"Take Out From Under The Blood"
Excommunication in the Message movement — what Branham taught, what pastors actually do, and how the practice survives no biblical test. Including a side-by-side comparison against the New Testament procedural standard the movement claims to honor.
This article documents the practice of excommunication in the Message movement. It names ministers who are publicly on record as practicing "take out from under the blood." Every named minister appears in published source material (Believe The Sign, Arizona Daily Star, William Branham Sermons archive). No claim is paraphrased. Branham quotes are verbatim from the canonical sermon transcripts at the cited DateCode. The article applies Branham's own procedural standard alongside the New Testament procedural standard.
1.The Phrase: "Take Out From Under The Blood"
The Message movement has a euphemism for excommunication. The phrase is "take out from under the blood." A pastor announces, from the pulpit or in private, that a person who has left the church has been "taken out from under the blood of Jesus Christ" — meaning, in the pastor's framing, that the leaver is no longer saved, no longer covered by the atonement, no longer to be associated with by congregants. The pastor then instructs the congregation to shun the named person, often including the leaver's own family.
The phrase performs three things at once:
- It claims pastoral authority over salvation. The pastor is the actor; the leaver is the object. The blood becomes a covering the pastor can administer or withdraw.
- It pronounces damnation. Not "this person has chosen a different path" — but "this person is now lost." Eternal stakes are attached to the leaver.
- It commands shunning. Once announced, the congregation's social obligation flips. Friends become strangers. Parents become permitted to refuse contact with their adult children. Children are pressured to refuse contact with parents.
The phrase is documented across Message churches in survivor testimony, in critic-podcast transcripts (Believe The Sign), and in pastors' own pulpit recordings (Calgary Living Word Assembly, where Barry Johnson prayed publicly that the congregation would "not slander a brother or a sister or try and take anything out from under the blood"). It is in active use. The question this article asks is: where does the practice come from, and does it survive its own founder's test?
2.Branham's Doctrinal Foundation: Rejecting the Message = Damnation
The "out from under the blood" practice did not arise in a vacuum. It rests on a doctrinal foundation William Branham preached, repeatedly, across his recorded ministry: that rejection of "the Message" is the unforgivable step that places a person outside Christ's saving blood. The verbatim record is unambiguous.
That's just the first step: rejecting Christ, rejecting the message. No matter how much you try to pretend. That don't do nothing to you. That only takes you deeper in hell. Your life proves what you are.
When the ones that's rejected the message, will be asked to give a reason, what then? What then? Think of it now, real deeply. While we bow our heads, think of it: When the ones that's rejecting this message tonight, going to be asked to give a reason, what then?
I don't believe in this here Baptist teaching of eternal security. I believe it in a way, but I believe you're secure as long as you're in the church. But you get out of the … out from under the blood of Jesus Christ, you're not secure. I'm secure from the rain as long as I'm in here. And when you are baptized into the Holy Ghost and say you got the Holy Ghost, and then deny God's Word? Say you believed and received the Holy Ghost, and then deny that the Word is true?
What a great blessing it is to our hearts to be on the inside now, under the blood, while that last angel passes through the land, taking out … the ones that's out from under the blood — they died without mercy.
Set the four quotes side by side and the doctrinal architecture becomes visible:
- Rejection of the Message is the unforgivable step. Not denying Christ in the abstract — but rejecting the specific Branham-Message proclamation. (1956-07-15)
- Those who reject the Message will be without excuse on the Day of Judgment. Framed in eschatological terms. (1957-09-01)
- Security is conditional and revocable. Salvation is held "as long as you're in the church" — and someone who denies God's Word is no longer under the blood. The doorway out is a person's own response, but the resulting state is real and damning. (1963-01-16)
- Those out from under the blood die without mercy. The eternal stakes are explicit. The angel passing through "takes out" the ones outside. (1963-11-10)
Branham's consistent framing is descriptive: the person who rejects the Message is — by their own act — out from under the blood. Branham did not, in these passages, claim that the pastor performs the removal. But he established the theological fact that the state exists, that it is eternal, and that it follows from rejecting his teaching. The Message pastors who weaponized the phrase added one step: they appointed themselves as the announcer of who has fallen into that state.
4.Branham's Procedural Disclaimer (61-0112) — And Why Pastors Ignore It
In one notable Q&A session at his own Branham Tabernacle on 1961-01-12, William Branham was asked directly about excommunication. His answer pushed back, hard, against pastoral authority to perform it. The quotes below are from that single Q&A, sections §188 through §191, in order. They are the strongest counter-evidence against modern Message pastoral practice — counter-evidence that comes from Branham's own mouth.
We don't take people's names off the book and excommunicate them, and everything like that, because I believe that's not in our duties to do that. I believe it's God does the excommunicating.
I believe the thing to do is for the church to get together and pray for this brother. If he still don't straighten up, then let a couple go with him, go to the brother to be reconciled. And then if he don't receive it, then tell it before the church. Then if they don't receive it then, that's the time for the whole church then … I don't believe that any deacon board has a right to throw anybody out of church, or any trustee board, or any pastor has a right to do it.
I think if anybody was to be disfellowshipped, would be because of immoral living, or something like that, that he wasn't a fit person — like a man coming in here defiling our girls, or insulting our women, and things like that … or taking our little boys out and making perverts out of them, or something — those things should be taken up, and then that fellow should be excommunicated from the fellowship, and not permitted to take communion with it.
And Lewi Pethrus … said, "We don't put him out." "Well, what do you do?" Said, "We pray for him." I thought that was so sweet. That sounded Christian-like to me. "We pray for him." Nobody puts him out. They pray for him … So I think that's a good way to have it, don't you, brethren? And that way we are brethren.
Branham's 1961-01-12 procedural rules, in his own words:
- God excommunicates, not the church. The active verb belongs to God. The church's posture is descriptive, not declarative.
- Pastors have no authority to throw anyone out. Neither does the deacon board. Neither does the trustee board. Branham named all three categories of leadership explicitly to exclude them.
- Matthew 18 process is required. Private conversation → small group of witnesses → tell the whole church → only then, the whole church (not the pastor alone) acts.
- The trigger is immoral conduct, not disagreement. Branham's specific list: defiling our girls, insulting our women, making perverts of our little boys. Sexual predation. Not questioning, not leaving, not "rebellion." Sexual predation.
- The recommended response to a sinning brother is to pray for him. Branham endorsed Lewi Pethrus's Swedish Pentecostal practice — "we pray for him" — as "Christian-like" and explicitly recommended it: "I think that's a good way to have it, don't you, brethren?"
This single Q&A demolishes the modern Message excommunication practice. Every "take you out from under the blood" announcement from a Message pulpit violates:
- Branham's rule that only God excommunicates, not pastors.
- Branham's rule that pastors have no right to throw anyone out of church.
- Branham's rule that the Matthew 18 process must precede any congregational action.
- Branham's rule that the only valid trigger is immoral conduct — specifically sexual predation against women and children — not doctrinal disagreement or leaving the assembly.
- Branham's recommendation that the church's posture toward a sinning brother is to pray for him.
The pastors are not following Branham. They are doing the opposite of what Branham explicitly taught. The article does not have to import an outside standard to make this critique. It is sufficient to apply Branham's own standard.
5.What Message Pastors Preach From Their Own Pulpits
The strongest evidence that the Message movement has built an excommunication culture is not external testimony — it is the pastors' own recorded sermons. Below are named Message pastors, from their own pulpits, teaching pastoral submission, pursuing leavers, weaponizing Romans 16:17 as a shunning instruction, and demonizing former believers. The quotes are verbatim from the original sermon recordings — every one of which is publicly archived. Branham's 1961 procedural disclaimer (Section 4) is on tape. So is everything below. They contradict each other.
You see, brother Branham says this in Revelations chapter four, part three when he's preaching the church ages: congregation, submit yourself to your pastor. Pastor, submit yourself to your congregation. It's not a one-way street. Right? We all believe the message, don't we? So now speaking to the pastor: if a little clique rises up, don't be on either side. Submit yourself to the whole congregation. So you're going to submit.
What you need to do is submit yourself to your pastor. Believe that God has anointed that man to take you where you need to go. You may not even understand your lack. You might be the noisiest shouter in the church and you just never tried it … But get behind the word of God. Don't hinder someone else.
Submit yourselves one to another, the Bible says — what the prophet says, God says. Submit yourself to your pastor. Folks, sometimes I gotta tell people — people that quit church or whatever, sooner or later I gotta confront them. I gotta talk to them, if they're not going down the wrong way. My job is to tell you, you're not going the right way. You can quit this church and you still live in this area. I want to tell you something. I'm still your pastor as long as God doesn't need to be here in this area. I don't care. I am your pastor.
That's why a lot of people I'll be honest, that's why a lot of people don't reach out to people that leave the message because they're concerned it might be a Judas. Now should we go after the sheep? Of course. Do the Shepherd's grab for the sheep? Of course. Every person that left this church I've gone after them. Now mostly for good reasons. I don't have to go after that, but when somebody leaves the message or goes back in the world, you better believe I go after them. I try to call them. I try to visit them. My wife told me one time … you don't upset people. I'm like, yeah you're right, just because I — I just want them to know …
In Romans chapter 16 verse 17 it says: now I beseech you brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them. I even think the Greek is translated to shun — to shun them.
Now we know those ecclesiastical spirits that were released against the Jews have been released against the bride in the spiritual sense. Is that right? Now why don't they have death camps for us? They would if they could get by with it. And you know who'd be running some of them? Former message people. That's right. Some of those on YouTube — they would be the generals, they would be the commandants. Because they hate us worse than any other religious group there is.
Whatsoever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. This is loosening from under the protection of the blood. Because what is it? It's sin allowing to go on, being tolerated instead of it being addressed. Listen to me very carefully now: when Paul — I read to you out of 1 Corinthians 5 — when Paul spoke concerning that young man and what he was doing in living with his stepmother, what did Paul say?
Brother Branham brings that right back down to when we lift from under the protection of the blood. And Brother Branham brought that same thing on down to even when you had the one young man who even just called someone a Holy Roller, or the people in a church a bunch of holy rollers — and his dad got up and relied him from the protection of the blood. Why? Cuz he wouldn't make it right.
The doctrinal architecture of excommunication, in real-time, from named Message pulpits:
- Pastoral submission as doctrine. Aaron McGeary (Arizona Believers Church), Nathan Erickson (Bible Believers Church), Thomas Byler (Evening Light Tabernacle), Jesse Smith (Bride of Christ Fellowship), Paul LaFontaine (Literal Life Church), Dale Langstaff (Harvest Time Bride Tabernacle) — at least six named pastors across the corpus quote Branham's Revelation Chapter 4 Part 3 sermon to teach that congregants must submit themselves to their pastor. The pastoral-authority framework is corpus-wide.
- "God has anointed that man." Nathan Erickson's phrasing makes the underlying claim explicit: the pastor is divinely anointed; resisting him is resisting God. This is the doctrinal bridge from Branham's general teaching about pastoral authority (Section 3) to the specific authority to declare who is in or out of fellowship.
- "I am your pastor as long as God doesn't need to be here in this area." Thomas Byler's sermon — preached 2022-01-30 at Evening Light Tabernacle in Elkton, Kentucky — claims pastoral jurisdiction over former members. Leaving the congregation does not, in his framing, release the leaver from the pastor's authority. The leaver is still under pastoral oversight against their will, until God decides otherwise.
- "I've gone after them … I try to call them. I try to visit them." Jesse Smith (Bride of Christ Fellowship) admits, from his own pulpit, that he personally pursues people who leave the church — to the point that his wife had to warn him not to show up at people's houses uninvited. The pursuit is framed as shepherding; the practical effect on a person who has left is harassment.
- Romans 16:17 deliberately reframed as "shun." The unnamed minister at Arizona Believers Church (2022-02-09) tells the congregation that the Greek of "mark them … and avoid them" should be read as "shun — to shun them." This is the textual move that bridges the New Testament's narrow warning about factious teachers into the modern Message's broad licence to shun leavers.
- Former believers compared to Nazi concentration-camp commandants. Donny Reagan's recorded comparison — that former Message believers would run death camps for current Message believers if they could — is dehumanizing language by any measure. Likening one's ex-congregants to genocidal war criminals is the rhetorical extreme of the demonization process. It is not an isolated outburst; the YouTube clip is the primary source, archived at Believe The Sign.
- Matthew 16:19 "binding and loosing" reframed as authority to withdraw the blood's protection. An unnamed minister at Believer's Spoken Word Tabernacle (2017-06-18) preaches the doctrinal mechanism explicitly: "whatsoever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven — this is loosening from under the protection of the blood." This is the theological move that converts Christ's promise to Peter into pastoral authority to administer or withdraw Christ's atoning blood at the local-church level. The doctrinal mechanism is in place; the pastor is the gatekeeper.
- Branham's "holy rollers" example: a father disfellowshipping his own son for word-choice. Samuel Browning (Believer's Spoken Word Tabernacle, 2023-10-08) narrates Branham examples of the practice in action — including "the one young man who even just called someone a Holy Roller, or the people in a church a bunch of holy rollers, and his dad got up and relied him from the protection of the blood — why? Cuz he wouldn't make it right." The triggering offense is a word. The disfellowshipper is the father. The doctrine's scope is total.
These quotes do not need an outside critic to characterize them as authoritarian or coercive. They are authoritarian and coercive on their face — taught from the pulpits of named Message pastors, on recordings these pastors themselves published.
One contra-voice from within the Message: Doug Baker (Love Divine Fellowship, 2019-01-13) preached the doctrinally precise opposite: "'We're taking you out from under the blood.' So glad you didn't put me under it. Only He can take me out." Baker's reading is correct biblically and consistent with Branham's 1961 procedural disclaimer (Section 4). The fact that one careful Message pastor reads the doctrine correctly does not undo the fact that most Message pastors in this section read it the other way. Section 6 documents what happens when the authoritarian framework — rather than Baker's — is the one applied in practice.
6.What the Message Movement Actually Does — Confirmed by Inside-the-Movement Witnesses
The strongest possible confirmation that the Message movement excommunicates members through the "out from under the blood" ritual does not come from outside critics. It comes from fellow Message pastors — peers, speaking from their own pulpits, sometimes years before the practice was exposed by mainstream journalism. Below are four named Message pastors (one on record TWICE) and one named eyewitness, in chronological order. Each has corroborated, from inside the movement, what former members and the Arizona Daily Star reporters later documented.
When it comes to taking people out from under the blood — you know, there's a church in Arizona that's probably taken more people out from the blood than I'll ever pastor in my life. And there's other churches that are full of people that have come from their church that they've taken out from under the blood. Because if you sneeze wrong, or smile wrong, or out of the corner of your face or whatever, they'll take you out from under the blood real quick. But that's contrary to the scripture.
It's all works-based with some churches. "We're taking you out from under the blood." So glad you didn't put me under it. Only He can take me out. When church discipline is operated properly, you're not taking them out from under the blood. You're taking them out from under the protection of the blood. But because they're under the blood, Satan will be loosed on them for the destruction of the flesh, and will drive them back in. Because God's not going to lose any.
Some of us young men at the time, we sat right here on this front row, because we had done some things. And our fathers were right behind us on the second row. And Brother Green was right here. And you didn't really, you didn't want to see the wrath of Brother Green. But we saw the wrath of Brother Green in a loving way. And right after that, two of the young men were taken out from under the blood of the church, and I'd never seen that. I was mortified. It was like, oh wow — I mean, I was almost afraid to go outside thinking I was going to get struck by lightning or something like that.
What I have seen is, it is because you disagree with the way that the church is thinking. And I do not believe that that is what it was intended for by any means. The church may define sin as one thing, but somebody may not be condemned but still wanting to serve the Lord and may not see it that way. And if you don't see it like me, then I would come and say "Zeke, you're out of this church, you are not to come in here anymore, you are not to fellowship with him," and that would be a dominating spirit and that would be wrong.
People say that — you know, that they — they say "we don't excommunicate people." You may call it by a different name. Just an exercise in semantics, really. But you do. And they say that, "oh, we're not a cult, we're not a denomination, we just point people to the Bible." Well then why are we trying to reflect the reporter's questions — things that you regularly preach from the pulpit — and trying to just go back to mainstream? Almost every comment I saw was trying to get, "oh, we're just normal, we just preach Jesus Christ." Yeah, but you don't. You preach Jesus plus something else.
Or their behaviors like shunning people, taking them out from under the blood when they disobey the teachings of the local church. As I said, they may put some other label on it — that's just semantics — but you do preach those things, and those things do go beyond what has been taught in this Word. And they're constantly preaching about dress codes and about trying to get everyone to look exactly alike, and then when the reporter asks, oh, they just downplay it — "oh no no no, we're just normal." But you do preach those things that do go beyond modesty, and they do go beyond holiness.
You're trying to hide the way you believe, trying to hide that there is division. You're trying to hide that because you believe this way that you're cutting out these people over here. You're trying to hide the fact that you excommunicate people, or you kick them out. It's wrong. There is a place for it — but not just because you don't believe the same way, or you don't believe a certain thing is sin. No. There's no reason for that.
There were ministers who, when people leave their assembly, they say "we're taking you out from under the blood of Jesus Christ." Now first things first, it's not His blood, so he can't take them out from underneath it. Jesus says you're placed under the blood. Apostles and disciples say you're placed under the blood of Jesus. God says God will not forsake you or abandon you. And this minister, this message minister, has the temerity to say you're out from underneath the blood of Jesus — not His blood. How in the world can he take somebody out from underneath something that isn't His? Unbelievable.
Isaac, who immediately called down and told the pastors that they should disassociate themselves with those people because they had left Golden Dawn and that they were taken out from under the blood and that they had nothing to do, that they should absolutely shun those people. So it's an attempt to control these people not only when they leave, not only to leave them with nothing so that they leave essentially dependent upon Golden Dawn, but also after they leave.
They don't excommunicate people. Right, let's — it's semantics. Oh no no no, says Isaac Noriega, "We don't excommunicate people. They just take them out from under the blood." You can split the semantics any way you want to, but when they take you out from under the blood and don't give you the opportunity to talk to your parents and don't give your parents the opportunity to reach out to you and don't give you the opportunity to reach out and talk to people that your friends in the ministry — that's excommunication.
Six independent inside-the-movement witnesses, on tape, in chronological order:
- Nathan Bryant (April 2018) — six years before the Arizona Daily Star exposé, Pastor Bryant publicly named "a church in Arizona that's probably taken more people out from the blood than I'll ever pastor in my life." He went further: "if you sneeze wrong … they'll take you out from under the blood real quick. But that's contrary to the scripture."
- Doug Baker (January 2019) — Love Divine Fellowship — theologically dismantles the practice from within the Message: "So glad you didn't put me under it. Only He can take me out." Reading 1 Corinthians 5 correctly: the blood is Christ's, not the pastor's, to administer.
- Edwin Dougall (September 2024) — eyewitness, in the same Tucson Tabernacle sanctuary, to the practice under founding pastor Pearry Green in the 1970s. Pearry Green (deceased) was the founding pastor of Tucson Tabernacle (1965–2015) and a personal associate of William Branham himself. Tim Kraus named "Perry Green" on the public record alongside Noriega, Reagan, Dayal, Byskal, and Watkins; Dougall's testimony — given from the trustee bench at Pearry Green's own former church — is the eyewitness corroboration: "two of the young men were taken out from under the blood of the church, and I'd never seen that. I was mortified." The practice goes back fifty-plus years and was being performed by one of the Message movement's most senior figures.
- Daniel Evans (September 15, 2024) — two months before the Arizona Daily Star coverage — Tucson Tabernacle's lead pastor, giving the preamble before reading inmate Adam Gonzales's written prison testimony, demonstrates the actual practitioner's script and critiques it: "if you don't see it like me, then I would come and say 'Zeke, you're out of this church, you are not to come in here anymore, you are not to fellowship with…'" The trigger he names: "because you disagree with the way that the church is thinking." Evans makes clear he does not believe this is the intended purpose.
- Daniel Evans (November 24, 2024) — same pastor, two months later, one week after the Arizona Daily Star published — calls the denial what it is: "You may call it by a different name. Just an exercise in semantics, really. But you do." Evans is now twice on record critiquing the practice — both before and after the AZ Star exposé.
- Tim Kraus (2021–2024) — former Message believer, documenting the practice across three Believe The Sign episodes, naming the practitioners by name.
Six recorded testimonies from inside the movement. Four active or former Message pastors (Daniel Evans on record twice). One survivor-eyewitness (Edwin Dougall, current Tucson Tabernacle trustee). One ex-member documentarian (Tim Kraus). The earliest (Bryant 2018) preceded the Arizona Daily Star coverage by six years. Daniel Evans was already raising the issue from his own pulpit two months before the AZ Star exposé (Sept 2024) and was back at it a week after (Nov 2024). None is a hostile outside critic. They are peers, eyewitnesses, and survivors. The factual claim they converge on is identical to what former Tabernáculo Emanuel members told the Arizona Daily Star: Message pastors take members out from under the blood when they leave, and call it something other than excommunication when reporters ask.
Documented practitioners
- Isaac Noriega — pastor of Tabernáculo Emanuel / Golden Dawn Tabernacle, Tucson, Arizona. The most extensively documented case. Eight separate Believe The Sign episodes (2020-2024) document Noriega "taking" specific families out from under the blood for leaving the assembly. The Arizona Daily Star's investigative series corroborates: twenty former congregants publicly accuse the church of tearing families apart through excommunication. Noriega is, separately, under indictment as of June 2025 on two felony counts of failure to report child sexual abuse (covered in the By Their Fruits article).
- Donny Reagan — pastor of Happy Hill Church, Johnson City, Tennessee. Featured in the 2021-04-14 Believe The Sign episode "Donny Reagan Gets Excited" and named explicitly by Tim Kraus as one of the ministers who instructs parents to cut off children who leave.
- Pearry Green (1933–2015) — founding pastor of Tucson Tabernacle (1965 to 2015) and a personal associate of William Branham. Named on the Believe The Sign record by Tim Kraus alongside Noriega, Reagan, Dayal, Byskal, and Watkins. Eyewitness corroboration from Edwin Dougall, a current Tucson Tabernacle trustee — testifying from the same sanctuary in September 2024 — confirms Pearry Green used the ritual in the 1970s. The practice in Tucson predates Noriega by decades and traces directly to a senior figure of the Message movement.
- Vin Dayal — Message pastor based in Trinidad. Named in the same 2021-04-14 episode in connection with both the excommunication practice and (separately) a financial scandal where Trinidad government authorities reportedly raided his home.
- Ed Byskal, Jason Watkins — named in passing on the Believe The Sign record. The article surfaces these names at the level of documentation that exists; readers seeking more depth should consult the Believe The Sign archive directly.
The semantic dodge — "we don't excommunicate, we just take them out from under the blood" — is the move Tim Kraus, a former Message believer, addressed directly on tape in December 2024. The dodge does not survive scrutiny. When the practical consequence is the same (the person is named from the pulpit, the congregation is instructed to cut contact, family relationships are severed), the word used is irrelevant. The practice is excommunication. Calling it something else does not change what it does to the people on the receiving end.
7.What Triggers Excommunication Today
Branham's own list of grounds for disfellowship was narrow — sexual predation, defilement of women and children. The Message movement's real-world triggers are entirely different. Survivor testimony and pulpit recordings document the following pattern.
The actual triggers, in documented practice
- Leaving the local assembly. The single most common trigger. Not leaving the faith; not leaving Christ. Leaving this specific church. Going to a different Message church is sometimes enough; going to a non-Message church is almost always enough; leaving the Message altogether is universally enough.
- Questioning the pastor publicly. Bringing up a contradiction in a sermon; asking why a particular practice (head coverings, hair length, restricted dress) is required; raising a discrepancy between Branham's teaching and the pastor's teaching. Korah-frame is invoked.
- Marrying outside the Message. Frequent grounds for the leaver's family being pressured to cut contact. The marriage itself is framed as having "stepped out from under the blood."
- Talking to ex-members. Maintaining contact with someone already "taken out from under the blood" is treated as contamination. Multi-generational families have been split for this — siblings forbidden to speak; parents forbidden to attend their adult child's wedding.
- Consuming critical material. Reading research that questions Branham, watching Believe The Sign videos, listening to ex-pastor testimony. Several documented cases of members being warned from the pulpit not to access the internet without their pastor's vetting.
- Reporting abuse. Documented in the Tabernáculo Emanuel case (Arizona Daily Star): pastor Isaac Noriega told a victim's family to handle abuse internally rather than report it. The pattern is consistent across multiple Message churches: bringing abuse to outside authorities (police, social services, journalists) is itself a grounds for excommunication.
The list above maps almost perfectly onto the BITE Model categories for high-control religious groups (Behavior, Information, Thought, and Emotional control). None of it matches Branham's 1961-01-12 list. The triggers Message pastors actually use are not the triggers Branham authorized.
8.The Biblical Principle Test
The Message movement claims to practice "the Word." The New Testament gives specific, narrow, well-documented procedures for church discipline. Test the modern Message excommunication practice against the actual biblical standard — not Branham's standard, not a critic's standard, but the standard the movement itself claims to honor.
Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.
Against an elder receive not an accusation, but before two or three witnesses. Them that sin rebuke before all, that others also may fear.
And if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed. Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother.
New Testament requirement vs. Message practice
| New Testament requirement | What the Message movement actually does |
|---|---|
| 1 Corinthians 5:1–13 — disfellowship is for specific moral conduct: sexual immorality, idolatry, drunkenness, extortion, slander. | Disfellowship is for leaving the church, questioning the pastor, marrying outside, or talking to ex-members. |
| Matthew 18:15–17 — private conversation, then two or three witnesses, then tell the whole church, then (and only then) treat as outsider. | Pastor announces unilaterally from the pulpit. No private step. No witnesses. No congregational vote. |
| 1 Timothy 5:19–20 — accusations against an elder require two or three witnesses; sins are to be rebuked before all that others also may fear. | Pastor self-judges. The pastor accuses the leaver; no body of elders intervenes; no witnesses corroborate; no one rebukes the pastor. |
| Titus 3:10–11 — "a man that is an heretic after the first and second admonition reject." Reject the factious man after warning. | No admonition. No first-and-second-warning sequence. The trigger is questioning or leaving, not factious division. |
| 2 Thessalonians 3:14–15 — when withdrawing, count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother. | Treated as damned ("out from under the blood"). Family is forbidden to speak with the named person. Brotherly admonishment is impossible because contact itself is forbidden. |
| 1 Corinthians 5:5 + 2 Corinthians 2:6–8 — restoration is the explicit goal; Paul orders the disciplined man received back after repentance. | The declaration "out from under the blood" is treated as permanent. Path of return: full submission to the pastor who excommunicated. |
| Galatians 6:1 — "restore such a one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted." | Restoration is not in view. The leaver is publicly shamed from the pulpit. The shamer carries no risk of being shamed in return. |
| Branham's own §189 — neither pastor nor deacon board nor trustee board has the right to throw anybody out of church. | The pastor's unilateral declaration is the practice. |
The Message excommunication practice fails every single biblical procedural requirement. It also fails Branham's own procedural standard. It survives only if a reader is willing to assume that the pastor's prophetic discernment substitutes for the New Testament's witness-and-process requirements — which is itself a sub-Branham assumption, since Branham (§188) explicitly said the active verb belongs to God, not the pastor.
The biblical principle test is not a hostile critic's invention. It is the New Testament read at face value. A movement that claims to be the restoration of "the original Word" cannot, simultaneously, practice a form of church discipline that contradicts the original Word at every procedural point.
9.Survivor Testimony
The doctrinal and procedural arguments above are abstractions. What the practice does to actual people is not. Below is a brief sampling of the testimony in the public record. Each named survivor is on tape or in print; readers can verify directly.
I remember sitting through one of my friends' services where the parents had called it, and they took them out from under the blood, and there was all of this going on, and it was just it was a dreadful thing, and I didn't want my parents to go through that, because I love them and I care for them. But then I began to ponder and go, well, there's something different about my grandma. You know, what is what's different?
That funeral incident opened eyes for them, which allowed me to process. Like yeah, that is deeply, deeply wrong in every way possible, knowing that that was my dad.
I was dressed in a suit. It was how I used to dress. The only thing different is, I had a mustache. I was standing with one of my cousins, who was part of the black sheep. We were standing a distance away. The funeral director came up to me and said "They want you to leave." I was like, "Me?" "Yeah, they want you to leave." … Regardless of how my parents disowned me and turned their back on me, I still wanted to respect their wishes. It was my dad's dad. If they wanted me to leave, then I'm going to respect it. To me, it was really humiliating. It was really hard.
I'm 41 years old, and I'm still traumatized. I loved my grandparents so much and I was never able to see them.
Everyone there was definitely congregation people. I don't think they made an opportunity for outsiders to come … A lot of it very much felt like, let's not let this person down. Let's not disappoint Noriega. … Let's let him lead us. This was definitely a religious figure that was making decisions with and on behalf of the family.
The Emily Arndt testimony — recorded in 2014 — established the public record more than a decade before the Arizona Daily Star's investigative series. The fear of having "all of this going on" performed against one's own parents was, in her telling, a primary factor in her own decision-making process about whether to leave the Message. It captured the practice's social mechanism with precision: excommunication functions as a hostage system. The threat of having one's family taken out from under the blood — and being responsible, in the family's framing, for that — keeps people inside long after their belief has dissolved.
The Arizona Daily Star's funeral-blocking investigation
On November 15, 2024, the Arizona Daily Star published "Church blocks ex-members from attending family funerals" by Emily Hamer and Tim Steller. The article documents that at Tabernáculo Emanuel (Golden Dawn Tabernacle) in Tucson, the most heartbreaking consequence of leaving is being blocked from attending the funerals of loved ones still in the church — or being physically ejected from them.
- Andrew Loza (left the church early 1990s) was barred from his own father's 2011 funeral. His wife approached the deacons; they were turned away. His wife and children came back to the car crying.
- Samuel Silva (left ~late 2018) was ejected from his grandfather's March 2020 funeral. The funeral director, on instruction from family members still in the church, told Silva: "They want you to leave." Silva, who had dressed in a suit out of respect, left.
- Robert Avila, 41, could not attend his grandfather's 2020 funeral (kept secret from him) or his grandmother's March 2024 funeral (his mother was physically blocked at the door). He saw his grandparents maybe once or twice over thirty years because they feared Pastor Noriega.
- A former South Lawn Cemetery funeral director who arranged ~20 Golden Dawn funerals over 12 years confirmed the pattern on the record: Noriega was almost always present at funeral planning, advised against publishing obituaries, and the implication was always that outsiders were not welcome. Staff knew when outsiders were being misled about service times but could not say so.
Noriega denies it. He told the Star that Loza is lying — that families "make their own decisions on who they want to be in attendance." The funeral director's testimony, the photographic record of empty-of-family funerals, and three named survivors testifying to having been blocked or ejected suggest otherwise.
The pattern is documented across multiple churches
Believe The Sign's archive contains dozens of episodes documenting the practice across multiple named Message churches. The pattern is consistent: the trigger is most commonly leaving; the announcement is from the pulpit; the consequence is family fracture. The article does not invent the testimony — it surfaces what survivors have already put on the public record.
A methodological note on this section. The Arndt testimony has audio because she gave it on camera to Believe The Sign in 2014. The four Tucson testimonies above (Loza, Silva, Avila, and the South Lawn funeral director) have no audio counterpart. They were given to Arizona Daily Star reporters in interviews that the paper published in print and online; no recording of those interviews has been released. Every word attributed to those four is the verbatim text the Star published. Readers can verify each quote against the linked source.
10.Branham Is Responsible
The article does not conclude that the Message pastors who practice "take out from under the blood" are deviating from Branham. It concludes the opposite: they are applying Branham consistently. The doctrine is his. The procedural disclaimer in 1961-01-12 was a half-measure that did not change the underlying theology. Followers had no reason to weight the disclaimer above the foundation.
Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.
The article ends without a verdict on the man. Branham is deceased. The standard the article applies in closing is the standard Branham himself preached — and the standard the New Testament gives.
The doctrinal architecture Branham built — that rejecting the Message places a person out from under the blood (Section 2), that questioning the prophet is Korah-level rebellion (Section 3), that the pastor has authority (Section 3) — produces the modern excommunication practice with logical necessity. A follower who reads Branham consistently arrives at the practice the modern pastors perform. The procedural disclaimer in 1961 (Section 4) is a single Q&A response that did not survive the gravitational pull of the broader teaching.
The biblical test (Section 8) is independent of Branham. The Message practice fails it at every procedural point. The Message practice also fails Branham's own procedural standard. There is no reading of either the New Testament or Branham's own teaching under which the modern practice is defensible.
The survivors are owed two things by the movement that excommunicated them. The first is acknowledgment that the practice has no biblical warrant and no warrant in Branham's own procedural teaching. The second is the lifting of the announcement that they are out from under the blood — a declaration the pastor never had authority to make, by Branham's own teaching and by Scripture.
Whether either acknowledgment will come is a separate question. The article's purpose is to make both visible, so that any future acknowledgment has a documented baseline to address.