Friday, February 28, 2020

Jessie Penn-Lewis & Evan Roberts: Applications From Their Lives and Doctrines, III (part 22 of 22)

The content of this post is now available in the study of:

1.) Evan Roberts

2.) The Welsh Revival of 1904-1905

3.) Jessie Penn-Lewis

on the faithsaves.net website. Please click on the people above to view the study.  On the FaithSaves website the PDF files may be easiest to read.

 

You are also encouraged to learn more about Keswick theology and its errors, as well as the Biblical doctrine of salvation, at the soteriology page at Faithsaves.

Tuesday, February 25, 2020

Thorough Biblical Argument and the Emasculation of the Male Head

I don't know how serious the coronavirus is.  I hear both super serious and I also hear that it's being exaggerated as a conspiracy.  I don't want to get it or anyone else to get it.  It can kill.  We know.  There is so much emphasis on it right now, including with the most radical national quarantine I've seen in my lifetime.  It is portrayed as so horrible, that it seems justified.  To stop from spreading the disease, some are forced to stay for a long time in uncomfortable situations.  They don't have a choice.  The government has the authority to tell people to stay in their room for weeks without leaving.  I don't hear anyone complaining that the authorities are being mean or extreme or untrustworthy because of their severe requirements.

The male headship of scripture, which is the male headship, functions under the authority of scripture, which means also that it functions with authority from God.  God designed male headship in all human institutions. The male head can and should act with authority.  What I see today is that if someone differs with the male head in whatever position he may be, the one differing doesn't need biblical authority.  He just challenges and just because he has a challenge, it is a legitimate, worthy challenge to be treated with a kind of gentle, docile respect, perhaps even a giddy smile.

I am a male head in several different capacities:  husband, father, pastor, and teacher.  I operate with scriptural authority, and that means essentially two things to me.  First, God gives me various positions of authority.  God put me in these positions.  As long as I'm not requiring something unscriptural in those positions of authority from God, what I'm requiring should be done, just because I have authority.  Second, even though I have authority, I focus on what scripture says.  I don't major on non-scriptural areas.  In those I attempt to give liberty.  I give attention to what the Bible says and prioritize scriptural belief and practice.

You could say that I have two layers of authority in my positions of authority.  Someone under my authority should do what I say, just because I say it.  Yet, I'm not telling people to do non-scriptural things.  I'm telling them to do scriptural teaching.  It goes even further than that though.

I explain scripture to those under me.  I study scripture.  I don't take it out of context.  I understand the meaning of the words and the syntax of the passages to which I refer or on which I rely.  I'm saying that I'm careful with scripture.  I don't just quote the passage.  I expound it.  I want the adherents to know why they are doing what they are doing, so that they will believe it's coming from God.

Here's what I see happen today.  I work at explaining scriptural authority.  I have authority already.  I could just tell people.  I don't stop there though.  I quote the Bible and explain it.  What happens?  Today I see apathy, attitude, anger, contentiousness, and even defiance.  Why?  I have heard a number of reasons.

Not necessarily in any order, but I hear that I didn't say it nice enough. I wasn't nice.  The niceness is a kind of femininity.  Style is elevated above authority.  Something like "gentleness" can be used as an instrument of insubordination.  Everything said is true, but it doesn't have to be done because the style was sinful according to the hearer.  It wasn't said nicely, so it was abusive.  Command voice cannot be used.  Another idea I've heard here is that authority must be earned, and it's earned through a soft approach that allows for rejection.  The authority shifts from the one in authority to the one under authority.

It's good to be nice.  It's commendable to treat people in a nice way, to be as nice as they want.  It is not a requirement for the hearer to comply.  The authority says.  Add to that, the authority brings a scriptural explanation.

Also, requirements brought by authority apparently violate boundaries that restrain or inhibit freedom.  The one under authority wants freedom emphasized.  He requires free will.  Ironic, I know. Requirement means coercion.  The one in authority must respect a boundary placed by the one under his authority.  The hearer needs to be able to choose to do it or he doesn't have to do it.  You might be in authority, but you can't force him to do it.  He doesn't want to do it, so he doesn't have to.  His acquiescence must be earned.  This is where millennials today ghost authority.  They don't want a setting where they'll be told what to do.  This emasculates male headship, where the authority must accommodate and accede.

No boundary dictates to authority, or else it isn't authority.  Authority isn't earned.  It is given by God.  Sure, others might listen better if the style of communication is preferred by the hearer.  However, that style doesn't change the authority one bit.  Then if someone explains scripture, that doubles the authority.  This response to authority is just rebellion against God at the peril of the hearers.  The boundary is a capricious one.  It is fiction, an ethereal boundary that doesn't even really exist, like a pink pony.

A further kind of emasculation of male headship is when the one under his authority "disagrees."  Disagreement has some kind of magical property to it in the realm of authority.  The one in authority will just have to agree to disagree -- in other words, be nice again, when the person not only doesn't have authority, but he doesn't have a scriptural explanation.  He hasn't even worked at it.

A corollary to the previous paragraph is calling upon the existence of scriptural disagreement.  "Not everyone agrees."  You can find someone who will disagree with about anything, but disagreement is not authority.  This fits in with the boundaries argument.  Someone wants a safe space to develop his own arguments, but he isn't developing his own arguments.  It's not safe, because it's a place of ugly, destructive corruption.  But authority is required to wait and wait and wait....and wait....until he comes up with his argument.  Until then, he does what he wants.  This requires the male head to be a sissy.   Not only must he wait, but he must wait with a smile.  Verrryy patiently.  Send flowers while waiting.  Sit still and wait, letting cobwebs form while his authority is being defied.  See who is in authority?  Not the male head.

It is worse than all of what I've described.  Today if the male head wants to, well, head, then he's hurting mental health.  The one under authority hears the footsteps of the authority that he defies and feels scared.  He might be confronted.  He has some heart palpitations.  Let's just call it PTSD.  Clinical psychiatrists, most with their own serious problems, call it PTSD.  The imposition of authority is a form of abuse in the emasculated society I'm detailing.

Someone in authority, the male head, should be obeyed, and with a good attitude.  Someone then who gives thorough biblical argument should be obeyed, and with joy.  He's put that effort in.  He should get a thanks.  This is manhood.  It should be respected, but it is an endangered species.  People want male headship to disappear, and as a part of the apostasy in which we live, it could.

Monday, February 24, 2020

Righteousness Preserved through the Ears: I Have Made a Covenant with Mine Ears

In Job 1:8, God tells Satan about His servant Job, "[T]here is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil."  In Job 31, Job offers several explanations for how he fulfilled that commendation of God to Satan.  It was no accident or coincidence.  Right out of the box in verse 1 he explains with the now famous statement:
I made a covenant with mine eyes; why then should I think upon a maid?
In a practical way, Job kept from sin starting with either not looking or by the discontinuation of looking.  He doesn't say, I made a covenant with my will.  In other words, he didn't permit looking with the emphasis of working on his willpower.  No, he cut sin off at the looking stage.  This is crucial for a man.  Obviously for men, there is something to look at out there that isn't any good.

I've looked at bad pictures.  I've seen nude women in pictures.  It seems that there was a temptation for Job to look too.  I remember the first time I saw this.  It was in jr. high.  I wasn't going out of my way to see anything.  The father of a friend of mine was a carpet layer and he was hired to lay carpet at a vacation home on a lake in Wisconsin, when I lived there.  We went to help him and also for fishing and other lake activities.  While moving furniture and other items in that house to make way for carpet, I picked up a stack of magazines and one fell open and there was my first vision of a naked woman.  It is a picture that is impossible then to remove from the mind for a man.  I can't say that I remember it now, but I remember the incident in a very strong way.

Today pornography is worse and easier to be seen than ever.  It doesn't even have to be porn in a technical sense, if one considers this year's Super Bowl halftime show and still the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.  It truly is "every man's battle."  Every.  Job kept himself from the sexual sin at the vision stage, a step that also leads to further and worse sinning.  Accidental seeing isn't a sin.  Choosing to see it and then continuing to see it is a sin, because of what one can read in Colossians 3:5:
Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry.
All of these, which are short of fornication, are also sin:  uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness.  Someone can commit these sins by just seeing something with his eyes.

Even in Job 31:1, scripture doesn't expressly forbid looking at a naked person.  The Bible is obviously against it, because it is against nakedness itself in Genesis 3.  It is against uncovering nakedness in Leviticus 18 and 20.  Canaan was cursed because of a wrong relationship to nakedness in Genesis 9:21-25.  The lust of the eyes is of the world, not of God (1 John 2:16).  Job stopped his lust by not looking.  One should assume from Job 31:1, that someone will not retain his practical righteousness when he permits himself to look.

Job's covenant with his eyes was not to look, and this was his explained means of retaining his righteousness.  The eyes are not the only gate through which travels sensual, lustful, fleshly, worldly content to an adverse affect against righteousness, especially in a day of advanced audio technology, availability, and the greatest "influencers" being those of popular music.  Half the top ten in instagram followers are musicians.

Job said the way to righteousness was through the elimination of something not required to eliminate.  In the New Testament in varied instances, the Apostle Paul commands, "Flee fornication" or "flee idolatry."  Paul commanded, "Abstain from fornication," but even further, "Flee fornication."  "Flee fornication" is a command.  It is a sin, therefore, not to flee fornication.  However, how does someone flee it?  He flees it in part by not looking on the maid (Job 31:1), or like means to live righteous.  In like manner, he retains righteous living, as Job did, by making a covenant not just with his eyes, but today making a covenant with his ears and not listening or not hearing something that is sensual, fleshly, and worldly.

Today men look upon a maid and listen to a maid.  Could listening do anything?  In Proverbs 5:3, Solomon writes:
For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil.
Furthermore, in Proverbs 7:21, Solomon continues on the same theme:
With her much fair speech she caused him to yield, with the flattering of her lips she forced him.
Kinds of communication are sensual and lead to sexual sin.  Proverbs describes it as dropping as a honeycomb, smoother than oil, and fair speech.  These are not just words, but styles of communication.  Everyone knows this.  Popular music doesn't just tempt toward sexual sin, but also alcohol, rebellion against authority, foul speech, and many other sins that relate to worldly and fleshly lust.

Job explained how he stayed righteous.  He said it was making a covenant with his eyes.  Believers today need to make a covenant with their ears regarding popular music.  It is a pitfall that is the downfall and destruction for the present and the future of someone who should be living a righteous life.

Friday, February 21, 2020

Hyles-Anderson College & First Baptist of Hammond: Do They Now Please God?

Do Hyles-Anderson College and First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana, please God?

Hyles-Anderson College, of course, receives the first part of its name from the late Jack Hyles.  



Mr. Hyles was, and is, extremely influential in the independent Baptist movement.  Hyles-Anderson has had, for many years, 1,000 to close to 3,000 students, pumping out people to spread Hyles's philosophy throughout the United States and the world.  Mr. Hyles invented the "Romans Road" method of evangelism where a few verses are cited and the lost person is led to repeat the "sinner's prayer."  The church and college run a mission agency and has thousands of graduates spreading the Hyles message everywhere, claiming falsely that it represents independent Baptist fundamentalism.

Jack Hyles preached a false gospel.  The Bible says:

Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Repent, and turn yourselves from your idols; and turn away your faces from all your abominations. . . . But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. . . . Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord GOD: and not that he should return from his ways, and live? . . . Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways, saith the Lord GOD. Repent, and turn yourselves from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel? . . . Nevertheless, if thou warn the wicked of his way to turn from it; if he do not turn from his way, he shall die in his iniquity; but thou hast delivered thy soul. . . . Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel? (Ezekiel 14:6; 18:21, 23, 30-31; 33:9, 11)

Ezekiel is calling unconverted Israelites to salvation, not simply calling backsliders among the true people of God to live up to their privileges.   Ezekiel calls the Israelites to enter into the promises of the New Covenant of a new heart and a new spirit (Ezekiel 36:25-27). Similarly, the fact that Ezekiel calls on the “wicked” to turn from his evil ways proves that the prophet exhorts the lost to turn from their sins in order to be saved. Ezekiel never employs the word “wicked” for a saved person (3:18–19; 7:21; 13:22; 18:20–21, 23–24, 27; 21:3–4, 25, 29; 33:8–9, 11–12, 14–15, 19); he uses the word for lost people, such as the idolatrous Babylonians who destroyed the Jerusalem temple (7:21). Indeed, not one of the 264 references to this Hebrew word for “wicked” in the Old Testament is clearly to a saved person—the wicked are uniformly those headed to damnation, who are “turned into hell” (Psalm 9:17) under the curse and wrath of God, in contrast to those who trust in the Lord, (by grace) are righteous, and receive salvation (Genesis 18:23, 25; Exodus 2:13; 9:27; 23:1, 7; Numbers 16:26; 35:31; Deuteronomy 25:1–2; 1 Samuel 2:9; 24:13; 2 Samuel 4:11; 1 Kings 8:32; 2 Chronicles 6:23; 19:2; Job 3:17; 8:22; 9:22, 24; 10:3; 11:20; 15:20; 16:11; 18:5; 20:5, 29; 21:7, 16–17, 28; 22:18; 24:6; 27:7, 13; 34:18, 26; 36:6, 17; 38:13, 15; 40:12; Psalm 1:1, 4–6; 3:7; 7:9; 9:5, 16–17; 10:2–4, 13, 15; 11:2, 5–6; 12:8; 17:9, 13; 26:5; 28:3; 31:17; 32:10; 34:21; 36:1, 11; 37:10, 12, 14, 16–17, 20–21, 28, 32, 34–35, 38, 40; 39:1; 50:16; 55:3; 58:3, 10; 68:2; 71:4; 73:3, 12; 75:4, 8, 10; 82:2, 4; 91:8; 92:7; 94:3, 13; 97:10; 101:8; 104:35; 106:18; 109:2, 6–7; 112:10; 119:53, 61, 95, 110, 119, 155; 129:4; 139:19; 140:4, 8; 141:10; 145:20; 146:9; 147:6; Proverbs 2:22; 3:25, 33; 4:14, 19; 5:22; 9:7; 10:3, 6–7, 11, 16, 20, 24–25, 27–28, 30, 32; 11:5, 7–8, 10–11, 18, 23, 31; 12:5–7, 10, 12, 21, 26; 13:5, 9, 17, 25; 14:11, 19, 32; 15:6, 8–9, 28–29; 16:4; 17:15, 23; 18:3, 5; 19:28; 20:26; 21:4, 7, 10, 12, 18, 27, 29; 24:15–16, 19–20, 24; 25:5, 26; 28:1, 4, 12, 15, 28; 29:2, 7, 12, 16, 27; Ecclesiastes 3:17; 7:15; 8:10, 13–14; 9:2; Isaiah 3:11; 5:23; 11:4; 13:11; 14:5; 26:10; 48:22; 53:9; 55:7; 57:20–21; Jeremiah 5:26; 12:1; 23:19; 25:31; 30:23; Ezekiel 3:18–19; 7:21; 13:22; 18:20–21, 23–24, 27; 21:3–4, 25, 29; 33:8–9, 11–12, 14–15, 19; Daniel 12:10; Micah 6:10; Habakkuk 1:4, 13; 3:13; Zephaniah 1:3; Malachi 3:18; 4:3).

Similarly, the New Testament commands the lost to repent of their sins. The New Testament warns those who do not “repent of their deeds” that they will enter “into great tribulation” (Revelation 2:22). That is, those unsaved people who do not “repent of their deeds” will miss the Rapture and enter into the “great tribulation” (Revelation 7:14; Matthew 24:21) with the rest of the unsaved, those who “repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts” (Revelation 9:20-21), those who “blasphemed the name of God . . . and . . . repented not to give him glory. . . . blasphemed the God of heaven . . . and repented not of their deeds” (Revelation 16:9, 11).

While all of the above is very clear from Scripture, Jack Hyles taught exactly the opposite.  Mr. Hyles taught that the lost only need to repent of unbelief in order to be saved:

What keeps a person from seeing life? Believing not! What makes the wrath of God abide on a person? Believing not! So, from what must a person repent in order to be saved? He must repent of that which makes him lost. Since “believing not” makes him lost, "believing" makes him saved. In repentance there is a turning from the thing that keeps him from being saved to the thing that saves him. So, yes, there is a repentance from unbelief in order to believe. . . . In order to believe, you have to repent of unbelief. That which makes a man lost must be corrected. . . . There are those who say we have to repent of our sins in order to be saved. No, we have to repent only of the thing that makes us unsaved, and that is unbelief. . . . There are those who say we have to repent of our sins in order to be saved. No, we have to repent only of the thing that makes us unsaved, and that is unbelief. (Jack Hyles, Enemies of Soulwinning, “Misunderstood repentance: an enemy of soulwinning”)

Scripture teaches that belief also involves surrender to Christ as Lord:

Deissmann in Light From the Ancient East gives several convincing quotations from the papyri to prove that pisteuein eis auton ["believe in/on," the most common Greek phrase for saving faith in the New Testament, John 3:16, etc.] meant surrender or submission to. A slave was sold into the name of the god of a temple; i. e., to be a temple servant. G. Milligan agrees with Deissmann that this papyri usage of eis auton is also found regularly in the New Testament. Thus to believe on or . . . into the name of Jesus means to renounce self and to consider onself the life-time servant of Jesus.” (A Manual Grammar of the Greek New Testament, H. E. Dana & Julius R. Mantey. New York, NY: MacMillan, 1955, pg. 105)

By contrast, Jack Hyles taught that saying one needs to receive Christ as Lord and Savior is a false gospel of works salvation:

Now exactly what is Lordship salvation?  It is a doctrine embraced by some who say that one must receive Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord in order to be saved.  A careful took at this doctrine will show that it is really nothing more but salvation by works rearing its ugly head. (Jack Hyles, “Salvation is More than Being Saved,” Chapter 11)

Jack Hyles's rejection of Biblical repentance explains why his religious organizations have 99%+  false professions in their widely publicized “soulwinning” statistics.  When I was a student at Fairhaven Baptist College, when Hyles-Anderson and First Baptist would have their “Big Days,” they would attract many children to their services by turning God's house into a worldly carnival, lead the children to say the “sinner's prayer” (although salvation is by repentant faith, not by repeating a “sinner’s prayer”) and then baptize them on the back of their church buses.  I personally heard testimonies of the children, coming back to church with us a week after the big day at Hyles, having been led to say the magic prayer and having been baptized, and being just as lost as they were before--many children were baptized five, six, seven, or even double-digit numbers of times.  Hyles-Anderson would claim thousands and thousands of people were saved when they were manipulated into repeating the “sinner’s prayer”  but 99%+ were made two-fold children of hell and showed no fruits of repentance (Matthew 3:8).  For example, on May 3, 1998 Hyles claimed over 15,000 people were saved, and they baptized over 5,000 people, but zero of these people joined the church that day, and a very, very tiny percentage ever joined it.

In light of Jack Hyles’s false gospel, it is not surprising that he affirmed many other heresies, including:
  • Christ was human from all eternity: “Jesus Christ . . . did not become human when He came to Bethlehem. He’s always been human.”
  • Jack Hyles’s good works helped his father in hell.
  • Fallen man is not human and does not have a spirit.
  • It was good for Adam and Eve to sin.
  • All men are “mental homosexuals” and the only difference between someone who has committed adultery and one who as not is that in the latter the sin of adultery was “in remission.”
  • “It wasn’t God the Father that forgave; the Man, the human Christ Jesus, forgave.”
  • Hyles would pray to the dead, asking his dead mother to help and intercede on the big days when they would use extra salesmanship to manipulate more people into repeating the “sinner’s prayer.”  (See The Hyles Effect-A Spreading Blight, by David Cloud, pgs. 23ff.; hear audio of Hyles teaching the heresy of the eternal humanity of Christ in the message “Why I am not 100% for Jack Hyles” by Roger Voegtlin here; also see here.

It would not be surprising in the least if the demons who, unlike Jack Hyles’s mother, actually could hear and answer Mr. Hyles’s prayer, were very active on their “big days” while his congregation was deceiving people into thinking they were saved because they repeated a magic prayer and baptizing thousands of lost people.

In light of his teaching on all men being “mental homosexuals” and those who were not adulterers simply being those with adultery “in remission,” it is sad but not surprising that overwhelming evidence proves that Jack Hyles committed immoral acts.  Nor is it surprising that his son, Dave Hyles, was a sexual monster; nor that many other leaders at First Baptist of Hammond were adulterers; nor that the pastor of First Baptist after Hyles, Jack Schapp, was a child molester who was sentenced to prison for twelve years.




The current senior pastor at First Baptist of Hammond, which still runs Hyles-Anderson College, is John Wilkerson.  




Pastor Wilkerson has done some good things at First Baptist of Hammond.  Unlike Jack Hyles, Mr. Wilkerson does not quote a verse at the beginning of a message and then just say stuff without ever referring to the Bible again.  Furthermore, there is no evidence that Mr. Wilkerson is a child molester like the previous pastor, Mr. Schapp.  That is great.  Also, Mr. Wilkerson does not seem to be full of pompous boasting but appears to be humble.  That is very good.  Also, Mr. Wilkerson does not appear to believe some of the most bizarre stuff that Jack Hyles taught; he is not teaching the eternal humanity of Christ, teaching that all men are “mental homosexuals,” and so on.  There is no evidence that he follows Hyles in praying to the dead.  Nor is there any evidence that Mr. Wilkerson has been immoral and disqualified himself from the ministry the way Jack Hyles was immoral and was disqualified from the ministry.  All of the above is good and a vast improvement from the hellish evils under Hyles and Schapp.

However, John Wilkerson has not led First Baptist of Hammond and Hyles-Anderson to reject Jack Hyles’s false gospel.  The heretical books by Jack Hyles quoted above, where Biblical repentance is called an “enemy of soulwinning” and saying one must receive Christ as Lord and Savior is (allegedly) works salvation, are still on sale in their bookstore, as are resources by Jack Hyles on how to do salesmanship soulwinning, and so on.  Of course, nothing defending the Biblical gospel or Biblical repentance is for sale.  When Mr. Wilkerson gives someone his idea of the gospel on the First Baptist website, he completely omits the word and the idea of Biblical repentance but says that one must do two things, believe and then say the sinner's prayer in order to be saved.  The Hyles-Anderson doctrinal statement says nothing about repentance, leaving out the word and the idea from how the lost must be saved.  The mission agency run by First Baptist of Hammond, most improperly called "Fundamental Baptist Missions International," totally omits both the word and the idea of repentance in its doctrinal statement about salvation, rejecting what Baptists have historically believed about repentance and the gospel.  

I am glad a woman does not need to be afraid if she crosses paths with Mr. Wilkerson alone in a dark alley at night.  That’s great.  It is also true for many faithful Mormons, members of the Watchtower Society, Catholics, and atheists.  Mr. Wilkerson has not repudiated the false gospel preached by Jack Hyles, but continues to promote Jack Hyles and his false gospel.

Furthermore, corporate repentance involves acknowledging corporate guilt.  Consider the prayer of Nehemiah:

And said, I beseech thee, O LORD God of heaven, the great and terrible God, that keepeth covenant and mercy for them that love him and observe his commandments: Let thine ear now be attentive, and thine eyes open, that thou mayest hear the prayer of thy servant, which I pray before thee now, day and night, for the children of Israel thy servants, and confess the sins of the children of Israel, which we have sinned against thee: both I and my father’s house have sinned. We have dealt very corruptly against thee, and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments, which thou commandedst thy servant Moses. ... (Nehemiah 1:5-7)

There has been no corporate repentance for the sins of Jack Hyles and First Baptist.  They still have the name of this immoral man on their college--it is still “Hyles-Anderson College.” It still has its “Jack Hyles Memorial Auditorium.” It still promotes the books and videos of Jack Hyles. It still produces videos saying Hyles was a great man, covering up his immorality, covering up his heresies, covering up his culture of corruption that filled First Baptist Church and Hyles-Anderson College with adultery.

First Baptist Church and Hyles-Anderson College still promote Jack Hyles--they still promote the man, they still promote his false anti-repentance “gospel,” and they still cover up his well-documented immorality and wickedness.  They still seek to spread the influence, the books, the sermons, and the teachings of Jack Hyles to the ends of the world.

In Revelation 2-3 Christ called on disobedient churches and their pastors to repent.  If First Baptist of Hammond takes the name of Jack Hyles off from their college, publicly rejects and warns about Jack Hyles’s false gospel, stops selling Jack Hyles’s heretical books, stops covering up his immorality and admits he was disqualified from the ministry both for his own sins and those of his son (1 Timothy 3), renames its Jack Hyles Memorial Auditorium, cries out to God for mercy for the millions of people now in hell whom its members and others it has influenced with its wicked pseudo-soulwinning philosophy around the world have led into false professions, and is honest about its past, then we could conclude that perhaps, based on Revelation 2-3, Christ is now pleased with First Baptist of Hammond.  Until then, no--no way.

If you fellowship with First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana and Hyles-Anderson College, don’t fool yourself.  You are not pleasing Jesus Christ.  Christ did not say to cover up well-documented sin in people who are “big shots” and pretend it never happened. On the contrary, He commanded in His Word: “Them that sin rebuke before all, that others also may fear. I charge thee before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, and the elect angels, that thou observe these things without preferring one before another, doing nothing by partiality” (1 Timothy 5:20-21).

Don’t fool yourself into thinking you are helping people be saved either. Hyles-Anderson is just the excuse the world needs to think that all this Baptist and Bible talk about being holy and God changing people’s lives is just fake, externalist hypocrisy.  When Baptists allow Hyles-Anderson and First Baptist staff into their pulpits after the church and college just sweep Hyles’s immorality under the rug without repentance, they are telling the world that Christianity is fake, just like Hyles’s “gospel,” “soulwinning,” and spirituality were fake.

Unless there is real repentance at Hyles-Anderson, it has well been said:





Amen.


-TDR