Jack:Hey Bruce, I just read a little about your life and your description of how IFB preachers are treated like Demigods. I was saved in 1981 and God changed my life and Christ is my Saviour. I went to Hyles Anderson College for a little bit. I’m back with the Lord. The Lord seems to have restored me and I’m happier and have more peace and am winning souls consistently. Are you saying that none of this is real to you anymore? What about God, and Heaven and Hell and Judgement? I’m just asking I’m not trying to argue. I’m curious about your response.
Bruce: I’m an atheist, so no, I don’t think there is a God, Heaven, Hell, judgment, etc. You might find these posts helpful: Why?
Jack:Are you familiar with Dr. Jack Hyles?
Bruce: Yes, I’ve written extensively about Hyles and his son.
Jack:So what about getting saved, you never believed in that?
Bruce: Yes, I was saved, and now I’m not.
Jack:You really believe you were saved? How can you lose your salvation when the Lord comes into your heart?
Bruce: Don’t let your theology get in the way of reality. Countless people faithfully follow Jesus for years and then deconvert.
Jack:You don’t believe in being born again, and the Lord coming into your heart, and you becoming a new creature?
Bruce: Of course I did, but now I don’t.
Jack:So you don’t think that really happens?
Bruce: I “believe” it happened. All religious experiences are psychological in nature. We can believe all sorts of things that aren’t true or convince ourselves that certain experiences are real.
Jack: I believe the Lord really did come into my heart; there has been an internal change that cannot be denied! IT IS REAL! My desires changed, and my outlook, and I’m in the Light now, I see things differently! By faith!
Bruce: It’s “real” because you think it is. You want or need it to be real, so it is. And that’s fine.
Jack:You don’t think peace and comfort and joy and God’s love is real. I experience it!
Bruce: You “experience” what you believe those things to be. Again, all religious experiences are psychological in nature. Devout believers in other religions have similar “experiences.”
Usually, when an IFB Christian contacts me, I roll up my sleeves and ready myself for a bloody fight. Either that or I just say fuck off and turn on Sports Center. I sensed that Jack really wanted to understand my story, so I decided to briefly engage him in a discussion. I thought, “maybe, just maybe, I can get Jack to look beyond his narrow Fundamentalist theology.” I am not sure I accomplished that, but I hope that I planted a few seeds of doubt that might germinate and cause Jack to rethink his worldview. Not every online discussion has to end in hostility and conflict. I am content to put in a good word for reason, skepticism, and intellectual inquiry and move on.
Trained by the late Jack Hyles and his acolytes at First Baptist Church in Hammond and Hyles-Anderson College, Jack believes that once a person prays the sinner’s prayer and asks Jesus into his heart, he is a Christian; and once saved, always saved. In Jack’s mind, there’s nothing I can say or do to separate myself from God (Romans 8:35-39). Because I prayed the sinner’s prayer at Trinity Baptist Church in Findlay, Ohio, at the age of fifteen, I am forever a child of God, and Heaven awaits me after I die. No matter what I have said or done in the intervening fifty-two years, nothing can undo what took place one fall night years ago. I could become a Muslim, commit mass murder, or sexually molest children — it matters not — once saved, always saved.
IFB Christians such as Jack are left with two possibilities after reading my story:
I never was a Christian
I am a backslidden Christian
The first possibility is absurd. There’s nothing in my past that suggests that I was anything but a devoted, committed, sincere follower of Jesus. The fact that I am now an atheist does not magically erase my past (or the knowledge I have about Christianity and the Bible). The only honest explanation for my past is this: I once was a Christian, and now I am not.
The second possibility is equally absurd. There is nothing in my present life that remotely suggests that I am a Christian. Anyone who reads my blog surely knows that I am not, in any way, a Christian. Not an Evangelical; not an IFB Christian; not a liberal Christian; not a progressive Christian; not a Christian humanist; not a Christian universalist; not a Christian, period. I am a card-carrying atheist, a member in good standing of the unwashed, uncircumcised Philistines of the world.
When someone tells me that they are a Christian, I accept their “testimony” at face value. Jack says he has been an IFB Christian for thirty-eight years. I believe him. It’s his storyline. Who better to tell his story than Jack? I just wish that Christians would do the same for Evangelicals-turned-atheists. “But Bruce,” Christians say, “the Bible says yada yada yada yada.” What the Bible purportedly says is not my problem. I get it. Jack can’t square my story with his peculiar theology. Countless Evangelicals have the same problem when they read my story. Again, that’s not my problem. I know what I know. Ask anyone who knew me when I was a Christian: Was Bruce a “real” follower of Jesus; a True Christian®? To a person, they will say, absolutely! Either I deceived my wife, children, in-laws, extended family, friends, college roommates, professors, ministerial colleagues, and congregants, or I really was a Christian. What’s more likely? Trust me, I am not a very good liar. Me not having been a Christian is akin to the moon landing being a hoax.
Stories such as mine will continue to cause cognitive dissonance for IFB Christians such as Jack. All I can hope for is that by reading my story, they will have doubts and questions that will lead to further investigation and inquiry. Fundamentalist Christians can and do change. I once believed as Jack did, and so did many of the readers of this blog. Yet, we are now unbelievers. Deconversion is a slow, agonizing, painful process. Some people cannot bear the questions and doubts, so they retreat into the safety of their houses of faith. Others, however, are willing to suffer through the process, believing that truth and freedom await them on the other side. There’s a gospel song that says, we’ve come this far by faith, we can’t turn back now. For people such as myself, we’ve come this far by reason, we can’t turn back now.
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
Over the past sixteen years, I have received countless emails and social media messages from Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) pastors, evangelists, missionaries, and everyday church members. These emails and messages are typically hateful, judgmental, mean-spirited, and unkind. Some IFB adherents have threatened me with physical harm, including murder. They have also threatened my partner, our daughter with Down syndrome, and our other children. With no decency, no respect, and no regard for how their words might be perceived, these so-called lovers of Jesus ignore their Savior’s commands about how to treat their enemies. The Sermon on the Mount is nowhere to be found in their Bibles.
This behavior is not new, nor is it atypical. Abused people tend to abuse others. When you spend your life being berated and judged — hard, foot-stomping, pulpit-pounding, hellfire and brimstone preaching, brother! — by their pastors, is it any wonder that when they get older, they repeat the same behavior? The late Jack Hyles turned out thousands of preachers just like him, men filled with certainty and arrogance who Sunday after Sunday abuse their congregants with the pure words of God straight from the King James Bible. The late Cecil Hodges, a notable IFB preacher, said one time at a conference I was attending, “We hit our people over the head with the sin stick so often that they duck when we begin to preach.” Boy, ain’t that the truth. When you are psychologically abused and assaulted this way year after year, you begin to think the abuse is “normal.”
Some IFB preachers are nice people with winsome, kind, helpful personalities. By all accounts, they are respected by people both inside and outside of the church. Recently, Republican Mike Johnson was chosen to be the speaker of the House. Johnson is an all-round nice guy. However, when you look at his Fundamentalist Baptist beliefs and practices, you find a very different kind of man — beliefs that are physically and psychologically harmful. Johnson is a true blue believer, as was I. By all accounts I was a winsome, kind, helpful preacher, but my beliefs were anything but.
Does this mean IFB Christians are bad people? Well, certainly some of them are. More than a few IFB preachers are sociopaths, and some are even psychopaths. Narcissism is common. The question is, why this is so?
Hodges’ email was respectful and polite, so I shall respond to it in like manner:
Hello there Mr. Gerencser,
My wife and I have been IFB missionaries in Honduras for 26 years now. I would hate to think that I left my home in the USA and all that is dear to proclaim a gospel that is a figment of someone’s imagination. It would be sad to waste my life in such a way. But of course we do believe it is real and many precious souls have come to experience God’s grace as well.
People commit themselves to all sorts of beliefs that are false, beliefs they are willing to die for. Hodges likely thinks Mormonism is a cult, but millions of people believe Mormonism is true. Mormon missionaries go two-by-two across the earth, preaching the gospel and evangelizing sinners. They are devoted to the teachings of the Bible and the Book of Mormon. If the level of devotion and commitment is evidence for the truthfulness of a belief system, then Mormonism is definitely true. Of course, Hodges thinks Mormonism is false.
How is the IFB church movement any different? Just because people are committed to a peculiar belief system doesn’t mean it’s true. People can and do commit themselves to all sorts of beliefs that are false. None of us is exempt from delusion. All any of us can do is rationally and skeptically examine our beliefs. Hodges believes his peculiar brand of faith is True Christianity®. How does he know his flavor of Christianity is true and all others are wrong? Forty percent of Hondurans are Roman Catholics — Christians in every sense of the word. I suspect that Hodges rejects the claim that Catholics are Christians. How do we determine who is right? Every sect appeals to the Bible as evidence for their beliefs, yet no two of them agree on what the Bible teaches, They can’t even agree on the basics: salvation, baptism, and communion. Why, then, is Hodges certain he is right?
I grew up in IFB Christianity in the 70s and 80s.
Hodges was born into and grew up in the IFB church movement. The only religion he has experienced is IFB Christianity. Thanks to lifelong conditioning and indoctrination, Hodges is certain that IFB Christianity is right. I understand where Hodges is coming from, having spent the first forty years of my life in Fundamentalist Christianity. Even though I left the IFB church movement in the late 1980s, I continued to pastor churches that were Fundamentalist. It was only when I pondered whether I could be wrong that I began to reexamine my beliefs. I wonder if Hodges has ever taken a hard look at his beliefs? How many books outside of his IFB rut has Hodges read? (Assuming he reads books. Some IFB preachers don’t read anything except the Bible and the terms and conditions on porn sites.) 🙂 Best I can tell, Hodges is King James Only — an untenable position if there ever was one. I wonder if Hodges has ever read any of New Testament scholar Dr. Bart Ehrman’s books on the nature and history of the Bible? Until I was willing to read authors who were not IFB/Evangelical, my beliefs remained safe and secure. However, once I started wandering outside of the Evangelical box, I found that many of my sincerely held beliefs were untenable. I tried to hang on to some sort of faith, but eventually came to the conclusion that the central claims of Christianity were false.
Most IFB church members are cradle believers. Born into the church, it is all they know. They have what is called a borrowed faith. While they can point to a time when they got saved, they can’t point to a time when they weren’t surrounded by IFB beliefs and practices. Unlike many mainline sects, IFB Christianity is all-encompassing: multiple church services each week, Sunday school, revivals, conferences, youth rallies, and the like daily reinforce the one true faith (IFB Christianity). When people ask me why it took me fifty years to deconvert, I point them to my childhood, the conditioning and indoctrination. How could I have become anything other than an IFB preacher? My path was paved with thousands of hours of preaching and teaching that reinforced my IFB beliefs. I had no reason to think I could be wrong. The Bible says . . . end of discussion, right?
That seemed to be the tail end of the big church growth movement of the Fundamental Baptists in America. I realize that not all of the pastors of that time were faithful but many of them were. Some people were embittered over bad experiences they had with a particular church or pastor.
The bigger question is why the IFB church growth movement died on the vine. Why did so many of these churches close their doors or become shells of what they once were? If these churches preached the faith once delivered to the saints, why are they in numeric decline? Hodges would have me think that some people were “embittered over bad experiences they had with a particular church or pastor.” Is he suggesting that I am bitter? Scores of people have left IFB churches. Did they all leave because they were bitter or because they had bad experiences? Maybe we should take a closer look at these “bad experiences.” If I could, I would love to share with Hodges the emails I have received from hurting IFB believers. They were misused and abused, and, at times, raped, assaulted, and sexually molested. Bullies abound in the IFB church movement.
Regardless, the IFB church movement is dying because of its unwillingness to adapt to the times. Their rigid beliefs keep them from adapting to the twenty-first century. Instead, they continue to operate using 1950s methodologies. Of course, they take great pride in being anti-cultural.
I would love to know who Hodges thinks were “faithful” pastors. I suspect he and I have different definitions of the word “faithful.”
While I am no longer a Christian, I pay close attention to the IFB church movement. We have family members who are IFB pastors, evangelists, and missionaries. I daily read IFB websites and blogs, and occasionally listen to IFB sermons. I am a member of my alma mater’s (Midwestern Baptist College in Pontiac, Michigan) Facebook group. As someone who is considered an expert on the IFB church movement, I believe it is important for me to keep in touch with the machinations of the movement. While there is a peripheral movement towards more progressive practices, the beliefs of the 1970s and 1980s are pretty much the same as those held by more “enlightened” IFB preachers today. Sure, some IFB churches use drums and guitars in worship now, women are permitted to wear pants, and men can have mustaches, beards, and longer hair, but the core beliefs and practices are still harmful.
In my case I happen to believe to this day that the position of the IFB churches was and is the right position to take although some perhaps executed those positions poorly. It’s sort of like former President Trump I guess. Great policies but many hated his attitude and demeanor.
I certainly take issue with disgraced former president Trump having “great policies.” Many of his policies are contrary to the teachings of Christ. Worse, he is a vile, disgusting human being. Yet, countless IFB Christians voted for him twice and will do so again if he is on the ballot in 2024. I will never understand how any Christian could vote for the man.
Anyway I’m not the smartest guy in the world and my IQ is not the highest.
I can make no judgment here because I don’t know Hodges.
But the whole Christianity thing makes perfect sense to me.
Has Hodges seriously examined and studied any other religion but his own? I doubt it. I would love to know how many religious books he has read that were NOT IFB or Evangelical. Since such reading is widely condemned or forbidden, I suspect Hodges doesn’t wander too far from his IFB roots. I would be glad to make some reading suggestions if Hodges is interested in challenging his beliefs. 🙂
If it’s not real I don’t know why we are here on earth. Not much to live or die for if there is no eternal life.
We are here on earth because a woman and a man had sex, the woman became pregnant, and nine months later gave birth to all the Bruces, Sams, and Pollys of the world. I don’t need a deity to understand and comprehend why I exist. My existence is self-evident.
Does Hodges really believe there is “not much to live or die for if there is no eternal life”? Has he really thought about the implications of a meaningless life without Jesus/eternal life? I don’t know about Hodges, but my life is filled with meaning and purpose — all without God, Jesus, the Bible, or Christianity. Since this life is the only one I will ever have, I want to make the most of every moment of every day. Even in my sickest days, I still try to make the most of the day before me. I am in a tough spot physically with little to no hope in sight, but I still try to do what I can to make the most of my life. Does Hodges really believe life would be meaningless without eternal life; that the only reason he is a good person is that a religious book told him that a mythical deity promises him a home in Heaven IF he believes the right things? Is the promise of eternal life the only reason Hodges isn’t a rapist or a serial killer? If so, by all means, keep on believing. If Hodges needs religion to be a good person, fine. I just wish he’d realize that MOST humans do not need his brand of Christianity to live good and prosperous lives. In fact, I can make a compelling case for the fact that Fundamentalist Christian beliefs keep many believers from being good people; that their beliefs require them to hate, marginalize, and condemn anyone who thinks differently from them.
Polly and I have been married for forty-five years. We have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. We own our own home, drive a nice late-model car, and have two indoor and two outside cats. Our children and grandchildren all live within thirty minutes of our home. Are not these things (people) enough to make life worth living? If all I had was my family, it would be enough.
I hope Hodges will really rethink the notion that he has nothing to live for without the promise of eternal life. Is not this life enough, to live it fully and without reservation?
I give the following advice to readers on my About page:
You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.
Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you best get to living it. Someday, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.
This approach to life has served me well, as it has countless other unwashed, uncircumcised Philistines.
And just imagine if hell is real after all(and I believe it is) then all those who scoffed at that are in real trouble.
Sadly, Hodges ends his email with an appeal to Pascal’s Wager and a reminder that HELL is real. The good news is that as an IFB teenager, I was gloriously, wonderfully saved, so, according to once saved always saved, I am still headed for Heaven when I die. Nothing can separate me from the love of God, right? Hodges could argue that I never was a Christian, but I am confident he can’t provide any evidence to justify such a claim.
As far as Pascal’s Wager is concerned, I wonder if Hodges has applied it to all the other religions of the world. Shouldn’t I also become a Muslim just in case the Muslim version of Hell is true? Shouldn’t I cover all my bases just in case the true God of the universe is Allah or any other deities humans worship are God? Instead, Hodges applies Pascal’s Wager and the threat of eternal damnation only to the tenets of Christianity.
But everybody is going to believe like they want to. Thanks for taking my comments.
My beliefs, for the most part, are based on evidence. I will become a Christian the moment someone provides me with sufficient reasons to believe. I am open to believing in God, but so far the evidence that has been provided to me is lacking or false. Hodges seems to be asking me to believe regardless of what I know to be true. I can’t do that. If there is a God, he knows exactly what it would take for me to come to faith in Christ. Instead, God hides or sends people to evangelize me who seem capable of only spouting Evangelical talking points or cliches. I am more than willing to have honest, open discussions about Christianity, but Bible quotes, sermonettes, or cheap evangelism methods ain’t going to cut it.
Saved by Reason,
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
I grew up in the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) church movement, attended an IFB college, married an IFB pastor’s daughter, and pastored IFB churches for a decade. In the late 1980s, thanks to the Jack Hyles scandal and my exposure to Calvinism, I left the IFB church movement. As a writer, I have made it my mission to inform readers about the inner workings of IFB churches and institutions. My wife’s late father was an IFB pastor, and her extended family includes IFB pastors, evangelists, missionaries, and their wives. (Please see The Family Patriarch is Dead: My Life With James Dennis.) My IFB roots run deep (our family attended Tim LaHaye’s church, Scott Memorial Baptist Church, in the 1960s), and just because I am no longer a believer doesn’t mean that I can no longer speak authoritatively about the movement. While the IFB church movement has evolved over the years, its core principles remain the same. The older generation of IFB preachers is dying off, but, unfortunately, their children and grandchildren are following in their footsteps. Polly’s IFB cousins are now in their forties and fifties. Their oldest children are now college-age. So far, the colleges of choice have been IFB institutions — offering up another innocent generation to be sacrificed for the “cause.”
I wrote the brief biography above in the hope of warding off IFB zealots who think I am too far removed from the movement to have anything of value to say. I will leave it to readers to decide if my words ring true. The IFB church movement tends to slowly evolve and change. This means that, while there have been peripheral changes since my IFB days, the core beliefs and practices remain the same. Don’t confuse these superficial changes with transformative change. The IFB church movement remains a dangerous, cultic group that causes untold heartache and psychological harm.
Now to the subject of this post: IFB evangelists.
I came of age at Trinity Baptist Church in Findlay, Ohio. The church held several revivals, youth revivals, and conferences every year. Typically, the revivals started on a Sunday and went through Friday or started on a Monday and concluded on Sunday. High-powered evangelists were brought in to preach at these meetings. Their goal was always the same: evangelize the lost and revive the saved.
As an IFB pastor, I followed in the footsteps of my mentors. Typically, the churches I pastored had two revivals a year. For many years, Don Hardman would come to our church and hold what is called a protracted meeting. For fifteen days — including three Sundays — Hardman would preach to saint and sinner alike. Countless church members attended all eighteen services. Nearby IFB churches would bring busloads or carloads of people to hear Hardman’s often hour-plus-long sermons. Souls would be saved and scores of Christians would come forward during the invitations, kneel at the altar, and get right with God. Throw in nightly special music and fellowship dinners, and it should not come as a surprise that these meetings were the highlight of the church calendar. For his efforts, Hardman walked away with $1,000-$1,500 cash in a brown paper bag. I will leave it to you to decide if he claimed this income on his tax return.
Over the twenty-five years I spent in the ministry, numerous evangelists preached for me. Notice I said, “preached for me.” As pastor, I was the gatekeeper. I controlled who preached from the pulpit. Evangelists were hired guns, men who came to minister and stir up the church and then ride off into the night. Evangelists were, in effect, traveling preachers who went from church to church preaching canned sermons. Rare was the evangelist who preached new sermons at every church. These “men of God” had certain sermons that “worked,” and as long as these messages were effective, they continued to use them. Seasoned evangelists developed a pool of sermons to preach from. One evangelist, Phil Shuler — a frequent speaker at the Newark Baptist Temple, pastored at the time by Polly’s uncle — had recordings of his sermons. Each night, before the service, Shuler would refresh his memory by playing the tape of that night’s sermon. No need to study, just throw in a few relevant illustrations and regurgitate what had been said before. This practice is common on the IFB conference circuit too.
As hired guns, evangelists are expected to “help” the pastors they are preaching for. Sometimes, evangelists will sanctimoniously ask pastors, “Brother, is there anything I can pray for this week?” Such evangelists are trying to give the air of being directed by God in their preaching, but as sure as the sun comes up in the morning, those “prayer requests” would find their way into their sermons. Some evangelists just plain ask, “Brother, is there anything you need me to address this week?” Every pastor, myself included, had a list of grievances he would love to have addressed by an outside party. Evangelist after evangelist quizzed me about the state of the churches I pastored, and sometime during the week, my answers would show up in their sermons. Unwary congregants took such targeted preaching as a sign God was “speaking” to them. Little did they know that their pastor was the man pulling the strings behind the scenes.
The goal, of course, was to evangelize the lost and revive the church. Revivals were a way of energizing — for a time — complacent, lazy, indifferent church members. I watched hundreds and hundreds of congregants weep crocodile tears and sling snot as they got right with God. For a time, these lovers of Jesus would walk the straight and narrow, but, in the end, they usually reverted to the norm — as we all do. And just as they got settled in, it was time for another revival! Thus it went, spring after spring, fall after fall, year in and year out.
Let me be clear, many of the evangelists I knew were sincere, honest men of God. And let me also be clear, some of them were the IFB version of Elmer Gantry. I don’t doubt for a moment that these men believed that “God” was calling them to be evangelists. That said, it’s hard not to see the work of evangelists and revival meetings as manipulative tools used by pastors to gain certain objectives. What better way to stir up your church than to bring in a smooth-talking, high-powered evangelist to preach? Congregants get tired of listening to the same voice week after week. The evangelist is a new and different voice, so people are more likely to pay attention. Smart, and oh-so-godly, is the pastor who uses this to his advantage. The goal is to win the lost and revitalize the congregation. What’s the harm in a little manipulation, right?
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
Over the weekend, I received an email from Wesley Horstman — an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) Christian. He wants me to know that he thinks I am an asshole. Why? Evidently, he is offended by something I have written about IFB preacher, Bob Gray, Sr.
Gray pastored the Longview Baptist Temple (now Emmanuel Baptist Church) in Texas for years before handing the family business off to his son. Gray spends his post-Longview days as an evangelist of sorts, preaching at conferences and revivals. Gray, Sr. attended Hyles-Anderson College in Crown Point, Indiana in the 1970s.
Gray, Sr. — the ultimate bean counter — describes his ministerial career this way:
Dr. Bob Gray Sr. has been an ordained Baptist preacher for 43 years and pastored two churches in 33 years. He pastored Faith Baptist Church of Bourbonnais, Illinois (1976-1980), and Longview Baptist Temple of Longview, Texas, (1980-2009).
He pastored for 29 years in Longview, Texas. Under Dr. Gray’s leadership LBT had over one million souls come to Christ. Longview Baptist Temple grew from a low of 159 to 2,041 in weekly attendance under his ministry. The church gave 9.3 million dollars to missions and gave $ 325,000 to help the poor in the Ark-La-Tex area in those 29 years. The church averaged 2,041 the last year of his pastorate in 2008. The church baptized 4,046 converts in the same year. Dr. Gray had 99 baptisms from his personal soul winning in 2013.
Dr. Gray attended Michigan State University from 1963 to 1967. He worked for General Motors for seven years as an accountant for the Fisher Body Division in Kalamazoo, Michigan. He was ordained and licensed for the ministry in 1972. He attended Hyles-Anderson College in Crown Point, Indiana, where he graduated Summa Cum Laude in 1976. During Bible College he was listed in “Who’s Who in American Colleges and Universities.” He also served on the staff of Hyles-Anderson College. Dr. Gray received Honorary Doctorate degrees from Hyles-Anderson College, Tri-State College, and Texas Baptist College.
….
Dr. Gray has written 34 books with “JACK HYLES-The Communicator” and “TRIAL BY FIRE” being the two most resent books to be published. “WHEN PRINCIPLE WAS KING” and “PARENTING SKILLS” are the top two sellers. He is the founder of SOLVE CHURCH PROBLEMS ministry and INDEPENDENTBAPTIST.COM. He has preached in every state of the union with the lone exception being North Dakota and 17 foreign countries. He is a conference speaker and local church consultant having flown over 6 million air miles.
Gray, Sr. is an acolyte of the late Jack Hyles and a defender of all things IFB. He is known for supporting sexual predators and abusers such as David Hyles. Gray Sr. has been repeatedly called out for his unseemly — dare I say sinful — devotion to the Hyles family and his single-minded defense of anything and everything these men did and do, including sex crimes. (Please see a list of posts about Jack Hyles and David Hyles.)
Now that you know who Bob Gray, Sr. is, let me respond to Wesley Horstman’s email. All spelling, grammar, and punctuation in the original.
I am a born again Christian at fifty eight years of age, at a little Baptist Church in the little town of Altona Illinois. Fifty some year’s on I am going to Church tomorrow to hear a guest speaker, Dr. Bob Gray, at my Church, Bible Baptist Church in P.D.C. Wi.
Horstman attends Bible Baptist Church in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. Pastored by Andy Doll, Bible Baptist is an IFB congregation. Here’s how the church describes itself:
We are a Bible-believing, KJV only, salvation-through-faith, church that loves and welcomes everyone. We hope you’ll come by and see what an active and growing church Bible Baptist Church is. From potlucks, special church functions, youth activities, open gym for basketball and volleyball, and so much more we are all about living right and following what the Bible says.
Horstman must have missed the memo about loving and welcoming everyone.
A few moments ago I googled Pastor Gray and came upon your site.
Horstman should consider himself blessed. “God” sent him to this site for information about Bob Gray, Sr. Best I can tell, Horstman ignored the vast wealth of knowledge on the IFB church movement available on this site. He read a handful of posts and then fired away.
Horstman has no questions for me or any commentary about what I wrote. His mission is singular: Call Bruce Gerencser an asshole.
Pal, I’ll tell ya, the little bit of your shit I read convinces me that your a straight up asshole. If you want to put my name out there for million’s to read well knock yourself out, your still an a.h.
Welp, I am definitely straight and I can, on rare occasions, be an asshole. Assholery is a common human trait. Horstman himself behaves like an asshole too.
In Horstman’s world, an “asshole” is anyone who disagrees with him. Horstman made no attempt to read and understand my story. Nor did he bother to read my critiques of the IFB church movement. He didn’t like what I said about Bob Gray, Sr., and that gave him warrant to label me an asshole.
If your going to prove to the world that I am a stoooopppppiiiiidddddd uneducated moron, again knock yourself out.
No need for me to prove it, Horstman did it all on his own.
You look like a sickly person and would hope you are right with God. That’s it nuff said. Enjoy however much of your poison vile life you have left.
‘Cuz, if you don’t you are going to burn in Hell for eternity! Horstman concludes his email with a passive-aggressive threat. I know, nothing to see here. This kind of behavior among IFB believers is so common that I am beginning to think it is normative. One thing is for certain, this approach is not effective with Evangelicals-turned-atheists.
I intend to enjoy what life I have left. Contrary to Horstman’s claim that I have a poisonous, vile life, I have a good life. I have been married to my partner, Polly, for forty-five years. We have six children, thirteen grandchildren, and two cats. I have a lot of health problems: fibromyalgia, gastroparesis, anemia, stage three kidney disease, and a plethora of other physical maladies. I embrace my pain and suffering and do all I can to experience life. Over the past week, we saw all of our children and eleven of our thirteen grandchildren. We talked, laughed, played, told jokes, and argued sports. Good times, to be sure.
Horstman says I live a poisonous, vile life. This is a claim, for which he provides no evidence. I have been blogging for sixteen years. Not one time has someone called me poisonous and vile. Oh, I have been called all sorts of things, but not poisonous and vile. Perhaps Horstman will explain how he came to this conclusion about me. Or, maybe no explanation is needed. He is an IFB zealot — people known for hostility and hatred; people who routinely attack anyone who believes differently from them.
Saved by Reason,
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
A Christian man named Andy Miller sent me a short, succinct email today. Here’s what Miller had to say:
If you have left all tenants [sic] of faith, why do you care, except to build up yourself?
I know, I know. Sigh. (Please see Why I Use the Word “Sigh.”)Child, please. Just another email from someone who has made no effort to understand my story. But, it’s a cold, rainy fall day in O-h-i-o. Why not give Miller the answer he so richly deserves? Evidence suggests Miller is affiliated with the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) church movement.
Dear Andy,
The key to you understanding me is to actually read my writing. Based on what I can tell from this site’s server logs, you read all of one post before emailing me, The Scandalous Life of Jack Hyles and Why it Still Matters. You spent all of two minutes reading this article. You didn’t read the About page or any of my autobiographical material. No one, of course, is obligated to read anything before contacting me, but if you want to be taken as a thoughtful, honest interlocutor, it pays to do your homework.
I have not left all tenets of “faith.” What I have left is organized religion in general, and Christianity in particular. I have carefully weighed the central claims of Christianity in the balance and found them wanting. I am still a person of “faith.” By faith, I trust that science is the best tool for understanding our natural world. By faith, based on forty-five years of evidence and awesome rolls in the hay, I believe my partner, Polly, loves me. I live in a technologically advanced world; one which requires expertise beyond my abilities. By faith, I trust experts to tell me the truth about things I lack sufficient knowledge to understand. Son #3 is a certified mechanic. While I used to do ALL of my own repair work, I can no longer do so. My knowledge of automobile repair stopped growing in the early 2000s. When I have a car problem, I call my son. Why? He’s the expert, so I put my faith in him to tell me the truth.
Here’s my point, all of us are people of “faith,” to some degree or another. Most of us try to have what I call “reasoned faith.” None of us is a limitless dispenser of knowledge — though I try to convince my grandchildren that I am. 🙂 We rely on others, especially experts, to help us navigate our world.
While I no longer have the requisite faith necessary to believe the claims of Christianity are true, my ongoing objections have little to do with “faith.” If the Andy Millers of the world want to gather together on Sundays to worship a dead Jewish man with blood cult rituals, have at it. If they want to plaster their homes, yards, and autos with Christian signs, bumper stickers, creches, and Jesus Junk®, have at it. If they want to home-school their children or send them to private Christian schools, have at it. If they want to evangelize sinners on public sidewalks, have it. I have no problem with personal acts of piety. Each to their own, right?
However, when it comes to trying to overthrow the U.S. government, establish a theocracy, subvert the Constitution, take over public schools, indoctrinate children, or force others to live by your interpretations of an ancient religious text, I care — and I care a lot. Polly and I are parents to six adult children and grandparents to thirteen munchkins. I am sixty-six years old. I doubt I will make it to seventy. So, my focus is on what world I will leave behind for those that I love. I care a lot about their future. I care about what they are taught in school. I oppose any and all attempts to passive-aggressively force them to participate in release programs such as Lifewise Academy. I oppose any and all attempts to mandate school prayer, Bible reading, and posting the Ten Commandments. I want my grandchildren taught science, and not religion — creationism and intelligent design — masquerading as science. I want them taught the birds and the bees, and not here’s-an-aspirin-put-it-between-your-knees-and-just-say-no. I demand LGBTQ people receive equal protection under the law, receiving the same freedom, liberty, and justice as everyone else. I oppose book bans, music bans, play bans, beer bans, clothing bans, and countless other issues that seem to rile Evangelicals these days.
So you see, Andy, I care because these things matter — at least to me, anyway. You seem to think that I no longer have a right to protest these egregious affronts to our democracy and social order; that once I left Christianity I no longer had a right to say anything. I may have left Christianity, but Christianity sure hasn’t left me. Frankly, I can’t get away from it. And as long as Evangelicalism is hellbent on damaging and controlling my life and that of my family and friends, I intend to publicly push back.
Andy, you made no effort to know the man, the myth, the legend, Bruce Almighty, yet you felt qualified to judge my motives; that the reason I write is to build myself up — whatever the hell that means. “Build up” implies gain. What, exactly, have I gained by telling my story and critiquing Evangelical Christianity over the past sixteen years? I make no money to speak of from my writing. I receive donations via Patreon and Paypal, but these pay costs, and may, if I have a good donation year, allow Polly and me to eat a meal at a fancy restaurant and spend the night in a hotel. By the time I pay taxes on my blog donations — yep, donations are taxable — most years are a wash.
While I have an ever-increasing readership and loyal support from a number of readers — both of which are metaphorical jolts of adrenaline for me — I also attract a lot of negative attention. Hate mail. Death threats. Attacks on my spouse and our family. I am routinely battered and abused by people who allege follow the Prince of Peace. I would shutter this blog today if it wasn’t for the fact that the things mentioned above matter to me.
The only thing I have built up since I deconverted is my credit card balances and the number of shoes, fedoras, and Charles Tyrwhitt shirts I wear. I am sure you meant something else by your attack on my character, but I will leave it to you to explain yourself.
Do better, Andy, do better.
Saved by Reason,
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
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.
Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) evangelist Benjamin Garlick stands accused of five counts of Aggravated Rape of a Child, five counts of Aggravated Sexual Battery of a Minor who was under the age of 13, one count of Soliciting Sexual Exploitation of a Minor who was under the age of 13, and one count of Continuous Sexual Abuse of a Child. Garlick’s wife, Shaantal, was also charged with one count of Facilitation of Aggravated Rape of a Child and one count of Aggravated Child Abuse / Endangerment to a child age 8 and younger.
An evangelist who calls the Blackman area home is facing a slew of charges that revolve around the rape of a child. Benjamin Garlick was taken into custody under a sealed indictment that was handed down by a Rutherford County Grand Jury.
According to court documents, Garlick was charged with 5-counts of Aggravated Rape of a Child, 5-counts of Aggravated Sexual Battery of a Minor who was under the age of 13, 1-count of Soliciting Sexual Exploitation of a Minor who was under the age of 13, and 1-count of Continuous Sexual Abuse of a Child.
Prior to Garlick’s arrest, he led church services in Texas, Tennessee, Florida, Alabama and Arkansas, just to name a few. The suspect spoke Spanish fluently and frequented Spanish speaking congregations, events and organizations. Over the past few years, Garlick amassed thousands of views on YouTube and Facebook as a guest pastor, speaking at a variety of churches both large and small throughout the country.
The 32-year-old child rape suspect is currently behind bars in the Rutherford County Adult Detention Center in Murfreesboro. Garlick is being held under a $750-thousand-dollar bond, according to the Sheriff’s Office. The suspect was taken into custody this past Tuesday on September 12, 2023, which was the same day that his wife Shaantal Garlick was arrested.
The courts show that Shaantal Garlick is facing 1-count of Facilitation of Aggravated Rape of a Child and 1-count of Aggravated Child Abuse / Endangerment to a child age 8 and younger.
Shaantal Garlick, who is free after posting a $75-thousand bond, was in court just one month prior to her arrest. Mrs. Garlick filed for an Order of Protection against Benjamin Garlick last month on August 14, 2023. The order was filed in the Rutherford County Chancery Court under the Honorable Howard W. Wilson.
MPD Public Information Officer Larry Flowers told WGNS News on Tuesday the detective over the investigation says the Garlick case remains active and is ongoing. The crimes that Mr. Garlick is accused of committing date back to February of 2021, but again, the investigation is ongoing.
Police told WKRN they don’t know how many total victims there are, where they occurred or how Benjamin Garlick knew them. Police say the rapes allegedly happened on Feb. 13, 2021, and that the case is still under investigation.
The pastor was indicted Sept. 12 and booked into the Rutherford County Adult Detention Center, where he still remains. His was booked into jail and released on a $75,000 bond two days later.
One pastor in Murfreesboro told WKRN that he has known Garlick since he was a child, and called him a father with a “role model” family.
The preacher with the “perfect” family with the “perfect” wife, yet both of them are charged with sex crimes. Hmm . . .
According to multiplereports, the couple has ministered as itinerant Christian evangelists with their six children. In recent years, the Garlicks have led church services in multiple states including Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Texas, and their home state of Tennessee.
Authorities arrested Benjamin Garlick on Sept. 12 at his residence in Blackman, a suburb of Murfreesboro. Garlick remains in custody at Rutherford County Adult Detention Center on a $750,000 bond.
Shaantal Garlick was also arrested on Sept 12. She bonded out on Sept. 15, paying $75,000 in fees. The charges against both Garlicks stem from actions that were alleged to have occurred on Feb. 13, 2021.
The Garlicks have been supported in their itinerant ministry by First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana, a flagship church of the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement. As of publication time, the couple was still listed on the church’s website as church-supported missionaries.
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
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 2022, David Walther, pastor of Faith Baptist Church in Round Rock, Texas, was accused of distribution, receipt, transportation, and possession of child pornography. Faith Baptist is an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) congregation affiliated with the Baptist Bible Fellowship.
David Lloyd Walther, 56, of Georgetown, was arrested on Thursday and charged with distribution, receipt, transportation and possession of child pornography, according to a news release from the U.S. attorney’s office. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.
Walther told an FBI agent that “he had a pornography addiction and would often go through cycles ofdownloading and viewing pornography depicting both adults and minors,” the complaint said.
He also said that he would download child pornography files, “but would often feel guilty and go through a ‘purging’ of files, i.e., deleting the images and associated files, because he knew it was wrong, and that he last purged files on November 08, 2022, the night before the search warrants were served,” according to the complaint.
Walther was a pastor at the Faith Baptist Church in Round Rock for the past 18 years, said David Clawson, a deacon at the church.
“We regret anything along these lines that has happened,” Clawson said on Friday about the charges against Walther. “The church will continue to move forward as God has led,” Clawson said. He declined further comment.
“The criminal complaint alleges that Walther downloaded and made available child pornography using BitTorrent, a peer-to-peer file sharing network,” the release said. It said this happened when Walther, who is a Georgetown resident, was still a pastor.
When authorities searched Walther’s home and vehicle on Thursday, they found two large computer hard drives that contained child pornography, the release said.
Walther told authorities that he didn’t know he was sharing child pornography through the BitTorrent network and also apologized “for his actions,” the complaint said.
He said when he viewed the child pornography the children in it were between 8 and 17 years old, according to the complaint.
According to the affidavit, which Law&Crime is not sharing in this instance because of how detailed it is, the pastor had a “BDSM” folder containing an image of a nude boy with a collar on his neck and being sexually abused, a similar image of a female toddler, and images of nude young boys and girls being restrained by ropes and tools. A “Zoo” folder allegedly contained a bestiality video involving a dog and a female toddler “likely less than three years old.”
The feds allege that the defendant also downloaded several videos through BitTorrent showing young girls being sexually abused by adult men.
Walther has been scrubbed from his church’s website.
Last July, Walther pleaded guilty to an enhanced charge of possession of child sex abuse images.
A Texas pastor pleaded guilty to an enhanced charge of possession of child sex abuse images after he admitted having downloaded some of the materials at his church, according to federal prosecutors and court documents.
David Lloyd Walther, 57, “knowingly searched for, downloaded, distributed and possessed” child sex abuse images, some of which depicted prepubescent minors, on a peer-to-peer file sharing network while he was the pastor of Faith Baptist Church in Round Rock, a city 18 miles north of Austin, the U.S. attorney’s office for Western Texas said Thursday.
Walther was arrested Nov. 9 after a search of his home and car turned up two large computer hard drives with more than 100,000 images and more than 5,000 videos of child sex abuse material, the U.S. attorney’s office said.
….
He pleaded guilty in federal court in Austin on June 27, court records show.
Walther could face up to 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000, the U.S. attorney’s office said.
It was not immediately clear when he would be sentenced. A spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office said a sentencing date had not yet been scheduled.
In a statement, Worth Carroll, an attorney representing Walther, said: “David’s guilty plea is the next step in the healing process after he experienced horrendous childhood abuse where ‘trusted adults’ and the system repeatedly failed to protect him. Since his arrest, David and his family have courageously worked to confront his own abuse, address how he was neglected and abused, and begin making amends for the harm he has caused. I am proud of him, encouraged by the work he has done, and amazed by the love and compassion of his family.”
Last Wednesday, Walther was sentenced to seventy months in prison.
A Georgetown man was sentenced in a federal court in Austin on Wednesday to 70 months in prison [5.8 years] and 10 years of supervised release for an enhanced charge of possession of child pornography.
According to court documents, David Lloyd Walther, 57, knowingly searched for, downloaded, distributed and possessed child sexual abuse material, including child pornography—some of which depicted prepubescent minors—using BitTorrent, a peer-to-peer file sharing network. During a search of Walther’s home and vehicle in November 2022, two large computer hard drives were located and found to contain more than 100,000 images and more than 5,000 videos of child sexual abuse material. At the time of his arrest, Walther was the pastor of Faith Baptist Church in Round Rock.
In addition to the prison and supervised release terms, the judge also ordered Walther to pay restitution of $61,000.
“Many families in the Round Rock area placed their trust in this man when he served as a leader in faith for their community,” said U.S. Attorney Jaime Esparza for the Western District of Texas. “I hope that those families can find comfort in knowing our law enforcement partners and justice system are committed to protecting them, ensuring that predators such as Walther cannot continue to pose a threat to innocent children.”
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
The Official Independent Baptist Rulebook, Known in Some Churches as Church Standards
Thou shalt obey the pastor at all times
Thou shalt obey all adults at all times if you are a child or teenager
Thou shalt obey your husband at all times if you are a woman
Thou shalt obey your parents at all times
Thou shalt obey the police and government unless the pastor says it is a sin against God to do so
Thou shalt tithe
Thou shalt give an offering
Thou shalt give a faith promise missionary offering
Thou give an offering any time the pastor says God is saying to collect a special offering
Thou shalt attend church every time the doors are open
Thou shalt read the Bible every day
Thou shalt pray every day
Thou shalt pray without ceasing
Thou shalt pray for every meal, but ice cream at Dairy Queen after church requires no prayer
Thou shalt only use the King James Bible — 1611 edition which is really the 1769 revision
Thou shalt only use the Scofield King James Bible
Thou shalt not have long hair (over your ears, collar) if you are a man
Thou shalt not have a block cut hairstyle if you are a man
Thou shalt not have facial hair if you are a man, but if you are a woman you can have facial hair
Thou shalt not have tattoos unless you have prison tats from your life before Christ
Thou shalt not take the hem out of your Levi jeans or alter your clothing in any way so that you look worldly
Thou shalt not wear pants (britches) if you are a woman
Thou shalt not wear shorts, but a woman can wear Baptist shorts — also known as culottes
Thou shalt not expose any flesh if you are a woman, especially your thighs, breasts, or back
Thou shalt only wear dresses with hemlines below the knees if you are a woman
Thou shalt not have any physical contact with the opposite sex if you are unmarried
Thou shalt not masturbate
Thou shalt not have more than one hole in each ear if you are a woman
Thou shalt not pierce any body part except your ear, and then only if you are a woman
Thou shalt not watch TV, but if you are a carnal Christian and must watch TV thou shalt only watch Little House on the Prairie or Bonanza
Thou shalt not go to the movie theater, but using streaming services is okay
Thou shalt always have tracts in your shirt pocket or purse, ready to evangelize at a moment’s notice
Thou shalt drive a car with church advertising stickers, IFB cliches, or Bible verses attached to the bumper
Thou shalt park down the street when visiting the local strip club or whore house lest the pastor know you are there and stay away
Thou shalt not dance
Thou shalt not listen to secular music, especially rock music, which is from the pit of hell
Thou shalt not listen to contemporary Christian music (CCM)
Thou shalt not smoke tobacco
Thou shalt not drink fermented alcohol — after all, Jesus drank Welch’s grape juice
Thou shalt not dip snuff
Thou shalt not chew tobacco
Thou shalt not cuss, but saying darn, shoot, crap, freaking, and fudge are okay
Thou shalt not date non-Independent Baptist girls or boys
Thou shalt not have any non-Independent Baptist friends
Thou shalt home school your children or send them to a Christian school
Thou shalt only read pastor-approved Christian books
Thou shalt never speak in tongues
Thou shalt only believe what the pastor says you are to believe
Thou shalt go soulwinning every week
Thou shalt say you have victory over sin, even if you are lying
Thou shalt adhere to the perception is reality rule
Thou shalt send your kids to the same Christian college the pastor went to
Thou shalt leave the church if you commit adultery, get a divorce, or get pregnant outside of marriage
Thou shalt believe everything the pastor says even when you are certain he is lying, speaking evangelistically, or embellishing his illustrations
Thou shalt wear a bra if you are a woman, and it can only be a white, underwire bra
Thou shalt not mix bathe (Baptist for swimming with the opposite sex)
Thou shalt not go to amusement parks unless the youth group is going
Thou shalt not go to the prom
Thou shalt not show emotion unless praising Jesus from 10:00 am to noon on Sunday or giving a testimony during Sunday evening service
Thou shalt say AMEN during at the appropriate time during the pastor’s sermon, especially when he shouts, pounds the pulpit, or performs gymnastics
Thou shalt not be angry even though the pastor is allowed to be angry, but that’s because his anger is righteous anger
Thou shalt be for what the pastor is for and against what the pastor is against, because if you don’t, a bear might come out of the woods and eat you
Thou shalt never use your brain
Thou shalt ignore any science that contradicts the Bible
Thou shalt never try to fix your own problems because the pastor is the official fixer of all problems
Thou shalt takes notes on the sermon even if the rabbit wanders five miles off the trail or the sermon is incoherent
Thou shalt always tell the pastor what a wonderful sermon he preached, even when you have no idea what he was talking about
Thou shalt always tell Sister Bertha what a wonderful job she did with her off-key rendition of What a Friend we Have in Jesus
Thou shalt not use canned (taped) music for music specials
Thou shall not play the guitar or drums
Please be advised that this rulebook is subject to change at the whim of the pastor. He is the man of God who speaks for God. He alone is allowed to change his mind. This means that God changed his mind, yes?
Of course not.
This is the Christianity of millions of North Americans.
Is it any wonder that we are fucked up?
Feel free to add your own additions to the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Rule Book.
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
By Dr. Bruce Gerencser, resident scholar, specializing in snarkiness and smartassery
Evangelical preachers have been preaching about the “rapture” — the sudden, imminent return of Jesus to the atmosphere of Earth to remove all living Christians and transport them to Heaven — my whole life. I am now sixty-six years old. I can’t remember a time when an Evangelical preacher wasn’t predicting that Jesus would soon return to Earth and snatch away born-again believers. Some preachers even give dates for the rapture. Dozens of dates have come and gone without the rapture taking place. Famed Southern Baptist evangelist Bob Harrington was fond of saying, “I am not looking for the undertaker, I’m looking for the uppertaker.” Harrington died in 2017. He may have not been looking for the undertaker, but the undertaker was looking for him. Jesus was nowhere to be found.
Hal Lindsay, Jack Van Impe, Harold Camping, Edgar Whisenant, and countless other preachers have set a date for the rapture. None of their predictions has come true What are we to make of their failed predictions? Does this mean that these men are false prophets? Should we stone them to death?
As a lifelong follower of rapture pronouncements, I have come up with a new explanation for why the rapture never happens — all straight from the Bible.
First, the earth is flat.
Second, an ice wall surrounds the earth.
Third, there is an atmospheric dome that covers the earth.
Fourth, when Jesus returns to earth, the angel Gabriel will play his trumpet, announcing the rapture is nigh.
Fifth, as believers are pulled naked out of their clothes as they rise to the heavens, all of a sudden they slam into the dome and fall back to earth! Physics, Jesus.
What’s strange is that there are no past news reports of millions of naked Christians exposing themselves in public. Weird, right? I suspect that Jesus — in Men in Black fashion — wipes from the minds of humanity any thoughts of recent events. Evidence? Think of how many times Evangelical preachers have predicted the rapture — without success. Believers never seem to remember past failed predictions. Remember all those preachers who predicted Donald Trump would win the 2020 presidential election? Nary a word about their false prophecies. Instead, they have moved on to predicting Trump will win in 2024 and take America back for God. So it is for these rapture preachers. They want you to forget past predictions, and focus, instead, on their latest pronouncement. “Jesus’ return is imminent! He could return today!” they say. “And while you are waiting for Jesus to show up, please send a donation to my ministry.”
I predict that Jesus will not rapture away the church. Until Elon Musk sends a spaceship to the upper atmosphere and cuts a hole so believers can escape when the trumpet sounds, Evangelicals will just have to wait patiently to be raptured.
What I have written here is every bit as true as a dead Jewish man miraculously coming back to life, ascending to Heaven, never to be seen or heard from again, only to one day have an angel blow a trumpet announcing his return to Earth so he can rapture away millions of Christians.
Prove me wrong! 🙂
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
The local, visible church is an independent body of believers who are not associated or affiliated with any denomination. The pastor answers only to God, and to a lesser degree the church. The church answers to no one but God. Most IFB churches oppose any form of government involvement or intrusion into its affairs. While some IFB churches have deacon boards or elders, almost all of them have a congregational form of government.
F stands for Fundamentalist (or Fundamental)
The independent church is fundamentalist in its doctrine and practice. IFB churches are social and theological fundamentalists (see Are Evangelicals Fundamentalists?). Fundamentalists adhere to an external code of conduct. Often this code of conduct is called “church standards.” The Bible, or should I say the pastor’s interpretation of the Bible, is the rule by which church members are expected to live. IFB churches spend significant time preaching and teaching about how the pastor expects people to live.
IFB churches are also theological fundamentalists. They adhere to a certain and specific theological standard, a standard by which all other Christians and denominations are judged. Every IFB pastor and church believes things like:
The inspiration, infallibility, and inerrancy of the Bible
The sinfulness, depravity of man
The deity of Christ
The virgin birth of Christ
The substitutionary blood atonement of Christ for human sin
The resurrection of Christ from the dead
The second coming of Christ
Separation from the world
Salvation is through Christ alone, by grace, through faith
Personal responsibility to share the gospel with sinners
Heaven and Hell are literal places
Saved people go to Heaven, unsaved people go to Hell
I am sure other doctrines could be added to this list, but the list above is a concise statement of ALL things an IFB church and pastor must believe to be considered an IFB church.
B stands for Baptist
IFB churches are Baptist churches adhering to the ecclesiology and theology mentioned above. Some IFB churches are Landmark Baptists or Baptist Briders. They believe the Baptist church is the true church and all other churches are false churches. John the Baptist baptized Jesus, which made him a Baptist, and the first churches established by the Baptist apostles were Baptist churches. Churches like this go to great lengths to prove that their Baptist lineage dates all the way back to John the Baptist, Jesus, and the Apostles. (See The Trail of Blood by J.M. Carroll.)
Other IFB churches and pastors believe that Baptist ecclesiology and theology are what the Bible clearly teaches. They grudgingly admit that other denominations “might” be Christian too, but they are quick to say, why be a part of a bastardized form of Christianity when you can have the real deal.
Some Southern Baptist churches are IFB. They are Southern Baptist in name only. It is not uncommon for an IFB pastor to pastor a Southern Baptist church with the intent of pulling it out of the Southern Baptist Convention. Because of this, Southern Baptist churches frequently reject resumes from pastors with an IFB background. Area missionaries warn churches about pernicious IFB pastors who desire to take over churches and pull the churches out of the Convention.
Today, I want to focus on the “I” in IFB — Independent.
To properly understand the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) church movement, you must first understand the IFB concept of camps. In the IFB, a camp is the tribe to which you belong. It is a membership group that is defined by such things as what Bible version is considered the “true” Word of God, what college the pastor attended, approval or disapproval of Calvinism, open or closed communion, or ecclesiastical, personal, and secondary separation. Many IFB camps will have multiple “positions” that define their group, and admission to the group is dependent on fidelity to these positions. Many pastors and churches belong to more than one camp.
IFB churches, colleges, parachurch organizations, evangelists, missionaries, and pastors are quick to state that they are totally independent of any authority or control but God. Much like the Churches of Christ, the IFB church movement is anti-denomination and any suggestion that they are a denomination brings outrage and denunciation.
The IFB church movement found its footing as a reaction to the perceived liberalism in denominations such as the Southern Baptist Convention and the American Baptist Convention. In the 1970s and early 1980s, I heard IFB luminaries such as Jack Hyles go on preaching tirades against the Southern Baptist Convention. Hyles would run down a list of the top 100 churches in America, attendance-wise, and proudly remind people that the list contained only a handful of Southern Baptist churches. Hyles made it clear that the attendance numbers were proof that God was blessing the IFB church movement. Hyles, along with other noted IFB preachers, encouraged young pastors to either infiltrate Southern Baptist churches and pull them out of the Convention or start new independent churches.
It should come as no surprise, then, that many local Southern Baptist churches, under the direction of their area missionaries, would not accept resumes from men trained in IFB colleges when there was a pulpit vacancy. They rightly feared that if they hired an IFB-trained man, he might try to pull their churches out of the Convention. This was not paranoid thinking. Almost every IFB pastor who came of age in the 1960s-1980s heard sermons or classes on how to infiltrate a denominational church and change it or take it over. Pastors were schooled in things such as diluting the power base. They were told that one of the first things they should do as a new pastor is determine who the power brokers were. Could they be brought over to the pastor’s way of thinking? If so, he should befriend them. If not, he should work to marginalize their power by adding pastor-friendly men to church boards and by flooding the church membership with new converts. The goal was to further cripple denominations such as the Southern Baptist Convention and to establish IFB churches in every community in the United States.
For decades, this plan worked and countless churches abandoned their denominational affiliations and became IFB churches. Added to this number were thousands of new IFB churches that were planted all over the United States. The IFB church movement, as a collective whole, was a religious force to be reckoned with. Their rape-and-pillage policy left carnage and destruction in its wake, not unlike the Charismatic movement during the same time period.
Despite taking over countless churches, starting new churches, establishing colleges, and sending missionaries across the globe, the IFB church movement could not maintain its meteoric growth. Over time, internal squabbles, scandal, doctrinal extremism, worship of personalities, charges of cultism, and a changing culture eroded what had been built.
IFB pastors were quite proud of the fact that many of the largest churches in America were King James-loving, old-fashioned, fire-and-brimstone preaching IFB churches. Today, there is only one IFB church on the Top 100 list — First Baptist Church of Hammond.
Outside of Jerry Falwell’s church, Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia — now a Southern Baptist congregation — none of the IFB churches on the Top 100 list in 1972 have as many people attending their churches today as they did in 1972. Some, such as Emmanuel Baptist Church in Pontiac, Michigan — the church I attended while in college — and the Indianapolis Baptist Temple, have closed their doors. Others, such as the Canton Baptist Temple, Akron Baptist Temple, Landmark Baptist Temple in Cincinnati, Ohio, Highland Park Baptist Church in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and Trinity Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida are mere shadows of what they once were.
In 2008, only one IFB church was on the Top 100 Churches list: First Baptist Church in Hammond, Indiana. They were listed as the 19th largest church in the United States, with a weekly attendance of 13,678. This attendance number is less than their average attendance number in 1976. Outreach Magazine lists NO IFB churches on their 2017 Top 100 Churches list. This does not necessarily mean that there are no IFB churches that are large enough to make the list. I suspect many of the larger IFB churches have stopped bragging about their attendance numbers or they don’t want to be grouped together with churches they consider “liberal.”
Most of the IFB colleges that saw meteoric growth during the 1960s-1980s, now face static or declining enrollment numbers. Some have even closed their doors. Publications such as the Sword of the Lord, the IFB newspaper started by John R Rice, have lost thousands of subscribers. Everywhere one looks, the signs of decay and death are readily evident. A movement that once proudly crowed of its numerical significance has, in three generations, become little more than an insignificant footnote in U.S. religious history. While millions of people still attend IFB or IFB-like churches, their numbers continue to decline and there is nothing that suggests this decline will stop.
Many current IFB leaders live in denial about the true state of the IFB church movement. They now convince themselves that the numeric decline is due to their unflinching, uncompromising beliefs and preaching. Upton Sinclair wrote:
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.
I think this aptly describes what is going on among the leaders of the IFB church movement. Their continued power, control, and economic gain depend on them maintaining the illusion that the IFB church movement is healthy and still blessed by God. However, the facts on the ground clearly show that the IFB church movement is on life support and there is little chance that it will survive. Those who survive will liberalize, change their name, and try to forget their IFB past.
Every IFB church, pastor, and college has what I call a camp identity. While they claim to be Big I Independent, their identity is closely connected to the people, groups, and institutions they associate with.
Some of these groups will likely object to being considered the same as other IFB groups. Reformed and Sovereign Grace Baptists will most certainly resent being talked about in the same discussion as the Sword of the Lord and Jack Hyles. But many Reformed and Sovereign Grace Baptist pastors come from an IFB church background. While certain aspects of their theology might have changed, much of the IFB methodology and thinking remains. Some of the most arrogant, mean-spirited pastors I ever met were Sovereign Grace or Reformed Baptist pastors. They may have been five-point Calvinists, but they were in every other way Independent Fundamentalist Baptists.
Most people don’t know that groups such as the Southern Baptist Convention and the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches are really fellowship groups of like-minded pastors and churches. While they have many of the hallmarks of a denomination, their churches and pastors remain, for the most part, independent, under no authority but the local church (and God).
IFB churches and pastors trumpet their independent nature and, as their history has clearly shown, this independence has resulted in horrible abuse and scandal. But, despite their claim of independence, IFB churches and pastors are quite denominational and territorial. They tend to group together in their various camps, only supporting churches, colleges, pastors, evangelists, and missionaries, that are in their respective camps.
In 1983, I started the Somerset Baptist Church in Mount Perry, Ohio. I contacted Gene Milioni, the pastor of Trinity Baptist Church — the church where I was saved and called to preach — and asked him about the church supporting us financially. Milioni asked me if I was going to become a part of the Ohio Baptist Bible Fellowship. He wanted to know if the church was going to be a BBF church. I told him no, and he told me that I could expect no support from Trinity unless I was willing to be a BBF pastor. I ran into similar problems with other pastors who demanded I be part of their camp in order to receive help.
Only one church financially supported me: First Baptist Church in Dresden, Ohio. First Baptist, pastored by Midwestern Baptist College grad Mark Kruchkow, sent me $50 a month for a year or so. Every other dime of startup money came from my own pocket or the pockets of family members. I learned right away what it meant to be a true Independent Fundamentalist Baptist.
Over the years, I floated in and out of various IFB camps. I attended Ohio Baptist Bible Fellowship meetings, Midwestern Baptist College meetings, Massillon Baptist College meetings, Sword of the Lord conferences, Bill Rice Ranch rallies, and the Buckeye Independent Baptist Fellowship. For a few years, I attended a gathering of Calvinistic Baptist pastors called the Pastor’s Clinic in Mansfield Ohio. When I pastored in Texas, I fellowshipped with like-minded Sovereign Grace Baptist pastors.
Every group demanded something from me, be it money, commitment, or fidelity to certain beliefs. If I were to be part of the group, I was expected to support the colleges, churches, pastors, evangelists, and missionaries the group approved of. Stepping beyond these approved entities brought disapproval, distance, and censure.
The next time an IFB church member or pastor tries to tell you he is an INDEPENDENT Baptist, I hope you will remember this post. Take a look at the colleges, missionaries, churches, and pastors, the IFB church member or pastor supports. It won’t take you long to figure out what camp they are in, and once you figure out what camp they are in, you will know what they believe and what they consider important. The old adage, birds of a feather flock together, is certainly true when it comes to the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist church movement.
Parts of this post were previously published.
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.