Published on March 18, 1999. At the time, I was pastor of Our Father’s House in West Unity, Ohio. This is a good example of how I used to think about life, God, the Bible, sin, and culture. I encourage readers to read a letter to the editor I wrote on January 19, 2016, about the same the subject. You will quickly see that my viewpoint has changed a wee bit over the past 17 years.
Bryan Times:
I am writing in response to the recent editorial that suggested evolution is not being taught in public schools because teachers fear right-wing religious zealots. The zealots are portrayed as being anti-science and intellectually stunted. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Evolution is a theory. Even the writer of the editorial admits such. Yet, just a few paragraphs later, he advocates teaching the theory as fact. He then states that man cannot understand biology without evolution.
What arrogant presumption and distortion of truth. Evolution is a theory of “how” things came into existence. It is, at its root, a faith religion that suggests a random existence apart from a divine being. Evolution demands that there is no God, no creator, and that man is nothing more than the most evolved of creatures. Man becomes nothing more than an animal that has evolved to a more mature state than that of other animals.
Evolution is incompatible with Christianity. Christianity begins with the premise that God is, and whatever God says is true. The Bible is God’s revelation to man, and he reveals in the first three chapters of Genesis how this world came into existence. To deny the biblical record is to deny God and his revelation, and the result is eternal damnation. Christians fear being viewed as ignorant if they deny the teachings of evolution. They become just like the schoolteachers who fear the religious zealots. If God is who he says he is, and he meant what he said in the Scriptures, then let us not fear, but instead declare boldly “Thus saith the Lord.”
Bruce Gerencser, Pastor West Unity, Ohio
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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Many Christian sects, and certainly every Evangelical sect, believe that pastors are called by God to preach the gospel. Pastors are ordained by the particular church or denomination of which they are a part. Through their ordination, the church or denomination is saying we recognize God’s calling in your life.
According to Evangelicals, the Bible is a supernatural book given to them by a supernatural God. God calls pastors to read and study God’s inspired, inerrant, infallible Word so they will then be able to stand before their congregations and proclaim “thus saith the Lord.” These men of God are often viewed as people who have a direct line to God. When a church member is confused about what the Bible says, he or she most often seeks out the pastor for clarity. Like mythical oracles, pastors are expected to have ready answers for any question they might be asked.
Most Evangelicals believe in the priesthood of the believer. This means they believe that every Christian has direct access to God. However, as with many things in the church, the stated beliefs are often contradicted by what actually goes on in the church. Instead of directly accessing God, many Christians expect their pastor to be an intermediary between them and God. After all, the pastor is a mature Christian, a font of wisdom and Biblical knowledge, right? Or so many congregants think.
The pastor’s supposed intimate connection with God plays a big part in how parishioners view his sermons. In their eyes, the sermon is a direct message from God. The pastor is just God’s mouthpiece. God could have used an ass to speak as he did in Numbers 22, but he used the pastor instead (that is, until the pastor upsets them, at which time he becomes an ass). When the pastor stands before the congregation the people have an expectation that they are going to hear from God. The pastor expects God to use his sermon to speak to the heart of every person. He desires God to use his sermon to reclaim backsliders and save the lost.
Preaching is not just an intellectual exercise. There is a huge emotional component in preaching, not only for the pastors, but also for those who are listening to sermons. Emotion is often ascribed to God moving, God working, or God calling. I have preached in numerous services where it seemed evident God was in our midst. Emotional levels were high. People were weeping. People were coming down the aisle to the altar to pray. It was evident to everyone that God was using my sermon to bring repentance, renewal, and revival.
Any cursory reading about the First and Second Great Awakenings will reveal that emotions played a huge part in the success of these campaigns. The Evangelical movement can trace its lineage, to some degree, back to revivalist machinations of the 18th and 19th centuries. Emotions have always played a monumental part in any significant move of God (as revivals, awakenings, and movements are called). This should not be surprising since we are, by nature, emotional beings.
What we have here is a perfect storm. A supernatural God, a supernatural book, a God-called, church-ordained pastor, and a congregation of emotional human beings. If the pastor is good at his craft, he knows how to use all of these things to his advantage. The pastor is not necessarily manipulating the emotions of the congregation on purpose. Most pastors grew up in the church. By the time they start preaching they have sat in countless church services and heard hundreds of sermons. Their understanding of how to preach is shaped by the church environment and religious culture they grew up in.
The longer a pastor is in the ministry the more he is keenly aware of what “works.” He becomes more discerning about what his congregation “needs.” What “works” is coupled with what the congregation “needs” and the result is often described by parishioners as God speaking to their hearts. The fundamental problem here is that it is impossible to know whether the “feeling” a person has is God. The deeply affected person believes it is God, but must accept such a claim by faith.
A commenter on a different post wrote:
I don’t believe in Jesus because of arguments for the trustworthiness of the Bible. I believe in Him because I have a relationship with Him-I have heard His voice and I feel His presence. And I am aware that sounds vague and illogical, but I also know that no one can invalidate my experience.
This comment goes to the heart of the difficulty in trying to present an alternative viewpoint to Christians. They know what they have experienced. They were there when Jesus saved them, and they know that their experiences are “real.” It is almost impossible to move people away from their subjective experiences. Rarely do objectivity and facts win a battle against religious subjectivity and faith.
As I look back on the 25 years I spent in the ministry, I have come to see that I used my sermons to manipulate people (and I am not necessarily using the word manipulate in a negative sense). Spend enough time with a group of people and you will learn their strengths and weaknesses. Eat meals with them, pray with them, visit in their homes, and educate their children, and you will certainly know a lot about the people you pastor. With this knowledge at hand, sermons can be crafted to help the congregation (sermons are never preached in a vacuüm). It should come as no surprise, then, that people think that the pastor is preaching right at/to them. This is not God speaking to the particular parishioner as much as it is a human being who has good discernment skills, skills finely tuned by interacting with thousands of people over the course of many years.
Do I think God used me to speak to people? At the time I did. However, I now know that what people were responding to was a well-crafted sermon preached by a sincere man who knew the needs of his congregation. I knew the power of emotions and used them to God’s my advantage. I heard preacher after preacher do the same thing. I was not an anomaly. I was a young man raised in an environment that put a premium on powerful, emotional preaching. I was encouraged to study the great preachers of the faith, men like Charles Spurgeon, DL Moody, Billy Sunday, John Wesley and Charles Finney. When I became a Calvinist, I studied the great Calvinist preachers, men like Jonathan Edwards, Martyn Lloyd Jones, George Whitefield, and Rolfe Barnard. The way I preached was a result of the environment I grew up in and the men I considered my role models.
Because of the power ascribed to sermons, there is a real danger of abuse. The sincere pastor can quickly turn into a huckster who desires to advance his own agenda. Even well-meaning pastors can do this. Have problems in the church? Have people upset with a decision you made? Preach on pastoral authority. Offerings down? Preach on tithing. Want a raise? Preach on the laborer being worthy of his hire or an elder being worthy of double the salary. Better yet, get an evangelist to come in and preach on these things. That way you can blame the evangelist if people are upset about the sermon subject matter.
Liberal or mainline pastors find discussions like this quite amusing. For the most part, they see the ministry as a profession, one used by God, but not in the way Evangelicals think it is. Most liberal/mainline pastors have far more education than their Evangelical counterparts. And their sermons often reflect it: dry, boring, meaningless exercises in intellectual nothingness. What happened to their passion, their emotions? Preaching without emotion and passion is not worth listening to. A preacher ought to give 100% of himself to the sermon. I can admire a pastor’s passion without necessarily agreeing with his message. I don’t believe God exists, but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate a well-crafted, passionately-delivered sermon.
From 2002 through 2008, my wife and I visited over a hundred churches. Most of the sermons we heard were forgettable, and sadly a lot of them were downright awful. We did hear a few pastors who took their calling seriously. It was evident that they worked very hard to deliver a good sermon. Regardless of what I believe about Christianity, I admire any person who works hard at his craft. I may despise the message, but I can still appreciate the way the messenger goes about his work.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
For many Evangelical church attendees, the manner in which the pastor gets his sermons has an aura of wonder about it. How does he, week after week, come up with sermons that speak directly to them? Where do these sermons come from? How are they prepared? In this two-part series, I will focus on pastors and their preaching.
I have little respect for lazy-ass preachers who rarely, if ever, spend any time crafting their own sermons. Week after week they rip off the work of others and pass it off as their own. They scour the Internet looking for sermons to preach. They subscribe to sermon clubs that provide them with new sermon material. They buy sermon outline books or lectionaries and use them to prepare sermons that they then pass off as their own; anything that allows them more time for schmoozing with their fellow clergymen at the local golf course or diner. In any other profession, they would be considered thieves.
Let me give a few examples of what I’m talking about.
In 2005, my family and I visited for a number of weeks at a local nondenominational church. On our second visit, I began to sense something wasn’t right about the pastor’s sermons. He quoted a lot of Scripture, but his quotations were from various Bible translations. Lots of them. I thought “hmm . . . there’s something about this that seems familiar.” I went home and consulted the mind of God (aka the Google) and my suspicions were quickly confirmed. The pastor was ripping off the sermons of Rick Warren and preaching them as his own, word for word. We visited this church half a dozen times and the pastor never preached an original sermon of his own. Ironically, one Sunday the pastor asked for testimonies from congregants and several people stood up and praised Jesus for how wonderful the pastor’s sermons were. I thought “If they only knew.”
For several years, on an off-and-on basis, we visited the local Episcopal church. When the parish priest was there the sermons, as a rule, were excellent. However, there were many Sundays when the priest was absent, and at those times the sermons ranged from mediocre to absolutely dreadful. The worst ones were the sermons that were taken from books, magazines, or lectionaries and read to the congregation (These sermons reminded me of some of the worthless college classes I took where the professor read the textbook to us). The justification for reading the sermon was “Hey, it is better than nothing.” No, it wasn’t.
In 1984 I invited a pastor I knew come to the church I was pastoring to hold a week of special meetings. He asked me what I wanted him to preach. He then proceeded to list off numerous sermons of other preachers which he had memorized — famous sermons by noted preachers. I was shocked by his willingness to rip off the sermons of others and pass them off as his own. I told him I would rather he preach his own material. Little did I know, at the time, that using sermons preached by others was a common practice.
Many pastors recycle their sermons. The average Baptist pastor changes churches every 2-3 years. No need to craft new sermons, just reuse the sermons you preached before. If they worked well in Ohio, surely they will work well in Texas, right? I remember one well-known evangelist named Phil Shuler who kept long silver cases filled with recordings of his previous sermons. After collecting his sermons for many years, he would just pick a recording to re-familiarize himself with the sermon and then preach it that night. Rarely did he preach new material.
One more example: in the mid-1980s, I managed a Christian bookstore in Newark, Ohio for Bill and Peggie Beard. Over the course of my employment, I came into contact with dozens of pastors from a variety of denominations. I was astounded by how many pastors bought sermon outline books or lectionaries. I was beginning to wonder if any preacher crafted his own sermons!
Now, I don’t necessarily blame a pastor for using bought sermon outlines or reading verbatim from a lectionary. Truth is, there are a lot of pastors who lack good communication skills and, in many cases, they received little training in proper sermon construction and delivery. I think some pastors know they suck at preaching, so they do what they can to limit their suckiness.
From 1976-1979, I attended Midwestern Baptist College in Pontiac, Michigan, an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) institution started by Tom Malone in 1954. Every preacher-in-training was required to take speech and homiletics. The speech class was pretty much a waste of time, and very little of the instruction transferred over to the art of preaching a sermon. In fact, my homiletics teacher, Levi Corey — a world-class preacher — told the class on day one that we needed to forget everything we were taught in speech class. According to him, preaching a sermon was all about the text and the pastor’s ability to deliver it passionately. Outlines and illustrations were essential to successfully delivering a sermon.
Years ago, I was acquainted with a pastor who had horrible preaching skills. He was a Bible college graduate, yet he didn’t even know how to make a sermon outline. I tried to show him how to make a basic outline, but he had a hard time understanding the process. His approach was quite simple: read the text, chase rabbits, bring it back to Jesus, pray, and give an altar call. I never heard this man preach a coherent sermon. While he had great people skills, his preaching, at every point, was lacking.
There are a lot of preachers like the man mentioned above. Poorly trained or lacking the requisite skills necessary to effectively communicate with others through a well-preached sermon, they go from church to church killing everything they touch. They may have great people skills, but if they can’t preach passionately and effectively, they often do more harm than good.
Far too many men become preachers because someone told them that their gift of gab made them great candidates for the ministry. The truth is, running on at the mouth is not a gift at all, especially in the pastorate. All of us have heard those sermons that drone on and on and on. Don’t blame the preacher. Blame the person who told him he would make a great pulpiteer.
By the way, what I have said here also applies to other teaching-related jobs in the church such as Sunday school teacher, youth leader, or bible-study leader. I’ve had to sit through more aimless, heresy-ridden, ill-prepared Sunday School lessons than I care to remember. One man, my high school Sunday school teacher, told me that he studied his lesson on Saturday night while he was sitting in the bathtub. As this man’s class on Sundays proved, a lack of preparation yields a barren crop.
Here’s my point: the ability to preach and teach is a gift (not in a supernatural sense) just like the ability to do virtually anything else people do. Each of us has things we do that come easily to us. We enjoy it. And if we are smart, we will further develop the things we enjoy. Far too many people spend their lifetime trying to become things they will never be good at. It’s less than honest to tell everyone they can be anything they want to be. The sky is not the limit, and, no, not everyone can become President. A lot of men enter the ministry lacking the requisite skills necessary to be a good preacher. They simply are in the wrong profession, but since they believe GOD called them to the ministry, they refuse to admit that maybe they might be better off doing something else.
Many pastors would have you believe that their sermons come directly from God. I know I believed this for many years. I was certain that God was leading and directing me to preach on a particular Biblical text. I believed that God was guiding me through the delivery of the sermon all the way to the altar call. I was simply God’s mouthpiece.
As I look back over the thousands of God-inspired sermons I preached, I can now see who it was that was guiding me. It wasn’t God. It wasn’t the Holy Spirit. It was me. Through my own thought processes, I decided what the church needed to hear. Sometimes I had an agenda that I wanted to advance and what better way to do so than to couch my agenda in “Thus saith the Lord” terms.
Preaching came easy for me. I loved the intellectual aspect of preparing the sermon. I loved to read and study, preparing my mind for delivering the sermon. I devoted hours of study to virtually every sermon I preached (though I also was quite comfortable preaching extemporaneously). While most preachers won’t admit it, lest they give the impression that they are taking praise and glory away from God, they love the attention that preaching brings their way. As a person who has struggled with self-esteem issues his entire life, I found the love, respect, and adoration showered on me by parishioners quite affirming.
Remembering my preaching is one of the things that makes my defection from the Christian faith so troubling for many former parishioners. As Baptists, we believed once saved, always saved (eternal security, perseverance of the saints). This means that once people put their faith and trust in Jesus they can never, ever lose their salvation. People are left, then, with either believing I am still a Christian or that I never was. Neither choice sits well with them, especially for those who heard me preach and viewed me as someone who played an important part in their spiritual formation.
I’ve been criticized for a lot of things I did as a pastor, and rightly so. I was arrogant, narrow-minded, and rarely put up with dissent. I ran off a lot of good people. That said, few people have ever criticized my preaching. For the most part, the people I pastored found my sermons well crafted, worth listening to, and, at times, quite humorous and entertaining.
Hundreds and hundreds of people made public professions of faith as a result of my sermons. Lives were changed and people were delivered from sins. If I was never saved, what does that say about all the fruit I gathered over the course of 25 years in the ministry? If by their fruits ye shall know them, surely I proved that I was a great fruit grower?
I have no doubt that I could, even as an atheist, go to a church and preach a sermon that everyone would find inspirational and entertaining. I’m sure those listening to me would think God was speaking through me or using me to touch their hearts. What if I then told them I was an atheist? How would they explain their response to my oratorical gem?
Effective preaching requires passion and charisma. Two of our recent presidents are good examples of what I mean here. Forget the party affiliation or platform for a moment. Who would you rather listen to giving a stump speech? Barack Obama or George W Bush?
Good preaching moves people to go beyond themselves. Good preaching inspires and motivates. A good example of this is Martin Luther King, Jr’s I Have a Dream speech. And this is why preachers who excel at their craft are so dangerous. The potential for abuse and manipulation is great. Far too often, parishioners check their minds at the church door. When the winsome, charismatic pastor preaches they soak up his words like a sponge. If they are not careful and cognizant of the potential for manipulation they can easily be led astray. (Please see Should a Christian Preacher Turned Atheist Stop Using His Public Speaking Skills?)
I still like hearing a well-crafted sermon. I respect people who attempt to excel at what they do. Sadly, I have heard more sorry, pathetic, poorly-crafted, rabbit-trail sermons than any one person should ever have to listen to. I feel sad for church members who have to sit under this kind of preaching week after week. In fact, they sit under it long enough that they begin to think that their preacher’s pathetic sermons are the norm.
Why I am being so hard of preachers? Why should I, a card-carrying atheist, give a rat’s ass over the quality of sermons in the Christian church?
First, preaching is what I did for many years and I still like to talk about it.
Second, I think people should do what they do well. I hate half-assed wherever I find it, whether it be in the pulpit or the local fast-food restaurant.
Third, I realize that the world is always going to be predominantly religious. If that is so, I think people of faith should have leaders that thoughtfully and honestly teach them the beliefs of their particular religions. They deserve to have leaders who are passionate about what they do. Sadly, in many denominations, the higher a man rises in the denominational hierarchy the more worthless he becomes. Does anyone consider any of the popes a great orator?
I know this post is pretty pointed. I am of the general opinion that the United States is awash in mediocrity. It seems everything has been turned into an audition for American Idol or America’s Got Talent. People are told that they can be whatever they want to be, so they become what they want to be and not what they ought to be. Result? School teachers who can’t teach. Retail workers without basic people skills. And yes, preachers who can’t preach.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Earlier this year, Brian Pounds, pastor of Vernon First Assembly of God in Vernon, Texas, was charged with raping a 15-year-old girl. Pounds is a graduate of Liberty University.
After his original arrest, Pounds was accused of sexually assaulting another teenager.
A Wilbarger County grand jury handed down a five-count indictment against Brian Keith Pounds, 45, on Wednesday.
Pounds was indicted on one count of aggravated sexual assault of a child, two counts of sexual assault of a child, one count of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and one count of delivery of methamphetamine to a minor, according to the indictment.
The offenses are alleged to have happened July 1, according to the indictment.
Pounds, 45, was being held Friday in Wilbarger County Jail, according to online jail records.
His bond amounts were not available Friday evening.
Pounds was held by the Wichita County Jail from July 16 until Friday on total bonds of $300,000 for charges of sexual assault and delivery of drugs to a minor, according to online jail records.
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“Mr. Pounds has been a pastor in the Vernon community for over a decade,” 46th Judicial District Attorney Staley Heatly said in a media release.
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Pounds lists himself as lead pastor at Vernon First Assembly of God on his LinkedIn social media account.
He has held that position for nine years and 10 months, according to his LinkedIn account, where his function has been to “Inspire, motivate, and educate people in life’s journey, helping them to debelop [sic] the soul: body, mind, and spirit.”
A 15-year-old girl’s mother contacted Vernon police to report her daughter had sexual intercourse with a man later identified as Pounds.
She told police she was trying to find her daughter when she made contact with Pounds at a motel.
He told her he was a pastor at First Assembly of God and was trying to get a room for someone in need. He rented a room at the motel in the name of the church.
Officers did not know at the time that Pounds had been in the room with the woman’s daughter.
Later that day, the woman found her daughter at a Walmart and brought her to the Vernon Police Department.
The girl told police she had been having sex with Pounds and had smoked meth at the motel.
She told police they had been having sex for about a month, and Pounds had been counseling her and her family through the church.
Pounds denied to police any sexual contact with the girl. He told police he had been helping her and her family as a minister.
Pounds gave the police permission to search the motel room. They found evidence of meth, fibers and hair, leading officers to believe the girl had been there.
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She said he began to groom her by getting her a job cleaning houses. She said she would meet Pounds at the church, and he would give her meth.
She described the meetings at the church as counseling where Pounds offered her meth. She said their first sexual encounter was at the church.
The girl said she told her mother the day she and Pounds got caught. The teenager said Pounds picked her up, gave her meth and had sex with her.
Also, she said Pounds put his hands around her neck and choked her.
A new victim has come forward, accusing former Vernon First Assembly of God Pastor Brian Pounds of illegal sexual behavior with a child. The allegations were unsealed Friday and a new charge of sexual assault of a child was added to Pounds, who is currently being held in the Wilbarger County Jail under six Grand Jury indictments.
Jimmy Dennis, secretary of the Vernon Assembly of God board of trustees, said the new allegations saddened the church and were deeply troubling. He said the church was cooperating with authorities in the investigation. Dennis presented the following statement to the newspaper from the church: “As the congregation of Vernon First Assembly, we were deeply saddened and troubled by the news concerning our former pastor Brian Pounds. His tenure as pastor ended with a letter of resignation that was submitted by him and read to the congregation on Sunday, July 18. We are cooperating fully with local authorities as they investigate this situation. We understand how hurtful and heart-wrenching these allegations are and our hearts, our prayers, and our sincere apologies go out to the family and those in our community who, along with us, have been affected by these tragic events.”
Pounds was charged with a new count of sexual assault of a child on Friday. The new allegation refers to an incident that occurred sometime around Oct. 1, 2013 according to a probable cause affidavit from the Texas Rangers, and it was uncovered as part of the investigation into the initial accusation.
Pounds was aware, on July 1, that he was under investigation from accusations made by a 15-year-old girl. As the week progressed and a case was built, Pounds became suicidal. On July 5, 2021 the affidavit states Vernon police responded to Pounds residence because it was “reported he was threatening suicide.” Police removed a 38-caliber revolver handgun from the residence, and also located 38 caliber ammo at the church in Pound’s desk. Pounds reportedly checked into Red River Hospital in Wichita Falls.
The affidavit states that on July 14, investigators conducted an interview with Pounds’ wife Amy, at her residence in Vernon: “Amy was asked about any knowledge of inappropriate activities by Brian, including any extramarital affairs, inappropriate relationships, or methamphetamine use. Amy denied any knowledge of indiscretions, affairs, or methamphetamine use by Brian.”
Pounds was arrested on July 16 at the Wichita Falls hospital and booked into the Wichita County Jail.
While he was incarcerated, investigators reviewed phone calls Pounds made: “During these calls, Brian and Amy began discussing additional potential charges that could be filed against him. Brian identified (the new victim) to Amy by her first name, Brian inferred that if the additional charges are related to (the new victim) it would be bad. Amy told Brian, “I know.” Brian became extremely emotional saying, “I’m a dead man.’ Brian told Amy his involvement with (the new victim) was a long time ago and that “it has never mattered how sorry [he] was.”
During a follow-up interview: “Amy was confronted with the information obtained from the recorded jail calls between her and Brian. Amy confirmed she was dishonest during her initial interview regarding Brian’s involvement with other females and his methamphetamine use. Amy confirmed she knew of Brian being involved in exchanging inappropriate text messages with (the new victim) in the past though she denied any knowledge of a sexual relationship between the two.”
Investigators determined the identity of the new victim and interviewed her, they said she became extremely distraught, and agreed to give details of the alleged assaults.
She said about seven years ago, at age 15, she was sexually assaulted at the church and the assaults continued for about two years at both the church and Pound’s home. She said the first incident began when she participated in a youth group activity at the First Assembly of God church as they were playing a game called “Murder in the dark.”
She said Pounds would turn off the lights and the kids would hide in places around the church. She said when Pounds found her, he groped her. In another instance Pounds invited her to the church for a youth group activity, but she found only Pounds there. She said he told her to go wait in his office, until everyone else arrived. Instead he came in and locked the door. She alleged he made her disrobe and forced her to perform sex acts. On another occasion in the church office, she said Pounds put a revolver to her head and told her if she ever told anyone of the incidents he would kill her and himself.
In December 2021, Pounds pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual assault of a child and was sentenced to 45 years in prison.
A former pastor in Vernon, Texas, has been sentenced to 45 years in prison after he pleaded guilty last week to aggravated sexual assault of a child.
rian Keith Pounds was arrested in July and accused of raping a 15-year-old girl when he was minister at First Assembly of God Church and a chaplain at Tyson Foods.
An affidavit filed in the case said he groomed the girl by getting her a job cleaning houses for elderly people, then began to have sex with her at the church and in a motel room, giving her methamphetamines and, in at least one instance, choking her.
He also had been counseling the girl’s family through the church.
Pounds was charged with three additional counts of sexual assault of a child after he revealed the existence of another victim during a phone call to his wife in August from the Wichita County Jail, where he was being held on $200,000 bail.
Pounds was sentenced in the 46th District Court of Wilbarger County. According to the Wichita Falls Times Record News, Staley Heatly, 46th District Attorney, said that under Texas law Pounds will be required to serve at least half of his sentence, and that sex offenders generally serve more than that.
“Brian Pounds abused his position of trust as a pastor in the most horrific way,” Heatly said. “Our community and our children are much safer with him in the custody of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.”
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
One of the hardest things for me to admit is that I, at one time, believed things that I now know to be untrue. These fallacious beliefs had a deleterious effect on not only my life, but the lives of my wife, and the people who called me pastor. While everyone concerned would agree that we have escaped the consequences of my beliefs relatively unharmed, I can’t help but think how life might have been different had I not fallen for the greatest con game of all time: Evangelical Christianity.
On one hand, if I had not been raised in the Evangelical church nor attended an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) college, I never would have met my wife. Perhaps, in an alternate timeline, I might have met a woman with the same beauty, charm, and kindness as Polly. Perhaps, I say. I remember another woman I dated before Polly. I was madly in love with her, yet, as I look back on our torrid, tumultuous relationship, I know that had we married, we likely would have killed each other — literally. Choosing a different path doesn’t necessarily bring a better outcome. The old adage isn’t always true: the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.
This I know for sure: I spent most of my life believing things that are not true. And not just believing these things, but putting them into practice. It’s one thing to believe the Christian God exists, but it is a far different thing, based on that belief, to devote one’s life to serving and worshiping this God. And not just serving him on Sunday, the day when he demands fealty from his followers, but as a devoted slave, I served this God day and night; day after day, year after year, for almost 50 years. This God, found only within the pages of an ancient religious text, promised that he would care for me in this life, and after death, he would grant me eternal life in a glorious pain-free Heaven.
Daniel Dennett is right: There’s no polite way to suggest to someone that they have devoted their life to folly. Indeed, a life of folly. While I can, if given sufficient libations, cry over the spilled milk of my life, I choose, instead, to use my past life as a soldier for Jesus as a cautionary warning to all who dare to follow in my steps. I stand along the road of life waving my arms, hoping to turn sincere followers of this God away from the bridge-less chasm that awaits on the road ahead. Take another path, I passionately warn. Sadly, most of this God’s slaves will ignore my warnings, thinking that I am the one who is deceived and in need of saving.
There are other people similar to myself, who, due to their blind devotion to religious belief, squandered the best years of their lives. How can we not regret giving the years when we were strong, healthy, and full of life, to a mythical deity? And worse yet, how can we not regret giving our time, talent, and (lots of) money to the human-built religious machine that drives over all who dare to get in its way?
Like other survivors of the Evangelical con, I have made an uneasy peace with my past. I have many regrets over how I spent most of my adult life. I know there’s nothing I can do about the past. I choose to learn from my past experiences, using them to fuel my writing, in the hope that I can, in some small way, play a part in bringing Evangelicalism to an ignominious end. While I will not live long enough to see its demise, I hope that one day one of my descendants will be the person who holds a pillow over the Evangelical God’s face and finally smothers him to death.
What follows is Bruce’s Top Ten List of Crazy Beliefs. Most former Evangelicals will certainly find this list to be quite similar to theirs.
The Bible is a God-inspired text, inerrant and infallible
The universe was created in six twenty four hour days and is 6,024 years
God talks to me
The story of the supernatural Jesus — all of it
There is an unseen Frank Peretti-like spiritual dimension inhabited by angels and demons
There is a shadow government, a Satan influenced cabal that runs the world
Demons possess people and inanimate objects such as toys
Satan uses certain styles of music to control the masses
Mental illness is caused by sin
Government schools destroy the minds of students
My Evangelical journey began and ended with the Bible. My devotion to God was fueled by the belief that the Bible was a God-inspired text. This text was inerrant and infallible, and the God who wrote it meant for me to obey its commands and teachings. Not only did this God expect me to obey, he also commanded me to teach others to do the same. And so I did. Thousands of people sat under the sound of my voice, hearing me declare that loving, serving, and worshiping the Evangelical God was the way to peace, blessing, the forgiveness of sins, and life everlasting.
Everything in my life flowed from my commitment to the inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible. As Baptists are fond of saying: God said it, I believe it, and that settles it for me! My journey out of Evangelicalism was complete when I came to realize that what I once believed about the Bible was not true; that my worldview was built upon an irrational, intellectually lacking foundation. Once the Bible lost its magical power over me, other beliefs, like the ones mentioned above, quickly unraveled. When my mind was finally unfettered by the Evangelical delusion, I was then free to seek truth wherever it may be found. No longer was I walled in by a set of beliefs that forced me to embrace irrationality. (Please see The Danger of Being in a Box and Why It Makes Sense When you Are in It and What I Found When I Left the Box) And much like most Evangelicals-turned-atheists/agnostics, I am grateful that skepticism, reason, and knowledge have set me free.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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Did you know that you only need one man in your life to be truly satisfied? That’s right, ladies (no non-heterosexuals need apply). According to the Girl Defined website, young women have a hole in their hearts that can only be filled by the most awesome man e-v-e-r: Jesus. In a December 2015 post, guest writer Addi wrote:
I have a God-sized hole in my heart but I’ve been trying to fill that hole with a marriage-sized cork or a man-sized puzzle piece.
Neither of these were meant to fill the hole so they aren’t going to fill the emptiness.
I have learned that only one man is able to truly fulfill me.
Only one man has the ability to fully satisfy me.
We all were born with a hole in our hearts—an emptiness and void inside of us. There’s is only one man who can fill that hole and His name is Jesus Christ.
We, as girls, can try to stuff it with the things that surround us. We can choose to fill it with our desire for a relationship, our longing for a specific career, our group of friends, our greed for more possessions or more money . . . but none of these things will satisfy us—nothing of this world ever can.
My first thought was quite base: I know a hole that Jesus can’t fill. 🙂 Only a real flesh and blood man can fill this hole. Someday, Purity ring-wearing young women will fall in love and get married. If they have not “sinned” before their wedding day, they will learn, for the first time, that there are certain things that only a man (or a vibrator or dildo) can do for them. While Jesus might be able to fill the mythical hole in their mythical hearts, Jesus is no match for a real man with a penis or an Adam & Eve purchase (don’t click on the link “Dr.” Tee, you will go blind) with fully charged batteries.
I’m convinced that teachings like those espoused on the Girl Defined website are quite harmful. First, there is the denial of normal human sexuality. I dealt with this in a post titled, Hey Girlfriend: Eight Steps to Sex-Proof Your Life. Second, one day these young women will marry, carrying unrealistic expectations into their marriages. Their husbands will always be second to Jesus. When their husbands don’t or can’t meet their physical or emotional needs, they will turn to Jesus, the only man who can truly satisfy their every longing. Jesus will always be a better friend, confidant, and lover.
Marriages like this are actually polygamous: husband, wife, and Jesus. Years ago, I mentioned to a close pastor friend of mine that Polly and I listened to the Carpenters during our lovemaking (it was the only secular CD we owned). My friend told me that he and his wife only listened to hymns when they made love. Even then, when I was still very much a card-carrying member of the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist church, I thought, hymns? Really? What, did they play Victory in Jesus when they had orgasms? My friend and his wife believed, and still do, that Jesus should be a part of everything. Jesus becomes a voyeur, always lurking nearby.
Someday, Addi will find that having a real man to snuggle up to on a cold winter night beats a mythical Jesus every time. When she finds herself in a dark place, when it seems that Jesus is nowhere to be found, her husband will be there for her to talk to. When pain and loss bring tears to Addi’s eyes, it won’t be Jesus who holds and caresses her and wipes away her tears. Jesus makes for a great cliché, but Addi will one day learn that the people who really matter aren’t found in the pages of a religious text.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
BG has this series over at his website. What purpose it serves is beyond any rational and logical thinking. It certainly is not going to change the behavior of those people he accuses nor will it stop anyone from committing the same acts.
If he is trying to provide criticism against Christians and Christianity, he is barking up the wrong tree. Christians already know that there are people in their denominations that do these acts.
His series does an injustice to everyone as it ignores the fact that some of those people he highlights are not Christian except in name only. believers already know that. Their claims and presence in those denominations do not take away the reality of the Christian faith or its pure origins.
Nor do they harm the word of God. God’s word is true no matter how believers and wolves in sheep’s clothing behave. Their actions do harm the people committing those crimes as their deeds are exposed to the world around them and they commit sins that may put them into the lake of fire.
BG’s recording them does not create news as the Christians in those churches already know what is going on. At best, all he is providing is fodder for himself, and his atheist friends to justify their decision to reject Christ as their Savior.
He also provides fuel for them to criticize those who struggle in their faith or fail to live up to society’s ideals. That is the wrong thing to do. When people make these errors in their lives, no one has the right to mock them.
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Whatever bad purpose BG has for creating and maintaining this series we do not have to go along with it. We can bring something good out of these situations to help warn believers and prove the truthfulness of the Bible.
The Bible tells us that our enemy is not other rhumans [sic]. That means that BG and other atheists are not our foes. As the Bible tells us, our foe is the evil forces behind the unbeliever. This is why we need to put on the whole armor of God.
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In other words, we do not rail against BG for creating his Black Collar Series nor do we call him names and so on. We turn the other cheek and respond with the wisdom of Christ. He is just fooling himself if he thinks he is doing anything constructive.
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We see far too many Christians fall to evil’s influence and because of that, we should take Peter’s words concerning ‘making our own calling and election sure’ seriously. These examples of evil devouring possible true Christians are an enormous number, far beyond what BG records in that series.
We should take every step to see that it does not happen to us. One of the biggest examples we have of evil devouring true Christians is BG himself. if it can happen to him it can happen to anyone.
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We have to be wary, watchful, and learn what we need to do to protect ourselves and our families. Get to the truth and apply it correctly to your lives as the lessons from Black Collar Crimes are very clear. We are a targeted people and the enemy is not our friend.
If BG and the other pastors and missionaries who have left the Christian faith and become agnostics and atheists really want to do something of value there is a way. Instead of claiming that God & Jesus do not exist, that the Bible is a fairy tale, and criticizes those Christians who are still living the life they once lived, those former believers should be warning Christians to watch out for the attacks of evil.
But for some reason, they do not show any remorse for their decisions to reject the faith, etc. They do not even show any concern for their once fellow believers. What we see is a concentrated effort to destroy more Christians.
That is sad. These people could still do good work by warning believers but they have chosen to fight along side evil and do its bidding. How many more believers will be lost because of these worse black collar crimes BG ignores?
— “Dr.” David Tee (David Thiessen, TheologyArcheology, TEWSNBN), Theologyarcheology: A Site for the Glory of God, Black Collar Crime, December 23, 2021
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
In 2017, Riley Brown, executive pastor of Broadmoor Baptist Church in Madison, Mississippi, was accused of stealing $332,000 from the church.
A Baptist pastor is accused of stealing more than $300,000 over more than two years.
In an emailed statement, officials with Broadmoor Baptist Church said former executive pastor Riley Brown took $332,000 from the church coffers over a “primarily” 27-month period.
Brown could not be reached for comment.
The “transactions” were discovered after an internal policy review in September, according to the statement.
“These transactions were undertaken by one individual, Riley Brown, circumventing our existing internal policies and procedures,” the statement read.
Brown is no longer employed with the church. Church officials are reporting the matter to the Internal Revenue Service and the Mississippi Department of Revenue.
The church will not press criminal charges but will cooperate with prosecutors, according to the emailed statement. Madison County District Attorney Michael Guest was not immediately available.
“As a body of Christ, we sought to find a proper balance between accountability and grace; and given our exchanges in personnel and significant new safeguards and internal controls we have added, and will continue to add, we are confident we can responsibly steward the resources entrusted to us,” the statement reads. “While we choose not to press criminal charges against this individual, we will fully cooperate with prosecutors if it is independently pursued.”
Update
An October 27, 2017, MS News Now report stated:
Broadmoor released a statement that an internal policy review showed that more than $330 thousand dollars was unaccounted for.
The church also said that Brown was no longer with the church and that findings were turned over to the IRS and the Dept of Revenue.
Though he would not take any questions, Brown spoke to us exclusively about the situation.
“I am innocent of any alleged theft. This is a civil matter that was settled two weeks ago.”
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An email statement from church stated:
As a body of Christ, we sought to find a proper balance between accountability and grace; and given our exchanges in personnel and significant new safeguards and internal controls we have added, and will continue to add, we are confident we can responsibly steward the resources entrusted to us. While we choose not to press criminal charges against this individual, we will fully cooperate with prosecutors if it is independently pursued.
The former pastor of a central Mississippi Baptist church disputes claims that he stole $332,000 from the church.
The Rev. Riley Brown tells WLBT-TV that he’s innocent of any theft and signed a civil settlement with Broadmoor Baptist Church two weeks ago.
The Southern Baptist congregation in Madison is among the largest in the state.
More: Church says pastor stole over $300,000 from coffers
The church last week said Brown made unauthorized transactions for his own benefit over 27 months. Brown’s lawyer says it’s a dispute over church policy, not a criminal matter.
Broadmoor’s leaders say they’re not pressing charges but have notified income tax officials.
Madison County District Attorney Michael Guest says he was unaware of the claims before the church released a statement but is investigating. The church says it will cooperate if Guest intervenes.
In August 2019, Brown pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 15 years in prison, with 10 years suspended.
The former pastor of Broadmoor Baptist Church has been sentenced to prison after pleading guilty to embezzlement, Madison County court officials said.
James Riley Brown is accused of stealing $332,000 from the church to pay his mortgage between February 2014 and August 2017. The Southern Baptist congregation in Madison is among the largest in the state.
Documents show Brown transferred church funds into his personal bank account, including one transaction of nearly $36,000.
Brown was sentenced to 15 years in prison, with 10 years suspended and five years to serve, court officials said. He was also sentenced to serve five years’ probation once he’s released.
Church members initially said they wouldn’t press charges, but the Madison County district attorney’s office carried out its own investigation.
Brown served as executive pastor of the church from 2014 to 2017, when an audit exposed the missing money.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
In 2017, Javyon George-Boatman, who may or may not have been a youth worker at Family Christian Center in Munster, Indiana, was arrested Wednesday and charged with “three counts of sexual misconduct with a minor.”
Times reporters Steve Garrison and Lauren Cross had this to say about George-Boatman’s arrest:
A 22-year-old man who previously attended Family Christian Center in Munster is accused of having sex at the church with a 14-year-old girl. Javyon M. George-Boatman was charged Wednesday in Lake Criminal Court with three counts of sexual misconduct with a minor, according to court records. Court records listed George-Boatman as a youth leader at the church, but John Ponder, the pastor of Christian Education and Pastoral Care, told The Times on Thursday that George-Boatman is not a youth leader, nor did he serve the church in any official capacity.
The church barred George-Boatman from accessing church property immediately after learning of the allegations, Ponder said.
The girl told police in an interview June 26 that she first met the defendant during music practice at Family Christian Center, according to a probable cause affidavit. She said George-Boatman kissed her on Palm Sunday at the church, and the physical contact escalated until she agreed to have sex with him in a church closet on April 23, the affidavit states.
She said they had sex at least 10 more times at the church between April 23 and June 7, the affidavit states.
The church’s pastor, Steve Munsey, did not respond to a request for comment.
Ponder said the victim confided in a church elder, who encouraged the girl to tell her father. The female elder supported the girl’s decision and volunteered to accompany her, Ponder said. The father then contacted police, Ponder said.
“We’re very fastidious about such things. We find this abhorrent, immoral and against the law and totally intolerable,” Ponder said, noting the church conducts background checks before anyone can serve in an official capacity.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
In October 2021, Mark Cuprik, a youth leader at Victory Christian Center in Boardman, Ohio, was accused of sexual battery, unlawful sexual conduct with a minor, pandering sexually oriented matter involving a minor, disseminating matter harmful to juveniles, and importuning.
A warrant has been issued for the arrest of a former local church youth group leader who is the subject of an eight-count indictment accusing him of engaging in sex with a 15-year-old girl.
Mark Cuprik, 22, allegedly drove to Beaver Township Memorial Park with the girl last March.
According to police, Cuprik was a friend of the girl’s family, as well as a youth group leader at Victory Christian Center.
Police say a family member began chasing Cuprik’s car. The chase involved high rates of speed and a disregard for traffic control devices, according to the report.
Cuprik eventually dropped the teen back off at the park and she was reunited with family members.
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Following an investigation into social media accounts, the grand jury indicted Cuprik on charges of Sexual Battery, Unlawful Sexual Conduct With a Minor, Pandering Sexually Oriented Matter Involving a Minor, Disseminating Matter Harmful to Juveniles, and Importuning.
According to the indictment Cuprik engaged in sexual conduct with the teen from late February through late March.
Investigators say Cuprik also possessed material showing a minor engaging in sexual activity.
Victory Christian Center released the following statement:
Any abuse, especially that of a minor is abhorrent and should never be tolerated. We are incredibly grieved in regards to the allegations and indictments of of a former youth leader at our Boardman campus. Our Board of Directors are aware of the matter and cooperating with the appropriate authorities. The accused leader was removed immediately from any and all involvement with in the church when the allegations first surfaced under previous leadership of VCC in January of 2020.
When current VCC leadership learned more details about the matter, a statement was read to the Boardman Campus providing transparency and condemning the actions of the former youth leader. VCC leadership also made extra efforts to stay in close touch with the victim’s family, providing support and offering professional counseling to them, offering to pay for all such expenses.
Given that this is now an ongoing investigation, it would be inappropriate for us to comment any further.
On December 20, 2021, Cuprik pleaded guilty to charges of sexual battery, a third-degree felony; two counts of pandering sexual material involving a minor, a fourth-degree felony; two counts of disseminating harmful matter to a juvenile, a fifth-degree felony, and sexual imposition, a third-degree misdemeanor.
A former youth pastor pleaded guilty to sex charges today in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.
Mark Cuprik, 22, entered his pleas before Judge R. Scott Krichbaum to charges of sexual battery, a third degree felony; two counts of pandering sexual material involving a minor, a fourth degree felony; two counts of disseminating harmful matter to a juvenile, a fifth degree felony and sexual imposition, a third degree misdemeanor.
Prosecutors are recommending a sentence of four years in prison. Defense attorneys are expected to argue for less.
Cuprik, a former youth pastor at the Boardman Campus of Victory Christian Center, remains free on bond until his Feb. 7 sentencing.
Assistant Prosecutor Caitlyn Andrews said Cuprik had a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old girl who was a church member.
Andrews also said the pandering and disseminating charges deal with the person Cuprik had the relationship with and her sister.
The investigation began in March after Cuprik was involved in a chase with Beaver Township police after he was confronted by the family of the victim.
The indictment in the case alleges illegal activity from 2017-2020.
The church has said in earlier statements that it removed Cuprik from his post in January after allegations of misconduct first surfaced and they have been cooperating with authorities ever since.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
