This video has a little bit of just about everything in it. Harry Potter conspiracy theories, numerology, family slide shows, book sales pitches…and that’s just the first 10 minutes.
All posts by Darrell
FWOTW: psychoheresy-aware.org
This week’s selection is chock full of goodness from a couple who’s goal in life is apparently stopping people from getting mental health treatment from licensed professionals. Evidently ‘read your Bible more’ is a valid treatment for schizophrenia. Who knew?
Check any fundy pastor’s library and more times than not you’ll find a copy of their book Psychoheresy
Don’t miss their online books, position papers, and a Q&A section that is downright scary.
Camps Redux
This quote sums up the state of fundamentalist rival camps so very well that I decided to post it here without further comment.
One of the many things that trouble the Independent Baptists is our camp mentality.Somehow or another, through the desire to be separated and consecrated, we’ve ‘separated’ and ‘consecrated’ ourselves into our own independent camps. For instance; there’s the Shouting & Running The Aisles Camp, and the Non-Shouting & Running The Aisles Camp; then there’s the Southern Gospel Music Camp and the Bluegrass Gospel Music camp, and in opposition to them we have the Conservative Music Camp; and let’s not forget the camp that says it’s OK to have a Mission Board, and the Camp which thinks Mission Boards are of the Devil; the Anti-Horn-Rimmed Glasses Camp; or how about the Camp that allows the use of bass guitars & drums in the church, and the opposing Camp who cuts off fellowship with all such; and then the Camp who teaches that every believer should remember the very day and hour of their conversion, and the Camp who teaches that it’s not necessary; and of course the Get Rid Of Your TV Camp side by side with the TV is OK camp. Space constraints limit me from mentioning the Seminary Trained & the Anti-Seminary Campss, the Textus Receptus Camp, and the KJV1611-Only Camp; the Anti-Bus Ministry Camp; the Harold Sightler Camp, the Anti-Mustache Camp, the Ruckman Camp, the Hyles-Anderson Camp; the 1-2-3-Repeat-After-Me Soul-Winner Camp, the Anti-Divorced & Remarried Minister Camp, etcetera, etcetera.
The Errors of Independence, Mitch Allman
Well said.
Running the Aisles
Although Wikipedia identifies ‘running the aisles‘ as a Pentecostal or Holiness tradition it does show up in certain fundamentalist circles as well. To be fair, this sort of thing is usually reserved for Sammy Allen-style ‘camp meeting’ gatherings of the whoopin’ hollerin’ and tree-climbin’ variety. Still, for pure entertainment value it’s hard to beat. Be sure to keep an eye on the baptistry…
(thanks to Kitty for the link)
Outcome-Based Justification
No matter how dangerous, how silly, or how obsolete a fundy’s plan for evangelism may be, the justification is always the same: “If only one person gets saved, it’s all worth it.”
So what if the church van has four bald tires and hasn’t had a tune-up since 1978? We’re going to drive these 8 teens the 1400 miles to Mexico anyway. If we can get one person saved, the risk of death is all worth it.
Look, we may be serving those VBS kids snacks that expired in Clinton administration…but if between bouts of throwing up one of them gets saved, it’s all worth it!
We spent $148,987.50 on printing ten million copies of a gospel tract with three misspelled words and six verses taken completely out of context…but if one person gets saved from reading it, it was all worth it!
Every member of our church has been standing out on a street corner yelling gospel verses at traffic every weekend this year at a total cost of 85 man-hours, two citations for public disturbance, and a whole lot of dry cleaning. Not one person even slowed down that we know of…but if one person gets saved from from the seeds we planted, it was all worth it.
But what if it isn’t? What if the lost getting saved really isn’t really up to your efforts? And even assuming it totally depends on your evangelism antics, what if unsafe and antiquated methods drove a hundred people away in the process of winning one? That’s a net loss of ninety-nine souls in the process of winning one. Worth it?
Now I know that fundies who are reading this are going to accuse me of hating the lost and being too fat and lazy to get off my couch and go soul-winning. But if I have managed to make just one person re-think their approach to outreach…it was all worth it.