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116. Let us Prey Review Part 1 · 4-Freedom Podcast

0:04
Welcome to the For Freedom podcast.
0:10
I found my freedom in you. I found a.
0:16
Joy, I can't lose. And thank God it's true.
0:21
You wrapped your arms around me, and heaven broke through From
0:26
the moment she found me, I found my freedom in you.
0:32
This podcast exists to bring the freedom of the gospel for
0:36
everyday Christians with everyday issues.
0:40
Now here are your host, James Seyfert and Brett Martin.
0:47
Welcome back to the Four Freedom Podcast.
0:49
We are so excited to be back into this new year 2024.
0:54
Brett is so hard to believe that 2023 has come and gone and we
0:58
are into a new year, a new church year.
1:02
There's just something about a new year.
1:05
I don't know if it's the same way for you.
1:07
I sort of get excited just thinking about new things, a new
1:10
start, not like it's anything different, it's literally just
1:13
one day to another. But that calendar flip the the
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all the new things that come along with it.
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This is my first full year at this church at Pleasant Grove
1:22
where I'm at and I'm excited about it.
1:25
What what's your thought? New year what?
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How are things? How are things going in your
1:28
area? Well, it's weird because it it's
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like the past year goes by so fast.
1:35
You know, It's like if you blink and you miss it.
1:37
But then I think about when we went to Israel back in January
1:41
and it seems like 10 years ago that we that we went to Israel
1:45
because maybe because I'm just, I can't wait to go back, but
1:50
man, you know, a brand new year, brand new slate, there's
1:54
excitement, especially in our church.
1:56
We've got new and I told the people this Sunday, we're not
2:00
going in a new direction, but we're going in a fresh
2:03
direction. And I'm excited about some of
2:07
the things that we're going to implement in our church this
2:09
coming year. When it comes to missions, we're
2:12
going to go into missions on three different levels.
2:16
We're going to go into community missions, statewide missions,
2:21
overseas missions. And a lot of, you know, I was
2:25
telling my people about this and they're coming up to me after
2:28
the Sunday morning servers like man, count me in, count me in.
2:31
I don't you know, put me down and man that's exciting.
2:35
You know a New Year's a a new time to hit the ground running
2:39
with a fresh direction. And man I'm that's what I'm
2:42
ready to go I'm I'm ready to go. I'm ready to do.
2:45
Let's get her done. Man, I love it.
2:47
I think that's great. You know, at our church, we're
2:50
rolling out a mission statement this past week and rolling out
2:54
core values for the church, the four core values of the church.
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And man, I was just super excited about it.
3:00
Planning wise, I'm a planner. I'm a guy that likes to sit down
3:03
and I'll maybe take a day, a day and a half just planning things
3:06
out and brainstorming and getting ideas together.
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And so man, it's been great for us.
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And you mentioned Israel. We are going to Israel next
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year. Now we can officially say next
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year because it's 2025. And so March of 2025, our trip
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got pushed because of the crisis that's going on in Israel right
3:26
now. And I've got a couple of church
3:29
members here that are saying they're wanting to go and I'm
3:32
going to be presenting at our church.
3:34
And I know that we've got someones from the the original
3:38
trip that's still going to be going and you got some some
3:41
people going, let's ask this. And we won't take a lot of time
3:46
talking about this, but what's one thing that you're looking
3:48
most forward to about when we go to Israel, Brett?
3:52
Oh man, I had such a connection with the Sea of Galilee.
3:58
I don't know what it was. I know it was at the beginning
4:00
of our trip. And I know I got to see a whole
4:03
bunch of other stuff. We got to see the, you know, the
4:07
Garden of Gethsemane and the the Temple Mount and the and the
4:10
Garden tomb and all that was great.
4:12
But man, there was just something special about the Sea
4:16
of Galilee. All the stuff that happened in
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Jesus's early ministry in Capernaum and, you know, feeding
4:24
of the 5000 and walking on the water, and it's all that stuff,
4:30
man. It just hit me.
4:31
And my favorite thing that I did on our trip was that second day,
4:37
waking up before sunrise and watching the sun come up over
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the Sea of Galilee, one of the most precious times in my entire
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life. And I cannot wait to experience
4:52
that again. And I will tell anybody that's
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considering maybe possibly going to Israel one day, you'll never
4:59
regret going. It'll be something that you'll
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hold on to for the rest of your life.
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And I am just chomping at the bit to get back.
5:10
Yeah, for me, I was talking to some church members this past
5:13
week about it and was mentioning the pool of Shalom and that road
5:18
that those stairs that they had uncovered.
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And I told him, I said I'm hoping that the next time we go,
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when we go and March, that that entire path will be because
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they're excavating that path. That path will be cleared and
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we'll be able to stand there at the pool of Shalom and then walk
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that path that Jesus walked to the temple after he healed the
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blind man there at Shalom. I said for me, that was just,
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you know, it was concrete proof. This is exactly where Jesus was
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at. Like, there's no doubt.
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There's no archaeology wise like there.
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There is zero doubt in anyone's mind that Jesus was there and
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into that exact spot and we were in that exact spot.
5:57
You know, Christopher Hutchins was an atheist and he was an
6:03
atheistic apologist. And he would, he would crusade
6:06
against the judeo-christian God and and try to get turned people
6:11
to atheism. And one of the things that he
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cited as evidence that the Bible's false is there was no
6:17
pool of Siloam. And then, you know, I'm, I'm
6:21
pretty sure this is correct and somebody can correct me if it's
6:24
not, but I'm pretty sure that he died of cancer and then like a
6:29
year later the pool of Siloam was discovered.
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Well, you know, and that's just, that's an amazing story to me
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because archaeology always backs up the Bible.
6:42
Right. I love it.
6:43
I love it. Well, Brett, we're going to be
6:45
going into a series after these. We're going to 2P2PA2 part
6:51
series this week and next week on a review of of an episodes,
6:57
couple episodes that came out. We haven't done one of these in
7:00
a really long time with me and John.
7:01
Me and you have never done one and so we're I'm excited about
7:05
doing that with you. And then we'll be jumping into a
7:08
series that we are so excited about.
7:10
We've got interviews from people that Brett I have dreamed about
7:14
interviewing and man, it's going to be great.
7:17
We're going to share some of that next week's episode going
7:20
into the new series, but today we're going to be reviewing to
7:24
This Week, this Thursday, and next Thursday the Let Us Pray
7:30
docu series that came out with the Preacher Boys podcast, Eric
7:33
Skorzinski and giving some thought on that.
7:38
Couple people reached out to me and asked if we were going to be
7:41
doing a review and I told him how we were and the reason we're
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doing it. A little later.
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We did have time in December to do it and release it, but I felt
7:53
that I needed to process everything and watch it a couple
7:57
of times, get my thoughts together to give a very balanced
8:05
view of what it was. Again, there was a lot of
8:09
information. There was a lot of stuff that
8:11
was given hurt, that was given manipulation that was done in
8:15
the church. And so we wanted to come from a
8:20
point of view that was not necessarily as raw emotion, more
8:24
of logic, emotion here and talk through some stuff and I will do
8:28
this week and we'll do a Part 2 next week to finish up our
8:31
thoughts. So Brett, as we get started into
8:34
that, what was your initial thought?
8:38
And we're we're basically going to break this down.
8:40
I think how many of you discussed was the good, the bad
8:44
and the ugly of Let us Pray. Well, you know, First off, it's
8:51
just a very emotionally moving and sometimes emotionally
8:57
draining thing to watch. The the things that these women
9:03
experienced are horrific. And you know you can see and I
9:09
can think back in my time in the IFB and see things that I
9:14
experienced that you know this kind of stuff was kind of hushed
9:19
and kind of put under the rug. And so we we, like you said we
9:24
just we needed time to watch it. I've watched a couple of times.
9:28
I want to make sure I get my thoughts straight and the format
9:33
that we're all that we are going to kind of go go through is the
9:37
good, the bad and the ugly. Now when we say good, what we
9:42
mean by that is the good is the stuff that we kind of agree
9:46
with. The bad are the are the things
9:49
that we disagree with. And 'cause we don't have to
9:53
agree on 100% of everything. And then the ugly, which is
9:57
just, you know, the the really, really bad stuff that, you know,
10:00
we have felt to discuss. And that's going to kind of be
10:04
the format of how we're going to walk through this.
10:09
And you know, my suggestion would be just kind of start with
10:12
the bad, kind of start with the stuff that we kind of disagree
10:16
with, go into the good stuff that we.
10:19
Yeah, I agree with that. And then hit on the ugly at the
10:24
end. Save that for as long as
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possible. OK, let's do it.
10:28
We'll start by thanking the women that came on the episode
10:32
that came on this docu series. I liked how the RFP guys did
10:36
that, and I as best I could, I wrote down all their names.
10:40
I may butcher their names, I may mispronounce them or, and I hope
10:45
I don't forget any, but Rachel Peach was on their fantastic
10:48
story. I've heard her story many times.
10:51
Ruthie Hyler was on there, Kathy Durbin, her story.
10:56
It's fantastic. I've listened to a lot of her
10:58
interviews and a lot of her stuff.
11:01
Jamie Hiles thought that her little bit of input was
11:05
fantastic. And I'll say this later, but I
11:09
wish they would have done more with Jamie Hiles.
11:11
I think that was a great area. Amanda Holzhauser Man, What a
11:17
powerful story there in the girls home and that we don't.
11:23
I don't know Amanda, she may never listen to this, but I
11:26
think Amanda Story has helped so many people that I know
11:30
personally that we're in girls homes that were abused, that
11:34
were in that that there is hope there is a way out and I really
11:40
appreciated her coming on talking through that April Avila
11:45
was able to share her story. Nanette Miles, Brianna Moore and
11:51
Amanda Clintons. Clydence.
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Clydence was was on there as well.
11:56
That's the name, all the names that I had written down.
11:58
And ladies, I just want to thank you from my bottom of my heart
12:01
for sharing. I know that that takes a ton of
12:04
courage. A ton of you're vulnerable.
12:08
You're in a situation where people are going to attack you,
12:10
you're going to hear the attacks, and you're putting
12:13
yourself out there because you don't care about what people are
12:17
going to say anymore. You just want the truth to be
12:19
given. And so I really appreciate that.
12:21
And we stand behind you. I've got your names written
12:26
down. I'm, I pray for you guys now on
12:28
an often basis. And I want to thank you for what
12:32
you've done and allowed your story to be heard because it is
12:36
powerful and it is great. And if there's anything we can
12:39
ever do for you, please reach out to us because we want to
12:42
help in any way possible. So Brett, what are some of the
12:45
bad things, the things that we disagreed with of the episode,
12:51
these these four episodes that were put out on the on the the
12:55
Discovery Channel I believe. Well, let me say, right as we're
13:01
going into that, let me say a word to the women that you just
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listed. I want to say that I commend
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your courage and I commend your bravery.
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And you know, you, you, you fight a battle every day.
13:16
It's a battle that we'll never know, but we we empathize with
13:21
you and we support you. It's amazing to me, the pastors
13:26
and the Twitter clips that are coming out that are speaking
13:29
against these women and trying to justify the actions of some
13:34
people. And it just it it turns my
13:36
stomach, it makes me sick. And I just want these women to
13:40
know that that we are. I as well am praying for them.
13:44
I'm on their side and I want to lift them up.
13:48
I want their story to be heard. Their story.
13:51
They need to be heard. They have a voice.
13:54
And you know, I'm glad that they're that they're speaking
13:58
out. We don't want to silence them.
14:00
We want them to speak out as loud as they possibly can.
14:05
When it comes to the bad or the kind of stuff we kind of
14:09
disagree with. I'm going to read a statement,
14:12
James that Eric made, and I want you to tell me your thoughts on
14:17
it, he said. Every IFB church is a powder keg
14:23
ready to explode. Every single one.
14:26
What do you think about that? Initially what I'll say is when
14:32
you broad brush in that manner it makes a lot of the other
14:38
points that you say null and void when you begin to.
14:43
That's one of the things that I have tried, me and John have
14:46
tried and then me and you have tried is to not broad brush
14:50
anything. When you broad brush things with
14:53
a big stroke of saying this church, this church, this church
14:57
has hurt me or hurt other people, all of this church is
15:00
bad. What happens is, is you may have
15:04
individuals that are in a church that is really good and they're
15:08
going to say, well there's nothing for me to watch here
15:10
because they're already saying that I'm like them.
15:13
And so by broad brushing like that you begin to discredit what
15:19
you're saying in the rest of your show.
15:21
And so by saying every and I know the premise of what he's
15:25
saying, he's saying that the hierarchical or the
15:30
aristocratic, the the the hard nosed leader style church is a
15:36
powder keg waiting to explode. I understand that.
15:38
But he didn't say that. He said every IFB church is a
15:41
powder keg. Every.
15:43
I mean you could say like this, every independent church in the
15:47
world is just there, there's always something wrong with it
15:51
and it's just going to explode. And the problem with that is
15:55
it's it's a lie. It's not true.
15:57
And because there are some great churches, there are some great
16:02
Southern Baptist, IFB, non denominational Presbyterian,
16:06
there's some great ones out there that have nothing to do
16:09
with any type of cover up and they abhor that and they push
16:13
back against it and he's lumping them in with that.
16:17
I would, I I wouldn't be scared to say anything.
16:21
You know, everything is all in. If you want to qualify it by
16:26
saying most or a lot of. Things.
16:31
Like that. But to just definitively say
16:33
every IFB church is just right for abuse and has pastors who
16:42
abuse and pastors who don't report and listen, we're not
16:47
denying that any of that stuff doesn't take place.
16:51
Absolutely. We see in the documentary that
16:54
this stuff is real. It takes place.
16:56
It needs to be addressed. We need to bring the light.
17:00
So many things that were swept under the rug for so many years.
17:04
But just just the broad brush I think is unnecessary.
17:09
I think you can qualify it better, 'cause they, like you
17:14
said, there are a lot of Independent Fundamental Baptist
17:17
churches out there that that, that don't do this.
17:20
But you know, I also think about what Nathan said on the RFP.
17:26
You know the the church has earned its black eyes and you
17:30
know, we need to, you know, acknowledge, you know and just
17:34
like, you know Eric, Eric just like JC said also that Eric sees
17:39
all the bad. And so you know, I understand
17:42
that, but I do think that the broad brush is something that we
17:47
can do without. And so in that, I'm not
17:50
necessarily agreeing with that. Another thing that we and me and
17:55
you talked about is the statement where it says the
17:59
whole IFB movement starts with one man, Jack Hiles.
18:05
Now you know more about this than I do.
18:08
So I'm fixing to throw that back over to you.
18:11
But I just want to say that yet, you know, in my vein of, you
18:17
know, IFB churches, Jack Hiles was a prominent figure.
18:21
But I know a lot of Independent Baptist churches that, you know,
18:26
were fundamental that never even heard of Jack Hiles or didn't
18:29
have anything to do with Jack Hiles.
18:32
So you know, where is. You know, in the vein of the
18:35
show, all the churches that they're dealing with come from
18:40
that. When it comes to the IFB as a
18:42
whole, it may be an incorrect statement to say it all starts
18:47
with one man, Jack Kiles. Maybe you can, maybe you can
18:50
shed a little bit more light on that for us, yeah.
18:53
So if you go back and you listen to our first episodes when John
18:58
was flying solo, this is the episodes that I'm referring to
19:02
here, the history of the IFB and John and me did some great
19:06
things there. In my opinion, probably the best
19:10
historical documented episodes on the history of the
19:14
Independent Fundamental Baptist movement that has been ever
19:17
released with the amount of detail and the work that was put
19:20
into that. So if you're confused with that,
19:23
go back, pause it here, go back and listen because I'm going to
19:26
summarize it a little bit. So Jack House was not the
19:29
founder of the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement.
19:33
The problem with that is Jack House didn't come on to the
19:36
scene until the Forties, 50s and 60s.
19:39
And that's when he began to take over and and start to work
19:43
through the First Baptist Church of Hammond, IN which correctly
19:48
was stated it was a Southern Baptist church to begin with and
19:51
then became an Independent Baptist Church.
19:53
Later on, they pulled out of the convention, so back in the
19:57
1920s, a guy by the name of J Frank Norris.
20:03
Was a part of the Southern Baptist Convention.
20:05
He loved the convention. He wanted to be a part of
20:07
convention, but he was so divisive that he was kicked out
20:11
of the convention twice. He joined the convention the
20:14
second time after he was kicked out, and they kicked him out a
20:18
second time because of his divisiveness, because he was
20:21
just so just. He wanted things done the way he
20:24
wanted it done and he was a big, large mega church.
20:27
He would be considered a mega church in today's day and age.
20:30
And so he had a lot of pull and a lot of sway.
20:33
And so he started what was the Bible Baptist Fellowship, which
20:36
became the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement.
20:39
So when you look at the movement of the whole of the Independent
20:44
Baptist movement, J Frank Norris is the father of the movement.
20:49
And so all of a sudden you've now got another layer of someone
20:55
who maybe has some knowledge of this area, who now sees what's
20:59
been done and says, well, hold on, that's not true.
21:03
J Jack Holes is not the founder of the Independent Fundamental
21:07
Baptist movement. It's someone else.
21:09
Because I've read a book and I know these things and I've.
21:11
I've seen the history. And so all of a sudden you've
21:14
got another area of what is can be perceived of.
21:19
Well, this also isn't true. Is anything else in this
21:23
documentary true? Is anything else right?
21:27
And so all of a sudden it begins to just there's little things
21:31
that that just again, I know where it's coming from because
21:35
this is how it wrote down. I understand that they're trying
21:38
to frame the narrative of the circle abuse out of and around
21:43
the heils movement. But you have to set the stage
21:47
right. Not with false claims or it
21:49
looks like there is improper motive.
21:52
It seems like there's not the right motive.
21:54
Jack Heiles was the flagship church.
21:58
OK, Jack Hiles was the person that made the Independent
22:03
Fundamental Baptist movement what it is today.
22:06
I would say he was one of the three people that made it what
22:10
it is today, the size and the vastness that people wanted to
22:13
replicate. OK, there's not many churches.
22:17
There's not many, not many churches.
22:19
There's not many towns that you can go to and you can say this
22:23
is a house product church because there are so many
22:28
communities that someone left house Anderson and went back to
22:32
a small community and planted a church or took over a church and
22:37
made it like a mini Jack house First Baptist Hammond.
22:40
So, so in that situation yes he is the prominent leader but he's
22:45
not the founder. He's not the one that that that
22:49
that founded the movement. He's the one that promulgated
22:52
the movement to the size that it is now.
22:55
And so that information there, when you begin to process those
22:58
two things you begin to see just some fallacies in the research
23:03
and and maybe it was I just wanted to show the connection
23:06
between House and the movement of these men and the cover up
23:09
and the abuse. And I I see that I agree with
23:12
that, that yes, there was the cover up.
23:14
There was the abuse. But call it for what it is,
23:17
don't say that he's the founder. Say he's the prominent leader.
23:19
He's the one that made it all work and and he was the the
23:22
famous person that that everyone wanted to be like.
23:26
One of the reasons why we bring this stuff up is not to take
23:31
away from the testimony of the women, but it's to add to it,
23:35
yeah, we don't want these inaccuracies to take away from
23:41
the testimony that and the things that these women went
23:44
through in their experiences and and we're just afraid that if
23:49
you do have inaccuracies like this, then it it could take away
23:53
from that. And we don't want it to.
23:55
Once again we're on the the, the, the, survive.
23:59
We're not going to say victims, we're going to call them
24:01
survivors. We're on the survivors side and
24:05
we don't want anything to take away from what they experienced
24:10
and went through and what they're going through.
24:12
And these are just a few things that you know we're we're
24:15
bringing up now. I I had a question for you
24:18
James. One of the things that were
24:19
mentioned, it was said and and it probably wasn't.
24:23
I don't think it was intended as a blanket 100% truth statement.
24:30
It might have just been an off end comment, but I have a
24:33
statement written down here about boarding schools that, you
24:37
know, it was said every IFB member sends kids off to
24:40
boarding school. And of course, you know, I don't
24:43
think that was intended as a 100% accurate statement,
24:46
although it could have been. I don't have a lot of experience
24:50
with the boarding schools. I didn't even know that they
24:53
existed until I went to Bible college and so I didn't know
24:56
anybody that went to boarding school.
24:59
What? But you said you had some
25:01
experience with the boarding school.
25:03
Would can you shed any light on on on the boarding school with
25:08
IFBI? I don't have experience with
25:10
boarding school. I have experience with people
25:12
who have went to girls homes and boys homes.
25:15
OK, yeah. Boarding school I'm not as
25:18
familiar with and I'm I'm sure there was abuse done there.
25:24
You know, it's a, it's a difficult place.
25:26
The ones that I'm most familiar with like the military boarding
25:29
schools where a child who different opposite defiant will
25:33
will go to like a a military school where it's very regimen
25:37
and you know, just building structure around them and that's
25:41
the only thing I know about them but well, he.
25:42
He said boarding schools, but I think what he meant was like the
25:45
girls homes and the boys homes. I think that's what he meant.
25:49
And I I didn't know those existed until until Bible
25:53
college. Did you have anything else under
25:56
this category of bad? That's the only thing bad that I
26:00
that I came across as I watched through it again, a lot of this
26:04
was storytelling. A lot of this was once you get
26:08
past that first episode it's it's just the girls telling
26:11
their story and that's what I thought was just powerful it
26:15
listen to their story. There were some things that they
26:18
said that they wanted to paint in a in a bad picture.
26:22
But but I want to say push back just a little bit and say that
26:27
these are some good things because the old statement, you
26:31
know, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
26:33
It's true there you can have bad experiences, but there are some
26:37
good principles still behind some of those things.
26:40
And so I'm going to mention a couple and I'll sort of bounce
26:43
it back over to you and then we'll just sort of go back and
26:47
forth. A couple of things that I
26:48
pointed out that I thought were really, really good, that were
26:53
said was one of the ladies said that she was born in church,
26:58
that she was, you know, from the couple of days after she was
27:02
born, she was in church. And every time the doors open,
27:06
she was in church. And Monday through Saturday she
27:09
was there and she was working and she went to school there.
27:13
You know, I had that opportunity.
27:16
I was born in church. I was born on a Thursday, and
27:19
that Sunday I was in church. And I can't think of a time that
27:24
I was not in church. I have an awesome heritage that
27:27
God has blessed me with. A friend of mine named David
27:30
Tao. He would never listen to this,
27:32
so I can mention his name. He didn't come to Jesus until
27:35
about 10 years ago, lived a hard life, and I got to know him
27:41
about six years ago. When I got to the church that I
27:43
was at, his daughter just had her baby and I got to be at the
27:48
hospital, got to pray with them. And as I was praying with them
27:52
there at the hospital, I said this statement in my prayer.
27:56
I said, Lord allow this child to be in church your whole life.
28:02
Not everyone has that opportunity.
28:04
And he started crying as I was praying.
28:06
This because he knew that he lived a hard life for 40 years
28:12
until he finally received Jesus and God in church.
28:15
And he told me at his dad's funeral.
28:18
And I wish I could have the testimony that I was in church
28:21
every time that I was in church when the doors were open.
28:24
But unfortunately, I lived half of my life outside of the church
28:27
and outside of God's people. And he said I struggle in my
28:32
spiritual walk because of it, because of the decisions that I
28:34
made, because I wasn't raised in church and I understand the
28:38
value of people being in church, I made this statement this past
28:42
Sunday. God created the church to reach
28:45
the World, and so it's not a bad thing that we've been in church
28:50
our whole life. It's a bad thing when church
28:51
abuses you, but it's not a bad thing to be in church.
28:56
I agree that, you know, I wish I had the opportunity to say that
29:03
I I have been in church since I was a teenager.
29:06
We went sporadically as as kids and so that alone by itself I
29:12
think is a good thing especially for going to a a good solid
29:17
church that that is absolutely good thing there.
29:22
But there are, you know, there to the credit to some other
29:27
there might be some churches that do have a wrong way of you
29:32
know, looking at, you know, the way the home structure is and
29:37
maybe possibly a situation where than an overbearing pastor or
29:42
things like that. So when it comes to stuff, when
29:47
it comes to things like that, that in and of itself by itself
29:51
is a good thing and it's a blessing that somebody would be
29:54
able to say that still at the same time admitting that there
30:00
are some churches that are not exactly doing right, they do
30:04
exist. So that was that was another
30:08
thing. Did you have any?
30:09
Did you have something else? Yeah, I wrote down several on
30:12
this memorizing verses. One of the ladies said that, you
30:17
know, they were just memorizing verses.
30:20
Again, I love when my kids memorize verses.
30:24
I love when I'm memorize verses. The Bible says we should hide
30:27
God's word in our heart so that we our heart doesn't fail.
30:30
Our heart is an idol factor. Our heart's going to produce
30:33
things, and so if we can put good things in our heart, it's
30:36
going to allow us to produce good things.
30:38
And if scripture is what we're putting in our heart, it's a
30:40
pretty good thing. And so I don't think memorizing
30:44
Scripture's a bad thing. One lady said that when she was
30:49
in the IFB church, they taught her hard work and good work
30:54
ethics. Again, if I can teach my kid
30:58
hard work and good work ethics, I'm going pretty good with the
31:02
society in the day and age it is.
31:04
And so I don't see that as a negative.
31:06
I don't see that as something that is wrong.
31:09
One lady said that life revolved around church.
31:14
As a pastor, my kids lives revolve around church anyways.
31:17
But again, I don't think it's a bad thing that our lives revolve
31:21
around the church and the things of God's work.
31:24
And then I'll mention this one and then I'll kick it to you.
31:28
Let you say a couple things. One lady had made this
31:31
statement. The Bible is taken literally as
31:36
a bad thing. I want the Bible to be taken
31:40
literally because it is a good thing to be taken.
31:44
The Bible literally. Now, taking it and twisting it
31:48
to fit my narrative is a different thing.
31:50
But if Scripture says to guard my mouth, to guard my heart,
31:55
yeah, I want to take that literally.
31:57
And so it's not a not a good thing.
31:59
And so Brett, what what are a couple of your good things?
32:02
OK, now it's it's really neat the way me and you both look at
32:07
this different. I agree with everything that you
32:11
just listed. I think those are really good
32:14
things by themselves. When when I What I wrote Down
32:18
Under good is I I wrote down things that weren't necessarily
32:23
good in and of themselves, but things that I agreed with in the
32:30
show. So these things that I'm gonna
32:32
list, they're not good things by themselves.
32:36
That's why I'm glad me and you did it this way.
32:38
These aren't good things, but they aren't things that I agreed
32:42
with in the show. And so one of the things that
32:45
they mentioned was patriarchy. And like, an IFB church can be a
32:53
man's world. And they said it was a perfect
32:57
storm for SA, you know, sexual abuse.
33:03
And I agree with that statement that, you know, like, the man
33:10
has the whole voice. The man is right no matter what.
33:16
Even when they're wrong, they're right.
33:20
And you blame women for the actions of men.
33:27
Like one of the things that they said was like, men are just
33:30
these uncontrollable beasts, so you got to cover up, you know,
33:35
whenever, you know. You know, women have to cover up
33:38
and they're responsible for the man lusting.
33:43
It's it's not on the man. The reason why the man lusted is
33:47
because the woman didn't cover up.
33:51
And there are churches like that.
33:53
There are independent, Independent Fundamental Baptist
33:55
churches like that. I know a lot of them are like
33:59
that. And and I agree with the show
34:02
that there are churches like that.
34:05
And that's some of the bad practices that can lead to some
34:10
of the situations in the show. And I've grown up and I've seen
34:16
things like this and I've experienced this in my own
34:19
marriage. And part of my testimony is me
34:22
and my wife, we were brought up, you know, with this idea that
34:27
the man is right no matter what. And so I would be wrong and my
34:31
wife would try to, you know, we're fresh out of of House
34:36
Anderson College. And my wife would try to correct
34:41
me on something and I would give her the look because that's what
34:43
I was taught to do. And then one day I it wasn't.
34:47
I'll never forget I was in a blockbuster.
34:49
And you know, my wife, I said something wrong.
34:53
And my wife went to correct me and called herself.
34:56
And right then it's like the spirit of God convicted me is
34:59
like, Brick, what are you doing? What are you doing to your wife?
35:04
This is wrong. This attitude is wrong.
35:07
And man, on the way home I broke down crying and I repented to
35:11
her and I was like, this is wrong, this isn't the way you
35:15
should be treated. And so then we started getting
35:17
in the word of God and and saying that you know this, this
35:22
is not the way that we should act.
35:24
And so I think that, you know, I do agree that that system of
35:30
patriarchy in a church can lead definitely lead to this type of
35:36
abuse, especially when you put the responsibility all on the
35:41
woman and the man has no responsibility.
35:47
Yeah, I agree. The Bruce Goddard hierarchy
35:54
umbrella, it's not right. And I definitely think that
35:59
there it can be a powder keg. We'll use that term to set up
36:06
for abuse, but it not always is. And so, but I do think there has
36:12
to be some authority structure. God created authority structure
36:16
in Genesis chapter two and three.
36:18
Man sinned and he put man in charge of the garden.
36:22
He put man in charge of his family and in part of his house
36:26
as a contradiction of what how it was supposed to be.
36:29
It was supposed to be they were going to cohabitate together and
36:31
they were going to both have this unity.
36:33
There wasn't going to be this, this, this power structure.
36:39
But because of the fall, because of sin, this is what happens.
36:42
And God said that the wife is going to be subject to her
36:45
husband and it's not going to be this, oh, I'm just going to bow
36:49
under your feet. But he said that this is going
36:51
to happen because of the fall. And so there is this authority
36:55
structure that is there as well. So I I agree with that, Brett,
36:58
yeah. I mean, IA 100% you know, the
37:01
husband is the leader of the home.
37:03
That doesn't mean he's the dictator.
37:05
That doesn't mean that the woman should worship the husband,
37:08
because any worship you give anybody other than God is wrong.
37:13
And and in the Bible, when a woman is told to submit, she is
37:19
not, you know, the church isn't supposed to force her to submit.
37:23
The husband is not supposed to, you know, force her to submit.
37:28
She is to submit of our own free will.
37:31
It's it's her act of, you know, submission to, you know, to the
37:35
Lord. She has it.
37:36
She does it voluntarily. And but yes, I do agree, you
37:40
know, I am, I am a complimentarian 100%.
37:44
But at the same time, you know, a husband, just because he's a
37:48
leader doesn't mean he's he's a dictator, right.
37:52
Another thing, and I've got several of these and when you're
37:54
ready to cut to the next episode, let me know.
37:57
But the next thing that I wrote have written down is children do
38:02
not have voices. And man did James that I feel
38:06
that in my soul because when you're a kid growing up, IFBI
38:13
know, especially in my church, man, you had.
38:16
Absolutely no voice whatsoever. And you know, you you had to be
38:22
careful what you said. Everything you say can will be
38:27
used against you. Sometimes it feels like and then
38:32
you know, you go into college and you're still treated as a
38:35
child and you still feel like you have no voice.
38:40
And I felt that way. You know, some of these women,
38:43
they were chomping at the bit to get to House Anderson, to get
38:47
away from you know, their situation, you know, and then
38:51
you get to House Anderson and yes, you get away from your
38:54
situation, but at house Anderson you, you know, you're treated as
38:58
a child as well and you have no voice there either and you're
39:02
not treated as an adult. And so I definitely that's
39:07
something that I agreed with that you know I've experienced
39:12
in the in the IFB. And then another thing that you
39:17
know we they talked about was they talked about they called it
39:22
the pedophile shuffle, OK. And a lot of people called it
39:26
leapfrog. We called it, you know, the
39:29
Assistant Pastor Shuffle where and we I experienced this and I
39:36
can sympathize with this because I experienced this even in the
39:39
church that I grew up in. And I don't know if you saw
39:42
this, you know, growing up IFB, but I definitely did.
39:46
Where the assistant pastor would come into the church, he would
39:50
have some kind of affair or do something nefarious.
39:54
And then, you know, the pastor would call his buddy in the next
39:58
state over and then that assistant pastor would go over
40:02
there and work for that pastor. That happened all the time and
40:06
that happened in the church that that I grew up in.
40:10
And you know there are certain and nobody would ever talk about
40:14
it would be hushed and and nobody would ever say anything.
40:18
Things will be swept under the rug And you know just think if
40:23
it how how much could be, you know prevented of this type of
40:27
behavior in this type of abuse if people would just speak up.
40:32
And another thing that they talked about was pastors being
40:37
mandated reporters. And as pastors, that's what we
40:40
are. We are mandated reporters.
40:44
We have to report. When it comes to this type of
40:47
things. I can't tell you how many times
40:50
as a pastor I've had to. People would beg me not to call
40:54
the police. And I want to have no choice.
40:56
I would pick up the phone and I would call the police because I
40:59
have to report these things. Because if I don't report these
41:03
things, I am just as guilty as the perpetrator and I get put
41:09
into them and I'm not gonna risk, you know, my life and my
41:13
freedom to keep silent on something that should be
41:17
reported. And I think that these pastors
41:21
like John Jenkins and Bruce Goddard who did not report these
41:26
issues and these problems, I think they should be held
41:32
accountable for, for not reporting.
41:35
Because we've seen in in the documentary where you know, if,
41:40
if, if the pastor would have said something, if if they would
41:43
have called the police, if they would have told the church, then
41:47
so many things would not have happened.
41:51
And and you know as pastors we are mandated reporters and I'm
41:56
going to ask you what you know what you think about that.
42:00
But I am just I'm appalled that these pastors can can can hear
42:05
these things and then just sweep it under the rug.
42:09
And I personally, I'm sick to death of it because I
42:12
experienced that growing up as well.
42:15
So we never experienced that in our church.
42:16
Again, we were in IFP church and there was no abuse that was ever
42:19
done. The that that I know of I'll say
42:23
it like that yes, we must report that we are mandated reporter.
42:30
We have to do these things. That's what we are called to do.
42:33
What aggravates and frustrates me is where some of these ladies
42:39
I'm thinking of it especially like in John Jenkins Church who
42:43
because the person wasn't turned in the first time another girl
42:48
was abused. And if only the pastor would
42:52
have turned him in the first time, the second time would have
42:54
never happened because he wouldn't have been there to
42:57
happen. Or he moves on to another state
43:00
and it happens in another state and now all of a sudden if the
43:03
pastor would have just done his job, don't he was supposed to do
43:07
that wouldn't have happened. And then this is the part that
43:09
gets me the most. How can you, as a pastor, stand
43:12
up in front of your church and preach the goodness of God when
43:16
you don't even report the bad when you don't report because
43:21
you don't want your church to have a a bad eye in the
43:24
community? It doesn't matter.
43:26
At that point, your obligation is to those people.
43:30
You're to shepherd those people. You're to care for those people,
43:33
not to hurt them by not turning them in.
43:37
And so, yeah, it's it's it frustrates me to no end because
43:43
they didn't to do those things. Let me share my last two that I
43:47
have and then I'll let you share your last couple ones that you
43:49
have, Brett. Two that I thought was great.
43:53
I love the court proceedings and been able to see how that all
43:56
transpired because that gives so much help to some ladies that
44:01
are struggling to maybe come forward, maybe to come forward
44:05
on abuse that happened and maybe to think, well if I come forward
44:08
nothing's ever going to happen. That was proof that this court
44:13
proceeding can happen, will happen and your voice will be
44:16
heard. To see that judge.
44:19
Look at those ladies and say I've got your back, I've.
44:23
I'm standing with you. Just give me your voice.
44:26
Tell me what you have to say and I'll make the ruling.
44:29
And I thought that was powerful man love that love that ending
44:33
of that the purity culture, it was painted in a bad light.
44:38
I think purity culture is great if it's taught right.
44:43
You're the culture to be taught to abuse girls is taught wrong.
44:47
But I think pure. To stay a virgin until you get
44:50
married I think is a beautiful picture, beautiful picture.
44:55
And so by saying that's a bad thing in reality, I believe it's
44:59
a good thing. And then the last thing I'll say
45:02
is I loved the community that has come out from this, the
45:07
Blonde Eye movement. You said it earlier.
45:09
These ladies have a community, have a voice to go to, have a
45:12
group of people that can relate to them, that can help each
45:16
other. And I think that was a fantastic
45:18
movement that has come out. Brett, what's your last couple
45:21
things that you've got? And then we'll close the episode
45:23
down for the day. Let me just say two things off
45:28
of what you said and then we'll save the rest of what I have for
45:31
the next episode. I want to say that I thought
45:35
that her sitting, I think it was Rachel sitting with her lawyer
45:40
having that conversation. I think that was such a good
45:44
thing to show because what Rachel needed in that moment is
45:49
she needed her lawyer to comfort her.
45:53
She needed to not feel alone. She needed to feel heard and her
45:58
lawyer delivered that in that moment, comforted her and and
46:04
told her what she needed to know.
46:07
Gave her the confidence and bravery to step forward.
46:11
And I'm so thankful that that was shown on the documentary so
46:16
that other women who are potentially going to have to go
46:21
through the same thing that she went through can see that yes,
46:24
when you step out and you speak up, there are going to be people
46:28
fighting for you. There are going to be people in
46:31
your corner. There are going to be people
46:34
that care about you. You're not get you've been alone
46:37
so far, but when you speak up, you're not going to have to be
46:41
alone anymore. And I'm so thankful that that
46:45
moment was captured on camera because I think that that would
46:49
that would just give other women the you know the the comfort in
46:55
knowing that if they did step out and speak up that there
46:59
would be people in their corner. And and I love that interaction
47:03
with her lawyer. I think what's a good thing And
47:06
I just want to I want to go on top of what you said about
47:11
purity culture because you know we say purity culture is toxic.
47:15
Purity culture is toxic and that's a, you know, so many
47:18
people use that and IIA 100% agree with you that, you know,
47:24
maybe the culture is is toxic when it comes to it being
47:29
abused, but purity in and of itself is not and never will be
47:34
a bad thing. It's something that the, you
47:38
know, the you know, the Bible, you know tells us to do.
47:42
And I think that that's another blanket statement that, you
47:47
know, purity culture is, you know, toxic.
47:50
It is when it's abused. So I, you know, I'm going to
47:53
agree with you that you know, when it comes to to purity, it
47:57
is something that the Bible teaches.
47:58
It's something that we need to teach, but we need to teach it
48:01
the the right way. Yeah, I love that.
48:04
Teach it the right way. It is very vital.
48:07
Well, thanks for joining us today.
48:09
We're so excited that you have tuned in, hopefully this whole
48:12
part and if you can ever, we can ever do anything for you, reach
48:15
out to us and I will pick this back up next week with Part 2
48:20
and until next time to God. Not the pastor, be the.
48:25
Glory. Found my new name.
48:29
Found that good grace. Found that healing.
48:33
And the tears fell down my face. When I found my beginning.
48:37
That has no ending. I found that second chance.
48:41
Found my best friend. Found my forgiveness.
48:47
Found my happiness. I've been singing ever since I
48:56
found my freedom thanks. For listening to the For Freedom
49:00
Podcast. If you enjoyed our content, do
49:03
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49:10
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