Gwen Shamblin Lara
(1955-2021)
In 1997, Shamblin published The Weigh Down Diet, a book that advised readers to use spirituality to avoid overeating. The Weigh Down Diet teaches the love of food should be transferred to a love of God, and to cut food portions in half and eat only when hungry.
She founded the Remnant Fellowship Church in 1999 in Franklin, TN. The church's building was completed in 2004 on 40 acres Lara purchased in Brentwood, Tennessee.
On August 10, 2000, Shamblin sent an email to her followers saying that she believed that the doctrine of the Trinity was not biblical.
On May 29, 2021, Gwen and six church leaders, including her husband, Joe, and son-in-law, Brandon Hannah, were killed when her 1982 Cessna Citation 501 private jet, bound for Palm Beach, Florida, crashed into Percy Priest Lake near Smyrna, Tennessee, shortly after takeoff. Upon her death in 2021, it was found that Shamblin's will left none of her multimillion-dollar fortune to the church. (cited from Wikipedia)
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Gwen Shamblin Lara
(False Prophet)
2022, Embroidery, found fabric, thread, velvet, fake plastic bead pearls, hot glue, m fake gilded black frame, 8 x 10 inches
In a Private Collection, NY
Would you believe?
The research
The Way Down: God, Greed and the Cult of Gwen Shamblin (2021)
Documentary Series
is a 2021 American documentary television miniseries directed and produced by Marina Zenovich. It follows Gwen Shamblin Lara, the founder of a diet program Weigh Down Workshop, and The Remnant Fellowship, a new Christian group led by Shamblin Lara. It consists of 5 episodes and premiered with the first three on HBO Max on September 30, 2021, with the last two set to premiere in 2022.