I just sat through 4:46 of hearing about “Brother Hyles”, and John R Rice and no scripture and no Jesus. Sounds like good old fashioned religion/preaching, and sticking to the ancient landmarks to me.
Wow. Just wow.
It’s scary.
Sermon outline I got from that
I. preaching Expositionally means your a liberal
II. Don’t Slap Dr. Hyles
III You owe Dr. Hyles alot
IV Slap an Evangelical or Liberal Instead(or grandma)
V. Don’t critisize guys who are building big churches and have big numbers
VI. You can make vieled unwarrented commets from the pulpit, but the other guy can’t
VII. When there is disagreement,silence is golden
XI. May God bless us, everyone, as we go out to eat.
X. Amen
Somehow I get the feeling that all the yelling and talking was just because he wanted someone to go buy him a new suit.
Stuff I forgot that I should have added
Dr. Hyles took all the good threw out the bad and created a Independen Baptist Super
Fundmentalism at Hyles-Anderson College.
What? No alter call, just lets go eat?!
Gray is no longer the pastor of that church. His son is. I guess they want to keep it(the pastorate) in the family.
So said a child molester….
BTW I’m fairly unfamiliar the various fundy ‘men of gawd”. Who is this Bob Gray. I googled, the name, but found someone in Jacksonville area that doesn’t look like him that passed away before his trial for molestation charges. Same guy? Diff?
@RobM: “I googled, the name, but found someone in Jacksonville area that doesn’t look like him that passed away before his trial for molestation charges. Same guy? Diff?”
More like three and now two(hopefully only two). The Jacksonville one passed away while in jail. There the Bob Gray in the video and the second his son , who has taken over for his dad( hereditery pastorates).
Woooooooow. So I guess if a “liberal” disagrees with you they should just go buy you some new clothes and then he’ll never mention it again. Cool. Who’s up for the task?? 😛
Hey bob, here’s one for you, Jack Hyles was and empire building heretic. His greatest contribution was the spread of “Hit-n-Run ” evangelism, the Stop Light evangelism and easy believism his minions perfected in order to make the numbers saved each week look good.
He was a dictatorial home wrecker as well. Hyles was and continues to be a foul stench that drives people away from Truth and has done more to harm the cause of Christ than an army of atheists could in a thousand years.
Most wouldn’t slap him because that much that is piled up, walking and talking will splatter.
too subtle?
Excellently said Don!!! Its amazing to me how many followers fell under his cult of personality the effects of which are still felt today becuase of the followers still propigating his brand of nonsense.
I LIKE expositional preaching. I don’t like Billy Sunday, Jack Hyles, John R Rice.
SLAP!
🙂
that would suck to have some child molester out there with your exact name…no wonder he is all ticked off.
How many times did he say the word Slap? 40+ I would guess. Somebody buy this man a thesaurus!
Seriously though, disagreeing with Jack Hyles means you are a liberal? Anybody know that Jack Hyles got on the KJVO bandwagon really late? I know a preacher that graduated from there in the early days and used a NKJV the whole time. He did not ever have a problem with it until later.
Dr. Rice used to preach from other versions in the early days as well. I am guessing Gray would consider the use of other versions to be “slap worthy”.
Hyles references = 18
Christ references = 0
There is simply no justification for that.
Ewwww….
I’m glad I never had to listen to this weirdo preach in real life. I would’ve found myself fuming and furiously writing notes just so I could keep track of what he said and blog about it later. 😛
What an idiot!!!
I have spent time with Dr. Gray personally. He struck me as the height of arrogance. I drove him to his hotel as a preacher boy, I asked him for some advice. He asked me if I had someone saved and baptized every week. When I said no, he told me I was not fit to even consider entering the ministry. He then had me stop at pizza hut and gave me a butt chewing for no running over a cat.
Sorry about the spelling and punctuation errors, my dial up connection was acting up and some characters didn’t take.
He was mad you didn’t run over a cat? That’s a classic sign of sociopathic behavior I think, right? Like no concern for anyone or anytjing but self? Not shocking from a Hyles supporting “preacher”:
He also had people stand at the end of the service if they promised to win a soul that week. He also refers to ladies in the church as “heifers.” Other memorable quotes–“Slits are for sluts.” (At his kawlege, girls must have any slit totally sewn to the hemline, which includes button up skirts.) He preahes at my inlaws church every year.
He is 100% Jack Hyles, but to be fair Gray was not preaching here. “ok lets go eat. Are you hungry?” Must have been at the end of one of his morning services at the Soulwinning Clinic.
He is FAR beyond Hyles. HAC is a rank liberal institution compared to his school. (Bob is one of the major reasons I left fundieism.) Every time I hve heard him preach he reminded me of Samson– I felt like I had been slain by the jawbone of an @$$.
@trex even if he weren’t preaching, how do you conduct a soul winning seminar that features Jack Hyles & John R Rice as the solution to the problem of sin & evil?
WHERE’S RICK!?! LMAO.
I didn’t really understand what he was trying to say. That was dumb.
What is with these people and slapping? If we put this guy and Jack Schaap together in a room and tossed them some personal preference topic not covered in the Bible that they disagreed on, would a slapfight commence?
The only way Hyles would ever make it to heaven won’t be for what “he ” did and his long list of funderful accomplishments. No, if Hyles made it to heaven it will only be the same way any of us make it… by the Grace of God.
It’s kind of an amusing juxtaposition that the guys that rail the hardest about “effiminate” men, are quickest to use/threaten what is considered effiminate fighting technique by the same mysoginists/chauvinists.
@Don BIG if! 🙂
Oh, the things I love about this segment:
1) How often do you actually hear someone say they’d rather hear the opinions of a man rather than the actual Bible?
2)The little head-nodding pawn beside him.
3)That he takes a difference in preaching styles and turns it into something personal.
4) It seems the focus of his “soul-winning” is conversion to Hyles-Anderson-ism, rather than to faith in Christ.
5) The alternating scream-whisper combination that ensures you’ll never really hear a complete sentence.
Best part of the video “Let’s stand cause we’re going to go eat!”
@Darrell this guy is definitely that same Bob Gray from that Texas site? His pic on their site looks soooo much younger & leaner. IDK how old the photos are on their site, but there’s a LOT of gray hair on the Bob Gray in this video.
The guy on the site is the man in the video’s son (also named Bob Gray just make it more confusing). I was just trying to show where the man in the video was from (i.e. not Florida)
Ah, makes sense. I need a fundamentalist org chart to keep track of who all these lunatics are!
Actually Schaap and Gray(both father annd son) are not on speaking terms with Schaap because Schaap refuses to call the KJV inspired, but instead call it preserved. At least the last time I checked. If the Grays said anything about Shcaap it would have been said here:
They have Grey on there and they also have R.A. Smith who has been featured on there. Also the modified Hyles (Oklahoma Baptist Jim Vineyard).
OOOO. They even linked to the Schaap Says he”ll slap grandma video and labeled the link as Schaaps view of women.
So yea. to the guy who asked if Grey and Schaap would get into a slapping contest they answer is probably yes. Or it might just be a verbal slapping match.
Also Bob Grey I, his church, and college are the one talked about in the book, Tales from the Temple : the Texas Baptist Crucible. One can find this in the post Writing Memoirs After leaving Fundamentalism.
Oh, if only someone would arrange this slap-fight in an octagon full of jello and KY.
“Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!!!!”
I’ll be thankful tomorrow when I lead worship and have the priviledge of listening to a good sermon from my boss, who happens to be a woman.
In the Still pic above is he saying, “The kool-aid line forms on my right…”
You know these demigods all secretly admire Jim Jones for the total control he had over his people… they all covet that kind of worship for themselves but are not willing to do what it ultimately takes to get there… so they will forever chase that elusive “man god” status.
@Phil I clicked around on the HACalumni page, and the scanned letters between various anti-Schaap people & Schaap read like an out & out parody of someone would write up of small idiotic angry men accusing each other of meaningless BS as a power grab, playing the same old “you’re angy/bitter/haughty/arrogant/liberal” cards back & forth at each other, and just generally making fools of themselves as they try to make fools of each other. The idea of Schaap calling an alumni angry/haughty/arrogant as if that’s somehow not what they try to create there takes a LOT of audacity. I still think one of the SFL readers could invent a phony site lace it with angry e-mails back and forth, phony PhD’s, loaded w/ regrets & prayers for each other, and could possibly get it listed as an SFL:FWOTW. There seems to be no parody possible though that fundies haven’t already done & continue to do. Please please please someone setup that cage match!
PS, Baker in one of those letters signed off “Regretfully, Dave Baker”. The only thing that could have been more true and funny would have been to sign off “Passive Aggressively, Dave Baker”.
Dear Fundies, as painful as it is to see your infighting, thank you for at least parodying yourselves for us in the process.
This could be sold as a teaser to a WWE fight promoted by Senate candidate Linda McMahon. It would be worth watching it on USA Network’s WWE RAW.
I wonder if they think that the vast amount of people really give a rat’s rear about their in fighting? Why isn’t there a 24/7 all Fundy cable network? They could run reruns of their sermons with Crossfire type progams discussing the pressing subjects of the day (like the 1611 KJV).
At one time, when Hyles was still alive, Bob Gray of Texas (Longview Baptist Temple) and Tom Neal of Orange Park Florida (Berean Baptist), were the two major Hyles henchmen. When Schaap rose to his position as lord of the Hyles empire (by virtue of marriage to Hyles’ daughter), both Gray and Neal made the catastrophic blunder of challenging Schaap and trying to seize supremacy of the Hyles empire. Both went went into sharp declines from their previous stations. The Russell Hirner (school staff at Gray’s Christian school) child molesting case and resulting lawsuit further diminished Gray’s membership count, and this incident coincided with James Spurgeon’s TALES FROM THE TEMPLE. Gray’s membership has declined a lot.
Meanwhile, for a couple years on the FFF, there was talk that Berean was close to bankruptcy. This talk has again emerged, and there are now links posted on the FFF to show legal records of liens and other financial info. The talk is that Tom Neal has filed for bankruptcy for Berean. There is also a lot of talk of unethical financial practices at Berean, but for all anybody knows, the church constitution may allow Neal to treat the church like his personal property.
Anyway, both guys are on their last legs as leaders of the old Hyles machine, and it seems that they may be trying to prolong their individual kingdoms long enough to get through retirement.
So they have both moved from prime wannabes to loud has-beens. Neither one has the clout he used to have.
Can’t believe I am agreeing with you, but your analysis is dead on. I was working in a ministry that was caught in the middle of the power struggle for ordship of the empire. I know all about it!
@Steve WWE doesn’t have the raw emotion, and genuine rage. They may be good actors, but you just came substitute out of control power hungry rage with acting (even if it is roided up). If USA network ever discovered the possiblities w/ IBF RAW they could own the world! 🙂
@BASSENCO good background info. I’ve never heard of any of these creeps, and hope to forget the whole lot of them by the time I get to bed tonight!
Ah the kneeling Neals. They broke with Schaap when he first started saying weird things. things like the lords Supper is like havin spiritual sex with God (no joke) and Schaaps message For Christ’s Sake . All this is probably still on the internet. It might be on HAC Alumni. it may not. The sad thing is alot of that sight is about fueding who is closer to what Jack Hyles belived.
34 seconds to rage. A new record!
Whoa Whoa WHOA…. did anyone see him flash the “devil’s horns” at 1:40 to 1:43? OMG HE IS THE DEVIL IN SYMBOLISM!!!!
LET’S EAT!!!! Nothing mentioned about the SIN of gluttony..
@Jason! OH YES HE DID! HE DID!
Blood pressure spiked at 39 seconds in….turned it off.
Thanking God right now for the nondenom. pastor we have that preaches…verse by verse by verse….
Who’s Rick?
RobM it appears these are just closing remarks after maybe he or someone else preached. It was lunch time he said…no invitation was given, ect. Darrell i did not watch the links, but i will take your word on it.
Hereditary pastorships? Isn’t that a large part of why the Catholics instituted mandatory celibacy for priests?
And, @phil – communion is like having sex with Jesus? Well, I’ve read some mystical writings on it that seem to lean towards that, in very guarded metaphorical language, but I never thought I’d hear of a fundie preacher echoing 14th century Catholic mystics.
Comments are closed.
A silly blog dedicated to Independent Fundamental Baptists, their standards, their beliefs, and their craziness.
I just sat through 4:46 of hearing about “Brother Hyles”, and John R Rice and no scripture and no Jesus. Sounds like good old fashioned religion/preaching, and sticking to the ancient landmarks to me.
Wow. Just wow.
It’s scary.
Sermon outline I got from that
I. preaching Expositionally means your a liberal
II. Don’t Slap Dr. Hyles
III You owe Dr. Hyles alot
IV Slap an Evangelical or Liberal Instead(or grandma)
V. Don’t critisize guys who are building big churches and have big numbers
VI. You can make vieled unwarrented commets from the pulpit, but the other guy can’t
VII. When there is disagreement,silence is golden
XI. May God bless us, everyone, as we go out to eat.
X. Amen
Somehow I get the feeling that all the yelling and talking was just because he wanted someone to go buy him a new suit.
Stuff I forgot that I should have added
Dr. Hyles took all the good threw out the bad and created a Independen Baptist Super
Fundmentalism at Hyles-Anderson College.
What? No alter call, just lets go eat?!
Gray is no longer the pastor of that church. His son is. I guess they want to keep it(the pastorate) in the family.
So said a child molester….
BTW I’m fairly unfamiliar the various fundy ‘men of gawd”. Who is this Bob Gray. I googled, the name, but found someone in Jacksonville area that doesn’t look like him that passed away before his trial for molestation charges. Same guy? Diff?
@RobM: “I googled, the name, but found someone in Jacksonville area that doesn’t look like him that passed away before his trial for molestation charges. Same guy? Diff?”
Youtube says this is a different guy.
There are two Bob Grays.
The (alleged) child molester Bob Gray was from Jacksonville, FL: http://www.news4jax.com/news/9251642/detail.html
This Bob Gray is from Texas: http://lbtministries.com/LBT/Our_Pastor.html
More like three and now two(hopefully only two). The Jacksonville one passed away while in jail. There the Bob Gray in the video and the second his son , who has taken over for his dad( hereditery pastorates).
Woooooooow. So I guess if a “liberal” disagrees with you they should just go buy you some new clothes and then he’ll never mention it again. Cool. Who’s up for the task?? 😛
Hey bob, here’s one for you, Jack Hyles was and empire building heretic. His greatest contribution was the spread of “Hit-n-Run ” evangelism, the Stop Light evangelism and easy believism his minions perfected in order to make the numbers saved each week look good.
He was a dictatorial home wrecker as well. Hyles was and continues to be a foul stench that drives people away from Truth and has done more to harm the cause of Christ than an army of atheists could in a thousand years.
Most wouldn’t slap him because that much that is piled up, walking and talking will splatter.
too subtle?
Excellently said Don!!! Its amazing to me how many followers fell under his cult of personality the effects of which are still felt today becuase of the followers still propigating his brand of nonsense.
I LIKE expositional preaching. I don’t like Billy Sunday, Jack Hyles, John R Rice.
SLAP!
🙂
that would suck to have some child molester out there with your exact name…no wonder he is all ticked off.
How many times did he say the word Slap? 40+ I would guess. Somebody buy this man a thesaurus!
Seriously though, disagreeing with Jack Hyles means you are a liberal? Anybody know that Jack Hyles got on the KJVO bandwagon really late? I know a preacher that graduated from there in the early days and used a NKJV the whole time. He did not ever have a problem with it until later.
Dr. Rice used to preach from other versions in the early days as well. I am guessing Gray would consider the use of other versions to be “slap worthy”.
Hyles references = 18
Christ references = 0
There is simply no justification for that.
Ewwww….
I’m glad I never had to listen to this weirdo preach in real life. I would’ve found myself fuming and furiously writing notes just so I could keep track of what he said and blog about it later. 😛
What an idiot!!!
I have spent time with Dr. Gray personally. He struck me as the height of arrogance. I drove him to his hotel as a preacher boy, I asked him for some advice. He asked me if I had someone saved and baptized every week. When I said no, he told me I was not fit to even consider entering the ministry. He then had me stop at pizza hut and gave me a butt chewing for no running over a cat.
Sorry about the spelling and punctuation errors, my dial up connection was acting up and some characters didn’t take.
He was mad you didn’t run over a cat? That’s a classic sign of sociopathic behavior I think, right? Like no concern for anyone or anytjing but self? Not shocking from a Hyles supporting “preacher”:
He also had people stand at the end of the service if they promised to win a soul that week. He also refers to ladies in the church as “heifers.” Other memorable quotes–“Slits are for sluts.” (At his kawlege, girls must have any slit totally sewn to the hemline, which includes button up skirts.) He preahes at my inlaws church every year.
He is 100% Jack Hyles, but to be fair Gray was not preaching here. “ok lets go eat. Are you hungry?” Must have been at the end of one of his morning services at the Soulwinning Clinic.
He is FAR beyond Hyles. HAC is a rank liberal institution compared to his school. (Bob is one of the major reasons I left fundieism.) Every time I hve heard him preach he reminded me of Samson– I felt like I had been slain by the jawbone of an @$$.
@trex He wasn’t preaching?
Here are the 3 previous parts to this message:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DfHdFKje40
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEvPFWIy6-U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3_Y41hRIEo
It looks like “preaching” to me.
@trex even if he weren’t preaching, how do you conduct a soul winning seminar that features Jack Hyles & John R Rice as the solution to the problem of sin & evil?
WHERE’S RICK!?! LMAO.
I didn’t really understand what he was trying to say. That was dumb.
What is with these people and slapping? If we put this guy and Jack Schaap together in a room and tossed them some personal preference topic not covered in the Bible that they disagreed on, would a slapfight commence?
The only way Hyles would ever make it to heaven won’t be for what “he ” did and his long list of funderful accomplishments. No, if Hyles made it to heaven it will only be the same way any of us make it… by the Grace of God.
It’s kind of an amusing juxtaposition that the guys that rail the hardest about “effiminate” men, are quickest to use/threaten what is considered effiminate fighting technique by the same mysoginists/chauvinists.
@Don BIG if! 🙂
Oh, the things I love about this segment:
1) How often do you actually hear someone say they’d rather hear the opinions of a man rather than the actual Bible?
2)The little head-nodding pawn beside him.
3)That he takes a difference in preaching styles and turns it into something personal.
4) It seems the focus of his “soul-winning” is conversion to Hyles-Anderson-ism, rather than to faith in Christ.
5) The alternating scream-whisper combination that ensures you’ll never really hear a complete sentence.
Best part of the video “Let’s stand cause we’re going to go eat!”
@Darrell this guy is definitely that same Bob Gray from that Texas site? His pic on their site looks soooo much younger & leaner. IDK how old the photos are on their site, but there’s a LOT of gray hair on the Bob Gray in this video.
The guy on the site is the man in the video’s son (also named Bob Gray just make it more confusing). I was just trying to show where the man in the video was from (i.e. not Florida)
Ah, makes sense. I need a fundamentalist org chart to keep track of who all these lunatics are!
Actually Schaap and Gray(both father annd son) are not on speaking terms with Schaap because Schaap refuses to call the KJV inspired, but instead call it preserved. At least the last time I checked. If the Grays said anything about Shcaap it would have been said here:
http://hacalumni.com/
They have Grey on there and they also have R.A. Smith who has been featured on there. Also the modified Hyles (Oklahoma Baptist Jim Vineyard).
OOOO. They even linked to the Schaap Says he”ll slap grandma video and labeled the link as Schaaps view of women.
So yea. to the guy who asked if Grey and Schaap would get into a slapping contest they answer is probably yes. Or it might just be a verbal slapping match.
Also Bob Grey I, his church, and college are the one talked about in the book, Tales from the Temple : the Texas Baptist Crucible. One can find this in the post Writing Memoirs After leaving Fundamentalism.
Oh, if only someone would arrange this slap-fight in an octagon full of jello and KY.
“Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!!!!”
I’ll be thankful tomorrow when I lead worship and have the priviledge of listening to a good sermon from my boss, who happens to be a woman.
In the Still pic above is he saying, “The kool-aid line forms on my right…”
You know these demigods all secretly admire Jim Jones for the total control he had over his people… they all covet that kind of worship for themselves but are not willing to do what it ultimately takes to get there… so they will forever chase that elusive “man god” status.
@Phil I clicked around on the HACalumni page, and the scanned letters between various anti-Schaap people & Schaap read like an out & out parody of someone would write up of small idiotic angry men accusing each other of meaningless BS as a power grab, playing the same old “you’re angy/bitter/haughty/arrogant/liberal” cards back & forth at each other, and just generally making fools of themselves as they try to make fools of each other. The idea of Schaap calling an alumni angry/haughty/arrogant as if that’s somehow not what they try to create there takes a LOT of audacity. I still think one of the SFL readers could invent a phony site lace it with angry e-mails back and forth, phony PhD’s, loaded w/ regrets & prayers for each other, and could possibly get it listed as an SFL:FWOTW. There seems to be no parody possible though that fundies haven’t already done & continue to do. Please please please someone setup that cage match!
PS, Baker in one of those letters signed off “Regretfully, Dave Baker”. The only thing that could have been more true and funny would have been to sign off “Passive Aggressively, Dave Baker”.
http://www.hacalumni.com/pdfs/8-8-09.pdf
Dear Fundies, as painful as it is to see your infighting, thank you for at least parodying yourselves for us in the process.
This could be sold as a teaser to a WWE fight promoted by Senate candidate Linda McMahon. It would be worth watching it on USA Network’s WWE RAW.
I wonder if they think that the vast amount of people really give a rat’s rear about their in fighting? Why isn’t there a 24/7 all Fundy cable network? They could run reruns of their sermons with Crossfire type progams discussing the pressing subjects of the day (like the 1611 KJV).
At one time, when Hyles was still alive, Bob Gray of Texas (Longview Baptist Temple) and Tom Neal of Orange Park Florida (Berean Baptist), were the two major Hyles henchmen. When Schaap rose to his position as lord of the Hyles empire (by virtue of marriage to Hyles’ daughter), both Gray and Neal made the catastrophic blunder of challenging Schaap and trying to seize supremacy of the Hyles empire. Both went went into sharp declines from their previous stations. The Russell Hirner (school staff at Gray’s Christian school) child molesting case and resulting lawsuit further diminished Gray’s membership count, and this incident coincided with James Spurgeon’s TALES FROM THE TEMPLE. Gray’s membership has declined a lot.
Meanwhile, for a couple years on the FFF, there was talk that Berean was close to bankruptcy. This talk has again emerged, and there are now links posted on the FFF to show legal records of liens and other financial info. The talk is that Tom Neal has filed for bankruptcy for Berean. There is also a lot of talk of unethical financial practices at Berean, but for all anybody knows, the church constitution may allow Neal to treat the church like his personal property.
Anyway, both guys are on their last legs as leaders of the old Hyles machine, and it seems that they may be trying to prolong their individual kingdoms long enough to get through retirement.
So they have both moved from prime wannabes to loud has-beens. Neither one has the clout he used to have.
Can’t believe I am agreeing with you, but your analysis is dead on. I was working in a ministry that was caught in the middle of the power struggle for ordship of the empire. I know all about it!
@Steve WWE doesn’t have the raw emotion, and genuine rage. They may be good actors, but you just came substitute out of control power hungry rage with acting (even if it is roided up). If USA network ever discovered the possiblities w/ IBF RAW they could own the world! 🙂
@BASSENCO good background info. I’ve never heard of any of these creeps, and hope to forget the whole lot of them by the time I get to bed tonight!
Ah the kneeling Neals. They broke with Schaap when he first started saying weird things. things like the lords Supper is like havin spiritual sex with God (no joke) and Schaaps message For Christ’s Sake . All this is probably still on the internet. It might be on HAC Alumni. it may not. The sad thing is alot of that sight is about fueding who is closer to what Jack Hyles belived.
34 seconds to rage. A new record!
Whoa Whoa WHOA…. did anyone see him flash the “devil’s horns” at 1:40 to 1:43? OMG HE IS THE DEVIL IN SYMBOLISM!!!!
LET’S EAT!!!! Nothing mentioned about the SIN of gluttony..
@Jason! OH YES HE DID! HE DID!
Blood pressure spiked at 39 seconds in….turned it off.
Thanking God right now for the nondenom. pastor we have that preaches…verse by verse by verse….
Who’s Rick?
RobM it appears these are just closing remarks after maybe he or someone else preached. It was lunch time he said…no invitation was given, ect. Darrell i did not watch the links, but i will take your word on it.
Hereditary pastorships? Isn’t that a large part of why the Catholics instituted mandatory celibacy for priests?
And, @phil – communion is like having sex with Jesus? Well, I’ve read some mystical writings on it that seem to lean towards that, in very guarded metaphorical language, but I never thought I’d hear of a fundie preacher echoing 14th century Catholic mystics.