships with Jesus, are NOT dependent on the life of the group or the leader. For us there is a dual membership but also a problem with “equating” these memberships and subordinating one to the other. We were born of the Spirit and our life with God we lived, under Traill’s leadership. Remember Gamaliel's counsel to the Pharisees? He gave examples of groups tied to a leader and when the leader was gone the group broke up; came to nothing. In those cases the life of the group was dependent on the life of the leader. Gamaliel made a distinction between what was of God and what was an undertaking of man. Our one True Leader of the church, our Chief Shepherd also died, which would have disintegrated his followers. But Jesus rose from the dead and his followers, the members the body of Christ, did not break up or “come to nothing” but turned the world upside down. I believe the formation of the FF/Cobu was an undertaking of man but that our salvation and life in Christ was an undertaking of God. These are separate things and must not be equated.

In Cobu we were taught directly and indirectly that our life in Jesus WAS our life in the fellowship. No scripture can support the elevation of a leader or a gathering or group to the importance of our individual life in Jesus. We are branches and we abide in the Vine. Our life comes from Jesus. This was Stewart’s error to not follow scripture with regard to church structure and appointed leadership. It was our error to allow him to do this and to give him the power and authority and job description that belongs only to the Holy Spirit. So we left ST’s group and yet we live. Our life with Jesus still exists. Life in the group is not equal to life with Jesus. The teaching of Traill does not equal "God showed him, God talked to him." By Stewart elevating himself and equating himself, we were taught the equation. We lived under the belief of that equation and the fruit of this equation is in the hearts and minds of those currently living in Cobu.

Now I know that some FFer's are going to read this, scratch their heads, and wonder to what am I referring. This is absolutely fair because as I said before, we all got in as individuals at different times, left at different times, and our contact with ST also varied from person to person. This is why we can disagree about the whole subject and yet not suffer much loss because THE GROUP LIFE was only part of our eternal life with Jesus. The diehard ex-members don't see it this way and when they argue they are fighting for their very spiritual identity and not placing the FF/Cobu in its proper, subordinated context.

Why we belong to a group or choose to belong to a particular entity with members tells us something about ourselves but that is not the only benefit of a group. What the group is about plays a part, dramatic or not, in our daily lives, depending on what kind of a group it is. Can we agree also that what impact a leader has on a group is not set or specific? The role of a leader, his job description, can be set and specific but how he leads, what he proposes, installs or instills, is as complex as humanity itself. There are examples of godly leaders and ungodly leaders, faithful elders and false teachers. ST fits one of these descriptions because he does not live outside scripture. No one does.

For us, those who were in the Forever Family and Cobu, there is a series of complications. We did indeed belong to this group. It was not a weekly, 1 hour, attendance thing. We lived in this group. By definition and geography we were in a unique category when it comes to existing groups, organizations, churches, or institutions. If we were instead attending Boy Scout meetings every weekend, the impact on our lives would be minimal. The subject matter would be useful and innocuous and the heart/mind investment would be minute. Ron Enroth wrote in his book Churches That Abuse that the recidivism rate of Cobu was among the highest in America among cults. He then gives Traill credit for his mastery of manipulation. I would offer a more accurate accounting. Because we, the members were willing to believe that we were serving God BY serving in Cobu (equating) we gave our hearts and minds to Cobu as if we were giving them to God. We thought God was pleased with this and that He saw our faithfulness to Him the way Traill taught it.

We were actual Christians. I repeat this because it is essential to remember that we were not average godless, spiritless, cult members. Because we were actual Christians, we stayed, served, and toughed out some terrible conditions and some of the worst psychological abuse because of what we believed about why we were doing it. Our ability to endure was rooted in our belief in God our Father. We believed we were following Jesus by serving in the fellowship. This is similar to what happens with Mormons and Catholics. The leadership and the doctrine, in my opinion, are erroneous but this does not discount the heart of the believer in God in those groups. The ex-member who still believes Traill and the FF were of God and God's will, understand this concept backward because Traill did. They will talk to you today and will NOT have fellowship with you based on your heart and where you are with Jesus in your relationship with Him. No, they will set up a check point and ask to see your papers with regard to Traill’s doctrine and your opinion of him as a leader and the group he formed. These equations: Jesus=Traill , Traill= Elijah, Moses=Traill, and therefore whatever ST=Bible; it was established by Stewart not by the Christians who followed his lead. At the Grace Meeting one brother on the tape said "We turned, what does the bible say into what does Stewart say." Stewart himself said that he took Jesus' place. This thinking originated with him. I also think that the evidence of Stewart’s self exaltation can be found in the years of the Forever Family. In the 1973 “Personality” bible study Stewart talked about his gift to discern spirits. This declaration separated and elevated Traill above the Christians around him. Earlier Stewart said that God had given him “true interpretation” of the Bible. He meant that the Christians of the Forever Family not only had a special view of the Bible available to them that other Christian did not have, but it later meant that they(FF’ers) no longer could study the Bible on their own and learn from the Holy Spirit themselves. They needed to check their understanding of scripture with the only one who knew the “true” meaning of God’s word as shown to him by God.

Members of the Forever Family will still tell me, "But ST wasn't like that before 1976!" I agree. There were actual signs of this stuff from the beginning and evidence of ST's godless leadership at his own home but I do not expect FFer's to remember clearly or to do the work I have done, researching printed FF docs and talking to members who were there, listening to recordings from 1972-73. It is a matter of what you knew at the time. This brother who was one of the first 5 in the Forever Family described Stewart this way:

"Stewart came around every day, looking after a luxuriant spiritual plant that had marvelously sprung up without him, right under his nose, and seemed to call for a daily watering from him, to which duty he perhaps too diligently attended, anxiously thinking too much of his supposed responsibility, I think, and laying the groundwork for the high anxiety that, by its impatience with the more easy-going faith personified by Skip O'Neill, would one day discourage the church."

It would be wrong to think the FFers had today’s understanding and today’s maturity to call ST to account back then. Remember that there were those few who did oppose him and he shot them down and we applauded Traill for it. I make the argument to those who were in the FF that in hind sight your opinion about what you belonged to would greatly change if you look back at what was actually said and done at the time. Because of the dual nature of this looking back, you will find that the FF was a part of your life, not equal to your life with Jesus. You were Christians and you did have fellowship with Christians. Stewart's undertaking was not your fellowship in Christ with each other.

In Cobu we were taught every aspect of life and how to live it. Let us establish that 1) God saved us and was now going to show us how to live and 2) Traill then entered and "taught" us "how to live" with the bible which is God's book about Himself and "how to live" while still here on earth as sons and daughter of God. We were Christians so we could not, give ourselves over completely to Traill because God put His Spirit in us. God kept His faith with us in kept His promise and commitment to help and lead us. Traill's attempt at total control could never be and has never been realized because he chose to control Christians. God bought us and God owns us. “He yearns jealously over the Spirit He has made to dwell in us.” I would even say that the current members, “at the scent of water would sprout again.” I do think we need to admit that any human being who invests his mind, heart, and strength in to a group or an entity and is willing to accept or receive what a leader says to them or does to them, that there is impact, effect, impression, psychological indentation. One simply cannot put themselves in a group like Cobu and not retain or sustain some bumps, bruises, thought change, or heart damage. This is true of those who invested in the group. If you were a quick in and out then none of this will make sense or apply to you. You may not care like some ex-members do and that’s okay.

One feature which makes understanding our experience more difficult is that the group's existence spans decades. We make the mistake of carrying notes from different time periods of the group and we find disagreement in what we are trying to arrive at as a universal truth about our experience. There are some things that did not change but there are plenty of things that happened later in the group that did not happen in the beginning. There are really good things that happened at the beginning which later members never experienced. Through all of this we were Christians and so now, after all is said and done, we Christians can still have real fellowship in the Holy Spirit according to 1st John not according to geography or one man's control.

It is a separating process: winnowing. We were young and the "how to" of life here on earth and our life with Jesus were being taught to us by the Spirit and separately by Traill. He couldn't succeed with older people for the reason that their "how to do life" was well under way and St's tricks and sales tactics did not work on people who had lived a little. He could not completely succeed with us because of God's Spirit but he did get to us at a young age which made us more susceptible to his psychological control.

The truth is, for some of us, now is that we are "out" of the group but still "in" fellowship with Jesus. In the group the "in" Cobu = "in" Jesus. Now that we are "out" of the group, ST taught that we were also "out" of fellowship with God. We are older now and living the Christian life after Cobu. We are Christians still, after Traill. We proved him wrong. The void of learning, practicing, and doing life is wide open for us but it is not a void entirely because "HE who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ." For the ex-members who invested their minds and hearts in the group, first we need to realize that we have a life in Jesus. "How then ought we to live?" The Spirit will show us, the scriptures tell us how. We need to face the truth about what we came from. If not, then we might proceed from the notion that Traill and Cobu were fine all together or in part and therefore be tempted to believe some of the "teaching of "how to" be a Christian. We might think that some things should still be practiced and some ex-members still do behave like Traill. They still do his training whether they are aware of it or not.

What was the Manhattan Training Center? It was a life course on how to do the Christian LIFE not just one aspect of it. It was suppose to be rigorous preparation for the end times. With every “school” and ST created 3 or 4, it was primarily ST teaching with word and example “how to be a Christian.” He wasn’t qualified to teach and his conduct disqualified him from continuing to do so. We lived in and lived every moment of our lives in Cobu based on a model constructed of ST's teachings. If this were again an innocuous club that just tampered with a hobby on weekends then none of this would matter. I contend that we ex-members have a major problem because ST took Jesus' place and tried to engineer our very lives, something crudely imitating what The Holy Spirit has sole authority to do. Does anyone remember ST's dream of a whole school system: Lamb, Young Sheep, Middle, Older, Child, and something I can't remember? The last and highest level was Man of Understanding or man of God, can't quite remember. It was a 7 level school. One of the courses in the curriculum was "Directing Others Lives." Can someone tell me who was suppose to teach that class and where in the bible does it show that we Christians eventually direct others lives?

So now we are in present day life. We are in present day Christian life. For the ex-member, depending on how engrossed each one of you, individually became in Traill’s gospel, you will show how much you have detoxed from Traill. You will show how much you have accepted what the Spirit has revealed to you and how much of His teaching you have accepted in the present.

The bible was misapplied, the teaching of how to live was taught wrong and so we had as Christians the right words with the wrong meaning. We had the right words with the wrong application. So when we ex-members live, we struggle to do the bible but the way the Spirit teaches us while shedding what Traill misunderstood and taught. Same book, but for us, we have two teacher, one false, one True.. Now that we're out, how have we lived (individually)? How do we live, how should we live, the nuts and bolts. We were taught everything about everything inside Cobu so to speak. We gave our minds and hearts and trusted Traill that what he was saying was what God meant “about everything.” This is why we gave so much of ourselves to Traill and the group. We believed we were serving God and we were because we were true Christians. Why did Ron Enroth say that the return rate of Cobu members was among the highest among cults? Because we invested ourselves into the group and into St teaching as though we were investing in God which we were because we believed this. Current members of Cobu, some of them, might be able to say, right now, confidently that they are doing God's will and pleasing Jesus because they have not yet made the distinction that following St's teaching about God IS NOT the same as listening to God in the Holy Spirit and doing His will.

OTHERS: US AND THEM

Look back with me to the beginning, 1971, the Message coffee house. What did Traill think of "other" Christians then? What did they think of him? Go forward. What did ST think of Christians outside the FF or those inside his group who were "Led of the Lord" to go elsewhere. Stewart wrote, himself, in mocking tones what he thought of them. Not my words, his.

Look at these documents from early FF days and see Stewart in his own words from 1972 speak about other Christians. This same view is now expressed by those who look at ST and their FF days as pleasing to God.

Homily 1972 page 1

Homily 1972 page 2

Homily 1972 page 3

Forever Family Tract

Concentrate alone on what ST thought of other Christians and how he spoke of them, how he treated them. There is little evidence of treatment because they were obviously unwelcome in his group and he did not seek them out. My belief is that Pastor Wurmbrand and Pastor Popov were invited grudgingly by Stewart to come and speak to us. I think the only reason Traill even knew about them was because of the brothers and sisters in Cobu who first learned about the Voice of the Martyrs. One ex-member tried to challenge my assessment that Traill ran a closed group and pointed to a few examples of ST making contact with outside Christians. I concede that ST did succeed in this but no one can show me a pattern, doctrine, or guiding philosophy or teaching that confirms the idea that ST made a habit of or taught us to “have fellowship” with other Christians. ST had an unhealthy "us and them" mind set and he passed this on to us. Every Christian who was in the FF and Cobu who was under ST leadership, absorbed some of his thinking. How could we not? A major component of his thinking was what he thought his group was and what he thought of those outside his group. Without precise information, without contact, ST judged Christians outside his influence as "game players" hypocrites, Contentious Church Christians.... all this without the benefit of the doubt and without information. Some ex-members display this same kind of judgmentalism. Remember God spoke to Traill so why did he need to bother actually meeting face to face with other Christians? He knew what they were. I said this to an ex-member recently, “I think that you judge wrongly everyone outside your group. When I say “group” I mean anyone who agrees with you IS in your group. Think about this: Is your fellowship with Christians based in the Holy Spirit and His work in them and you or is it contingent upon their accepting your way or view of Christianity? This is the legacy of Traill. He made the fellowship and membership in the fellowship equal to fellowship with God. He judged and made judges out of all of us, teaching us “who’s in and who’s out” based on 1) adherence to his thinking and teaching and 2) his own judgment of a person’s faithfulness to his idea because “his idea was from God. He had true interpretation.” Remember?

The Fruit

The fruit of the Spirit is love , joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control, against such there is no law.” The fruit of the stewart is contempt, depression, anxiety, Hurry, speak, loud, fast! pushy! ,unkindness, judgmentalism, faithfulness(to ST), harshness, legalism for which there are numerous charts, graphs, journals, morning meetings, reports, and dealing sessions. You can fiddle with the fruit of ST and come up with your own list. He did not teach or demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit. He converted each fruit of the Spirit to resemble traits he had already exhibited which were as false and misleading as he was.

Judgment, divisions, age groups, no marriages, no children, no families. Division among ourselves and a gap between the leader and his followers. I could go in several directions here but I will try and stay germane to the topic at hand. Stewart for most the 40+ years of his group has lived apart from his members. He was married. He then got married and is now I think skipping a few steps and is dating a young lady 40 years younger than he. He and his family lived apart from the FF and in Cobu he lived in mansions with his wife and with a group of sisters as well for his sin. Communal living can be disputed as biblical or not. What I am openly wondering is why Traill from the beginning never joined us in “having all things in common”? The countries of the world who practice communism do have at least one thing in common, perhaps two. The masses all live in the same misery and their leaders don’t.

Who came up with the whole concept of judging? Who came up with the, now laughable, age groups? Who came up with the color judgment? Who got in the way of relationships, marriages, who meddled in family matters not his own? Who was it who had his own son beaten by members of Cobu? Who set Shirley up at bars wearing short dresses hoping that she would fall and give grounds for the charge of adultery to gain a divorce? We ex-members can certainly tell and feel the effects of which teacher we listen to now. If it is the Holy Spirit then the fruit of the Spirit will be seen and experienced by us and through us. If anyone of us still clings to Traill’s version of Christianity then one can expect the ex-member to be , judgmental, legalistic, self-righteous, using cheap debating tactics, and have an overall appearance of not having a mind of his own.

The online arguments with such ex-members still boil down to this. Who are you listening to right now, Jesus in the present, or teachings from the past. Although some ex-members do not use the language of the past, they certainly “strive” to do what they were taught. The simple test, which I have used over and over with ex-members who are stuck is this. Question: Do you think I am a Christian? They will say yes because they do not dispute one’s salvation (although some have). Question: Can I have fellowship with you? Here is where the Bible is squashed between what Traill taught and what the Holy Spirit says fellowship is. For the Christian the answer is simple. For the “member” of St’s group, they cannot commit. Why? Well, they need to test you. What does that mean? Long story short, they need to see and hear that you are agreeing with them about ST and his group because in their minds it is THE SAME as one’s faithfulness to Jesus. They are being faithful to their calling and you are not. When they return to Jesus, some of them believe they need to return to how they were taught how to be a Christian. They equate the two. Now to the part which was suppose to be the title of this piece. It’s none of your business.

When I began this writing I wanted to call it, None Of Your Business, because what I wanted to talk about was what we ex-members do now that we are out and how do we handle ex-members who are either bugging us or upsetting us by their cruel, judgmental, Traillism. We learned many things in Cobu, how to treat one another, how to “trust” one another which only resulted in no one trusting anyone except ST who didn’t trust any of us. One of the things built into our group was the “full disclosure” doctrine. John 3:21 “But he who does what is true, comes to the light that he may be clearly seen that his deeds have been wrought in God” was the supposed scriptural support of this idea. From this St taught that we were to “come to the light” and “be fully honest with our brothers and sisters.” “Do you trust what I am putting forth?” All this meant was that ST and every member in Cobu had license to see our insides anytime, anywhere. Plenty have written about this method being popular in cults. I bring this up because right now, some ex-members still believe that they have a right to my insides, a right to know “how I am doing with Jesus” or “how my relationship with Jesus is.” To them I say, None of your business! Now granted this phrase is not to be employed indiscriminately. I do trust some ex-members with my “information.” They are trustworthy as the bible notes that we are able to attain a steadfastness of faith that Paul would commend as trustworthy. Think about the concepts, trustworthiness and commendation in the context of Cobu. So there are brothers and sisters in Christ who reveal in their communication to me that they are with Jesus and are trustworthy and I trust them. I do not tell them everything as this is not scriptural. Honesty does not mean full disclosure and “coming to the light” was misunderstood and misapplied. I told you and will remind you that part of the reason we ex-members argue with one another about Cobu is because of this aspect of our life inside the group. I said that we were individuals who got saved at different times and joined the group at different times and were exposed to ST at different times for long or short periods of time. Factor in what you as the individual invested into ST and the group. How much did you believe? How much of your heart did you put into this group? How much of your mind accepted ST’s teaching and practices? You could have been in for 6 months but if you put everything inside, outside, then your damage would be much worse than the brother or sister who put in 5 years and never really invested heart or mind into what was being taught. Some never had direct contact with Stewart and it is hard for them to imagine who or what I am talking about. Secrecy, boundaries, privacy, all blown apart in Cobu. Imagine: having to check with ST about who you wanted to “start a relationship with to marry.” How was that possibly his business? There were and are so many things that I do not have the right to ask you, the right to know, the right to even think about you. It is none of my business and you have every scriptural support to tell me so.

What about Now

What about the former members of the Church of Bible Understanding formerly known as the Forever Family? Note that ST did use the bible and so his ideas, HIS ideas were about the bible not the bible. His “interpretation” was not the true meaning of scripture but only his thinking on it. His life, his actions, his behavior toward us was not inspired by the Holy Spirit but by his own belief about such things. But we have a problem. We Christians now use the same bible but we now listen to a different teacher. This means differing beliefs of the same text. We already have this among healthy Christians, hence the existence of denominations. Ex-members have to work against one added source when looking at the bible: what ST taught. Millions and millions of Christians do not have this problem. They can disagree about end times, predestination, and all of the doctrines that have been argued about for centuries. We who lived in Cobu had our biblical view tainted. We now are just trying to understand the day to day “how to” of Christianity. When we read the Bible, depending again on how much one has invested in the group, there is right away conflicting teachings, conflicting voices. For me, it is what God is showing me now vs. what that false teacher Traill taught then about the same scripture. I think this is why talking to ex-members is so edifying to me. They know what we were taught. Some of them have pulled away from ST and his group so far and so successfully and have drawn closer to God that they are able to show sound teaching and point to ST’s false doctrines in detail.

What do we do now? For starters we need to recognize just exactly if there is a “we” and, if there is, what is “our” identity.

Here's what I used to think. Everyone who was in the Forever Family and Cobu got saved. Everyone was a Christian. Everyone got bashed by Stewart. Most left. Most now are Christians. Most think St was rotten and most are now in churches and serving God where they are. You can see now by this paper that my understanding of “us” is much more complex now. The point is, we are not a "we" anymore with regard to our membership in the FF or Cobu. We are a "we" because we are the members of the Body of Christ.

How do I behave now toward ex-members? Think of all the assumptions and thinking I would have to wade through before actually speaking to “one of us”. Did I know the person in Cobu? Is the person a Christian now? Is the person a healthy Christian? What does the person think about his or her experience in Cobu, about ST? Was the person in leadership? What time period was he or she in the FF or Cobu or both? The assumption of some is that I and other ex-members are obligated to have a contact with and/or some form of a relationship with any ex-member based on our membership in the group. Because I have said that we had a dual membership, I think it is important to address this issue in light of both.

Am I obligated to speak to, correspond, stay in touch with ex-members? The answer is no. Because of what I believe about St’s group and his obsession to control us, I consider anything that might stem from his work should receive no more of my energy or attention. Those ex-members who have “equated” their lives in the FF/Cobu with their relationship with Jesus will insist on our thinking of each other as still belonging to “the call” to which we were called, which is to them the FF with ST in charge pre-1976.

As I said before that in any group there is a charter, a mission, or purpose but, within the group, relationships are formed: friendships, marriages, etc. I made friends in the FF and Cobu. Today some of those with whom I still wish contact are not Christians. Oh the howling I have had to endure from the Pharisees who found their way physically out of Cobu. Do I have “fellowship” with my non-Christian friends? The answer is no. We cannot in truth. Now, what a conundrum for an ex-member, right? “Friendship with the world is enmity with God.” But I was with these brothers in the context of serving God when we first met, but they now say they are no longer serving God or believing in God the way they did in Cobu. Well, neither do I. Oh the howling of the Pharisees who made it out of Cobu! What can I do? Well that leads me to the second part of our two-parter.

When I look at anyone through the lenses of Cobu, there really is but one course of behavior. But I am a Christian. I was a Christian before I learned from Traill. I received the Holy Spirit before I moved in. I became a member of the Body of Christ before I became a member of the Forever Family. So now, being 30 years out of my cult membership, my relationship with Jesus still exists. I walk with God today, now. So how do I speak to anyone, Christian or not, ex-member, current member, non-member? The Lord Jesus gave me His Spirit. He poured His Spirit into my heart. I learn from the Spirit “how to live” how to love, now. I follow Jesus and hope that I am becoming Christ-like. When I speak to someone, when I engage anyone, I hope that I can walk by the Spirit and love that person in the wisdom God gives me. This means that I am not following rote teaching, not borrowing methods or reviving some ritual of religion, the traditions of men.

Ex-members come in all shapes and sizes and their needs and wants vary. Their needs and wants are not my business. We were taught that they are. I owe no one anything but to love them. Some might say that it would be loving to help ex-members, those who are still struggling from the abuse they sustained under Stewart. To them I would say that I could help only by be a listening ear and then offer my understanding of the time, but the damage is spiritual and so is the healing. My understanding of the matter is just that, my understanding and people can take it or leave it. It is not the one “true” interpretation of the FF/Cobu. There are those who do believe that they have a ministry to help ex-members. I could give my opinion about such ministries but you did not ask for it and so I will not give it. We ex-members are anywhere from 45-65 years old. Most of us are Christians. God has loved us for many years and has taught us Himself. I have not encountered very many ex-members who seem weak or vulnerable enough to buy into another unbiblical group led by an unbiblical leader.

The healing comes from God. He is the only One able to heal us. I do not judge any of the ex-members of the group. I meet them in the present; who they are now. The great “moving on” from our past is truly living in the present with God, isn’t it?. I used to think that one remedy to my damage would be to find as many ST bible studies in print or on tape and go, point by point, and prove exactly how he was wrong wrong wrong. This is, of course, folly in two ways. One, spending any more time around the man in any form is harmful. And two, I’d be barking up the wrong tree. Judging myself, recognizing my own weaknesses and my own flesh, I know that my healing from my past will be like yours and different. We are members of the Body of Christ and individually members of it. There are no blanket answer-one size fits all -cure for everyone. Some might find it helpful to look at ST's teaching and show by scripture and by the Holy Spirit how false he was. I do not think I am up for the task.

Why do ex-members argue with other ex-members? What is the reason for the fighting? I believe half of the fighting is specifically about defining our group, identifying what ST was and the other half is spent on what the remedy, the answer, the cure is for whatever they have defined as the real sickness of Cobu. One of the reasons for the disparate opinions among ex-members is that there is a lack of distinction between our relationship with Jesus and what ST was teaching us about Jesus and about the Christian life. Some ex-members equate these. So when one disagrees with them about their view of St and of his false teaching one is, as taught by ST, disagreeing with God. You are not listening to God. When you left fellowship, you left your relationship with God. It follows that if you want to return to God, you have to return to the teachings of ST in the FF and the Christian life model that he taught prior to 1976. I have been called a backslider, lost, unfaithful. I have been told that I am not saved and that I never was. All this from ex-members who do not live near me, do not have current information about me. Based on what I believe about ST and his group, my life and relationship with Jesus is questioned, mocked, discredited, or declared non-existent.

Remember again what we were taught to think about other Christians, by Stewart, who were outside his group. Remember what we were taught to think of our own brothers and sisters who left fellowship. Can anyone of us think of a single time when Stewart prior to 1976, said anything like, "It may not be God's will for you to be in this fellowship. Yes, you can be a Christian outside this fellowship." I can only think of one person in my age group who met Stewart face to face and gave his reasons for going somewhere else and then left. Anyone who is honest knows that the membership in the FF and the membership in Cobu was more than "not neglecting to meet together." For crying out loud we lived in the thing. Lived, ate, drank, slept, witnessed, studied, got abused, all in St’s group.

One has to only look at healthy churches outside of Cobu. Look at healthy brothers in leadership and consider what scriptures say about churches and about leaders. We were taught the wrong way to look at a "group" and we were not taught how a healthy Christian brother qualifies to become a pastor in God's church.

We were taught unscriptural ways to treat each other. We were taught that we have the right to access each other private lives. We were taught to judge each other. We were taught St's version of Christianity and again for the ex-member who still believes all the stuff from 1971 to 1976 as God's will revealed to ST, anyone who disagrees with him, more precisely, anyone who dares live outside ST/FF/COBU, with their minds, with their hearts, with their very lives IS NOT FAITHFUL TO JESUS which is what the cult leader taught him. Period!

I have no problem disagreeing with ST, researching the facts about him, and then publishing my findings. Because I separate my life with Jesus which He began in me 5 years before I moved in and because God does not look at location and leader as equal to faithfulness to Him, I can be free to disagree and discuss our time in Cobu in its right context without jeopardizing my eternal life.

A true test to see and know if someone is not separating their Christian life from their Cobu life is this. Is the brother or sister treating you the way Jesus would? Are they being Christ-like? Do they bring to your ears current teaching and current revelation of God taught to them by the Spirit of God. Do they act like ST and bring “old” teaching, something that resembles man’s thoughts instead of God’s revelation? Some ex-members withhold fellowship from you based on your views of ST and his group. They can be judgmental, abusive, inappropriate with your private life, demanding an account from you of your relationship with Jesus and will not behave toward you like a Christian until you have met their unscriptural tests which were taught by ST. In these ex-members' minds, faithfulness to ST and his group still = faithfulness to Jesus. If the brother starts out suspicious and untrusting, that's the first red flag. One can still be a Christian and Christ-like and inquire more closely how a brother or sister is doing in their faith and learn from the brother or sister what the truth is concerning their relationship with Jesus without opening the conversation with a pronounced judgment. There is a difference in how we are as Christians, taught and led by the Spirit and how we were shown by ST what "real" Christians are like according to him.

Here is another test for ex-members. If they seem to promote their group or members of their group as much or more than Jesus, than what you have is an ex-member intentionally or unintentionally investing in a group or man and not putting "group" in its proper place and not praising Jesus in His proper place.

So do not be surprised if you are assaulted online by some ex-members who have not understood the truth about ST and his group, have not recovered or healed from it, and/or wish, in some form or another to return to practicing Traillism. As Stewart did not accept the Christians outside his group, so now do ex-members, who adhere to his teaching, not accept, believe, or trust anyone who acknowledges Jesus as their savior, if they do not first prove that they agree with their new cult that has formed outside of cobu.

The poison we must all finally remove is really anything Traill. FFer's will testify of God working through them, and all the great things Jesus was to them and for them. The mistake is to then give glory or credit or endorsement to ST. Even pastors in healthy churches do not accept what rightfully belongs to God. But these devotees to a man and a group make their Christian fellowship with you conditional upon what you believe about their man and their group and not what you believe about Jesus and what He has begun in you. It is a testimony to their error and of your existing relationship with Jesus, when they abuse you and exclude you. Cult thinking begets cult behavior. Remember the dual nature of our experience in the FF/Cobu. We had a life with God in Jesus. We had and have the Holy Spirit inside us. We also were in a group and we listened to a teacher. We lived in a group and were controlled by a leader. The grace of God is that ST was not and is not more powerful than God and when all is said and done what God has done in us and through us and for us will remain and ST's wickedness will be burned up. But we have freewill. If we choose to cling to one master's wood, hay, and stubble, and reject the other Master's gold silver, and precious stones, we will suffer loss but God will still keep his promises and save us.

Years ago I had dreams of confronting Stewart. I pictured myself marching into a meeting, standing up, and taking on the false teacher. When I started the web site and began to gather information about ST and the group, I thought that I was being prepared by God to march into a meeting and take on the false teacher. Years went by and my contact with ex-members caused me to realize that I was not the only one who dreamed of a confrontation. I soon stopped dreaming about or thinking about confronting ST. I had passed some stage in my healing. I wrote a script for a fictional meeting wherein I did get my chance to face Stewart. It was a good exercise and some who read it thought that I actually went to 162 and had this head to head( insert the sound of bowling pins here). At the end of my script and to my surprise, Stewart won the argument. He was still in charge after I had my say. I realized then that unless God Himself speaks to me and sends me, any attempt on my part to confront, remove, or replace Stewart would fail. Oh, did I tell you that I dreamed of taking Stewart’s place as pastor of Cobu? Yes, I dreamed of that about 12 years ago.

About all this dreaming. Can I give my opinion? I think that there are other ex-members who think to put themselves forward to replace Stewart when he is gone. There are some who think that they are the rightful heir to the converse sneakers. I wonder if they will fight each other to get St’s job. I think KGB is the heir apparent. They didn’t go by scripture when ST took the job. They didn’t go by scripture when he kept the job. So I doubt they will follow scripture when they replace their him.

And speaking of the next pastor of the Cobu; yes, I thought about that too. Here again is an example of identifying what you are speaking of correctly so that you can act according to the truth. For the current members, if they think the group was God’s will and ST’s leadership was God’s will then it stands to reason that they will continue the group and the leadership will fall to one of their own. For ex-members who hold that The Forever Family and Stewart the leader prior to 1976 was God’s will, they might be hoping to offer their services to bring Cobu back to its founding, believing that God blessed the FF but did not approve of what it became.

And there those who were in Cobu, got out, and moved on to become educated, ordained, pastors. They have been tested and approved by elders in local congregations and have served for the last 25 years in the pulpit or in the field. I have not heard any of them declare or hint at any interest in taking the post when it is vacated.

I come now to my category. I am an ex-member who was and is still a Christian. I do not have any education logged in seminary. My personality and my weaknesses show in how I have handled my time in Cobu and how I have understood the meaning of things over the years. I do not think Stewart was suppose to start the Forever Family. I think the members of the group were Christians, but I do not think it was God’s desire for Stewart to gather them and lead them. Because I believe this, you can guess what I think of the current group of Christians living in the Church of Bible Understanding. Would I take the job if offered? I do not know. I have ideas for and against. Let me be honest about what I would do if I were tested, approved, and installed as pastor of Cobu. I would end our involvement in Haiti. I would ask other Christians to take up the work in our stead. Haiti was a good work but it was used to enslave members to the group. I would ask for an IRS audit and face the consequences, if any, and make right what I could. As for our brethren, the first meeting would be to decide whether or not the Church of Bible Understanding should continue to exist. If it is agreed that our brethren should disband then I would hope to begin a slow process of drawing down until our brethren are living independently of physical Cobu. I would also at the same time get our brethren to healthy Christians in healthy churches. I would, if allowed, guard our brethren from ex-members who would in their various ways further harm them with their thinking or their remedies, not having fully recovered themselves from Traillism.

To answer the idea or claim of healing or remedy, I say that the one cure, the one way to be healed and made whole is to go to God. You might say that you know this already or may ask exactly what I mean or how or in what way? I am saying the answer to the Christian of 1971, the Christian of 1974, the Christian of 1983, the Christian now is this. You were born again. You received the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit is your Lord and Counselor and teacher. You can be healed from Cobu by Him. You can understand scripture, apart from ST, by listening to Him. You can live your Christian life by walking by the Spirit. Your life in prayer is the most important. In prayer it is you and Him. This is what should have been taught years ago. Nothing can separate you from the love of God and nothing should come between you and God and you must not put any man or anything between you and God. Isn’t this the very reason why so many of us suffered in Cobu, because we did not obey scripture and the Spirit but allowed a man to come between us and God?

If our brethren in current Cobu decide that they want to continue together, they should still shut Haiti down and call for a financial accounting. The work of the next pastor of Cobu must include recognition of the truth of what Stewart Traill did to our brethren and by God’s strength, His power, His wisdom, By the Holy Spirit, and to undo what has been done, what has been allowed. I honestly do not see myself as the next pastor. I look at the qualifications for bishops and deacons in Timothy and Titus and I judge myself as having not met them. Maybe someday I will meet the qualifications. Perhaps I am too critical of myself. The testing and appointing is not my job anyway and those who examine me would have to reach their decision without my judgment. I see myself as a Christian, a husband and father. I see myself as beginning to learn true Christianity now after being a Christian for 39 years. Imagine that!

P.S. Those ex-members who are witnessing right now, who were once members of the Forever Family and Cobu, I do judge you. I do not know your heart. I cannot, based on your actions determine WHY you are doing what you are doing. I should rejoice when Christ is preached, no matter what the motive. My concern is that at least one of your number believes that the FF and ST leading it prior to 1976 was God’s will and I am afraid that once he leads someone to Jesus, he will then teach and train the new convert with the only Christianity he knows, Traillism.

Thank you for listening. The Grace of Our Lord Jesus and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you, to the glory of God, our Father.