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VA Pastor: Zacchaeus Was ‘Oppressed’ And Jesus Helped Him With ‘Affirmative Action’

A Virginia pastor tries to turn the story of Zacchaeus into support for ethnic prejudice in college admissions (i.e. affirmative action). Dwight Riddick, Sr., of Gethsemane Baptist Church says the wealthy tax collector was “oppressed” and a “second-class citizen” because of his height. “Jesus saw Zacchaeus and he levels of the playing field. Jesus institutes an affirmative action program.”

This past week, the Supreme Court ruled that affirmative action was unconstitutional in permitting colleges and universities to take into consideration race when it comes to their admissions standards. This was and is a major blow in America, a country that is already struggling and who has been working hard to achieve racial equality. And now, the hands of the clock have been more than turned back, it almost feels as though the hands up the clock has been torn off.

…In our story today, we find a familiar character, we’ve called him Zacchaeus….Zacchaeus was a man who was hated. He was a man who, in every sense of the word was at a place of disadvantage. He faced life with doors constantly being closed in his face….(he) suffered and experienced oppression. Not because of anything, but he’s made in a contribution to, he was just born this way.

He didn’t have anything at all to do with his physical stature. He was just born this way and only grew to a certain stature and now because of his physical appearance, he’s being oppressed, he’s been pushed to the side, he’s been marginalized. He’s been discriminated against. Here he is, a short man in a tall world. He is the minority among apparently everybody else on the street that day.

He continues:

..And I know you’re gonna tell me that He was despised because he was a tax collector, he had treated other people wrong, he had overcharged them the taxes due. But I argue today, never mind the fact that he’s rich and a tax collector, he’s still a person who has been the target of hate. And no one likes to be hated. I don’t care who you are, you don’t want people hating on you. Nobody likes to be pushed aside. No one likes to be denied access, have doors closed in their face, and feel as though they’re always hitting the glass ceiling.

And here is Zacchaeus. A short man in a tall world. When Zacchaeus could not get a space in front of others for he could see Jesus, he is forced to settle for a secondary substandard viewing position…this tree was not the best seat in the house. It was not on equal footing with the rest. It was where short people had to go if they were to see the guests passing by.

…Jesus knew that Zacchaeus being in that tree was an indication that Zacchaeus had been put in a place where he’s being made to feel as though he’s a second class citizen. People who are well thought of and treated equal do not meet Jesus in trees. People who are well thought of and treated as equals, do not meet Jesus in trees. They meet him on ground level.

And then concludes:

Jesus saw Zacchaeus and he levels the playing field. Jesus institutes an affirmative action program. The Bible says Jesus invited himself to Zacchaeus’ house. Notice that Zacchaeus was the only one who had to climb the tree and he had to climb the tree to see Jesus because he was short and nobody would open the door and give him access to where Jesus was.

But when Jesus comes by, Jesus said ‘man come on down.’ He said, ‘I tell you what I’m going to do, I’m going to your house today.’ There were a whole lot of people in Jericho on that day, a whole lot of people who wanted to see Jesus but Jesus chose one to spend time with. Jesus only went to Zacchaeus his house.

When everybody else has shut the door on Zacchaeus, God who opened the door. Others hated Zacchaeus, denied him the opportunity of access, but then Jesus comes along and gives him favor. Somebody thank God for favor.

h/t to WokePreacherTv for the title, intro and vid.

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ICYMI. Megachurch Pastor Mike Todd Jumps Into Crowd and Crowdsurfs During Worship Service

Pastor Michael Todd leads Transformation Church. He is known for his wild Easter service, preaching some good old-fashioned Modalism, giving the world perhaps the grossest illustration in church after he snorted and then hocked a loogie full of spit and snot into his hand and rubbed it in another man’s face,  (twice) claiming his church had 75k salvations in the last 18 months even though none of them stuck around, had a service where ballet dancers with bare butts danced around the stage, preached in a shirt featuring his wife in in a bathing suit, and claimed that Jesus never reached his potential,

In February of 2020, Todd decided to expend some pent-up energy when he jumped into the crowd during a Sunday night church service, having his congregants catch him and ride the wave through the auditorium as the people cheered and filmed him on their cellphones.

Captioned “The way I’m jumping into the blessings of God ALL YEAR,” the video on his Facebook page is captioned #transformationworship, #energy#rePRESENT, #pastorcrowdsurfing.

Transformations Church bills itself as a “dynamic, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, non-denominational inner-city ministry in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It embraces the spirit of its founder as it expresses a radical, diversified, progressive, 21st century technological church.”

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Hillsong Leader Phil Dooley Crowdsurfs During Worship Event

Global Hillsong leader Phil Dooley raised a few eyebrows during a worship session at the 2023 Hillsong Conference this past week, after he jumped off the stage and into the crowd. Dooley floated around for a bit before being brought back to the front, in a video posted to the embattled church’s Instagram page.

The scandal-riddled, embattled church has been running on steam over the last year, with attendance and tithes plummeting to the point that their main campus had to section off parts of the auditorium and reduce services from two to one to appear fuller and less sparse. The day before the conference, Dooley acknowledged in an interview.

“I understand that public perception is not always the greatest. We need to rebuild trust, and that’s earned, Lucinda and I, stepping into the role of leading our church. … We feel the weight of that. We believe we are stepping into a new era. … We’ve got a really clear vision. We’ve got a focus when it comes to our mission, and we’ve been doing a whole lot even with our governance, you know, refreshing our board and making changes there.”

It’s difficult to see how Dooley can rebuild trust when he was one of the ones abusing the system. Member of the Australian Parliament Andrew Wilkie, who used parliamentary privilege to unearth a vast trove of Hillsong expenses, said this about Dooley:

The new head of Hillsong, Phil Dooley, has told church followers he only flies economy, but these documents show him clocking up $58,000 in business-class flights for him and his daughter to Guatemala, $42,000 in business-class flights to Mexico and $32,000 in business-class flights from Cape Town to Sydney via the U.S Hillsong followers believe that the money they put in the poor box goes to the poor, but these documents show how that money is actually used to do the kind of shopping that would embarrass a Kardashian.”

The whistleblower report extrapolated further:

“As a long-term board member, the current Hillsong Global Senior Pastor, and Brian Houston’s replacement, Phil Dooley has been party to all of this misconduct. He has also been involved in this self-indulgent spending and private benefit — and still is. Not only does Lucinda Dooley also fly around the world business class but Hillsong additionally pays to fly Phil and Lucinda’s children around the world — and not in economy class.

Phil Dooley is flying to Guatemala at an airfare cost of $44k, to speak at the church (Casa De Dios) of his good friend and spiritual mentor Cash Luna. Considering that Hillsong does not have a church in Guatemala, and spiritual mentoring can be performed over Zoom, it would be surprising if these $44k flights were not being used solely for Phil to earn a personal benefit honorarium for preaching at two church services — likely to be around at least $20-30k. It is unfathomable why Hillsong is also paying an additional $23k for Phil’s daughter Bella and his best mate ‘Sanga’ Scott Samways to accompany him to Guatemala.”

Bonus

Top 10 Weirdest Things Hillsong Leaders Expensed to the Church  
Top 10 Most Expensive Meals Brian and Bobbie Houston Expensed to the Church 
Top 10 Luxury Hotels Hillsong Leaders Expensed to the Church (Spoiler: The Cheapest is $8457.42)

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Abolitionists Rising YouTube Channel Hits Milestone of 100K Subscribers, Over 1M Views a Day

Abolitionists Rising is perhaps the most prominent and principled abortion abolitionist organization in the culture today. Founded in Norman, OK, their mission is to spread abolitionist ideas and support abolitionist organizations, projects, and legislation, with their goals being “the abolition of abortion, the repentance of the nation, and the glorification of God.”

The group is not part of the frequently problematic and mushy Pro-Life Movement and instead actively distances itself from such comparisons. Rather, they are wholly different in their theology, tactics, and goals, distinguishing themselves by possessing a more biblical and consistent ideology. 

“We seek to abolish abortion totally and immediately. We do not call for incremental legislation that regulates the who, what, when, where, and why of legal abortion. We call for abolitionist legislation that makes preborn children equal under the law and criminalizes abortion as murder.”

For over a decade, they’ve clung to those differentiators, waging boots-on-the-ground conferences where street activism and engagement play a major role. They’ve distributed millions of drop cards, leaflets, and tracts, backed abolitionist politicians, engaged in state lobbying, and introduced abolitionist legislation that pro-life groups have consistently opposed. 

These groups have included National Right to Life, the ERLC, And Then There Were None, Southern Baptist Convention President Bart Barber, and a host of other groups who are uncomfortable with legislation that abolishes abortion without exception and which insists that women who purposefully murder their babies in the womb should be treated no differently than women who murder their babies outside the womb.

It’s started to pay off in a big way.

Since starting a Tiktok account last year, they’ve garnered 5.8M likes and have 136.9k followers, with multiple videos receiving millions of views.

Furthermore, their YouTube channel has amassed over 108k subscribers, including an influx of 50k new ones in the last 30 days. This doubling of subscribers can be attributed to the success of their Shorts, which have been viewed over 45,000,000 times in the previous month and are driving traffic and interest.

The Evangelical Dark Web points out how swiftly they’ve grown compared to other establishment pro-life sites, are are still growing, adding an extra 8,000 subscribers since that update was posted 4 days ago.

The significance of this in terms of the pro-life movement should not be understated. Live Action, the organization of Lila Rose, has 233K subs but has been around since 2007. Students for Life (also around since 2007) has 165K subs and is helmed by a feminist, Kristan Hawkins

We love to see it, and we wish them all the success in the world

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High Definition Healing! Controversial Pastor Raises Man From Dead On Camera….. Or Does He?

‘Prophet’ John Anosike is the President and Senior Pastor of New World Faith Ministries, a “multi-cultural, highly dynamic ministry with a membership of over 8000” in Cape Town, South Africa.

More particularly, he’s a prosperity-preaching heretic who routinely claims to raise people from the dead, commit miraculous healings like curing cancer and AIDS, and regrowing lost limbs. He routinely takes trips to heaven when he hangs out with Jesus and God, getting supernatural and direct revelation which he then returns to earth and shares, most which involve how his followers need to give him more money.

He describes himself as “The Last Trumpet” and the “custodian of a dimension” that he’s come to bring into the world so that “men can access the dimension.” He’s claimed for certainty that Jesus is not coming back in the next 100 years because the church is too sick, divided, and disorganized and has pledged to write a series of books that will personally “change the world and bring about the final revival preceding rapture, the great harvest!”

We wrote about him last after he waived his spirit-filled hands sent his congregants flying through the mid-air, shrieking like someone threw acid in their faces.

In a video published on his YouTube channel last year, Anosike showed the world one of his dead-raising miracles, with the first thing that should strike skeptics is how visibly the dead man is still breathing and how casual and cavalier the whole thing is. The blood is a nice touch, and the acting is better than normal- certainly better than we usually see from other hucksters– but heretics don’t raise people from the dead, despite how much Holy Ghost they claim to possess and impart. 

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Liar Liar? Mark Driscoll Claims Book Was Banned From Amazon, So Why Is It Still There?

Early Sunday evening, controversial pastor (see endnotes) and noted plagiarizer Mark Driscoll took to Twitter to complain that his new book “New Days, Old Demons: Ancient Paganism Masquerading as Progressive Christianity” got him suspended from Amazon. He claimed the online retail giant was trying to “silence the word of God and faithful Bible teachers” and urged followers to purchase it from his website instead.

While it’s true that his book wasn’t available on Amazon at the time of his tweet, it’s also true that it wasn’t available anywhere. Not at Barnes and Noble, Books a Million, Thriftbooks, or Powells. 

Driscoll’s missive makes it seem like he was singled out from Amazon specifically. However, given that no one else carried the self-published book, described as a “prophetic message for pathetic times,” this reeks of shameless self-promotion. 

Yet on Monday, hours after his claims, his book was on Amazon, alive and well, free to be shared and purchased from the masses.

Despite the book being available on Amazon, Driscoll still keeps on repeating claims to the contrary. In an Instagram post early this morning, he insists it’s “the book that big tech doesn’t want you to purchase,” despite being on sale for $17.98 and eligible for free shipping through Amazon Prime. 

Ultimately, claiming that he was suspended from Amazon because of this book reads like a quick and dirty way to raise controversy and project scarcity, which wouldn’t be the first time Driscoll has manipulated book sales to make a buck. 

Bonus content

Back in the day, Driscoll favored an edgy, aggressive style marked by prurient sermons laced with cuss words and punk-style worship- he once called women’ penis homes’ and commanded women with unsaved husbands to give their husbands oral sex to convert them. All the edgy aggressiveness boiled over in 2014 when the empire suddenly imploded due to Driscoll’s emotional and spiritual abuse of the flock, plagiarism, and accusations of financial misconduct. Rather than undergo church discipline, he claimed he audibly heard from God that he needed to leave, and he bolted. Later, nearly 40 former Mars Hill elders issued a public statement describing him as ‘unfit’ and ‘unrepentant.’

Not many years later, with the help of his crony James MacDonald, Mark Driscoll wrapped up his own discipline and re-established himself behind a pulpit in Phoenix, Arizona. Here, he set himself up as Pope of his own church, removing any of the limiting factors that previously constrained him, chiefly the presence of elders. Despite having hundreds and hundreds of people attending each week, there are no elders at The Trinity Church, which has resulted in his bullying ways continuing. Think of him as a wayward child who locked his parents in their room and now has the run of the house, terrorizing the dogs and torturing the cats.

Slowly, he rebuilt his empire, even as his theology got squishier. He mocked reformed theology and described Calvinism as “garbage.” He publicly apologized for criticizing Joel Osteen. He started selling copies of his sermon notes online and pushed seeker-sensitive services like “Swimsuit Sunday.” He even defended the Roman Catholic Church, saying they “believe in the essentials.”

Despite resigning in disgrace and possessing a penchant for theological violence, people flocked to him at his new home, and his church has grown immensely in the last few years, slowly edging towards megachurch status. 

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Famous Charismatic Prophet and his Family Make HOW MUCH MONEY From their Ministry?!

Chuck Pierce of Glory of Zion International is a major player in the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR.) We last wrote about him after he burned a Counterfeit $20 on Stage to Rebuke the ‘Sneaky Quid Spirit’ that Led to George Floyd’s Death“, the time he falsely prophesied Covid would come to an end… in early 2020, his role in the ‘Charismatic Day of Infamy“, the one time he held a “Car Anointing Fire Tunnel” Service, and in our recent post NAR False Prophet Chuck Pierce ‘Interprets’ a ‘Prophetic Dance.’

In a recent TrinityFi article outlining the respected charismatic, they flag the apparent Nepotism at play which sees family members getting excessive compensation for frequently questionable work. According to the ministry’s latest Form 990, which recently became public, seven Pierce family members received $4,386,730 in compensation and independent contractor payments from April 1, 2021, to March 31, 2022.”

This is quite the boone for the Pierce family, who saw their compensation increase by $606,800 from last year, with Daniel and Amber Pierce, two pastors at Glory Zion International Ministries receiving the lion’s share of the increase.

The times have been good for Chuck Pierce, who has seen his compensation triple in a few years, and who made an extra $310,386 this year compared to last year.

All in all, his ministry brought in $22,844,65. As part of his expenses, Pierce and ministry also paid out $374,273 in “landscaping and maintenance” which is quite the suspicious designation, and is more than the $318,644  he paid last year for the same services. We would love to know how that money is really being spent.

Despite the dollars he has coming in, Pierce still spends his time urging followers and donors to donate to him. One of the areas you can give into is the Kingdom Harvest Alliance so that you can “initiate and make available a new organism for alignment.”

Something to consider next time you hear him begging on TV about how important it is you tithe into his ministry to receive the blessings and favor of God.

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Christian Model Hailey Bieber Urges Social Media Sites to Censor Anti-LGBTQ ‘Hate Speech’ like ‘Deadnaming’ + Misgendering

Professing Christian model Hailey Baldwin Bieber has joined hundreds of celebrities in endorsing a public letter from GLAAD that calls for social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok and Twitter to censor so-called anti-LGBTQ hate speech, including deadnaming, misgendering, and spreading ‘misinformation’ about ‘gender-affirming healthcare’ for trans teens.

The letter, which is from “celebrities, influencers, and prominent public figures with significant followings on social media” includes such names as Patrick Stewart, Demi Lovato, Zooey Deschanel, Lena Dunham, Judd Apatow, Sam Smith, Jazz Jennings, Dylan Mulvaney, and Elliot Page.

It argues that “dangerous posts (both content and ads) created and circulated by high-follower anti-LGBTQ hate accounts targeting transgender, nonbinary, and gender non-conforming people are thriving across your platforms, directly resulting in terrifying real-life harm” and that “targeted misgendering and deadnaming of trans and nonbinary people is a widespread mode of hate speech across all platforms, utilized to bully and harass prominent public figures while simultaneously expressing hatred and contempt for trans and non-binary people in general.”

Their call action is that the owners of these sites meet with them to address how they will censor and shut down hateful content that “spreads malicious lies and disinformation about medically necessary healthcare for transgender youth,” accounts and postings that “perpetuate anti-LGBTQ extremist hate and disinformation,” including “anti-transgender hate speech, including targeted misgendering, deadnaming, and hate-driven tropes”

It’s an unsurprising move from Hailey Bieber, who has nearly 50 million followers on Instagram. Despite being a professing Christian who is married to Justin Bieber, attends Churchome with Pastor Judah Smith, can occasionally be seen doing little mini bible studies and scripture readings online with her husband, and has publicly stated, “I’m here to represent Jesus through me, for other people — for His will to be done,” Hailey has frequently bucked basic standards of Christian belief and practice, demonstrating a decidedly unbiblical worldview.

Chief among her foibles includes routinely going nearly topless as part of her modeling endeavors, resulting in pushback from other believers criticizing her for her scantily clad shots. This has led Hailey to defend herself by saying:

I’ve met Christian people that are just super judgmental and made me feel like I’m a bad person because I don’t live my life the way they think I should live my life. And I felt weird about posting certain photos of myself or feeling like, ‘People in the church are gonna see this. Am I doing something wrong? Am I setting a bad example?’ And the reality is- no.”

That she can sign her name to a letter like this is more proof that she is deeply compromised, and whose profession of faith should not be assumed.

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Church Of England’s New Plan to Deal with Empty Church Buildings is Delusional

In a great act of senility and delusion, the Church of England has suggested a new and novel way to deal with its plummeting attendance and swift slide into irrelevancy; leasing out its underused churches rather than selling them off, with the hope of resuming control of them once attendance picks up and their numbers start to grow again. 

It’s a fair strategy for retaining current properties. As reported by The Telegraph, the plan, which is under consideration by the General Synod (the CofE’s legislative body), involves renting these churches to local authorities, other Christian denominations, or other institutions through shared ownership deals. This new proposition is a strategic shift from the current approach of merging sparsely attended churches with larger parishes and then selling the vacated buildings, which many congregants have been critical of. According to reports, nearly 450 churches have closed in the last 25 years. 

While this plan may be successful in retaining denominational assets, anyone who thinks that allowing the properties to “lie fallow” until a future revival would necessitate their repossession is an insane person. 

The Church of England, whose church attendance has dropped 25% in the last ten years and who earlier this year affirmed a historic proposal to allow clergy to offer prayers of thanksgiving for same sex-couples and bless same-sex civil marriages in the church, is never going to have a revival so long as they continue their blasphemous and scurrilous attacks on the word of God. 

Over the last 30 years, their trajectory has been a sustained and shameless repudiation of the scriptures and the Lord himself, salting the earth under their feet while praying for seeds to grow. Rather than repudiate their progressive proclivities, they have leaned into them, aping the strategies of American mainline denominations who have likewise been seeing catastrophic losses that have dragged hundreds of thousands into hell.

Unless the Church of England undergoes a mass overhauling of theology and leadership from every corner of the denomination, they will not grow, but only shrink further, and any hope or belief to the contrary of reopening these churches under their own name is a mad and pathetic dream.

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Shiver me Timbers! Ayye Ye Scurvy Matey! New ‘Pirate Bible’ Translation of the Scriptures Released

A new and novel translation of the Bible has been released, containing the entirety of the Old and Testament in….pirate-speak? According to the publishers:

The Pirate Bible is a complete translation of the King James Version of the Bible into pirate-speak. All of the original books, chapters, verses, stories and characters are present, but the dialogue has been rewritten to bring an entertaining, swashbuckling flavor to the pages. Each book of the Bible is included; guaranteed to bring a smile. This is an excellent gift for anyone who loves the Bible, but also enjoys a lighthearted take on the stories it contains.

Explaining that “The translation was completed entirely using Artificial Intelligence and a fine-tuned algorithm” the creators note that “we worked hard to find a formula that produced true, pirate-like speech while still preserving the meaning of the original text.”

The Pirate Bible is the first translation paraphrase of the Bible done 100% by Artificial Intelligence. While it may be highly problematic, the technology does open the door to creating bible versions with fewer references to scurvy dogs and instead more faithful renditions for people groups who don’t yet have a bible in their language. Some of the translated verses include:

Galatians 5:18-21 (KJV)18 But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

Galatians 5:18-21 (Pirate Bible)18 But if ye be led by the wind, ye ain’t subject to the Code. Ayy, the scurvy deeds of the scallywag be plain to see: adultery, fornicatin’, uncleanliness, and lecherousness. Mutiny, voodoo, avast hatred, arguin’, lookin’ fer a fight, bombs burstin’ with rage, scallywags at each other’s throats, blasphemous thinkin’, and mutinous notions! Arrr, envyin’s an’ murders, guzzlin’ grog an’ revelries, o’ th’ likes o’ that, I be tellin’ ye afore, as I said afore t’ those what do such, that they won’t inherit th’ kingdom o’ God.

The creators of this bible have responded to criticisms of its creation, specifically the claim that it’s blasphemy, by saying their version prompts more questions about what the real bible says. It’s for that reason they include a free KJV with every purchase.

The Passion Translation and the Message Bible have been put on notice: there’s a new, even more accurate competition to contend with.