Broken Faith - Inside the Word of Faith Fellowship, One of America's Most Dangerous Cults - Mitch Weiss Page 0,4

to make ends meet and enjoyed stopping for drinks on the way home.

Wanda was not a model mother, but she cared about her girls. She was a master at thrift-store shopping, so her daughters dressed like they were better-off than they really were.

When her husband abused her, Wanda got a divorce. She remarried, had another daughter, and divorced again. She worked hard, and partied hard, too. She vowed to never marry again. She didn’t need a man, she said.

Wanda finally landed a legal secretary job and settled down. Suzanne, the responsible honor-roll student, kept the house and made sure her sisters’ chores and homework were done. When graduation day came, there was no money for college.

“Get out of Florida and see the world!” Wanda told her daughter. So Suzanne enlisted in the Air Force.

Mother and daughter remained close. While serving a hitch in Hawaii, Suzanne met Rick Cooper, a decent, handsome Navy engineer, a strong Christian. They fell in love, more or less.

Suzanne knew from the moment she said “I do” that marrying Rick was a mistake. Now, twelve years and six babies later, it looked like she was about to make another.

Suzanne had told her mother everything and found her sympathetic. “Let Rick go on to his Bible school. You get those children in the van and come back to Ocala,” Wanda told her daughter.

But Rick already had a plan. They would move in with his mother, Cora.

“It’s only temporary,” Rick promised. Soon as he got his degree from Word of Faith Fellowship Bible School, he’d find a church of his own, in the town of Suzanne’s choice. He would be a pastor. God would provide for their needs.

Suzanne was skeptical. She’d grown up in the Bible Belt and had heard salvation messages from childhood, but she no longer believed in a loving God. The only God she’d seen was an angry, miserable taskmaster, always testing people’s faith. Her children were the only beam of light in her life, her only joy. She invested all her time in them—homeschooling, playing games, planning excursions. They had become her whole life.

Out in the driveway a car horn beeped. Suzanne picked up her handbag, stuffed the paper and pencil inside, and walked out the front door. The children were loaded in the van. The back door of the Ryder truck was shut tight; the engines were running.

“Just follow me and we won’t get lost,” Rick said to Suzanne. He climbed into the driver’s seat of the truck.

Suzanne buckled herself into the van. The children chattered with excitement, but she blocked out the noise. Down the driveway and out toward the highway, her mind raced. How would they ever fit all their furniture in Cora’s little house? How long before Rick found a job, how long before they could have their own place again? How much would the Bible school cost? How could Rick support them all, and go to school, too?

As they approached the Interstate 95 on-ramp, Suzanne looked at the highway signs. She could take the southbound exit and head to Florida, to her mother’s house. But she followed Rick, like she always did. It was the way God commanded, after all, and children need a father.

Rolling northward, Suzanne erased her negative thoughts and focused on the highway. She didn’t know she was driving her family to hell.

2

SETTLING IN

Cora Cooper’s white bungalow was tucked between an auto-repair shop and a Coca-Cola bottling plant. Suzanne pulled the van into the driveway and killed the engine. Her mother-in-law stood smiling on the front porch.

Suzanne took a deep breath. This wasn’t her kind of place. Sure, the Blue Ridge Mountains were picturesque, but the narrow, winding roads into town were lined with derelict factories and stores. The clapboard houses had appliances rusting on the porch, and Fords rusting on the lawn.

Jeffrey, Lena, Benjamin, Peter, and Chad poured out of the van and into their grandmother’s arms. Suzanne pulled John David from his car seat. Rick parked the truck in the space behind them.

The house was dark, smaller than Suzanne had remembered.

“You can stay as long as you like,” Cora said, almost reading Suzanne’s thoughts. “I’m happy you’re here. Happy to have my grandbabies right here, where I can hold them.”

Suzanne walked from room to room, trying not to feel horrified. Elvis figurines and other knickknacks covered the tabletops. Suzanne envisioned six little pairs of hands smashing it all to smithereens. The worst awaited on the enclosed back porch. Out there was the bathroom: one