111 thoughts on “Field Report 2011 Sword of the Lord Conference (Day 2)”

1. First?!

   1. Score! Alright, now I can comment on the post. These updates are great! I am glad that someone else is doing this reconnaissance…I don’t think I could keep a straight face. Ugh.

      On a more sober note, I was not raised fundamentalist (though close enough being Pentecostal). But there are many in my congregation who tell me their horror stories from these sorts of churches and pastors. Sad.

2. SO CLOSE! Would it have been unfair two days in a row?

3. Third! My best yet. 😀

   1. I agree with NFP, I am enjoying the reports, but I wouldn’t want to have been there.

      My fundy background was not this extreme, until my third fundy church. The pastor was fresh out of HAC. I ended up finding out I could not understand the Bible because I wouldn’t shave off my beard. 🙄

      When my wife and I decided to leave, one of my teenage sons said, “It’s about time.” But then he’d been to Pastor’s School. 👿 He saw before I did.

4. “Everybody else is already gone. Every other denomination, they’ve already gone. They’re liberal to the core. And if we don’t do it who’s going to do it? If we don’t stand up for God and hold the line and stay with the stuff, Bible Christianity will soon be gone.”

   Oh, the arrogance!

   My ESV Bible says:
   “…I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.”

   1. One wonders what the IFB will do as they continue to grow more and more irrelevant. The cries will become increasingly desperate. The question for me is, will they adapt? Or will they end up like Fred Phelps’ church, with just a few family members, still thinking they’re the only ones?

      1. They don’t adapt. They just continue to draw people who are looking for a church that will confirm their paranoid right-wing values. To everyone else, they are indeed irrelevant. Sad.

         Our town lost a 200-year-old IFB church that withdrew from the ABC years ago. The congregation dwindled and dwindled, split, then dwindled even more to the point where at the end only six people were left. Sad. Inevitable, but sad.

   2. How is it possible that these guys can’t see how much they sound like the Pharisees? Are they even aware of who the Pharisees were, and why Jesus openly despised them? Have any of them read those parts of the Bible?

      Amazing.

      1. @TrappedPentecostal

         They read them, but they put their twisted spin on them to make anyone who isn’t a fundy a Pharisee.

      2. Hey now! That’s not fair to the Pharisees. The gospels portray them quite a bit more badly than they actually were.

5. Don,

   Once, just once, during this entire conference for pastors and church leaders did anyone dare mention how important it is to report any suspected child abuse to the police immediately – and not try to keep it a private church matter?

   Any mention of it at all?
   ❓

   1. Not in the evening services. I can’t speak to any sessions. They did have a “Legal” session one day but I cannot speak as to what was said or topic of of that session.

   2. What the heck is up with this?

      “Who is the smart aleck who said that little teenage girl who dresses like a tramp is, well you know, just a little loose?”

      Is he really saying you know a child is sexually active by their clothing style?

      1. Here’s a tip for those guys:
         Somebody’s sexually active if he or she is having sex. That includes a lot of girls in what you would call modest dress, and it excludes a lot of girls who you say “dress like tramps.” It includes a lot of boys in suits, and it excludes a lot of boys in baggy jeans.

         1. Shattering their stereotypes with the truth can cause fundies’ heads to explode…It goes against their programming.

6. Excellent updates Don. I would offer you a beer but I am afraid one beer would turn you into a drooling wife-beater.

   1. Don, I will offer you a beer or the drink of your preference. If you ever make a trip through the upper Midwest, I’m buying.

   2. Apathetic gets comment of the day!

      Seriously, I’m more and more impressed that you managed to sit through all that, Don. I don’t know how you did it, but you have my gratitude and admiration.

      1. Seriously…I would have been rolling my eyes so hard I would have hurt myself.

   3. Don, come to my uncle’s bar. I’m sure he’d give you a free beer. 😛

7. Don, your ability to endure this conference is amazing. Thanks for reporting what was said, and how it is a fundy hot-button, not true doctrine.

   1. I agree with Laurat99. To steal a line from the Eagles….I would have been…”running for the door”

      Great..now the wheels are turning…writing the IFB Version of Hotel California (..Hotel Fundy-Mental?)

      …you can check out anytime you like…but you can never leave!

      1. ….”we haven’t had the Spirit here since 1969″

         1. They stab it with their steely knives but they just can’t kill the beast…..

         2. “We’re all just prisoners here of our own device.”

      2. Oooh! Do it do it!! 😀 Then put it on the forum so we can read it! ^_^

      3. …………..”sweet SFL. Some post to remember, some post to forget”

      4. “…We are programmed to receive”

8. Wait a second! I agreed with something the second preacher said!
   “- When we stand before God we will not have any labels
   – He’s tired of camp loyalty
   – He tired of loyalty to colleges
   – He tired of loyalty to conferences
   – He’s tired of us being loyal to man made institutions
   – When are we going to be loyal to the Bible?
   – When are we going to be loyal to God? ”

   I agree with all that and I was confused at first, then I remembered that what he means and what he said are two different things. If he actually believed what he said he would be embracing some of those he calls “liberal” denominations, learning from them, and realizing they are his brothers and sisters in Christ. If the Fundies ever realized that they were bludgeoning the Body of Christ and spewing hate towards those who will one day be in eternity with God it might actually cause them to realize the many errors of their ways.

   I do have to say a huge thanks to Don. This is quite the fascinating read. I am not a confrontational person and not one to stir up trouble, but I would be very hard pressed to sit through this in person without standing up and calling the pastor out. Especially when the manogawd proclaimed them to be God’s last hope. I don’t think I could have been silent on that one. Nope, how dare any of us think that God is on “our” side. Ok, stopping now before I really pull out the soapbox.

   1. It’s insane – the way they say things they don’t mean. You’re very right that one minute he’s saying that we should be loyal to God and not to any man-made institutions, but the next he’s saying that THEY are God’s last hope. WHA????? You can’t have it both ways!!!

      One of my favorites is how at the end he says, “Teach them how to love people” when all through the sermon, he’s been showing no love toward people who aren’t like him: men with long hair, kids with baggy pants, anyone with a “wacky” Bible.

      The double-speak drives me batty!!!

9. I had a few beers yesterday but had no inclination to beat the **** out of my wife. Of course I was drinking IPA’s and not Miller.

   1. Now there’s separation I can practice: Hold no fellowship with those who partake of Budweiser or Miller.

   2. When I drink beer, I don’t beat my wife, and when she drinks beer, she doesn’t beat me. Are we doing it wrong?

   3. The beer thing cracked me up. When I’ve had a couple, I get extremely affectionate. Maybe the commercials should show that? 😀

      1. Same here. I get really, really affectionate…….and then I go to sleep on the couch. I don’t think I would make a very good commercial. 😉

         It is one of my pet peeves that people blame their bad behavior on beer. If a man beats his wife when he has had a couple of beers it is because that desire was in there to begin with. Beer relaxes your inhibitions somewhat and brings to the surface what you try to keep hidden. The typical fundy answer to everything is to attack the surface problem without dealing with the root of the problem.

         1. VERY good point.

      2. Same. When I’ve had a few drinks (when I’ve been extremely tipsy), I get very affectionate & happy. Of course, I’ve really only had THAT much to drink a couple times.

   4. Why is drinking Miller like making love in a canoe? Cause its copulating close to water. The f-word gives it more zing, but I’m trying to remain PC and PG.

      1. I heard that about Lite Beer.

         1. I heard it about American beer from the pope himself, Eric Idle.

   5. “A little wine for thy stomach’s sake,” or one’s jaw joint that’s perpetually stiffening up due to an old injury, in my case.

      I like what a Luther scholar said about him: “Luther’s faith was simple enough to trust that after a conscientious day’s labor, a Christian father could come home and eat his sausage, drink his beer, play his flute, sing with his children, and make love to his wife — all to the glory of God!”

      Also, can I hear an hay-Men for Blue Moon? 😀

      1. hay-Men

         1. HAY-MEN!!! 😀 😀 😀 😀
            And don’t forget Jameson too!

10. I’m just testing to see if I can close the “bold” tag here.

    1. Nope, guess not.

11. Ah, those liberal bastions (probably mostly evangelical)… many only liberal in the sense that they don’t have the same standards as IFBs

    Our pastor just did an overview on Sunday night of the last 100 years or so of church history. He explained how the divisions occurred and how each camp stands in relation to what actually matters (the Gospel).

    I found it interesting as I knew many of the labels (e.g. liberal, fundamentalist, evangelical, neo-evangelical, etc) but only had a rough idea of the interplay between them.

    1. How each camp stands?
       Why each camp is the only group who focus on the real, unadulterated Gospel of Jesus Christ (according to themselves).

12. this sound like every other sermon I heard the first 25 years of my life. Chocked full of pseudo-Christianity and contradictory statements.
    Props to ya’, Don. I couldn’t do it .

13. “With our head bowed and our eyes closed start for this altar”

    Sounds dangerous…

    1. Yes, I hope they had ambulances standing by.

    2. Let’s hope it didn’t have any sharp edges!

       (or maybe we SHOULD hope it had sharp edges? :razz:)

       1. There is a balcony… just sayin’ 😯

          1. Oh my. Why do lemmings come to mind just now?

       2. Eh well, it is a Double-edged Sword conference….why do references to falling upon one’s sword keep popping into my head? #whatIgetforlisteningtotoomanyEarlyShakespearelecturesthepastcoupleofdays

14. Damn Miller, drink one and you go Rambo on everyone in sight. Helluva drug…

    1. That’s why us refined drunks prefer Sam Adams…the beer of patriots and statesmen 😀

15. It makes me as physically ill to read this stuff as it did to listen to it the first 30 years of my life

16. I read it all Don and it has been said here before but this “stuff” they call preaching is addictive. The preacher is addicted to hearing himself talk and the sheeple are addicted to the same ol same ol. They do not walk humbly and do justice in any way shape or form.

    Any mention of Community Outreach such as meeting peoples immediate needs of hunger or paying their utilities?

    It’s stunning, in such a terrible way.

    Thank you for showing us that nothing has changed. Sorry for what you endured.

    1. Exactly!

17. “I think it’s time for ever IB preacher and I think it’s time for every IB Evangelist, and I think it’s time for every IB Missionary and teacher and lay person to get their nose in this Bible and find out for yourself what you believe instead of having to go to your pope (That rocked the house w/everyone denying that they answer to a pope…. Because each of them are the pope in their own eyes. ) or having to go check w/your administrator, or your mentor, or your hero or your headquarters to be told what you believe.”

    Well, SOMEbody won’t be speaking at SOTL next year. Of course, this is almost certainly another one of those instances where he said one thing and meant something completely different. It’s a completely true statement, of course, but that doesn’t mean that fundamentalists will ever actually act on it.

18. I hate to be a critic of this fine reporting, but there is a big error in here. When you were quoting what Yoda was saying in your head, you must have been under the influence of too much fundyade.

    Yoda clearly would have said, “Another there is.” NOT “There is another.”

    Just needed to point that out. Continue on with the hilarity. I’m having flashbacks so violent that I may need a sedative.

    😀

    1. No, you must have an NIV comparing with George Lucas’s KJV. The inspired text, from canon, is, “There is another.” And that text cannot be improved, amen? If the Lord Lucas had meant it to be otherwise, he would have said so, amen?

       … Then follows a diatribe of how we could prove it by showing the movie clip, but we shouldn’t be showing movie clips in church, amen?

    2. Nope! Yoda definitely said “There is another.”

19. “Finally there is the Diamond level, you get all the above and, a genuine authentic leaf from a 1620 King James Bible, with authentication and beautiful framing.”

    And I thought Baptists were supposed to be AGAINST the veneration of Holy Relics???

    1. As someone who loves books, especially old ones I almost cry every time I see one of those pages hanging on a wall. It means that a priceless bit of history has been chopped up and sold for a profit. If fundies stopped and thought about it for 1.7 seconds they would realize that it is a horrible way to treat an old Bible.

20. I seriously don’t know how you were able to sit there and listen to all of that crap, Don. My hat goes off to you, sir.

21. “- Long hair on men (how he got a haircut when he was saved) (+1 Christian appearance standards)”

    Hmm, what do the fundies think of King James I’s hair?
    http://www.cindyvallar.com/JamesI.jpg

    For that matter, what do they think of the outfits he wore?
    http://www.wilsonsalmanac.com/images1/james_I_hawk_sm.gif
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:King_James_I_of_England_and_VI_of_Scotland_by_Arnold_van_Brounckhorst.jpg
    http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/james/james.jpg

    And, pardon me if I digress, but why do pictures like this (maybe Not Safe for Work) http://celebspotlight.org/gallery/james%201
    come up when I type “King James I” into Google Images?

    1. Crud, I don’t think that last link worked the way I wanted it to. Just try it yourself, and see some of the weird cheesecake pictures that come up.

       1. ummm…i didn’t get cheesecake. the pic however was one that was def nsfw.

    2. Are those “man culottes”

22. TMI.
    This makes me ill.
    Love the Yoda insert.

23. “(so you can worship your very own page that was torn out of a real King James English Bible, in the comfort of your own home. )”

    I read (or possibly heard) an interesting thought once, that perhaps God hadn’t preserved the original copies of the letters and books that make up the Bible because we, in our inevitable foolishness, would very likely end up worshipping the books/letters/papers themselves rather than paying attention to what they’re saying. Nice to know the IFB has managed to overcome this slight difficulty–they just venerate something else instead.

    1. Also, how many times can you say “soulwinning” for just one point??

    2. Wow, good thought!

24. I’m thinking back to the times when I heard sermons about a “demon possessed” person writhing on the floor of the church during a sermon. I now think it was just an SFL spy that got so badly triggered that they couldn’t take it. That would be me anyway. Don, your commentaries (and this site) have given me some of the language I need to combat all of these lies I’ve heard in Fundystan for so many years. Thanks for staying strong! 🙂

25. I wonder if God throws up when He hears crap like this. Or maybe He calls the angels over and says, “Listen to what this quack is saying!” and they all have a good laugh and a drink.

    It’s probably more likely that He’s sad and angry. Or maybe He’s all of these things and just waiting and waiting with open arms, realizing that they won’t come because He’s not separatist enough for them anymore.

    1. ^+1

    2. He is probably saying something along the lines of “No, that is not what I said. I don’t think that. You know what? Please stop quoting me.”

       1. Sometimes I think He’s saying, “I’m sorry…do I know you?”

26. Thank you for doing the reporting.

    re soul-winning:

    If we go to the Bible that they profess to love, we find Jonah, who probably had more people saved than any of them have personally seen. We also have Noah, who didn’t have any saved (unless his family counts).

    Guess who God honored in His faith chapter? Yes, not the one who saw so many saved, but Noah (the man who would be considered a failure in most of today’s IFB churches).

    Truth in writing: The thoughts expressed in the above two paragraphs are from a book “The Technique Catastrophe” by Bob Creel.

    1. The interesting thing to me about Jonah’s story was realizing that God loved the people of Ninevah (not just the Jews) and did not want to destroy them, but Jonah had no love for them: “But Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry. He prayed to the Lord, ‘O Lord, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. 3Now, O Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.’”

       Soul-winning means nothing to the soul-winner if it is not motivated by love.

       1. Not to hear the SOTL crowd talk — good (big) numbers mean everything, and Jonah had that!

27. then the camera would pan from those kids shaking to death, crying, weeping and hiding their faces so the cannot be seen and the camera would then pan over and you would see a mother laying on the floor with her eye swollen shut with a bump knot over top of her eye and blood coming out of her nose; blood coming out of her mouth laying unconscious on the floor then it would pan on over and there would be…the MOg zipping up his trousers.

28. When he was giving instructions on how to preach the inspiration of the King James version, I so wanted to shout out, “Hey, according to your logic, my ESV was not only inspired but was actually
    ‘breathed out by God’, Amen?!!”

29. So let me get this straight…It’s wrong to beat your wife and make your kids cry after drinking beer, but it’s OK to keep your wife and kids cowering under your “Biblical” authority?

    1. @Rebel? yeeah I think fundys think of it as “tough Biblical love” 🙄

30. DON – do you happen to have a voice recorder that you could just record the whole entire thing? Then Durl (Darrell) could post the file on SFL? Just a thought.

31. Don, good reporting. How I endured that nonsense for 4 years and thought it was Biblical truth shows how we can be deceived. I think I could put up with a Roman Catholic mass easier than go to a SOTL conference. Given the choice, I will visit a liberal church rather than an IFB church, because it is far more likely that the Bible will actually be read (and more than just 2 verses) in a liberal church.

    1. Well, since the Roman Catholic mass actually has Scripture readings–most with no commentary at all–I’m thinking you would do pretty well.

32. Great stuff! Thank you so much for taking the time to do this. I know it had to be difficult (although I’m sure it was extremely entertaining at times) and I’m sure many appreciate it! Thanks again!

33. Oh…oh. *curls up on the ground*

    And in the first part, the “Flying the same flag” part: I think it would be blood-stained, blood-bought. Cuz my pastor who went there said the same thing Sunday night 😛

    WHY WHY WHY must every conference message reference the same stuff? Music, dress, alcohol. Seriously?? And not everyone who drinks automatically becomes a drunkard and a wife-beater. The illogicality of it just kills me.

    The whole “look like a Christian” bit really ticked me off too. Who is to say what a Christian is to look like? Oh, like you? Convenient.

    “If we don’t stand up for God and hold the line and stay with the stuff, Bible Christianity will soon be gone.”
    Oh good LORD. This is the final touch. This-I have no words. Just sldfkjqwiejfoisjdflkaw298jf.

34. You know, the worst part of the whole thing is, after being out of the IFB realm for a few years, I still have a hard time reading my Bible without seeing that same stuff there. How long does detox take? I’m reading a pretty in-depth Bible study right now, and I’m absolutely wowed by what I’m reading, because it turns out that the Bible ISN’T just a bunch of moralizing and pointing out what people did that was right/wrong. It’s such a relief, though, not to be under the LAW….

    1. It just takes time. A lot of people here like reading The Message, because such different language makes it easier to see things without old associations. You reading that already?

35. I’m kinda surprised they’d bring up smoking in North Carolina. In my Fundyland days, everybody in North Carolina knew that smoking just wasn’t mentioned – the economy was too dependent on it. Mmm.

    1. yeah, but now the Tobacco allotments are a thing of the past so it’s sorta, kinda something they can talk about now.

36. “Special singing ‘Who Am I?'”
    Whoa! The Casting Crowns’ “Who Am I?”??? Get outta town.

    “Opening monologue: Comment on the singing, ‘If that singing don’t light your fire then your wood’s wet.'”
    Guess he missed the memo about God being able incinerate soggy wood and meat? And yet, apparently the very reason IFBs can’t stand CCM because it “stirs up your emotions.” WHAT’S THE FREAKIN’ DIFFERENCE??? Gahh!!!

    1. I’m almost certain that this was Rusty Goodman’s “Who Am I?” (that a King would bleed and die for…)

       1. yes, Southern Gospel is synonymous with Old Paths Fundie Preaching. If a preacher can’t get up and keep the Amens and PIB’s flowing after a rousing ol’ standby such as this, or “It’s Real!” then he needs to go back down to the minors for some more training.

37. I threw up when the speaker equated drinking beer with wife beating/child neglect. Then I skipped the rest. I can’t take it.

38. How do you go soul winning in North Carolina? Almost everyone in that state has heard the fundie message. Do you go to the local 7-11 and strike up a conservation with Aziz, who only knows one word in the English language “Marlboro”.

39. Really, It’s got to be easy to come up with these sermons. It’s the same cliches I heard as a kid and I havent’ been in these churches in years. Pastors reusing favorite sermons… Who does that outside of this little world?

    1. Yup. Hardworking pastors who study the Bible seriously do several hours of study to produce one biblically solid sermon. The tripe preached by these fundies takes little to no time to produce since it is just rehashed shallow regurgitations with texts twisted to mean anything the preacher wants them to.

40. Here is what I don’t understand:

    Why do they need a copy of the Original King James version if they (supposedly) can open their Bibles and see the original King James version right in front of them.

    I would think that the KJVO leaders would not want to encourage them to have a copy of the original, because it could only bring home the extent to which todays KJV differs from it.

    1. 1. Because they probably wouldn’t read it; its just their for decoration.
       2. Even if they did try to read it, they probably couldn’t decipher it. Old English is not intuitive.

       1. The language of the original King James Version is actually considered Early Modern English. Old English, which is also called Anglo-Saxon, was used over 500 years earlier, and is a completely foreign language to current speakers of English.
          But it’s true that 1611 English is not easy for a 21st-Century American to understand without doing some special study of the language.

41. Don, you are a trooper for slogging through all that garbage. Thank you for giving such a great commentary along with your notes. I find your notes very helpful and refreshing. Keep smiling sir. 🙂

42. A key feature of a cult is the creation of isolation;

    “We are the good; evil is out there. God is with us; he has abandoned everyone else.”

    Add to that the authority of the leader, and but for grace and luck go the Branch Davidians.

43. Just curious, but how many people were in attendance? A few hundreds, a thousand, more?? I would like to know how many of the elite elects are left.

44. I literally laughed out loud at this:

    Obi-wan: “That non-denomination denomination is God’s last hope.”
    Yoda: “No. There is another.”

    This is really great stuff Don. These conferences are a monster to get through, let alone deconstructing them, listening to them TWICE, and typing everything up.

45. I heart “SOTL commercial”

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