9: History of the IFB Part 6

This is the For Freedom Podcast. This podcast exists to bring to light the legalism and abuse in the independent fundamental Baptist movement, and to encourage believers to grow in grace through the scriptures. Now, here's your host, John Hollifield. And welcome to the For Freedom Podcast, guys, and I hope that you've been having a good week. I've been having a wonderful week. My third born, my little son Mason, had his third birthday this week, and we had a good time with that. I have four kids. I have a daughter, Madison. I have another daughter who's five, Mackenzie. And then Mason is three, and then my wife and I, we just had one in February, little Maggie. And so Mason turned three, my little dude, and was all about Spider-Man this year. So we had a good time with that. My wife's birthday was the next day, and we enjoyed the time together. But excited about, I'm going to finish up today this segment of history of the independent fundamental Baptist movement. That's my goal, so we're getting a lot to cover in this section. Before we do that, I want to start a new segment. I'm going to try to start off most of the podcast episodes. If I don't have, if it's not an interview episode, then I want to do a segment called John Recommends. And so what I'm going to do is just each episode try to recommend something that I think I really enjoyed, either got a lot out of, or just really absolutely loved. It could be a show, movie, documentary, book. And so to recommend to you to check out. And this time, it's going to be by way of book. Now, with the theme of history going on with these episodes, I know I've recommended a lot of the works that I've got a lot of my information from throughout the episodes, and I've included those in different episodes, show notes, and stuff like that. But I'm going to recommend today two books that deal with church history. Just to warn you, they are rather lengthy, but these have greatly influenced me, and I think that they are very well written. They're done in the forms of biographies, and one is actually a theological overview, but I recommend it. It's called Foundations of Grace by Stephen Lawson. It is a thick book. I think, looking here, close to 500 pages. So it's a slow read. It took me a little over a year to get through it, but it's worthwhile. I don't recommend that thick of books on a whim. It is a very, very solid work. It is called Foundations of Grace, A Long Line of Godly Men, 1400 BC to AD 100. And so what this does, Stephen Lawson takes this book, and he starts from Genesis and covers men that have taught or, in the books of the Bible, have gone through and talked about the doctrines of grace. And it does a wonderful job of laying this out biblically. I saw a tweet somewhere where somebody said, no one becomes a Calvinist by reading the Bible. And I've got to be honest with you, although I really dislike the term Calvinist, I don't like the term Calvinist, but we'll get into that another day. The only reason why I do hold to a doctrines of grace view is because of the Bible. There are too many biblical passages to just pass over. And anybody that says that to me clearly does not know their Bible very well. Foundations of Grace is a fantastic book. That's a volume one. The next one is sort of a take on church history done in the form of several biographies called Pillars of Grace, A Long Line of Godly Men from AD 100 to 1564 by the same author. It's still a thick book. It is still a thick book. But it is shorter than the first volume. But it goes through, does a great job of giving you some church history from the Book of Acts all the way up to a little after the Reformation. So it covers guys like Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Justin Martyr, Athanasius of Alexandria, Augustine of Hippo. These are just a few that it covers. Gottschalk of Orbe. That's an interesting chapter to read. Anselm of Canterbury, John Wycliffe, John Huss, Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli, William Tyndale, Heinrich Bollinger, and John Calvin. And so those two books I recommend. I'll put the links in the show notes. Those are, that's the Foundations of Grace and the Pillars of Grace, Volumes 1 and 2 by Stephen J. Lawson. That's what I recommend. Now, let's get into the history of the Independent Fundamental Baptist Movement. We have covered this, 100 years of this IFB history, starting from J. Frank Norris, going from J. Frank Norris to John R. Rice, and then John R. Rice to where it expands, 50s, 60s. We looked at Lester Roloff. We looked at Oliver V. Green. We looked at Lee Roberson. And then in 80, Rice dies. Jack Hiles is the premier guy, becomes the leader. In the last episode, we really covered the life of Jack Hiles. So, now let's get into this. So, going back to 1980. In 1980, John R. Rice dies and turns the sword of the Lord ministry over to a guy by the name of Curtis Hudson. Now, let me scold you a little. If I were to say to how many of you, how many of you believe the Bible is the Word of God? Up goes your hands. But how many of you strive with all of your might to obey it? That's another question. I can start now listing areas. I just start with the alphabet and go A, B, C, and go all the way down. And I can hit every one of you before I got through. For you deliberately disobey the Word of God. It's not how much you know about it, how much you believe about it. It's how much you obey of it. Our problem is not that we don't know enough. Our problem is that we're not doing enough. John 13, 17 said, If you know these things, happy are you if you do them. If you do them. Not knowing them makes you happy. Doing them makes you happy. Safeguard against compromise. Obedience. That's a safeguard. Obedience. Second safeguard. And I'm not making this up. It's all in the chapter. Second safeguard separation. Get it? Verse 7 and 8. That you come not among these nations. These that remain among you neither make mention of the name of their gods, nor cause to swear by them. Neither serve them, nor bow down yourselves unto them. But cleave unto the Lord your God. There's two sides of separation there. Separation from those nations. Don't bow down to their gods. Don't even mention the name of their gods. But turn away from them and cleave to the Lord your God. I mentioned that last time, but Curtis Hudson takes this over. And Curtis Hudson really platforms and does everything he can to push Jack Hiles and the Sword of the Lord ministry there. So that happens. Moving to the 90s. Now while Hiles is going through all of his scandals and stuff in the early 90s, this is what happens in the 90s. You begin to have another, a new generation of IFB leaders come on the scene in the 90s and they start their institutions and their platforms begin to grow. In 91, you have a guy out of Powell, Tennessee, close to Knoxville, named Clarence Sexton. I'm sure that many people believe that the thing that is essential in putting this kind of meeting on is the size of this ministry. But it is not the size. It's the spirit of this ministry. And that's the thing that's so refreshing, isn't it? The Christ-like spirit. When I am thinking in my own life and ministry about what is happening here this week, I am grateful to be an independent Baptist. To be identified with people like the people who are here. And I know this pastor deeply appreciates his precious people. To be a part of this. To be a part of this whole movement. Friends, we have something to be so grateful for. My dear wife and I, we've been married 44 years. And we're thankful, very thankful to God, that we can be in this part of the race with this pastor and his wife. And be encouraged by what God is doing in his life. And I love him and I'm praying for him. Praying for his family. This is an unusual place because you had a real pastor in Dr. Hiles. A man known around the world and, of course, will be remembered forever as a true man of God. He was a pastor. And God has given you another pastor. With a pastor's heart. That's a thrilling thing. And I love you, Bunkscop. I really do. I'm praying for you. I'm praying that every dream God has given you will be fulfilled. And I believe that God's hand is on his life. And I know the Lord has been blessing here and continues to bless. He is the pastor of Temple Baptist Church. He starts in 91, the Crown College of the Bible. And Clarence Sexton, to this day, has that church, rather large church, considered by the standards of a megachurch, considered a megachurch. And has the Crown College of the Bible there. It still holds many students there. In 1995, now here's a change with Curtis Hudson that we mentioned earlier. In 1995, Curtis Hudson dies of cancer, sadly. He dies of cancer. And when he dies, he turns the Sword of the Lord over to Shelton Smith. Shelton Smith was a pastor. He wanted the Sword of the Lord. The Sword of the Lord then is turned over to Shelton Smith. And he is the current head of the Sword of the Lord ministry to this day. Also in 1995, a guy out in California by the name of Paul Chappell... Titus 1.15 Under the pure, all things are pure. Now you listen very carefully. That pure mom and dad out there, when those kids are up here, you know what they're saying? That's great. Praise the Lord. Because to the pure, all things are pure. But unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure. But even their mind and conscience is defiled. I don't want to sound weird tonight. There's a reason when ladies come up here to sing, that the rule, if you want to use it, the standard... Call it, I don't care what you call it. Call it legalism. Call it control. I don't care what you call it. There is a standard in this church that the dresses are going to come down to the knee when a lady stands up here. I've been here long enough now, you can call me every name you want to call me. I mean, just fill my name in the blank. They call me old-fashioned. It's okay. Say, why, Pastor? I've counseled too many men to know that if we don't have everything covered just right, they're not going to be thinking about wonderful grace of Jesus. Some of you men want to help me with this tonight? We're just trying to keep the focus on Him. I get so sick and tired of going to weddings, and it's the bride's day. And here's some Jezebel with hardly any clothes on, strutting around the wedding. Look it. You come to a wedding around here. Show some respect to the bride. You go to a funeral, and unsaved women do the exact same thing. You come to the house of God. It ought not to be a flesh show. It ought to be a place where Jesus is lifted high and His holiness is remembered. Who pastors Lancaster Baptist Church begins West Coast Baptist College. This college starts in 95, and this college grows quickly. And I think at one point they had over 1,000 students. I think that's dropped a little bit, but they're back up there. We'll come back and talk a little bit more about Paul Chappell in a little bit. 96, the following year, same state, California. Different part of the state. Another wing of IFB colleges started by Jack Treber. Now, Jack Treber started an institute in 92. And in 1992, he starts a little Bible institute. And it was sort of like a soft opening for the college to see if they could do that. As they run the institute for a full graduating class, that class graduates in 95. In 96, they launch the Golden State Baptist College out of North Valley Baptist Church there in Santa Clara, California. Submission. Submission. Men and ladies. Authority. Submission. Say the first one, please. Authority. It's very difficult to say this next one. See if we can say it. Ready? Try it. See, I knew it was going to be hard. Authority. Submission. Here's a third word. It's a very difficult word. Obedience. Obedience. Say all three words. Ready? Authority. Submission. Obedience. How about this word? Leadership. Say that word together. Leadership. Say all four together. Ready? Authority. Submission. Obedience. Leadership. There's a valuable lesson that we'll learn here tonight in these few moments. You don't want to touch God's anointed. I remember reading that book the first time. I reread it again this week. You never know when God's anointed ceases to be God's anointed. I know of leadership that at times has been authoritative and dictatorial. And I think downright abusive. It's sad. However, it's a frightening thing to raise your hand against the anointed. I don't know when the principal ceases to be the anointed of God. I don't know when the principal ceases to be the author. I don't know when the deacon ceases to be the one that's been set apart for the church. It's very dangerous. I don't know when the pastor. And by the way, God always has a way of removing. God has a way. So all of these colleges are popping up. You have Pensacola Christian College, which was started in the 70s. They're running strong in Florida. You have Bob Jones University still going in South Carolina. You have these colleges starting up and growing across the country. And when these things do, they sort of fracture the IFB a little bit. And those that are within the IFB sort of look towards those institutions and those churches, those hubs, if you will, as their sect of the IFB. Now, 2001. I mentioned this in the last episode. Jack Hiles dies in 2001. Shortly after, like less than just a few months, I mean, they really didn't do much of a pastor's search at all. First Baptist Church of Hammond announces their new pastor, Jack Scott. Brother Darrell Moore stopped me the other day and he said, Pastor, I've got to talk to you a minute. He says, do you think, do you think, Pastor, that quite possibly God in his kindness and mercy is looking at your generation, my generation, his generation, his generation? He says, those of us who have a worldwide appetite to do something on a big scale for God and is saying, hey, you know what? I gave the previous generation a chance to go to Japan and they shut me down on that one. I'll kick the door wide open right now. Would you all want to go there again? My prediction, we won't send 10 missionaries there. Our prediction is we'll send a few dollar bills extra to the missionaries who are there and we'll pat ourselves on the back for a token nod of God bless you. The whole issue of human tragedy all centers not around what caused a tragedy or why do people suffer? Why do bad things happen to good people? My goodness, I've always said for a long time, I don't question why bad things happen to good people. I question why good things happen to anybody. We're sorry sinners on our way to hell. Why would God be merciful to anybody? Including me, including you. Get off your self-righteous high horse and stop saying, well, I'll tell you what, I've served God. You know what? You were going to the same rotten hell that the unsaved heathen were going to. You weren't going to the air-conditioned compartment. Now, Jack Skopp worked in the college. He was a teacher in the college. Taught homiletics there at Howells Anderson College. Was on the pastoral staff. Really was a star on the staff there at the church and college to many of those that came through there. People loved his preaching. Even before he became the pastor, he was a sought-after youth speaker. So he would travel outside of the college and preach around the country and other IFB youth conferences and camps and those types of things. He married Jack Howells' daughter, Cindy. And when Howells died in 2001, they announced, they named Jack Skopp as their pastor. Jack Skopp was a very bombastic preacher. More so than Jack Howells. I remember when I was in Bible college, one of the guys that I used to hang out with loved Jack Skopp. And we used to listen to a message that Skopp preached all the time. We listened to the message all the time. Skopp preached it about five to six months after he became pastor. The name of the message was, I sure do miss you, Brother Howells. And in the message, it's like an hour and 20-minute message. And he just goes off about keeping the church the same way that it's always been. And it's a doozy of a message. And he basically just says that if you didn't like Howells, you're going to hate me because I'm that much more into that. So Skopp becomes, he really grows that church. The church grows bigger in his ministry. In fact, in 2002, the church was leasing and operating 250 buses for its bus routes. Now, this is less than a year after Skopp takes over. Giving was up 37% since Howells died. And enrollment at Howells Anderson College was said to be at a 25-year high. In 2006, the church completed a new $27 million auditorium. Skopp also became the most sought-after conference speaker in the entire independent fundamental Baptist movement. In fact, so much so that he stepped back and cut off his traveling schedule quite a bit. And to get Jack Skopp and the IFB movement at your conference or meeting or something was really the big deal. And he also had, at this time, they bought a Learjet to help him travel. He had his own private pilot. And they would fly him other places to help him, you know, it was said to make best use of his time. But a lot of this comes to a head in 2012. So let me just give some personal story of my interaction with the IFB movement. I go to college. I went to an IFB college in 2005. Now, I say it was an IFB college because now the college that I went to is not an IFB college. They totally changed since I've left. And they're not even in the realm of the independent fundamental Baptist anymore. But while I was there, this Skopp was a big deal. And even at this place. And so I graduated in 2009. In 2010, I went to work at a church, an IFB church. And so for 2010 to 2013, I was working at an IFB church. This is while I was still in the movement. And the church that I worked at, we always went to this Clarence Sexton's couples retreat in Gatlinburg. So Sexton and Temple and Crown and all them, they put on a couples retreat. They do several meetings a year. They do a men's meeting. We'll talk about the Baddest Friends Conference in a minute. But they do all these things. And they did a couples retreat. And the church that I worked at, I always sent the couples to this couples retreat. And I remember in 2012, we went to the couples retreat. The special speakers were Clarence Sexton, David Gibbs, and Jack Scott. And I remember Jack Scott being there and preaching on marriage. That was in February of 2012. Okay. I think somewhere I have the message that he preached. I may still have it. I don't know. But I remember ordering those messages because at the time, I thought it was so awesome. Oh, okay. We'll just move on from there. So that was February of 2012. In July of 2012, First Baptist Church of Hammond is having their youth conference. Okay. Their practice, they always put on this huge youth conference. I think they boasted one year when I was at Bible College having 10,000 teenagers there on campus. So a massive, massive youth conference. One evening while Jack Scott was preaching, after he got done preaching, he left the auditorium. And this is where it all went down. But before I get into that story, I just got ahead of myself there a little bit. I want you to listen to this clip real quick. This is a clip of what is believed to be one of Scott's final messages or maybe the final message he preached at the church before he was found out for what he was doing. Listen to this. Because sexuality, listen to me. That sexuality change of adolescence is the most crucial moment to connect a child with the God who gave him that beautiful, wonderful change to become an adult. And we disconnect and we pull the plug instead of plugging it in. Look at, listen, I don't want you to miss this. Human sexuality is the most powerful operating system on planet earth. You either use it or it blows up in your face. Because the pastor now represents everything that they are terrified of talking about. And certainly the man of God has no idea what I'm going through. And he'd probably hate me and send me to hell if I told him. Quite the opposite is true. There's more misunderstanding about this. I want to say to my fellow brethren who cremate me over this. Absolutely destroy me on the blog pages. Massacre. We've lost scores of college students because pastors get furious when I talk about this. But who wrote the book on sexuality, folks? Who better to talk about it than a man who represents the book? When we disconnect a man of God from human sexuality, we are pulling the plug on a kid's chance of understanding what true biblical intimacy is. Nobody wants to be more intimate with you than God does. The language that Jesus Christ used when he talked to his father about what he wanted for his people. Read John 17, mom and daddy, and tell me how intimate he wanted your kids to be with him. Read John 15 and ask me if Jesus Christ just wanted to shake hands. If you abide in me and my words abide in you, I in you, you in me, we in the father, the father in us. Don't try to read some ambiguous theological nonsense in that Jesus was saying, can I put it in language that everybody understands? He says, I want to be the most intimate of intimates with you. And when we blow that off and talk to our kids, we are the ones. Look, we get upset because of the Big Bang Theory. But if we don't get it figured out that we're connected with God, and when your teenager goes through adolescence and they start changing, and daddy, you don't want to touch your daughter anymore, you don't want to hug her anymore, you know, her body change, it kind of pulls you off. Trust me, she's got a boyfriend lined up who would be happy to touch her. Okay, so Scop was, he preached the youth conference that evening. It was a Wednesday evening. He leaves the auditorium and a young staff member there at the church notices Jack Scop's cell phone was left on the pulpit. So he gets his cell phone and goes to, you know, getting it to return it to the pastor. When he gets it, he picks it up and sees messages that causes him to be very concerned. He looks at him and he decides not to turn in the cell phone to Pastor Scop. He actually decides to turn it into a deacon or leadership within the church. Scop takes off. When he finds out that they got the cell phone and they're questioning him about this relationship with an underage girl in the church, he leaves. He gets in his car. He tries to go immediately and try to get out of state. They call him, call him, call him. They almost were going to get law enforcement involved. Finally, he came back. They got him back. They confronted him about it and then eventually he was arrested for having a sexual immoral relationship with a 16-year-old girl that he was counseling. One of the major issues with his case was that he was taking her across state lines to carry on this relationship. And that's a federal offense. Jack Scop goes to prison. He, in fact, is in prison right now. He only has a few more years left on his sentence and then he'll be out. But he was sentenced, I think, to 10 years in federal prison. And so he's been in prison that long and he'll be getting out in a few years' time. Since that time, Cindy divorced him. The church began to look for a new pastor. First Baptist Church of Hammond, Jack Isles Church, with the Jack Isles statue out there. Scott was the guy. Scott falls. He goes to prison. And they decided to call a new pastor, John Wilkerson, to the pastorate. Wilkerson was a former pastor in California. And he came and he's been the pastor there at First Baptist Church in Hammond to this day. He is the church. He did change some things there. They no longer do their pastor's school conference. They still do the youth conference, I believe. But they no longer do the pastor's school conference. He has a much different personality than Hiles or Scop. And you can tell that by his preaching. Here's a clip of Wilkerson preaching. I oftentimes will say this, and I don't know if it's absolutely accurate. But I say that Christians, if they do not get their head straight on money and music, they will struggle in their spiritual growth. I believe that. I believe that Satan is extremely... The Bible tells you can't serve God and mammon or finances. Materialism and the Lord will always be a fight with us. All of us have already thought about money today already. And it's just part of our nature. I've talked about it here in church with our offering. But even before that, you thought about money this morning, and I did too. It happens to us every day. Because money is very personal. Where a man's treasure is, there his heart will be also. But also, music is extremely personal. Most Christians believe, if I like it, God likes it. It's okay. If I like it, then it's good. You know, music is... God's music, it doesn't start that way. Music is a heart matter, and it should be for the Lord. People say, well, no, I like jazz, and I like this, and I like salsa, or I like rap, or I like rock, or I like soft rock, or I like country western, I like bluegrass, I like Christian, I like CCM. And you know what's the matter is, it doesn't really matter what you like. Or what I like. But it's very, very sensitive. So that was what happened with Scott and First Baptist. So what is the... I want to go now and talk a little bit, as we wrap this up, and this whole thing of the history of the Independent Baptist Movement, Independent Fundamental Baptist Movement. What is the landscape of the movement today? And that is really... I've tried to give history, give facts with this whole segment of the history of the movement. Although some of my opinions do come through. But this right here is a lot of opinion. This is my opinion. Because I'm going to talk a little bit and give an assessment of what I believe the Independent Fundamental Baptist Movement is right now. So, as the movement is laid out today, of course you have Chappell's ministry, Treber's ministry, Sexton's ministry, and the Sword of the Lord. Each of them have their major conferences. Paul Chappell has the Spiritual Leadership Conference in California each year with some other IFB pastors that make their way out there, and he has them speak. Treber has his pastors conference each year, which he has guys like Tony Hudson and Bob Gray II, and a guy named Mike Johnson, who is... Anyways, out there in California. Clarence Sexton each year has the Baptist Friends meeting. They're in Tennessee, and they're still going on with that conference. And then the Sword of the Lord conference is still going on, and they have guys in there like Jeff Fugate, John Hamblin, our regulars at the Sword of the Lord conference, although the Sword of the Lord is a shell of what it used to be. The Sword of the Lord has been slowly dying over the years, and they seem to be getting less and less influential. The movement also exists in different sects or wings as we see it today. There is the...of course, I've already mentioned you have the Treber camp. You have the Paul Chappell camp. Those are your two camps really mainly in California. You have the Sexton camp there in Tennessee. You have the First Baptist Church camp with Wilkerson. They're still following there. You have the two Christian education camps, if you will, although in Pensacola and Bob Jones. Although, let me say this. Let me give a disclaimer between those two. It is my opinion that Pensacola Christian College and Bob Jones University have distanced themselves from the toxic fundamentalism, and done so not like Wilkerson, not in just word. Let me say that. I think a lot of these guys have tried their best to distance themselves from toxic fundamentalism in word, and people buy it. And in action, they still have it. For instance, it is my opinion that that's what's happened with Paul Chappell. Paul Chappell thinks that he's distanced himself from the toxic fundamentalism, but I've heard way too many personal stories of people out there that work out there that have been in that ministry that that's not actually the way it is on the inside. But as far as from what I've heard from Pensacola and Bob Jones, they have distanced themselves, gotten more balanced biblically. Now, one thing that I do have a problem with is in Pensacola's statement of doctrine, they still hold to a King James-only-ism, but that's another episode. Okay? So you have those educational institutions. Then you also have the southern, what I call camp meeting camp wing, if you will, of the IFB. So this really goes on sort of in the southeast or the southern east section of the country, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia. And you have the names of this part of it, of this sect of the IFB is Ralph Sexton Jr. Think about the homes. Think about the families. Think about the stress that we're going through before the coronavirus ever came to America. You think about how we were living in the weeks and the days before. We're sick as a culture. We're sick as a society. We can't breathe spiritually. We don't have any anointing of the Holy Ghost on our services. We're going through religious activities. We're manufacturing. What we're trying to do is replace the breath of the Holy Spirit with the mechanics of men. And you cannot replace the power of God and the presence of God with the methodology of men. That will not touch the souls of your children or your grandchildren. We need the power of God. We're sick and we can't breathe. We're so sick that we've got 10-year-old boys in our culture that are being treated in therapy for pornography addiction. We've been infected by a deadly virus that's called sin. There's a virus there. We're in the valley of this virus. You also have one of the biggest names that's helped grow this was Larry Brown. We're not going to back up on him because he ain't never backed up on us. Oh, God help us tonight to preach the truth, to tell the truth, to stand in the truth, and live the truth for the glory of God. What is the first mandate that you've got to have in order to get to the point of no return? That's what we'll call it. The point of no return. I'm not going back. I am not retreating. I am not giving up. I've watched them go and I've seen them go, but I've decided not to go. I've just shook me off a little place. I've cleaned me off a little place. And I'm just going to stand. And having done all to stand by the grace of God. I'm glad. Thank God. There are some mandates in these verses that will help us to stand. Read me that first one, son. Let's see. It's out of verse number. I put this together in the bathtub and it got some water on it. And my verses got wet. From Augusta, South Carolina, who pastored Victory Baptist Church. He actually has resigned that church and now has turned it over to the upcoming star of that part of the movement, which is the new pastor there at Victory Baptist Church, Victory Baptist College. And that's C.T. Townsend. All that men and women would quit coming to church worried about who's got the nicest tie on or who's got the nicest suit. But somebody come to the house of God and say, if it had not been the Lord that was on our side, we would be destroyed. I come tonight not to see you, not to see them, but I come tonight to lift my voice and say, blessed be the name of the Lord tonight. Oh, that men would praise the Lord. I go lots of churches. Preacher does too. I don't find many churches don't have steeples. I don't find many churches don't have a piano. I don't find many churches don't have a choir and some of them ain't as good as others. But I don't go places where a lot of those things are missing. But hear me well. What's missing in the churches today is old-fashioned grandmas that used to shout till their hair fell down. Old men, the grandpas that would teach their grandchildren that this just ain't religion, but this is a relationship. Oh, where's the Sunday school teachers that shouting on Wednesday, shouting on Thursday, and shouting on Friday. I'll tell you what we need is a revival of people getting happy over what Jesus did for them. Oh, that men would praise the Lord tonight. Then you have Ruckmanism. And so I talked in one of the history episodes about Peter Ruckman. Now, Peter Ruckman sort of had his movement going. Peter Ruckman actually died a few years ago. He lived into his 90s. And his movement still lives on today. Ruckmanism is still surviving today through guys like Sam Gipp. That is a negative connotation. That is the first time that Egypt appears in Scripture, and it is a negative connotation. We won't go there. You can mark it down if you're writing notes. But in Genesis chapter 37, Joseph was sold into slavery in Egypt. Again, if you see that as positive, it's because you bought him. But it is not a good thing. Take a look at Exodus chapter 1. Exodus chapter 1. And look at verse 11. Therefore, talking about the Egyptians, they did set over them, the Jews, taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens. And they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Python, and Ramses. All right? Joseph went down into Egypt. And then, of course, then Jacob, his father, and his family all followed him down into Egypt. And hundreds of years later, they ended up being slaves there. Correct? Okay. I'm going to go on vacation. Tell me what it's like. Well, if you go there, they'll probably kill you. They'll keep your wife. And they'll turn your kids into slaves. Bill Grady or William Grady. Think about this for a minute. Job 32 was written, don't miss it, 1800 years before Paul wrote 2 Timothy. Furthermore, Job is the oldest book in the Bible. Furthermore, according to Dr. Uckman's viewpoint, Elihu is the author of the book of Job. And he just happens to be the speaker when you get to chapter 32 in the context. Thus, we are about to discover that the first author of the first autograph of the Holy Bible just happens to give us the definitive text on the doctrine of inspiration. Let me read you a statement from my book in the introduction. A little lengthy statement. So this is all taped. And by the book, I need the money. Now, uh... And a new guy named Andrew Sluder. Not only that, but we see the lie of the contemporary. The lie of the contemporary. It kills you all because it's sinful. We're living... You know, we're living in Laodicea. We understand all this. Laodicea, last days. Things are not going to get better. Things are only going to get worse. Wicked men and deceivers shall what? Wax. Worse and worse. Deceiving and being deceived. We're on the down and down, not on the up and up. Okay? Everybody understands that. But we've got now independent, fundamental, temperamental, right-wing chicken, eating King James, Bible-believing, you know, Ruckmanite, whatever, whatever, whatever adjective you want to put before it, Baptist people that are feeding right into the contemporary movement. You're feeding right into it. You got it in your cars? Listen, listen. There... People say, preacher, you believe in Christian rock? No, I don't believe in it. No such creature exists. What is Christian rock? You drinking you a Christian beer? Everybody okay? Going to go out and snort your line of Christian cocaine? That's so extreme, preacher. How can you compare it? Now, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second. I remember the kind of music that me and my family used to listen to before my mama and daddy got... I was four years old, my mom and daddy got saved. And so that's where you have the Ruckmanism wing. And we'll get into more. Maybe I'll do an episode sort of refuting Ruckmanism. And then you had this a couple years ago. I sort of mentioned this last time. But you had emerged called the New IFB, or the New Independent Fundamental Baptist. And really the major name in this is a guy named Stephen Anderson, who pastors Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona. And here's a clip of Stephen Anderson sort of explaining the difference between the old IFB and the new IFB. Hey everybody, Pastor Stephen Anderson here from Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona. Today I want to talk a little bit about the difference between the old IFB and the new IFB. But let me just say this. You know, the new IFB inherited a lot of good things from the old IFB. The King James, the soul winning, the hard preaching, the clothing standards, the traditional music, the sound Baptist doctrine of salvation by faith alone, eternal security of the believer, the Trinity, and the verbal inspiration of the Bible, the preservation of the Bible. You know, all these great doctrines that we've kept. And then these things that we've changed, the things that we've actually deviated from, what the old IFB had done in the previous generation, are an improvement in every case. If you actually compare these things side by side, you'll see that in every case we've gotten closer to the Word of God. We've actually tightened things up and improved things. Like take post-trib versus pre-trib. So they have this escapist, weak, watered down, pre-trib rapture doctrine of basically, we get to leave before it all hits the fan and before the Antichrist starts persecuting Christians and killing Christians. You know, so it's this escapist fantasy. We have the realistic biblical view of a post-tribulation rapture, where we're going to go through the persecution and tribulation and suffering that leads up to the second coming of Christ, as opposed to the old IFB that's just like, hey, any day now, you know, we can just go from our comfortable American life. Just boom, we're up in heaven like that. You know, they're splitting up the family into Sunday school and nursery. That's unbiblical. You know, we've got the stronger position of having our babies and children in the service listening to preaching. They're watered down on the LGBT. You know, we are taking a hard biblical line. And by the way, we take the exact same line on the Sodomites that they took in the 1990s. And, you know, in the 1990s, the preaching that we do in the new IFB would have been at home in any old IFB church in regard to the Sodomites. As far as being Zionist and pro-Jewish, you know, that's a new doctrine that came out in the late 1800s. And so we're just, you know, rebooting that, resetting that to what Christians have believed before the late 19th century. So, you know, we're just bringing that back to a biblical view. And, you know, they're so confused on that issue because, you know, on one side of their mouth, they have to admit that anyone who rejects Jesus Christ has God's wrath abiding on them. But then all of a sudden they're under some special blessing from God, even though they reject and hate Jesus. It doesn't make any sense. When it comes to hiding the scandal, I mean, come on, any idiot knows that that's a stupid policy to have and that they should be exposing it. Pro-Republican? Come on. The Republican Party isn't what it used to be. Birth control? Again, that's modernistic, worldly covetousness that led us into that junk. We've tightened that up and gotten more conservative on that. Using more Bible, local church, homeschool. We are more conservative in every area. They are watered down. They have gotten more progressive and liberal. So that's Steven Anderson. Their movement is really small. But it's very toxic. It's the worst of the worst. And honestly, I think that that's going to implode on itself. Now, also a few years back, I think about five years ago, you had a guy, a pastor out of Las Vegas, and some other young guys who wrote—his name was—a pastor out of Las Vegas whose name is Josh Tice. And Josh Tice wrote an article called The New Independent Baptist, and it made some waves. Now, since then, I've actually heard Josh Tice say himself that he was not—his intention was not to start a movement. He regretted even using the term New Independent Baptist. That was not his intention. He was just talking about guys that are Baptists, that are independent, that don't hold to a lot of the legalism and toxic things that are in the IFB. And the interesting thing is, is I don't think the New Independent Baptists are a movement that will overtake the IFB for a couple of reasons. One of them being, most of the guys who move to a disposition or a position that is similar to what is described in the article, The New Independent Baptist by Josh Tice, don't stay Independent Baptist for long. They end up saying, look at it, and then they come to the point where, you know, we're evangelical. We're just going to be done with all of that. And I think that's where Josh Tice sort of is now. And the other fact of the matter is, is that to have any links towards any Independent Fundamental Baptist, the actual people who are holding on to Independent Fundamental Baptist will not have anything to do with anybody that doesn't look like them. So if you look a little bit more balanced and culturally appealing in any way, an Independent Fundamental Baptist or old IFB is going to be scared to death of being associated with you. So therefore, it's really not a thing in itself. So this brings us to sort of the end of the history of the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement. And so I want to finish with my take on the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement, the IFB. And I think the next episode I'm going to do, I'm going to start off, I may start off talking about defining the movement. But at some point I'm going to give a definition of what an IFB is. But I believe the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement is a dying movement. And I think it's going to die out. And I don't think it will last much longer. I think they're dying quickly as it is right now. They're hemorrhaging. Many of the leaders and names of the movement are trying their best to fix the leaks and the gaps that they have for people who are not coming back. Listen, when I was in it, I remember a lot of topic of discussion. This is back in between 2005 and 2009, and then 2010, 2011. The biggest question that always got asked at every conference or youth meeting or anything like that where youth workers were involved asking pastors questions was, how do we retain people? We get teenagers in a youth group and then they leave. How do we retain them? And they didn't have a clue. They tried every time they even come up with an answer. It wouldn't work. They didn't have a clue. They're not retaining their people. And then those that are waking up in the movement are leaving as well. And so, therefore, the movement is hemorrhaging. So, I think that it is dying. So, you may say, why are you doing your podcast about a dying movement? Because my podcast is not about trying to bring attention to this movement. My podcast is for those that are leaving it to help them. And part of doing that, part of helping them, is to identify the wrongs that this movement does. Okay? So, that's just a little bit. That concludes the history of the independent fundamental Baptist movement. And I hope that that segment was helpful to you. And then, coming up, I want to do some episodes on abuse and bringing attention to abuse in the movement and also helping those that have experienced abuse. So, if you know anybody that has experienced any type of abuse, whether it's in the church or not, be looking for the next few episodes. I'm going to try my best to put out some content that may help them. Thank you so much for listening to the podcast, for rating it, seeing some rates on there. If you've shared it, I appreciate all of that. If you enjoyed it, if you liked the episode, why don't you go on your podcast platform, give it a rating, give it a share on social media, maybe leave a review. And I appreciate all that. You can follow it on Facebook and Twitter and on Instagram. And until next time, guys, to God, not the pastor, be the glory. God bless you. God bless you.

Auto-generated transcript · 8,140 words. May contain errors.