119 thoughts on “Guest Speaker Bingo”

  3. Tells same jokes when he was there three years before.

    Apologizes for Mrs. Guest Speaker not being able to make it and that she sends her greetings.

    Calls your pastor one of the best and most faithful preachers he has ever known.

    Thankful that this church is one of the few he knows that still has “God honoring” music.

    Mentions how all his children are serving the Lord and where.

    Tells how many grandchildren he has.

    Has a perturbed look when no one comes forward at the invitation.

    Finishes by saying “I’ll turn it over the pastor to close the service as he sees fit.”

    After final prayer pastor says “Please allow Dr. Guest Speaker enough time to get to the lobby so you can greet him on the way out.”

    1. Sits on the platform next to the pastor. Goes through his sermon notes during the announcements and offertory.

      Is introduced by the pastor with “Dr. Guest Speaker please come and share with us what the Lord has laid on your heart.” Shakes hands with Pastor.

      Responds in southern drawl with “Thank ya Paysta.”
      Opens with “Please turn in your Bibles to….” but doesn’t read the passage for another 15 minutes.

      Jokes about keeping the sermon short in order not to compromise his love offering.

      1. There could be a whole separate Bingo for how fundy preachers introduce special speakers. And it might actually inject some real competition into the Bingo because there are several very different types of introductions given by fundy pastors to different kinds of speakers:

        When introducing one of the pastor’s own heroes (e.g., Jack Hyles, Clarence Sexton), it is obligatory to gush and swoon but also to tell every time the two were in the same room (no, make that same building) (no, make that the same state) together for the last 50 years in order to make it sound like they are old pals and hopefully have some of the special speaker’s fundy cred rub off on the local talent.

        When introducing an up-and-coming fundy celeb, it is obligatory for the pastor to take a condescending tone and behave as if he knows just what a privilege it is for the young buck to be invited to preach in his church.

        When introducing a missionary, it is obligatory for the pastor to make tasteless jokes about how many kids the missionary has, how much it is costing the church to host the missionary, how the preacher cannot pronounce the name of the country where the missionary is ministering (unless it is Canada, in which case there are just lots of tasteless nationalistic jokes that get bandied about), and of course there must be the statement: “now you young people need to listen to this because I know God is calling many of you to be missionaries.”

        When introducing a former pastor (a rare treat, because they are usually not invited back to speak since they threaten the current MOG’s reign, sort of like what some people feared would happen when Benedict XVI became the “pope emeritus”) it is obligatory to talk for a VERY LONG TIME about how much the church has changed and grown and improved since the previous reign but also (because the older church members who are the big tithers are the reason for having the former pastor back to speak in the first place) to make lots of obsequious comments that mean nothing about what a great holy righteous etc. etc. etc. man the former pastor is.

      1. Fudny MOGs don’t hate the liturgy because of its order or rote quality or anything like that. They just hate having anyone other than themselves tell them what to do. They are perfectly fine imposing, as you say, their own “liturgies” on their congregations.

    4. I’ve heard those stories too. When (and *IF*) they’re true, I think it says more about the innate generosity and kindness of the ‘rescuers’ than anything else. People usually are more than happy to help someone in genuine need.

  4. Not to nitpick or anything…

    …OK, yeah, I’m nitpicking. 😀 Regardless, it’s “compliment”, not “complement.” A compliment means you’re saying something nice about someone. A complement goes along with, or “completes” something, such as a complementary set of shoes and handbag.

    Other than that, it’s a great list. I bet you could do this with any number of YouTube sermons as well.

        2. That bothers me too! One of my former students wrote a facebook post today in which she wrote “your” instead of “you’re.” I was SO tempted to correct it (especially since she was talking about college in her post), but I refrained.

    3. When I read ‘complements music’ I thought it was about the speaker doing back-up vocals or something.

  5. Tells anecdotal story in which he yells some witty response to a perceived opponent to finish the tale.

    Says that when things get really bad, you need to take care of the pastor and his family first.

    Mentions trials and tribulations related to vehicles and travelling 50K miles a year to make a living, er, to minister.

  6. Anyone remember the evangelist or preacher who is invited to preach on a subject that is more sensitive than usual so the pastor doesn’t have to get his hands dirty?

    The evangelist that talks about owning a television, the one that hammers on faith promise, the evangelist who only talks about submission to “God’s Man” and the woes of rebellion against him.

  7. Great card; I’ll take it along the next time I listen to an evangelist.

    Wonder how long it would take John Hamblin to fill up the card?

    1. “Persnickety Polecat, you have such lovely eyes, they complement your outfit.”

      I am hereby claiming the beginning of “complimont”. This is when a sentence uses one of the two words, compliment or complement, yet expresses the meaning of the other.

  10. – Shifts from a normal speaking voice to BOOMING AND SHOUTING again and again through the sermon.

    – Has the audience repeat some short phrase he used in the sermon back to him.

    – Blames demonic influences for abortion/homosexuality/promiscuity/public schools/Democrats.

    – Tells some snarky story about his wife.

    1. Re: snarky stories about his wife.

      Only if she isn’t there. (And, as noted above, she usually isn’t.) God may bless evangelists, but it seems He usually curses their wives with super poor health.

        1. Time to dust off the Fundy-to-English translator:

          “My wife would never miss this, except that she is sick today” = “My wife has heard enough of this drivel to last her a lifetime, and won’t sit through it again unless she has to.”

  12. I think there should be a space for spotting the telltale 4-point pocket square…in order to identify which speakers REALLY have the “power”.

    1. The four-point pocket square is a passive-aggressive emblem. It says, “I have teeth like a monster from “Where the Wild Things Are”.” ….Boo!

      1. The Bingo card, of course. And that’s actually a great idea, John Is Awake! One that I’m going to steal when I become a libruhl Jezebel woman preechur. 😉

  15. Is there an official guide they use? Sounds exactly like every guest preacher I’ve heard. Sounds exactly UNlike the traveling preaching of Paul and the apostles, who spoke from their hearts, not from a formula.

    1. Maybe.
      I’m not saying they used a formula or a canned speech, but anybody who does a lot of public speaking ends up repeating himself or herself quite a lot.

    2. While they also received divine inspiration, I suspect that Paul, at least, had a classical education in addition to his grounding in the Jewish faith, so he would have known how to use rhetorical flourishes and so forth. Peter, maybe not so much.

  16. I do a similar thing with David Cloud’s Friday “news” updates. You just fill in the boxes with CCM, Obama, Billy Graham, Contemplative Prayer, etc. He always hammers the same 15 or so topics.

    2. OK, now I have to look up David Cloud to see what he has against contemplative prayer. Saint Teresa of Avila, call your office.

      1. If you ever heard these guys preach, you would have no doubt that they dislike contemplative prayer, and that their “prayers” bounce off the ceiling, unless they are in a huge room, in which case, their “prayers” barely clear the roof of their mouths.

        The best way to describe their “prayers” is as a berating of the congregation while pretending to address God. Some people call it the “second sermon” if it happens at the end. They certainly don’t seem to understand that they are speaking to the God of Heaven, because they address Him in tones that would be more suitable if they were talking to a junior employee who just did a bad job of making the coffee and then put the toner cartridges in the wrong slots on the color printer.

        “Now Lord, I pray that you would help these people to understand how important it is that they come again to hear me talk some more. Lord, you KNOW that my heart is pure, and that these people need more of what I have to offer. Lord, I pray that you will convict their hearts, Lord. Lord, impress upon them the importance of filling the pews and the offering plates, Lord. And Lord, I’m embarrassed by the way some of these people are dressed tonight, Lord. Moooove in hearts tonight, Lord. We need to feeeeeel your presence among usssss. Have thine own way, Lord. In Jesus’ name. Aye – MAHN.”

        Ad nauseum. Night after night after night.

        Nope. Nothing contemplative HERE!

    3. Contemplative prayer, eh? I guess it’s what them eebil cathliks do, so it must be wrong.

      I really am starting to think that whatever these nut jobs preach against must actually be a good thing. I have recently discovered contemplative prayer and find it cool water to a thirsty soul. I have never prayed so much or enjoyed it so much, frankly.

      1. What a lot of Fundies don’t realize is that one size does not fit all. The church has developed multiple tools for growing spirituality, and many people just grow more from one than the other. In my life, it is the Lutheran Book of Prayer as well as the service book. For my wife it is meditating on a single verse for the whole day. Contemplative prayer is one of those tools that stands in sharp contrast to the always-on-the-go western lifestyle, and is making a necessary comeback.

        1. Very true. Each method will be more helpful to some people than to others, and different ones may be more helpful to you at different times in your life.

      2. You know what’s annoying? I wasn’t sure what contempletive prayer was so I tried to look it up. All I got were links debating whether it was biblical or not and some stories about xian contempletives.

        Sometimes we suck! Whatever you do (not you Clara the article writers), don’t just tell me what a thing is and let me make up my own mind without your bias!

        Now I’m annoyed. I’ll go contemplate that for awhile.

  17. Ooo! There’s a guest speaker at the school where I teach today, think I’ll print it out and take it with me (or fill it out afterwards).

    In any case, I just want to point out that “compliment” in the upper-left hand corner should be spelled with an i, not an e (Sorry – English teacher here.)

    1. Please give an update on whether or not you win. I hope you printed out two copies so that a friend could compete.

  18. Yes, the “complement” debacle basically ruined it for me. I thought only fundies were illiterate!

  19. The last guest speaker at our church had several of his children speak from the platform. One told a “retard” joke. Another railed against the legalization of gay marriage. Then the speaker made fun of Wiccans, comparing their “craziness” with vegans ❓ & finished up by negatively commenting on those with tattoos but imploring us to show love to the weirdos, anyway. 😯

    Considering there are several people with special needs, others who have Pagan, vegan, and/or gay family members, and tattooed folks attending the church, I’m pretty sure he won’t be invited back.

    Of course, it’s because we’ve left the Old Paths, not because they were incredibly rude, unloving, & intolerant.

    2. Pagans/Vegans/Wiccans

      They aren’t the same??? 😯

      Stuff Fundies Like: assuming that if two or more words sound the same, then they most all have something in common. (Santa/Satan, anyone?) There must be a name for this illogical fallacy, but I don’t know what it is.

      2. @ D.S. The word is “malexia”. It’s what happens to a good word when it “breaks bad”. (Insert tongue-in-cheek emoticon here)

        3. Oops! The prefix is Latin, and the root is Greek. But they complement each other nicely. (Callback)

        4. Yes, “malexia” would have to mean “bad words,” which is why it’s so unfortunate that someone is actually named that.

    3. Rude, rude, rude. Fundamentalists are the most judgmental people I know, despite their savior preaching “Judge not, lest ye be judged.”

        1. “Savior” or “Saviour”, somehow neither version looks quite right. 😕
          Am I in trouble now? 😳

  20. I am still a fundy; but I LOVE this! I am smiling big time; and can not wait to use this card for the rest of my life, ha!
    Thanks for stealing this idea!

        1. Oh we had a special evangelist that came in and told us we needed to do this at a church and some of the sheeple got busy embroidering handkerchiefs and proudly wave them during service. We left not long after that.

  22. You forgot:

    Tells church that he visits many churches and they are one of the few who still “stand by the stuff.”

      1. It’s a reference to 1 Samuel 25:13 when Ziklag was sacked and David took some of his men after the raiders while leaving 200 behind to guard the supplies: “there went up after David about four hundred men; and two hundred abode by the stuff” (KJV).

        It’s usually used to comment people for being faithful especially in small, unglamorous duties.

        1. Thanks, PW, we both replied at the same time. As usual, my response was much more loquacious. 😳

        2. But you actually had the correct chapter for Ziklag. Chapter 25 that I referenced had people staying by the stuff when David went to attack Nabal. Chapter 30 was the one I was thinking of, but apparently David’s men stayed by the stuff more than once.

          That was my fault. But I’m blaming George that I wrote “comment” when I meant to write “commend.”

        4. Wow, PW, I never knew they stayed by the stuff several different times!! Five years out and the fundies do sometimes teach me something new about the Bible. 😆

      2. YOU’VE NEVER HEARD THAT!?!

        Okay, here we go . . .

        In I Samuel 30, David leads his men to battle, but some stay behind. After the battle, the men who went to fight want to keep all the spoils to themselves but David says, in verse 24, “For who will hearken unto you in this matter? but as his part is that goeth down to the battle, so shall his part be that tarrieth by the stuff: they shall part alike.”

        Now, please set aside all of that context and just focus on the phrase “tarrieth by the stuff” which sounds weird so we will just say “stays by the stuff.” There is a whole fundy theology that has cropped up around those words. It started with the notion that those who go minister in foreign fields are no better or more worthy than those who minister at home. (See: http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=2414) But, of course that teaching seems inadequately to value the missionaries, so it had to mean something else. What it came to mean in the fundy circles I grew up in was that “staying by the stuff” meant staying by the “old paths” of fundamentalism and not “going on” to worldliness. It was one of the absolute highest praises that could be accorded to a MOG. My own father, who should know better, also believes there is no higher compliment. He will say this at the funerals of fellow fundies: “well he (or she) really stayed by the stuff.”

        1. So, a guest speaker alters the words of the KJV in order to use an enigmatic phrase Fundies interpret not only as complimentary but receive as high praise?

          I’m so confused. I guess it’s better to be standing by the stuff than standing in the stuff.

        2. It has never made any sense to me. But, for some reason, it seems to make lots of sense to them. Kind of like how “pay lay ale” means something sacred to Mormons but sounds like something very different to the rest of us.

        3. @Kreine — LOL.

          I never heard that “stand by the stuff” thing, BTW. But I’m a pagan papist who doesn’t know the Bible, so what would you expect?

          (Actually I do vaguely recall that passage, but, in my Bible, it doesn’t say “stuff.” Just “supplies” or something like that.)

        4. CGC, I knew the passage. We Babtidstz know our Bibles, after all! I just don’t recall ever hearing a guest speaker say that particular phrase to a church.

          Fundies focus on weird things. Maybe that one got lost in the memory banks to more bizarre outbursts. And I did see a visiting speaker die of a heart attack in the pulpit. I quit listening so much after that.

          SFL: using obscure Scripture passages as compliments.

        5. “Your neck is like an ivory tower. Your eyes are the pools of Heshbon by the gate of Bath Rabbim. Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon looking toward Damascus.”

  23. Oh, what about running the pews?

    I saw that happen once when I was a kid, & I remember the feeling of moral outrage following that display. If I got my tenders whipped for running in church, why was it acceptable for some bellowing clown in a suit to run over the tops of the pews?

  24. If I played that at my old fundy church, I would have the upper left to lower right crossed off in the first five minutes of the sermon, no matter which person it was. There must have been some set things that all the guests preachers had to start with or something…

  25. Ok, I do a lot of guest preaching, especially this summer. Though I’m no longer a funy (I think), I’ve got to admit, someone might be able to scream bingo during one of my messages.

  26. Compliments his “lovely wife of 45 years”, tries to sell his book/cd/dvd, expresses his burden for the youth/children of today, talks about his mentor from fifty years ago.

    1. Compliments his “lovely wife of 45 years” and being completely insincere about it, after a while you can tell. 😀

  27. There are 2 more boxes on the BINGO card that could be added:

    1. “Don’t lift your hand against God’s anointed”. Meaning that you better not speak against or go against the man of God in any way shape or form.
    This tactic was often used by a pastor to bring a guest speaker or evangelist and use them to “spank” the crowd back in to submission (by quoting verses like (1Sa 24:6,10; 26:9,11,23 etc.) for speaking against, resisting or not wholeheartedly agree with the pastor.

    2. Avoid ANY doctrine that the Pastor may agree with. In the 80’s all visiting speakers were forbidden to mention the King James controversy. Until the 90’s when the theological (church political?) winds changed and it was no longer “controversial” to hold to a KJV only position…. then they could mention it.

    The same is true regarding which pastors & preachers they could favorably or negatively speak against. Hyles in the 80’s could be mentioned in a positive light, but by the 90’s his name was anathema. Billy Graham could be attacked by name in the pulpit all the time.

  29. Of course, ftw, you could also play this Bingo card at any regularly schedule message by your average fundy MOG.

  31. Long, drawn out unending invitations. Everyone is standing, swaying and holding onto the pew so as not to fall over. Pretty soon, you start to raise your hand for just about any reason, since you don’t remember if he has asked if you are saved or unsaved.

    You can also count the number of times the preacher says “I”. That makes the time go a lot faster.

        1. It’s from Softly and Tenderly (Jesus is Calling).

          Much as I’d like to have you all think I have every song in the Fundy hymnal committed to memory…I had to look it up.

  33. I reckon that one day, as many of us that can should show up at a fundy revival complete with guest speaker, and start playing bingo. Whoever gets bingo first needs to yell it out as loud as possible and the rest of us can start clapping. :p

  34. You’ll NEVER be able to fill that middle square.

    Fundies hate people thinking they can get something for free.

  35. Have to remember the guilt-inducing pleas for financial help for the nation-wide ‘ministry’- and if by some chance his wife *is* in attendance, she will then warble out some emo fundy tune while everyone opens their wallets.

    And she will not be able to stay on tune, causing you to lock your back teeth.

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