WD Training Video: How to Get Stupid Church Members to Bring Their Bibles for the Pastor's Excellent Sermon

One of the more pressing problems in our churches today are church attenders who don't bring their bibles to church. Apparently, it is very difficult for an authoritarian pastor to convince people from the bible that NOT to have a pastor is "dangerous" (which the bible does not actually say), unless that person is holding the bible in their hands. The effect of the pastor's statements of his own importance in the lives of his followers will have much more impact, and be retained in their long-term memory if the sheep are holding that bible in their hands.

Thus, as a public service to pastors who face this challenge of non-bible-bearing Christians, Watchdog has produced a training video especially for pastors on how to motivate your church members to bring their bible to your church service so that you can convince them that the bible says what YOU want them to think it says.

In the WD training video below, we have used an excellent example of Mac Brunson forcefully telling his church members they absolutely must have a bible in their hands, just moments before he tells them that house churches are a "movement" of people without, egads, a "pastor". And that Christians in house churches that don't have a pastor (i.e. "seminarian") are in "danger" for lack of a pastor. In the training video we examine step by step the masterful way Brunson exerts his pastoral dominance and authority over the plebe in the audience, in a very rude and condescending sort of way, just before he pulls a fast one out of his....bible.

Although this training video is provided for free, I do want to issue the following warning:

This training is for pastors only. This is an exclusive training video best suited for Southern Baptist pastors south of the Mason-Dixon line. If you are a lay person, a woman, an NIV-reader, or any FBC Jax employee, or a preacher north of the Mason-Dixon line, please do not watch this video, as it may be harmful to your ministry. Any questions about the techniques used should go directly to the pastor, not to the Watchdog. CEUs for completing this training are available upon request. Thank you. And PLEASE HAVE A BIBLE IN YOUR HAND. Enjoy.

Pastor Gets Caught in 5-Year Lie About Being a Navy SEAL - Navy Expert Says "Clergy" are Worst Offenders at Exaggerating Their Military Record

A Pennsylvania pastor was caught red-handed last week in a 5-year lie about his past as a Navy SEAL.

The Rev. Jim Moats of Christian Bible Fellowship Church in Newville, PA had told people in his congregation that he served as a Navy SEAL in Vietnam. After Osama bin Laden's death last week, Moats' local paper did a story on his supposed military career involving Navy SEALS service in Vietnam.

To Moats' credit, he did own up to it, and he confessed and asked for forgiveness publicly. Unlike Ergun Caner who was exposed last year for his decade-long deception of being raised in Turkey, Moats didn't remain silent. He didn't depend on his friends to defend him and attack those who pointed out his deceit. Moats didn't say that Satan was attacking him, or that the story was concocted by a bunch of Calvinists trying to bring him down. But then again, Moats didn't have high-profile pastor friends who helped push his story either.

After what evangelicalism went through last year with the Ergun Caner fiasco, this sort of story is not surprising.

But what IS surprising about this story, is what the Navy expert who busted Moats had to say about these kinds of liars, and also what law expert Jonathan Turley said.

Here are quotes from Don Shipley a retired Navy SEAL who runs a website called Extreme Seal Experience, which in part is set up to expose liars who claim to be former SEALs.

"We deal with these guys all the time, especially the clergy. It’s amazing how many of the clergy are involved in those lies to build that flock up."

"Pastors are common impostors. So are sheriffs. Politicians get caught boasting about medals they never received. Several impersonators were booted from boot camp, dishonorably discharged....Many never served a day in the military."

How sad that pastors are known as the worst offenders. This likely has to do with how pastors do a poor job of policing themselves as we saw in the Ergun Caner disaster. Pastors and law enforcement leaders are the worst, says Shipley. Last year I compared the Ergun Caner saga to that of Gainesville, FL police chief, Waylon Clifton, who was found to have exaggerated his life story by telling of his days playing football at Alabama for Bear Bryant. Someone finally investigated, and he was found out.

Also from the article about Shipley:

"Shipley and other retirees use YouTube, Facebook, and military sites, such as pownetwork.org, to get the word out. As soon as a news article hits the wire, they mass distribute — outing the phonies in a virtual form of street justice. 'We don’t just go around punching these guys in the nose anymore,' he said. 'The pen is mightier than the sword.' "

Amen. The playing field is evened, and lying pastors are found out. Pastors might have the mike for 45 minutes on Sunday with no rebuttals, but the Internet allows their sermons to be listened to and stories checked, and lies and deceptions exposed.

Another quote:

"Until Shipley told him, Moats said he was not aware of the Stolen Valor Act, a federal law that had made it a crime for someone to wear military medals he had not earned or to otherwise misrepresent service in the U.S. military. The law has been declared unconstitutional as a violation of freedom of speech. Shipley said even if the law was binding, he would not favor prosecuting Moats. The pastor has been outed through the Internet in what Shipley said is a form of street justice.

George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley chimed in:

"Jonathan Turley, a professor of law at George Washington University, said the majority of people who lie about military ranks and honors do it for the money. ...'Faux warriors often buy medals on the Internet,' Turley said. 'Some can’t resist buying more and more medals until they look like a Soviet general. ... It’s tragic. These are people who are desperately seeking recognition of this kind.' "

And Turley summarizes it very well, at least what SHOULD happen to ministers when they have been found to be repeating lies about their past to make them seem greater than they are:

"And for a minister, it should be rather devastating to have perpetuated such a terrible lie. That’s a significant punishment. ... Many of these people have a desperate need for public adoration and respect, and when uncovered they become social pariahs and pathetic figures — truly their worst nightmare."

Here is video of Rev. Jim Moats:

H/T: Times Union reporter Jeff Brumley, on his Twitter.

As a Gift to Our Mothers and Daughters, Consider You May Be Wrong About the Doctrine of Male-Only Authority in the Church

Happy Mother's Day to all of you WD-reading Mothers! I hope your day is filled with love and joy!

I want to take this Mother's Day as an opportunity to encourage all men who read this blog - for the good of your mothers, wives, daughters, and granddaughters - to consider that you just might be wrong about what the scriptures say about women and their subordinate role they must play in the church.

I know that the prevailing thought based on scriptures such as 1 Timothy 2 and the account of the fall in Genesis 3 is that women should be subservient to men, and that men should have authority over women, and that women are forbidden from teaching men, or holding certain offices in church.

I know, because I was taught that in Southern Baptist Churches my entire Christian life. I've been taught it by people in my family and by my baptist pastors for over two decades. It was when I heard of the firing of Dr. Sheri Klouda by Paige Patterson that I first considered that perhaps this doctrine that led to this tragic action taken by Patterson was wrong. I read a good portion of Patterson's deposition in the Klouda case a couple of years ago, and the absurdity of statements made by Patterson under questioning of Klouda's lawyer, Gary Richardson, further led me to believe that this doctrine of male authority in the church is counter to scripture and the will of God and required my further investigation.

And I have to say one of the turning points that caused me to dig even deeper, is last year when I came across Ergun Caner's "joke" at the 2007 Ohio Free Will Baptists Men's Retreat when he said that he believed women should be behind the pulpit...how else could they get back there to vacuum....and his jokes about "mutant granddaughters" barking like dogs. It made me sick that this sort of thing came from one of the most popular baptist preaching-circuit personalities.

So after much reading and research I have come to the conclusion that I was wrong, that in fact the bible does NOT teach that God's plan is for men to have authority over women, and that the Bible does NOT teach women are exempted from having leadership positions over men in the church. I may explore this topic in future posts as to the particular arguments for what I believe, but I want to in this post simply implore men to consider an alternative view by a conservative teacher that can be trusted in this area. His name is Jon Zens.

Jon Zens is a preacher and author that has spoken around the world, but mostly outside the institutional church which is why many Southern Baptists have not heard of him. He is a pastor of a church, but does not draw a salary. He has taught and lived out for years a different model of pastor, not of a pastor having authority over people, but of serving and being amongst the congregation as a servant. You can read Jon's bio here. Jon is a good friend of author Frank Viola ("Pagan Christianity"), and also of Cal Thomas who uses Jon as a reviewer and editor of his work. Jon and his wife Dottie are sweet Christians who in recent years have been involved in traveling to the Philippines to help women and children get out of the sex-slave trade.

I had the privilege of meeting Jon for lunch last September when he was in Jacksonville to do some teaching at a home church group here in Jacksonville, after which he traveled down to Gainesville to meet his friend Frank Viola and minister in that city. We talked over lunch about my family's experience at First Baptist, the journey I have traveled through my blog, and my views on tithing which Jon has written about for quite some time. Jon graciously shared with me a bag full of books and other materials related to topics I was writing about on my blog that he had written about.

What I would recommend for men (and women!) who are willing to just possibly consider they have been taught wrongly what the bible say about women is to listen to Jon Zens' 8-part teaching series he delivered at Wade Burleson's church last September. Click here to go to Emmanuel Baptist Church's video archive, and scroll down to September 2010 to see this teaching series. Also, Jon has written a book entitled "What's With Paul and Women", and another one out this year entitled "No Will of My Own - How Patriarchy Smothers Female Dignity and Personhood". Read Wade Burleson's forward to this latest book here at Wade's blog.

Let me give you a quote from Wade Burleson's foreward he wrote for Jon's book "What's With Paul and Women":

"The viper known as 'the doctrine of male authority' has bitten the church. the toxin emitted by this errant teaching affects the females within our assemblies. It debilitates their God-given gifts, denigrates their Spirit-led ministry, and downplays their role as new Covenant priests. Those of us who have seen the church bitten need assistance, and help has arrived. This book will help you suck out the venom of male-only authority within the church. It will do so by helping you be able to articulate Jesus' view of the equality of women and then revealing for you how Paul's words in 1 Timothy 2 are consistent with Jesus' own teaching and ministry. You will be able to point out to others how the modern institutional church has misconstrued and misinterpreted Paul's writings on the subject, while at the same time ignoring Jesus' words and life on the same subject."

So I hope this Mother's Day you will commit to at least consider the possibility that you have learned wrongly what the Bible says about women, and do further investigation starting with Jon Zens' bible teachings in this area. I believe this is so very, very important. I believe this wrong teaching that has infected our churches for so long is why we are reading about so much sexual abuse and cover-ups in our churches as Christa Brown has chronicled for years. I also firmly believe that the absence of women from any serious positions of leadership in the Southern Baptist Convention or in our churches is why there is no movement at all toward reaching out at a denominational level to victims of pastoral abuse or establishing a database of credibly accused ministers to keep predator pastors from freely moving from church to church. Many of the problems we see in the SBC, I believe, are related to having women on the outside of the leadership circle.

So Happy Mother's Day...and please, men....as a gift to the women in your life, be open to what God might speak to you in this important area.

Mother's Day at FBC Jax Means: We Need 1% More of Your Money to Do Basic Ministry

And here's a thought: if you think the ministries shown on the video are worthwhile, do NOT give to FBC Jax, but rather give DIRECTLY TO THE MINISTRIES! Mac has said that anything in excess of the goal will go into the general fund!! This means if they take in $200,000, then only about 3/4 of your money will go to those ministries. Give directly to Trinity Rescue Mission or the First Coast Women's Ministry, click on the links and GIVE!! Don't funnel it through FBC Jax where some of it might end up in their general fund for salaries and buildings." FBC Jax Watchdog

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This Sunday FBC Jax is taking up ANOTHER special offering on Mother's Day.

It seems they STILL don't have enough of your money coming in to do basic ministry.

Mac and Trey Brunson announced in video form Sunday 4/24 that they need to raise an additional 1% of their budget by members giving 1% more of their income to FBC Jax, so that they can help Duval County Schools, give money to the the crisis pregnancy center, and help out at Trinity Rescue mission, and to help fund a church plant in Columbus, Ohio.

They are already giving $500k to the Cooperative Program, but they need more of your money for the Columbus, Ohio church plant.

So the dollar amount they are shooting to collect from you this Sunday is $130,000 for these ministry needs.

They take in $13 to $14 million a year, and they can't budget these items in, so guess what: they need YOU to give more money. And as Mac said, if you're really generous and they raise more than the $130,000, it will go into the general budget.

I blogged about this back in 2008 when Mac asked for $1 million to pay for "emergency repairs". I told the FBC Jax faithful that you already gave it, and THEY need to budget better. That year they took a special offering to put Mac's sermons back on INSP network, then later that year Mac coldly demanded $1 million in two weeks for their emergency repairs. They didn't get it, and the Monday after the special offering was taken, the church administrator filed his complaint with the JSO detective/church member/church security guard/deacon/discipline committee member (yes, he was all five), and that opened the investigation into this blog resulting in subpoenas for this blog, Tiffany Croft's blog, and the Bellevue Baptist blog.

But, I will say the same thing here: you already gave it and are giving it. The good people of FBC Jax are giving generously in tough times already, so why doesn't FBC Jax and Mac Brunson find the $130,000 in the budget? They just spent millions in putting in a new stage and new carpet and new pews, and now they need $130,000 MORE, else they can't do basic, essential ministry in our city? Do they think people are THAT gullible and can't see through this?

And here's a thought: if you think the ministries shown on the video are worthwhile, do NOT give to FBC Jax, but rather give DIRECTLY TO THE MINISTRIES! Mac has said that anything in excess of the goal will go into the general fund!! This means if they take in $200,000, then only about 3/4 of your money will go to those ministries. Give directly to Trinity Rescue Mission or the First Coast Women's Ministry, click on the links and GIVE!! Don't funnel it through FBC Jax where some of it might end up in their general fund for salaries and buildings.

God Bless Florida Baptist Convention Director John Sullivan. He made a cameo appearance on the video with Mac and Trey, saying he and his wife are giving 1% more of their income to FBC Jax so they can do more ministry.

So follow John Sullivan's lead, FBC Jax. Give 1% MORE.

Let's hope that our soon-to-be-elected mayor Mike Hogan, long-time FBC Jax member, doesn't follow his pastor's lead and try to get 1% more from us to fix the city's financial ills.

Or better yet...maybe Mike Hogan can teach Mac a few things about fiscal responsibility and cutting expenses, rather than always coming to the people holding out his monogrammed-cuffed hands asking for more money.

Perry Noble's Church Opens Service With Katy Perry Song: So Is it Really Non-Tithers Who Promote the Gay Lifestyle, or NewSpring Church?

Two weeks ago, Perry Noble said that if there were fewer greedy, non-tithing, God-robbing Christians, there might be less homosexuality in the world.

"Maybe there would be less homosexuality in the world today if there were less greedy Christians who actually cared enough to tithe and spread the gospel." Perry Noble, April 17, 2011

But interestingly, we see this past Sunday, that the reverse might just be true: that the more money you give to NewSpring Church, the MORE promotion of homosexuality you might be involved in! It might actually be the tithers and Perry Noble at NewSpring, not the non-tithers, who are promoting homosexuality.

You see, this past Sunday Perry Noble's worship band opened the service by playing and singing the song "You're a Firework". Watch the NewSpring worship band here.

"You're a Firework" is a world-wide #1 hit pop song, performed by and co-written by pop sensation Katy Perry. The song is from her album "Teenage Dream", and the music video for the song features several young people who find courage within themselves to overcome their fears and anxieties. One of the young people in the video is a gay young man who musters the courage to approach another young man at a party and land a French kiss on him, as seen in the still shot below from the video. The sparks in the picture are from the "fireworks" bursting from within as he expresses himself as a gay man kissing another man. That is what the song is about in part.

So who is promoting homosexuality now? Is it the non-tithers? I think not - perhaps it is the tithers at NewSpring Church, because it is a reasonable assumption that Perry Noble's church did pay a licensing fee to Katy Perry and her co-writers for the use of her song. If true, then Perry Noble's NewSpring Church is taking money from Christians who were told they MUST give it to God (via NewSpring, Inc. of course) and NewSpring (on God's behalf, presumably) purposely gives it to an artist who has no problem promoting the gay lifestyle in her songs and videos. Watchdog readers might remember that Katy Perry rose to fame in 2008 with the song "I Kissed a Girl (and I Liked It)", about her fantasy of romantically kissing a pretty girl.

So while Perry Noble pontificates that greedy non-tithers are keeping him from reaching the gays with the gospel....his church is playing songs written by a pop artist who does not have a problem promoting the gay lifestyle.

I'm really not trying to make light of the hypocrisy of Perry Noble in this...it really is a serious matter. Noble's church is filled with a very young crowd - that is why his worship band is playing rock and pop songs. We've raised teenagers for the past 8 years, and believe me all the teens at NewSpring know who Katy Perry is, and they know of her "I Kissed a Girl" song. Many of them have probably seen the "You're a Firework" video featuring the male kiss above. So for Perry Noble's worship leaders to be playing Katy Perry music is about as close to promoting the gay lifestyle as a church can get, whether they mean to or not.

But if you're a gullible mega church pew sitter, it is easy to convince you that the person who doesn't drop 10% in the plate is the one who is helping to promote a gay lifestyle, not those who might be paying licensing fees to artists who promote a gay lifestyle in their music and videos.

So let's do a remix on Perry's quote:

"Maybe there would be less homosexuality in the world if emergent churches would stop confusing their young Christians by playing in their worship services secular music written and performed by artists who promote the gay lifestyle." Watchdog, May 4, 2011