New River Fellowship Church and Scott Crenshaw Give Us Something to Talk About

"Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis link

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White River, Vermont

We are holding on the developments with Highpoint Church and Chris Carwile because some info is about to break. We shall post in the next 24 hours or so.

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This story from New River Fellowship Church gives us something to talk about but it is not what the church wants us to talk about. TWW believes that if the pastor is in the public eye than the pastor gets both glory and dishonor in the public eye. 

Scott Crenshaw  

Another pastor, Scott Crenshaw, bites the dust, at least for now. It seems he was viewing pornography on the church computer or at least that is what the church is claiming. They denied that it was *child* pornography in a tweet to Amy Smith earlier today. 

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New River Fellowship Church's statement:

Shortly after this exchange, Humphrey denied it was child porn and promptly blocked us. Don't these guys know we can still see their tweets? The church released a statement here. The following are some relevant excerpts.

In accordance with our governing bylaws, the Board of Directors has unanimously arrived at the difficult decision to remove Scott Crenshaw as the Senior Pastor of New River Fellowship. While this is the most difficult and painful decision we have had to make, it was necessary.

Scott has made some unfortunate choices that have caused us much concern. Leadership confronted him and discussed at length the concern, the nature of which was related to inappropriate images on his church office computer. The Board then confronted Scott and went through the steps of dealing with sin as outlined in Matthew 18.

Because Scott chose not to properly address this issue, he is not qualified to lead as outlined in 1 Timothy 3 and the church bylaws. We spent hours with Scott praying diligently about seeking outside counseling, to which he has agreed. It is our desire to see complete restoration for him and hopefully return as our Senior Pastor; however, that is the Lord’s call not ours. 

…(We will) provide personal and financial support for them in the days ahead. 

…For complete healing for Scott and his family we want to honor the man and woman of God they are, and not give into gossip. 

…You will not see Pastor Scott and Renee at church and will not see much of them on social media. Please understand, their marriage is strong and Renee is walking at Scott’s side through all of this. 

Did you know that many will be come free because of Scott's submission to the Freedom Ministry?

Pay particular attention to this part. I will get back to it shortly.

Many of you have experienced the power of God in this house through Freedom Ministry. Please understand that as Scott “submits to this process” many will become free because of his submission. Leadership starts in the house of God. 

Scott Crenshaw's statement

Crenshaw was recently operated on for a mass on his kidney. As of now, he is cancer free and for that we are grateful. The following are excerpts from Crenshaw's complete statement. 

Recently I have fallen into areas of temptation that sicken and embarrass me. Please hear this: I am not embezzling or having an affair, but I have found myself viewing inappropriate images that are not in line with what God calls me to be. 

 I have watched the crowds come in and encounter the healing hand of our God. No one is exempt from sin and no one is exempt from God's healing grace, including me.

For this reason, I am stepping to the side for a season of healing and restoration. I am submitting to the leadership of our Board of Directors, as well as other qualified leadership, who will be walking me through counseling and restoration.  

What is the Freedom Ministry?

I found the following on the Church's website. It reminded me of some of the stuff coming out of Chris Hodges' Church of the Highlands and Robert Morris of Gateway Church. The church is not a member of the ARC as far as i can tell but I will be looking at this a bit closer. 

We define Freedom as the ability to respond fully to God out of who He created and redeemed you to be. Core lies, soul wounds, demonic oppression and life patterns are all obstacles that can stand in the way of the life of freedom Jesus has made available to every believer. New River Freedom Ministry is kingdom-focused and designed to help you learn to hear and respond to God’s voice. We’ll help you identify and remove those things that are currently hindering your growth, enter the life you were made for, discover your identity in Christ and learn how to be an influence in the lives of others.

Dee has this crazy idea that there should be some sort of double blind, randomized controlled study to prove if those who go through the Freedom Ministry are somehow more free than those who are garden variety Christian who read the Bible and pray. But, I digress…

As many of you know, Robert Morris has spoken about the fact that he believes everyone is demon oppressed on regular basis, including  the Apostle Paul. Church members need to go through their freedom ministry in order to get rid of said oppression.. I have some serious concerns with this theology since I think it can be misused to make "problems go away" by simply renouncing the demon(s).

Will there be a quick return of the de-demonized™ Scott Crenshaw

It is my opinion that it would be quite easy to rapidly restore the porn viewing pastor simply by saying that he has been de-demonized.™ The devil made him do it and the devil is now gone. I often wonder how many exorcisms one must receive in order to be guaranteed demon free™? And how frequently one must go back for re-treatment? Robert Morris seems to say that one needs regular demonic cleansing.

It looks Scott's wife and kids who were all allegedly employed by the church are no longer on the staff.

His wife was the pastor of the women's ministry and we assume that she was reimbursed for her role.

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However, she is now gone from the staff. Why? Was she responsible for Scott's porn viewing habits? It was reported that both of his sons were employed by the church but I cannot find their names anywhere. So, did they fire the whole family because Scott was viewing porn or was something else amiss? Oh yeah, I am not a great fan of pastor's hiring their family members but that is neither here or there.

The final statement was from the executive pastor, Jeff Humphrey, who wants to give us something to talk about.

I think it is a motto of some churches that no good crisis should be allowed to occur without asking for money. I have to admit, I got a good laugh out of this one. In this statement, he said:

So in the midst of a world that likes to talk about things they know not of… I would like to quote the great theologian… BONNIE RAIT. (sic)

Using large font he went on:

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Here is the problem for the church universal. You cannot demand that people talk only about what you want them to talk about. They will see the good, the bad and the ugly. If we really understand the gospel, then we should be as comfortable when people see our sin as well as our good deeds.

Given Humphrey's statement

So in the midst of a world that likes to talk about things they know not of

I wonder how much he knew of Bonnie Raitt and her song. It's meaning is rather interesting, given the context of this church situation. Here is an explanation. Dee can't stop giggling.

This song is about small-town gossip and the effect it has on the singer and the guy she's secretly in love with. It turns out that they're rumored to be having an affair, and since the rumor-spreaders already think that the two people are involved, the song asks, why not have an affair anyway, thus giving them "something to talk about."

Comments

New River Fellowship Church and Scott Crenshaw Give Us Something to Talk About — 129 Comments

  1. One has to wonder about his computer choice (not the use) – was he so far gone that he thought he was undetectable or did he actually want to get caught?

    This may be an ancillary issue, but it’s one I wonder about every time something like this happens.

  2. Every one of the church’s statements are full of buzzword bingo. No real meaning. If you strip out the blather, there are only a few facts:

    We have bylaws.
    We removed the pastor. (Not sure exactly how ‘remove’ is defined- is he fired? on temporary leave?)
    He was doing something bad that we’re not going to tell you about.
    He’s still on the payroll.
    This is all the information you’re getting. You are not to talk to him or talk to anyone else about this.

    And in the other statement:

    You will give more, work harder and obey what you’re told.

    The rest of the words have no objective meaning.

    New River Freedom Ministry is kingdom-focused [whatever that means] and designed to help you learn to hear and respond to God’s voice. We’ll help you identify and remove those things that are currently hindering your growth, enter the life you were made for, discover your identity in Christ and learn how to be an influence in the lives of others.

    Believers should realize that they don’t need these programs or leaders to know God and to grow spiritually. God has provided through His Spirit for our spiritual growth.

    Christ is always with us, accessible to each one of us, the Bible is, as well. Paul said, “solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.” (Hebrews 5:14) As long as believers are depending on others to direct them and tell them what they are allowed or not allowed to talk and think about, they are not getting that practice or training.

  3. Official New River Fellowship Quotes Indicating a Plan for
    Crenshaw to Return to the Senior Pastor Position

    “It is our desire to see complete restoration for him and hopefully
    return as our Senior Pastor
    .”

    “The Board of Directors have made Jeff Humphrey the Executive
    Pastor. We have also made Korby Taylor the Hudson Oaks Campus
    Pastor. These men are not Scott’s replacement.”

    Scott Crenshaw Quotes Indicating a Plan for Crenshaw to Return to
    the Senior Pastor Position

    “In the last year, we have seen several prominent pastors descend to
    the point of falling, burn out or removal from their pastoral
    seat. I don’t want to be on that list.

    “I am stepping to the side for a season of healing and
    restoration.”

    Analysis

    These churches, with their leaders and attendees, are looking more
    and more like a professional sports team. When the star player gets
    caught in domestic violence or taking PED’s, first there is an
    attempt to cover it up. Only when forced, will there be a
    confrontation. At that point, the punishment is only a temporary
    suspension. The home town fans want their team to win, they don’t
    want their superstar out of the lineup. And the league knows this,
    as fan interest (cash flow from tickets, concessions, and TV
    revenues) are at stake. So they have to ‘act like’ discipline is in
    place, but it’s just “discipline theater”.

    The local church has a similar desire to keep the games going, keep
    fan interest high, to keep the money rolling in.

    Nowhere in this is a desire to actually follow the bible. They might
    quote a few verses here and there, but they don’t intent to follow
    any verses that are inconvenient. The bible has become a prop, a
    token. It’s not treated as the Holy Scriptures, authored by an
    immutable God. These church leaders show quite clearly that they
    love mammon more than God.

  4. “…(We will) provide personal and financial support for them in the days ahead. ”

    A little paid vacay, eh?

  5. “Scott has made some unfortunate choices that have caused us much concern.” When I sin it is called sin, when it is a pastor it suddenly becomes “unfortunate choices”. In my case it is their minimizing and then defensiveness that raises questions and draws interest.

  6. “We spent hours with Scott praying diligently about seeking outside counseling, to which he has agreed. It is our desire to see complete restoration for him and hopefully return as our Senior Pastor; however, that is the Lord’s call not ours.”

    I have said this in the past, these people do not live in the same universe as many of us do. Could you imagine leadership spending hours doing anything for a regular pew sitter.

  7. NRFC has an outlaw cowboy culture church in a rural area west of Ft Worth in Parker County. It’s where David Barton is from and it is Ergun Caner’s home church. They love their nasty at that church. In answer to Burwell, I attended once, hoping to bump into Caner (I didn’t) but Crenshaw is loud and quite full of himself. I think he didn’t think it would matter if he got caught. This is a privately owned family business after all. No one tells a family business owner what to do, do they? It’s a minor miracle that the NRFC elders are bothering with this tithe funded paid vacation before declaring Crenshaw has been “healed and restored”. Of course, they said that was only because he was recalcitrant. Had he played ball from the start he probably wouldn’t have missed any time.
    .
    It was Ben and Zach Crenshaw who were also on the payroll. Ben worked in the creative department working in video production, and Zach worked with the Youth Group.

    NRFC is not an ARC church for the simple reason that it was founded before ARC was founded in 2001 (because the New Age of Apostles didn’t start until 2001). The ties between NRFC and Gateway are very, very strong and NRFC operates just like an ARC church in terms of their focus on spiritainment,state of the art Technical Arts depts, popular culture and ARC style Pentecostalism. They share resources and staff with Gateway.
    .
    It was Gateway’s North Ft Worth campus pastor Marcus Brecheen that preached at NRFC this past weekend. Marcus and his wife Alexa lead NRFC’s Marriage Seminars. NRFC attends GW Conferences and they use some of GW’s worship leaders and definitely use their teachings and programs which include Gateway’s famous demonic exorcism oriented Freedom Ministry Department, where many of the staff have attended Bob Larson’s School of Exorcism.
    .
    The head of Freedom Ministry at NRFC is Korby Taylor, an avid sportsman. Korby is friends with Tom Lane who oversees the Prophesying at GW and with Bob Hamp who developed the entire Freedom Ministry program, before he was forced out due to the the break up of his marriage. Korby worked at NRFC drom 1999-2010 as an Associate Pastor, then moved to LifeMission Church in Olathe, KS from 2010-2013 where he worked in their Freedom Ministry Department under the tutelage of Gateway trained staff. Life Church in Olathe has such strong ties to Gateway that they are one of the few remaining churches that still has a TKU campus. They really support the GW Freedom Ministry stuff and are regular guests at Gateway.
    .
    Dee is right,that no matter how hard Robert tries to live a Christian life, those pesky demons are always getting inside him. And that’s with him having professional exorcists at his beck and call and Dr Henry Cloud as his personal psychologist. At the October Pastors Conference he told 4,500 pastors that negative feedback/questions have demonic spirits tied to them so if he opens an email or comment card that isn’t filled with praise, he can be infected by a demonic spirit for a week or more. Therefore, he makes the low paid admins open the mail and take the demonic spirits for the pastors. It’s sort of like having royal food tasters.
    .
    The interesting thing about these Freedom Ministry Departments is that the Lord just arbitrarily speaks things into being. As soon as Crenshaw or Korby or the elders think they hear “a word from the lord” saying “it’s all good”, then Crenshaw will be free to go back to being Senior Pastor, regardless of the fact that he is already disqualified from ministry for failing to be above reproach and of good moral character. Fortunately for him and his family, they are all on tithe funded vacations until someone “gets that word”.
    .
    Korby seems like a really nice guy. But this Freedom Ministry stuff tends to be very sketchy.

    On a happy note, Gateway’s big monthly miracle crusade service called Habitation, is officially gone, like most of the other programs that are being cancelled due to their current financial crisis. It turns out the vision that the Lord gave Robert to provide all of that healing and prophecy was only intended to last while GW was pulling in $1M every 2.25 days. Who will tame those evil spirits now?
    .
    The head of Habitation, Robert Morris’ millionaire golfing buddy, Steve Dulin, talked on Sunday night about how GW provided him with his major miracle. He had severe back pain that was not resolved via surgery. God spoke to him during worship at Gateway and said, hey, there’s a doctor behind you that can cure you. Steve had already traveled across the country, to NYC and Chicago, seeking all kinds of specialists, but to no avail.
    .
    So God tells Steve to turn around and God shines a spotlight on a man. It turns out he is a “doctor” and this doctor agrees to see Steve after the service where he proceeds to examine and treat him on the cafeteria table of a grubby preschool room. The doctor manipulates Steve’s spine and tells him to come to his house for more that night. Steve does. The doctor works on him and he gets 75% better. Then the doctor turns around and fills up five really large syringes with mystery fluid from some large vials then sticks them right into Steve’s back and tells him he will feel better and boy does he (as he acts out a wobbly, buzzy feeling).
    .
    Then Steve says this will “prevent him from running for political office” but he’s gonna tell you anyway. He says the doctor is working on him some more, in his home at nights, but he wasn’t fully recovering. The doctor with the mystery syringes asked if Steve played golf because he saw a vision of him on the golf course and a demon stuck his actual demonic head out of Steve’s right hip and the Lord told Dr Feelgood that it was a demon of fear. Steve was afraid he would never be able to play golf at an exclusive country club without having some back pain. WHAT’S THE POINT IN EVEN LIVING NOW?!
    .
    So the doctor and Steve’s wife laid hands on him and drove out the demon of golfing fear and he was instantly healed 100% forever and delivered at the same time. To prove this miracle he said he immediately started playing golf and he ran into an atheist chiropractor on the course who asked to see Steve’s back and instantly could tell exactly what surgery Steve had had years before. The atheist chiropractor said “you are a walking miracle because NOBODY who has this surgery doesn’t have to have it again within in 12 years” and his original surgery was a bit over 12 years ago. And the Lord rewarded Steve by letting him play 36 holes a golf this weekend which is why, and I am quoting him now, “he has such great faith!”
    .
    Steve then goes on to say that his hands are super oily tonight and that every time his hands have gotten really oily then many people get healed and his hands are really oily so many people are going to get healed tonight.
    .
    I guess that’s pretty lucky. Steve happens to have oily hands on the last night of Gateway’s monthly miracle services forever. Better than last month when Steve resorted to giving away free surgeries from a GW elder who also happens to be the Chief of Surgery at a big hospital in Plano. The fact that it is illegal for a surgeon to waive their fees never came up – either month. But one poor lady who traveled to Southlake for her miracle from these two elders, who were laughing and yucking it up like they were drunk on a golf course, collapsed. Southlake Fire Department had to be called in and she had to be gurneyed off into an ambulance and taken to a, ya know, hospital where sick people are treated.

    The two elders downplayed it as she’s fine, this is just protocol. She only has Lyme disease – chuckle chuckle. NOT one of the GW elders got off the stage (she was just a couple of rows from the front and in the center) and went to her aid. The surgeon just stood their joking with the golfing elder with the fear demon in his right hip and happy juice syringes. The doctor could have offered assistance to the patient or a kind and compassionate word to the family, or just prayed with them and helped to answer their questions, but no. The lady was mucking up their miracle crusade. This is Benny Hinn’s worst nightmare. Actual paramedics! The show must go on people!
    .
    The point is that these Freedom Ministry classes are generally tied to big, big money. Now that Gateway’s money has run out, the oil from Steve’s greasy little palms is drying up and those thousands of people making pilgrimages will have to go elsewhere. No miracles for you!
    .
    If tithing goes down at NRFC due to Crenshaw’s absence, expect to see “the lord” speaking healing and restoration more quickly. The fact that the Lord cannot go against his own holy Word doesn’t matter. Making money does. These Freedom Ministry classes are filled with nonsense. The “miracles’ they sell have as much snake oil as the mystery vials of fluid that a “doctor” was willing to inject in his living room at night, into a spine, in a non-sterile environment. But it’s all good because the “demon of fear of not golfing” (Golfifer) has poked his pointy little head out of Steve’s hip and deliverance has taken place. Anyone believing in this needs to watch Darren Brown’s Miracles for Sale documentary https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bouAp1pGBwk

  8. LT wrote:

    At the October Pastors Conference he told 4,500 pastors that negative feedback/questions have demonic spirits tied to them so if he opens an email or comment card that isn’t filled with praise, he can be infected by a demonic spirit for a week or more. Therefore, he makes the low paid admins open the mail and take the demonic spirits for the pastors. It’s sort of like having royal food tasters.

    This poor man is certifiable …. or a great scam artist …. or/and ?
    He needs a good psych work-up right now, since he is willing to throw his underpaid underlings under the demon bus, as this indicates a sociopathic nature to say the least. Yikes!

    How did the faith of Christ ever morph into something like this????? My guess is it is all a scam:
    a greedy showmanship like the old snake-oil pedlers long ago and appealing to desperate vulnerable people.

  9. Something is not adding up here.

    Because Scott chose not to properly address this issue, he is not qualified to lead as outlined in 1 Timothy 3 and the church bylaws.

    We spent hours with Scott praying diligently about seeking outside counseling, to which he has agreed. It is our desire to see complete restoration for him and hopefully return as our Senior Pastor; however, that is the Lord’s call not ours.

    If it was viewing of images, you’d think that they’d pray over him and BOOM, claim they cast out the demon and had restoration, as that is their modus operandi.

    But it says: “Scott chose not to properly address this issue.”
    How? Did they find stuff again after confronting him? Did he tell them to stuff it, and he could do what he wanted because he was in charge?

    This doesn’t add up. Either the images were really inappropriate, or there is more to the story.

    I’d give them kudos for actually going through with a removal process, except that they’re already talking about bringing him back. Just once, I’d like to see a church not say that in their removal announcement, like they really meant the removal was serious business.

    And I’d like to see these wayward pastors go work a humble, very low income job to support their family, and not get stipends, to learn what it’s really like to be a pew peon. Nobody’s ever paid me for messing up, so why do they get paid (and probably paid a lot) for doing so?

  10. ishy wrote:

    And I’d like to see these wayward pastors go work a humble, very low income job to support their family, and not get stipends, to learn what it’s really like to be a pew peon. Nobody’s ever paid me for messing up, so why do they get paid (and probably paid a lot) for doing so?

    I think it is a sad reincarnation of a very old idea that drove the Church into Reformation:

    that people can PAY for what they want from God….. I see a connection between the poor 15th Century woman whose husband has died contributing the last of her money to the Church in hopes that her husband’s soul will be ‘released from purgatory’; and the poor waitress who prays for her son’s healing from addiction and ‘contributes’ to these phony pastors her hard-earned money to get them to help her son to be ‘saved’.

    People need help.
    Pastors are who they go to.
    Some pastors want money, they are NEVER satisfied.
    Out of desperation, people will ‘donate’ for what they hope will bring relief to their suffering and worry.

    It’s an old story. And a very sad one.

  11. Christiane wrote:

    that people can PAY for what they want from God….. I see a connection between the poor 15th Century woman whose husband has died contributing the last of her money to the Church in hopes that her husband’s soul will be ‘released from purgatory’; and the poor waitress who prays for her son’s healing from addiction and ‘contributes’ to these phony pastors her hard-earned money to get them to help her son to be ‘saved’.

    I think there’s also an extra brand of entitlement for these pastors, because they just “couldn’t survive!” on an income under $100K. Even if that income comes off the backs of hardworking people who spend their lives just trying to make ends meet.

  12. “At the October Pastors Conference he told 4,500 pastors that negative feedback/questions have demonic spirits tied to them so if he opens an email or comment card that isn’t filled with praise, he can be infected by a demonic spirit for a week or more. Therefore, he makes the low paid admins open the mail and take the demonic spirits for the pastors. It’s sort of like having royal food tasters.”

    Is there video of this?

  13. If that church is based in Hudson Oaks, Texas, that’s a strategically located church in the next DFW booming suburb.

  14. “…but I have found myself viewing inappropriate images…”

    “The Israelites gave me their gold, I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!”

  15. Jessica wrote:

    but it’s just “discipline theater”.

    Discipline Theater, heh, heh.

    Is that the name of a band or movie or poem or song or something?
    Cause if it isn’t, it should be.

  16. NJ wrote:

    “At the October Pastors Conference he told 4,500 pastors that negative feedback/questions have demonic spirits tied to them so if he opens an email or comment card that isn’t filled with praise, he can be infected by a demonic spirit for a week or more. Therefore, he makes the low paid admins open the mail and take the demonic spirits for the pastors. It’s sort of like having royal food tasters.”
    Is there video of this?

    If this is true, it’s seriously one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard a Christian say.

  17. dee wrote:

    @ Tina:
    You are quicker than Jeff Humphrey was in blocking me.

    🙂

    I’m all for helping someone repent and showing support for a fellow Christian, but it does seem like, at times, there is more of a concern for the sinner than for the sinned against.

  18. Christiane wrote:

    negative feedback/questions have demonic spirits tied to them so if he opens an email or comment card that isn’t filled with praise, he can be infected by a demonic spirit for a week or more.

    Bwahahahahaaaaaaaaa *wipes tears of mirth*

  19. I was born and raised in Weatherford. Moved from there this summer when I got married. I remember when New River was a small church. Then it took off and seems very popular, though I personally don’t know anyone who goes there.

  20. Whew! I keep hoping for spiritual maturity to step forth in these situations and do the right thing, but seldom see it; the way New River leadership is handling this is no exception.

    From Pastor Crenshaw, we get the usual warning that he will make a triumphant reentry to the pulpit: “I am stepping to the side for a season of healing and restoration.” Crenshaw has plans to retake and repossess his territory, after a season of demonic oppression in his life and ministry … or was it simply his choice to fulfill the lust of his flesh. “The devil made me do it” is getting old … the world and flesh are crippling ministries without the devil ever getting involved!

    Good Lord, what does it take these days to disqualify a minister?! Should the church forgive him “if” Crenshaw demonstrates genuine repentance? Certainly! Should the church restore him to ministry? NO! He has forfeited that privilege.

    To invoke the name of Bonnie Raitt to teach us all a “theological” lesson is icing on the cake of how not to handle the failure of a senior pastor. New River church leaders should pray as they ought and draw on Scripture as their guide. When it comes to “Freedom Ministry”, the Word says “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” … many church leaders in America hit the pulpit without being set free indeed and the pew eventually pays an awful price of despair and disillusionment.

    Finding the genuine amidst all of the counterfeit is becoming a challenge. It’s no wonder that so many have become ensnared in ministries which cause us to drift further from our mandate to fulfill the Great Commission.

  21. I need to hire some admin assistants to read my emails for me. I didn’t know that demons could travel through online communications. Is it just email? What about Messenger, texts, tweets, Instagrams? Obviously, Facebook is a transmission source. What about… [gasp] Blogs?

    So is this guy intentionally exposing his staff to email-based demons, or do the demons only attack the person to whom the email is addressed?

    So many questions…

  22. Max wrote:

    “The devil made me do it” is getting old … the world and flesh are crippling ministries without the devil ever getting involved!

    that ‘devil made me sin’ teaching may work in neo-Cal land, but the truth is that in orthodox Christianity, people be willing participants in order to be held accountable for their sin

  23. GSD wrote:

    I need to hire some admin assistants to read my emails for me. I didn’t know that demons could travel through online communications. Is it just email? What about Messenger, texts, tweets, Instagrams? Obviously, Facebook is a transmission source. What about… [gasp] Blogs?

    So is this guy intentionally exposing his staff to email-based demons, or do the demons only attack the person to whom the email is addressed?

    So many questions…

    sounds to me like the demons already got him, that he is willing for others to be ‘demonized’ in his place ….. what a coward!

    I suspect the guy is a roaring scam artist or he is a crazy loon ….. either way, he’s not safe to be around

  24. LT wrote:

    The doctor with the mystery syringes asked if Steve played golf because he saw a vision of him on the golf course and a demon stuck his actual demonic head out of Steve’s right hip

    So a demon had crawled up the golfer’s a**???
    Snort. If that wasn’t so pathetic, it would be funny. Sounds like something a circuit riding stand-up comic would say! I wonder if Morris gave him the idea so they would have a big story to tell GW?

  25. As of a few minutes ago, Scott Crenshaw is still listed as the registered agent for New River Fellowship (corporation) on the Texas Secretary of State’s website. Unfortunately, Texas doesn’t have an easy way to look at corporate filings, so I can’t see if Crenshaw is an officer or director of the corporation.

    I suspect Crenshaw won’t be out long enough to make it worthwhile to remove him as registered agent.

  26. New River Fellowship Church and Scott Crenshaw Give Us Something to Talk About

    Now if one of these churches and guys would give you something GOOD to talk about…

  27. Nancy2 wrote:

    LT wrote:
    The doctor with the mystery syringes asked if Steve played golf because he saw a vision of him on the golf course and a demon stuck his actual demonic head out of Steve’s right hip

    So a demon had crawled up the golfer’s a**???

    Well, Spiritual Warfare types see DEMONS under every bed, so why not up your a**?
    “DEMONS! DEMONS! DEMONS! SHEEKA-BOOM-BAH! POOT!

    And “doctor with mystery syringes” intrigues me. I can’t help thinking of A.Hitler’s Doktor Feelgood who was shooting Der Fuehrer up with METH-spiked “vitamin shots”. (Explains a lot of the last two years of the war.)

  28. LT wrote:

    NRFC has an outlaw cowboy culture church in a rural area west of Ft Worth in Parker County. It’s where David Barton is from and it is Ergun Caner’s home church.

    That’s two strikes against it right off the bat.

    And the rest of your account (like a true bio of Elron Hubbard) would be farce comedy soap opera except for the collateral damage in people.

  29. LT wrote:

    So God tells Steve to turn around and God shines a spotlight on a man. It turns out he is a “doctor” and this doctor agrees to see Steve after the service where he proceeds to examine and treat him on the cafeteria table of a grubby preschool room. The doctor manipulates Steve’s spine and tells him to come to his house for more that night. Steve does. The doctor works on him and he gets 75% better. Then the doctor turns around and fills up five really large syringes with mystery fluid from some large vials then sticks them right into Steve’s back and tells him he will feel better and boy does he (as he acts out a wobbly, buzzy feeling).

    Herr Doktor Feelgood und Der Fuehrer…

    Or a scene out of South Park or Aqua Teen Hunger Force.

    This has gotta be for real. “You think I could make up sh*t like this?”

  30. LT wrote:

    The interesting thing about these Freedom Ministry Departments is that the Lord just arbitrarily speaks things into being. As soon as Crenshaw or Korby or the elders think they hear “a word from the lord” saying “it’s all good…

    What if the “word from the LOORD” is “White Night at Jonestown”?
    Or “Join Bo and Peep behind Hale-Bopp”?

  31. I listened to Marcus Brecheen’s sermon as I was preparing signs for something I’m doing in a little while. 🙂 His whole thing was an argument that when we read “you” in the Bible, we really should be reading it as “you plural” or in Texanish, “y’all.” So he proceeded to read the passages of scripture with “y’all” in place of you. This was all preparation for what he really was saying, which was basically “y’all can’t abandon the church even though this unfortunate thing has happened.” Because being by yourself is wrong. He didn’t use the overworked phrase “doing life together” but he might as well have done so.

    I was reminded yet again how many sermons annoy me, which is why I had to work on something else while listening to it. That said, I did laugh when he pointed out how Texans like to use the phrase “fixin’ to.” I’ve been gone from Texas for 22 years now and I still say “I’m fixin’ to do [fill in the blank]” and people here laugh.

  32. LT wrote:

    But one poor lady who traveled to Southlake for her miracle from these two elders, who were laughing and yucking it up like they were drunk on a golf course, collapsed.

    Not “drunk on a golf course” — just “tokin’ the Ghost” with that ol’ Jehovah-juana, YOING! YOING !YOING!

    (You realize if someone put these scenes in a work of fiction, Nobody Would Ever Believe Them.)

  33. siteseer wrote:

    Every one of the church’s statements are full of buzzword bingo. No real meaning.

    I was struck by the list of “obstacles that can stand in the way of the life of freedom”. Bizarre terminology. “Core lies”? “Soul wounds”? What do these even mean? Are they defined somewhere in that NAR/Gateway document that Dee posted a few weeks ago? (I haven’t gotten all the way through it yet.)

    Are “soul wounds” something like trauma? Are they claiming that PTSD can keep us from our full potential, and they have The Cure™?

    Or am I trying to make sense out of empty buzzwords?

  34. I talked to a new friend last night who just returned from a mission trip to NYC. It seems that much of their time was spent prayer walking through bad neighborhoods. It seems all this demon talk has infiltrated most churches. When did prayer walking go mainstream? I doubt most people know that it is tied to Ted Haggard’s church in Colorado Springs, and is also known as Spiritual Mapping. It is definitely NAR theology.

  35. ishy wrote:

    If it was viewing of images, you’d think that they’d pray over him and BOOM, claim they cast out the demon and had restoration, as that is their modus operandi.

    But it says: “Scott chose not to properly address this issue.”
    How? Did they find stuff again after confronting him? Did he tell them to stuff it, and he could do what he wanted because he was in charge?

    This doesn’t add up. Either the images were really inappropriate, or there is more to the story.

    Exactly. It is just a bunch of spin.

    Funny how “unfortunate choices” require “healing.”

    I’d give them kudos for actually going through with a removal process, except that they’re already talking about bringing him back. Just once, I’d like to see a church not say that in their removal announcement, like they really meant the removal was serious business.

    Possibly this affected enough people or particular people so that they were forced to do something.

  36. OK: about these packaged, systematised “healing processes” of which the Freedom Ministry is just one of very many.

    Long-term listeners may remember “womb-of-liquid-love”-guy – the laddie who wrote about a religious experience lasting for several weeks which he described as like walking around in a womb of liquid love (his words). I remember hearing a sermon CD (remember them?) of him teaching once in which he describes a never-ending series of powerful and intense “healing experiences” that he seemed to have, both spontaneously and just about every time anybody prayed for him in a meeting. He experienced deep, incredible healing for this, that, and the other.

    Except…

    … he never seemed to be whole or healthy. The more he was “healed”, the more “healing” he needed. And it all began to look, to me, like something akin to scratching a rash. That is, in the sense that it feels good in the short term but doesn’t actually do any good, and may even do harm. The silver lining is that as far as I know, this laddie wasn’t going around marketing a healingProcess. But a part of me feels more than slightly sorry for him.

    Now, obviously, we all pick up bumps and scrapes – both physical and emotional – as we go through life. Sometimes people pick up unusually serious ones. But franchised healingProcesses that function in such a way as to create a need for themselves (invariably augmented by offering “training” that enables one to become some form of quasi-official “healer” oneself) always look suspicious to me.

  37. GSD wrote:

    I didn’t know that demons could travel through online communications.

    I do hope my antivirus is able to detect and remove them. Should I move the antivirus quarantine to network storage outside my house for protection? I do not wish to have a bunch of demons bottled up in some pandemonium, er quarantine that is under my roof, oh my. Will a file shredder be able to git rid of them or to I need to cleanse each bit? For those of us without staff to screen our messages, how do we protect ourselves?

    What about the problem for big companies like Microsoft and Google that offer email services to a vast number of users, can you imagine what shows up in their quarantine? It may well explain why some companies go bad.

  38. Serving Kids In Japan wrote:

    Are “soul wounds” something like trauma? Are they claiming that PTSD can keep us from our full potential, and they have The Cure™?

    Or am I trying to make sense out of empty buzzwords?

    There is just enough of a bare outline of something that might mean something to give people vague ideas to grasp onto and imbue with their own hopes and needs. The thing that amazes me is how long people can go on supporting these “ministries” with nothing more than vague hints to hang their hopes on. I wonder whether it’s a revolving door, people who have realized it’s an empty sham revolving out as new gullible victims revolve in? Or do people hang onto this stuff for a lifetime?

  39. I have distant relatives by the name of Crenshaw up in the Dallas area. I sure hope these men aren’t related to me. I haven’t done much research on the part of the family tree, but now I think I will give that a pass. Don’t want any more black sheep in the family. (LOL)

  40. ION:

    Fitba’

    England host Spain in one of tonight’s international friendlies; should be a larf.

    IHTIH

  41. siteseer wrote:

    There is just enough of a bare outline of something that might mean something to give people vague ideas to grasp onto and imbue with their own hopes and needs.

    Just like Messiah Politics — Ross Perot, Barack Obama, Donald Trump(?)

  42. siteseer wrote:

    You may need to take some action like this! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MM0Z_jCrGo

    I’ve worked in applications software since 1978.
    You don’t know how close I’ve come to taking app code to an Exorcist FOR REAL.
    In the early years, it was a running joke that Debugging = Exorcism; I remember hearing someone made a pre-YouTube video parody of The Exorcist about just that.

  43. Christiane wrote:

    that ‘devil made me sin’ teaching may work in neo-Cal land…

    And/or if you’re Flip Wilson onstage.
    It’s called “The Geraldine Defense” for a reason.

  44. Burwell wrote:

    One has to wonder about his computer choice (not the use) – was he so far gone that he thought he was undetectable or did he actually want to get caught?

    This is not that uncommon; One of the hallmarks of serious addiction is the inability to stop a behavior even if it threatens one’s job. Also, he may have thought it was easier to get away with it at work than at home with his family around.

  45. Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    You don’t know how close I’ve come to taking app code to an Exorcist FOR REAL.

    It is the people that insist that there has to a reasonable explanation why it doesn’t work that I worry about.

  46. Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    In the early years, it was a running joke that Debugging = Exorcism;

    I taught introductory computer programming at the college level for 10 years. The hardest part of the first semester was convincing the students that the computer does exactly what you told it to do. This is still absolutely true but the vastly greater complexity of our current software makes it easier to believe that someone else is messing with your program.

    Computers are deterministic. People are not. This should be good starting point for a deep theological discussion.

  47. OldJohnJ wrote:

    Computers are deterministic. People are not. This should be good starting point for a deep theological discussion.

    Computers are Calvinists?

  48. Canna wrote:

    I talked to a new friend last night who just returned from a mission trip to NYC. It seems that much of their time was spent prayer walking through bad neighborhoods. It seems all this demon talk has infiltrated most churches. When did prayer walking go mainstream? I doubt most people know that it is tied to Ted Haggard’s church in Colorado Springs, and is also known as Spiritual Mapping. It is definitely NAR theology.
    Did they lay lines of salt around the walked-out perimeter to set the Wards?
    (Holy Water would be too Romish.)

  49. Canna wrote:

    When did prayer walking go mainstream? I doubt most people know that it is tied to Ted Haggard’s church in Colorado Springs, and is also known as Spiritual Mapping. It is definitely NAR theology.

    it sure doesn’t sound like walking the Via Dolorosa, no

  50. When a prepared statement includes passive voice or passive constructs, I always pay more attention. The phrases “fallen into areas of temptation” and “found myself viewing” are not technically passive voice, but they suggest a certain passivity on the part of the writer – as if he’s saying “these terrible things just sort of happened!”

  51. NJ wrote:

    “At the October Pastors Conference he told 4,500 pastors that negative feedback/questions have demonic spirits tied to them so if he opens an email or comment card that isn’t filled with praise, he can be infected by a demonic spirit for a week or more. Therefore, he makes the low paid admins open the mail and take the demonic spirits for the pastors. It’s sort of like having royal food tasters.”

    Is there video of this?

    Yes.It’s here https://gatewayconference.com/resources/media/6631
    For those interested in discovering why so many megas continue to do horrible and neglectful things,this provides part of the answer. This video is Focus Group 3 where Tom Lane’s son Todd, the new CEO of Gateway, interviews Robert Morris and Lead Apostolic Elder and now new GW Senior Pastor Jimmy Evans about “Purity in the Pulpit”. It’s 58 minutes long, but has many revelations on all kinds of senior pastor topics.

    The Demon Spirits on critical emails and feedback part starts around the 45th minute. Here’s the transcripts. Please keep in mind that in Robert Morris’ mind, and we know this because he has taught it over and over, anything that is not encouraging is criticism and is from the Devil. Robert also teaches that 100% of all Prophecy must be encouraging. Any prophecy that is not flagrantly filled with praise and encouragement is from Satan. This is neither biblically nor historically accurate.

    Jimmy Evans is more reasonable, but neither really listen to anything outside of their inner circle, which is an echo chamber. Robert could not give you the names of 2 dozen families that have joined GW in the last 5 years if his life depended on it – due to how intensely removed he is from his royal subjects. These Senior Execs know nothing about who the flock are or what they think let alone why they are currently leaving GW in record numbers.
    .
    Topic: How do you deal with criticism? (43:10) Jimmy talks about getting a lot of hate mail. (FYI Many Amarillans considered Trinity Fellowship to be a cult and the former senior pastor had to leave due to a financial scandal. Jimmy was appointed Senior Pastor despite having NEVER been a pastor and having no college or seminary training)
    Jimmy: “Well, early on when I took over as Senior Pastor I would get a lot of hate mail…they were doozies. They just kind of slammed your brain. And I told my secretary never to give me one of those again. That I never, ever want to see another one of those uh, bad letters. I don’t mind criticism I just don’t want the slam” (Jimmy goes on about only wanting to hear from healthy people about how to improve so he “can learn and grow. I try to keep healthy people around me who will speak the truth because I don’t want to insulate myself against criticism. But at the same time you’re not going to be a healthy person if you let everyone take a shot”…”It’s not good to have people telling you how they feel about you”.
    Robert: 44:54 “yeah, I do the same thing. The negative stuff doesn’t get to (make its way to) me.” (RM’s Admins screen it all out just like Jimmy’s do) “I know you say well, in a smaller church it’s more difficult…but you can put some safeguards around you. Um, and, uh, um, uh, don’t let the Devil beat you up. And that’s what those letter and emails do. They just beat you up. And you set there, I,uh, I, uh, I can guarantee that everyone of you, have gotten a letter or email that had a Spirit attached to it. That was the ‘attachment’. The ‘attachment’ was a Spirit. And you, when you read it, you, it took you days to get over it. Maybe weeks or months. And so I just, I don’t do that.

    (Robert has previously taught that the Admins screen all the emails, letters and feedback forms for ALL of the pastors and purge the critical ones – this session he only references he and Jimmy are doing as that is how the question is phrased – what do YOU do to deal with criticism. The binning of delicately worded with very helpful feedback and even mere questions is further verified by members reporting sending in emails with reasonable questions and never receiving any responses from pastors or staff even after numerous emails have been sent. Some have even had their prayer requests trashed as well.)

    Also my staff knows, don’t give me a bad report before I go to the pulpit. (fortunately Robert is only in the pulpit about 34 minutes only 28 or fewer times a year.) Don’t, don’t tell me ‘Pastor Robert we’re gonna talk about it this week but we’re $6,000,000 in the hole.’ (it’s MUCH worse than $6M btw – they were $15M in the red just for July and August). Don’t tell me that! hehehe right before I go to the pulpit. Cuz I’m I, um I, I’m about to try to encourage the congregation and I’m discouraged now ya know.. So we, you, just have to put safeguards around you. And, um, that stuff and then when someone, if someone is attacking you, uh, Facebook, or or some way, don’t read it. (the safeguards are the admins reading your demonic spirit filled feedback and deleting it for you). Don’t read, uh, criticism, about you that is not intended to help you. It’s intended to hurt you. And it will hurt you. So don’t read hurtful things”.

    It’s impossible to predetermine if a letter, email or feedback form is negative without knowing the contents, so they are telling 4,500 pastors plus thousands more online to let your “safeguarding” lower staff open the correspondence with the demonic spirit “attachment” and pre-screen it for you.

    It is true that the GW pastors have their email and feedback forms pre-screened by their Admins and anything negative is deleted. However, this is not an entirely true depiction of all that is going on, because the Media Dept, which is also the Crisis Management Dept, purposefully sets up Google word search advisories and have staff assigned who read the blogs that cover Gateway. They read everything including the comments and Gateway has made numerous responses and changes based on that “negative” feedback. The top pastors are advised about the current buzz on the internet at executive meetings. Although they should not spend any time on blatant hate mail or profanity strewn nonsense, they can and do pay attention to topics about GW covered here and elsewhere. They just don’t say that to the 4,500 pastors because they cannot afford large Media and Crisis Management Departments.
    .
    The best news on all of this is that Robert admits he is not open to anything critical, which is very true. That is why GW is currently in financial crisis and why even his protected and pet projects are getting the axe right now. My hope is that they continue to ignore everything and keep running the ship into the ground. Ignorance may be bliss, but it is not profitable bliss.

  52. Nancy2 wrote:

    “…(We will) provide personal and financial support for them in the days ahead. ”
    A little paid vacay, eh?

    And another thing that doesn’t happen in the real world. Playing solitaire on the office PC can get people fired without any compassion for their feelings and their families’ needs. Viewing porn would be a far more serious problem, due to workplace rules, liability, and network security risks (introducing computer viruses, etc., when downloading images or programs, or just clicking links). But in these bad churches, the priestly class knows that they never risk a hard landing when they fall.

  53. LT wrote:

    it’s all good because the “demon of fear of not golfing” (Golfifer) has poked his pointy little head out of Steve’s hip

    Uh, may I just say that this whole scenario doesn’t happen at most churches?

  54. ishy wrote:

    If this is true, it’s seriously one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard a Christian say.

    Sadly, that would be quite a contest.

  55. LT wrote:

    Robert also teaches that 100% of all Prophecy must be encouraging.

    So his Bible didn’t come equipped with the Book of Jeremiah?

  56. Christiane wrote:

    How did the faith of Christ ever morph into something like this????? My guess is it is all a scam:
    a greedy showmanship like the old snake-oil pedlers long ago and appealing to desperate vulnerable people.

    Hey, it didn’t take long at all for the simple love of Jesus to morph into filthy hogs wanting to profit off faith and scam innocents:

    You had the seven sons of Sceva who apparently put on a big show of deliverance for the First Century wonders-and-miracles crowd, and got their clothes ripped off and beaten by an actual demon.

    You had Simon the Sorceror, who made a living off of telling everyone how great and godly he was (was known as “The Great Power of God”) who, even after he’d turned round and begun following Jesus, still thought the Holy Spirit was a commodity you could buy and sell, and was told by Peter to repent because he was “full of bitterness”. Funny, isn’t it? Not a pew sitter who called full of bitterness (as the leaders always like to proclaim of any detractors from the pulpit), but a signs-and-wonders First Century televangelist type.

    You had the super-apostles Paul so excoriated because they were all about the money (as well as enslaving others, taking advantage of and exploiting people, exalting themselves and slapping people in the face).

    Things don’t change.

  57. @ Law Prof:
    ah, yes, Judas and his thirty pieces of silver …..

    human nature has been wounded since Eden, yes, but the faith of the Apostles who denied Our Lord and ran away from Calvary (except for St. John) …. that faith was strengthened at Pentecost and the ones who ran away were later martyred, giving their lives in witness to Christ

    I suspect there are none of us ‘perfect’, no; but for someone to cold-bloodedly seek to defraud anxious, tormented people seems to me one of the greatest betrayals ever…. to take advantage of people when they are down, and for what? a McMansion? 100K a year?
    That’s really cold.

  58. Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    And “doctor with mystery syringes” intrigues me. I can’t help thinking of A.Hitler’s Doktor Feelgood who was shooting Der Fuehrer up with METH-spiked “vitamin shots”. (Explains a lot of the last two years of the war.)

    It sounds just like “Miracle” Max Jacobsen, who treated, among others, President Kennedy, Bogie and Bacall, Truman Capote, Mickey Mantle and about half of Hollywood back in the day. All these famous people swore by his treatments–until it was discovered that all the fellow was doing was shooting clients up with amphetamines and he had his license revoked. It’s hard to imagine a legitimate doctor shooting someone up under such unsanitary conditions. Hopefully this is merely a hoax.

  59. Harley wrote:

    I have distant relatives by the name of Crenshaw up in the Dallas area. I sure hope these men aren’t related to me. I haven’t done much research on the part of the family tree, but now I think I will give that a pass. Don’t want any more black sheep in the family. (LOL)

    Maybe you’re related to the Hall of Fame golfer Crenshaw from that general part of Texas, not the other Crenshaw.

  60. Friend wrote:

    LT wrote:
    Robert also teaches that 100% of all Prophecy must be encouraging.
    So his Bible didn’t come equipped with the Book of Jeremiah?

    Or his description of criticism as something that brings demonic “attachments”. What in the world was Paul thinking when he opposed Peter to his face? Why was Jesus so critical of His disciples, in one case calling Peter “Satan”? What in the world is going on in the Bible, are they all shamelessly attaching demons one to another?

    Or is it more likely that this talk from the pulpit at the 4,500 strong pastors conference was the ranting of abusive tyrants who like to set up systems in which they are conveniently insulated from the consequences of their behavior?

  61. LT wrote:

    Robert also teaches that 100% of all Prophecy must be encouraging. Any prophecy that is not flagrantly filled with praise and encouragement is from Satan.

    Uhhhhh … Brother Robert is obviously not familiar with a multitude of prophecies recorded in the Bible that dispute what he is saying. God will send a harsh word to His people to cause them to repent and turn from their wicked ways … why would Satan want folks to turn from their wicked ways?

  62. Max wrote:

    why would Satan want folks to turn from their wicked ways?

    Alas, nobody at Gateway seems to have wondered about this.

  63. siteseer wrote:

    God has provided through His Spirit for our spiritual growth.
    Christ is always with us, accessible to each one of us, the Bible is, as well. Paul said, “solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.” (Hebrews 5:14)

    Yes.

  64. Bill M wrote:

    For those of us without staff to screen our messages, how do we protect ourselves?

    Business idea! Email screening and exorcism for Pastors. Call it… Social Media Spiritual Management. We will sort through your emails, Facebook messages, even letters in the mail, and sort out all of the demonic criticism. It’s all sunshine and roses from here on out. If anyone is unhappy about your performance, you’ll never know it!

    I wonder what our hourly rate should be, given the massive risk we would be taking.

  65. I’m sure the good pastor was just doing some research on the evils of pornography to prepare for his upcoming sermon series, or to see some porn to better minister to those who are addicted to it. Unless it was, ahem, something a little more serious and perverted, if you get my drift, that would cause the good elders to terminate. Who was that mega church pastor in Colorado??

    And I loved Dee’s tongue-in-cheek comment:

    “Dee has this crazy idea that there should be some sort of double blind, randomized controlled study to prove if those who go through the Freedom Ministry are somehow more free than those who are garden variety Christian who read the Bible and pray. But, I digress…”

    Got me to thinking: do seminaries even teach a basic statistics course, covering topics like descriptive statistics, hypothesis testing, probability, and observational studies and experiments?? If not, I certainly know why..hey, let’s do a controlled experiment to determine cause and effect between tithing and “blessedness”. We randomly select 100 church members, and randomly assign them to three treatment groups, those who give 10% of their gross, one who gives 5% of their gross and another 0%. We could then measure outcomes and test for statistical significance on measurable outcomes to see level of “cursedness”. What? No? OK, we’ll just take Robert Morris’ and Ronnie Floyd’s word for it.

  66. GSD wrote:

    Bill M wrote:
    For those of us without staff to screen our messages, how do we protect ourselves?
    Business idea! Email screening and exorcism for Pastors. Call it… Social Media Spiritual Management. We will sort through your emails, Facebook messages, even letters in the mail, and sort out all of the demonic criticism. It’s all sunshine and roses from here on out. If anyone is unhappy about your performance, you’ll never know it!
    I wonder what our hourly rate should be, given the massive risk we would be taking.

    Your business plan would require a “Substantial Love Offering”.

  67. “Scott’s wife and kids who were all allegedly employed by the church are no longer on the staff.

    I checked the Wayback Machine to see what earlier versions of the website said about Scott and the rest of the family. Then I fell down a rabbit hole comparing the staff list on the current website to the old one. There’s been so much staff turnover that I had to make myself a cheat sheet to even figure it out. I suspect there’s a whole heck of a lot more going on at NRFC than just the senior pastor looking at a few dirty pictures.

    The Worship Pastor formerly listed on the site, Michael John Clement, and his wife Angela (Bookstore director) are no longer associated with the church.

    There was a big overhaul of the “Creative Team” which included Ben Crenshaw. According to his Facebook account, his job with the church ended July 1, 2016. Zach Crenshaw (another son of Scott & Renee) was a NRGen Intern, but I’m not sure when he ended that position.

    Interestly, I also noticed that the church has a position called “Director of First Impressions.” I’m flabbergasted.

  68. Elizabeth Lee wrote:
    <blockquoteInterestly, I also noticed that the church has a position called “Director of First Impressions.” I’m flabbergasted.

    “First impressions” is the new term for greeters and ushers, also maybe coffee. It’s based on Disney’s model. I went to a church for awhile that changed the greeter volunteers to that.

  69. Is there some reason churches can’t act like a business in these respects and say, hey, having this stuff on a work computer is a firing offense. Period. Never mind all this restoration nonsense. Ugh.

    And I’m not a fan of family on staff either. Built in conflicts of interest!

  70. LT wrote:

    Steve was afraid he would never be able to play golf at an exclusive country club without having some back pain. WHAT’S THE POINT IN EVEN LIVING NOW?!

    Ha! This whole story is unreal. I feel like I need to rescue friend from gateways nonsense now.

  71. Lea wrote:

    LT wrote:

    Steve was afraid he would never be able to play golf at an exclusive country club without having some back pain. WHAT’S THE POINT IN EVEN LIVING NOW?!

    Ha! This whole story is unreal. I feel like I need to rescue friend from gateways nonsense now.

    Please do try, but I don’t know how far you’ll get. The first time I heard a sermon series about finding God’s blessing on a luxury golf course was, uh, several presidents ago.

  72. Elizabeth Lee wrote:

    I checked the Wayback Machine to see what earlier versions of the website said about Scott and the rest of the family. Then I fell down a rabbit hole comparing the staff list on the current website to the old one. There’s been so much staff turnover that I had to make myself a cheat sheet to even figure it out. I suspect there’s a whole heck of a lot more going on at NRFC than just the senior pastor looking at a few dirty pictures.

    Good detective work, Elizabeth.

  73. JYJames wrote:

    siteseer wrote:

    God has provided through His Spirit for our spiritual growth.
    Christ is always with us, accessible to each one of us, the Bible is, as well. Paul said, “solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.” (Hebrews 5:14)

    Yes.

    all this seems lost to people who crave excitement and ‘entertainment’ and call it ‘worship’

  74. LT wrote:

    It’s where David Barton is from and it is Ergun Caner’s home church. They love their nasty at that church. In answer to Burwell, I attended once, hoping to bump into Caner (I didn’t)

    LT, here is an interesting bit of trivia – I am now the pastor (bi-vocational) of a church outside Louisburg, NC, where a certain ‘Butch’ Caner, as he was known then and by which the congregation still refers to him, was pastor while he was in seminary at SEBTS.

  75. siteseer wrote:

    Paul said, “solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.” (Hebrews 5:14)

    Which is exactly why these sort of “churches”, and their cool “pastors”, do not target the spiritually mature as prospective church members. The immature are so much easier to deceive.

  76. LT wrote:

    It’s where David Barton is from

    ah, this is the Barton of historical revisionism, yes?

    nightmare scenario: Trump appoints him as Secretary of Education (unless of course, the department is shut down completely and all educational issues left to political agendas of the states, and I don’t know which is worse for our nation’s children)

    I must get a grip and stop worse-case scenarios in my imagination, yes.

  77. Serving Kids In Japan wrote:

    Are “soul wounds” something like trauma?

    I was wondering if this was in any way related to the concept of soul bonding? Maybe the way some people apparently think you are ‘soul bonded’ through sex, they think other kinds of wounds (or maybe those same kinds of wounds) are ‘soul wounds’?

    Basically everything bad harms your soul. If you think of a person’s emotional self as a soul, maybe that makes sense.

    But it still doesn’t really mean anything except to say that hurts cause damage.

  78. Friend wrote:

    ishy wrote:
    If this is true, it’s seriously one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard a Christian say.
    Sadly, that would be quite a contest.

    I can’t forget Kevin Swanson and his “womb tomb” claim. If it’s not #1, it’s gotta be waaaaaaay up on the list.

  79. Law Prof wrote:

    It sounds just like “Miracle” Max Jacobsen, who treated, among others, President Kennedy, Bogie and Bacall, Truman Capote, Mickey Mantle and about half of Hollywood back in the day.

    Is that how the term “Miracle Max” (as in Princess Bride) originated?

  80. Elizabeth Lee wrote:

    I checked the Wayback Machine to see what earlier versions of the website said about Scott and the rest of the family. Then I fell down a rabbit hole comparing the staff list on the current website to the old one. There’s been so much staff turnover that I had to make myself a cheat sheet to even figure it out.

    Purge following Purge faster than the USSR under Stalin or France during the Reign of Terror?

  81. GSD wrote:

    Social Media Spiritual Management. We will sort through your emails, Facebook messages, even letters in the mail, and sort out all of the demonic criticism. It’s all sunshine and roses from here on out. If anyone is unhappy about your performance, you’ll never know it!

    “And we Decree that henceforth the month of September shall be named Commodus, and the Roman Empire shall henceforth be known as the Empire of Caesar Commodus…”
    — The Roman Senate in the old sandal flick Fall of the Roman Empire

  82. Friend wrote:

    LT wrote:

    it’s all good because the “demon of fear of not golfing” (Golfifer) has poked his pointy little head out of Steve’s hip

    Uh, may I just say that this whole scenario doesn’t happen at most churches?

    I sincerely hope you are right. However, so many pastors signed up for this year’s Gateway Conference in October, that they filled a 4,000 seat auditorium, every overflow space and still had to erect a giant tent in the parking lot to seat hundreds more. Supposedly tens of thousands more watched online.
    .
    Over 100 million Americans suffer from chronic pain and are willing to spend over $600 BILLION a year to ease that pain – a lot of which is spent on snake oil. If advertising that your church can cure crippling, chronic pain by driving out Demonic Spirits, well, some enterprising people are going to take advantage of that. There is science behind fake healing. It’s not lasting but anecdotal stories are their weapon of choice. They sell false hope based on these few “lottery winners” and it is a lucrative business.
    .
    I would like to think that most Christians could see through this, but many of these types of churches do quite well. The back doors of such places may be wide (like most MLMs) but they seem capable of enticing more new people. When millionaires (who can afford the best medical care available) are willing to do all kinds of kooky things for pain relief, like having mystery fluids injected next to their spinal chord in an non-sterilized environment, why not try one of these miracle crusades?

    People come from other cities and states for these monthly Gateway Habitation Miracle Crusade services. This coming Summer, the Gateway Students’ Youth Conference theme is 100% Miracle Crusade. Kids from well over 100 churches all over the U.S. will attend and it will be broadcast all over the world. They are indoctrinating the next generation to accept this as legitimate. SMH.
    .
    Let us hope that Gateway’s current financial woes will discourage these pastors in the future from from flocking to GW to learn their secrets to success and that parents will wake up and become more discerning.

    When those children see hundreds of other kids receiving “instant miracles” at this coming Conference, it can shatter their faith as they believe that God “could” help them like He did with all those other people at the Conference. He just chose not to. There’s no “what happened 6 months later” followup session. All they see is God helped a bunch of people but didn’t heal my grandma from cancer, my parent’s marriage, my sick pet, etc. When you are taught that God hands out miracles, on demand, by the bucket load, it’s even more devastating when you believe you’re the only one left out. May God have mercy on the people hosting that Crusade this Summer.

  83. Tom R wrote:

    I’m sure the good pastor was just doing some research on the evils of pornography to prepare for his upcoming sermon series, or to see some porn to better minister to those who are addicted to it. Unless it was, ahem, something a little more serious and perverted, if you get my drift, that would cause the good elders to terminate. Who was that mega church pastor in Colorado??

    New Life in Colorado Springs is a sister church of Gateway and they installed GW pastor Brady Boyd as the new head pastor, so there was a bit more info here in TX on that scandal. New Life intended to stand by Ted Haggard and keep him in place and portray the male prostitute as a liar trying to profit off a lie and sway the upcoming vote on gay marriage.
    .
    In the end too much other corroborative evidence surfaced. Ted sometimes splurged (tithe money) to have more than one escort at a time, so there were other witnesses. He used his personal cell phone to make the appointments. Ted frequented a gay sex toy shop where his picture was identified by a salesperson. Haggard kept a giant canvas bag of sex toys in Denver. He used his personal cell phone number to be called when his newest toy would arrive. Imagine that? Something not in stock. Then there were the young college men. The one intern who got the 6 figure pay-off came forward, but there were others. More people came out of the woodwork and people, including members, were talking.
    .
    Colorado has a more secular bias than say, Texas, so not everyone in the media were willing to overlook all of this corroborating evidence. When Ted tried to use his wife and kids as human shields the gloves came off. New Life was backed into a corner and had to admit to the scandal and pay Ted off to go to AZ and seek therapy and basically fade (not so quietly as it turned out) into the landscape.
    .
    But had the media not amassed the evidence that proved the connections between Ted and his secret life, New Life was originally positioned to defend him and at worst would have probably just had him step down for a “season” then restored him. As it was, the media did sit on the story for quite a while, even in CO, and only went to print/TV AFTER Jones went to talk radio and told his story and it went completely viral. Then the national media jumped in.
    .
    The local CO news stations and papers said, after the fact, that they intended all along to tell the story. They were just waiting to catch Ted on film. They already had him trying to schedule an appointment on audio tape (with confirmation from voice expert it was Haggard) plus all the phone records and personal IDs, so I don’t know if this is true. It sounded like they had enough proof. It seemed like they got scooped by a morning rush hour DJ, so they were forced to jump in. To Ted’s credit he finally admitted to much of it – not all, but more than I expected.
    .
    It makes me seriously wonder what the real story is behind Crenshaw’s removal – however temporary it may be. Causing him and his 3 other family members to step down doesn’t sound consistent with viewing some Girls Gone Wild video. The elders had to have known that in a church where all three campuses are based around a single celebrity pastor, removing him could literally tank their church. I’m guessing there is more to this story. I hope someone comes forward so that other pastors and elders don’t believe that concealment is a legitimate strategy for God’s church.

  84. Canna wrote:

    I talked to a new friend last night who just returned from a mission trip to NYC. It seems that much of their time was spent prayer walking through bad neighborhoods. It seems all this demon talk has infiltrated most churches. When did prayer walking go mainstream? I doubt most people know that it is tied to Ted Haggard’s church in Colorado Springs, and is also known as Spiritual Mapping. It is definitely NAR theology.

    A lot of that started out with George Otis, Jr. and his Transformations videos/DVDs. This caught my attention back about 2000ish because Otis claimed that the city of Hemet, California, had been “transformed” by prayer walking and spiritual mapping. I knew that was utter nonsense. At the time, Hemet was hosting a couple of large apartment complexes full of Scientology Sea Org members. And just on the border of Hemet was, of course, Scientology’s Gold Base. This spiritual mapping did *nothing* for them. What did affect Scientology was continual grinding picketing and lucky things like Tom Cruise jumping on Oprah’s couch in 2005, telling Matt Lauer on Today that he knew more about post-partum depression than anyone else because of Scientology, etc., etc. I think I knew more about the spiritual condition and (non-)transformation of Hemet, California, in the 1990s and early ’00s than Otis did.

    I *cannot* believe people are doing prayer walking instead of offering concrete help. Please let me be clear: I am absolutely NOT speaking against prayer. But I am speaking of spiritual mapping and prayer walking as opposed to what Catholics call the corporal works of mercy: feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, taking care of the sick and burying the dead (may have forgotten one there). And I don’t recall Jesus or Paul saying anything about spiritual mapping.

    These days, though, I hear the big thing in some circles is “interceding in the courts of heaven”–as in you have to present your case before God like a lawyer because Satan has legal hold on you. I mean, I thought Jesus broke all those bonds on the cross.

  85. LT wrote:

    Over 100 million Americans suffer from chronic pain and are willing to spend over $600 BILLION a year to ease that pain – a lot of which is spent on snake oil.

    Dee could probably speak better to this, but we do have a serious problem with opioid addiction here in the USA. Given how bad addiction to Oxycontin or heroin is, I’m almost of the opinion that church-borne snake oil is probably less destructive.

  86. Dee Holmes (fka mirele) wrote:

    LT wrote:

    Over 100 million Americans suffer from chronic pain and are willing to spend over $600 BILLION a year to ease that pain – a lot of which is spent on snake oil.

    Dee could probably speak better to this, but we do have a serious problem with opioid addiction here in the USA. Given how bad addiction to Oxycontin or heroin is, I’m almost of the opinion that church-borne snake oil is probably less destructive.

    I agree with you on the destructiveness of certain opioid drugs, but at least those do fall under government regulations and there are rehab programs that specifically address this abuse in a qualified manner.

    Churches like Gateway have ZERO and I mean zero accountability to anyone. How is it possible that a $150M/yr organizations gets to pay no taxes, file no financial statements with anyone, keep their books sealed, yet manipulate suffering people for, in many cases, over 20% of their gross income advertising false hope for medical problems? The average family at Gateway pays $15,500 to attend. At least drug dealers risk facing arrest and prosecution. Realistically, there is no other industry on earth that is so non-regulated despite affecting the health and well-being of hundreds of millions of people while maintaining control over billions of dollars.

    Depleting one’s financial resources causes added stress which exacerbates chronic conditions. People often give so much to these churches and televangelists seeking relief that they cannot afford proper healthcare. And let’s not forget Freedom Ministry gets you coming and going… Sign up for your pain and give us a bunch of money to help you get better. If we don’t help you with your pain, come back later if you turn to drugs for relief. We will drive those demons of addiction out, providing you an “instant cure” from drug addiction and related cravings, like Robert Morris claims happened to him, for just 10% of your income for life.

    I understand the U.S. has a long way to go on cleaning up opioid abuse (verses monitored use – a number of TWW readers suffer chronic pain and I am very sympathetic to their issues) but these con artist megas would be charged with fraud if not for that easily obtained IRS exemption. Psychics draining people’s bank accounts are finally getting put away for offering Spiritual guidance that only benefits the psychics. They only clear in the hundreds of thousands a year.

    I watched parents of a deaf mute young man stand on the stage at Habitation. Steve Dulin made a big dramatic show of driving out the spirit of muteness. They said he was destined to be a preacher and God would restore his voice. His family drove down from Houston and wept on stage. At the end of the exorcism, this 27 year old man who had not uttered a sound since he was a toddler (he had brain damage from Spinal Meningitis I believe) strained and strained to speak. The audience sat on the edge of their seats while the GW Elders, including the surgeon who knew better, extended their hands. And….nothing….. just sobbing from the mother.

    The worst part was Steve said, well maybe the seeds of removing the Demon of Muteness were planted tonight, you can send us a report later if anything happens. Steve had corresponded with the parents in advance and encouraged them to get their hopes up and make the long awful drive to Southlake with tales of the other “miracles”.

    I felt sick to my stomach watching that and cannot think of that night without physical repulsion. The young man’s sister wrote later about the waste of time and how they were immediately turned away and had to drive another 6 hours back after less than 5 minutes of the pastor’s time. Had the boy been healed, oh how Steve and the others have exalted him and lauded him, and made movies about him. They would have gone out for the finest late night dinner that money could buy. Daystar would have put him on everyone of their TV shows. But the magic trick didn’t work so like the lady who collapsed last month at Habitation who had to gurneyed out by paramedics, they were of no use to Gateway or Steve so they had to be swept away, like the riff raff that they are.
    .
    Abuse like this can tear entire families apart every bit as much as drug addiction can. At least there are some standards governing snake oil. These faith healers aren’t even required to use a “results not typical” warning. Why would they when there is no means of getting your money back?

  87. LT wrote:

    Churches like Gateway have ZERO and I mean zero accountability to anyone.

    Oh, but there will be a payday someday:

    “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day [when I judge them], ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, and driven out demons in Your name, and done many miracles in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them publicly, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me [you are banished from My presence], you who act wickedly [disregarding My commands].” (Matthew 7:21-23)

  88. LT wrote:

    Churches like Gateway have ZERO and I mean zero accountability to anyone. How is it possible that a $150M/yr organizations gets to pay no taxes, file no financial statements with anyone, keep their books sealed, yet manipulate suffering people for, in many cases, over 20% of their gross income advertising false hope for medical problems? The average family at Gateway pays $15,500 to attend. At least drug dealers risk facing arrest and prosecution. Realistically, there is no other industry on earth that is so non-regulated despite affecting the health and well-being of hundreds of millions of people while maintaining control over billions of dollars.

    What would happen if professors in public colleges and medical professionals behaved like these charlatans?

  89. Nancy2 wrote:

    What would happen if professors in public colleges and medical professionals behaved like these charlatans?

    They would lose their jobs! But that’s the point LT is making when he says “Churches like Gateway have ZERO and I mean zero accountability to anyone.”

    Likewise, SBC doesn’t have an effective accountability system in place to hold characters like Mohler in check. Folks argue that’s what the trustee board of each SBC entity is supposed to do, but the trustees are just yes-men who are loyal to entity heads. So, a guy like Mohler can launch a rebellion against the belief and practice of majority Southern Baptists and Calvinize the denomination, while the non-Calvinist majority supports him financially! A strange arrangement, indeed.

  90. Max wrote:

    Likewise, SBC doesn’t have an effective accountability system in place to hold characters like Mohler in check.

    I don’t believe there will ever be any accountability system within the SBC. There was talk of making a network listing of sexual predators and pedophiles for SBC affiliate churches to access, but they decided it couldn’t be done.
    I think it can be done, it would just cost some money and some people would have to sacrifice a little of the time they spend self-glorifying and actuall do some work! Just my disgruntled opinion.

  91. LT wrote:

    …negative feedback/questions have demonic spirits tied to them so if he opens an email or comment card that isn’t filled with praise, he can be infected by a demonic spirit for a week or more.

    JUST LIKE SCIENTOLOGY BODY THETANS!

  92. Elizabeth Lee wrote:

    Interestly, I also noticed that the church has a position called “Director of First Impressions.” I’m flabbergasted.

    Call me when they get to “Commander of Great Feathers” (actual above-top-of-the-list title in a New-Agey pyramid scheme called “The Airplane Game”).

  93. Canna wrote:

    When did prayer walking go mainstream? I doubt most people know that it is tied to Ted Haggard’s church in Colorado Springs…

    Ted Haggard of rentboy fame.

  94. Lea wrote:

    soul bonding?

    Maybe like “spiritual connection”, practiced by an infamous “church” near Seattle back in the day.
    1: Find someone who attracts you “spiritually” and stare into their eyes whilst “dancing before the lOrd”.
    2: Find that the things of spouse will look strangely dim. Spiritual connection strangely becomes sexual connection.
    3: pAstor has the pick of spiritual connections, and the most.
    4: pAstor’s wife can top that one by having a vision in which she and jEsus are having connection whilst the church is watching.
    Meanwhile, the impressionable young Mark Driscoll is growing up nearby. Perhaps this explains his later disparagement of “love songs to Jesus”.
    https://russellkorets.com/2013/07/08/from-a-church-of-3000-to-0/

  95. Nancy2 wrote:

    There was talk of making a network listing of sexual predators and pedophiles for SBC affiliate churches to access, but they decided it couldn’t be done.

    Yep, that will never happen. Developing and publicizing such listing would be to admit there are pervert church leaders operating within SBC. Such sin is embedded in other church groups, not the good ole SBC … denial. SBC is having enough trouble keeping members from joining the Done ranks, as New Calvinism spreads. They certainly don’t need any more bad press; news about sexual predators/pedophiles on the loose in SBC churches would not be good.

  96. Seems these churches with scandals are good at: Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain. Ignore reality and get suckered into the theatrics on stage.

  97. Dave A A wrote:

    Meanwhile, the impressionable young Mark Driscoll is growing up [near the disastrous Community Chapel]. Perhaps this explains his later disparagement of “love songs to Jesus”.

    Well, TBH, the “love song to Jesus” and “Jesus my beautiful boyfriend” tropes are cringeworthy enough in themselves…

    I read the article you linked to. It is a tragic story and, if true as presented, a particularly disgusting one. It’s hard to say whether it had any effect on weeMarkDriskle but it certainly had an effect on many people. To my mind, it illustrates the two-fold effect of any well-evolved deception.

    Put another way, if the devil (or some such sentient operative within that kingdom, to which Jesus certainly did refer) can get a particular bit of crackpot extremist ideology well-established, so that it spawns a load of crackpot behaviour, he gets at least two wins for the price of one. Firstly, he gets all the people who are seduced by the crackpot behaviour. Secondly, with a bit of patience, he gets all the people who flee as far as they can in the opposite direction, usually believing that they’re being safe and balanced, but who in the process reject a lot of vital and good stuff in the process. This second win is much bigger.

    With the so-called “Community Chapel”, the match that lit the bonfire was the wrongful pursuit of the manifestation of the spirit. Inevitably, there will be many who will look at such a disaster, associate all things “pentecostal” or “charismatic” with the same, and end up rejecting the Holy Spirit himself. Among those who survived the debacle of Mars Hill (and I heard this via Warren Throckmorton) there’s a saying that – to quote Throckmorton – “Mars Hill created as many atheists as Christians”.

  98. Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    With the so-called “Community Chapel”, the match that lit the bonfire was the wrongful pursuit of the manifestation of the spirit. Inevitably, there will be many who will look at such a disaster, associate all things “pentecostal” or “charismatic” with the same, and end up rejecting the Holy Spirit himself.

    ‘morning NICK,
    when I started reading on evangelical blogs, I first encountered some of the stranger teachings of pentecostal/charismatic Christians;
    and I thought then how far they were from the orthodox understanding of the Holy Spirit

    without the tradition of the Church, relying on isolated passages of Scripture, some very peculiar teachings and practices have evolved;
    but the sense of the sacred powerful mystery of the Holy Spirit is missing in these fringe groups …. instead there is another ‘tradition’ among them:
    they have these traveling ‘shows’ where scam artists pretend to heal paid shills in the audience who pretend to be disabled ….. and then the money rolls in to the scammer …. it’s an old American scene, these ‘shows’, preying on those who desperately seeking help

    I guess Driscoll was giving the people what they wanted for a while, before he absconded with the monies …. people put their faith in these showmen and then are disappointed?

  99. “LET’S GIVE EM SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT …”

    Watchblogs like TWW are fulfilling their responsibility to the Lord and not subject to the control, manipulation, and intimidation of church leaders. Pastor Humphrey, when you give watchmen something to talk about, they are doing what they are called to do. “On your walls (Church), I have set watchmen; all the day and all the night they shall never be silent.” (Isaiah 62:6)

  100. @ Nick Bulbeck:
    Good observations. This was the most locally-publicized church scandal in that area until Mars Hill, contributing maybe to it being the highly unchurched area Fiscal liked to talk about later. Did you read the comments? The demon of spiritual connections is still manifesting himself in a small remnant under a new “Agape” name, and the old pAstor has just recently been put out to pasture.
    30+ years ago I had a co-worker who went to Community Chapel. The company took our office to team-building exercises, which included a couple new-agey ones seemingly relying upon demonic influences. Another Christian man, this young lady, and I were the only ones who declined to participate (despite great pressure from management). While sitting out, we were able to converse and the topic turned to her “church”. We attempted to convince her to leave, making the point that they were doing the same sort of stuff as the company. She couldn’t see it.

  101. Nancy2 wrote:

    And the truth is not gossip!!!
    ……or slander!

    Homeland Security’s instruction to Americans “See something, say something” is just as relevant in church!

  102. Dave A A wrote:

    Lea wrote:
    soul bonding?

    Maybe like “spiritual connection”, practiced by an infamous “church” near Seattle back in the day.
    1: Find someone who attracts you “spiritually” and stare into their eyes whilst “dancing before the lOrd”.
    2: Find that the things of spouse will look strangely dim. Spiritual connection strangely becomes sexual connection.
    3: pAstor has the pick of spiritual connections, and the most.
    4: pAstor’s wife can top that one by having a vision in which she and jEsus are having connection whilst the church is watching.

    Point 4 sounds like Bridal Mysticism on Bath Salts.

    With a side order of Sanctioned wife-swapping/temple prostitution.
    (But no actual Tab A into Slot B, so like Douggie ESQUIRE everyone can wipe their mouths and announce “I have not sinned”.)

    As for Point 3, in the words of my old Dungeonmaster:
    “Most cults are started so the cult leader can (1) Get Rich, (2) Get Laid, or (3) Both.”

  103. Christiane wrote:

    they have these traveling ‘shows’ where scam artists pretend to heal paid shills in the audience who pretend to be disabled ….. and then the money rolls in to the scammer …. it’s an old American scene, these ‘shows’, preying on those who desperately seeking help

    The faith healing version of the Old West Medicine Show.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicine_show

  104. Christiane wrote:

    I guess Driscoll was giving the people what they wanted for a while, before he absconded with the monies …. people put their faith in these showmen and then are disappointed?

    Too true, sadly. There are men (and, more rarely, women in the same industry) who should never be pastors; they lack not only the character but also the love for God or their neighbour that the office needs. But those men will always be “pastors” because they meet the requirements of the worship industry. There will always be people desperate to worship them and make them wealthy.

  105. Christiane wrote:

    all this seems lost to people who crave excitement and ‘entertainment’ and call it ‘worship’

    Back in the day, it was idols and Asherah poles that drew the crowds. All that glitters…
    Bling.

  106. siteseer wrote:

    Dave A A wrote:

    Maybe like “spiritual connection”, practiced by an infamous “church” near Seattle back in the day.

    Wow. That was just amazing. I found this article also, https://culteducation.com/group/867-community-chapel/1116-ministers-teachings-wrack-church-move-of-god-linked-to-divorces-suicides-alleged-murder-of-child.html
    The things people will do, it mystifies me.

    Two suicides, one murder, and counting…

    All from spiritual wife-swapping with a Christian coat of paint.

  107. JYJames wrote:

    Back in the day, it was idols and Asherah poles that drew the crowds. All that glitters…
    Bling.

    Not to be confused with Maypole plaiting and the coming of the Solstice celebrations practiced by present day Wiccans.

  108. Christiane wrote:

    oh no, the May Pole is a Swedish custom

    To me it’s just cool the way they plait the pole with ribbon and garlands. Same with the Solstice celebrations when the sun reaches its highest and lowest points in the sky. Whether Wiccans or just regular folk do it, I think it’s still charming.

  109. Muff Potter wrote:

    To me it’s just cool the way they plait the pole with ribbon and garlands. Same with the Solstice celebrations when the sun reaches its highest and lowest points in the sky. Whether Wiccans or just regular folk do it, I think it’s still charming.

    Christians have done a pretty good job of hijacking “pagan” holidays and ceremonies. Some Christians worry about the pagan roots of holiday celebrations such as Christmas trees and Easter eggs. So they whip people into a frenzy to boycott such traditions. On the other hand, “to the victors go the spoils.”

  110. Ken F wrote:

    Christians have done a pretty good job of hijacking “pagan” holidays and ceremonies. Some Christians worry about the pagan roots of holiday celebrations such as Christmas trees and Easter eggs. So they whip people into a frenzy to boycott such traditions. On the other hand, “to the victors go the spoils.”

    well, maybe the early Church thought ‘all truth is God’s truth’, so when something symbolic of good or of the victory of good over evil was celebrated in the pagan world, then it might still find a place in a ‘renewed’ way to be used in Christian celebration.

    Example: the pagan marking and celebrating of the winter and summer solstices. Six months apart, with waxing and waning amounts of daylight. So the Church celebrates the summer solstice as the birthday of St. John the Baptist who said ‘I must decrease and You must increase’ and from the summer soltice, the daylight decreases in length.

    And the winter solstice comes and the Church celebrates it as the birth of Christ, the coming of the Light of the World, marking the turning of the year when the amount of daylight begins to INCREASE in our world. (We have to remember that the Church was thinking in terms of the northern hemisphere’s solstice patter, when these two feast days were set as ‘holy days’)

    I would say that the Church put some thought into how it ‘transformed’ and ‘renewed’ pagan celebrations in order to increase the way that new Christian converts could understand the good news of Christ.

  111. @ Christiane:
    In union with the concept of winter sostice, the celebration of Advent also carries in it a pagan celebration: the Advent wreath: as the weeks grow closer to winter solstice, the darkest time, the candles each week on the Advent wreath will increase, until just before the Christmas celebration, at the turn of the solstice time, when the days were darkest of all the year, the wreath was fully lit with four candles,
    awaiting the coming of the Light of the World, the birth of Our Lord.