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PAT'S EXPERIENCES
THROUGH THE YEARS
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And I entreat thee also, true
yoke fellow, help those women, which labored with me in the gospel,
and with other my fellow
laborers, whose names are in the book of life.
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Pat, Sharon, Wanda
& Betty - November 1973
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My name is Patricia
Fogleman. I live in Phoenix,
Arizona. (Now in Texas-2007) I am
the sister of Betty Edmondson, Sharon
Netzer and Wanda Mason.
I pray for God's guidance
in this letter. I was never in a cult like church but I do remember the hell
that my sisters, Sharon and Wanda went through. I was part of that.
(I (Wanda) would like to
insert here that I do not know what I would have done without Pat. She was always there for me when I needed her
the most. She helped me through some rough times of my life and I know that
Sharon and Betty would say the same. She was our ANGEL OF MERCY and she also has the singing voice of an angel. She says that I was her hero but she is
mine.)
I am not
and never was a seeker. I
just always believed what my daddy told me. He always said: "Put your
trust in God and He will see you through. I have the Holy Spirit and God in my
heart but I'm not a real religious
person. I believe in "being" a Christian because without that, all
the religion in the world isn't going to do me any good.
I was raised in a
Pentecostal environment. We went to a lot of the Gospel Assembly Churches
through the years and there were some good ones, I believe that my dad was
considered an outsider because he never could go along with everything they
taught. He did put his trust in God and the Lord gave him dreams. When I was 10
years old and Wanda was 12, in 1959, we were going to R.E. Dawkin's church in Kansas City, MO.
We loved that church but Dad had a dream that they took down Jesus' picture and
put Dawkin's picture on the wall. He told us that we weren't going back. We
cried because the church was everything to us and we got mad at our Dad. A week
later, Dad took us back over there and sure enough, Dawkin's picture was up and
the picture of Jesus was down.
As children, we didn't
always understand. We thought our Dad could make it right. If we were in the
wrong place, the Lord would give Dad a dream or a vision to warn him and we
would get out just in time. We are thankful for that now. I do have a lot of
positive things to say about the Gospel Assembly Churches. Like I said, I
wasn't one to search. I just had total love and trust. I guess that's why I
never gave my life to a church, heart and soul, so to speak.
In 1965, we lived in Missouri
and went to my Uncle's church in Ponce De Leon, MO.
It was just a little inter- denominational country church. My Uncle was
Pentecostal but never talked about the gifts of the Spirit so as not to offend
anyone. Wanda and I loved that church because it was just full of love. Our
dad, at that time, was so discouraged with the churches he had been part of
that he wasn't going anywhere so we went with our Uncle. I believe it was
around this time that my dad learned of all the "Tom Jolly" affairs.
Wanda was my idol and I
followed her in everything. She had the Holy Spirit baptism and I wanted it so
bad. There were a lot of young people there that knew nothing of this gift of
the Holy Spirit. Because of some of Wanda's testimonies, these young people
started asking her questions about it and she witnessed to them and showed them
the scriptures. It was at this time that I remember her determination to find
the truth no matter what. Her testimonies were simple and to the point but
before that summer was over, revival broke out and most of those young people
in that church had received the baptism of the Holy Spirit! We had Church! The
revival spread to the other churches around that countryside that year. She
never took credit for anything, always giving God the glory. She didn't even
know that she was my hero until many years later.
We moved to Little Rock, Arkansas and
went to Brother Tucker's Gospel
Assembly Church
for a while. This is where I received the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the greatest
gift I could ever have asked for. All I remember are good things about Brother
Tucker's church. We attended Brother Lineger's church in Oklahoma and we had some good experiences
there. We had known them for a long time. We also attended Brother Don Patton's
church in Fort Worth, Texas a few times and Brother Patton seemed
to be a good man. I can think of nothing bad to say in my experience there. I
can remember feeling the precious spirit of God in his church. I remember
hearing many anointed messages from some of these ministers and also my dad.
We went to the Shepherd
of the Hills Campground in 1966 for a camp meeting there. I was 16 at the time.
What stood out to me was the fact that the women had to sit with their knees
together and couldn't cross their legs but the men sat up there on the platform
in just any old position that they wanted to. It seemed like a double standard.
I guess that's when I really started asking questions. I didn't question having
to wear our hair up, no make up, long skirts and sleeves; that was expected.
But I did question the actions and motives of some of these
"Leaders."
Wanda got
married and lived in Michigan
and I went out to stay with her for awhile and met my first husband. I attended
Brother Willie Atwell's church there in Detroit.
He was a good minister. I had asked him to marry my husband and I and he took
me aside and counseled me that it was not a good thing. He turned out to be
right, even though I was a little upset at the time.
(Picture of Patricia in front of
Brother Willie Atwell's Church in Detroit, MI - 1966)
After moving back to Oklahoma, I started going to Brother Ralph Angelo SR's
church in Tulsa
and that became my home church for several years. Later Brother Igler became
the pastor there. I thought the world of he and his wife. They are very special
people. I remember him saying, "If you have a problem that both husband
and wife could come and talk to him if they needed help." My two children
were raised in their younger years in this church. It had standards but they
were not unbearable.
Until I was 17, I was
always so scared that the world was going to come to an end. At that age, my
dear Mother told me that she had been taught the same thing. When my two oldest
brothers were 2 and 4, she was scared even then. Here it was 1967 and I was her
youngest of nine living children and already grown. I am now 49 years old have
raised two children and things are still going on. A lot has passed away but
the earth and a new generation is here. I get so angry sometimes at the way
people can hurt the children of God, IN
HIS NAME! It's not His name but "Vengeance is mine, sayeth the
Lord, I will repay." I believe all these false preachers in any church will
get their just rewards. It's so sad that all these good people have and are
still getting hurt because of them. I believe these websites are sanctified by
God and I believe it will help a lot of people.
After
Sharon had moved to Des Moines, my Dad and Mom and myself
went to a convention in Kingsport, TN. I thought
it was the prettiest music I'd ever heard. I remember how thin Sharon was and how much older she looked
because of the way she wore her hair. I fixed it for her and wanted to leave
some little curls at the sides and she said that she couldn't. I was
fascinated with
Lloyd
Goodwin because he was so
charismatic and smooth talking. He and Carl Voorhees invited my Dad to sit on
the platform. Dad got up and sang a song and said a few words. He was
"preaching!" The whole church was blessed. He was so anointed. All of
a sudden, Lloyd Goodwin got up and said to him, "You need to sit down, big
boy, and be taught!" Dad was so embarrassed and so were we. I wanted to
get up and walk out but I was in Tennessee and
lived in Oklahoma.
Dad wanted to be humble
and he was. He had another dream. I can't remember what it was, although it was
about these churches. He still tried to go. He said that even as many things
that were bad, they were still some of the best that he knew of and the good
people could bring in the Spirit of God.
(Picture of Sharon, Sherry and Pat in Kingsport, TN - 1975)
I had two
experiences with the Gospel Assembly Church
in Des Moines.
The first was in 1975. I lived in Tulsa,
Oklahoma. My 16-year-old niece,
Rita, and I decided to go see Sharon and Wanda. I was 25 years old and I just
wore what I had to wear which was a shorter skirt. I only weighed 105 pounds at
that time. I just wanted to visit church and stand back there and sing. My
sisters and I had been singing together since we were very young girls. Well, I
guess they felt like I needed to be delivered of all of these demons but I
didn't want to go up front so I stayed back. But my niece, Rita, wanted to be
set free from smoking cigarettes so she went up front. She was crying and there
were 3 or 4 women around her praying for her. I saw her shake her head "no"
and they started, what looked like to me, punching her in the stomach to make her get rid of these
demons. I guess she threw up. That's when I went up there and got her. I am not
a bold person and even less so then but I just put my arms around her and took
her back to the seat. I told Wanda later that they were punching her in the
stomach but she said it was just a method of love or something like that.
Picture of Sharon, Pat and Wanda in Des Moines, IA
- 1975)
We tried to
spend the night at Wanda's house that night. She had a room upstairs, like a
loft. It was a bright pretty room, until we went to bed. I swear there was
another presence in that
room and it was not friendly. We could never go to sleep and finally got up and
went to Sharon's
house next door. We left the next day for Oklahoma. There is a long stretch of road
through that area where there is nothing. It was dark and our radio went out.
Rita and I both felt an evil presence again. We both were scared but I was the
adult so had to be the strong one. Rita was almost hysterical and I told her,
"let's just start singing and let the presence of God come in." We
did that and the fear went away.
(Picture of Rita on the right with her sister, Tammy on the
left - 1998)
The second time in Des Moines was in 1983, I
believe. Wanda had been out of the church for awhile and had gone back to a
convention and we went with her. She had been paying her tithes and offerings
to Lloyd Goodwin and listening to tapes and that type of thing since leaving
the church in 1981. I was married and had both my kids. My hair was short but
Wanda got it up. I limited my makeup, which I didn't wear much anyway, took off
my earrings and went to the convention. It was just the greatest! We wanted to
sing a song that would have gone so well with what Lloyd Goodwin was preaching
on and she asked Goodwin if we could sing it. Sister Pat Baker was going to
play the piano for us and we even practiced in the band room. But he wouldn't
let us sing. He seemed to have to be in "control" of everything. It's
like there was no such thing as "letting the Spirit of God have His
way."
This is the story of my
experiences with the Gospel Assembly Churches, some good, some bad. I don't
even consider the bad experiences bad because it kept me from getting more
involved in them. I praise God for that. I hurt when my sisters' hurt and just
being there for them was the only way I could help.
God be with you all. God
does work through his people, not just one man. When The Man starts telling you that you can't do this and you
can't do that, it's not because it's against God's law, just man's law. It's a
control thing.
Sincerely, Patricia
Fogleman
Wanda's Journal
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