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is committed the dispensation of the ages. In one man’s gospel is validated the ministry of Paul, and Peter, and Moses, and Elijah – in one single man.

“And I want to tell you something else (I’m about to close). Well, if one man were to pass away, [would] someone else raise up? Not in this case. Not in this case! Because not just anybody can do what that one man does. In fact, NOBODY can do what that one man does. Nobody can – NOBODY! … And I, for one, am happy about it. And I want to throw in a little bonus before I sit down. And this is me speaking, not the Lord, but it might be the Lord, because I have also the Holy Ghost. I think that Brother Ray is a perfect human being. I know somebody knows I’m right. … It’s amazing that God gave us somebody that doesn’t have the same struggles that you have – I mean, yes, he can be moved with the feeling of your infirmity, but brother, he’s not messed up like some of us are. I don’t know how God preserved it and worked it out and called him and saved him – I don’t know how all that worked out, I just know I’m glad He did. Because he’s not messed up like me, and he thinks clearer than I think, and he has better judgment than I do, and his person is capable of doing what my person is not. And on this I stand, and I’ll stake my everlasting soul until I split the sky with you and leave these vile bodies behind. God bless you, love you, and Brother Ray, God bless you!”

After this, Chief Apostle Ray Tinsman arose and stood before the congregation amid shouts and cheers and confirmed that what Apostle Addison Everett had preached to them was right!

Any true apostle or minister of Jesus Christ with a heart tuned to the Spirit of God, would have done as Paul and Barnabas did in Acts 14:11-18, when the people tried to exalt them as gods. “Which when the apostles, Barnabas and Paul, heard of, they rent their clothes, and ran in among the people, crying out, And saying, Sirs, why do ye these things? We also are men of like passions with you, and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God, which made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein” (verses 14-15).

In Revelation 19:10, Apostle John tells us how he fell at the feet of the angel who gave him the Revelation and tried to worship him, but the angel said, “See thou do it not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” (See also Rev. 22:8-9.) On the other hand, Apostle Ray Tinsman, who claims he has the correct understanding and interpretation of the prophecies of Revelation, and who Addison Everett says was “the one that went to John and started expounding the prophetic deep things of God to John the apostle,” seems to have no objection to men falling at his feet and worshiping. John Friesen publicly stated in Ray’s presence that he came to God another way, saying “Lord, I come to you in the name of our chief apostle, Brother Ray Tinsman. … There are things in my life that have passed away at Brother Ray’s feet. And I invite you to join me …!” In another videoed worship assembly, I saw one actually fall at Ray’s feet, and Ray was smiling and acting like he was enjoying it! Why didn’t Ray do as Apostle Peter did in Acts 10:25-26, when Cornelius fell down at his feet and worshiped him? The Scripture says, “Peter took him up, saying, Stand up; I myself also am a man.” Evidently, self-

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-proclaimed Apostle Ray Tinsman is of a different spirit than the Christ-ordained Apostle Peter!

To all who have a scriptural understanding of what the church of God is and what it stands for, it is both shocking and mind-boggling how such corrupt ideology as quoted above can be spewed out under the name “Church of God!” It just goes to show what a mastermind the devil is in raising up impostors to counterfeit and bring reproach on God’s name and God’s work.

Sister Marie Miles, a daughter of Brother Fred Pruitt, wrote the following admonition in one of Faith Publishing House’s publications in early 1974, just six years before Danny Layne made his appearance among the Faith and Victory people:

“In reading the Bible we notice that the devil tries to counterfeit everything that God has or does. We read about the good Shepherd (John 10:11), but we are right away reminded about the hireling or the false shepherd in John 10:12. Surely we need to be watchful whom we follow! …

“The devil is opposing everything God has done or tries to do to help people find the right way, which leads to Heaven. We need to be aware of the many false teachers and prophets that are in the world which ‘come as angels of light’ to deceive souls. Some false prophets speak a lot of truth, but mixed in there may be deception!

“Thank God, if we are honest and will read the Word of God with an eye singled to find truth, we will be led by His Spirit into all truth. Praise God for that faithful Spirit of God that deals with honest souls in the world today. …

“… Christ … is the door into the church. There you repent of your sins with godly sorrow. Jesus forgives you and you are ‘born again.’ You become a new creature in Christ Jesus. … God keeps the record of everyone that is born into the church of God [through the spiritual rebirth]. He writes your name down in that big book. … When God’s book is opened in that last day, we want your name to be there. John saw a vision of the books being opened and he said, ‘Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire’ (Rev. 20:15). Oh, how important it is that we are born into the church of God and have our names written in the book of life when the final judgment comes! Jesus told His disciples to ‘rejoice because your names are written in heaven’ (Luke 10:20).”

This is so true! In meditating along these lines, the Holy Spirit inspired me with the following verses of poem. I feel like sharing them here:

Not all who the “Church of God” title may wear

Are a part of God’s church, my dear friend;

You must discern this by the fruit that they bear,

Whether they are “of God” or “of men.”

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The true Bible system bears true Bible fruit –

This is what you must always look for.

The right system always springs from the right root,

Right foundation, right head, and right door.

When men usurp headship within those aspects

Where God’s Word and His Spirit should lead,

Invariably, they will create their own sects

Where contentions continually breed.

Are there saved people (true members of the church of God) in the man-ruled Church of God Restoration sect? God knoweth (see 2 Tim. 2:19). If there are, God is abundantly able to deliver them from this false religious spirit just as he delivered the folk at St. James, Missouri, from the false spirit that they had fallen under. All it takes is honesty, humility, an acknowledgement of the truth, and then running to the arms of Jesus and completely trusting the merit of the blood He shed for your soul. He is just as able to save us from false religion as He is to save us from sin.

SPIRITUAL GIFTS ARE FOR WHAT PURPOSE AND FOR WHOSE GLORY?

Expounding on Ephesians 4:7-12 and other related scriptures, Brother Leslie Busbee also wrote the following comments in a Bible Lesson that was published by Faith Publishing House for June 2, 1974:

“Not everyone is gifted and anointed in the same manner with the same thing. There are diversities of gifts and callings. When Christ arose from the dead and ascended to the right hand of God, He received of the Father gifts to be distributed by avenue of the Holy Spirit to His own. It rests solely in the wisdom of the Father as to whom the gifts are given, and what gift is given to each individual. There is one body, one Spirit, one Lord, one faith, and one God. We are called in one hope. But to every one is given the portion of grace that the gift of Christ measures, or distributes. This clearly illustrates the personal contact and knowledge that the Savior has of all His own. He knows their downsitting and their uprising (Psa. 139:2), their capabilities and their inabilities. According to what He knows they can properly and successfully handle will He bestow His divine gifts.

“Each function of the members of the natural body is different, but altogether they cooperate to make life and health possible. So it is with Christ's body, the church of God. God sets the members in the body as seemeth good in His sight, and we know His ways are best. He had a work to give Paul to do, a work that He saw that Paul would be able to handle. Perhaps Ananias, when he was instructed to go and pray for Saul to be healed and go forth for Christ, might have been tempted to think: ‘Well, Lord, why could you not send me on that kind of mission?’ I do not think that he entertained such a thought. He knew that God was running His own business.

“Every function in the church is there, not because of human talent or esteem or ability, but is placed as a divine gift upon the faithful heart and life of the respective

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THE ORIGIN OF THE SO-CALLED CHURCH OF GOD RESTORATION
There is a religious sect headquartered in Greenville, Ohio, (that bears definite cult
characteristics) which claims to have its roots connected to D. S. Warner. This sect,
founded in the late 1980s by Daniel Wilburn Layne, now acknowledges its head to be
Chief Apostle Donald Ray Tinsman of New Paris, Ohio. I am convinced there has not
been another movement in religious history that has misrepresented the teachings and
beliefs of D. S. Warner in a worse way than this group has done. As a matter of fact, its
practices, policies, and basic belief system stand directly opposed to the beliefs and
teachings of D. S. Warner. I am sure that, if D. S. Warner were alive today, he would
denounce this sect and warn everyone to beware of it.
The purpose of this writing is not to malign the reputation of any person, but to expose
what I perceive to be a religious system of gross error. I witnessed the formation of this
group that now goes under the name Church of God Restoration. In this writing I am
going to speak plainly about the things that I witnessed and have observed over the past
40 years. The group had its beginnings in the decade of the 1980s under the leadership of
the man mentioned above, who was a novice preacher in his early 40s at that time.
For a bit of background, this man had previously been a drug addict in the state of
California, having spent approximately 20 years of his life in gross sin. He was the son of
an “Anderson Church of God” preacher. In May 1980, Danny Layne, as he was called,
claimed to get converted. (I do believe that he did have a real experience of conversion.)
After his conversion, he came among a conservative group of Church of God people,
often referred to as the “Guthrie Church of God,” or “Faith and Victory people,” because
of a periodical called Faith and Victory that was published at Guthrie, Oklahoma. That
publishing operation, founded by Fred Pruitt in 1923, was known as Faith Publishing
House. For many decades Faith Publishing House kept much of the original literature that
was published by the Gospel Trumpet Company, founded by D. S. Warner in 1881, in
constant print and available to the world. The Faith and Victory publishers believed that
the Bible doctrines that were published by D. S. Warner in his Gospel Trumpet are as
vital now as they were then.
The local Guthrie, Oklahoma, Church of God congregation was established around the
year 1906. It was one of the original congregations of the “Anderson Church of God”
fellowship that chose not to accept liberal innovations that crept into the movement in
later years. Fred Pruitt founded Faith Publishing House in Guthrie and operated it in
much the same way that D. S. Warner operated his publishing work – not as an official
organ of the church, but as a service to the church. Charles E. Orr, a former co-worker
with D. S. Warner and contributing editor and writer for the The Gospel Trumpet, in the
final years of his life assisted Fred Pruitt in his publishing effort at Guthrie. The Faith
and Victory periodical bore the subtitle, “Church of God Servant,” and had the following
statement of purpose on its editorial page:

“This non-sectarian paper is edited and published in the interest of the universal
CHURCH OF GOD each month (except August of each year, and we omit an issue that

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month to attend camp meetings). … Its motto: Have faith in God. Its object: The glory of
God and the salvation of men; the restoration and promulgation of the whole truth to the
people in this ‘evening time’ as it was in the morning church of the first century; the
unification of all true believers in one body by the love of God. Its standard: Separation
from sin and entire devotion to the service and will of God. Its characteristics: No
discipline but the Bible, no bond of union but the love of God, and no test of fellowship
but the indwelling Spirit of Christ.

“Through the Free Literature Fund thousands of gospel tracts are published and sent
out free of charge as the Lord supplies. Cooperation of our readers is solicited and will be
appreciated in any way as the Bible and the Holy Spirit teach you to do or stir your heart.
‘Freely ye have received, freely give.’”
Like the original Gospel Trumpet Company, founded by D. S. Warner, Faith
Publishing House conducted its operation based on faith in God and the free-will
offerings of His people. The publishing effort was shared by consecrated, dedicated saints
from many parts of the United States who came to help and to dedicate their time and
labors to publishing the Gospel via the printed page. The publishing work was in
operation for approximately 90 years (extending 50 years beyond the death of its founder,
Fred Pruitt) and was never under the control of any church organization, nor was it in any
way the “headquarters” of a denominational body.

I was born and raised among these humble, Christ-oriented “Faith and Victory people”
and witnessed first-hand their spirit and manner of life. I have always considered it a
great privilege to fellowship and worship among them. I never witnessed any
manifestations of religious pride, authoritarianism, or lordship in spiritual matters among
any of the ministers associated with this group. Their doctrinal stress has always been on
acquiring and developing a personal relationship and walk with God wherein the Holy
Spirit teaches each believer how to live and conduct their lives according to the teachings
and standards of God’s Word. I was converted and genuinely born again at a young age
because of the wholesome Biblical teachings I grew up under. I have never had a single
regret, disappointment, or religious let-down because of my affiliation and fellowship
with these humble people. Their teachings led me to a walk with Christ that has brought
my soul joy unspeakable and full of glory. Not one yoke of religious bondage have I ever
known, but with joy I have drawn living water out of the wells of salvation because I
found, as these people emphatically teach, GOD is my salvation (Isa. 12:2-3), and in His
presence is fulness of joy (Psa. 16:11). I can truly say my soul has been “abundantly
satisfied” with the fatness of God’s house, and He has made me to drink of the river of
His pleasures (Psa. 36:8). My religion has been from day one, as songwriter Lizzie
DeArmond expressed her experience, “a happy religion of love and salvation.” I wouldn’t
trade it for anything. I have found that “love is freedom’s law.” Entering a love
relationship with Jesus will set any soul perfectly free.

Believing that it is our Christian duty to reach our hands in fellowship to every blood-
washed child of God, we accepted Danny Layne’s testimony of conversion and gave him
the right hand of fellowship. He had a vibrant testimony and soon began preaching

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among us. As I said, I personally believe that Danny really was a converted soul at the
beginning of his Christian profession. But he missed the mark later when he failed to
allow the Lord to refine some areas of his personal self-life that needed to be
brought into conformity to the perfect will of God. He obviously never completely
died to his own self-interest. When he was in the drug world, he manipulated people to
his advantage. He seemed to carry some of those same traits into his religious experience.
By the mid-1980s, Danny Layne’s preaching was becoming tainted by a spirit of
harshness and authoritarianism. He manifested an unwillingness to allow others their
personal “space” to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12).
Sheep cannot be driven; they must be led. True shepherds must not make themselves
lords over God’s heritage. The body of ministers in general discerned where Danny was
missing the mark in his manner of presenting the Gospel and wanted to help him gain a
balanced and wholesome perspective in his ministry. In April 1986, a minister’s meeting
was held here at Myrtle, Missouri, especially for counseling and instructing young
ministers regarding potential pitfalls; about the danger of allowing one’s ministry to
become blighted by personal ambition, the importance of being humble, of being subject
one to another, being patient and longsuffering toward all men, and leading by humility;
also the importance of staying within the bounds of God’s Word in preaching – not
preaching personal opinions, etc.
Brother Clifford Wilson, an older minister among us at the time, brought an excellent
discourse the first night of the meeting on “The Qualifications of a Minister.” He touched
on many important aspects of ministerial qualifications. Expounding on 2 Tim. 4:1-2, he
said, “Oh brethren, whatever we put out, it ought to be in accord with the Word of
God. Do we have any right to preach anything that we cannot substantiate in the Word of
God? I believe that’s a mistake, don’t you? … ‘Preach the word; be instant in season, out
of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine’ (verse 2). [You
may say] this is what I’m waiting for – this gives me the license now to go and cut some
folks down. [They’ve] been doing things for a long time I didn’t think they ought to do.
Now I’ve got the scripture here! I’m going over and doing some reproving and rebuking
and some straightening out! Well, before you go too far with that, do some thinking along
these lines: have you ever had the Lord rebuke you? Have you ever had Him reprove
you? How did you feel when it was over with? [Did you] feel like you were brow beat
and crushed down, been told off, and all that? It felt more like a blessing, didn’t it? And
yet you knew there were things there that needed to be fixed. Does that tell us anything
about how to deal with folks when it comes to the Word of God? A reproof doesn’t have
to be an abusive thing. A rebuke doesn’t have to be a sharp thing. We’ll do well to learn
the secret of presenting God’s Word ALWAYS CONSTRUCTIVE – ALWAYS
UPLIFTING – ALWAYS POINTING MEN TO SOMETHING HIGHER. …”

Brother Clifford went on to address 1 Thess. 5:13b, “And be at peace among
yourselves.” He said, “Oh brethren, let’s get along with each other. What had it ought
to take before I’d be willing to lay down my confidence? I feel like that I’d just nearly
have to see somebody in the very act of committing sin before I’d be willing to say,
‘Well, you’re not saved.’ I want some pretty reliable information before I start cutting

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somebody out of my confidence. Didn’t He tell us in one place, ‘Don’t cast away your
confidence – it hath great recompence of reward?’ … I was impressed this afternoon by
what Brother Fry said. … He said, ‘There was a brother here and we had a little
difference, but we got it ironed out.’ It thrills my soul for more reasons than one. Because
you know what the answer is if they didn’t – well, these brethren had some trouble and
disagreement and so, alright – somebody needs to be cut off – somebody has done wrong,
and this needs to be done, and that. You better be careful! What did he say in the
qualification? Have patience [1 Tim. 3:3]. And in time it worked out. Isn’t that better
than to have somebody pushed aside? Oh saints, holiness always runs true to form –
GENTLE, KIND, EASY TO BE ENTREATED ….”

That was one of the best instructional discourses I ever heard in my life! There were
many other excellent ones throughout the course of the three-day meeting as well. Danny
Layne was here, and in fact, stayed in my house during that meeting. It was a wonderful,
inspiring, and very edifying meeting. After it was over and everyone had gone home, I
talked again with Danny on the phone, and he told me he would NEVER attend such a
meeting again! I was surprised! Why would anyone be opposed to such wholesome and
godly instructions? He seemed to have an aversion toward the meeting and the burden of
the brethren for unity and cooperation in their ministerial efforts. This raised a red flag in
my mind.

Although I was not convinced of it at the time (and perhaps Danny himself was not
even aware of it) he was already imbibing a religious spirit contrary to the true Spirit of
Christ. For that reason, the instructions regarding ministers humbling themselves, being
submissive one to another, and working together for the promotion of Christ’s kingdom
and the salvation of souls did not set well with him. He wanted to see things go his way.
He was harboring a desire to be the man at the helm. As became evident over the next
three years, people had to accept his way, his interpretation of Scripture, or else. He
showed an intolerant attitude toward anyone who disagreed with him on any line. I well
remember him preaching about “Cut-off Time.” That seemed to become a favorite theme
of his. He left that ministers’ meeting and went in direct opposition to the instructions
that were given and spent the next three years gathering a following to himself of a few
hundred people, most of them being also young converts who had little experience in
walking with the Lord. It became obvious that he intended to “cut off” and disfellowship
anyone and everyone who did not come in line with his preaching and teaching. He took
the liberty to do a lot of “reproving” and “rebuking” that was neither “with longsuffering”
nor, as Brother Clifford Wilson said, “constructive” or “uplifting.” Brother Clifford
Wilson was one of the preachers whose counsel he resisted and refused along with the
counsel of others of the most experienced and well-seasoned ministers among us –
humble men who had been walking with the Lord for decades and had valuable
experiences in Gospel work, dealing with people, and winning souls to Christ. Because
they disapproved of his harsh, judgmental spirit, he branded those faithful men of God as
“compromisers.” But they loved Danny and were only trying to help him.

I believe it was some time prior to this minister’s meeting held in 1986 that Danny
Layne held a revival meeting for the Church of God congregation in Guthrie, Oklahoma.

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I was not there but heard about it. One member of the congregation told me that their
pastor, Brother Leslie Busbee, who is now deceased, simply sat and observed Danny as
he was preaching, seldom saying “amen” to anything. I knew Brother Leslie from the
time I was a small boy, had grown up around his ministry, and can testify that he was one
of the most Christ-like, Holy Spirit-filled men I ever knew. I later mentioned this meeting
to him and what one of the members of the congregation had told me. Brother Leslie
replied that the reason he did not “amen” Danny’s preaching was because he discerned a
spirit behind it that wasn’t right. Danny wasn’t necessarily preaching false doctrine at that
time, but his manner of presenting the Word of God was often not constructive or
healthy. Brother Leslie realized this during this revival meeting, therefore he did not feel
free to put his sanction on Danny’s preaching. After Danny realized that Brother Leslie
was not sanctioning his preaching, he developed an aversion toward Brother Leslie. At a
later meeting in Oregon, where they were both attending, Danny refused to even stay in
the same facility where Brother Leslie was staying.

It seemed that Danny took the attitude that anybody who did not sanction his
preaching was resisting “the truth.” The truth, however, was not the issue. It was “the
spirit” in which he was presenting it. You can take a bone and coax a dog to come, take it
and enjoy it, or you can take the same bone and beat him with it and run him off.
Wholesome preaching should not leave people feeling that they have taken a beating.

About the same time Danny held the above-mentioned revival meeting in Guthrie, if
not during that same meeting, he approached a young sister in the Guthrie congregation
and asked her if she would agree to be his “spy” and report to him in California
everything that went on in the Guthrie congregation. The very thought of such a thing
was repulsive to her. She replied to him that she would NEVER do such a thing! She told
me later that Danny became very angry with her when she refused to comply with his
request. She said she knew from that day forward that there was something seriously
wrong with that man!

If we fail to allow the Holy Spirit to temper us by submitting ourselves to His
workings through fellow members of Christ’s body, we expose ourselves to an unhealthy
and unbalanced religious perspective. The church of God is not about our personal
interests or individualities, but it is a body that is fitly framed together and
compacted by that which every joint supplies (Eph. 4:16). Every joint is important! If
we cut off a hand or a foot, we become a handicapped individual. So it is when people cut
themselves off from other joints and bands in Christ’s body and refuse to receive the
nourishment that flows through those joints and bands (Col. 2:19). “… We, being many,
are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.” Rom. 12:5. “For by one
Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be
bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.” 1 Cor. 12:13. Therefore,
we ought to walk worthy of the vocation wherewith we are called, with all lowliness and
meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavoring to keep the
unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of
the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of
the fulness of Christ (Eph. 4:1-3, 13).

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I was also told that Danny made the statement when with a group of saints who were
gathered on another occasion at another place: “Who knows? I may be another D. S.
Warner!” The brother who reported hearing him make this statement said that raised a
red flag in his mind regarding Danny. Obviously, Danny was harboring in his heart a
desire to be an important religious leader. Unbeknown to him, perhaps, his very motive
of heart in thinking such a thing was contrary to the character and spirit of D. S. Warner.

DANNY LAYNE MAKES HIMSELF AN AUTHORITARIAN LEADER

In June 1989 Danny Layne told all his followers it was time to disfellowship the
“Faith and Victory people” and to no longer attend their church services or camp
meetings. He proclaimed them to be a “fallen” group of people and that the Spirit of God
had left or was leaving them. His misrepresentations regarding the people he removed
himself from are still believed by his followers to this day. However, the people Danny
denounced were obviously saved people, owned and accepted by the Lord – people who
loved God, who were striving to do His will and to love Him with all their hearts. They
were real members of Christ’s body. Their only crime was that they were unwilling to
accept Danny’s notions or support his agenda.

Before the year 1989, he had exerted a lot of influence in several Church of God
congregations across the United States. Although he pastored a congregation of his own
in Ontario, California, he had done a lot of traveling to several camp meetings in various
states, thus hundreds of people had heard his testimony and had been exposed to his
preaching, which was always accompanied by a great deal of charisma.

There was a congregation of considerable size in southern Louisiana where he carried
a great deal of influence and had won the devotion of many of its members by the late
1980s. At that time the polarities between those in the congregation who discerned what
the devil was doing and those who were giving their allegiance and devotion to Danny
had become sharp. Danny’s devotees wanted him, their favorite preacher, to come hold a
meeting in that place. But in order for such a meeting to be arranged, Danny had to get
the approval of the pastor. The pastor at that time was Brother Ed Wilson, who now
resides in Shawnee, Oklahoma. (Brother Ed Wilson is the son of the late Brother Clifford
Wilson, from whose discourse I quoted above.) Brother Ed told me that Danny called him
and asked if he could come to hold a meeting in that congregation. Realizing the
volatility of the situation, Brother Ed decided to record his end of the telephone
conversation. He told Danny, “Yes, you can come and hold a meeting, provided you
agree to follow certain guidelines.” Danny would not commit to an agreement.

Following this conversation, Danny called his followers in that congregation and told
them that their pastor had forbidden him to come and hold a meeting. Angrily, they
approached Brother Ed, asking why Danny Layne could not come to hold a meeting for
the congregation. Brother Ed replied that he did NOT tell Danny that he could not come.
He said, “I’ve got the recording right here – you can hear exactly what I told him.” They
refused to even listen to the recording but went back home and called Danny about the
matter. Later, Danny had another telephone conversation with Brother Ed and said to
him, “You got me!” In other words, he acknowledged that he had lied to his followers

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and had gotten caught! Yet, he never made any effort to correct the lie or to let the people
know what the truth was.

“LORD, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? who shall dwell in thy holy hill? He that
walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart.” Psa.
15:1-2. Nothing will separate a man from God’s presence any quicker than dishonesty of
heart and a lying tongue. “These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an
abomination unto him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent
blood, An heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to
mischief, A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among
brethren.” Pro. 6:16-19. Danny was guilty of both lying and sowing discord among
brethren.

Following the above incident, Danny assisted his followers from that location in
separating themselves from Brother Ed Wilson as their pastor and approved another man
from among them to be their overseer or pastor. Later, that man ended up violating at
least two young girls under his leadership. (I’ve been told that there was also a third
case.) It was a very sad situation. It was in this kind of spiritual climate that the Church of
God Restoration sect was born.

THE COGR SECT ADOPTS A UNIFORM STANDARD OF DRESS

After separating themselves from us, Danny Layne and his followers began calling
their group the Church of God Restoration, often referred to today as the COGR for
short. They claimed that they were engaged in a movement to restore what D. S. Warner
believed and taught in the 1800s. Among their first moves was to name a periodical they
were publishing The Gospel Trumpet; the same name D. S. Warner gave his periodical.
Then they began dressing similarly to people who lived in the 1800s, except they adopted
a uniform standard of dress. They seemed to think that there was some kind of grace or
holiness associated with wearing clothes that resembled the clothing worn in the 1800s.
But they seemed to forget that the main thing D. S. Warner taught and believed in was
HOLINESS OF HEART. He believed the outward appearance should reflect holiness of
heart, of course, just as all true Christians do today, but he did not adopt a certain kind of
attire and promote that as a standard of dress. In fact, adopting a uniform standard of
dress was considered by him and his associates to be “a mark of sectarianism,” as can be
proven by their writings.**

**(In a sermon delivered at West Milton, Ohio, during their May 2022 meeting, COGR Apostle Patrick O’Shea, Jr., said, “We don’t dress because of modesty. … You know why we dress this way? Because we’re Laynites!” He might as well have said, “Because we’re sectarians!)

A few years after Danny established his Church of God Restoration sect, some of his
followers came back and attended a service at the national Church of God camp meeting
at Monark Springs, Missouri, one evening. Following that evening service, a few
brethren, including myself, went to greet them and let them know we were glad they
came. Almost immediately, one of the members of their group began criticizing the
service, saying there was no anointing and finding fault with the way people were
dressed, etc. He asked us, “How did the saints dress back in D. S. Warner’s time?” The

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Lord gave one of the brethren a wise answer to his question. He replied, “They dressed
just pretty much like everybody else did at that time.” The questioner hardly knew what
to say to that! I guess he hadn’t thought of it in that way!

It is true that, as the world departs farther and farther from Bible principles, their
customs and fashions depart more and more from what is acceptable as godly and
righteous. Therefore, the gulf between what is acceptable in the church and what is
acceptable with the world is bound to become wider and wider. Yet, at the same time, the
church is not bound to any “uniform standard” of dress. The Bible says to dress “in
modest apparel.” And that can vary from culture to culture and from one country to
another. What is considered “modest” here in the United States of America might be
considered “immodest” in Pakistan. Therefore, we must allow for latitude in the area of
Christian dress and always be sure to keep within the bounds of modesty and propriety in
whatever culture we find ourselves.

I want to comment briefly regarding “anointing.” People who fall under spirits of
extremism often assume charismatic-styled preaching and emotional demonstration in
worship services signifies “anointing.” That, however, usually falls more into the
category of will-worship than anointing. True anointing is unrelated to any human
element we may incorporate into religion. Anointing simply signifies God’s presence and
approval resting upon us through the personal witness of His Spirit in our own hearts (see
1 John 2:27). Whether or not anointing produces any degree of outward demonstration is
completely irrelevant. Charisma and emotional demonstrations can be worked up in the
flesh and may have no real divine inspiration behind them at all. True anointing only
flows into our souls by God’s Spirit sent down from Heaven. It may come to us like a
silent dew or like a gentle rain. One inspired songwriter said, “Like the rain that falls
from Heaven, Like the sunlight from the sky, So the Holy Spirit given, Falls upon us
from on high.” – Mrs. M. P. Ferguson. The evidence of true anointing is “love, joy,
peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance,” etc. (Gal. 5:22-
23). Sadly, to this day, the followers of Danny Layne assume their worked-up,
emotionally styled worship services to be an indication of anointing.

D. S. WARNER’S TENETS REGARDING CHRISTIAN DRESS
(Followed With Comments)

“…We must be like Christ – of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord; not
judging after the sight of the eyes, neither reproving after the hearing of the ears,
but with righteousness shall He judge. (Isa. 11:3,4.) Yea, we are positively commanded
to ‘judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment’ (John
7:24). To do this we must be so illuminated by the Spirit of God, that we may read the
inward condition of man, and fellowship, and disfellowship as we discern by the real
Spirit of God.

“A man’s temperament and education may be such that his ideas of plainness of
dress may be much different from those of another who may nevertheless be God’s
special anointed, while at the same time one of the devil’s angels of light may just

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meet his standard of outward apparel. Now if he is not careful, he will reject God’s
man, and join himself to one who is possessed with devils, and before he is aware he
has fallen a victim to seducing spirits. Never take sides hastily, stay upon God, and
time will tell who is true to God in heart, and who is not. … Fast and pray and become
so full of God, that you will be devil-proof. Get the real gift of discerning spirits and wait
before God until every mystery is solved. He will guide you with His eye. He that
walketh with Christ shall have the light of life, and he that walketh in the day shall not
stumble.

“Perhaps, dear reader, your only ideal of men possessed with devils, is that of hideous
looking, cursing and raging maniacs. If so, may God quicken your understanding of these
perilous times of deception. Remember that ‘Satan is transformed into an angel of light’
(2 Cor. 11:14). He is possessing men with religious devils. The evil spirits enter men and
deceive unwary souls. THEY ASSUME ALL THE OUTWARD APPEARANCE OF
PIETY. They talk just as reasonable in business matters, sit just as courteously in social
intercourse, and are not soon excelled in outward acts of devotion, and yet to the holy,
anointed soul they are known to possess a devil. … Flee away from such, lest in
fellowshipping them the devils enter you!”

– D. S. Warner, The Gospel Trumpet, November 15, 1883

I am convinced beyond all doubt that Danny Layne opened himself up to religious
devils when he failed to allow the Holy Spirit to temper his humanity and bring his
personality and self-life into subjection to the will of God. It means so much for all of us
as Christians to always be completely honest with God, with ourselves, and with all
men -- especially to always be on the lookout for any personal faults or shortcomings that
we may have, and always be quick to make any necessary adjustments of our attitudes,
outlooks, or whatever needs to be brought into conformity to the nature and image of
Jesus Christ. We should always be more concerned about examining ourselves and
addressing our own shortcomings and imperfections than we are about pointing out those
things in others. Jesus is the model to which we should endeavor to pattern our lives.
Jesus was “meek and lowly in heart,” and He said, “Take my yoke upon you and learn of
me” (Matt. 11:29). Learning does take time and it requires experience. Any time there is
a lack of humility and lowliness of mind and a manifestation of religious pride in a
professed minister of the Gospel it is a sure indication that he has not yet learned from
Jesus some of the most important things he needs to learn. These indications became
clear in Danny Layne’s harsh, judgmental preaching, as he began to gather his own
following. That style of preaching, coupled with his charisma, seemed to attract people
who had a like spirit of being judgmental toward others. As Apostle Paul warned the
saints in his time, “Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to
draw away disciples after them.” Acts 20:30.

The Word and the Spirit of God operate in unison. “The Spirit of truth” bears witness
to “the Word of truth.” But if we begin preaching our own opinions or teaching as
doctrines our own private interpretations of God’s Word, the Spirit backs off. This is
another way that we make ourselves vulnerable to false religious spirits. We MUST be
tuned to and stay in sync with the Holy Spirit to be guided into the correct

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understanding of God’s Word, otherwise, we’ll find ourselves walking in the light of
our own sparks and in that of a fire that we ourselves have kindled (Isa. 50:11).
Remember, the Holy Spirit was the one who “moved” men of old time to write the Word
(2 Pet. 1:21), therefore He is the One who knows exactly what God had in mind when He
moved them to write it. Since we don’t even know how to pray as we ought, without the
Spirit helping our infirmities (Rom. 8:26-27), how much more do we need the Spirit’s
assistance and guidance in properly understanding God’s written Word? Only in His light
can we perceive correct light (Psa. 36:9), and He alone can light the candle of our hearts
and illuminate the darkness of our understanding regarding spiritual matters (Psa. 18:28).

DANNY LAYNE COUPLES FALSE APOCALYPTIC TEACHING WITH HIS
AUTHORITARIANISM

About the time Danny was drawing away disciples after himself, he also began
endorsing a method of interpreting the Book of Revelation that had been introduced by an
“Anderson Church of God” minister named W. S. Goodnight some 50 years before.
Around the year 1930, W. S. Goodnight had begun advocating the concept of seven
distinct “church ages,” the last which he said began in the year 1930, the year he began
publicizing his new Revelation message. He taught that, at that time, the seventh and last
trumpet of Revelation 11:15-18 began to sound. The new doctrine contained several
obvious fallacies and strange interpretations of apocalyptic scripture, including a set
timeline of 1980, which was supposed to conclude his supposed seventh epoch of the
Gospel Age (1930 to 1980). After 1980, according to Goodnight, no one else could be
saved and the second coming of Christ would be imminent. This ideology was rejected
by most Church of God people, except for some who came under Goodnight’s influence.
Danny Layne found himself attracted to Goodnight’s method of interpreting Revelation.
With just a little modification, Goodnight’s interpretations fit very well with concepts
that he had endorsed regarding the church, prophecy, and the end times. So, he devised a
new scheme. He changed Goodnight’s date of 1930, which he had set for the beginning
of the sounding of the seventh trumpet, to 1980 instead – the year of his own conversion.
In other words, instead of the supposed seventh trumpet era ending in 1980, as
Goodnight had speculated, Danny chose to proclaim that it started in 1980. He began
teaching his followers that from 1980 he and those preachers who had oriented
themselves around him were sounding the seventh and final trumpet of God.

This proclamation was very foolish for several reasons. For one, in 1980, when Danny
was first converted, he didn’t even know anything about Goodnight’s seventh trumpet
teaching and didn’t learn much about it until several years thereafter – more like the mid
to late 1980s. He had to seek out information about it in order to put his version of it
together. His followers to this day believe there was something divinely prophetic about
the date 1980, the year Danny Layne was converted. The whole platform of their teaching
rests on a fallacious doctrine that originated long before Danny Layne was born. The
focus of those groups who have embraced it, from my observation, has been primarily on
THEMSELVES and a special place that they believe they hold in church history – a
position they try to prove through speculative apocalyptic interpretation. The message
generally boils down to a call to “look on US – WE are the church in prophecy.”

14.

DANNY LAYNE’S POSITION OF HIERARCHICAL HEADSHIP PASSED
DOWN TO ANOTHER AT HIS DEATH

After Danny Layne’s death, September 21, 2011, his position of hierarchical headship
in the movement he founded was passed down to his closest friend and associate, Donald
Ray Tinsman. Ray later appointed eleven other apostles under himself. They claim these
twelve apostles, including Ray and those beneath him, hold an equal place with the
twelve apostles chosen and appointed by Jesus in the foundation of the Christian church,
except that Ray, in this present time, holds an even more important place than Peter,
Paul, or any of the first twelve apostles appointed by Jesus. Ray is second only to Jesus
Himself. Since the death of their founder, Danny Layne, the whole movement has been
on a rapidly spiraling crash course into ecclesiastical disaster. Some of the things that
they are teaching and promoting now are shocking, to say the least! I doubt that the
group’s founder himself, Danny Layne, would even approve of some of their present
notions. In fact, in one of their big meetings held in Greenville, Ohio, in February 2019,
one of their apostles, Stephen P. Hargrave, who is supposed to be apostle #2, under Ray
Tinsman, made this public acknowledgement: “If we would have said some of the
things we’re saying now three years ago, we would have emptied out this place!”
Truly, the place needs to be emptied out! People need to be running for their lives!

In this same February 2019 meeting, John Friesen, whom they acknowledge as one of
their “prophets,” said this:

“… I’m here to tell you tonight that I have been wonderfully saved by the wonderful
working power of the church. … I knelt down to pray, and I knew I wasn’t going
nowhere fast, or anywhere at all, really. Well, there was something working in my bosom
that was something that needed more than just the average go on my knees and pray for a
few minutes. And as I was praying, I knew I was getting nowhere. I got up on my knees
and I looked up at the ceiling knowing that I couldn’t see any farther than that, but I said,
‘Lord, I’m going to do something – I’m going to start praying another way.’ And I began
to pray, and I said, ‘Lord, I come to you in the name of our chief apostle, Brother Ray
Tinsman.’ That’s what I did! And I’m telling you, I knew I had tapped into something! I
did know that! Something was already changing just from that announcement! I got
encouraged in my praying! I said, ‘I know I’m on the right track now!’ So I started out
and I said, ‘And in Brother Steve, and in Brother Benjamin, and in Brother Everett.’ And
I went through the whole list! I’m telling you, the room filled with the glory of God that
night! There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that heaven was in that room! There’s no
question! I didn’t quite know, actually, where to go from there. I had opened up
something I didn’t quite know what to do with! But I just want to announce to you
quickly, heaven has been open to me ever since! And I’m telling you tonight, this doesn’t
even need a disclaimer, really. We’re not talking about man worship, although we could
be educated some right here on this point. And brethren, tonight I’m a free man! I’m
telling you tonight, I’m free! Free like I’ve never been free! I’m telling you what
happens, dear brethren. If you’ll turn your hearts THIS WAY – there are temptations
and problems in the room tonight that will disappear! You won’t have to come here to
pray about them, you won’t have to fast about them, they’ll vanish away. There are

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things in my life that have passed away at Brother Ray’s feet. And I invite you to
join me, and this I can tell you, follow me as I follow them!”

Where in the Word of God do we read about anyone being “saved by the wonderful
working power of the church?” Apostle Peter taught emphatically that there is but ONE
NAME under Heaven given among men whereby they must be saved (Acts 4:12).
Evidently, this poor man, John Friesen, who thought he had gotten on the right track was
way off track! What he tapped into did not come from Heaven, but from another source.

TEACHINGS AND TENETS OF D. S. WARNER COMPARED TO THOSE OF
THE CHURCH OF GOD RESTORATION SECT

The message the Church of God Restoration leadership is promoting is so foreign and
so directly opposed to what D. S. Warner taught that, to anyone who knows the facts
about D. S. Warner’s teachings, it is difficult to understand how these people could even
claim any affinity to him at all. One thing is certain, if D. S. Warner were to rise from the
dead and enter their meeting house and be allowed to preach, he would empty out the
place for sure! He would take the hammer of God’s Word and break their idolatrous man-
worshiping system of religion all to pieces! But sadly, the leadership of the Church of
God Restoration has so brainwashed its members that they seem to have no
comprehension of what the church of God really is. They seem to really believe that their
little Tinsman-led group constitutes “the church of God,” and believe that whoever wants
to be a part of it must acknowledge whatever chief apostle Ray Tinsman says as absolute
truth and gospel. Ray Tinsman has even publicly stated that he has authority to take away
people’s salvation. He claims to do so when members of the group do not do as he
requires.

I’ve noticed through the years that many of those who finally do get their eyes open
and make their escape come out of this group in a pathetic state of disillusionment
regarding what D. S. Warner taught, what his message really was, and what Christianity
in general is all about. Often, because of the trauma and emotional scars they have
received from the harsh treatment they got for questioning or objecting to policies or
requirements of the Church of God Restoration leadership, they tend to think that
anybody who claims any connection to anything relevant to “D. S. Warner” or “Church
of God” are of like spirit – cultish bigots or promoters of strait-jacket religion. Several
who have come out of the Church of God Restoration have even turned to atheism or
agnosticism. The fruits that have been produced from this false system of religion that
Danny Layne initiated have been devasting to an immeasurable degree to many dear
people and are heart-breaking to those of God’s true people looking on.

I’m going to give several quotes in the next pages from credible historians regarding
D. S. Warner, the real message that he promoted, and what prompted it. I invite the
reader to compare these quotes to what is being taught and promoted by the so-called
Church of God Restoration today. I believe you will have to agree that the organization
Danny Layne founded constitutes a complete counterfeit and perversion of D. S.
Warner’s message and is a reproach and insult to D. S. Warner himself.

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The Quest for Scriptural Holiness and the Unity of God’s People

The interdenominational Holiness Association that was formed following the
American Civil War had a profound effect on many of God’s people who were scattered
among many denominations. Many earnest Christians who were hungering and thirsting
for God’s fullness in their hearts and lives began obtaining the glory of our Lord Jesus
Christ “through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth” (2 Thess. 2: 13-14).
And because of the hallowing presence and anointing of the Holy Spirit in their hearts, (1
John 2: 20,27), they were also made aware of the spiritual deadness and shallowness of
the denominations they were members of and how far short these humanly organized
systems were of being like the divine church we read about in the New Testament.

As a young Christian, D. S. Warner had joined an organization known as the “General
Eldership of the Churches of God in North America.” John Winebrenner, an ordained
minister of the German Reformed Church, played a pivotal role in its establishment in
1830. This was the first denomination in North America to become referenced as “the
Church of God.” D. S. Warner joined it because it bore a scriptural name and its
doctrines, as far as he was able to discern at the time, were scriptural. He spent
approximately 10 years of his earliest ministry working hard to build up this organization,
bringing in many converts and establishing new congregations. But in the late 1870s,
through the influence of people involved in the holiness movement who touched his life
in a deep way, D. S. Warner was persuaded there was deeper grace and higher things in
God to be attained than what this denomination allowed for. This got him into trouble
with its governing body, the eldership. Eventually, charges were brought against him for
the crime of fellowshipping with members of the Holiness Association, allowing them to
participate in worship services at a certain “Church of God chapel,” and for preaching
and teaching experiential holiness.

On September 29, 1877, he was summoned to appear before a committee of Elders of
the so-called Church of God and answer to charges of heresy brought against him. In
writing of that experience in his diary, he said, “… I came out with another perfect
evidence that ‘the very God of peace had sanctified me wholly.’ I was entirely free
from the least hard feelings against any of my brethren. Glory to God, I felt good
toward them all. Looked upon their efforts to condemn me and the holiness cause as
springing entirely from ignorance, sin within, and a blind zeal to protect the church. I
went to my room a happy soul.”

On October 1, 1877, the committee reported “charges sustained” against Elder D. S.
Warner. In speaking about a conversation he had later with a committee member, after
they had expelled him from the so-called Church of God, D. S. Warner said, “I thanked
him for their decision and assured him that if I were to look upon the matter from the
mere human standpoint and consider my attachment to the Church of God and her
principles, I should regard their action a dreadful calamity and intolerable to bear; but
that I had now that charity which ‘believeth all things’ and ‘endureth all things,’ and
therefore I calmly rested in the promise of God that ‘all things work together for good’ to
me, and the sweet assurance that my dear Father, to whom I belonged, would turn this

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and everything else (as long as I stay on the altar) to my good and His glory. Praise His
holy name!”

On New Year’s Day, January 1, 1878, he wrote:

“Praise God for the mercies of the past year. … O my God, I shall forever dwell with
Thee, and through the riches of Thy boundless grace, my whole being – every thought,
word, feeling, appetite, desire, wish, purpose, emotion and action; yea, my whole life
shall be a continual offering to God in the flames of His love. Amen. Almighty, all-
wise and ever-present God, fulfill this Thy pleasure in me. I am in Thy hands. Amen.
Amen.”

For a while D. S. Warner was not sure what course he should take from this point. The
body of believers he had grown to love so dearly had expelled and disfellowshipped him.
What group should he join now? He considered for a short time joining a certain group of
Mennonites. But leaning heavily on God for guidance, the Holy Spirit soon impressed
upon his heart and mind that this would not be the proper course to take either. In the
meantime, the Holy Spirit was revealing more and more truth to his mind regarding what
“the church of God” really is. It became clearer and clearer to him that the church is not a
humanly organized, humanly governed organization. He later expressed this
understanding in a verse of song he wrote:

“I need to join no earth-begotten thing, The church that Jesus built is all I see.
And God Himself has truly set me in, And that’s surely good enough for me.”

However, he was not alone in that kind of thinking. At the same time, the Spirit of
God was enlightening the minds of many to the fact that the real church cannot be bound
to any man-made, man-ruled organization but is rather the divine body of Christ in which
all those who are saved in Christ have obtained membership by virtue of salvation and
are brought together to partake of one Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13). Many holiness people began
to also feel that the Holiness Association itself was too denominationally oriented. It
encouraged or required adherence to some denominational body of believers. But some
began to sever their ties with organized denominations. They became known as “come
outers.” Among that class was D. S. Warner. It was amid this atmosphere of spiritual
revival and awakening to the evils of denominationalism that he began publishing his
anti-sectarian holiness journal called The Gospel Trumpet in January of 1881. There were
other holiness men who were also publishing anti-sectarian papers, and he also advertised
and sanctioned their periodicals through The Gospel Trumpet.

D. S. Warner made tremendous personal sacrifices and endured great financial
hardships to publish The Gospel Trumpet. His motivation was far from a self-serving one.
He could have saved himself from much hardship had he given up the endeavor. But his
whole heart was in doing the will of God as the Holy Spirit directed him and promoting
the truth of God’s Word. He was, at the outset of publishing The Gospel Trumpet, still
connected with the Holiness Association. But within a few months after beginning The
Gospel Trumpet publication, he felt the Holy Spirit was leading him to sever his ties with
the Association. He gives his reasons for doing so in the June 1, 1881, issue

“Saturday, April 22, the hand of the Lord was heavily upon our soul, had no relish to converse with any one but God. Finally in company with two brethren we went into the

18.

house of God at Hardinsburg, Indiana, and placed ourselves under the searching eye of God, when the Spirit of the Lord showed me the inconsistency of repudiating sects and yet belonging to an association that is based upon sect recognition. We promised God to withdraw from all such compacts. But being dearly attached to the holiness work, we attended the Association at Terre Haute, and tried to have the sect-endorsing clause removed from the constitution. Its substance is as follows, speaking of local associations:

“‘It shall consist of members of various Christian organizations and seek to work in harmony with all these societies.’

“We offered the following substitute: ‘It shall consist of, and seek to cooperate with, all true Christians everywhere.’

“We had supposed that fellowship and cooperation should not exclude any person or truth that is in Christ Jesus, and that we should not be compelled to bow down to anything not in, nor of, Christ Jesus.

“We were positively denied membership on the ground of not adhering to any sect. And now we wish to announce to all that we wish to cooperate with all Christians, as such, in saving souls – but forever withdraw from all organisms that uphold and endorse sects and denominations in the body of Christ.”

The clear, spiritual tone of The Gospel Trumpet became a great attraction to spiritual people everywhere. Multitudes of Christians became convicted of the Bible truth it taught, consecrated themselves to God unreservedly, and came out of their denominations, taking the Word and Spirit of God as their only guides. Along with all other scriptural terms relative to the church as the spiritual body of Christ, these “come outers” also accepted the scriptural term, “church of God,” which is found eight times in the New Testament and is used more than any other term in reference to the church as the universal body of believers. The “come outers” believed the scriptural appellation should be used without denominational connotations. The following quotes from various historians shed much light on their application of the term “church of God.”

“D. S. Warner’s Church of God carried the nonsectarian traditions of the holiness revival to such extremes that he rejected entirely the idea of an organized denomination. Local congregations kept no membership records and were bound to others only by the fellowship of the Spirit.”

– Excerpted from Called unto Holiness (Kansas City, MO: Nazarene Publishing House, Copyright 1962). Used by permission in Barry Callen’s “A Time to Remember – Beginnings,”  

(page 15.)

“This Church of God does not regard itself as a denomination but as a movement within the church universal to restore Christian unity on a scriptural basis. It does not keep membership lists but believes that all Christians are by virtue of their faith and experience members of the true church of God.”         – The Small Sects in America, by Elmer T. Clark.

19.   ****

“At the outset D. S. Warner was opposed to any kind of organization. … Ministerial meetings were called casually without any organization, and the publishing work was operated by private persons and not as an organization controlled by the church.”
                                          – When the Trumpet Sounded, by Charles Ewing Brown, page 94.

“Those who followed him (D. S. Warner) rejected all creeds, recognized ‘the Lord’s people’ in all denominations, and sought to bring about the identity, or at least the possible identity, of the visible and the invisible church.”

– Excerpted from Christianity in a Revolutionary Age, Vol. III (New York: Harper and Row, Inc., Copyright 1961). Used by permission in Barry Callen’s A Time to Remember – Beginnings, page 26.

“The most important message was that Christ built the church and we are members of it. There is no joining in God’s church, all saints are one and we should recognize all saints. … The theory back there was that everybody saved belongs to the church.”
– A quote from J. N. Richardson in Church of God History in South-Central Missouri, by Barbara Crouch, page 13.

In the Feb. 15, 1887, issue of The Gospel Trumpet, D. S. Warner replied as follows to one who asked him, “Have you no organization?” He answered: “We have none that we call ours. But God has one which He bought, built, and organized Himself, into which we are happy to have been organized, or builded together through the Spirit.” Then he proceeds to give scriptural proof that this is the only kind of church organization God recognizes.

It is clear in studying the New Testament that the apostolic church “kept no membership records and were bound to others only by the fellowship of the Spirit.” (See 1 Corinthians chapter 12, Ephesians 2:18-22 and 4:1-16.) Thus D. S. Warner’s concept of a theocratically organized church, owned by God and governed and directed by His Son, Jesus Christ, through the agency and ministration of the Holy Spirit was nothing more or less than the true Scriptural ideal. He believed Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit to be competent enough to perform their administrative functions in “fitly framing and joining and compacting” all the members of His body, the church. He believed that every element that is foreign to Christ and the Holy Spirit is no part of the “church of God, which He hath purchased with His own blood” (Acts 20:28), and that the whole New Testament system operates on the basis of intimate personal relationship with Christ – Christ being all and in all (Col. 3:10-11; Eph. 1:22-23; 4:6); that God Himself places the members in His body as it pleases Him (1 Cor. 12:18), and that the members only recognize one another through spiritual kinship in Christ (2 Cor. 5:16-17, Rom. 8:9).
20.
The church historian and theologian, Charles Ewing Brown, says: “… Let us try to see Warner as he would be judged today by a professional theologian and a historian critic. The present writer feels the more free to promise an objective analysis of Warner since he never met Warner personally and is obliged to write in the light of research, both among Warner’s friends and in the published and unpublished literature of the movement which he initiated. 

“In the Tradition of Radical Christianity”

“In the matter of church organization and polity it has been asserted that Warner stood in the Reformed tradition. This statement is based upon the fact that (John) Winebrenner [founder of the oldest sect in North America that bears the name ‘Church of God’] came out of the Reformed Church, and since Warner came out of Winebrenner’s church the assumption is that both Warner and Winebrenner stood in the Reformed tradition. This kind of argument would prove that Martin Luther was a Roman Catholic because he came out of the Roman Catholic Church. Such argument would prove that Emerson was a Unitarian because he came out of the Unitarian Church. Naturally Luther and Zwingli both came out of the Roman Catholic Church. Nevertheless, each established a form of Protestant religion which claims no kinship with the Roman church. As a matter of fact, Menno Simons was also once a priest of the Roman Catholic Church, and yet he was the organizer of the Anabaptists into the group called Mennonites.

“It should take no argument to prove that a reformer cannot be identified with the organization which he has denounced and deserted. As a matter of historic fact, D. S. Warner stood rather in the historic tradition of radical Christianity, extending from the dissidents from Roman Catholicism in the eleventh century down through the Anabaptists into the radical Christianity of modern times. It was with this school of historic Christianity that Warner had deepest affinity. …

“Regarding the doctrine of salvation, technically called soteriology, although Warner came out of the Reformed Church, he stood clearly in the tradition of John and Charles Wesley and of James Arminius before them. The stream of salvation teaching comes down through these men and through the Pietists of the seventeenth century to the present time. James Arminius (1560 – 1609) revolted from the intense Calvinism of his time. He taught that the atonement of Christ was universal, and that salvation is for all men. In other words, he taught the doctrine of freedom of the will in accepting salvation. He also taught that it is possible to be saved from all sin in this life. His doctrine was later taken up by the Wesleys and fired with evangelical fervor.

“… Actually, as the historian of theology can show, every doctrine save one which D. S. Warner taught had been taught in large groups of Christians at one time or another throughout Christian history. … The discovery that practically all of Warner’s teaching lies deep in the historic theology of the church has moved some critics to assail Warner as lacking in originality. There is not space here to discuss that absurd charge, but if it lies against Warner, it lies against every great theologian of the church. Men like

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“In all science and industry originality does not consist in hatching out complete novelties, but rather in developing new combinations of the old, until we have what has always existed now become new because placed in new relations. The atomic bomb, for instance, was made possible by the development of science since the days of the alchemists.

“Warner’s Unique Emphasis”

“In a foregoing paragraph we reserved one point of Warner’s teaching as a novelty. This was his doctrine concerning the identity, or at least the possible identity, between the visible and invisible church. When we say that the doctrine of the identity of the visible and invisible church is a novelty, we mean in modern theological thinking. It was the doctrine of the church during the first century that the normal church is both visible and invisible at the same time. In my book The Apostolic Church I have given Adolf Harnack, the famous German Protestant church historian, as authority for this statement. It is easy for the historical student to verify this assertion by study of the ancient patristic literature.

“Numerous authorities concur in the statement that Augustine was the first authoritative writer in the church who drew the distinction between the visible and the invisible church, and this he did to contrive a defense against the Donatists, a widespread sect of his time and country who said that the Catholic Church could not be the church of God because it was composed so largely of sinners. Augustine countered this attack by the defensive claim that there was a visible and an invisible church, and many false professors had found their way into the visible church.

“When the Protestant reformers were accused of dividing the church they fell back upon the arguments of Augustine and maintained that they had divided the visible church only but had done no injury to the unity of the invisible church of Christ. From that time forward the doctrine of a visible and invisible church was prominent in Protestantism, being regarded as one of its foremost dogmas, since upon it rested the primary defense against the charges of Roman Catholicism concerning dividing the church.

“In the beginning of the Friends movement under George Fox there was for a short time a vision and acceptance of the principle of the identity of the visible and invisible church, and the Quakers practiced this doctrine for a short time. It was not long, however, until the exigencies of their struggles with the courts, their persecutions, and their efforts to hold property and carry on Christian work caused them to drop this doctrine. Warner preached this doctrine assiduously from the first issues of The Gospel Trumpet throughout his life.

“While D. S. Warner spent a great deal of time in a fresh study of Christian doctrine from the Bible direct, it must be repeated that he was not a technical theologian, neither was

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Luther, Wesley, and other reformers did not introduce novelties into the church’s theology. They set old and neglected truth in a fresh, new light. They changed the arrangement of some themes and placed fresh emphasis upon old and forgotten truths. This is what Warner did.

“In all science and industry originality does not consist in hatching out complete novelties, but rather in developing new combinations of the old, until we have what has always existed now become new because placed in new relations. The atomic bomb, for instance, was made possible by the development of science since the days of the alchemists.

“Warner’s Unique Emphasis”

“In a foregoing paragraph we reserved one point of Warner’s teaching as a novelty. This was his doctrine concerning the identity, or at least the possible identity, between the visible and invisible church. When we say that the doctrine of the identity of the visible and invisible church is a novelty, we mean in modern theological thinking. It was the doctrine of the church during the first century that the normal church is both visible and invisible at the same time. In my book The Apostolic Church I have given Adolf Harnack, the famous German Protestant church historian, as authority for this statement. It is easy for the historical student to verify this assertion by study of the ancient patristic literature.

“Numerous authorities concur in the statement that Augustine was the first authoritative writer in the church who drew the distinction between the visible and the invisible church, and this he did to contrive a defense against the Donatists, a widespread sect of his time and country who said that the Catholic Church could not be the church of God because it was composed so largely of sinners. Augustine countered this attack by the defensive claim that there was a visible and an invisible church, and many false professors had found their way into the visible church.

“When the Protestant reformers were accused of dividing the church they fell back upon the arguments of Augustine and maintained that they had divided the visible church only but had done no injury to the unity of the invisible church of Christ. From that time forward the doctrine of a visible and invisible church was prominent in Protestantism, being regarded as one of its foremost dogmas, since upon it rested the primary defense against the charges of Roman Catholicism concerning dividing the church.

“In the beginning of the Friends movement under George Fox there was for a short time a vision and acceptance of the principle of the identity of the visible and invisible church, and the Quakers practiced this doctrine for a short time. It was not long, however, until the exigencies of their struggles with the courts, their persecutions, and their efforts to hold property and carry on Christian work caused them to drop this doctrine. Warner preached this doctrine assiduously from the first issues of The Gospel Trumpet throughout his life.

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“While D. S. Warner spent a great deal of time in a fresh study of Christian doctrine from the Bible direct, it must be repeated that he was not a technical theologian, neither was he a dogmatist. In fact, the chief accent of his preaching was not a dogmatic and didactic, but evangelical and evangelistic. In other words, he was more interested in getting people saved, sanctified, and healed of their afflictions than in any other aspect of his work. He was concerned about the doctrine of the church and the great principles of Christian living, not because he was obsessed with a theory, but because he believed that the doctrine of a pure church intelligently preached and earnestly practiced would actually tend to the salvation of souls and the increase of the kingdom of God.”

– Excerpted from When the Trumpet Sounded, pages 83 – 87.

In his book,  “Birth of a Reformation – Life and Labors of D. S. Warner,” Andrew L. Byers says:

“… It is not assumed that Brother Warner was right on every point of doctrine or in every application of a Scriptural text, but that the movement, in addition to being based on correct Scriptural principles otherwise, possesses that flexibility and spirit of progress by which it adjusts itself as God gives light.

   1. “It teaches the Scriptural process of salvation, by which people may obtain a real deliverance from sin and have the Holy Spirit as a witness to their salvation.

   2. “The truth only, and obedience thereto, is its motto; and it recognizes the rule of the Holy Spirit in the organization and government of the church.

   3. “It does not assume to possess all the truth, but stands committed thereto, holding an open door to the entrance of any further light and truth.

   4. “The spirit of the movement is to acknowledge good wherever found and to regard no door into the church other than salvation and no test of fellowship other than true Christianity possessed within the heart.

“Thus its basis is as narrow as the New Testament on the one hand, and as broad as the New Testament on the other. May it ever go forward on this line in the spread of the truth to all the world.

“… It is altogether a spiritual movement, and its discernment can therefore only be spiritual. It may appear outwardly as only one religious body among many; for it is only when judged by the spiritual standard of God’s Word that its character is seen. It is a call to those who are willing to be led of God.

“… Brother Warner had the right spiritual quality, the secret of which was letting God have His way. His entire abandonment to God in a complete consecration, together with his adaptable temperament and gifts, made him suitable for God’s use in this great work …. He also had in the Spirit the prospective vision of the pure church unruled by man. … Unity can come only by absolute abandonment to God, for He must be the one-making agent. Men may attempt a unity through some Interchurch World Movement or other plan, but no plan can represent the true Scriptural unity unless God does the work Himself. He must have the full right of way in human hearts. …

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“For proper representation everything depends upon the understanding of, and the attitude toward this great movement. For any body of people to hold that the reformation is entrusted to them, or that they have become the standard for the world, is a self-centered attitude, vastly different from that which regards the reformation as something prophetically due, as having come independent of man, and as being greater than the people who have been favored with its light, and that it is their part to conform to it in principle, doctrine, and everything. The great movement is in the world, and any attempt to ‘corner’ it or to limit it to a particular body of people could only result in making that body a sect, or faction, while the movement itself would proceed independently. The true spirit of the reformation will be, however, with those who measure to its standard, whether they be few or many, and God will manifest Himself accordingly.”

                                                              – Excerpted from Birth of a Reformation, pages 20 - 28.

The so-called Church of God Restoration, headquartered in Greenville, Ohio, founded by Danny Layne and now ruled by his successor, Ray Tinsman, his done exactly what Andrew Byers said in the last paragraph quoted above. They are holding that the reformation (which they now call a “restoration”) is entrusted to them and that they have become the standard for the world. As Andrew Byers said, this is “a self-centered attitude.” They have attempted to “corner it” (the reformation) and to “limit it to a particular body of people,” thus they have made themselves a “sect” – and a sect of the worst kind – a sect with all the characteristics of a cult, completely ruled and governed by proud authoritarian leaders who show no trace of humility of mind or heart.

Warner As Perceived by Those Who Knew Him

Those who personally knew D. S. Warner left the following testimonies of their memories of him:

“He was truly a man of God; as meek, humble, and Christlike as anyone I have ever met. Meeting him seemed very much like meeting Jesus Himself. He was always ready to comfort and encourage young workers. He once felt so bad over having neglected to pray for a sister that was suffering, that he went to the altar and sought forgiveness, although his neglect had been due to the fact that he was so busy that he could scarcely have done otherwise than he did.”                                      – Mary Cole, Trials and Triumphs of Faith.

Interestingly, Sister Mary Cole also makes mention in her book regarding D. S. Warner’s first visit in the St. James, Missouri, area. He had contacts with people in that area and had come with his evangelistic company to hold a meeting. When he got there, some of that group of people came out to meet him speaking in unknown tongues, jerking, and with other strange manifestations. Brother Warner and his group were astonished and immediately began to wonder just what they were dealing with. They were soon convinced that it was some kind of false religious spirit. Sister Mary Cole said that Brother Warner was very careful how he handled the situation. He began to earnestly seek God to know His mind about these people. Were they real children of God, or were

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they not? He did not want to place any judgment on them that was not God’s assessment. Before long, God’s Spirit witnessed to him that these people were indeed saved and owned by Him. But they had just fallen under the influence of another spirit. Brother Warner began meekly and tenderly instructing them how that the Bible gift of tongues is not an unintelligible babble, but a gift of sharing the gospel in other languages, like they did on the day of Pentecost. He prayed with them and, before he left the place, most of them found deliverance from the false religious spirit they had fallen under.

It is true that we, as children of God, can come under the influence of spirits that are not from God. The devil is a subtle and cunning foe. After a soul escapes his clutches by repenting and turning away from sin and coming to Christ, the devil often changes his tactics then and comes at them in a religious way, as an angel of light. I know what I’m talking about because it happened to me in my early Christian experience. The devil tried to, and did for some time, bind me up with a “spirit of accusation.” In other words, he tried to play Holy Spirit to me and tell me that I was coming short of being all God would have me to be, that I was not perfect enough, and that God was going to cut me off if I did not do better, etc. I got into such a state of perplexity and confusion that I was miserable. I didn’t know what to do about it or how to shake loose from it. I finally got a hold of a tract published by Faith Publishing House on the subject of “Accusations.” The writer described my situation to a tee. He explained how this was a spirit from the devil that he uses to harass and torment conscientious Christians who are striving to do God’s will, and how that God’s Spirit NEVER comes to us in an accusing, harassing manner, but if we indeed have done wrong or come short, God’s Spirit will show us exactly what our problem is and point us to the remedy. Any spirit that comes trying to overwhelm us with accusation, discouragement, and a feeling of hopelessness is from the devil. The writer said the only way to get victory over the spirit of accusation is to simply ignore the accusations that the devil brings to our minds, refuse to accept them, and claim victory in the name of Jesus. I learned to do that, and the devil had to quit tormenting me in that way.

D. S. Warner dealt with that spirit too. I heard Brother Ostis Wilson tell one time that Brother Warner was a guest at a certain place for dinner. When another brother sitting at the table gave thanks for the food, he somehow became so blessed in his soul that he began to shout and praise the Lord. But D. S. Warner didn’t feel any movement of the Spirit in his soul. After this, he got to thinking, “How could God come this close and bless that brother in the way that he did, and I not feel anything? There must be something wrong with ME!” He became so troubled in his soul that he couldn’t finish his meal. He got up and went out somewhere to a private place and began calling on God to show him what was wrong with him. As he searched his own heart, the Spirit of the Lord manifested Himself to D. S. Warner’s spiritual consciousness and showed him there wasn’t anything wrong. Afterward, He gave him the words for a new song, which we now have as #299 in our Evening Light Songs hymnal:

“My feelings are given to Father’s control, His wisdom shall govern my body and soul; His Word is sufficient, I seek not a sign, I grasp but the promise, and Jesus is mine.

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“The tide of emotion may run as it will, The Son and the Father abide in me still;

I dare not confide in a rapturous frame, But stand on the promise forever the same.

“All nature may perish, the heavens may fall, But JESUS is ever my all and in all;

Creation may crumble to chaos and dust, In God my salvation securely I trust.”

Brother Ostis Wilson told the above story about the origin of this song in one of the Jefferson, Oregon, camp meetings, if I remember correctly. I’ll never forget it. (He also told me personally that D. S. Warner performed his parents’ wedding ceremony. I think that was in the year 1895 – just a few months before D. S. Warner’s death in December of that same year.) What a blessing it is to be able to gain knowledge from those who have trod the pathway to Heaven before us. If we will be humble, teachable, and openminded, we can gain much benefit from the experiences of others.

One of the most convincing testimonies, to me, of the spirit and character of D. S. Warner, are the hundreds of deep spiritual songs and hymns he wrote. Before his death in 1895, he had published three songbooks. Those songs provide a true window to the man’s soul. Being a lover of poetry and music myself, I cannot but stand in awe of D. S. Warner’s songs! They are so full of Holy Spirit inspiration and convey a vast scope of the truths set forth in God’s Word. There is enough Bible truth in D. S. Warner’s songs alone to point anyone to the true pathway to Heaven.

I thought about Church of God Restoration Chief Apostle Ray Tinsman making the statement just a few years ago, publicly, that he even has the authority to write scriptures! I don’t know of a single hymn or spiritual song that either he or Danny Layne ever wrote. Yet, I heard Ray say recently that he and his associates are engaged in an even greater restoration work than D. S. Warner was! If that is the case, then where is the evidence? The Word of God that D. S. Warner and his associates preached was accompanied not only with the writing of hundreds of hymns and spiritual songs but also with signs following – many miracles of healing took place, including the opening of blind eyes – not just spiritually blind eyes, but physically blind eyes! Almost every kind of miracle that we read about in the Book of Acts also took place in the reformation movement that D. S. Warner was engaged in. It is confirmed in recorded history – undeniable and undisputable. But I have not heard of a single miracle or healing that Danny Layne, Ray Tinsman, or any of his appointed “apostles” have ever been instrumental in performing. Danny claimed, after he initiated his Church of God Restoration, that they were going to see great miracles and healings restored. But it never happened. God was faithful to them, and to everyone looking on, NOT to confirm their message or their work. They would have loved to have had miracles and healings manifested among them as a means by which to tell people, “LOOK ON US! SEE, WE ARE THE TRUE CHURCH! WE TOLD YOU SO! SEE, GOD FAVORS US! But God is a jealous God and His glory will He not give to another (Isa. 42:8).

Barney E. Warren, one of D. S. Warner’s close associates who wrote the music to most of his song lyrics, heard once of a little girl who was seriously ill. He rode his horse to the place where the child and her parents lived and went in and prayed a simple prayer of faith for her healing. God answered and healed the child immediately! The parents

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were so astonished and amazed that they wanted to call the local news reporters and have them come out and interview Barney. But Barney declined. He flatly refused to accept any honor, recognition, or credit for the miracle of healing that was performed. He told the girl’s parents, “Just tell them the Lord did it.” Then he went and mounted his horse and quietly rode away. He shared the same humble, Christ-like spirit that D. S. Warner had.

God confirmed the truth that D. S. Warner and his associates were preaching with signs following and that did indeed get the attention of multitudes. They had no need to draw attention to themselves – the movement of the Holy Spirit that accompanied their message was what drew the attention, and the full gospel message they were preaching pretty much spread around the whole world in just 30 years. I understand that, in the first decade of the 1900s, the evening light reformation movement was among the fastest growing religious movements in the world. My grandfather, who was living at that time, told me personally that it looked like the movement was going to take the whole world for Christ! He would often recall his boyhood memories of the pioneer evening light preachers coming to this rural area of Myrtle, Missouri, and what a stir their Holy Spirit anointed preaching made in this area. Meetings were held in various communities and many souls sought the Lord and obtained genuine salvation. People found deliverance from the binding habits of tobacco and alcohol. Converts began to go back to the local merchants and places of business where they had stolen things and confessed their misdeeds and made restitutions. The whole area was stirred, realizing that true religion of the Bible kind had indeed come on the scene. There was nothing fake, pretentious, or imitation about it. It was causing people to truly repent and clean up their lives and conform to true holiness. The new converts began to meet together for worship as members of the church of God in several localities, including Myrtle, Doniphan, and West Plains, Missouri, and other localities in this region. They avoided the formalities of the organized denominations and simply sang, prayed, shared the Gospel, and worshiped from their hearts. My grandpa remembered his parents singing from the songbooks they received from the Gospel Trumpet Company and how they loved those deep spiritual songs that had such beautiful melodies and such inspiring messages. One of their favorites, he said, was “The Blood of Jesus,” written by Barney E. Warren, now song #127 in the Evening Light Songs hymnal.

“Must I in sinful bondage be, Deprived of peace and liberty,

When in the promise I can see, The blood of Jesus cleanseth?

Chorus:

“The blood, the blood, The precious blood of Jesus,

The blood will work a perfect cure, Will cleanse the heart and keep it pure,

The blood, the blood, The precious blood of Jesus.”

Grandpa said he could remember his parents singing that wonderful song. It has been a favorite of mine too through the years! How I thank God for these precious, uplifting, truth-promoting, heart-warming, Holy Spirit-inspired songs that D. S. Warner and his associates wrote! How thankful I am that God has preserved them for us today. They’re

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wonderful! The Spirit of truth still bears witness to them as we sing them, because they’re based on the truth of God’s Word.

Another song that Barney Warren wrote both words and music for was titled “The Gospel Trumpet.” I’ll quote three of its verses here:

“Blow the gospel trumpet, brother, over land and sea,

Sound the news to all creation, Christ will set you free.

He will break the chains of bondage, let the tidings sound,

He is able, do not doubt Him, let His grace abound.

“Sing, and pray, and preach for Jesus ev’rywhere you go,

Wake the slumb’ring, sinful nations on the brink of woe;

Tell them of that cleansing fountain flowing deep and wide

From mount Calv’ry’s sacred summit, from His pierced side.

“In the Spirit’s holy unction preach the Word of God,

Till its melting power brings the lost to Jesus’ blood;

Compass ev’ry heathen nation filled with sinful dearth,

Scatter light and truth from Heaven over all the earth.”

This was the true spirit and focus of the Gospel Trumpet Movement or Evening Light Reformation Movement, as it came to be called. And that was why it had such great success and pretty much encompassed the whole world in just 30 years. God’s blessing rested on the labors of those early pioneers because their purpose and focus was on the right thing. Their focus was Christ-oriented, not movement-oriented. They were out to do exactly what the above song says, not to promote themselves or to draw people to themselves. And Christ could not but bless their efforts in fulfillment of His own promise: “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” John 12:32.

The evening light reformation was by no means something that was done in “a corner!” It spread quickly around the world. Its message of full gospel freedom was accompanied by powerful Holy Spirit inspiration and was instrumental in the salvation of thousands of souls. Sister Ruby Stover, who also lived in those days and had personal acquaintance with D. S. Warner’s widow, Frankie, told me that, in the early 1900s, you could go to almost any town or city in the United States and inquire about a Church of God congregation and the people would know exactly who you were talking about and where to point you. Now, if you were to do so, they would probably just look at you and ask, “Which one?” As with other great spiritual reforms down through history, the evening light reformation and its message was blighted and stifled in later years by apostasy and schisms among its adherents who lost the Christ-oriented focus that D. S. Warner had and drifted into a movement-oriented or group-oriented mindset. Warner had no part of, nor was he in any way responsible for that. The good news is that the true substance of what he taught, practiced, and believed is still available to everyone through the same source from which he acquired it – the Word of God, coupled with Holy Spirit inspiration and guidance. (Read more about this in a following chapter,

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titled, “What Was the Basis of the Spiritual Revivals and Reformation Movements of the Past?”)

Allie Fisher wrote: “Brother Warner was a very humble man, and one who exemplified the life of Christ more perfectly than any person that I ever knew. He had so much patience and sympathy for the erring and those who were weak and vacillating, helping them unto their feet time and again, and speaking encouraging words to those under trial. … He lived very close to the Lord. He started the day with an early morning walk, and somewhere on his walk he would find a place to pray. He would start out about four o' clock, if the weather would permit, and return about five-thirty or six, in time for breakfast, strengthened and refreshed soul and body for the day's toil, for he always worked hard. …

                                                              – Allie R. Fisher, Excerpted from her Autobiography.

Allie R. Fisher was a worker at the Gospel Trumpet Company for many years and assisted D. S. Warner in the writing of the music for some of his songs.

“One of the most striking examples of true humility that I ever saw was on the day I first met and became acquainted with Brother Warner. With his company of workers, he came to the place where I was expected to preach that day. … He insisted that I should preach and did not seem to care to take the pulpit. I pled with him to do so, and said, ‘Brother Warner, I simply could not preach in the presence of such a great man as you are.’ He came up to me and placed his arm around my neck and his head on my shoulder, and said, ‘God bless you, my brother, I am only one of God’s little ones.’ This action seemed very strange to me, as I was not acquainted with such a spirit in a man of such reputation. … I was greatly helped to try to sink into deeper humility, and through the grace of God find my place in the body, the church. This impression of humility has remained with me these years and has often been a protection when at times there would be presented temptations to self-exaltation.”                                                                      – J. W. Byers

“In 1893 they had a wonderful camp meeting at Granby, Missouri, and Bro. D. S. Warner was at this camp meeting. [Note: Granby, Missouri, is just a few miles north of the Monark Springs, Missouri, campground where national camp meetings of the Church of God are now held annually.] … Some of the soul-stirring messages that Bro. Warner brought would last for hours. They were brought under the power and unction of the Holy Ghost. People sat spell-bound as they heard the gospel of holiness in its fullness which was brought to them sharp and clear by the Word of God.

“Bro. Warner was a very humble man of God. At the close of the meeting, Sister Sunderland asked the people to come forward and shake hands with Bro. Warner, but he said, ‘No, Sister Sunderland, I had rather not do that. It would look like I was receiving honor from men. I will just walk out among the people and shake hands with them.’”

– Charles E. Stites, age 90, Granby, Missouri, Excerpted from a testimony published in the Faith and Victory, December 1968.

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A Contrasting Quest for Prominence, Praise, Prestige, and Power!

How do the testimonies above compare to the spirit we now see manifested by the “chief apostle” and other apostles of the so-called Church of God Restoration? (Just the very acceptance of the title “Chief” is a serious red flag!) I’m going to make some direct quotes from videos I have watched online of their livestreamed services.

What about these statements?

“I believe I’m due some honor.” … “I’ll even tell you that you don’t have the opportunity to pick and choose what you fellowship or whom you fellowship with. You fellowship whom THIS MINISTRY, THIS APOSTLE BODY fellowships with – that’s who you fellowship with.”

– Chief Apostle Ray Tinsman, Oklahoma City Doctrinal Meeting, November 2020.

And what about this one?

“I want to share with you real quickly, that the names of these apostles of the Lamb are not talking about Peter, James, and John, and the original twelve. It’s not talking about that. It’s talking about a different twelve! It’s not disconnected, because there’s one ministry, one church, and the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets. So, there is no disconnection, and we don’t do wrong to refer to the original twelve. But in context it’s not talking about the original twelve. This is talking about another twelve! Do you want to know the names? One of the names is THE ONLY NAME, THE NAME THAT IS ABOVE ALL NAMES ON THIS CREATURE EARTH, OF GOD’S CREATURES – THE GOVERNOR OF THE WORLD, THE JUDGE OF ALL THIS WORLD, IS THE CHIEF APOSTLE, OUR VERY OWN, BROTHER D. RAY TINSMAN!”

– Apostle Stephen P. Hargrave, expounding on Revelation 21:14, (I failed to record the time and the place.)

Now, this one will just about blow your mind!

An Excerpt from a Sermon Preached by Apostle Addison Everett February 2, 2021, at Greenville, Ohio “

… But what I want to say next is that, really, THIS IS ONE MAN’S GOSPEL! THIS DISPENSATION BELONGS TO ONE MAN! … He’s smarter than you are, he’s got a bigger, deeper burden than you do, he’s better at prayer than you are, he understands the Bible better than you do, he cares more about the standard than you do, he’s more in love with holiness than you are, he has a better burden for souls than you do, he’s sacrificed and given up more than you have, and more than you probably ever will. I’m right tonight! Say, ‘Why are you preaching this, brother?’ Because you need to know it, if you don’t. You need to have it clear – THIS IS ONE MAN’S GOSPEL! I’m thankful that there is a Peter and a James and a John, and I’m thankful for the others, and

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I’m thankful for everybody in the room, but I want to tell you tonight, I’m especially thankful – I owe my life, I owe my soul, I owe my salvation to the ministry of one man – someone who has poured out their life in utter abandonment, made personal sacrifices that you cannot number, that you have not numbered, who’s prepared not only to be bound, but to die also for the gospel. … Brethren, there is a father of the gospel whose shoulders are big enough that we can all piggyback, and by whose gospel we are saved. So [you say] ‘I got saved by the Bible.’ Lord bless you. You got saved by Bro. Ray’s ministry! Well, ‘I got saved by what John wrote in first John, and I read the scriptures in first John.’ I’m telling you about the one that went to John and started expounding the prophetic deep things of God to John the apostle! [Note: They believe and teach that the rainbow angel of Revelation chapter 10, who gave the little book to Apostle John represents Ray Tinsman!] It’s a miracle, it’s a marvel that someone can come at the end and hold the message from the beginning. Stop thinking of Paul the apostle as greater than Brother Ray. Stop it! You’re wrong when you think like that. You’re wrong! You’re wrong about that! I love Paul, the apostle and, God willing, he’ll be one of the first people I’ll talk to when I get to Heaven. Oh, I love Paul, … but brother, I’m telling you something, and some of you all don’t get this tonight, there’s someone in this room whose ministry is greater, whose ultimate understanding is greater, whose prophetic significance is greater than James, John, Peter, and yes, Paul, the apostle.

“I said to Sister Tamara [Ray’s wife] one time (I believed it then, and I believe it now), ‘Sister Tamara, what’s it like being married to the most important person in the history of the world except for Jesus Christ Himself?’ You don’t have to say ‘amen,’ I’m right anyway. You don’t have to say, ‘amen,’ I’m right! I’m so right, I’m going to say it again for my own sake – it makes me feel good to say it, it makes me feel safe to say it: Sister Tamara, what’s it like being married to the most important person whose soles of their shoes, or sandals, or bare feet ever touched the soil of this earth, EVER, from Adam to Isaiah, to Moses who parted the Red Sea, to all the minor prophets to John the Baptist himself, and everybody else, save only the man Jesus Christ? I believe that. I’m convicted about it. And I’m in love with the idea, and I can follow someone like that. And I want to exhort you to understand that, and to have the same heart. … Ultimately, everything that we accept, everything that we believe, everything that we know, filters through the person of one individual human being. If he don’t say it, we don’t believe it. If he says ‘no,’ the answer’s ‘no.’ If he says ‘yes,’ the answer’s ‘yes.’ And, you know what, IT’S RIGHT! I know you didn’t understand, and you didn’t see all the things that got us there, and you haven’t worked out this scientific equation in your brain for why it should be that way, but I’m telling you, it’s right! And here’s how you know – because of who said it! … Ultimately, it’s one man’s word. Just one! … And I’m so happy about it. And I feel so safe with that. Because I’m going to get [things] wrong sometimes, but there’s someone that can keep me right. And I’m going to get down sometimes. There’s someone that can lift me up. And I want to tell you, I live utterly free from the concern and the worry that this Restoration is ever going to go off the deep end. That is utterly void from my mind and heart. … I live utterly void of that concern, because of one man – one man to whom

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Church of God Restoration Teachings and Tenets

Versus

Teachings and Tenets of D. S. Warner

By Harlan Sorrell

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Table of Contents
THE ORIGIN OF THE SO-CALLED CHURCH OF GOD RESTORATION ............ 4
DANNY LAYNE MAKES HIMSELF AN AUTHORITARIAN LEADER................ 9
THE COGR SECT ADOPTS A UNIFORM STANDARD OF DRESS ..................... 10
D. S. WARNER’S TENETS REGARDING CHRISTIAN DRESS ........................... 11
DANNY LAYNE COUPLES FALSE APOCALYPTIC TEACHING WITH HIS
AUTHORITARIANISM ................................................................................................ 13
DANNY LAYNE’S POSITION OF HIERARCHICAL HEADSHIP PASSED
DOWN TO ANOTHER AT HIS DEATH .................................................................... 14
TEACHINGS AND TENETS OF D. S. WARNER COMPARED TO THOSE OF
THE CHURCH OF GOD RESTORATION SECT ....................................................... 15
The Quest for Scriptural Holiness and the Unity of God’s People ............................... 16
“In the Tradition of Radical Christianity” .................................................................... 20
“Warner’s Unique Emphasis” ....................................................................................... 21
Warner As Perceived by Those Who Knew Him ......................................................... 23
A Contrasting Quest for Prominence, Praise, Prestige, and Power! ............................. 29
SPIRITUAL GIFTS ARE FOR WHAT PURPOSE AND FOR WHOSE GLORY?33
WHAT WAS THE BASIS OF THE SPIRITUAL REVIVALS AND
REFORMATION MOVEMENTS OF THE PAST? ................................................... 36
HOW COUNTERFEIT MOVEMENTS ARE BORN ................................................ 40
“WARNER’S APOCALYPTICISM” ........................................................................... 42
“Prophetic and Apocalyptic Preaching” ....................................................................... 42
“Warner’s Method of Interpretation Old”..................................................................... 43
WHO SEPARATES THE TARES FROM THE WHEAT? ....................................... 47
THE CHURCH OF GOD – THE ECCLESIA OF GOD ............................................ 49
A RECENT THEOLOGICAL SHIFT WITHIN THE COGR SECT ....................... 51
THE FOCAL POINT OF D. S. WARNER’S MINISTRY.......................................... 54
MY CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................ 58

2.

Two Men of Opposite Spirit and Character

David Wilburne Layne

1944 - 2011

Danial Sidney Warner

1842-1895

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