But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up. Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh. Matthew 24:36-44
After what I thought was another failed rapture on September 23, I received the following card in the mail, letting me know why I wasn’t taken up into the clouds by Jesus.
The former pastor at Cedar Key First Baptist Church is accused of taking more than $76,000 from his church over several years.
Levy County Sheriff’s deputies on Tuesday charged Todd Anthony Pope with scheme to defraud, forgery and grand theft greater than $20,000 but less than $99,999. He’s being held in the Levy County Jail on $215,000 bond.
Deputies say they received a tip from a concerned citizen about unusual charges to the church’s operational expense accounts.
Investigators immediately identified a number of unusual charges. They say they determined Pope not only used funds for personal gain, but also opened charge accounts, credit card accounts and gas charge accounts. Some of the accounts were created in the church’s name but only Pope had access to them, deputies say.
Pastor Todd Pope was born in Lakeland, Florida in 1962 and was born again at age 14. Pastor Todd preached his first sermon at 16. He served Lakeland area churches until moving to our church as pastor in August, 2008. He and his wife Star have five children and five grandchildren.
I recently posted an excerpt from an article written by Michelle Lesley detailing her view of the human condition. According to Lesley, humans — Christian and unbeliever alike — are:
You’re a dirty, stinking, rotten, rebellious sinner. You yell at your kids. You don’t submit to your husband. You act out of selfishness. You lie. You gossip. You covet. You bow down to your idols instead of to Christ. You sin against a holy and righteous God in a thousand ways every day in thought, word, and deed. Just like I do. Let’s put on our big girl panties and just admit it. (1 John 1:8,10)
Commenters rightly objected to Lesley’s trashing of human self-esteem and her debasement of human goodness. The question I want to answer today is whether Lesley’s theological beliefs have a Biblical basis. Liberal and Progressive Christians are angered and offended by Lesley’s words — and rightly so. That said, Liberals and Progressives have developed unique and, at times, intellectually incomprehensible ways to hold on to what the Bible says about the love, kindness, and mercy of God while, at the same time, pretending all the verses that support Lesley’s beliefs either don’t exist or mean something other than Evangelicals say they mean.
Both sides of the theological divide make things up as they go, shaping God and Jesus into a deity in their own image. No two Christians worship the same God. Personal beliefs and experiences shape and mold God into a being acceptable to each Christian. This is especially true in Evangelicalism where the priesthood of the believer — every Christian has direct access to God — turns each Christian into his own final authority. As a pastor, I had countless Christians take issue with something I said during one of my sermons. Sometimes, people would get so angry with me over what they believed was heresy that they would leave the church. More than a few congregants told me after confronting me and hearing my response, “well, pastor, we are just going to have to agree to disagree.” And so it goes, with every Evangelical thinking he or she is infallibly right. Armed with an inerrant, infallible Bible, written and given to them by a supernatural, infallible God, Evangelicals, with great certitude, believe they are absolutely R-I-G-H-T. When challenged to “prove” their contentions, they say, the Bible says _________________.
Lesley, if required, can easily find Biblical justification for her abhorrent, anti-human beliefs. The Bible can be used to prove almost anything. Asking ten Christians a theological question will elicit twelve opinions. The Bible says that there is ONE Lord, ONE faith, and ONE baptism, yet, as any unbiased observer of Christianity can attest, modern Christianity has MANY Lords, MANY faiths, and MANY baptisms. The Bible says that Jesus’ followers will be known by their unity and love for each other. Yet, Christianity is rife with internecine warfare, bitter debates, and sectarian division.
Lesley believes, as do most Evangelicals, that Jesus, the virgin-born, sinless son of God, died on the cross for human sin. Jesus took upon himself our sin and suffered indignation, torture, and death that should have been ours. As our substitute, Jesus suffered the wrath of God that we deserved. His blood atonement on the cross appeased God, the father, and satisfied our sin debt. Through the death of Jesus and his resurrection from the dead three days later, humans can find redemption/salvation/deliverance. The only way anyone makes it to Heaven after death is by and through Jesus Christ. (I speak broadly here, knowing that there is broad diversity within Christianity concerning Christ’s atonement. Arminians will view matters differently from Calvinists and Pelagians.)
Why do humans need salvation? Why was it necessary for Jesus to die on the cross? One word: SIN. According to the Bible, sin is transgression of the law of God. Evangelicals believe the Bible is God’s standard of objective morality. The definition of “sin” is determined not by human opinion, but by the Bible. God said__________, end of story. Evangelicals trace the human sin nature all the way back to Adam and Eve and the book of Genesis. Adam and Eve were created by God without sin, yet thanks to a talking, upright-walking snake (Satan) tempting them, Adam and Eve sinned against God and were cast out of the Garden of Eden. From that moment forward — five to six thousand years ago — all humans are born sinners.
It is from this understanding of the Bible that Lesley wrote what she did about her fellow humans. The Bible says that babies come forth from the womb speaking lies, that none of us has the capacity to do good, no not one. We are sheep who have gone astray. We, by nature, hate God and are at variance with him. These things, according to Lesley, can be said of atheist and Christian alike. The only difference is that the Christian has prostrated himself before God, confessed his sins, and asked Jesus to save and forgive him. Because the Christian has done so, Jesus stands between the sinner and God — who still hates sin and those who do it. When God looks at the saved sinner, all he sees is Jesus. Praise the Lord, right?
When the Michelle Lesleys of the world denigrate people, emphatically saying that humans are vile, awful people, they do so because that is how the Bible describes the human race. This provides yet another reminder that the Bible is an anti-human text best suited for the dustbin of human history. Perhaps it is time for Christians to band together and write a new Bible, one that better reflects our 21st century understanding of the world. Doing so would be an admission that the Bible is a human, not divine book, but everyone except Evangelicals and other conservative Christians already know this. The Bible, in its present form, represents the thinking of Bronze-age and first-century people. Despite what Evangelicals say, the Bible is not an unchangeable, timeless book. The Bible is not an inexhaustible text that gives readers something new every time they read it. Imagine how much better our world would be if a new Bible was written, especially if the text was based on modern sensibilities and knowledge.
Bruce, the Bible says Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. How dare you suggest a new Bible be written!What’s next, a new Jesus? Well, now that you mention it…No need. Christians have been manufacturing new Jesuses for two thousand years. Lesley and her Evangelical friends think their version of Jesus is identical to First-Century Jesus/Bible Jesus, but an honest reading of the Bible reveals that whatever Christianity is today, it has very little, if anything, to do with an itinerant Jewish carpenter who walked the land of Palestine 2,000 years ago. That Jesus was swallowed up by the Apostle Paul’s Jesus, never to be seen again.
Lesley’s view of humanity has real world implications. Such thinking destroys self-esteem, often leading to psychological trauma. Countless former Evangelicals are in therapy due to the teachings mentioned in this post. This is why such beliefs must be exposed and repudiated. For people who still believe in God, there are better expressions of faith than that which is peddled by Lesley and her fellow Evangelicals. You don’t need to spend one more moment in a church where your sense of self-worth is pummeled with a Bible club, with the goal being the destruction of who you really are.
Did you grow up in a family/church that believed as Lesley does? How did these beliefs affect you psychologically? Please share your thoughts in the comment section.
Yesterday, I published an excerpt from an article by Air Force Chaplain Sony Hernandez — a Fundamentalist Calvinist — in which Hernandez told Christian soldiers that their duty to God comes before the U.S. Constitution. Today, church-state watchdog Freedom From Religion Foundation responded to Hernandez.
To Captain Sonny Hernandez, Chaplain for the U.S. Air Force Reserves:
Dear Captain Hernandez,
This is a response to your recent misguided rant about the “duties” of Christian military chaplains to “avoid supporting or accommodating evil.” You make it clear that by “evil” you mean the American values of religious pluralism and the constitutional right of non-Christians and the nonreligious to freely exercise their beliefs. Your ideas are unworthy and un-American.
The tirade was meant to encourage other military chaplains to follow your lead and turn their backs on the Constitution — the very document that you and they have sworn an oath to uphold and defend — by actively denigrating non-Christian service members. This is a shameful call to action that will actively undermine unit cohesion and the readiness of our armed forces.
You begin your diatribe by distinguishing between “True” Christians (those who are devoted to your interpretation of the bible and “hate the things that God hates”) and “Counterfeit” Christians (those who “appeal to the Constitution” and “support everyone’s right to practice their faith regardless if they worship a god different from ours”). You declare that military chaplains “accommodate evil” if they accommodate the men and women of our armed services who are not Christian.
Midway through your rant, you swing and miss at an incredibly easy question that you pose to yourself: “Is it wrong for a professing Christian service member to say, ‘I support the rights of all Americans to practice their faith since the Constitution protects their rights?’ ”
The easy, correct, obvious answer — the one demanded by your oath to uphold the Constitution — is, “No, it’s not wrong to support the right of free religious exercise, or any of the other rights enshrined in our Constitution.”
Your answer? “Absolutely!” Your disrespect for the very principles on which this nation was founded is appalling.
As a military chaplain you have a duty to aid our service members in the free exercise of their religious beliefs. Accommodating the free exercise of religion is, in fact, your only job. Military chaplains exist to grant our service members access to a church or religious leader of their chosen religion while they live on base or travel overseas.
While the military chaplaincy has unnecessarily expanded and in many cases now provides redundant access to Christian chaplains in areas where private Christian churches are available, the justification for military chaplains nevertheless remains rooted — tenuous though those legal roots may be — in the constitutional principle of free religious exercise. Your call to openly disregard the Constitution is particularly hypocritical, given that the Constitution justifies your existence.
You are encouraging military chaplains to abuse their government positions to promote your particular brand of Christianity to atheist and minority religious service members. This is a dangerous proposal that disrespects the constitutional separation of religion and government and undermines the well being of our non-Christian military members.
U.S. service members have freedom of religion, which includes freedom from religious promotion by the government. By conflating the difference between private belief and government action — the First Amendment only protects the former — you sow confusion and perpetuate the type of overt proselytization by military chaplains that has become far too common.
Earlier this year, the Freedom From Religion Foundation wrote to the Pease Air National Guard Base in New Hampshire after a guardsman complained to us that on-base ceremonies regularly include chaplain-led bible readings and prayer. These are not optional services taking place in a chapel; service members are often required to attend these events as part of their official duties. This is a serious violation of the First Amendment rights of our country’s service members, a violation that you appear to embrace, since it benefits your particular religion.
After bashing the constitutional rights of non-Christians, you bizarrely choose to make an appeal to the constitutional rights of military chaplains. You write, “Military chaplains are not forced to do anything that would violate what their conscience dictates,” which is poorly phrased but basically true. Military chaplains have the right to freely exercise their religion too. But they don’t have the right to force their personal beliefs on others. And they also don’t have a right or an obligation to be military chaplains. Freedom of religious belief does not include the freedom to blow off the duties you’re being paid to perform while continuing to receive a government paycheck.
Your final straw man sets up a false dichotomy. You claim that your opponents want military chaplains either to accommodate “all service members” or else “resign from the military.” There is a world of choice between these two extremes! How about we find military chaplains who are willing to preach to those who welcome them without jamming religion down the throats of the more than 30 percent of service members who are non-Christian, including the 23 percent who have no religious preference? There are indeed many atheists/agnostics/humanists in foxholes who should be protected from religious intrusion and coercion while on duty.
All servicemen and women, chaplains included, must swear an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Your recent post was meant to undermine that hallowed document and the rights it protects. You are unfit to wear the uniform and, if you had the courage of your loudly proclaimed religious convictions, you would resign immediately. Shame on you.
Yours Sincerely,
Sam Grover
Associate Legal Counsel
Freedom From Religion Foundation
I am absolutely weary of some of the memes aimed at Christian women these days. You know the ones I mean, ladies- the ones with lovely pictures of flowers or an ocean or a meadow with a superimposed flowing script practically BEGGING us to believe how much worth we have to God, how awesome we are, how we need to discover the greatness within, how God gives us limitless potential and a superfantastic divine purpose, blah, blah, blah.
You know why they have to take that begging tone to try to get us to believe those things? Because they’re not true. You know it, and I know it.
You’re not awesome or great or imbued with some radical purpose or potential that will magically make your life phenomenal and give you oodles of self esteem once you discover it.
You’re a dirty, stinking, rotten, rebellious sinner. You yell at your kids. You don’t submit to your husband. You act out of selfishness. You lie. You gossip. You covet. You bow down to your idols instead of to Christ. You sin against a holy and righteous God in a thousand ways every day in thought, word, and deed. Just like I do. Let’s put on our big girl panties and just admit it. (1 John 1:8,10)
That’s why these memes and false teachers have to try so hard to convince us of how terrific we are- deep down we know we’re not. It’s a lie. And putting all our eggs in the basket of that lie of greatness sets us up for disappointment and self-loathing every time we sin.
Ladies, stop listening to this hearts and flowers, cotton candy, pump up your ego so you’ll feel better about yourself dreck, and put your faith and hope in the One who will never let you down. The One who looked at all your nasty thoughts and evil deeds and said, “I’m going to the cross for her anyway.” The One who sees all your daily faults and failures and is still willing to forgive when you repent. The One who’s faithful to you even when you’re not faithful to Him.
Stop focusing on how great you are – because you’re not – and put your focus on Christ and how great, and awesome, and superfantastic, and terrific He is. Because if you’re feeling bad about yourself, it’s not because you don’t have a high enough self esteem. It’s because you don’t have a high enough Christ esteem.
We’re not worthy. He is. Let’s get over ourselves and give Him the glory, and honor, and attention, and focus, and praise He so richly deserves.
….
— Michelle Lesley, Michelle Lesley: Give me church ladies, or I die, You’re Not Awesome…and You Know it, September 19,2017
Christians in the Armed Forces will have their faith tested on many occasions. This is important—since Christians are commanded to examine themselves (cf. 2 Cor. 13:5) to see if their professing Christianity is true, or false and vitiated.
True Christianity produces a love for God, a hunger for His Word, fervent prayer, devotion to a local, Bible-believing church, and not a military chapel. The imputed righteousness of Christ that is credited to those who come to Him by faith alone, will enable believers to hate the things that God hates, and love the things that God loves. This does not happen because merit and favor can be earned with God, but only because of the active and passive obedience of Christ.
Counterfeit Christians in the Armed forces will appeal to the Constitution, and not Christ, and they have no local church home—which means they have no accountability for their souls (Heb. 13:17). This is why so many professing Christian service members will say: “We ‘support everyone’s right’ to practice their faith regardless if they worship a god different from ours because the Constitution protects this right.”
Christian service members who openly profess and support the rights of Muslims, Buddhists, and all other anti-Christian worldviews to practice their religions—because the language in the Constitution permits—are grossly in error, and deceived. This article will explain a few reasons why:
First, where in the Bible do the apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, or Christ Himself, support or accommodate anti-Christians to give adulation to their false gods or to yield and obey anyone except the One true and living God? There is no exegetical support, and no moral justification for any Christian service member to openly profess or support the alleged rights of anti-Christians. Christian service members must share the Gospel with unbelievers so they can be saved, not support unbelievers to worship their false gods that will lead them to hell.
Second, professing Christian service members must answer this important question: “Do you appeal to the Holy Scripture, or the US Constitution as an ultimate standard to measure your conduct?”
The answer to this question will determine how the service member will conduct themselves, and what is truly the authority for their faith and practice.
If a professing Christian service member appeals to the Bible, all their thoughts, words, and deeds are to be examined and resolved with the Holy Scripture that points to Christ—not the Constitution. Why is it wrong for a professing “Christian” service member to appeal to the Constitution for their faith and practice? If the professing Christian service member appeals to the Constitution and not the Holy Scripture as their ultimate standard—they have no business calling themselves a Christian—since they would have nothing to measure their Christianity upon without the Bible.
Also, appealing to anything except the Bible as an ultimate authority would not only be anti-Christian, it would also nullify their previous argument of professing to be a Christian—since an ultimate authority does not appeal to anything except itself. It is impossible to submit to both the Bible and the Constitution as an ultimate authority—because the Laws of Logic would prohibit this—since two propositions cannot both be right and wrong at the same time. Christ made this clear in Matthew 12:30.
Third, the First Amendment of the US Constitution states that the free-exercise of religion is for all Americans to practice their faith, but does that mean a Christian service member should accommodate or support things that are contrary to their faith? Absolutely not!
Also, is it wrong for a professing Christian service member to say, “I support the rights of all Americans to practice their faith since the Constitution protects their rights?” Absolutely!
— Sonny Hernandez, director for Reforming America Ministries, US Air Force Reserves Chaplain, Christian Service Members: Avoid Supporting or Accommodating Evil!
Note
Hernandez sports a doctorate from Tennessee Temple University — A Fundamentalist Baptist institution founded by the late Lee Roberson, pastor of Highland Park Baptist Church in Chattanooga, Tennessee. In 2015, Tennessee Temple University merged with Piedmont University.
This is the one hundred and fiftieth installment in the Songs of Sacrilege series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a song that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please send me an email.
Today’s Song of Sacrilege is Joel Osteen by Roy Zimmerman.
Luther Feltus-Curry, pastor of Revival Center Ministries in Vallejo, California was sentenced to prison yesterday after being found guilty of defrauding several church members.
A former church pastor convicted of 29 felonies relating to fleecing several members of his flock of more than $1 million was sentenced Thursday to 23 years and eight months in prison.
Luther Feltus-Curry, 69, former pastor with the Revival Center Ministries in Vallejo, was found guilty in January of multiple charges of grand theft and scheming to defraud others by using false information to pedal promissory notes in their investment companies.
A partner in the scheme, Alma L. Perez, 56, was found guilty of 11 felonies. She was sentenced in May to 10 years in prison.
A former Vallejo church pastor was found guilty Monday of 29 felonies related to fleecing several members of his flock of more than $1 million between 2008 and 2010.
Luther Feltus-Curry, 68, former pastor with the Revival Center Ministries, taught financial management and debt relief classes to his fellow church members starting in 2004, according to lawyers for Feltus-Curry and co-defendant Alma L. Perez.
Perez, 56, was found guilty of 11 felonies. Both defendants faced multiple charges of grand theft and scheming to defraud others by using false information to pedal promissory notes in their investment companies.
Judge John B. Ellis ordered Feltus-Curry and Perez to be locked up as they await sentencing, which is set for March 8. They had been out of custody since charges were filed against them in 2014.
Feltus-Curry in 2008 started promising annual returns of between 5 and 18 percent for church members who invested in the companies set up and operated by Perez. Some church members invested their entire life savings, in one case more than $300,000. Altogether, at least nine church members entrusted Feltus-Curry with more than $1 million, according to prosecutors in the complex jury trial that spanned nearly a month.
Lawyers for Feltus-Curry and Perez built their defense case largely around claims that their clients were also victims of fraud. They claimed Feltus-Curry and Perez were duped because they took the money handed over to them by churchgoers and invested it with other companies that promised even high rates of return in just months and that turned out to be just as bogus.
Lest anyone doubt how far some Evangelical churches will go to attract and maintain a crowd, I give you a recent video of The Point Church worship team singing and playing AC/DC’s song, Money Talks — much to the delight of those in attendance. I’m an atheist, but I wonder — shouldn’t music sung during church services at least be about Jesus being your boyfriend or best friend? AC/DC? I never thought I’d see the day. Something tells me my guitar-strumming sons would love playing in the Pointe’s worship band.(According to one article I read, some of the people associated with Sweetwater Sound attend the church. I suspect the Pointe has awesome AV equipment. A former friend of mine is the senior vice president — sales at Sweetwater.)
The Pointe Church, located in nearby Fort Wayne, Indiana is a generic, seen-one-seen-them-all, ain’t-we-unique-and-relevant Evangelical church. Such churches are scattered all over the Fort Wayne area, heaven-bent on attracting and pilfering Christians from other churches, people who endlessly seek the latest and the greatest.
According to The Point Church website, the church strives to be:
Real
Relevant
Relational
Reliant
Risk-Taking
Reproducing
Redemptive
The seven R’s of modern Evangelical church planting. Woo Hoo! right?
Led by Ray Harris, several other pastors, and a passel of “directors,” The Pointe Church attracts a thousand people a week to their three Sunday services. By the end of 2020, the church hopes to have:
50 Young Adult Leaders Developed
600 Students Won to Christ
1000 Kids Attending Weekly
125% Of Our Worship Attendance participating in Small Groups
1000 Churches Using our Artistry
5000 Attending Worship Services
1,000,000 To Find & Follow Jesus
Several years ago, I wrote a post about another Fort Wayne church — Elevate City Church. What I wrote then applies to The Pointe Church today. In a post titled, The Elevate City Church Con Job, I wrote:
The dirty little secret of Evangelical church planting is that the vast majority of people who attend a new church plant come from other churches. Few people are new converts. Why? Because almost every American, especially here in the Midwest, has already heard the good news of the gospel. It is not a lack of information that keeps people out of churches. Americans are increasingly rejecting Christianity and turning to spirituality, eastern religions, or atheism/agnosticism/humanism. Why?
Evangelical Christianity is slowly dying. Instead of trying to strengthen that which remains, hip, relevant church planters start new churches. They poach the members of old, established churches and this “growth” hides the fact that the disinterested are still disinterested and they haven’t flocked to the new church. The truth is, more and more Americans think Evangelical Christianity is irrelevant. Evangelicals have a huge PR problem, and as long as their beliefs, practices, and lifestyle are tethered to an inspired, inerrant, infallible ancient book, Evangelicals should not expect the disinterested to rush to their churches on Sunday. Playing rock and praise and worship music, dressing down, getting rid of pews, and acting all hip and cool, hides the fact that the message is still the same; repent and believe the gospel or you are going to be tortured by God in hell for all eternity.
I have no objection to Evangelicals starting as many clubhouses as they want. This is America, and corporate, capitalistic, libertarian thinking dominates the Evangelical church-planting scene. They just need to understand that some of us see through the smokescreen. By all means, plant another church, convince yourself that “God” is leading you to do so, but the facts on the ground remain the same. Planting a new church will not fix what ails America. Americans no longer are buying what Evangelicals are selling. Perhaps it is time to follow the command of Jesus: go sell all that you have and give it to the poor. Perhaps when Americans see THAT kind of Christianity, they might take an interest in it. Even though I am an atheist, I can, from a distance, admire a church and a pastor which take seriously the teachings of Jesus. All I see right now is the same incestuous, irrelevant church, with a new name. It is time to burn the institutional church to the ground and start over. Or so says this atheist.
Elevate City and The Pointe are separated by ten miles of Fort Wayne interstate. Between these two churches are numerous other churches preaching their brand and version of Evangelicalism. Much like driving along one of the many restaurant rows found in Fort Wayne, cruising the streets there discloses that local Evangelicals have every type of church at their disposal. Want Wendy’s? Burger King? McDonald’s? Rally’s? or Five Guys? Local Evangelical churches are manning their grills, ready to serve up their brand of hamburger. Perhaps these churches should become IN-N-Out Burger joints — reflective of the constant stream of people in and out of their doors.
What do you think, readers? To my atheist readers I ask, if you were still a Christian, would you attend a church that played AC/DC during Sunday worship? Do you think there are lines that can’t or shouldn’t be crossed? If you are still a Christian, would you be okay with the worship team playing songs by AC/DC, KISS, or other patently anti-Christian groups? What say ye?
Note
2006 news article featuring Pastor Harris and The Pointe Church. Here’s an excerpt from the article:
Eventually, he said, those churches do move into traditional church buildings.
The Pointe Church is still an exception, because its organizers don’t plan on making it a megachurch. Ray Harris, the church’s lead pastor, said he plans to keep his church in a non-traditional building and train other pastors to start similar churches in other locations that would be affiliated with The Pointe.
‘”New Testament’ churches met in public spaces,” said Harris. “We’re in the real world on Sunday mornings, in a movie theater. Even though Fort Wayne is the ‘City of Churches,’ many people who come (to The Pointe) have never been in church but have been in movie theaters. There’s familiarity.”
Formerly pastor to students at The Chapel, a Fort Wayne megachurch, Harris said typically more than 33 percent of a church’s finances go toward maintaining a building.
“We wanted to focus on meeting people’s needs, not putting money in the bank or paying people to clean the church,” Harris said.
Although it pays rent to the Rave, the church doesn’t have to worry about the cost of heating bills or hiring someone to shovel snow, Harris said. Instead, the church already has helped some people who were struggling to find jobs and/or finance a house payment.
“It’s an economic decision for the Rave, too, because no one comes to watch movies there on Sunday mornings,” said Harris. “We fill seats when they can’t.”
In addition to the economic reasons for having a church in the Rave, Harris said the church’s goal is to help people get to the next step spiritually.
….
Ten years later? The Pointe Church has its own building located at 5335 Bass Road. So much for “New Testament’ churches met in public spaces. We’re in the real world on Sunday mornings, in a movie theater. Even though Fort Wayne is the ‘City of Churches,’ many people who come (to The Pointe) have never been in church but have been in movie theaters. There’s familiarity….We wanted to focus on meeting people’s needs, not putting money in the bank or paying people to clean the church.”
Evangelicals fall into three camps when it comes to the recent spate of hurricanes, tropical storms, and flooding. One camp says these weather events are retribution from God over homosexuality, same-sex marriage, abortion, or _________________ (fill in blank with latest “sin” Evangelicals are offended by). The second camp sees these events as tests of their faith; that God is ready and willing to perform miraculous works if they will but storm the throne room of Heaven with their prayers. A smattering of Evangelicals, deeply immersed in the teachings of John Calvin, believe that God is the divine weatherman; that recent weather events are manufactured and controlled by God — according to his sovereign — often secret — purpose and plan. I recently wrote a post on this third camp titled, Hurricane Harvey: Where is God When the Flood Waters Rise?.
Today, I want to write about the second camp: Evangelicals who see hurricanes, flooding, and other cataclysmic events as tests of their faith; that God desires to hear and answer their prayers, if and when enough Christians, in one accord, pray for him to come to their rescue. Presently, social media is flooded with hurricane levels of praying. Some of these praying Evangelicals believe that since Hurricane Irma was not as bad as weathermen thought it would be, this is proof that God heard and answered their prayers.
These Christians, along with countless other praying believers, think that their prayers reached a certain numerical threshold upon which God answered their prayers; that if they will only keep praying and encourage other people to pray, the sheer number of their prayers will reach the “stop hurricane in its tracks” level. Evidently, God is a busy man. If Christians want him to stop what he is doing and answer their prayers, there better be a lot of praying going on. This is the Evangelical version of the government petition website established by President Barack Obama. If a petition reached a signature threshold, the government would respond to the petition. So it is with God and prayers.
The number of prayers required for God to answer must be quite high. I am certain that tens of millions of devout, Jesus-loving, church-going, sin-hating Evangelicals prayed for God to turn aside hurricanes Harvey and Irma. Based on damage reports coming out of Texas, it is evident that Evangelicals must not have prayed enough prayers for God to stop his vacation early and deliver Houstonians and other Texans from Harvey’s murderous rampage. However, according to the aforementioned praying Christians, the “you are a winner” level was met and God reduced Irma from a category 5 storm to a category 2. Evidently, not enough Christians prayed, so God refused to stop Irma in her tracks. God did — thanks to his tender mercies, love, and kindness — however, turn down the wind, lessening the carnage wrought upon Florida. Or so Christians say, anyway.
A friend of mine on Facebook by the name of Bonnie has several Christian friends who resolutely and infallibly believe that the prayers of God’s chosen ones led to a better storm outcome in Florida than in Texas. Trying to point out the absurdity of their comments falls on deaf ears. No amount of skepticism, reason, and science moves them. These prayer warriors know what they know, and facts will not move them off the notion that prayer can and does change things. They are certain that God not only listens to their prayers, but he also, when so inclined, answers them.
I learned long ago that people who believe in supernatural magic — a God-man who lives in heaven and is capable of hearing millions of prayers at the same time, will, on rare occasions answer Christian prayers — cannot be reached with reason, facts, and logic. Convinced that they can manipulate the material world though uttering words to the ceiling or saying silent words in their minds, these worshipers of the one true God are impervious to arguments and data that challenge their worldview. These believers in the prayer-answering God will continue to pray because it is the only way they can make sense of the world. They want to and must believe that their lives have meaning and purpose; that the Christian God loves them and has a wonderful plan for their lives; that this God is their Father and he is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.
Using the recent carnage in Texas and Florida as a focal point, ask yourselves, is God acting like a loving, caring Father? Is God acting in ways that would lead people to think that he is your BFF? Some readers might ask, How can we know what God can and can’t do or what God did or didn’t do during the recent weather events? This question, from an Evangelical perspective, is quite easy to answer. God is the Creator, the first-cause of EVERYTHING. The Christian God is all-seeing, all-knowing, and all-powerful. He is the sovereign Lord over the heavens and the earth. Nothing happens that is not according to his divine purpose and plan. Whether he actively decrees things or passively allows them to happen, God is in full control of what happens. He has the absolute power to stop or change events such as hurricanes Harvey and Irma. If people are maimed and killed, it is because God commanded it or allowed it to happen. The thoughts and ways of this God — Jesus is his name — are above ours, and as the Apostle Paul stated in the book of Romans, we are not to question what he does or doesn’t do. In other words, God is always right, regardless whether a hurricane kills zero people or three thousand. Simply put, God is God, shut the hell up.
I am grateful that Irma turned out not to be as deadly and destructive as it could have been. The weather is an unpredictable beast. Weathermen trained in meteorological science and predictive methodology do what they can to warn us when bad weather is headed our way. Sometimes, they miss the mark; other times they are spot on. Either way, prudent people pay attention to weather reports. I am always amused at Evangelical hypocrisy when it comes to “trusting” God during severe weather events. If God is as caring and powerful as Christians say he is, then why don’t praying believers hunker down and pray out the storm? Surely the God who promised to never leave or forsake Christians would be right there with them as the winds blow and the flood water rise. While a handful of Evangelicals will foolishly put their God to the test, most of them wisely and prudently flee to safer and higher ground. Their behavior in times of calamity reveals that Evangelicals talk and pray a good line, but when push comes to hurricane, they will do all they can to keep from being killed. When forced to ride out severe weather, many Christians will make sure their pantries are stocked, water bottles are filled, and that they have the necessary supplies to successfully weather whatever comes their way. Again, why not trust God to meet their every need — as Elijah did at Brook Cherith when God sent ravens daily to bring the prophet bread and meat (I Kings 17)?
Try as they might to paint themselves as benighted beings who live on some sort of supernatural plane of existence, Christians are, in every way, quite human. Much like the unwashed, uncircumcised Philistines they condemn and deem sinful vermin, Evangelicals like houses, lands, and property, love their families, and they want, to quote the venerable Spock, to Live Long and Prosper. Doing so requires, not prayer, but human decision and action. Nothing fails like prayer, and all the anecdotal stories in the world won’t change this fact. Prayers might provide comfort to those inclined to believe that God exists, but I suspect, for many Christians, praying is an exercise they know is futile and changes nothing. They pray because the Bible commands them to and their upbringing demands it, but deep down they doubt the value and efficacy of praying.
