Maryland Man Busted for Taking Speaking Gigs Based on His Fake Past

Why does Liberty University, and so many SBC pastors, still tolerate an unrepentant Ergun Caner in their classrooms and pulpits? Why is First Baptist Church Jacksonville flying Caner in to speak at their Pastor's Conference to high school students and seminary students? Why is Caner still getting speaking gigs at SBC churches?

The good news is that while SBC pastors and SBC leaders like Mac Brunson may tolerate and still give speaking gigs to someone who has repeatedly lied to Christians for a decade about his past and never given a full explanation or offered a public apology, in the real, everyday world this sort of thing is NOT tolerated.

A very interesting story broke yesterday about a Maryland man who was arrested for accepting money for lectures he gave based on his past as a special forces agent, a claim that turned out to be false.

William Hillar - pictured above - marketed himself for years as a retired special forces agent, and was able to secure speaking gigs to military groups, law enforcement agencies and schools. Apparently he was incredibly convincing, and very entertaining, and had people fooled for about 10 years.

If you read the Fox News account here, and a watch a TBD News video on this story, you'll learn the following:

- as reported by TBD, "...for years this man [Hillar] invented a persona so that he could market himself as a speaker, teacher, and trainer."

- Hillar was willing to even speak lies involving his family to make his story seem more convincing. Hillar claimed that the movie "Taken" was patterned after his life, as his daughter had been kidnapped and killed. Nope, she is alive and he never was a special forces agent.

- One of his neighbors summed up Hillar very well: "To make up a whole life's story in order to draw attention to himself, I think is very sad."

- Hillar to this day is unrepentant. According to the TBD reporter, "He seems unrepentant. In court this afternoon...he said he plans to continue working as a lecturer, teacher and trainer on these exact same subjects."

- Hillar even fooled the government, and got himself a speaking gig with the FBI at one point.

- Hillar was knowledgeable and entertaining, and had his audiences fooled by being a captivating and motivating speaker. One of Hillar's victims, Mark Stone of the Rural Justice Training Center in Wyoming said that Hillar kept a class of 60 students riveted by telling stories from his special forces days. "His stories were so detailed,” said Stone. “Probably things he read in a book....he was great...He knew a lot of information and he was motivational."

The similarities of Hillar's story to Caner's are so obvious to anyone who has closely followed Caner. He transformed himself from "E. Michael Caner" to "Ergun Mehmet Giovani Caner" and gained popularity in the SBC preaching circuit shortly after 9/11 by telling us members at FBC Jax that he was "raised in Europe", and that he was "trained to do that which was done on 11 September" and that he was in "Islamic Youth Jihad". He secured a speaking gig to our armed forces as someone who understands Islamic culture based on being raised in Turkey. He has told audiences that his dad had three wives, when there is no evidence whatsoever that this is true. He over and over told audiences of debates that he had with Muslims, yet there was no record of these debates. He told stories to the Ohio Free Will Baptists at a men's retreat of his days growing up in Turkey and watching American television to learn of our culture, when records show he lived in the states since he was about 3 years old. Caner is on tape speaking jibberish multiple times to fool his audiences into thinking he speaks a foreign language. Need I go on?

And please don't tell me that Caner repented publicly. He has not. At one of his first speaking gigs AFTER he was let go as president of Liberty's seminary, he told a reporter that it would take a lot more than edited videos to take him down, called his critic bloggers who helped expose his lies "frustrated people in their basement" and he mischaracterized his lies as just getting a few names and dates wrong. That is not repentence. That is denial, and ad hominem attacks on those who speak the truth about him.

Lying about one's past is not in and of itself illegal. But when you accept money to speak to people or give lectures based on a falsified past, that is a different story. Let me remind you of this advertisement that was on Phil Waldrep's Living With Joy website until a few days after I wrote an article about it, when it magically disappeared:

Problem is, Caner was not a terrorist. Never trained as a terrorist. Certainly never a "hardened terrorist". He never "came to America to be a terrorist". Yet this website was attempting to sell a CD for $35 to hear an audio tape of a "hardened terrorist".

Does this news story about Hillar help you to perhaps understand why Caner does not publicly repent about his decade of deceit?

I want to add some information here about this story that is not in the main press accounts. If you read this piece at the TBD website, the point is made that what helped take Hillar down were retired men who WERE in the Special Forces, who took great offense of a man making money off of lies claiming to be one of the them! They wrote letters and posted information on the Internet about Hillar, until eventually an investigation was done.

This makes me think of James White. James White was the most vocal minister calling for Caner to repent during 2010. White was absolutely blasted in the most un-Christian fashion by some Southern Baptists in their desperate attempt to defend Caner. They attacked White for his Calvinist views, they even contacted one of his employers at a seminary to get him fired, claimed he was "obsessed" with Caner. They ridiculed him and tried to discredit him. It was unbelievable to see this happen to James White at the hands of other Christian ministers as White was being true to his Christian convictions and seeking the repentance of a Christian brother.

Why did White get so involved in the Caner fiasco and put so much at risk in publicly calling for a fellow minister to repent of his lies? If you remember, White explained that he was compelled to get involved, because Caner was falsely claiming to be doing what James White DOES do: and that is debate people about the Christian faith and Islam. Caner claimed to have hundreds of debates all over the world, but there is not a record of any of them. White was attempting to protect the integrity of his profession, from someone who was falsely claiming to be a Christian-Muslim debater.

These men retired from Special Forces don't take kindly to imposters. Said Jeff Hinton, a retired Master Seargent: "These guys are using our reputation to scam innocent people. It really makes us angry."

Most professions root out those who use fake credentials and lie about their past to advance professionally and financially, and they and expel them from their midst. Most professions will call out someone who is gaining in their field from lies - not so apparently in the SBC. Instead in this case the SBC turned on the one who was blowing the whistle and tried to harm him.

But it really doesn't have to be that way in Christian circles. There is a way of restoration, and it is called confession and repentance. Caner and Brunson know that public sin by a minister requires public confession and repentance. Brunson has practiced this in his church with his ministers, and Caner and Brunson wrote about "private sin, private confession, public sin, public confession" in their 2005 book "Why Churches Die" (p. 208).

But sadly, Ergun and the pastors of the Southern Baptist Convention who continue to promote Caner believe that the embarrassment of a public confession and repentance by one of their rock star preachers is too high a price to pay in order for them to practice what they preach. And you know what? Maybe this story of William Hillar helps to explain just how high the price can be.

Welcome back to Jacksonville, Ergun.

2011 Guide to Mega Church Easter Entertainment

Who is that at the left? That is Marduke. Marduke the Moon God. Just thought you might be interested from the previous post on tithing. Markduke might have a banner hanging in the Pastor's Conference, I'm not sure.

Enough of the serious talk on tithing.

But let me summarize our tithing discussion:

It ain't in da book.

I've looked. And so has John MacArthur.

Instead, give as you purpose in your heart, not under compulsion. Give 1%, 5%, 10% or 20%. Give it to your church, or spread it around. The church is not an Old Testament storehouse, and the pastors are not Levitial priests. You are the temple, the "church" is not your local church and its buildings and employees, it is the body of Christian believers everywhere. You are free in Christ. It is wonderful to be free in Christ, and know that you do NOT have to meet a 10% demand as a requirement to receive blessings from God.

But do give as the Lord leads you, do it cheerfully, sacrificially, and don't let mega church pastors guilt you into a percentage. Don't let them twist scripture to convince you the Bible says something that is not there. Take care of your family first. Don't cut your family and their needs short, don't go into debt, and don't sacrifice your financial future to meet the demands of a bully preacher who says you are disobedient if you don't give him 10%.

If preachers would just preach the truth that I've just shared with you, I predict their giving would INCREASE. Stop the bellyaching and the scriptural gymnastics, pastors, and people might dig deeper.

And by all means: definitley discount any arguments made to support a 10% storehouse tithe that include a mention of ancient tithing to "Marduke the Moon God."

And speaking of Marduke the Moon God, time for a new, light-hearted post in advance of the Pastor's Conference.

Below is the audio of a satirical skit of a ficticious seeker-friendly podcaster, "Stanley Andy" who summarizes the entertainment line-up at this year's mega church Easter services. My favorite part is when Stanley talks about the plans at Perry Noble's church. Too funny!

Chris Rosebrough does some very good satire on his radio show, and this is an example of that.

Enjoy.

Ancient Pagans Tithed to Their False Gods, So How Dare Christians NOT Tithe to Their God, Says Mac Brunson

In the three years plus we've discussed tithing on this blog, we've looked at a number of ridiculous, sometimes even abusive arguments used by mega church pastors to convince their congregations that they must fork over 10% of their gross income to their pastor's church to stay in good graces with God.

But Mac Brunson recently has put forth one of the wackiest, over-the-top arguments I've ever heard on tithing: that because ancient pagans supposedly "tithed" to their phoney-baloney gods, that we as Christians today should be quite happy to practice the same ritual.

Yes, according to Mac because the Mesopotamians apparently tithed to "Marduke the Moon God" 7000 years ago, and becauses hieroglypics depict Ramses tithing to Ra (did he write a check or put cash in the offering plate?) Christians should do nothing less than divide our weekly gross income by 10, and fork that over to the pastor's church. This argument really should be a Saturday Night Live skit making fun of mega church pastors - not seriously put forth from the pulpit of a Baptist church.

Below you can see and hear it yourself, courtesy of Kevin Oliver, a Christian discernment video blogger who was appalled when he heard Mac Brunson use the pagan practice of tithing to rip into Christians who dare to debate the issue of tithing. Watch Kevin's video and commentary:

Even Chris Rosebrough of the Pirate Christian Network got word of this Brunson sermon, and did a segment on his radio show recently entitled "The Worst Reason Ever Given by a Pastor as to Why You Should Tithe" where he spent 15 minutes analyzing the above clip and pointing out the logical and scriptural fallacies of Brunson's argument (click here if you want to hear Rosebrough's analysis, fast forwarding to the 22:00 minute mark).

As you see in the video, Brunson gets all worked up explaining how ancient civilizations tithed to their "gods", including the "Mesopotameians tithing to Marduke the Moon God." and thus it seems Brunson believes that God has placed "tithing" as a basic truth in the heart of man.

Several things about this argument pointing to tithing practices of pagan religions:

- David Croteau in his book "You Mean I Don't Have to Tithe: A Deconstruction of Tithing and a Reconstruction of Post-Tithe Giving", references author Henry Landsdell's work that discusses how ancient cultures exhibited some form of giving increases to their gods. But Croteau points out: "...how they gave differed in the amount, the voluntary nature, and the timing. There certainly was not a uniform 10% of increase prescribed across the board." Crouteau goes on to point out that in Arabia tithes were paid on frankincense, but if the ground had been watered by Baal (as in rain) a double tithe was due. So it certainly is quite a stretch to compare these pagan tithes to even Old Testament tithing, and just completely absurd to compare it to believers under the new covenant who are to give joyfully, out of their blessings, and without compulsion.

- I would take exception to Brunson's opening statement in his diatribe: "Its amazing how the human heart knows that when you come before God, I'm supposed to bring something to him." Absurd. God planted in the human heart the knowledge that we are to bring something to God when we come before him? Where does he come up with this? I thought that under the new convenant we have finally understood that God doesn't want us to bring something to him, because we have nothing he wants. He had to redeem us, we couldn't redeem ourselves. Isn't the essence of false religion (i.e. paganism!) man's attempt to reach God by "bringing something to him"? And we're now to believe that God put that in the human heart, and thus Christians are supposed to bring God the tithe because of this? Lord, I hope they are not teaching this in seminaries!

So the next time you are considering what to give to the Lord, stop and think of what our pagan brethren did.

They tithed to Marduke and Asar and Ra, and so should you! You didn't know it? You know it now.

FBC Jax Resigns from Evangelical Council of Financial Accountability

According to the membership website of the Evangelical Council of Financial Accountability, First Baptist Church of Jacksonville has resigned this week from the ECFA, effective 1/18/11.

Too bad, as FBC Jax was one of the few Baptist churches who was an ECFA member. The Watchdog recommended that FBC Jax become an ECFA member way back in September 2007, and they did join the ECFA sometime in 2008.

No reason is given by the ECFA for the FBC Jax resignation - it could be FBC Jax is cutting back and didn't want to pay the $4500 annual fee a church their size would is required to pay, or perhaps the financial statements for last year were not good and they didn't want to submit them for posting on the ECFA website.

But no doubt the timing of the FBC Jax resignation is not good. It was just a few weeks ago that Senator Grassley charged the ECFA to spearhead the effort to work for financial reform in the religious community. Grassley's staff prepared a 60 page memo summarizing the problems of excessive compensation, lavish lifestyles of pastors who fly in private jets, live in million dollar homes, and use the ministries to provide employment for family members.

While it is commendable that FBC Jax was an ECFA member when the vast majority of churches were not - it doesn't look good when they do resign after a tough financial year, just two weeks after a U.S. Senator is looking to the ECFA to spearhead self-reform in the area of financial transparency and accountability. One of ECFA's largest church members is now "gawn" - "GAWN". :). So much for hoping the Southern Baptists will be part of the ECFA solution.

And on an unrelated note: it was confirmed last night that the FBC Jax high school pastor of 3 years, Rev. Chris Eppling, is leaving FBC Jax. We were at FBC Jax for only a short time after Chris was hired, but everything we have heard is that he is a wonderful youth pastor and we wish him well in his next area of service.

Caner's Comeback Almost Complete - Will Speak to Students at FBC Jax Pastor's Conference

In only seven months since Ergun Caner was removed from his duties as dean of the Liberty Theological Seminary, his rise back to SBC prominence is almost complete - with a little bit of help from his friend Mac Brunson and the high schoolers of FBC Jacksonville.

It was announced to FBC Jax high schoolers and their parents this past Wednesday night that Ergun Caner will be speaking to the high school students at the Pastor's Conference on Saturday night, January 29th. I assume this is why Ergun Caner's picture and bio appear at the Pastor's Conference website although he doesn't appear any where in the speaking schedule: he must be the speaker at the 7:00 pm "Student Conference" on the conference agenda, for which there is no specific speaker listed. If he is the speaker there, why not put his name on the agenda? Why is the cat let out of the bag only a few weeks prior to the conference?

Pretty amazing that in just 7 months since his removal as President of the Liberty Theological Seminary over his 9 years of telling fibs in pulpits all over America - exaggerations of his testimony including his growing up in Turkey, learning of American culture through watching American TV shows while living in Turkey, how he was trained in Jihad - all false - that Ergun Caner is now given a platform to speak to high schoolers and presumably seminary students at the 2011 FBC Jax Pastor's Conference. I'm sure Caner will be in rare form - the last time he preached at FBC Jax in 2009 he had the faithful yucking it up over stereotypes of black worshippers ("shoes that match their suits that match their cars" and "satellite dish hats with curtain rods down the front") - so I'm sure Caner won't disappoint this time either.

I guess what makes this even worse is that FBC Jax really is where this whole ugly saga started when "Butch Caner" emerged from SBC obscurity after 9/11 as "Ergun Mehmet Giovanni Janel" back on November 21, 2001. It was on that day when Caner preached in the FBC Jax pulpit with Jerry Vines looking on, telling us he was raised in Europe, trained in "Islamic Youth Jihad", had "been trained to do that which was done on 11 September", and didn't know English well as a teenager. But it was all an exaggeration, as he moved to the states at the age of 3 and was raised in Ohio. His 11/21/01 sermon may very well have been a carefully orchestrated attempt to use our church to catapult him to stardom as an Islamic expert after 9/11.

So now he comes back to FBC Jax again, at the 2011 Pastor's Conference.

Make no mistake: with all the SBC bigwigs in town for the conference like Johnny Hunt, Jerry Vines, David Platt and Ed Stetzer - seminary presidents Al Mohler and Danny Akin and Chuck Kelly and Paige Patterson - along with thousands of conservative SBC pastors in town for the conference, this most certainly should be seen as the SBC putting it's stamp of approval back on Ergun Caner. He is back, and he is in the good graces of the SBC pastors and the leadership. The message is clear: pastors, it is now safe to invite him back into your churches to speak.

This rapid return of Caner to SBC prominence perhaps says just as much about the state of evangelical Christianity as did our eagerness to lap up his stories for nine years and roll in the aisles at his racial and gender stereotype jokes. The lesson is if you can tell a good yarn, make people laugh, have superior oratory skills and can draw a crowd and generate revenue - you will be in high demand. It is about the dollar, and who are your friends. Caner is a co-author with Brunson, and Vines is the one who helped him to fame in 2001 when he brought him to FBC Jax.

Neither can afford to let Caner fail.