Church, education

Introducing: A Beka Church

93 Comments

From the creative minds who brought you A Beka Book, A Beka Academy, and the Four Winds Carpet Color Scheme, now comes the new and exciting A Beka Church program that will spiritually enrich your family or small home gathering. A Beka Church is the perfect solution for a world full of doubt and indecision caused by years of liberal education and free thought. With so many apostate churches in the world, why take a chance on having to listen to differing points of view or hear non-inspired words being read from inferior Bible translations?

The A Beka Church concept makes being a strong Christian so easy. Each week you’ll receive a set of DVDs of songs, sermons, and proof texts crafted by master preachers from Pensacola Christian College and Pensacola Theological Seminary. Each sermon is painstakingly checked for accuracy and grammar usage by a team of spiritual giants headed by none other than the co-founder and campus spiritual leader Beka Horton. Your Christian life is all but guaranteed!

At a traditional church you could spent thousands of dollars in overhead costs to pay a pastor and maintain a building but with A Beka Church there’s only small monthly fee of 39.99 (+S&H) in addition to one-tenth of your income for the rest of your life. You can even use the same video equipment that your children already use for their school work!

Listen to these thrilling testimonials

“Since leaving PCC, I just haven’t been able to find a church that gives the feelings of guilt and inadequacy that I crave. I’m so thankful that A Beka Church was there to put be back in my place.” ~ Danny in Ft. Worth, Texas.

“I just haven’t been able to find any church who’s standards I completely agree with. No more having to spend time on Sunday morning with pants-wearing hussies! I love A Beka Church!” ~ Esther in Greenwood, Delaware.

“A Beka Church is the greatest innovation in spiritual thought this world has seen since you-know-who.” ~ St. Paul

After receiving your membership questionnaire (please use black pen only), your bank draft authorization for automatic tithe withdrawal, and your notarized oath of allegiance, you’ll receive an A Beka Church starters kit containing:

– 1 Copy of The Leaven in Fundamentalism on Video Cassette
– 2 King James Award Bibles (18.99 value!)
– 1 Dr. Joel Mullenix replica hairpiece.
– An exclusive phone number to the pastor’s office which will be working once we actually get a pastor again.

A Beka Church: Get to Heaven From Your Living Room.

93 thoughts on “Introducing: A Beka Church”

  1. Wow! You really outdid yourself this time, Darrell! You usually don’t do parody, but this is so spot-on, it’s amazing. I’m sure there are some inside jokes that PCC people will get that I didn’t, but this is good enough to be enjoyed by everyone!

  4. I can see this as saving me countless hours that I’ve had to use for that Devil inspired activity of study. Also seems like a great way to safely find something to preach without having to actually observe the world around me.

    Please don’t tell my church I’m going to be using this program. I’ve ordered them to think I’m awesome and I wouldn’t want to be a stumbling block.

  5. “proof texts crafted by master preachers”

    Always got a kick out of their excessive use of the description “master.” “Master teachers, master enrollment advisors, master floorwalkers, master Christians, et. al.”

    I can see you patting yourself on the back for conjuring that one. Excellent post to kick off 2011 here.

  7. Like “Rejoice in the Lord,” does A Beka Church come with its own version of Fundamentalized, Hymnized, sanitized CCM, Hamilton-Garlock and Southern Gospel (easy on the beat) hybrid of music? 😐

    2. Not only that but it comes with a songleader-on-video who will make sure you’re not causing moral relativism by sliding your notes or “scooping.”

  8. It’s funny how not-so-independent that independent fundamentalism is. They still have to bear the criticism of everyone who claims that denomination. It also doesn’t help when they produce carbon copies of themselves in their preacher boys. And we all know the preacher boys that pastor in their new church still owe allegiance to the IFB institution they came from.

  9. Yessss! Now I finally have the missing piece….ABeka homeschool materials, Rejoice Radio/TV, Joyful Life Sunday School materials, and now ABeka Church!! What better way for those of us who can’t attend Campus Church to stunt–oops–meant to say ‘grow’ spiritually! 🙄

  10. Okay, Darrell–you got me. I totally believed it for a second. You may now take your seat beside Jonathan Swift among the Great Straight-Faced Jokesters of the World.

    Love the blurb from St. Paul, by the way. But don’t fundies always drop the title Saint? 😉

    1. Yeah, but just signing it “Paul” would be a little ambiguous.

      Perhaps “Paul the Apostle”?

      “Paul the Baptist?”

      “Paul, author-of-half-the-New-Testament-perhaps-including-Hebrews-but-we’re-not-quite-sure?”

      1. I hear “Paul the Apostle” or “The Apostle Paul” quite a lot, but your last suggestion definitely captures the belligerence I remember oh-so-fondly from discussion of St. Paul’s canon at BJU.

      2. Gah, I know I’m totally blowing my fundy cred and relegating myself to a mere half-fundy by asking this, but who is “You-know-who”?

  11. Darrell, this is perhaps the best post you have ever written. You truly have a gift.

    1. Oh, no you don’t! Everyone in your family must be in full fundy attire even though you are home, you are dressing for the Lord… 🙄

      1. I have to say, that is brilliant. I can imagine this product coming in handy when bringing communion to people’s homes, hospital rooms, etc.

      2. My dad’s church uses these. We were surprised to see it when we visited a few months ago. We took an extra one for a souvenir because it was so unique to us…shhh! And no, his church is definitely not fundy.

    1. I started going to “chirstian” schools using ABeka in the 3rd grade. By the 5th grade, I came to the conclusion that ABeka was for “teachers” who didn’t want to teach and would rather assign busy work. Why else does a kid need to do 500 exercises on where to put the hyphen?

      1. I remember BEKA representatives promoting their curriculum saying how all the teachers had to do was follow the lesson plans – sort of like pointless robots. I was so insulted: doesn’t my creativity, my training, my intelligence count for anything?

        And now Darrell’s parody has reduced my husband to a completely unnecessary role too! 😉

      3. Oh, man, that’s nothing compared to ACE…or whatever it’s called now. It was for churches who didn’t have staff for a full school. It was basically home-schooling with supervisors at church. I remember the absolute torture their math “paces” were (that’s what they called the workbooks). An entire page of long division…with no pictures…for a 9 year old…pure torture. I remember my mom pulling her hair out, almost literally in frustration because I hated doing the homework. Thankfully, in 5th grade I transfered to a school that used Abeka, and it was so much better. Mind you, not great, but WAY better than ACE ever was.

        1. Right…I looked it up and it is/was also known as “School of Tomorrow”. Although, I checked their official site and there was no mention of that. The ACE stood for “Accelerated Christian Education”.

        2. ACE/School of Tomorrow is now based in the Nashville area. Two of my friends used to work there. I wanted to warn them about the place since ACE was the official curriculum of my eight years of Hell, but they both needed jobs. They didn’t last long, and now at least one of them is pretty rabidly anti-ACE and anti-Gothard (Gothard owns the property ACE is using… but Gothard and his bunch is another story entirely).

        3. Christian math? I would have thought math was the same regardless of one’s religious persuasion.
          Of course, if I didn’t live in Texas, I would have said the same thing about science, too. 😐

        4. When was browsing the ACE site, I found the fact that they are on their 4th edition kind of funny, and a little sad. They started in the 70’s, and are only just now on the 4th? Also, in describing the updates, they don’t really mention anything about updating content to reflect current events over the last 30 years, but hey, they added cute borders and made the comic strip characters more current…that must count for something, right? Then, I looked at the workbook samples and my head hurt. It was familiar, and headache inducing at the same time. I just don’t remember the writing in them being this horrible. There are places where they just repeat the same phrase 50 different ways, just to fill the page. Ugh…

    2. 1977, fresh out of Bible college, and I landed at what I not so fondly refer to as “Pensecola North”. It was a large Christian K-8 school with Dr. Horton’s brother at the helm. He expected to be called “Pastor Horton” even though this school was not attached to a church, and I’m not so sure that Horton was a pastor at the time. That always puzzled me. I taught one of four second grade classes. They handed me an orange ring binder the size of the national debt. Upon inspection I was pleased to see that I was not going to be needing my brain for the next school year. This tome even included instructions on when and how to take children to the bathroom and where to have them stand…uh, in the hall waiting, that is. 😳 I had time each weekend to practice my penmanship copying lesson plans from the The Orange Book into an ordinary teacher’s lesson plan book with carbons that I turned in to the second grade supervisor for review. Since the four classes were populated with children grouped according to their standarized test scores, it was a challenge for me to keep my mid-range munchkins up with the top level class and on the proper day in The Orange Book. I pitied the poor lower level groups! If Johnny can’t read on day 93, oh well. Maybe they’ll catch him next year. It was cummulative, you know. By the third time Johnny repeats second grade he ought to catch up. His parents might not catch up with the tuition, though. Regarding the MATH BOOKS. At that time the math books were an old series from the 50s or 60s that I remember from my own school years. A Beka had purchased the copyright and reprinted them with their own soft covers. My best friend taught third grade and was really struggling getting her kids to have any success with math. I honestly cannot recall how we learned the truth about the math books, but this was it: A Beka goofed and printed the fourth grade math book in a third grade cover. There was NO 3rd GRADE MATH BOOK! About that time I snapped. I switched on my brain. I quit attending the smarmy second grade “devotions” and spent those moments each morning in my own classrrom trying to figure out how to circumvent The Orange Book and get my kids to learn. In an attempt to get my poor kiddos ready for 4th grade math I invented ways to teach them how to multiply and divide with toothpicks and dry pinto beans. At the end of the year, no one asked me to come back next year, and my friend and I were both pleased as punch to load up our cars and head back home! I have used A Beka books in other schools since then, although I never saw another Orange Book, but I was always given the liberty to do what I needed to do to get kids to learn. That usually meant leaving A Beka stuff on the shelf and grinding away at creating my own learning materials.

      1. How absolutely demeaning to be told to copy their plans into your book to be submitted for approval. Why even pretend you’re writing lesson plans? Those poor kiddos, forced into a system without creativity or flexibility, and those poor parents, who thought they were providing an excellent education for their kids, and those poor teachers, taught that the public schools were evil and trapped into performing like robots. Teaching, while challenging, delights a true teacher, but situations like this break the spirit.

        1. I left that school thinking I had made a huge blunder in mistinterpretting God’s call to be a teacher and I swore I’d never step into a classroom again. God had different ideas and dropped me into a school, though very fundy, that allowed me free reign to be creative; and I went on for a 14 year career in some great Christian schools. Years later, after I’d left full time teaching and was in a music ministry, I approached a local Christan school to offer my services as a substitute teacher to pad my pocketbook. The administraor had been on the textbook writing staff at Pensecola. She explained that they brooked no nonsense with teachers getting creative and diverting from the A Beka curriculum. She could have been describing me when she referred to a former teacher who decided to “get creative.” Note the word “former.” Yikes! I knocked the dust of that place off my feet!

        2. The disdain with which they view teachers is so prideful it’s disgusting. They think THEY’RE so superior to a lowly classroom teacher? The Bible calls us a BODY. We are ALL essential. We are all gifted. To force every teacher into a Procrustean model of a classroom is unprofessional, undignified, and even (to me) unbiblical! (Sorry, I’m a bit passionate about teaching!) I’m glad you found a better place to teach after the first!

      2. I used to have a couple of those giant orange 3-ring binders when I was a teenager. Of course I kept them full of baseball cards.

    3. Having done a curriculum analysis project in an educational philosophy class (d**n that “general studies” major was a drag) – ABeka math scored very low on the quality and academic rigor compared to both christian and secular math textbooks – in fact – BJU Press math texts actually were in the top group, well above average. This was done using a grading system used by a couple of the accrediting organizations for K-12 schools. Even the Fundy schools I attended didn’t use Christian math texts. Most often something like Saxon. Of course they were fundy-lite but not really bona fide fundy, just the major trappings, not hardcore. Oh, and they actually used all the standard achievement tests SAT/CAT/ACT, etc. So we knew we were better than 95 percent of the public schools in the world.

    4. Long Time reader, First Time Poster.
      I grew up in an old school, fundamentalist, Holiness-Pentecostal Church that used A Beka for its Christian School. While I realize that A Beka was certainly NOT perfect (The math was certainly lacking in many ways), the A Beka program left me academically prepared to go onto state school in the Northeast, and later to an Evangelical seminary in the Southeast. People from my high school, who grew up on A Beka Book, went to colleges and universities such as Vanderbilt, The University of Connecticut, Hofstra, Liberty University, George Washington, Syracuse, Cornell, Wagner College, Drew University, Washington State, and Purdue. Interestingly, not a single one of us attended PCC, because we are Pentecostals.
      While A Beka is not perfect, education is often what one makes of it. And yes, our Standardized Tests/ SAT scores were MILES better than the local public schools.

    1. They should provide a pack of “emergency cullotes” in case a visitor shows up wearing those liberal breaches, or however you spell it.

  16. Which one of you wrote the Amazon Review for “The Leaven of Fundamentalism”? It is brilliant.

    1. It honestly reads more like a post from the guys that used to run The Student Voice (www.pensacolachristiancollege.com) more than commenters on here, IMO.

  17. This is up there for the best post ever, Darrell! I disturbed a class next door to mine.

    For all of the emphasis on the local church in fundamentalism, it always amazed me that BJU and PCC did not require attendance at an actual local church.

    This would be a logical next step for A Beka, I believe. You better watch out, or they might swipe your idea! 😈

    1. My 11th grade Bible teacher at BJA told us that if you couldn’t find an appropriate local church, you could do your own church @ home. Of course, we all know the definition of appropriate is whatever the Bob in power thinks is appropriate.

    2. Now, now. Just because the rich guy who owns the college tells the ‘pastor’ what to preach and there is no voting or input from the congregation doesn’t mean that the Campus Church isn’t an ‘actual local church’… ok, I can’t even type this and keep a strait face. 😆

      The funny things is that this is essentially what PCC did – there wasn’t a local church holy enough for them (or to be perfectly honest, controlling enough for them) so they made their own; and go figure, they run it.

      For what it’s worth, I know staff members there who got into serious trouble for attending a service at another Baptist church in the aria without permission.

  19. But what about the official red tie for the usher in training and the electrical shock insert for the hymn books? (just in case a female member of the household chooses to touch the book.)

      2. Oh, no! I am the chief of sinners. I’ve shared hymnbooks probably hundreds of times with whomever sat next to me in church, regardless of sex or age.
        I had no idea this was an abomination.

        1. For one it is the “appearance” clause. It may appear that you are dating or intimate with the member of the opposite sex with whom you are sharing the hymnal.

          In reality the hymnal is a conduit, a bridge that channels sexual energy between the sexes. For a mixed couple to hold onto a hymnal for the duration of all 56 verses of “Just As I AM” or all 72 verses of “I Surrender All” would build up so much sexual energy the ushers would have to hose them down with the fire hose before the smoldering passion burst into flame right there in the pew.

          And that’s the truth! According to the 1611 (and a half) King James Embellished version so help me. 😯

        2. I don’t know if Don is referring to BJU or another school. At BJ, it was a custom for many people who were dating for the guy to always hold the hymnbook for both of them. Not a rule, just a custom. I always thought it was just an emphasis on chivalry and also a good excuse to have to stand closer to your date. 🙂 There was also an unwritten rule that the guy would pass the offering plate, that his date/girlfriend would not have to touch it. My hubby and I also made it a rule when we were dating to use the same umbrella, and to make sure that it was as small as possible.

        3. Oh, Don, this made me laugh so hard I have tears in my eyes!!! And for the record, I totally believed this was a real product. 😳

  25. Once a family left my old church. I am not sure of the reason why they left but there was a disagreement with the pastor. The father decided to start his own church in his house, because somehow the other 20 Baptist Churches in the area were not good enough for him. He soon began to advertise his new church in the “Pennysaver”. He got in trouble with his neighbors and the zoning department. His church lasted less than two months. But I believe he “home churched” his family for many years. There are 1.5 billion Christians in the world, but the only Christian who was 100% correct was an undereducated, recovering alcoholic from West Virginia.

        1. @Rob,
          For instance, the town I live in is roughly 6,000 people, we have:
          1 GARBC church
          3 United Methodist Churches
          1 AOG
          2 United Church of Christ
          1 ELCA Lutheran
          1 Fundy Church aching for a TV ministry
          1 Church of Christ

          I can not, with good conscience, endorse any of the above churches. It’s not a matter of being “right and everyone else wrong”; however, I don’t believe in baptismal regeneration, so that knocks out the Methodist, Church of Christ, Lutheran and UCC. I don’t care for the GARB church whatsoever…I’m not of an AOG orientation and the TV ministry Fundy church said I had to dress appropriatly because of their desire to have a TV ministry. All that said, I am of a Mid-Acts Dispensational bend (hyper-dispensationalist)and am of the opinion that the “church” is universally made up of all believers. Therefore, my family and I have our study and prayer time at home.

        2. There are areas of the country where this could be the case. Standard fundy answer – “why would you move there unless you had a chosen local church to join – your job/home decisions would be secondary”

          Actually most of the home churchers I know could easily find a church that they should be able to endorse theologically – its just that they can’t submit to any authority since their view of the authority of the home is out of balance. By which of course they mean the authority of the father (or in most cases they authority of the puppet father whose strings are controlled by the passive agressive publically submissive dominatrix he married some many years and 19 children ago) ITs normally an authority thing, not a theology thing.

        3. Smith, how many points to you have to agree on before the church is “acceptable”? You have a lot of adjectives applied to yourself. Do you require them ALL of a church you attend as well? 😯

        4. There are places sufficiently remote that regular church attendance would be difficult. Some parts of Alaska, Nevada, Wyoming, and Montana might qualify (come to think of it, that may be why so many goofy cults get started/find room to grow in those parts of the country). And if an area is extremely homogeneous in its religious persuasions (talking to *you* here, Utah!) someone not of the majority church might well decide to establish a home church for his family (and maybe a few other like-minded people).

      2. Most “home churchers” I know are just plain nuts. They are often nothing more than mini-cults. As I stated, the area I grew up in was littered with Baptist Churches. There was a church for every taste. I knew which churches were moderate, which ones were aligned with Bob Jones, Jack Hyles, which ones were black, SBC, ABC, GARCB, Pri-Trib, Post-Trib, etc…
        Most men who start home churches lack the ability to get along with other people, often due to their own egos. They also expect the church to agree with them 101% of the time.
        You are never going find a person or institution you agree with 100%. But often with fundies, it not disagreements on the major tenants of the faith that cause division, but the minor non-biblical stuff that cause them to start new churches.
        Randy Weaver (of Ruby Ridge) started his own home church. In his isolation, he convinced himself and his family that the government attack on his house would lead to the return of Christ.

  26. I almost believed you, until I remembered that the idea of doing church “outside the umbrella of authority” would not be something allowed. You would need ushers in your home, just in case a spontaneous outburst of joy is uttered and no one is there to bring you back under subjection.

  27. @Mark,

    I do not know your dad’s personal reasons for not joining one of the twenty Baptist churches in town, but I don’t think it’s fair to say that they were not “good enough” for him. I think every believer should be given the liberty to go with his or her conscience when choosing a fellowship group. The problem may no be whether or not a group is “good enough” for the individual; the problem is usually found when a certain group inhibits the exercise of conscience and the growth of an individual.

  29. I come back to SFL after the busy holidays to find this masterpiece! 😆 😀

    God bless you Darrell!

  30. Yeah fake church, fake music, fake christians, fake church in a box!
    “I wanna “Catch the Spirit!”
    I miss the old campus show, fake ensembles smiles, fake faculty, fake back tracks to the music.

  31. Much laughter. Thank you for brightening my day. Good thing it’s not late at night here or the house may have been disturbed!!

    Brilliant.

    “Since leaving PCC, I just haven’t been able to find a church that gives the feelings of guilt and inadequacy that I crave. I’m so thankful that A Beka Church was there to put be back in my place.” ~ Danny in Ft. Worth, Texas.

  33. Holy monkey cows…how did you trick so many people into reading this stuff? For that I clicked on two google links. Enjoy the 15 cents.

  35. Oh, man, I can’t believe I just read this one. ROFL. The black ink only line was priceless.

  36. If that post had a FAQ page, a question could be:

    Q: Hasn’t PCC gone through a couple of pastor lately, and aren’t the pastors just puppets for Dr. Horton, the real authority behind the “church”?

    A: Not to worry. God has personally told Dr. Horton that what he is doing is right. You can have confidence in us! Really!

    🙄 I was attending PCC when Pastor Schettler left, and when Pastor Jackson left. I don’t see them as a legitimate New Testament church because of their authority problems. The running jokes about the “Horton cult” is well founded.

    *raise arm in Nazi salute* Hail Horton! 😈

    1. I never went to PCC, but used the A Beka curricula in it’s earlier days. I hated it from the first. The WIFE, Beka, came across as incredibly haughty on her stupid videos. People here make fun of the BJU text books, but their literature texts, at least, were so much better than A Beka!

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