To read Scene One, click here.
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Word Over the World
Scene Two
The Way was structured like a tree known as The Way Tree. It consisted of a Trunk, Limbs, Branches, Twigs, Leaves, and Roots. The Trunk represented a country, such as the Trunk of the USA or the Trunk of Canada. Limbs were states, such as the Limb of New York. Branches were areas within a state and were typically composed of about seven Twigs. Twigs were small fellowships held three to four times a week in Way believers' homes. An individual believer was sometimes referred to as a Leaf. Two terms not related to parts of a tree were a Region, which was composed of several states, and an Area, which was smaller than a Branch.
The Roots of the Tree represented the research of God's Word stemming from Wierwille and the Research Department at Way Headquarters in New Knoxville, Ohio. Headquarters is located on the old Wierwille farm, property once owned by the Wierwille family and deeded to The Way in February, 1957. In the 1970s and '80s The Way purchased other training locations in Kansas, Indiana, and Colorado which were collectively called "Root Locales." After The Way experienced a huge exodus of followers in the late 1980s and early '90s, the Indiana and Kansas campuses were sold.
In the early 1990s the concept of The Way Tree faded, and the term "Twig" was replaced with "Household Fellowship." The Way owns no church buildings. It's main gathering place is in the home where believers meet in small groups. A common phrase in the 1970s and '80s was, "Life is in the Twig." For larger meetings, conference rooms are rented.
From the early 1970s through the mid 1990s, The Way's main outreach program was Word Over the World Ambassador, or WOW. The WOW program was promoted as being mainly for the individual's spiritual growth. Part of the reason, if not the main reason, a person went WOW was to learn to hear God's voice more clearly, to learn to operate "all nine all the time," referring to the nine manifestations of the spirit listed in I Corinthians 12. Wierwille said that when a believer went WOW, he or she would "grow ten years in one."
WOW volunteers were sent out in groups called "WOW families." A typical WOW family consisted of four to five believers who were assigned together by Way leadership whom followers believed were directly inspired by God. Except for married couples, and their children if they had any, it was rare that members of a WOW family knew each other before going WOW. They met one another and learned where they were being sent during WOW training at The Way's week-long festival, the Rock of Ages, held each August at Way Headquarters.
The Rock was a huge yearly gathering of Way believers from all over the world. They gathered to "welcome home," with great fanfare, the incoming WOWs from their year of service and to witness the "commissioning," also with great fanfare, of new WOWs as they embarked upon their year of service. The week was filled with fellowship, music, food, and teachings. Most people would camp on grounds in tents or RVs. Others would stay in local hotel rooms. It was like a giant family reunion, complete with a petting zoo, and was deemed a "mini-gathering together," referencing the future time when believers, alive and dead, will meet Jesus together in the air. A common saying through the year between each gathering was, "See you at the Rock!" The Way sold bumper stickers that said the same. At its peak, around 16,000 believers attended the festival. In 1995, after twenty-four years, the Rock of Ages and the WOW program were discontinued.
All WOWs served for one year, from August to August, wherever assigned by The Way. Each WOW was required to work a secular job twenty to thirty hours per week and to do the work of the Ministry forty hours per week. We were to tithe, a tenth or more, from our income to The Way. We were to take one day a week off from our secular job and ministry work. We were to be in bed by midnight each night and up by 6AM to begin each day with at least thirty minutes of prayer and reading the Word. Except for a death in one's biological family, a WOW was not to leave the field during the year of service. One's marital status could not change while on the WOW field, and no births were allowed. The WOW Handbook outlined most of these, and more, guidelines.
I still have one of my WOW Handbooks. On page three it asks: "Who is a WOW Ambassador?"
And it answers: "You as a Way believer make a one-year out-and-out commitment to give yourself as an Ambassador for God on special assignment to hold forth the integrity and accuracy of God's Word. As a WOW Ambassador you are ready and willing to serve in any area you are needed. Share with others what God did for you and what God will do for them also."
At the bottom of that third page, I handwrote a note, a quote from Dr. Wierwille during WOW training: "The only way to get you out of your [WOW] family, is to kill you and carry you out!"
He didn't mean that literally, of course; it was figurative driving home the gravity of our commitment. We were sold out, "bond slaves for the Lord Jesus Christ" to stay faithful to our WOW commitment for one year, no matter what.
To desert the WOW field was a spiritual and moral failing.
There were exceptions to guidelines depending on revelation or inspiration from God working within the believer, especially within leadership. Revelation never went against the written Scriptures; it went beyond. Even though there was only one proper interpretation of Scripture, there was latitude within that interpretation. It was like there were at least two standards: a written standard, and an oral standard which changed according to circumstance. Whatever the standard, it was always to be undergirded by the love of God. We were taught that "things are to be used; people are to be loved."
This freedom-in-Christ, adjustable-according-to-need doctrine was one characteristic that drew people to The Way. It appeared genuine; not artificial, like religion. Grace (God's divine favor) and mercy (God's withholding of merited judgement) were wide. Yet, at the same time, that grace and mercy were confined by Way jargon and a rigid, yet ambiguous, doctrine.
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Click here for Scene Three.
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