LAY MINISTER'S VANCOUVER ISLAND SINKING PROPHECY PROVEN WRONG AGAIN

Even though I'm writing this in June, I feel confident that Brother Herald (not his real name) will be wrong again about Vancouver Island sinking into the Pacific. All but two of his outlandish prognostications never came to pass. The two which did occur were because he heard news reports of them before we did.

So who was this Brother Herald? He founded his own church and led a tiny congregation which met in the basement of a house in Edmonton. Our lay minister claimed to be a prophet and often made predictions of disaster at his Wednesday evening Bible studies.

During the summer of 1974, he claimed to have dreamt that he held a copy of The Edmonton Journal with the headline, "VANCOUVER ISLAND SUNK" in bold type. He tried to read the date but all he could make out was "June 30." The year was unreadable, according to him.

As a result of his subjective experience, Brother Herald warned us not to live on the west coast. I felt nervous when I went on a student exchange trip to Victoria and Vancouver as a result of his prediction. My prayers seemed to be answered when I arrived safely in Edmonton. This had the unfortunate effect of strengthening my belief in this false prophet's prophecies.

Vancouver Island is still exactly where it was when Brother Herald made his ridiculous prediction and I feel confident that it'll still be there for years to come. My assurance is based on the fact that this pseudo-prophet's predictions have consistently failed to materialize. Even the one about Pope John Paul II visiting Edmonton wasn't real since I heard about the planned trip on the news.

I wrote about Brother Herald and his preposterous predictions in my new book called How I Was Razed: A Journey from Cultism to Christianity. Visit Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Virtual Bookworm Publishers to read more about this amazing story of God's marvelous providence.

HOW TO TELL IF A PROPHET IS A PHONY.

Many TV preachers claim to know what will happen in the future. How can a person tell if those prognosticators are right or wrong? The Bible states that if what they predict doesn't come to pass, those prophets have spoken presumptuously and we need not fear them. In fact, one passage even calls for false prophets to be stoned to death.

Though I didn't know it at the time, I whole-heartedly believed the predictions of a false prophet. In my upcoming How I Was Razed: A Journey from Cultism to Christianity memoir, I wrote about this man's many prognostications. None of them came to pass as he predicted they would. Here is one outrageous example of his phony prophecies.

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In addition to receiving revelations, prophesying, and teaching, Brother Herald claimed he received divine messages in dreams. "A great earthquake will cause Vancouver Island to sink on the thirtieth of June," he declared one Wednesday. "I dreamt that I was sitting at my kitchen table with The Edmonton Journal in my hand. Across the front page were the words, 'VANCOUVER ISLAND SUNK!' in large type. It was dated June the thirtieth. I tried to read the year but it was smudged. God didn't permit me to read it because he doesn't want me to reveal the entire date. People would use the information to place bets and enrich themselves if they knew it."

Though I understood God's need to withhold the year from us, I still frowned. "It would be fun to tell the sceptics what was going to happen and then to say, 'I told you so,' when it did," I mused as he taught.

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How I Was Razed is the testimony of how God revealed his true character to me after charismatic house church elders misled me for more than fifteen years. You're welcome to contact me directly for more information about this upcoming paperback.