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The Children of God
The Inside Story By The Daughter Of The Founder, Moses David Berg by Deborah (Linda Berg) Davis with Bill Davis, 1984
Therefore thus saith the Lord God: Behold, mine anger and my fury shall be poured out upon this place, upon man, and upon beast, and upon the trees of the field, and upon the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched." (Jeremiah 6:26; 7:20) Because Vienna is near Washington, D. C., we planned our first demonstration on the doorsteps of the nation's Capitol. U.S. Sen. Everett Dirksen had recently died, and his body was lying in state in the Rotunda of the Capitol building. My dad explained to us that Dirksen's death was symbolic of the death of the nation, because the senator had tried to pass legislation that would allow mandated prayer and Bible-reading in public schools. A large group of us, eighty-five strong, held a silent vigil at the site of Senator Dirksen's funeral. We also demonstrated in front of the White House, mourning the demise of peace and freedom. We planned the vigils in great detail. One of our buses would deliver the disciples to a predetermined location. Then we would march single file in perfect unison (after hours of practice) to the actual site of the protest. The seven-foot wooden staves we carried—representing God's righteous rod of judgment—would strike the ground simultaneously, creating a noise like thunder. People would turn to see what was causing this frightening sound and be awestruck to see seventy-five to a hundred red-robed prophets walking silently down the street with stern countenances, large wooden yokes about their necks, and ashes smeared on their foreheads. The long robes symbolized mourning for the nation, and the red sackcloth (burlap) was an ominous sign of the blood that would be shed in the coming destruction. The yokes represented the bondage that was to befall America, paralleling the bondage of the Israelites under the Babylonians. The male prophets, with the beards that were in vogue at the time, looked as if they had walked straight out of ancient Israel. Many of the girls wore large gold or silver earrings. Upon arriving at the protest site, we would stand in complete silence and unroll large scrolls with hand-lettered Bible verses declaring the Message of Jeremiah to the United States. Some of the most commonly used verses: The nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish; yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted." (Isaiah 60:12) For I will bring evil from the north, and a great destruction. The destroyer of the Gentiles is on his way; he is gone forth from his place to make thy land desolate; and thy cities shall be laid waste, without an inhabitant." (Jeremiah 4:6-7) Some people welcomed our solemn protest. One woman, coming upon a vigil in New York City later on, said to me, "Oh, I'm so glad you're here! I'm praying for America, hoping they'll turn to God!" The interest shown by the news media was also a great boost to our morale; getting so much attention made us feel important—as if we actually were God's endtime prophets, confirming what my dad had been telling us. Those days were like playing a role in a movie. It was really great fun. We packed a lifetime of excitement into a few short months as we traveled in a large caravan from city to city. Immediately after the Washington vigil we visited Philadelphia to protest the death of freedom and peace at Independence Hall. We then went on to New York City and held a vigil in Times Square. While we were in New Jersey, en route to our next destination, a curious reporter visited our campsite and wrote an article about this strange group of prophets. We had explained our cause and our message to him. In his article he quoted Matthew 5:9: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God." It sounded good, so we adopted the name. We were no longer "Teens for Christ"; we became "the Children of God." In some of his revelations, Dad said the Lord had called him "Moses." Hence, we had become Moses and the Children of 74 God. In prophecies Dad had yet to receive, it would be revealed that he was also like David of old. Thus, David Berg became the prophet "Moses David." We were gradually being subtly seduced by false teaching. David Berg spoke the longings of our hearts. Like Ignorance, in John Bunyan's allegory, Pilgrim's Progress, we did not foresee the inevitable consequences of our seduction.
Christian explains to Ignorance that the concurrence of one's heart and life must still be examined against a higher authority, the Word of God. This the followers of David Berg were not doing. We had erred by supplanting scriptural truth with the personally revealed truth of a man. Consequently we were blinded to our sin. As Christian explains,
And that was the sad condition of the disciples of David Berg. We saw neither our original nor our present sins, but were blindly following our hearts and the desires of our anointed leader. Christian's judgment of Ignorance was prophetic for us:
After our vigil in New York we visited Chicago, arriving there while the conspiracy trial of the Chicago Seven was in progress.*
My dad's reaction to the seven conspirators was quite revealing."They are just misguided," he said."The only problem is that they are doing it for the wrong motive, the wrong reason. They're not doing it for the Lord." His reasoning sounded right to us: Of course, they are just a bit misguided. They should be doing "it" for the Lord. But what was this "it" to which Dad referred? Simply more rebellion, anarchy, and selfish resistance to authority. My dad did not teach his followers that the Christian way is not the way of rebellion. On the contrary, we learned that as long as we acted in the name of Jesus, everything was okay. Rebellion against authority is not the same as resisting evil. This Jesus understood, but my father did not. Why? Because my father was himself bound in sin and therefore could not discern between rebellion and resisting evil. How could he? He was drowning in his own rebellion. Christians are taught in the Bible to submit to God and to other proper authority, but not to submit to evil. As disciples of Moses David, we were taught to rebel against authority whenever it suited our purposes. We professed to submit to God, via David Berg's leadership—but actually we submitted only to my dad's deviant teachings. There is no such thing as "righteous rebellion," and our rebellion against the authority of parents, church, government, and employment was certainly not godly. We were not resisting evil; our defiance simply mirrored the actions of political groups such as the SDS or the Weathermen. If the followers of Moses David were truly resisting evil, why then were they so easily led, in years to come, into heretical doctrines of adultery, incest, and spiritism? Following our vigil in Chicago, we journeyed south to Louisiana to escape the cold northern winter. Just outside New Orleans, we were raided by a group of fifty law officers, vigilantes, dogs and assorted "rednecks." Those were "Easy Rider" days, and our group of 150 long-haired, bearded hippie dropouts weren't exactly on friendly grounds. The raiders surrounded our camp and began checking everyone's I.D. Many of the disciples didn't have proper identification or were of minor age, and twenty-five were taken into temporary custody. One black disciple, Simon, had to hide in the swamps for fear of his life. Joshua, my brother-in-law, was teaching a class to a large group of disciples at the time of the arrests, and was suspected of being the "leader" of this group. He was taken to jail and held for three weeks. Meanwhile, the great Prophet of God was hiding in his motor home, too sick with fear to face the sheriff and his deputies. He locked the door of his camper and refused to come out. (For some reason, the police simply left his camper alone after finding the door locked.) My dad felt "the sheep lays down his life for the shepherd." In checking the identification of the disciples from California, the officials discovered exactly who we were, and that twenty-seven disciples who had been arrested in Huntington Beach in January 1970, had illegally skipped town before receiving sentencing. However, no charges were pressed against us, and we were told to be out of town "by sunup" and not to stop until we had crossed the state border. It normally took a couple of days to break camp, but needless to say, we were on the road by dawn and didn't stop until we reached Houston—a long way from the state line. Once in Houston, things began to go well for the Children of God. Camping in the numerous state parks surrounding Houston for the maximum two-week limit, we hop scotched about the city gaining new converts and disciples. For one reason or another, the Texas youth were greatly attracted to our bizarre and austere lifestyle. In one month we gained nearly twenty-five new followers. One event occurred in Houston that was to have devastating effects on my father. Dad decided to visit a Gypsy camp in the Houston area. I don't recall how he knew of this camp, but he felt it was vital that he meet these Gypsies. He asked me to drive him there, and on the way he explained to me that the Gypsies were models for living a truly godly lifestyle. For centuries the Gypsies have lived in tents, just as Abraham did, he explained."We have a lot to learn from them. They have a special anointing from God." Dad entered the Gypsy camp of motor homes and trailers and did not return for a long time. Afterward he explained that he had visited personally with the king of their tribe. In several months' time, my dad would discover that while visiting with this Gypsy king, a miraculous event occurred—one with immense spiritual significance. Meanwhile, toward the end of January 1970, we were running out of places to camp, so Dad flew to California to speak with his old friend and employer, Fred Jordan, to beg the use of his abandoned ranch in West Texas.
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