Baptist Hall Of Shame

In the "Baptist Hall Of Fame" thread someone coined the term "Baptist Hall Of Shame." That gave me a thought to start this thread.

I give my nominees for top 10. They are picked not just because of the severity of their errors, but because of their widespread influence on the Baptist churches and ministry.

These are all so shamefull that my order is almost totally arbitrary.

10. Jimmy Carter - ran for president on the "born again" ticket now says he is "being born again." Model left wing Baptist.

9. Rick Warren - perfecter of religious marketeering in the name of God.

8. Harry Emerson Fosdick - as much or more than, any other individual Baptist popularized modernism among northern Baptists.

7. Wayne Oates - bastardized the gospel ministry with psychology.

6. A.T. Robertson - perfected the ridiculous notion that the Greek language somehow holds some hidden "word pictures" which shed light on the word of God - thus helped popularize the common practice of preaching about words rather than preaching about what the prophets actually said.

5. Jerry Falwell - promoter of gimmickry and programmism and religious charlatanism.

4. Shailer Matthews - injected the modernist heresy deeply into the northern Baptist blood through the infamous University of Chicago Divinity School.

3. William Whitsitt - enthroned the restorationist ecclesiology among the Southern Baptist intellectual elitists.

2. Martin Luther King Jr. - helped turn the black Baptist churches into black political advocacy groups and was a proponent of the universal fatherhood of God heresy.

1. Charles Spurgeon - done more, by example, to promote Calvinism than perhaps any other individual.

Others who could be added (in no particular order): E.Y. Mullins, Walter Shurden, Crawford Toy, James P. Boyce, James Dunn, A.H. Strong, Tony Campolo, Henry C. Vedder, Leon McBeth, Billy Graham, Pat Robertson, Daniel Parker, John Gill, John Mason Peck, Lasserre Bradley Jr., Charles Stanley, Dale Moody, Daniel Vestal, Glenn Hinson, Bill Leonard, Jack Hyles, and Bob Gray.

Who might you add to the list?

Mark Osgatharp

 

Gregory,

The Texas Tyrant. He is only one of four out of my list I have heard in person. He preached what ranked as one of the most ridiculous messages I have ever heard from a Baptist pulpit. On top of that, he walked up and down on the pews and literally demonstrated how to shame people into walking the ailse.

Mark Osgatharp

 

Very few, if any, "in leadership" couldn't vie for the list. The very reason most men become "leaders" is because they are self-promoting glory seekers and/or are preaching some ear tickling philosophies that the masses are itching to hear.

Paul foretold of such when he warned Timothy that in the latter days the people would heap to themsleves teachers, having itching ears.

I chose the ones I did because of their success in influencing the Baptist masses.

Mark Osgatharp

 

jshurley,

I did not indict all leadership. I was not even referring to local church leadership, but to leaders of "the masses". Even then I qualified it with "most".

There may have been some men who had noteriety thrust on them simply because they did what was right (though I admittedly can't think of a single bona fide case of that in modern times). That is quite a different thing from the Billy Grahams and Jerry Falwells of this world who set out to - and in fact did - build personal religious empires.

Mark Osgatharp

 

When you consider that vast numbers of Baptist ministers and people who have lived and died in this country, the list is really not limited at all. Again, the reason I choose these men is because of their widespread influence for evil.

Note that those on the list basically fall into four categories: Purveyors of modernism, purveyors of Calvinism, purveyors of, for lack of a better term, psycho-babel, and purveyors of religious gimmickery/commercialization.

There have been literally thousand upon thousands of Baptist pastors who have lived and died who fit none of these categories.

So who do I like? The sort of Baptist who would make my "hall of fame" list would be a plain old Bible believing Baptist who believes that Jesus died for all and would have all men to come to the knowledge of the truth, and who has no part in the commercialization of the gospel.

People like this seldom become well known and, therefore, I don't know the names of most of them and if I called the names of the ones I do know, you wouldn't recognize them. But God will reveal His "Hall of Fame" someday and then will every man have his praise from God, not from man.

And all those men of fame who have done untold harm to humanity and the kingdom of God will be exposed for the waterless clouds they really were.

Mark Osgatharp

 

Never heard of any of these men so I cannot comment on them.

Mark Osgatharp