132 thoughts on “Baptist Flag Sightings”

        2. I feel as if I know him well enough to ask that, and trust me, you don’t want to ask that. 😉

  3. Strangely enough, with all our cheesy decor, we did not have one of these in our church.

  6. That’s a big bad bow tie! Notice that “the book” comes before “the blood”. Hmmmm 🙄

  7. I’ve always been intrigued by Baptist preachers who insist on sitting in “the chief seats” of the church.

    Have they not read about the Pharisees??

    1. The M-O-g is lord over all he surveys from his elevated position. It is a matter of reverence for the M-O-g that people look up to him.

      Have you ever been in one of those services where when the M-O-g really want’s to show empathy, or connect with the audience he steps down and get on floor level and speaks from the heart… and the audience just feels the connection. Yeah, that’s a manipulation tactic.

      In Preacher boy classes in some IFB institutions of captive learning they actually teach the prospective preachers to develop a veneer of authority that keeps people at arms length. The Pastoral Mask if you will. Appearance is everything.

      1. Yep. At my Fundy U we were taught to not let church members to get too close to us. We were taught to seek out friends among other Mogs and not be close friends to the people in the church.
        The thinking was, if I remember correctly, that if we maintained our distance from people we would not be tempted to play favorites, we could be objective when preaching against their sin and people would not be disappointed in us by seeing our failings.

        1. That sounds like Bob Gray, Sr (TX) teaching… he may have stolen re-preached something his idol, Jack Hyles, taught.

        2. That is exactly what I was taught at my Fundy U with the same reasons. If you were friends with someone in the church it would lead to gossip and jealousy.

      2. Dear SFL Reader:

        At the same time, I’ve also observed that some pastors vanish when they are asked questions. How funny is that!

        Christian Socialist

      3. Don’t bash them! We need a mediator who will step down from his high place a to teach and empathize with us. If the MOG doesn’t do this, where else will you find such a one in a fundy church?

  8. I love the kleenex box on the Lord’s Supper table . . . because publicly crying over sin is a biblical mandate.

    2. I grew up in a church much like this one. I am guessing that the jug is there for people to place change in during special offerings. At the church I grew up in we had a water jug that we would fill with change and then give to the Fellowship Tract League.

    3. Had a water jug as well that was deposited into each servuce. Funds were designated for bus kids. Probably for koolaide. Note to self…dont drink the koolaide

  10. Ah yes, and you have to say the pledge to the flag, the pledge to the Baptist flag, and the pledge to the Bible flag. Good times.

    1. When I was a counselor at Camp CoBeAC in MI, we had to pledge to the Christian Flag and the Bible.

      “They word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path”

      Which is true, but I don’t think God wants others to force us to say that. To me, it’s a personal one.

      1. I LOVED going to CoBeAc when I was a kid! As a teen we went there for snow camp and soccer camp too. Good memories.

        1. In the summer, we had to use the toboggan hill for a game. We had to roll these huge balls up it while the opposing team was kicking them down.

          We called it the “buns of steel hill.” I lost about fifteen pounds that summer.

          I have good memories there too. And it’s so pretty.

  11. Ok, this isn’t the best rendition of this song I’ve ever heard, but…

    I can’t stand it when preachers have to be the center of attention at ALL times. This guy drinks water, SLOWLY walks BEHIND the quartet, then proceeds to shout over the singing. I’ve can’t count the number of times I’ve been trying to listen to a song in church with the MOG shouting over it. Very annoying. I’ve always suspected they were jealous that someone else was getting attention besides them.

    3. What do you think the reaction would be if one of the singers stood up behind the pastor, drank slowly from a glass of water and then yelled louder than the preacher in the middle of his sermon?

    4. The shouting is unnerving for me- they do that in pente churches, and I have more than a little PTSD…

      Did anyone else notice how VERY OFF PITCH the ‘tenor’ was at times? I was cringing. And I’ve not yet heard the singing accompanied. Is there a reason for that?

  13. I’m always amazed that so many fundies preach against contemporary music, however they seem to sing it often with the “Fundie Touch(TM)”.

    And…. the water bottle…. my old fundie church had one of those. Had the kids go around and collect an offering, and they didn’t stop until everyone’s pockets were empty.

    1. The song was copyright 1982, So I’m guessing 30 years is the minimal age limit possibly of songs? I envision a calendar like convenience stores have that say if the song was not born on or before this date you can’t sing it.

      1. That’s hilarious! I have actually heard this song done in fundy circles from as early as 2000. Maybe it’s a 15-20 year shelf life before the “contemporary” expires?

        1. I would agree I mean 12 years ago in my mind that song was very dated, but I’m not a fundy so wanted to give them a little additional time 🙂

    2. I was preached at by the “bus kid youth pastor” when I taught this song to my bus kids at HAC. He said the lyrics were from the NIV or something like that. I wonder how his youth group is doing….

  14. I do like A Capella music but I also like CCM. Glad does good A Capella music.

    The IFB just takes the joy outta everything including music.

    1. I heard John McArthur say, “Fundamental means, No Fun, too much dammed, and not enough mental!”

    2. Petra (Horrors! Hard rock!) did a couple of a capella tunes in the early ’80s. ‘Why Should the Father Bother?’ comes readily to mind:

      (Chorus)
      Why should the Father
      Bother to call us His children?
      Why should the Spirit
      Hear it when we pray?
      Why should the Father
      Bother to be concerned with all our needs?
      It’s all because of what the Son has done

      Once we were lost out on the ocean
      With no direction or devotion
      Tossed about by every wind and wave
      Now we are in the world, not of it,
      And we can surely rise above it
      Because the Lord has risen from the grave

      And we cry, ‘Abba, Father’
      ‘Abba, Father’, ‘Abba, Father’
      ‘Abba, Father’, ‘Abba, Father’
      ‘Abba, Father’

      Once were strangers from the promise
      We were doubters worse than Thomas
      ‘Til the Spirit opened up our eyes
      Now He has offered us adoption
      And we have taken up the option
      To be His family eternally

      …Not exactly Wesley, but better than most CCM. 🙄

  15. That girl held up her hand – she’s outta there as soon as she finishes singing her contemporary praise song.

    1. Hidden trap door opens and quartet suddenly becomes a trio…lesson for all the hand raisers 😯

      1. HAHAHA… I wish there was a “like” button… or perhaps more appropriately, an “HAY – MENN” button.

    2. I noticed that too, and was very surprised. There was also a lot of vocal sliding throughout, which would have made them anathema at any fundy church I’ve ever been in.

      1. Yeah… but a bit of gliss is common to music of that vintage, though particular to American stuff. You’re unlikely to find it in England, for instance.

      2. No kidding. The music director at my college told a guy and I to NOT slide our notes when we sang in chapel for missions conference just before we went to the microphone. We ignored him, and got the first standing ovation I had ever seen after a special in chapel. :mrgreen:

  16. I’d like to take this moment to thank the Lord…. That my YouTube is acting up today and wouldn’t play this.

    HAY-MEN!

  17. At first glance, the flag reminded me of the Budweiser beer symbol, and that Bud was a corporate sponsor of some event. Do the Baps give any thought about how things appear?

      2. Great point, Apathetic. They often take stances against things that were popular a decade ago, but completely miss things in current society. (I remember the rulebooks in my Christian school mandating “no bell bottoms” when none of us in the 80s would be caught dead in them!)

        1. I remember seeing a rule in our Christian School year book, when I was in Jr. High, about the width of the flair at the bottom of pant legs. It gave a certain measurement. I don’t ever remember anyone enforcing this rule. And yes, this was the 1970s!

    3. When you say “Baptist”
      You’ve said a lot of things nobody else can say
      When you say “Independent”
      You’ll go to any length to separate from all the rest
      When you say “Baptist”
      You’ve said the word that means you like to hand out tracts
      When you say “Fundamental”
      It means you want a Bible published in 1611
      When you say “Baptist”
      You tell the world you know what makes it all sin that way
      When you say “IFB”
      You say you care enough to only want the King James Version
      There is no other one
      There’s only something less
      Because the King James
      Is leading all the rest
      When you say “Independent Fundamental Baptist”
      You’ve said it all!

        2. 😆 😆 😆
          {sings} “We are the world… we are the drunken…”
          Sorry, I’ll quit now.

    4. Here comes the King, here comes the Big Number One
      (The IFB)
      Jesus thinks our Church is second to none
      (The IFB)
      The King is calling, so loud and clear
      There’s an altar, it’s right down here
      Come to the altar due to guilt and fear

      When you say Independent Fundamental Baptist
      – You said it all.

      1. Wow, that guy on the front row with the mustache looks like Dave Boyer, former night club singer and popular Christian artist of the late 60s and 1970s.

    5. Behind the singers there’s the ‘Christian’ flag, which is actually really bad heraldry- color on color in the canton.

      There’s a pledge, too. I had to memorize it as a kid, but thankfully, I can’t remember it now.

      1. Oh, dumb me! That’s the flag y’all were referring to! I thought it was snarky reference to the US flag, so prominently on display.

        1. That first Baptist flag was actually the battle flag of the army of Northern Virginia. Then it was the flag of the U.S. Now that TEH GAYS have taken over, however, it was deemed appropriate to create a new one all separated unto themselves.

    6. Our old church posted the ten commandments on the wall in the classic Budweiser font that was used for a time in the logo. Every time I saw it, I thought of beer.

  18. The best part of this video was when the MOg took a five minute drink from his thermos while they started to sing. Classy.
    And I’m a little confused by the hand raising – the IFB church I was raised in wasn’t super conservative, but no one dared to raise their hands. Interesting combo

  19. This is literally where my family lives now. Fortunately, I’ve never heard of this church, but wow! And the sad thing is that this will make 3 IFB churches in this one small-ish town. One is an HAC grad, the other is a very gracious self-made man out of a small Bible college in Virginia, and now this guy. Anyone know what camp this church is out of?
    I know we are in the Bible belt, but how many IFB churches does one town need?

    1. So which one does your family go to? I actually interviewed at an IFB church in Rock Hill back in 2007. By the descriptions, I’d say we were at the gracious pastors church. He has a small radio station if that gives you a clue. 🙂

        1. Harvest Baptist is not fundy – at least not totally-crazy-off-the-wall-KJVO-fundy. So actually I was not counting Harvest Baptist – I guess that makes 4 IFB churches then. Again, wow!

      2. I do believe that is the gracious man’s church. And he truly is the most gracious Christian I have ever met in my life.
        My family doesn’t go to any of them. My grandpa was born a Catholic and will die a Catholic, and when my mother went down to care for him (leaving her IFB pastor husband behind in NY “until her parents died” wink wink) she started attending his church.
        I did attend the gracious man’s church for a little while when I was home, but I haven’t really lived in Rock Hill – I’ve only just stopped when passing through for a few weeks here and there to see my family.

        2. Yeah that was the church. They were nice people and the pastor was kind to us. The definitely placed a huge emphasis on the music issue while I was being interviewed. In the end I was glad we did not end up there because if I did, I would probably still be trapped in the prison of IFB. Nothing against them though because they really were nice people.

        3. I live near there. Being the fundy I am, our two youth groups double up every now and then.

    2. might be hard to find these folks, since I would venture a guess of one IFB church per 50 population in any town in SC.

      2. Same for AL, GA, MS, TN, etc. of course.

        Must be a lot of part time pastors struggling with bible school student loans 😛

  20. I have attended several Baptist churches across the northeast, and one in the southeast, and also visited about 150 churches the 3 years my parents were on deputation and I never once saw this flag. I first saw it about 2 years ago. Wow. What lunacy!

  21. The pledge:

    “I pledge allegiance to the Baptist Flag,

    And to the Faith once delivered unto the Saints.

    I will ever remain faithful to the tie that binds us together,

    The Book, the Blood, and the Blessed Hope of our Lord’s soon coming.”

    From:
    http://www.baptistflag.org/

    This flag was invented by “Dr” Don Green which explains a lot in my mind.
    I was once in a meeting and he was seated behind me. He leaned up and asked to borrow my Bible. He is known for writing out his sermons and Bible references in a notebook beforehand so he sometimes doesn’t bring his Bible. I guess he needed to look up a verse. Anyway, I had a ticket to a baseball game stuck in my Bible. When Green got up to preach he went on and on and on about how disrespectful it was to the Bible to have worldly things like sports tickets in your Bible.
    Classy.

    1. Made ya want to stand up and yell, “THEN, BRING YOUR OWN BIBLE NEXT TIME, A**HOLE!!!!!”, didn’t it?

        1. Me, neither, and back when I was drunk on the kool-aid, I felt I couldn’t be as sarcastic as I naturally am.

          I look back at things and realize I’d handle them WAY different now…. And, probably get myself kicked out or shunned.

          Ah, staircase wit.

      2. I would SO want to say, “Good thing you didn’t find the LSD I stashed in the back binding, then.”

    2. That was so unChristlike of him!

      How hypocritical to make up things to get offended by yet to excuse oneself for similar “lapses” (like not bringing a Bible.)

    4. Huh. That link (http://www.baptistflag.org/about/) shows a flag divided in party per saltaire gules and argent (equal quarters diagonally red and white- which is good heraldry), with the pledge you list. Doesn’t show a date, but Don Green appears to still be alive, so it can’t be that early.

      The flag in the corner behind the male singer is the ‘Christian flag (argent, in a canton azure a Latin cross gules)’ which according to http://www.auburn.edu/~allenkc/chrflag.html “…was conceived at Brighton Chapel, Coney Island, New York, Sunday, September 26, 1897, and was presented in its present form the following Sunday by its originator. Call it chance, or providence, serendipity, or the plan of God, on that day, the Christian flag was born.

      The white on the flag represents purity and peace. The blue stands for faithfulness, truth, and sincerity. Red, of course, is the color of sacrifice, in this case calling to mind the blood shed by Christ on Calvary, represented by the cross.

      The first pledge to the Christian flag was written by Methodist pastor Lynn Harold Hough in 1908.

      “I pledge allegiance to the Christian Flag and to the Savior for whose kingdom it stands. One brotherhood, uniting all mankind, in service and love.”

      I’m pretty sure that pledge, or something very like it, is what I learned as a kid.

      1. Nah, fundies wear crosses too- and get persecuted for doing so, though in a non-threatening, only minorly hurt-feelings way.

        It’s crosses with Jesus’ body still hanging on them that are Catholic. But fundies never wear the one with beads on them! Those are idolatrous!

        (Times to remove the tongue from the cheek. 😕 )

      2. True. Necklaces are too feminine and good fundy men do not wear them. However, I have seen some truly garish examples hanging around the necks of female fundies in my day. Some of them looked liked all the needed was a stake and knee boots and they could’ve gone vampire hunting with Buffy. 🙂

  25. No baptistry 😯 😯 :shock to baptize the hundreds of converts who repeat the “sinners prayer” at the old fashioned alter…ichabod on you!

    2. Maybe off to the side a little where you can’t see it? Maybe an outdoor bapistry? Maybe they use another church’s bapistry for baptisms? Who knows, but I am sure they get ’em dunked!

    3. One church I went to had it in the wall behind the stage, with a curtain in front of it when it wasn’t being used. Another was in the floor under wear there pulpit was- they had to pull up a panel in the floor to get at in. That was the one that had wiring go bad and the church burned down, a week before I got married.

      The Episcopal parish I go to now has a lovely brass basic on a niche to one side- we all crowd in to watch the priest pour water over the head of the watered person, usually a small child who isn’t so sure about this…

  26. Something else interesting about this video: 1. Listen to the first few notes of the song. 2. Skip to the ending of the song. 3. See how far off their original note they are. 😕

  27. You also might be a fundamentalist if you just now singing a chorus that was a favorite in evangelicalism 20 years ago, and was one of the “devil’s songs” at that time, but is now just old enough to be ok to sing.

  28. Also, notice that it hangs higher than both the US and Christian flags.

    From USFlag.org bullet point #1) The flag should never be dipped to any person or thing.

  29. 1. The MOG looks like a fatter Christopher Walken from a distance.

    2. I’m going to propose that we change the US flag by scribbling random words all over it in the most butt-ugly default font in Microsoft Word. Possibly even Papyrus.

    3. “Dr.” Don Green is a certified nutjob. I’ve met the man and some of his relatives. Where you have a brain, Don Green has a whack-a-mole game.

    1. I looked at his church’s website. Sorry- honestly they’re a bunch of old, fat, ugly white guys who couldn’t make a living anywhere but in ‘ministry’. And there’s something a little squicky about holding a church for that long, and your sons working with you in that same church, for that long.

        2. Don, I think you win. Everything. Forever. 🙂
          I know it’s been stated before, but the power is really what it comes down to here.

  31. My cousin Charlotte went to this church. The guy believes that blacks are cursed by God because they descend from Ham. When Ham went in and laughed at Moses, this guy actually teaches that Ham sodomized him. When I asked my cousin where the Bible taught this, she said the pastor said you have to “read between the lines”. Nice.

    1. Many southern churches teach that. I wonder if it’s a leftover from “slave days” – a way of justifying owning human beings?

    2. Ah, yes, “reading between the lines”– the key to getting more milage out of your eisegesis.

    3. “The guy believes that blacks are cursed by God because they descend from Ham. When Ham went in and laughed at Moses, this guy actually teaches that Ham sodomized him.”

      Considering that Moses came along considerably later in history that Noah, Ham must’ve lived for quite a long time.

Comments are closed.