Bro Gary Hawkins 23: Give Us the History

[thoughtful]

Continuing his 8/20 evening message, Dr. Davis zooms along talking about the meaning of Easter and Palm Sunday, and reading Luke 19:28-44 at breakneck speed, throwing in some explanations and a detour to a verse from John (because Luke doesn't mention the palms).

He makes them read the last bit of verse 44:

Quote

because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation.

Then he says his subject is "When God Comes to Visit, you could also call this How to Recognize and Redeem the Opportunities of Life."

Snappy titles, Bro.

He says he wants to ask and answer three questions:

Spoiler

Answer to number one is Jerusalem. He makes them read the word off of a slide, and yaks for a long time about Jerusalem, including the "fact" that, since there was probably a settlement there 5000 years old, it is "almost as old as the world."

Answer to number two -   And his ramblings about this are so long that I have put them under a spoiler.

Spoiler

After a long dissertation about the word time, and how it is used in the bible. He makes a point of the two different Greek words used for "time" in the bible, and how the one meaning a limited time of opportunity is the one used here. Davis is treading on dangerous ground here - them IFBers don't cotton to no original Greek mess - they want their perspired - er, inspired KJB!

Spoiler

He continues to refer back to the Greek word kairos for the rest of the message.

He blabs about seasons of life, and opportunities, and how God had each of us be born for a particular set of life opportunities. He takes a a long detour through his wife's garden and how her zucchini died because she planted it too late, and how missionaries should be sent where the "harvest is ripe."

"Forty years ago we had a missionary that we sent to France. I heard that he's just now coming back home from France. And when he leaves, there will be nothing there. No church."

France, it seems is "not a ripe harvest field like Honduras is." He goes off on a tangent about a missionary who has started churches in Honduras and Nicaragua.

The "ripe for harvest" shit makes my blood boil. It's pretty much synonymous with "poverty-stricken and desperate for any comfort."  In fact, Davis does the prettified, bible-quoting version of saying the quiet part out loud - he says you can tell the richest harvest fields by thinking of the parable of the sower.

"Jesus said, 'The cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches choked the word.' It happens in America."

And he goes on to talk about how Liberia and Nigeria are ripe for harvest, then back to Honduras.  He says he preached there on short notice, and, within 30 minutes of word going out that there was a guest preacher, the church was full. "There's no television, no Internet, no cellphones - cares of this world, deceitfulness of riches. They just got electricity in that village. They're hungry."

He leaves his White Savior detour as fast as he started it, and quotes from the bible again:

Quote

Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

And again, he talks about the two Greek words used for evil. Satan will see your opportunities coming, and work to prevent your doing what God wants.

He rattles off the biblical biography of Abraham, to point out that only the major events of his life are in the bible. He says he gave this talk at "the ladies prison" a few weeks ago, and told them "Ladies, you need to understand something. Those fences out there, that barbed wire up there, can not stop the hand of God from giving you seasons of opportunity."

Back to Satan - here's what he will do to prevent you from taking the opportunities God offers:

Spoiler

The sound goes weird again, but I manage to catch that he illustrates the idea of Satan distracting us from God's plan by telling a story about a preacher's daughter who met the perfect man when she was 29. Problem was, "she had tired of waiting and met and married a divorced man three years earlier. After all, at age 26, how could she hope for any other opportunities?"

To be fair, his tone of voice indicates that he is indicating how she felt, not that he thinks 26 is an old maid. He goes on to make sure they know God, in his mercy, forgives divorce.

"But this single godly young lady, God's will clearly for her would have been for her to wait and marry a single godly young man, she was offered a substitute counterfeit kairos, took it, and three years later was tryin' to figure out 'Whoa! What kind of mess did I get myself into?'"

He talks about how to tell a real kairos from a fake one.

Spoiler

More later. I have a kairos to teach a piano lesson, and I'm taking a chance that it is not from Satan.

Edited September 13, 2023 by thoughtful
riffles

[Xan]

Bad luck there, @thoughtful -- the King James Bible doesn't mention the piano.  Could you, by any chance, give horn or harp lessons just to be sure that Satan isn't up to his old kairos switching tricks?

[Ozlsn]

On 9/10/2023 at 12:31 AM, thoughtful said:

Cranky baby Gary is revving up his Covid conspiracy engine again.

With the LORD help you be taken out because there was men and women that fault for our country die! You remember that, dammit!

 

I love how masks are the worst thing that ever happened or that they now imagine could happen to them. Please Gary, feel free to get infected, and definitely try horse antiparasite tablets before seeking medical attention.

2 hours ago, thoughtful said:

yaks for a long time about Jerusalem, including the "fact" that, since there was probably a settlement there 5000 years old, it is "almost as old as the world."

Is it wrong that I'm glad he said almost? This bunch I half expect to say it's as old as the world (on the eighth day...). As it is, "almost" is good - give or take a couple of billion years of course.

These tiny churches are more cult of personality than anything else. The personalities are so abrasive they can't grow more, fortunately. And then they throw children, wtelf was that?

[thoughtful]

4 hours ago, Xan said:

Bad luck there, @thoughtful -- the King James Bible doesn't mention the piano.  Could you, by any chance, give horn or harp lessons just to be sure that Satan isn't up to his old kairos switching tricks?

I do have a horn (well, a bugle) and a small harp. But this kid insisted on a piano lesson. If Satan sent her, it's to lull me into thinking I am a fabulous teacher, because she is such a great student.

2 hours ago, Ozlsn said:

Is it wrong that I'm glad he said almost? This bunch I half expect to say it's as old as the world (on the eighth day...)

Most of them say the world is 6000 years old, and I've heard a few say anything from 8000 to 10,000 more recently. I suspect he had one of those figures in mind when he said almost. 

So, where were we? Oh, yes, still working on question two - when was the time, and how to tell Satan's opportunities from God's. Believe it or not, he still has a lot to say, so everything except his finally finishing the story of the ringing phone is under a spoiler.

Spoiler

  "You may think that working serving booze in a tavern is a wonderful opportunity, gonna let you make a lot of money."

Hey, Dr. Davis:

Spoiler

But of course, it isn't godly, so it's not a real kairos.

How about if you can turn water into wine?

He reviews the other way to tell if a kairos is OK and not satanic -  godly counsel, from pastors, parents.

"Now, let me pull out something very significant here. Listen to this next statement very carefully. The. Ultimate grief. Expressed by the son of God while he was here on this earth was because. A kairos. Was not redeemed. Only twice in the gospels do we read that Jesus wept. "

Again, he makes distinction between two Greek words for weeping. The one used when Lazarus died meant simple weeping, the one used in Luke 19:41, when Jesus wept over the city, means "extreeeem grief, extreeeeem agony and brokenness."

He says it's the same word used when parents grieve over children, and starts talking about a video he'd seen several years ago and hasn't been able to find since, about compassion failure among doctors. He says they were interviewing a "lady medical doctor in a country in Africa." She said that, in America, a doctor may have to tell parents their child is dying every few months, but she had to do it every few days. She broke down and had to go back to Europe and recuperate from hearing the sound the mothers made when told their child had died.

That is the cry Jesus made when he came to Jerusalem. They were about to reject "the greatest Kairos of all human history. Now, there's a huge mystery here that I don't understand that I don't think anybody understands it I don't think it can be understood. We just have to wait until we get to heaven and God explain it to us. I'm talking about that though there were may people out there putting the palm leaves and their arly* garments down and welcoming Jesus as king, the leaders of the Jews and most others were not accepting him. They rejected him as king."

* I have no idea what word this was supposed to be.

He rattles of the rest of the events of that week, per the bible, and says the lesson is that "we can mess up big time, and God is never done as long as we're alive. God can take the ashes of whatever your failure is and give birth to something even more magnificent than you ever dreamed if you let him. How do you reconcile those two thoughts? Ah really don't get it. But anyway who is being visited? Jerusalem and all the Jews what was the time it was their greatest opportunity number three what was the visitation?"

Oh, we're back to his first three questions. He says the visitation was the greatest ever offered, and goes on about what the Jews could have had if they accepted Jesus, and how heartbroken he was that they wouldn't (because he could see into the future, of course).

After reading this slide:

Spoiler

he goes on to tell them that, in 66 BCE (well, he says AD, of course), Titus was sent to conquer Jerusalem, which he describes in gory detail, and makes sure they know it's because the Jews rejected their "visitation."

He advises them to make sure they watch for their visitations, especially since one of them may be their last chance.

He says the next part is his favorite part of the talk, and yells out a dramatic telling of the story of blind Bartimaeus not missing his kairos (I bet Gary loved that - he'd just used that story that morning). He says that the beggar and Jesus had a kairos at the same time, and that's why "an explosion of the miraculous" took place.

Spoiler

He rhythmically chants out a list of life events most of us have gone through, and how they were all visits from God, and tells a story from his own childhood, showing a picture of himself as a child:

Spoiler

Is it me, or does he look really smug, even at 12?

He was on what he refers to as a "life raft," (he says kids were renting them for fun, so he did, too, even though he didn't know how to swim), in the ocean near Myrtle Beach. He went out too far - he says it was 100 yards or more. He yelled for help, and nobody was near enough to hear him. He decided to step off of the raft, and "I went alllllll the way under. And it was like a hand pushed me forward, and at the end of my toes I felt dirt."

He says he kept taking steps, and, after a few, his head was above water. He is alive to day because he "had a visit."

I think that was a visit from the tide and waves, not Jesus, but what do I know?

He tells another story about being 16 and on a motorcycle and how a visit from Jesus saved him then. He had a heart attack in 2011, admits he was too stubborn to go to the ER but called his doctor and asked to be seen instead. The doctor, who was about to go home, waited in his office for the hour and a half it took Davis to get there, did an EKG and sent him right to the hospital. Davis credits Jesus with keeping the doctor in his office to wait for him, I guess.

At least he says that, whenever he sees this doctor, he says "There's the doctor that saved my life." I don't know if also mentions Jesus to the doctor.

Six years ago he had prostate cancer (he says it was stage four) and no money to have the surgery - people gave the money and God saved his life.

And finally, he says, "Ken Gaub," and after a brief detour to  say he forgot to tell them about the time he almost crashed an airplane, finishes the rest of the story. "Ken Gaub just answered the telephone, the voice on the other end of the line said 'Yes operator, that's him, that's Ken Gaub' He just answered this pay phone, he just walkin' bah, they just took off the interstate t'rest. He said (Davis reads from the book, very fast):
 

Quote

Ah listened, dumbfounded, a stranger, a strange voice identify herself.
"I'm Millie, from Harrisburg Pennsylvania. You don't know me, Mr. Gaub, but I'm desperate, please help me."
"What can I do for you?" 
She began weeping. Finally, she regained control and continued.
"Ah was about to commit suicide. I just finished writing the note when I began to pray and tell God I really didn't want to do it. Then I remembered hearing you preach and I thought if I could just talk to you, you could help me. I knew that was impossible. I didn't know how to reach you, I didn't know how anyone could help me find you. Then some numbers came in my mind. And I just scribbled those numbers down. I looked at 'em and thought, wouldn't it be wonderful if I had a miracle from God and he's giving me Ken's phone number? I decided to try calling it. I can't believe I'm talking to you. Are you in your office in California?"
"Lady, I don't have an office in California - my office is in Washington."
"Really? Then where are you?"
"Don't you know?" I said. "You made the call."
She said, "I don't even know what area code I called. I just dialed the number that I wrote down on this paper."
"Ma'am you won't believe this - I'm in a phone booth in Dayton, Ohio."
"Really?" she said. "What are you doing there?"
And I kidded her and said, "Well, I'm answering the phone. It was ringing when, ah walked bah so I answered it."

Knowing this encounter could only have been arranged by God ah began to counsel her as she told me of her despair and frustration the presence of the holy spirit flooded the phone booth give me words of wisdom beyond my ability. Moments later she prayed the sinner's prayer and met Jesus, who would lead her out of her situation into a new life.

I walked away from that phone booth with an electrifying sense of my heavenly father's concern for each of us. What were the astronomical odds of this happening? Millions of phones! Innumerable combinations of numbers! Only an all-knowing God could have caused that lady to call that number in that phone booth at that moment in tahm as ah was walking by, forgetting my melancholy, now bursting with exhilaration, I headed back to my family, wondering if they would believe my story. Maybe I better not even tell 'em. But then I couldn't contain it.

"Barb, you won't believe this, honey. God knows where ah am!"

 

"And that lady's kairos and Ken Gaub's kairos met, and an explostion of the miraculous took place."

Sure, Jan.

He goes on for a while about not missing your kairos, especially if it's to get saved, and Pastor Baker does an altar call.

Edited September 14, 2023 by thoughtful
riffle, fixing image formatting

[thoughtful]

Gary posted his pastor's video begging for money for his son-in-law's new church.

https://www.facebook.com/pastorbaker1/videos/312288878148048

[Xan]

1 hour ago, thoughtful said:

I headed back to my family, wondering if they would believe my story. Maybe I better not even tell 'em. But then I couldn't contain it.

"Barb, you won't believe this, honey. God knows where ah am!"

Of all the things that never happened to Ken Gaub, this never happened the most.

[AmazonGrace]

Wondering why, if God could give Millie Ken's phone number, why didn't God just give her the message straight to her head? 

Seems like she could listen to voices speaking encouragement and spiritual blessings, just as easily as random numbers.

[thoughtful]

2 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Wondering why, if God could give Millie Ken's phone number, why didn't God just give her the message straight to her head? 

Seems like she could listen to voices speaking encouragement and spiritual blessings, just as easily as random numbers.

Really. But, of course, they're not supposed to wonder about things like that.

Their image of the God they supposedly worship and respect seems to be something like this:

Spoiler

 

[AmazonGrace]

If they cut out the middle man the middle man would have no cause to ask for donations.

[thoughtful]

I had this thought in the middle of listening to Dr. Davis' kairos talk, and forgot to post it. Listening to Dave Warnock this afternoon reminded me.

That entire spiel could have been summed up with one of Dave's favorite phrases:

Spoiler

Carpe the fucking diem!
 

If you don't know who Warnock is, I recommend checking out his content. He hosts a call-in show called Dying Out Loud, on The Line. 

He makes it much easier than Davis, though - no God or Jesus needed, no mystery, no agonizing over whether an opportunity is from Satan. As far as he's concerned (and I agree), that's just a waste of precious time.

Warnock even sells merch with the sentiment (somewhat sanitized):

https://dyingoutlouddave.threadless.com/designs/carpe-the-f-kingdiem

[thoughtful]

I know Gary has no ability to think logically. I've known that for a long time. But even so . . . damn, dude.

How are people supposed to find out if what they have is Covid, if they don't test?

Here's the pre-edit version:

Spoiler

 

[AmazonGrace]

what stuff does Gary take?

Gary, there are these self test kits you can buy, and the government will never know what your results are.

[Xan]

1 hour ago, AmazonGrace said:

what stuff does Gary take?

Does he just start chugging Ivermectin when he feels sick?  He certainly can't get an antivirals without going to a doctor and getting tested.  Does Becky make him take something less crazy like cold medicines and Advil?

Also, when Gary says "Needed to be said", it rarely if ever needed to be said.

[postscript]

Enjoy having Covid, Gary. You’ll almost certainly get it with that attitude. 

Nobody is putting a gun to your head and forcing you to test of get vaccinated. And if you don’t want to mask, there’s this concept called staying home. 
 

45 minutes ago, Xan said:

Also, when Gary says "Needed to be said", it rarely if ever needed to be said.

Truer words were never spoken. 

[Dana723]

On 9/12/2023 at 12:13 AM, AmazonGrace said:

Well I'm sorry if I am insufferably smug but before this it would honestly never even have occurred to me that tossing a child across the room was even an option.

It wouldn't to the majority of the human race.

 

And had I been there and that had been my child, that pastor would have been regretting his decision within in about 2 seconds. 

[thoughtful]

I looked at bits of the video of the Wednesday 8/23 service, enough to know that:

 - Becky and Gary were there.
- Pastor Baker does an interactive sermon, quizzing the congregation (mostly the kids, as far as I can tell) about details of Exodus.
- Pastor Baker said that God didn't just "drop something on Pharoah" so the Israelites could leave Egypt, because "God uses people."
- he tells a joke about angels asking God why he's annoyed, and God saying he made 18 different animals from which humans could get milk, and they're trying to get milk out of an almond. Then he asks for a show of hands of who drinks almond milk, and teases them about it.
- he tries to imitate Garry Coleman saying "What you talkin' 'bout?"
- he tells a story about Jack Hyles preaching when he was so young "they called him Jackie Boy Hyles."

[thoughtful]

Gary was in the 8/27 morning service without Becky, and alone again at the evening service. That was another "family fun night," so I may go back and look at it at some point.

They were both in church on Wednesday evening, 8/30. Pastor Baker's son Jonathan preached.

Spoiler

They've both been in church for every service since. If I have the intestinal fortitude, I might listen to some. Pastor Baker gets on my last nerve - he's so slick and full of himself.

[thoughtful]

Gary removed his most recent Covid post.

[Ozlsn]

I wonder why. Push back from people he knows who have post-viral sequelae from covid? Sudden flash of sanity? Found a new meme he wants to put up instead?

I was reading the post and thinking about Becky having MS, which is currently looking likely to be a post-viral sequelae of infection with Epstein-Barr virus (glandular fever). Obviously not everyone who was infected with EBV ends up with MS, in the same way that not everyone who was infected with polio develops post-polio syndrome, and not everyone infected with measles developed subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE) (we would have worked out the link a lot quicker if they did, or if more people did).  But just through weight of numbers in infections with Covid Gary is going to know a lot more people who have developed or are developing post-covid symptoms - and I wonder if some of them are pushing back on the "don't get tested", if only because it makes it easier to get diagnoses or assistance if you have a definite test result.

[FiveAcres]

19 minutes ago, Ozlsn said:

I wonder why. Push back from people he knows who have post-viral sequelae from covid? Sudden flash of sanity? Found a new meme he wants to put up instead?

I was reading the post and thinking about Becky having MS, which is currently looking likely to be a post-viral sequelae of infection with Epstein-Barr virus (glandular fever). Obviously not everyone who was infected with EBV ends up with MS, in the same way that not everyone who was infected with polio develops post-polio syndrome, and not everyone infected with measles developed subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE) (we would have worked out the link a lot quicker if they did, or if more people did).  But just through weight of numbers in infections with Covid Gary is going to know a lot more people who have developed or are developing post-covid symptoms - and I wonder if some of them are pushing back on the "don't get tested", if only because it makes it easier to get diagnoses or assistance if you have a definite test result.

I was diagnosed with Bell's Palsy in my late twenties. My case completely resolved in about two months. (Fortunately, because of my age, my PCP, when I called her office, didn't think it was stroke and sent me directly to a neurologist, who diagnosed the Bell's Palsy. Waking up with half my face paralyzed was unpleasant. ) I know there is some suspicion that the Epstein-Barr virus might cause Bell's Palsy.

I have a friend diagnosed with MS. She is at high risk if she gets Covid-19 because she is on drugs to suppress its progress which also suppresses her immune system.

Viruses are nasty, which is why I flinch when someone says "It's just a virus."

[thoughtful]

Gary might have gotten some pushback. The only two people I can imagine getting through to him are Becky and his new pastor. I think Gary is totally gaga over David Baker.

But I don't know where either of them stand when it comes to Covid conspiracy theories. Becky, despite having been a nurse, has not shown much more sense than Gary about health issues in the past. but maybe that's changed since her own diagnoses.

[thoughtful]

Becky re-posted a meme from Onesimus House that says:

Quote

Drinking to be happy is like setting your house on fire to stay warm.

Becky, addiction is a physical disease. I hope the men at Onesimus House can get themselves well and free of it, but I hope they are getting real help, not just preaching.

You and Gary have chosen to numb yourselves to the complications of reality as well, clinging to belief, and the rituals that come with it, as The One True Answer That Fixes Everything.

Although, I guess, at this point, they may be trapped in the clutches of an addiction. Maybe I should be more sympathetic.

[thoughtful]

Gary posted a riddle - the first comment is typical of the answers he got:

So, at least he's being silly, rather than hateful.

I wouldn't expect Gary, or his friends, to know this, but it's no reflection on them, since I think most people don't know this. It's not a coincidence that poodle sounds like puddle - the dogs got that name because they were bred as water retrievers, and it comes from the German for splashing in water.

https://www.etymonline.com/word/poodle

ETA - I did check the weather in Hohenwald, to make sure he didn't mean it as an actual practical question, because Gary. It is not raining there today.

Edited September 16, 2023 by thoughtful

[thoughtful]

Besides the obvious poodle joke, some of Gary's commenters actually came up with some cute or funny responses to his raining cats and dogs post. But, of course, somebody had to do this (I'm actually surprised it took so long):

Spoiler

Which makes me wonder - if what's raining down is animals, what does one take on such an Ark? Raindrops?

 

[thoughtful]

A new Garyism? I think he meant "truth" when he wrote "trust."

Gary's self-awareness, as usual, is nil.

Also, the man and the (outdated, of course) TV,  are NEKKID! Horrors!