September is a big month for Andrew Wommack, the controversial health and wealth preacher who celebrates the 30th anniversary of his Charis Bible College on Sept. 6 and hosts his annual gathering of his Christian nationalist political arm, the Truth and Liberty Coalition, Sept. 12-14.
But you don’t need to be a Wommack disciple to be impacted by his activism or his teaching, both of which have spread across the country.
Who is Andrew Wommack?
Jamie and Andrew Wommack
Wommack broadcasted his first “Gospel Truth” radio program in Childress, Texas, in 1976, and still has that Texas twang. He founded Andrew Wommack Ministries in 1978 and moved to Colorado in 1980.
Through the mid-1990s, his ministry had income of less than $2 million a year, but once he went on TV, income soared to $68 million by 2019, the last year the ministry released any financial information. Annual income is said to be more than $100 million now.
Mentored by prosperity preacher Kenneth Copeland, Wommack teaches people that God wants them healthy and wealthy, and it’s their fault if they’re not. Much of his teaching aligns with Word of Faith theology, which claims people can make things happen by speaking them into existence.
“God is called El Shaddai, not El Cheapo.”
Wommack is a relentless fundraiser, which has helped his prosperity. “God is called El Shaddai, not El Cheapo,” he has said. “He is not a tightwad, and he will take care of you better than you take care of yourself. You need to start giving.”
The Gospel Coalition critiqued Wommack’s teaching on healing in his book God Wants You Well, calling his theology of healing “deeply flawed and pastorally dangerous.”
“If God wants all believers to be well, why are so many believers not well?” the review asked. “Wommack’s answer is mercilessly logical, crystal-clear, and repeated frequently throughout the book. Here’s an example: ‘If God wants us well, and we aren’t, this means we have to accept some degree of responsibility.’ Some people don’t experience healing ‘because they don’t understand how to receive healing properly.’ Wommack hereby absolves God of responsibility for the sickness and poverty of believers, but in so doing, he lays that responsibility at the feet of the sick and the poor.”
Charis Bible College
Wommack never attended college or seminary, but says he teaches “the revelation God has given me.” He founded Charis Bible College in 1994 to provide a practical ministry education to nontraditional students.
“We train disciples in the uncompromising truth of God’s word, equipping them to fulfill their unique purpose through a powerful relationship with Jesus,” says the school, which claims thousands of graduates, nearly 1,000 current students in Woodland Park, Colo., near Colorado Springs, and more than 7,000 students attending satellite campuses around the world that are run by Charis graduates.
Charis is not accredited, and Wommack says that’s a good thing: “This offers us the freedom to provide world-class Biblical teaching and training in our various programs.”
Wommack’s teaching that believers can walk in a state of healing caused him to oppose COVID precautions and crowd limitation orders at Charis, leading to two community COVID outbreaks starting there. Wommack later sued the state of Colorado, called Gov. Jared Polis “a governor who is openly homosexual and anti-Christian,” and labeled health officials as the “Gestapo.”
‘Taking over’ Woodland Park
Wommack moved his Charis Bible College to the city of 8,000 west of Colorado Springs in 2014. In 2017, he launched his political group, Truth and Liberty Coalition, and Focus on the Family helped him get up and running. His teaching has since taken on a more political tone.
In 2021, he publicly announced his plan to use his students and employees to “take over” the mountain city.
“This county ought to be totally dominated by believers.”
“Man, as many people as we have in this school here, we ought to take over Woodland Park,” he said at a 2021 Truth and Liberty rally. “This county ought to be totally dominated by believers.”
He recruited candidates who successfully took over the local school board and city commission, but this past April, voters rejected his slate of candidates, most of whom concealed their connections to Wommack.
A local citizen’s group called TUFF (an acronym for Teller United for Facts and Freedom) organized an event critiquing Wommack’s Christian nationalism last February and will hold its next session this week. The session will focus on “the emotional, financial, and physical abuse many former students have endured while attending Charis Bible College.”
“TUFF feels obligated to let local citizens know how much influence Wommack Ministries attempts to exert over the town of Woodland Park,” said an event organizer. The event will be streamed live from 6 to 8 p.m. Mountain time Sept. 4.
National politics
Wommack is involved in political activities across the country. One initiative, called Transform Colorado, claims it “unites Christian leaders to restore biblical values in the public square.”
“The role of the church is to demonstrate a Christian worldview to our world, society and culture at large,” says Transform Colorado, which has hosted gatherings across the state to overturn school boards, claiming incumbent school leaders are “grooming students” for sex and to become transgender.
Wommack also serves as an adviser to the National Association of Christian Lawmakers, founded in 2019 to make “a biblical worldview” the law of the land in cities, states and federal legislation.
Jesus told his disciples to “go and make disciples of all nations.” Wommack says that means governments — and all other sectors of culture — should be brought under Christian control, starting right here in America.
“We have been commissioned to bring heaven to this earth, to its people — every tribe and tongue,” he says.
“When you are teaching the principles that are in the Constitution, you are teaching from Scripture,” Wommack said on one broadcast. “It was based on the word of God.”
Wommack has promoted the upcoming Truth and Liberty conference with the slogan, “Dawn’s Early Light: Is America, our beloved country, still standing? Are the liberties entrusted to us by Almighty God still intact? Will the sun go down on freedom during our watch?”
Christian nationalism and pseudo historian David Barton teaches a seminar at Charis Bible College.
Third Great Awakening
He also promotes what he calls the Third Great Awakening. “Revival is not coming through the prayer closet,” said one Truth and Liberty conference speaker. “Revival’s coming through the ballot box.”
Wommack “Third Great Awakening” unlike the historic First and Second Great Awakenings, prioritizes politics over evangelism, saving America over saving souls. On Sept. 12, he will debut a movie, Hope for the Future, that claims this revival already has started and “will turn the tide of socialism and the woke culture and all the demonic assaults on this nation.”
Wommack was among white Christian conservatives supporting a recent Black Conservative Summit at which Black conservatives attacked the Democratic Party as racist.
Wommack also is part of a group of pro-Trump “prophets” who claim Almighty God wants Donald Trump to make America great again, even if a 2024 Trump victory leads to civil war: “But would it be worth it to turn this nation back? I believe it would.”
“Revival’s coming through the ballot box.”
Wommack has promoted conspiracies of a stolen 2020 election, and two graduates of Charis’ Practical Government School were arrested and charged for their roles in the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Truth and Liberty’s podcast has featured Rebecca Lavrenz, the self-described Praying Grandma who was convicted in April on four misdemeanor counts and was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of house arrest and a $103,000 fine.
Fellow government school graduate Tyler Ethridge, who was a youth pastor, was found guilty of two felonies and four misdemeanors and awaits sentencing.
Another Truth and Liberty podcast featured Tina Peters, a conservative evangelical who used her position as a county clerk to try to sway the 2020 presidential election and has been found guilty of seven crimes, including four felonies.
In August, a Truth and Liberty podcast featured evangelical attorney Jenna Ellis, who has pled guilty for her role in trying to help Trump overturn 2020 election results in Georgia and been barred from practicing law in Colorado.
In the podcast, titled “From Morality to Chaos: The Necessity of Moral Laws for a Stable Society,” host Alex McFarland asked Ellis: “What are your hopes that this election will be honestly tabulated?”
In August, Charis issued a “HUGE announcement from Andrew:” a “transfer of leadership” on Sept. 6 to Mike and Carrie Pickett, who “are the ones the Lord has anointed” to “carry this life-transforming ministry into the next generation.”
But Wommack, whose control over Charis extends to the volume of worship songs at chapel services, makes it clear he’s not going to disappear.
“I’m going to continue doing everything I’m doing now and more,” said the 75-year-old preacher. “I plan to live a long, healthy and productive life.”
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