John Shrader in Zambia Pt 5: Witnessing, Weeping & Wondering

[KnittingOwl]

I hope everything goes well for Esther and the pregnancy. I can't imagine how John would react if something happened to her. 

[nastyhobbitses]

I hope everything goes well for Esther and the pregnancy. I can't imagine how John would react if something happened to her. 

Claim that she was a martyr for dying in childbirth and then set about finding a new brood mare while underpaying a Zambian woman to watch the kids?

Sorry, I'm cynical.

[Crocoduck]

Taking a deep breath

Feel better now.

I've made it through the "Burden to Burundi" thread, at the end of which the Schraders leave for Zambia. I'm just...

You all warned me you were not exaggerating this man's callous disregard for his family! YOU WARNED ME!!!!!

I did become acquainted with Sharon Bailgoat, so AMEN!

[Palimpsest]

I really miss Sharon Bailgoat.  I think we should go back to calling John "the Supreme Butthole of the Universe™. "

In the close horserace between Rea and Shrader, I think John is still in the lead by a nose even minus the plane.  He has a church with a roof while Rea promised to start up a Christian radio station not just print toilet paper tracts.

[Aine]

So I just commented on a photo of the famous plane and asked John 'Whatever happened to the plane?'...he promptly 'liked' my comment and then unfriended me. 

[Handmaiden of Dog]

I've forgotten the details about the purchase of the plane but is it at all possible that he lost or embezzled the money and a plane never existed?  It is the strangest detail of his story, that he spent so much money on flying lessons and a plane but then abruptly stopped talking about it (after mentioning he "lost the key.")  I can't understand why anyone would give him a dime more until he produced evidence that a plane really existed and he was capable of flying it.

[Aine]

He (or his mysterious wealthy donor who gave him the money) spent $15,000 on the plane plus the cost of the flying lessons. The photo I commented on today has this whole story about how God put the plane in their path with all these 'coincidences'/divine intervention blah blah. He's either embezzled the money or fallen for a scam- because it was totally believable he would get a plane supposedly worth $100,000 with only 100 flying hours for $15,000- and he's too ashamed to admit it.

I've been following him on FB for years, I think before he ever got his own thread here, and have been his 'friend' for that long for stalking purposes. I'm kind of annoyed I got unfriended for that! Ha. But it was weird behavior to 'like' my comment and then promptly unfriend me. It makes me wonder what the hell he is hiding. That really should be a simple answer for an honest forthright man of God. 

[Palimpsest]

I think it is possible that the plane was all a figment of flyboy's imagination.  Otherwise I hope he has explained the mystery to the person who paid for it in the first place.  He wants the rest of us to forget about it obviously.

His latest idiocies on Facebook include linking to a post by a pastor criticizing missionaries on deputation for their grifting tactics.  Like John isn't a moochinary extraordinaire himself!

John is scared of spiders (avoid his latest photos if you are too.)  Esther had to kill one for him (granted it was big.)  Stop with the alliteration and hyperbole, John. "Agressive [sic] Arachnid Attack Almost ends in my Asphyxiation" indeed.  And it is spelled arachnophobia.

[SledCat]

Hi all. Long time lurker, first time poster. I also grew up IFB in Australia in the late 80s/early 90s. The Shrader story fascinates me as well, partially because I also can’t understand the support he is apparently getting from some IFB churches, unless as other posters have mentioned, the IFB landscape has changed a lot over the years.

The underlying message was all about emphasizing good stewardship when I went to church as a kid. At one point, I believe our American pastor (who was a “missionary” himself: not a bad gig, being a missionary in Australia ) had a part-time day job to supplement the small wage the church paid him, until there was enough in the budget to support his full-time salary.

Our church also supported a few missionaries overseas. Like Shrader, many of these missionaries did not really seem to have any special skills, and “sharing the right kind of gospel” was always paramount.  

But, I believe if a John Shrader type had shown up to my IFB church,  if he was lucky, he may have received a potluck dinner,  a small love offering, and then a heaping of whispered gossip thinly veiled as “a prayer request” during the following Wednesday night prayer service.

[Evangeline]

I saw a picture of that thing. I would have been cowering in the corner with John. Seriously though, I guess Esther has to do everything! Birth countless babies, homeschool, live in a camper, put up with John's manic-depression, kill spiders that are bigger than some small dogs. She's either the most miserable person alive or the biggest bad-ass ever.

[Mitz_]

Aine, John answered your question with " the missionary that has it has been out of the country because of illness in his family". Two other people replied with a "praying" comment and one person has asked a detailed question about the plane. He doesn't understand why an absent missionary would prevent the plane from being used cuz it wasn't bought for the use of one unnamed person, plane is in Zambia and what is the whole story maybe we can help. Wow.

i can't believe he just unfriended you for asking. He is a real snake. Can't understand why people don't insist on answers about that plane. Did he ever fly it? Are there any pictures of him or Rea with that plane? John once said that it was in a hanger 50 miles away but another missionary had the key. 

The plane was purchased after a donor gave the bulk of the amount needed for the plane but a lot of people had given money for flying lessons and toward the purchase of the plane so there isn't just one donor.  I think he got screwed and doesn't want to talk about it. I'm really curious to know if he was photographed with the plane though.

 

[Palimpsest]

Hi all. Long time lurker, first time poster. I also grew up IFB in Australia in the late 80s/early 90s. The Shrader story fascinates me as well, partially because I also can’t understand the support he is apparently getting from some IFB churches, unless as other posters have mentioned, the IFB landscape has changed a lot over the years.

The underlying message was all about emphasizing good stewardship when I went to church as a kid. At one point, I believe our American pastor (who was a “missionary” himself: not a bad gig, being a missionary in Australia ) had a part-time day job to supplement the small wage the church paid him, until there was enough in the budget to support his full-time salary.

Our church also supported a few missionaries overseas. Like Shrader, many of these missionaries did not really seem to have any special skills, and “sharing the right kind of gospel” was always paramount.  

But, I believe if a John Shrader type had shown up to my IFB church,  if he was lucky, he may have received a potluck dinner,  a small love offering, and then a heaping of whispered gossip thinly veiled as “a prayer request” during the following Wednesday night prayer service.

Welcome!  Not a bad gig at all being a missionary in Australia.  Do tell us more.

I admit that I enjoy the IFB missionaries to Scotland who seem to be on an extended tourist trip to most of the British Isles.  They are witnessing from John O'Groats to Lands End.  Literally. 

The bolded made me howl with laughter.

Aine, John answered your question with " the missionary that has it has been out of the country because of illness in his family". Two other people replied with a "praying" comment and one person has asked a detailed question about the plane. He doesn't understand why an absent missionary would prevent the plane from being used cuz it wasn't bought for the use of one unnamed person, plane is in Zambia and what is the whole story maybe we can help. Wow.

i can't believe he just unfriended you for asking. He is a real snake. Can't understand why people don't insist on answers about that plane. Did he ever fly it? Are there any pictures of him or Rea with that plane? John once said that it was in a hanger 50 miles away but another missionary had the key. 

The plane was purchased after a donor gave the bulk of the amount needed for the plane but a lot of people had given money for flying lessons and toward the purchase of the plane so there isn't just one donor.  I think he got screwed and doesn't want to talk about it. I'm really curious to know if he was photographed with the plane though.

John bought the plane sight unseen with, if he is to be believed, money from a single donor.  It was a miracle, I tell you.  I don't think he ever posted a photo of the plane irself  - just of similar planes.  He claimed that he bought it from a missionary who was returning to the states.  Before he knew how to fly it.  And people wonder why we question John's judgment!

He apparently got his flying lessons free from a retired missionary pilot, but donors paid for his airtime, airport fees (and so on) and to support his family for another 6 months or so while he learned to fly.

[formergothardite]

I really miss Sharon Bailgoat.  I think we should go back to calling John "the Supreme Butthole of the Universe™. "

In the close horserace between Rea and Shrader, I think John is still in the lead by a nose even minus the plane.  He has a church with a roof while Rea promised to start up a Christian radio station not just print toilet paper tracts.

I didn't realize Rea had promised a radio station. He needs to get on the ball with that.   I'm on the fence about giving John any points for building a church because it goes against his original plans. Originally he claimed the Zambians had to build their own buildings and he wasn't going to give them a dime to do so. When it became clear nobody in Zambia wanted to build John a church he had to twist himself into pretzels and have a "miracle"(he loses points with me here because he started exploiting his sister's death) to explain why it is okay for him to build a church in Zambia. 

He did get a piano sent to him Zambia, so he gets some credit there.

The plane is as weird of a story as Jill Rod's mysterious house. He spent months posting non-stop about that damn plane and how he needed flying lessons to use it and yet now he basically tries to pretend it never existed. How is no one but us questioning this?! 

[Trynn]

Are he and his family still sick?

[Palimpsest]

Are he and his family still sick?

We have to assume they have recovered.  John hasn't deigned to update but he has not  asked for prayers for his sick children or wife recently.

And Esther was well enough to squash an ENORMOUS spider for John.  She is a woman of great fortitude.

 

[SledCat]

 

Thanks for the welcome, Palimpsest! The IFB churches in my area were all pretty inter-connected. I wish I could find a reference to it on the internet, but one of these churches ended up on the local news once referred to as a possible "cult". They had put a church member under "church discipline", and it somehow ended up as a headline. 

One of the local IFB churches had an A.C.E school attached to it for a while, I am not sure if it's still there. While I went to a small, Christian private school I am very grateful my parents didn't get caught up with the A.C.E system. A couple of my friends/acquaintances did end up there, and their education suffered badly as a result.


As far as I recollect all of the pastors were originally from the US, which I assume is the norm. Some would remain in the church they "planted" for many years.  Seemed like a sweet deal to me. They weren't living large by any stretch (most of these churches were small. Averaging around 100-150 people on a good day), but living in nice suburban areas in Australia seems like a very comfortable existence. Every few years, they would return to the US and give presentations to their supporting churches (that always struck me as an all expenses paid vacation ).  


A pretty classic IFB childhood though, I think: Wednesday night prayer service, Friday night AWANA (and then youth group when we aged out of that); Sunday School followed by Sunday morning Service; followed by Choir Practice and Evening Service (evening service might be devoted to a special seminar or guest speaker like Ariel Ministries; or the Creation Science stuff. Ken Ham was big). Saturday might have the occasional handing out of Chick tracts or some other type of tract in the neighborhood, or volunteering for some other church activity. It amazes me looking back how much of a time sap it all was.

[slickcat79]

I think it is possible that the plane was all a figment of flyboy's imagination.  Otherwise I hope he has explained the mystery to the person who paid for it in the first place.  He wants the rest of us to forget about it obviously.

His latest idiocies on Facebook include linking to a post by a pastor criticizing missionaries on deputation for their grifting tactics.  Like John isn't a moochinary extraordinaire himself!

John is scared of spiders (avoid his latest photos if you are too.)  Esther had to kill one for him (granted it was big.)  Stop with the alliteration and hyperbole, John. "Agressive [sic] Arachnid Attack Almost ends in my Asphyxiation" indeed.  And it is spelled arachnophobia.

See, that makes it sound like he got bitten and had an allergic reaction, which was my first thought when I saw the entry. I would freak the fuck out over spiders that size too, but it's pretty sad that Esther and Timothy(?) had to go kill them because the asshole who dragged his family over there is too chicken to do it.

Aine, John answered your question with " the missionary that has it has been out of the country because of illness in his family". Two other people replied with a "praying" comment and one person has asked a detailed question about the plane. He doesn't understand why an absent missionary would prevent the plane from being used cuz it wasn't bought for the use of one unnamed person, plane is in Zambia and what is the whole story maybe we can help. Wow.

i can't believe he just unfriended you for asking. He is a real snake. Can't understand why people don't insist on answers about that plane. Did he ever fly it? Are there any pictures of him or Rea with that plane? John once said that it was in a hanger 50 miles away but another missionary had the key. 

The plane was purchased after a donor gave the bulk of the amount needed for the plane but a lot of people had given money for flying lessons and toward the purchase of the plane so there isn't just one donor.  I think he got screwed and doesn't want to talk about it. I'm really curious to know if he was photographed with the plane though.

 

When I saw the plane pop up on FB again, I thought he was actually finally going to say something about it...but no, just a snarker trying to get more information. I don't think there are any pics of John or anyone else with the plane. I don't remember seeing them myself, or seeing them discussed on here, and that would have been a major topic of conversation.

So Rea has updated his Team Zambia page to share how life is going in Zambia. He has accomplished more in a couple of months than John has in a year. I bet John is fuming. Rea hasn't been plagued with the container problems that John had. His container arrived in perfect shape and in a couple weeks he will be able to start printing things nobody in Zambia really wants. He has accumulated a handful of converts and started a Bible study. His Chinese tires are giving him trouble, but other than that things are running smoothly in the Rea Mission Camp. 

So far in the Zambia Missionary Printing Wars Rea is winning. John can get back in the lead if he produces the plane and starts flying to the bush to save souls. Come on John! You can do it! We all want to know what happened to that plane. 

Yeah...reading Rea's new prayer letter, he'll probably have as much accomplished by the end of the year as Shrader, and Shrader's been there over a year longer.

Speaking of things that never showed up, do we know if John ever got that "blessing barrel" that they were going to send him last year? Seems like I remember seeing a bike and some other presents for the kids and stuff.

[KnittingOwl]

Claim that she was a martyr for dying in childbirth and then set about finding a new brood mare while underpaying a Zambian woman to watch the kids?

Sorry, I'm cynical.

It might be cynical, but you're probably right. I can imagine John leaving the kids in Zambia while he goes back to the US to find his next wife. 

[Curious]

<snip> I have started thinking that maybe certain churches and people are told what they are needing / wanting to hear.

I have wondered for a while if part of the reason John got so much support initially and why he eventually lost the sending church is because he changed up his spiel for whatever church he happened to be speaking to.

Since no one seemed to do much research on him prior to committing funds, it's possible that he told each church what they wanted to hear to get the funds and they reality set in (for the church) once he was in the mission field and acting differently than he preached to them.

I'm sorry to hear Esther is pregnant again.  I hope she, the baby and all the kids stay healthy. 

[Trynn]

We have to assume they have recovered.  John hasn't deigned to update but he has not  asked for prayers for his sick children or wife recently.

And Esther was well enough to squash an ENORMOUS spider for John.  She is a woman of great fortitude.

 

That's what I'm hoping. Asshat. No one cares about your stupid spider, we want to know the welfare of your wife and children!

[formergothardite]

I have wondered for a while if part of the reason John got so much support initially and why he eventually lost the sending church is because he changed up his spiel for whatever church he happened to be speaking to.

Since no one seemed to do much research on him prior to committing funds, it's possible that he told each church what they wanted to hear to get the funds and they reality set in (for the church) once he was in the mission field and acting differently than he preached to them.

I'm sorry to hear Esther is pregnant again.  I hope she, the baby and all the kids stay healthy. 

 

Could explain the split with David Rea too. They didn't seem to got to a lot of churches together and he might have not known what John was telling people. To us John seems like a smug asshole, but I bet he knows how to read people and how to tell them exactly what they want to hear. And what they wanted to hear might have been totally different than what John had agreed to do with Rea and what he actually did when he got to Zambia. 

[Gimme a Free RV]

John just makes my stomach hurt with his avoidance of truth, his hypocrisy, his self-righteousness, his condescending behavior and attitudes, his disregard for his wife's reproductive system, his selfishness, his scoundrel-like grin, his slicked-over hair, his bragging, and I could go on and on.  If John were responsible to a missions organization, he would be called out and/or disciplined.

The expensive vehicle he had to have to spread the gospel:  how many people have been saved through its use?

The tracts he prints with the machinery he has:  how many people have been saved through these?

The kitchen appliances (fridge, freezer) he has to have:  how many Zambians have been fed food from these?

The airplane and flying lessons:...nevermind.

The piano: How many salvations through the playing of this instrument, John?

The two accordions:  same question as above.

The refusal to seek medical help:  how many doctors has this taken out of your capacity to witness to them?

The Bible display case:  thousands have come to know the Lord through this, haven't they?

The fake accent:  Zambians have repented and become saved because they could better understand the gospel, right?

 

By the way, John, when was the last time you had contact with your niece?  You remember, the daughter your sister left behind?   

 

[ILoveJellybeans]

Ha, I cant believe a manly headship, leader of the house, protector of the wife and kids etc. has to get his submissive little headship to squish a spider for him

[Palimpsest]

Could explain the split with David Rea too. They didn't seem to got to a lot of churches together and he might have not known what John was telling people. To us John seems like a smug asshole, but I bet he knows how to read people and how to tell them exactly what they want to hear. And what they wanted to hear might have been totally different than what John had agreed to do with Rea and what he actually did when he got to Zambia. 

Yes, Rea seems to have done his deputation in different areas to John, although they were both in TX at some points.

I was just looking over Rea's TeamZambia page.  He's done quite a bit of editing to get rid of embarrassing stuff himself.  I can't find the reference to his taking over the radio station, for example.  That was one of his biggest selling points in the past.  He also got rid of the hilarious shopping list where he got all his percentages wrong! I still get the feeling that both Rea and Shrader were supposed to go to Kafulafuta but some doctrinal difference scotched the plan.

David's "Culture Shock" entries are expanded now (and the latest entries are amusing).  Building churches is still evil - see Shrader!  He's also put all his old prayer letters in the archive so the grandiose Burundi plans are still preserved.

I'm sure whenever Rea and Shrader are asked about Burundi they both say: "That trip failed because he was possessed by Satan and it wasn't my fault!"

[formergothardite]

So John had some sort of youth activity with pizza and ice cream and there was a good turnout. The time John bragged about his huge attendance on a Sunday was also the Sunday he provided food. John, of course, thinks it is because he has such a great ministry, I suspect that it is the free food. 

John has a video of him singing with the youth. Looking at that video it is so clear that John doesn't want to blend in and dress like the people he is "ministering" to, he wants to stand out. Nobody else is dressed in those shirts John is wearing, they are all dressed in clothes that wouldn't be out of place here in America. I think John is playing dress up so that people will notice him.