Stories from the Message
The following are true stories that were experienced by ex-message believers while in the Message.
Stop your medication!
The preacher in a Message church felt particularly inspired, so he challenged the people in his congregation to trust the Lord for their healing, and stop taking their medication as a leap of faith. Shortly after, a woman in his church committed suicide after she stopped taking her anti-depression medication, and an elder had a stroke that put him in a wheelchair speechless for the rest of his life after he stopped taking his doctor-prescribed blood pressure medication.
What kind of results was he expecting when he began challenging his congregation to stop taking their medication?
Caring for the Poor
A Message Pastor stood up and asked his Church for approval to give the guitar player some money because he had pawned his guitar and couldn't afford to get it out again. No one raised a hand. Taking the silence as affirmation, the Pastor handed the guitarist $300 cash from the offering plate. Later, In hushed whispers, many express to one another their disapproval. Still, no one confronted the pastor about the folly of giving cash without asking for reasons behind a person’s financial distress. A short time later the guitarist stoped attending services because of alcoholism and drug use.
In another Message Church, a single mother of four approached the Pastor about her financial distress. She had been in an abusive situation, and had attended the church for years. She needed diapers and food, and was humiliated that she had to ask for help. The Pastor went to discuss the situation with a deacon, who gave the woman $20 with the instructions “Here is some money for diapers, but we don’t help charity cases here.”
A third message church had a lot of money that they had saved up. They were doing nothing to fulfill the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19). The pastor wanted to invest some of funds because the money was sitting in the bank earning a low rate of interest. So he found an "investment" that was going to provide a high rate of return and provided collateral to the church for the loan in the form of property. The deacons and trustees approved the transaction, provided that the church's lawyer ensured the guarantee of the land was put in place.
A year later, it was discovered that the pastor had invested the money without the guarantee, he had never involved the lawyer, and the church took a $100,000 loss. The pastor stated he would repay the money as between his salary as a pastor, living expense allowance and the trucking business he owned on the side, he was earning close to $300,000 a year.
But instead of that, he worked to get the sympathies of many of the churchgoers on his side and it was finally decided that he did not need to repay the money that he had lost through his negligence.
What these stories teach us
The Message often claims that it has the ability to “write another book of Acts”, but the Book of Acts says that “All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need.” (2:44-45 NIV). What is clear is that the Message is not a continuation of the book of Acts as it claims to be.
Dealing with tithes and offerings
The pastor's motives?
All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.[1]
The preacher in a Message church challenged his congregation that if they tithed regularly, God would bless them. One family in the church began to faithfully double-tithe. After a while, the Pastor purchased a nicer house and car. The family in his church continued to give, and continued to struggle financially for years.
In the Bible, Job’s status of righteousness did not depend on his earthly wealth, and his earthly wealth was not a status of his righteousness. A formula of wealth for worship is a works-based submission-for-prosperity gospel that the Devil preached to Jesus.
Was this pastor twisting the Bible's message for his own advantage? Is this the doctrine of devils? Was the motivation for the family's giving based on a desire to obey scripture or to receive blessings?
A child's story
As a small child I would get bored after church so I would sneak back in to the sanctuary. Sometimes there was an adult alone and they didn't know I was there. I vividly remember watching the pastor take all of the money from the three boxes in front – for tithes, offerings and missions - and stuff it into his pocket in one giant wad. Another time I watched a congregant collect a watch they put in the offering box while “dancing in the spirit” during the sermon. Both times I was confused because it seemed so dishonest. Later I would hear my parents complaining about not receiving receipts for their taxes. Now it all makes sense. It was all dishonest.
An adult's experience
The treasurer of the church called me into the Pastor's study to explain to me that I should never pay my tithes by check anymore, but only use cash.
"Did I bounce a check?" I asked.
“No”, he replied, “but the prophet warned the ministry of three things: money, women and popularity. The pastor has a revelation about a fourth one: the government.”
This sent up a red flag in my mind, but at the time I didn't dare question the "anointed one" over the congregation.
What these stories teach us
There is no accountability for the spending of funds in most message churches and the misappropriation of funds is fairly common (as message pastors consider that they "own" all of the tithe funds, although there is NO scriptural support for this position).
Unfortunately some people don't realize that the 'Christian' thing to do is not to sit idly by and let abuses continue. But they think they are serving God and letting these wolves in sheep's clothing fleece them. It's sad, but the Bible told us it would happen.
Unanswered questions about the message
- 20 years ago, I was in a car with my Dad crossing the Ohio River from Jeffersonville to Louisville. I asked my Dad, "Which bridge did WMB see the 16 men fall from"? He looked straight ahead, and said, "I have never been able to figure out which bridge it was."
- I was as troubled by the attitudes I saw in message followers, and began to read my Bible avidly. I was curious about the five comings of Elijah, and could not find the references, so I called my mom to ask her. She said, "I don't think there is an actual Bible reference to Elijah coming five times. It was something Bro. Branham taught."
- The assistant minister at our church yelled, "Don't they know that Elias must come first"? I sat there wondering why he didn’t quote the rest of the verse, where Jesus said that Elias had already come, but you didn't know it (John the Baptist).
- A minister discovered a discrepancy in Bro. Branham’s math, and taught that the end of the United States would be in 1984, rather than 1977. In 1985, he realized that the date should have been 1994 instead. When he passed on, he said, “Bro. Branham lied to us!”
The sexual abuse of a child
The Pastor of a Message church showed his congregation a short video of a Catholic Priest preaching a fireball sermon to an evangelical audience. I was a teenager in the audience. The pastor stopped the video and told us that the Catholic Priest in the video was a pedophile. He then told us how the Catholic Church is spiritually bankrupt. Years later, I learned that the same Message Pastor was hiding ongoing sexual interaction between an adult and a minor in his congregation when he showed the video. I talked to the Pastor about this, and he lied about the events that happened. Realizing that the Pastor was spiritually bankrupt, many people in his congregation left to form a new Message Church.
A few years later, the Pastor of the new Message church showed his congregation a short video of a Catholic Priest preaching a fireball sermon to an evangelistic audience. I was an adult in the audience. The pastor stopped the video and told us that the Catholic Priest in the video was a pedophile. He then told us how the Catholic Church is spiritually bankrupt. He never mentioned that the same issues exist in Message Churches. I began to think about why we would call the Catholic Church the Mother Whore when our Message Churches were acting like her daughters?
I realized that I had seen this all before, and decided not to let my children too far out of my sight. Very soon after I left the Message.
- ↑ Matthew 4:9