Thinking about Steven Lawson's situation

What happened with Steven Lawson is not something simple, much less for the family. I am the son of a pastor, my father also failed, my father raised two granddaughters from babies and my father's infidelity became public and my nieces tell me that they could not go out because they were made fun of by telling them that they were the granddaughters of the "pastor who cheats." Yes, these things must come to light. Uhmmm and it is a sign for everyone that no one is exempt and it is good especially for those with sound doctrine who tend to be very conceited. Years ago my mother taught me that when one believes very strongly in something or is very arrogant, God will allow or will make us fall into sin just to deal with the arrogance.

I believe that in these things God will also measure the wisdom of his people, the idea is not to cover up but not to destroy either because it can happen to any of us. And there is another question that we should be asking ourselves, and the question is "What is happening in pastoral families?" I recently made a post about what happens to pastors' children when they reach 15 years of age, what is being done and what is not being done, that they end up mostly separated from the church or if they are, they have it as a club.

Now we have to ask ourselves what happens in pastoral families. My father was a very anointed man, just looking at people and they were healed, idolized by many... For years I was in charge of a congregation and I knew a lot about the pastoral environment and we see what happened with Lawson and we are surprised but there are many that do not come to light, wives who suffer in silence. I have never asked my mother how long she knew about my father's infidelity. I only remember many years ago I told her about some things about my father that I saw as incorrect and she only answered me "Sometimes we just have to keep quiet and not say anything because he is the man whom God is using." Today I wonder how much she wanted to tell me with those words.

There are problems in pastoral families and they must be identified, because as I said it is not only in the couple itself, there are problems in the whole family, I as a pastor's son who had the opportunity to relate with other pastors' sons can attest to that, and then as a pastor, having to see such terrible things... one sees what happened with Steve Lawson and is surprised, but there are many other cases that do not come to light.

Pastors are always worried about the church, whether as a church or as a business, and they tend to forget that their main ministry is in their home, my father and many other pastors forgot that and many lives of pastors' sons and pastors' wives have been a disaster, what people see is just a picture mounted on the wall...

There is a book called "Skeletons in the Closet: Memories of a Pastor's Son" (Martin Garcia) it is a true story that shows that pastoral families are in crisis. Something must be done...

A lost Characteristic in men of God

A LOST CHARACTERISTIC IN MEN OF GOD

The place where I was living was the place where, like nowhere else, my supposed intelligence was praised. The problem came when I told them that I did not agree with practices they had or decisions they made that I considered incorrect. There I was no longer the super intelligent one. There the praises changed very quickly to "I am in charge here," "The one God called to this place was me," or "You are in my house and I am in charge here."

Thinking about these things I realized that this is not a problem only for those people, it is a human problem that is also strongly present in the churches and perhaps in the churches I have seen it worse than in the wicked.

The misunderstanding of identity in the church has brought proud men, people you will often hear saying "Here I am the man of God" "The Angel of the Church"

The Bible is not the authority in most churches, there are thoughts, preservation policies and ideas that ministers are not willing to change even if they are shown to be biblically wrong. It is a problem of pride usually masked by humility. The phrases "My God speaks to me and if he has not shown me that, it is because I am not wrong" (David had a heart in accordance with God's, he had committed a crime and had not realized it)

One of the lost characteristics of today's men of God is that of being correctable, the truth is I have seen very few, that is why when we see Marco Barrientos publicly recognize that he had been living and preaching an incorrect gospel, we must glorify God for it, Julio Melgar had to God put him in a horrible position for him to recognize his errors, and apparently for many the only way to humble themselves and be correctable is for God to put them in the position in which he put Julio Melga and that in the end he had to take him away.

It is sad that God has to go to such extremes to make men of God accept correction. A little over a year ago, God gave me a word for someone, a leader who was very grown up. The word was of life or death. I could not give it to him directly because he was a man, "a man of God" and he did not accept anything from others (like most pastors). I sent him the word through a blood sister of his. She told me: "I will try." Unfortunately, months went by and the man did not change his attitude. Then, on his deathbed, his sister told me that he repented and then died in peace.

Actually, it has happened to me twice and both times it was death. It is on the deathbed that people recognize their sins and repent.

In both cases, God's idea was not for them to die, but three of the biggest problems people have in accepting correction are:

1. WHEN THEY ARE SUCCESSFUL OR DOING VERY WELL IN THEIR MINISTRIES: When someone is doing well, it doesn't matter what you tell them from God, they are not going to accept anything because they are doing well! And people always assume that if they are doing well, it is because God approves of what they do. And the devil himself takes advantage of this and sends people to give them words of good. Something I learned this year is that the devil also gives words; you can see someone who is biblically wrong, who does injustice, deceit, evil, and you see him say: "God gave me a word that whoever messes with me, God will destroy him." It is very difficult for someone who is doing well in his ministry or who is free of illness to question whether he is doing something wrong. The time when I questioned my Christianity the most was the time when I was hungry and in need and I couldn't find the reason. There I questioned every detail of my spiritual life, I investigated every sin, but I'm sure that if everything had been going well for me I wouldn't have examined myself so exhaustively. And that is the first problem that men of God have when it comes to recognizing a mistake and accepting correction.

2. CONTEMPT FOR THE CLAY VESSEL: The second thing that is an impediment for these men of God to accept correction is the contempt for the vessel that God uses to give them correction. A person told me: "Until you have enough money I'm not going to pay attention to any correction you give me. Look at you, you don't even have enough to eat!" I have been told similar things many times, the man I spoke about a while ago and who died a year and a half ago thought the same thing because that was what he was taught, and it really is not a biblical teaching, but it is a teaching based on pride and he accepted it because of pride. Sometimes God does this to test the humility of these men, by sending people who "are nobodies and who have nothing to correct them" and they almost always fail.

3. IDENTITY. In the early 90s, it began in my country. I don't know if it began at the same time in the rest of Latin America, but in my country, at that time, a teaching began that seemed very good and correct, and I think it is. The problem is that man's pride distorted it. I am referring to the teaching on "The Identity of the Christian." We were taught that we are kings and priests, that we are seated together with Christ in heavenly places, in general the idea was correct, but then Cash Luna came and said that we are "Jehovah Junior"... and that is where the misrepresentations of men began, we were taught that we can give orders to the Angels, that the angels are at our service, when the Bible does not say that, it says that they are at the service of God to help us (Because all angels are spirits AT THE SERVICE OF GOD, sent to help those who are to receive salvation as an inheritance Hebrews 1:13,14)

This error in the understanding of identity has made many ministers believe that since they are pastors, angels of the church, priests, and they seek God, God cannot send someone to tell them anything. Dante Gebel said: "I must be so bad that God has to send someone else to tell me something that He himself can tell me." The question would be: "And who are you that God has to be forced to speak to you directly?" This teaching of identity at the service of human pride has made that in this era there exist the most arrogant pastors and ministers that the history of the true Christian church has had (obviously not counting the Catholic church)

Once, a person where I was living told me: "You came as a curse, because three have already died." The truth is that I don't kill anyone, God gives me the word, I say it because God has already made me experience what happens to me if I don't say it, then people don't accept it because they say "who are you to correct me if you have nothing and you are nobody" and then what God said would happen if they didn't accept it happens.

If I were to kill people... There are people who have tormented my life for decades, and there they are, fresh as a cucumber, there they continue to torment my life and not even God tells me like he did to Paul: "My grace is sufficient for you" nothing! He doesn't tell me anything! It's not me, I have no power at all! The problem is that after things happen because of people's pride, people need to look for someone to blame other than themselves. Others will say: "he has demons" as they said about Jesus, others instead of obeying and changing, take it as an attack... If they said Jesus was sent by the devil, we can hardly expect them to say less about those of us who notice the truth. The sad thing about these people is that most of them never examine themselves.

All the corrections that God has sent to Marcos Witt through Chuy Olivares are public knowledge, but Marcos has a successful career, a multimillion-dollar company and a lot of people who idolize him... Please!

I remember that one of the initial members of one of the largest ministries in my country told me, and that for many years it was the largest in the country. She told me that one day when they were booming, an old lady came saying that she had a word for the pastor and they took her out of the church. While they were taking her out, she began to say everything that God had told the pastor to say. They thought she was crazy, and when after that they began to grow like never before, they still remembered her as crazy. By the time they told me this story, more than ten years had passed and that church was the largest and most influential in the country. Today it is one of the most heretical churches and the pastor is known internationally as one of the most heretical pastors in Latin America.

God gave them plenty of time to mend their ways, but come on, an old Pentecostal lady!!! Who would take her seriously!!!!

It is time for us to go into our own temple and clean up before God comes and does it. It is time to recover that lost characteristic of humility, of accepting correction and of continually examining ourselves so that it seems that God approves of what we do. Sometimes it is not that God is approving of what we do but that we are in the period of His patience. I will never forget the story of a good friend who told me that her father was a great evangelist that God used in healings and miracles and this man was unfaithful to his wife and continued doing campaigns for years and the glory of God continued to manifest and people continued to fall to the floor when he touched them and in the campaigns great miracles continued to occur and this continued like this for a long time. The time of God's patience ended! And the guy (I can't call him a man of God) died on the stage in the middle of one of the campaigns of healings and miracles...

You can blame the messenger, you can try to kill the messenger, you can tell everyone that the messenger is what he is, a demon possessed...

Or you can accept the correction.

Sometimes people, especially pastors, are more concerned about what people think of them than what heaven thinks of them. In my personal case, I value a man more as a man of God when he accepts and recognizes his sins, that is why when Marcos Barrientos publicly recognized his error I loved him, when Alducin recognized his errors I valued him as a man of God, Julio Melgar hurt me that God had to take him to that extreme for him to recognize his errors, but at least he recognized them and that is important, because we are sure that he left with God.

How much more do we need!!!

How much more covering up sins? Lies upon lies, deceit upon deceit...!

My dream is to see my father doing the same and everyone in my family who is wrong doing the same. David ordered the killing of an innocent man, a man who loved David more than anyone else, and after that atrocious attitude, after a trial, God restored him.

We are not here to destroy anyone because if David sinned so horribly, it is evident that no one is exempt. So let us examine ourselves, let us humble ourselves, let us strip ourselves of all pride and let us accept all correction because we do not know how much patience God has left.

As I told my dad recently: "I have never, ever said anything to attack or destroy, nor is anything I publish with the intention of attacking or destroying, God has allowed me to see what others do not see and has put me in the worst position "poverty and without a great ministerial position and with everything to lose", which makes me look like the biggest idiot in the world because "who would think having everything to lose to say what they say" well the love of God and the same people who hate me for saying what others do not want to say... Maybe to test in the men and women of God that forgotten characteristic, to accept correction even if it is from a donkey (Numbers 22:21-33)" Maybe I am just a donkey.

Asperger's has made me very intelligent, God and the love for souls and for his church have made me a donkey. And do not think that I like it, so many fears, so many frustrations, humiliations, abuse, hunger, needs and the attack of those I love the most.

Someone told me a few years ago, "Aha, you've got competition, there's another guy on Facebook calling himself "Professor ____" posting harsh things like the ones you post." I told him, "It's not competition, we need a lot of people, but we'll see how long he'll put up with it when people he loves the most start attacking him like they did me!" He stopped posting a while ago... It's not easy being God's donkey, Balaam beat the donkey to a pulp...

I hope this donkey's message has reached people's hearts.

Kisses, I'm Profe Bubba, the Donkey! hahaha

Sola What?

"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge" (Hosea 4:6)

I am about to finish reading my 4th book on the history of the church, including the Catholic Church. And I think that adding the phrase "Catholic Church" is redundant because studying the history of the Christian Church without including the Catholic Church is impossible.

By knowing the history of the church, which curiously is also the history of the world, I was able to know with total certainty that the greatest atrocities that have been committed in the church, through the church and in the name of the church and of Christ have been because those people did not know or voluntarily did not hold on to the message of the scriptures, either out of pride, arrogance or for personal benefit.

I saw how the Catholic Church denied the knowledge of the Bible to the people and how they mercilessly murdered anyone who dared to translate it. They did not care that people knew the truth because they had proudly created a dominion based on their lies. Many Catholics, when studying the Bible, discovered the truth and tried to make changes from within and were minimized to the maximum.

Luther never intended to cause a division, he only tried to make them see reason, but we cared about them. They had created immense wealth and had created an empire where they dominated many countries and returning to the truth of the Bible would be losing all that.

It is curious that in order to maintain that empire based on lies and pride, they murdered many people in the attempt. The Inquisition, the Jesuits and many other groups murdered anyone who did not agree or confront their tyrannical government of the world.

But the truth is that in this article I am not here to criticize Catholics. My concern came when reading this last book on the history of the church I began to think about the Christian church of today, not the Catholic one. And the Christian church of today has become what it fought against for centuries.

Apostles functioning as Popes wanting to have dominion through manipulation and making people understand, as well as the Catholic Church, that because they are the apostles, only they have the revelation and that no one can question them.

The Bible says: "Search the Scriptures; for you think that in them you have eternal life, and they are the ones that testify of me;" (John 5:39)

However, the current church despises the study of the scriptures, and detests the "critical" and "unfiltered" study of the scriptures, that is to say that if it occurs to you to study the scriptures, that study must lead you to the same conclusions that your spiritual leaders have, even if they are far from the biblical truth, making these leaders equal to the Catholic Church.

And if so, you are branded as a heretic. Today the governance of the scriptures in the church is conditioned by whether it fits the "vision of the church."

Many groups put the fullness of the spirit above the study of the Bible.

Paul Washer says, "Do not talk to me about the fullness of the Spirit without the fullness of the word, for it is the same spirit who inspired the word."

The verse, "My people were destroyed for lack of knowledge" is not in the Bible by chance. God knows the importance of serious study of the scriptures.

Luther, Calvin, the Moravians, the Puritans, Wesley, were not persecuted for any wrongdoing. Their wrongdoing was studying the scriptures and staying true to them.

The same thing happens today. The fact that critical study of the scriptures is so denigrated and distorted today has the same purpose and the same background that the Catholic Church had when attacking anyone who seeks a serious study of the scriptures. Churches have beliefs that benefit them and they are not going to change them even if they are shown biblically to be wrong.

Just as in the Catholic Church they excommunicated, today in the Christian Church they also excommunicate. Many men of God in ancient times tried to reason with Catholic leaders pretending that the problem with them was that they could not see the truth, but the truth was that they DID NOT WANT to see the truth.

And all these things are happening in the Christian Church today. We can give a Pentecostal 100% biblical arguments as to why some of their most important beliefs are wrong, but they will not accept it, we can debate with them for hours, but they will not accept it, because just as in the Catholic Church and most of the Christian churches today the problem is not the biblical truth, the problem is a proud heart that is not willing to recognize its errors.

Many people are crying out for revival in their countries, but one thing I realized about the liberation of people from the domination of Catholic doctrines is that it all started with people seeking a relationship with God and having a serious study and not having fixed ideas about the scriptures.

Some may tell me about the Azusa Revival. Well Azusa is the greatest example that God left us of trying to do something by putting experiences first and leaving the scriptures second. I have read every book I could read about Azusa because I am addicted to reading about revivals and all the authors insist that "it should not have ended like this."

The apostle Paul praised people who submitted everything to the scriptures, (Acts 17:10,11) today they are considered rebels, worthy of being excommunicated.

And to top it off, today the Christian church has its own group of "inquisitors" (from the Inquisition) who are on the lookout for anything that is said or taught or published on the networks that is not in agreement "with the beliefs and policies of the company" to denounce and attack, it matters little if it is biblical or not.

Just as it happened in the Inquisition, biblical truth does not matter, it only matters if it is or is not in agreement with the policies of the institution and if it is not, the inquisitors do their job of denouncing and the "men of God" do their job of excommunicating.

I also want a revival, you cannot imagine how much I have read about revival, but a generation has to arise that does the same thing that the first ones who caused the first reform did:

1. Seek a Personal Relationship with God

2. Dedicate ourselves to the serious study of the scriptures without the filters of our organization.

3. Leave our comfort zone.

John Huss was burned at the stake for claiming that the Bible is the only and highest authority in all areas of the church. You can't imagine how many times the current church has done the same.

Someone said that history is written so that it doesn't repeat itself, in the case of the church, it has repeated itself, the church became what it confronted for so many centuries.

THE 5 PRINCIPLES OF THE REFORMATION WERE:

Only Scripture (Has all authority)

Only by faith does God save()

Only by grace

Only Christ saves

Only to God the glory

It is surprising and horrifying that today preaching these truths is a scandal and causes the same consequences.

I hope that just as history has repeated itself, the Luthers, the Wesleys, the Huss, the Wycliffes, the Calvins, the Zwingli will also reappear...

Confronting with all simplicity and humility, and above all with the example that we ourselves live the scriptures, because today many self-proclaimed reformers have arisen (the first reformers never called themselves reformers, people saw their works and began to call them reformers)

These current "reformers" mostly only have knowledge without testimony of life, without piety and without a life of communion with God.

Your knowledge is useless if you ignore the needy, your knowledge is useless if it is not accompanied by good works. Salvation is only by faith, but it is manifested that you are saved by works. (Ephesians 2:8-10, Philippians 2:13, James 2:14-26, (2 Corinthians 2:15

Yes, the church needs a reform, the church needs to return to the healthy gospel, to the primitive gospel, but those who promote it must be people who must be living it.

One of my favorite phrases is "If your knowledge has not led you to be more passionate about God, to seek Him more and to put into practice the fruits of your salvation, you are just another hypocritical Pharisee"

Kisses I am El Profe Bubba.

AN INTERESTING REFLECTION ON KEEPING UP

 AN INTERESTING REFLECTION ON KEEPING UP

(I know that people today don't like to read, but I think that this reading can be a blessing to them, and yes, it is a Christian thing)

A few years ago, when I didn't even have enough to eat (I don't have any right now, but at least I'm eating) with my intention of increasing my faith, I said to myself: "I'm going to create a Facebook page where I only post recipes that I like, so that when I'm financially well off, I can eat like crazy everything that I post there and so that people who want to show me affection with some food can go there and see what I like."

I named it the obvious "Bubba's Favorite Recipes" then I stopped posting, since the supply wasn't coming and posting recipes there rather depressed me. Then when things got a little better where I was, I had already lost the desire to post there.

When I came back here and saw that many recipes for Chinese and Japanese food were appearing on Instagram, I said to myself, "come on, let's get back to the recipe page so I have somewhere to post these things" and I started posting.

These days I saw that the page had like 6000 subscribers and like 10 thousand interactions and I said: "since I can't find a job I should monetize the page even though I really didn't create it for that"

Today, in the midst of the depression of going out and not finding a job, I said to myself "Definitely, I'm going to look for a way to monetize that" I searched on the internet and found how to do it, it seemed slow and long term, but I vented my frustration with something.

But what I want to talk about and where I want to get to is what happened to me this afternoon. This afternoon it began to cross my mind that, since I was monetizing that, the idea was to reach more people so I should "expand my way of thinking" and no longer publish only recipes that I like, because then I would be limiting the reach and the profit a lot and that in fact is not much anymore.

Thinking and analyzing myself led me to think about the churches, in the times of need in which we are living, my country is in a very strange process where the government is and is not, no employment is found and we are in the middle of a "silent" anxiety.

Then I saw some news that many churches in the United States had to close because due to inflation the income was not enough to even pay rent and I began to think about what could be going on in the heads of many pastors, especially those who are older and/or do not have secondary incomes.

"What if we stop being so rigid?" "What if we look for ways to get more people to come or at least take care of the ones we have so they don't leave us?"

Things like "For years we have been very rigid saying that in the early church even those who served at the tables were anointed, but if we don't put people to work they can leave because it is well known that people like to be taken into account"

"What do the people we have here like? Do they like events, activities?" "Are they mostly Pentecostal or free?" "Do they like to celebrate Christmas or not?" "Do they like charisma or are they rather quiet?"

"We have to know what we have here to give them what they want" (I just remembered a very interesting book I read a few years ago called "Give Them What They Want" I'm not going to name the author or anything but the book explained how to keep people in the church happy)

Yes, sometimes it's easy to point the finger, but being in that situation is not easy. I was in that situation, the group I went to had very crazy beliefs and I was at the crossroads of whether to tell them the truth with the possibility of making them enemies and making them leave or give them what they liked and keep them there and even increase their numbers (because they were tremendous at attracting people).

I didn't have a job, my wife had brain problems and heart problems, the medications were horribly expensive...

In the end I made the biblically correct decision, and no, no angels or crows came to feed me as they might preach there that if you do the right thing God will reward you. Nor did God give me three times as much when those people left. The problem with these sermons, which are more emotional than biblical, is that they don't say that yes, God will reward you, but it could be 10, 20, 30 years later, or that your reward is simply not denying the gospel or selling the truth or diluting it.

I saw people who told me: "Tell them things little by little so that the people don't leave you" and those people who advised me like that, they ended up diluting the gospel in their little by little way to keep the people, so I didn't find the little by little thing funny and I said it directly: "what they are doing is not biblical, nor this nor this" and I put up with the consequences.

Sometimes, some people in the midst of difficult times and not knowing what to do use a strategy that is like adding a little water to milk, it is diluted, but it still has the taste, smell and color of milk and that is how many sometimes do with the gospel, supported by the fact that we find ourselves in the middle of a church that is not dedicated to the serious study of the Bible. And everyone is happy, the pastors keep the people and the church is happy.

In my case we went hungry for several years, plus the terribly horrible consequences of my wife not having medicine. And a lot of people still make fun of me for failing as a pastor. Well, after the passage of time they have been fewer, but there are still people who treat me as "The failure"

I praise those brothers in the United States who preferred to close the churches rather than dilute the gospel, but it is not an easy decision and I, who went through a horrendous situation, know what it is and I know that those people deserve double honor, although like me, perhaps many will end up calling them failures.

I pray to God that in this time I can give strength and integrity to every pastor in the world so that in this difficult time that shakes the world they can stay focused on the Bible and not deny or dilute the biblical truth even when that means going through all kinds of tribulations.

My intention with this publication is not to point or shoot but to reflect, nor am I saying that we must remain silent with those who sell the gospel to keep people and avoid suffering. But it is not easy. And we must have double honor for those people who remain.

Kisses and a big hug,

I am Profe Bubba.