Plenty of Good IFB Churches, Men & Ministries

[Alan]

Brethren,

Just wanted to let everyone know that the Lord still has a lot of good, independent, fundamental, Baptist churches, men, and the ministries that God has given to these men, that are still going strong for the Lord Jesus. Most of these men, churches, and the ministries will not be recognized by any of the internet theologians, Reformed theologians, and disgruntled brethren trying to destroy good IFB churches, good IFB pastors and good IFB ministries of these men and their churches.

Throughout the history of the New Testament Church, starting at Jerusalem, these men, and their ministries, will not be listed in any of the 'church history' books written by any denominational scholar. The only men in any New Testament church listed by any denominational scholar mentioned or by a denominational 'church history' book, or an 'internet theologian,' will be one that has 'fallen' into disrepute. The denominational scholars, and internet theologians only use as their examples of non-denominational, New Testament, Baptist churches, men who disgraced the ministry, compromised, or fallen into sin. Denominational religious organizations  deliberately disregard non-denominational churches and those churches who stand for the faith and practice what they believe. A Protestant denomination does not want to recognize independent assemblies.

The men who have stayed faithful to the precepts of the New Testament church will be recognized, and honored, at the Judgment Seat of Christ. The purpose of my thread is to discuss what is an internet theologian and how they are undermining, or destroying, or causing to hinder, IFB churches.

Alan

 

 

Edited July 27, 2017 by Alan
doubled word & date & grammer (2) deleted the example changed the last sentence/purpose of the thread

[busdrvrlinda54]

Ummmm, the Watchman Bethel Baptist Church in Lawton,OK is calvinistic. Is that not a problem?

[HappyChristian]

Yes, it is calvinist. So folks need to be aware of that.

[Alan]

I understand the above statements and the concern. Thank you. I did not see any Calvinistic articles in the issue that I referred too. The reason for this thread is not to get in the debate about Calvinism. I think all of you know my doctrinal stance on Calvinism.

The stated reason why I started this thread was to show that there are IFB churches that are independent of a denominational hierarchy.  Maybe you missed this statement on their website; "Bethel Baptist Church is an independent, King James only, missions oriented church. We have and do maintain strict independence from any association, fellowship or group of any kind, but complete dependence upon God."

I guess I need to find better examples to bring out. Such is life.

[Alan]

Brethren,

I deleted the example.

Alan

[HappyChristian]

Alan, I think the idea for your thread is great. That was never the question. Nor was any debate started about Calvinism. But when something is recommended, if there are Calvanist links folks need to know. I didn't miss the quote you pulled from their website. But neither did I miss where they very clearly said they believe in the doctrines of grace and in an effort to be quite clear, specified that they meant TULIP.

Again, the idea for the thread is great. We need the encouragement of knowing that there are folks out there standing fast. But, again, if there is something questionable in their belief system, it's only right and proper to warn folks.

[Alan]

Brethren,

I am in the process of thinking (for me it my be quite hard sometimes), on how to proceed.

So, sit back, enjoy a cup of tea, and wait.

Alan

 

 

 

[Alan]

Brethren,

I decided to change the last sentence of the purpose of this thread as it seems that we will probably not fully agree on what a good IFB church totally believes in, an example of a good IFB church, and I do not want this thread to get into any disrespect of any IFB church whether on purpose or inadvertently.

On 7/15/2017 at 9:00 AM, Alan said:

The purpose of my thread is to discuss what is an internet theologian and how they are undermining, or destroying, or causing to hinder, IFB churches.

Premises, and Guidelines, for this thread

First, in order to go one step at a time in the premise of the thread, maybe we need to discuss what is an internet theologian? If possible (and that may be a big if), after we discuss, and maybe agree on a couple of points on what an internet theologian is, we can proceed on discussing how the internet theologian is undermining, or destroying, or causing to hinder, IFB churches.

I would like to qualify one word, the word, "destroy." In the context of this thread, the word "destroy" is taken from 2 Peter 2:2, "And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of." The Noah Webster Dictionary of 1828 definition of 'pernicious' is: (1) Destructive; having the quality of killing, destroying or injuring; very injurious or mischievous. Food, drink, or air may be pernicious to life or health. (2) Destructive;  tending to injure or destroy. Evil examples are pernicious to morals. Intemperance is a pernicious vice."

Local Church: Independent, Fundamental and Baptist

In this thread, the meaning of pernicious can mean to destroy the effectiveness of the church, to cause disrespect to the pastor of an IFB church, to injure the testimony of an IFB church, to cause mischievousness within the IFB churches. These acts of destruction, in the context of 2 Peter 2 are: heresies taught to destroy the church, the truth of the scripture being evil spoken of within the church, self-willed, despising government (the context is the government, or order, of the church), speaking evil of dignities (in the context of 2 Peter 2 this is a reference to the church offices of the  church: pastor, deacons, and evangelists). I fully understand that 'dignities' can mean civil government authorities; in this thread we will take the meaning of the offices of the church as listed in 1 Timothy 3:1-13; Titus 1:5-9 and Ephesians 4:11, "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers." For the purpose of this thread, the  teachers are teachers in an local, Independent, Fundamental, Baptist church. For this thread, the 'teacher'  as referenced in Ephesians 4:11, does not include an individual teaching outside a local IFB church. I will not consider the 'Universal church' as biblical at all in this thread.

In this thread, 'presumptuous' and 'despising,' (2 Peter 2:10), the local IFB church, or pastor, will be applicable as meaning 'to destroy' the local IFB church or pastor. In this thread, the context of 2 Peter chapter 2 is 'false prophets,' and 'false teachers,' "among you." 2 Peter 2:1 "among you" in this thread is the internet theologian.

Alan

 

Edited July 27, 2017 by Alan
spelling & capitalization

[Jim_Alaska]

With all due respect, and hoping that this does nothing to derail this thread, I would like to submit one thought for consideration.

 

My mind immediately goes to the fact that there were and are false prophets and teachers that have nothing to do with the Internet.

A person in any teaching or preaching capacity in a church can be a false teacher without any help from the Internet; may not even own a computer. So some may think of me as simply nitpicking, but I submitted this simply because the words "among you" were defined as Internet theologians.

Brother Alan did specify those two words as applying only to this thread, so perhaps I am just being nit picky in thinking beyond this thread and to IFB churches and the religious world in general.

[DaveW]

I think also, and somewhat related, is the fact that there are some who are Pastors of real churches who also have an internet presence. An example would be Steven Anderson, who has a small church that appears to concentrate on an internet ministry, but his teaching is largely false and very dangerous.

Edited July 28, 2017 by DaveW
Phone spelling

[Alan]

I understand both of the concerns and had previously thought about them.

I think there are good internet IFB sites and ministries. I know a lot of churches that have good sermon tapes, Bible Institutes on-line, and other resources, available for those who cannot attend the local assembly. A lot of the folks here on OnLine Baptist have excellent internet web pages and an internet ministry. I do not consider these ministries 'internet theologians.'

In this study, in order to narrow it down, due to the proliferation of individuals (mostly men), who leave an IFB on ill- terms and start their own ministry on the internet, usually a blog or a series of internet videos, in order to spread their heretical beliefs, their bitterness towards the pastor of their former IFB church, or to try and destroy the IFB community. The 'internet theologian' is a unique kind of heretical teacher and I wanted to define 2 Peter 2:1 "among you," in this study as an internet theologian. I fully understand that there are heretical teachers 'among you' in just about every local IFB church: even on the mission field. Those heretics are too many to mention in one study and I had to narrow it down.

As an example, due to the above parameters that I previously stated, in this study I would probably not include Pastor Steven Anderson. I think that Pastor Anderson's beliefs on repentance, the Second Coming of Christ for the Church, his sensationalism, his teaching on Israel, are erroneous. But, he is still the pastor of an IFB church, his church is local, KJV, and has a strong stance on other issues, and his internet ministry is part of his church.

So, even though Pastor Anderson fits the definition of a 'teacher' and "among you' he is the pastor of an IFB church, and his internet ministry is an intrinsic part of his church.

To my mind, an 'internet theologian' is an individual that has an internet ministry apart from an local IFB church, and is trying to destroy IFB churches, or doctrines that apply particularly to local IFB churches, or pastors, as a teacher, through his internet ministry.

I will give one example: Steve Sorenson, his blog is called, "Baptist Deception'" and here is the link to his site: http://www.baptistdeception.com/about/#.WXp-gnrhntR

This is an unusual study unique to our modern age and we need to know how to define the issue and deal with it properly. So, we will go slowly.

Alan

[DaveW]

I do know of a couple of guys who don't have websites for that purpose (they have their own church websites, both being ex-IB Pastors), but they both do a lot of talking on social media like Faceplant.... sorry, Facebook, wherein they defame IB in general, and often specific men and churches.

A website can't be pointed to in such cases, but they are out there - the beauty of this for them, is that much of the stuff they write on those platforms passes off the front page fairly quickly, which means that they can say stuff and it has an initial effect, but then it is hard to call them on it later, because the comments become hard to find.

Kinda like the guy who yells abuse from his car window as he drives past - it hurts, but there is really nothing you can do about it.

[Alan]

Hmmm.... I do not have a Facebook site (nor Twitter), so, I am not familiar with what goes on in the Facebook community.

And, it appears that some of the churches (sad to say), are using a church website in order to deceive folks that the church, and the ministry of the pastor, is accomplishing more than is actually happening. Apparently, there are church sites that are in reality internet church sites. If that be the case, than it may fit the description of an 'internet theologian."

One of the reasons why I feel that that the term 'internet theologian,' is appropriate is that these men are their own authority. They mis-use the scriptures (like other heretics), to teach their own interpretation of a pet doctrine, practice or disagreement with a previous pastor. They seem to disrespect pastors, IFB churches, and good sound biblical doctrine. Please, do not get me wrong, there is probably not a 'perfect' church in existence nor a 'perfect' pastor.  It seems that these internet theologians find one thing wrong in a church, or the pastor will not allow him to teach in the church, or the pastor preaches on some sin, and the individual becomes disgruntled, bitter, full of resentment, and goes on the internet to spew out his venom on an internet blog, forum, or video.

[DaveW]

I don't do Faceplant at all - but I know some who do, and they have regularly told of these two guys in particular, both of whom I have met in the past, one of whom I knew reasonably well in the past.

I did sign up to twitter many years ago, but I have no idea how to even view it let alone post to it..... 

In fact, the only thing even vaguely like that that I do use is ....ummm...... Linkedin - which I was signed up to a few years ago for work, but which I still keep track of - but that is all business stuff, not "social".

 

 

 

[Jim_Alaska]

In reading the various thoughts in this thread I can see that I have had a wrong understanding of the term "Internet Theologian" from the beginning. First I had never even heard the term until I found OB, it was here that I  heard it.

To my simple mind and not knowing any better, I thought an Internet Theologian was a "know it all", "always right" person, such as we have seen here at OB various times. These are the people that always seem to be at odds with correct IFB doctrine and all too willing to argue to the death to promote their false doctrine in message forums.

I just never thought of the term applying to various men and ministries that have a visible presence online. So here I get to learn something new. Although I may still, at times think of the term as applying to those who visit Internet forums with and agenda to disrupt unity and cause trouble among like minded brethren.