Bro Gary Hawkins 24: Smoking Meat

[thoughtful]

I found this, from October 2022, about a meeting of the Maury County Board of Trustees regarding the resignation of the head librarian, after the usual kinds of idiotic arguments going on about books these days. 

A woman gave a passionate speech decrying the bullshit of people being hateful under cover of Christianity.

https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/leave-alone-tennessee-mom-slams-homophobic-attacks-viral-video-rcna54801

If you scroll down to the second video, you can see this better - she yells "I've never been sexually assaulted at a drag show, but I have been in church, twice! The men at the church told me it was my fault."

As she yells, she whirls and looks at a man standing against the wall. When she yells "twice" she gestures at him. And that man is:

Spoiler

  

Pastor David Baker.

She goes on about him, implying he should know better about free speech, having served in the military, and how ironic it is that he's there to squelch it.

BTW, I don't think she's accusing him of being the person who assaulted her. In fact, I don't know if she was a congregant in either of his churches. Her point seemed to be more that he was a major force behind the hatefulness against the  LGBTQIA community.

[thoughtful]

A rare post from Becky. Notice the source - FIG, David Hyles and David Baker's hideaway for fallen pastors.

[Joyster]

Caleb (Gary’s oldest son) and his wife started a three month RV preaching mission tour earlier this month. I sped through a couple of his sermons, and they seemed like slightly better versions of Gary’s drivel. However, today the following was posted:

I admire them for not stubbornly sticking to a travel preaching plan and focusing on their needs as a family. By the comments given, they have a lot of support from their followers.

[Xan]

My guess is that Sarah wasn't as agreeable about living on the road as Becky seemed to be.  Good on Caleb for being willing to stop.

[thoughtful]

Becky re-posted this very clever  🙄  idea for dealing with a nonexistent problem:

Quote

Karen Stanton

So, there is a lot of talk about kids identifying as cats or dogs “furries”, they call them.

Imagine if you can, that one of my kids told me they thought they were a cat?

Sitting at the supper table son says: “Dad, I think I’m a cat!

Dad: “No son, you’re a boy! “

My son: “No dad some of my friends at school identify as cats, they call themselves furries, and so do I !! It’s my right and you can’t do anything about it!”

Dad: “OK!! “

My son: “Hey, where’s my supper? “

Dad: “Your supper is in the catfood bowl in the corner. Now get off the table you mangy cat!”

My son: “What???”

Dad: hits him with a broom, “get off the table furball!!”

My son in the corner looking bewildered!

Me to my wife : “Is that cat neutered”??

My wife: “I will make an appointment!! “

My son: “What??? “

Dad: “Your mother and I have decided we don’t want a house cat, so get out to the barn and hunt mice!”

My son: “What???”

Dad: brandishes broom, “NOW, to the barn you stupid cat!!”

My son: “Dad, I think I’m a boy!”

Dad: “I thought so, now sit down and eat your supper!!”

Spay and neuter these animals. Stop them from reproducing. Today’s society has enough fruit loops already.

End of story

I did a google image search on the picture with it - it's from a 2019 picnic and is, I presume, an adult. In any case, it's not a child dressed like that for school.

https://www.facebook.com/Becky1976/posts/pfbid0NUXZfGjTvcztBZ2VP8qXxN6Yq2ycfougrBjaQqMyTM16Db3bgaizoHaYHGxhCUhAl

https://ctvoice.com/2019/09/10/animal-instinct/

[AmazonGrace]

On 2/27/2024 at 6:10 AM, thoughtful said:

A rare post from Becky. Notice the source - FIG, David Hyles and David Baker's hideaway for fallen pastors.

Yes Becky, you're right. If a Christian sexually assaults people it should be covered up and the people who call him out are the ones in the wrong

[Expectopatronus]

8 hours ago, thoughtful said:

Becky re-posted this very clever  🙄  idea for dealing with a nonexistent problem:

I did a google image search on the picture with it - it's from a 2019 picnic and is, I presume, an adult. In any case, it's not a child dressed like that for school.

https://www.facebook.com/Becky1976/posts/pfbid0NUXZfGjTvcztBZ2VP8qXxN6Yq2ycfougrBjaQqMyTM16Db3bgaizoHaYHGxhCUhAl

https://ctvoice.com/2019/09/10/animal-instinct/

In my 15 years of teaching, I have known two kids who insisted that they were furries. One kept it up for a year and needed physiotherapy because he held his hands like rodent paws for so long. What ended it was when he started biting and ended up suspended. His teachers had talked to his parents when he stopped talking and just squeaked but they thought it was great that he was being himself. 
i had one in my class who did it for a week and told me that I was “racist against furries” because I refused to respond to meows instead of words. In both cases, they got the idea online. But yeah, two kids out of the hundreds I’ve encountered. Not a big problem. 

[Blessings of the Corn]

10 hours ago, Expectopatronus said:

In my 15 years of teaching, I have known two kids who insisted that they were furries. One kept it up for a year and needed physiotherapy because he held his hands like rodent paws for so long. What ended it was when he started biting and ended up suspended. His teachers had talked to his parents when he stopped talking and just squeaked but they thought it was great that he was being himself. 
i had one in my class who did it for a week and told me that I was “racist against furries” because I refused to respond to meows instead of words. In both cases, they got the idea online. But yeah, two kids out of the hundreds I’ve encountered. Not a big problem. 

And to be fair - Furries are a lifestyle of consenting adults who are roleplaying -Not kids just pretending to be animals.  Furries don't actually believe they are the animals, etc. 

[WhatWouldJohnCrichtonDo?]

My kids and I sometimes talk about the difference between sex and gender. For instance, I've told them that (in my view), our cats have a sex, but not a gender, because gender is a human cultural thing. As far as I can tell, cats don't have a similar thing to human genders. Also our cats' sexual orientation is "involuntarily asexual" (also imo), because they're neutered. 

None of these discussions ever led to my kids wanting to use a litter box. 🙄

[Expectopatronus]

3 hours ago, Blessings of the Corn said:

And to be fair - Furries are a lifestyle of consenting adults who are roleplaying -Not kids just pretending to be animals.  Furries don't actually believe they are the animals, etc. 

No, that domain is strictly inhabited by kids who are reading stuff online and take it literally. As do their idiotic parents; my colleague’s friend teaches in a high school and had a parent email her last year regarding the myth that New York schools were providing litter boxes for kids who identify as cats. Parent and kid believed it and demanded that our schools be equally accommodating. I gather explaining that this was an urban legend was all kinds of fun. It’s one thing for grade five and six kids to decide that they truly are a gerbil, cat, wolf etc but when parents also get in on the act one has to shake one’s head. 

[Blessings of the Corn]

17 hours ago, WhatWouldJohnCrichtonDo? said:

My kids and I sometimes talk about the difference between sex and gender. For instance, I've told them that (in my view), our cats have a sex, but not a gender, because gender is a human cultural thing. As far as I can tell, cats don't have a similar thing to human genders. Also our cats' sexual orientation is "involuntarily asexual" (also imo), because they're neutered. 

None of these discussions ever led to my kids wanting to use a litter box. 🙄

no kids actually ever wanted to use a litter box and no schools actually ever had any litter boxes - that was total right-wing propaganda for which there's been no proof

[Expectopatronus]

14 minutes ago, Blessings of the Corn said:

no kids actually ever wanted to use a litter box and no schools actually ever had any litter boxes - that was total right-wing propaganda for which there's been no proof

Oh, I would be willing to bet my entire salary that if the teacher who got the email had agreed and provided the litter box for the obnoxious family the kid wouldn’t have actually used it. This was a family that bought in to the ridiculous internet garbage and wanted a fight. And it was 1 family that made the stink. 

[Hane]

The only hint that a litter box was ever in a classroom came from a suggestion that there be kitty litter on hand in case a child needed to urinate during an emergency lockdown.

[Dana723]

On 2/23/2024 at 1:07 PM, 3splenty said:

When my pastor had a prayer for me due to cancer, I was amazed at the response. 

I was having a meeting with the doctors that coming week to discuss the next steps, but by that Sunday afternoon, these ladies had already blocked off one day each to take me to appointments/run my carpool so my husband could stay at work. One of them had a sibling at my parents' church (I volunteered to provide food for funerals there, etc). Since they were 45 minutes closer than my church family, they set up a meal calendar, if it would be necessary. There were offers of help with yard work from my daughter's FFA group. So many ways people volunteered to help.

I am now cancer-free and now pay it forward.

Jill, Christ did say to pray for others, but he also told us to help others in tangible. I mean, isn't that how He lived? And to be a testimony, your words have to be backed up by your actions. Words are empty without actions.

The church we go to currently isn't the most friendly place and for the past year, we've missed a lot of services due to my back problems.  So I was pleasantly surprised when I had my back surgery last month that the church signed up to bring us meals twice a week for the month of February!  People have been checking in on us and chatting with us when they drop off the meals.  It actually made me cry.  

[thoughtful]

Back to Sunday evening's service - Baker goes into a spiel about how he plans a sermon.

He imitates other pastors saying that they like going through the bible, and just picking up where they left off. He says that's OK for bible study (he can't very well condemn it, since it's what he does for Wednesday nights), but it's "not what we as pastors are supposed to do. We're supposed to reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine."

He goes on about how Paul and Jesus preached what the people they were addressing needed to hear. He says he has a list of 900 sermon ideas that he hasn't used yet, on his phone. He claims that, on Monday, he goes through all of the ideas that God has given him that week 🙄 and picks something that people need to hear. Being with people helps him know what they need to hear that week (he mocks two men, one of them his usual target, Cy, for needing to be preached to hahaha). He says he's never heard God audibly, but has "heard him thousands of times through the spirit."

He said that he looked through his ideas for tonight, but "there was none that God confirmed, 'OK, that's one I want you to preach.'" So, he claims, he asked God what to preach, and he claims he has no idea what kind of a sermon they're going to hear tonight.

Believe it or not, I'm paring this down considerably - he seems to think that explaining his process to them is of the utmost importance, and he went on and on.

So, get to this God-improvised sermon already, Baker.

He announces 1 Corinthians 14:3:

Quote

3 But he that prophesieth speaketh unto men to edification, and exhortation, and comfort.

4 He that speaketh in an unknown tongue edifieth himself; but he that prophesieth edifieth the church.

5 I would that ye all spake with tongues but rather that ye prophesied: for greater is he that prophesieth than he that speaketh with tongues, except he interpret, that the church may receive edifying.

He makes sure they know correct IFB doctrine - tongues just means foreign languages, not the stuff Pentecostals and Charismatics do. He does a long spiel about what prophesying is (he says it's not foretelling the future, but edifying, exhorting and comforting). Then he invites any man that wants to do so to prophesy, to tell them about some great life-changing idea God gave them.

He makes a joke about asking someone to block the doors, asks them to think of one great change God made in their lives, and jokes about the women being "off the hook."

Because they can't preach, of course.

He says that, if anyone is thinking that if they don't say anything and get to go home early, that has a backup sermon he can substitute, and, of course, jokes that he "wonders" why the names of two other men are written in his notes at that point. He also jokes that, since he's not preaching the entire sermon, he understands that they'll have to cut his pay, then imitates his wife objecting hahaha.

He has now spent 17 minutes setting up this idea. Get to it already, Baker.

As soon as he finally sends the microphones around, a man is ready - gee, I wonder if a few guys were tipped off to this plan. He speaks about iron sharpening iron, and Baker blabs a bit about it.

Another man is instantly ready, to tell them that all are equal, sinners. Baker reiterates that.

The third man sounds a bit more like he's truly being spontaneous and trying to put his thoughts together, about how being a man is not defined by age.

More men speak briefly, and, after each, Baker blabs, adding nothing. They are all speaking quite coherently, but I guess he thinks the ideas just get more godly when he repeats them. Most of them have a bible verse ready as part of what they say.

One man says that God kept sending him a message, about two weeks ago, to sing the song City of Refuge, which he did when nobody was around, and he had that song running through his head all the time. I'm guessing he doesn't mean the old gospel song,  or this one, but this one.

A week later, he said, God "drops it on me - this is your life." He says the song refers to the cities of refuge in the bible, where someone who had accidentally killed a person could go, and be safe from whoever was hired by the family to avenge the death by killing them in turn. He doesn't quote it, but it was easy to find:

Quote

Numbers 35:11-12

Then ye shall appoint you cities to be cities of refuge for you; that the slayer may flee thither, which killeth any person at unawares.

12 And they shall be unto you cities for refuge from the avenger; that the manslayer die not, until he stand before the congregation in judgment.

He gets the terminology wrong, calling the person who was sent to avenge the death the "slayer."

Why was this his life? He says, "As you know, my wife - she asked someone, for over 20 years, to take my life." He says she admitted it to him. "The thing is, she didn't know she was asking my city of refuge to kill me, and he said no."

And he goes on about how God is the city of refuge. Wait - I thought it was the guy who refused to kill you.

A man speaks about the comfort he finds in the Psalms, and Baker said he just recorded a lesson on that "for the depression class." I shudder to think what that might be. Is he shilling materials that are supposed to be in lieu of actual medical help for depression? I'll see if I can find out, later.

If Gary was there, he doesn't volunteer to speak.

Baker tops it off with some ideas from Spurgeon and Hyles, and his personal contribution, which is the belief that someday he's going to stand before Jesus, and will be asked what he did for him.

In the closing prayer, he says that, when God gave him this idea, he thought "OK, no one's ever done that before."

You need to get out more, Dave.

[thoughtful]

On Wednesday nights, congregants get to choose some hymns, and they sing a verse or two of each choice. This is peppered with some self-centered chat from Baker.

Someone still wants to see everyone:

Spoiler

There are very few prayer requests.

While preaching about the reading from Joshua, he says, "In the world today, in our society today, they call 'em seven mountains, seven mountains of influence it's called, and that every person should at least one of those mountains be trying to take, like Caleb did, that we're trying to influence there, and it's uh, education, religion, government, media, business, law, I don't remember 'em all, but there's seven - seven mountains of influence and that Christians should be the ones that are taking over and running and deciding the way those things should be."

"You believe that? Oooooh, that sounds like Christian Nationalism. Uh, which, by the way, if you hear that, please push back on that. Are you a Christian? Do you love your country? That's all that should be. Done. Yeah. Of course. I love my nation, and that's where we live and I'm a Christian, OK?"

After some fumbling about wanting to show them a video, he goes on, "There's this news person on this. Oh, dangerous. They said Christian Nationalists are - listen - more dangerous than the Taliban. This person said that. You understand what people think?"

He goes on to tell them that it was "Carville," (James, I assume) and makes sure they know he was in the Clinton administration. 

The captions have some difficulty with his pronunciation of Christian Nationalism:

Spoiler

 

He claims Carville said that our rights come from the government, and reminds them that rights come from God - it even says so in the Declaration of Independence.

Yeah, but the Constitution doesn't say a word about God, Dave.

BTW, the only clip I found of Carville saying anything like that was on Bill Maher's show; he said Al-Qaeda, not the Taliban, and nothing about rights. And Bill Maher credits the wrong artist for this masterpiece.

Later in his lesson, Baker says he got an email from a woman who said she is a Christian who strayed and is trying to get back to God, but finds it harder each time she tries. She doesn't know if God is testing her.

No doubt her name is Georgia Glass. You wouldn't know her - she goes to another school.

He says he reminded her about Job - God was testing him and the devil was trying to destroy him.  "God doubled everything he had at the end, so who won? God did, and he did!"

No problem losing those ten children - Amazon God sent replacements. 🙄

He says that working for God will be hard. "Is it gonna be a fight? Yeah. Are you gonna get some blood on you? Probably. Uh, hopefully, it's their blood."

For Joshua 1:7, he does a whole routine about how "observing" the law means to plan ahead and picture it in your mind. Of course, the original Hebrew word in the verse he's talking about doesn't mean observe in the visual sense - it means to keep or preserve.

He meanders on about meditating on the bible, and how it is blessed. He compares meditating on the bible to a cow chewing her cud. Yes, he describes it, with the vomiting and everything. So we can have ice cream. He tries to make a joke about how we shouldn't eat "green stuff" because we don't have three stomachs. I guess he-man Dave doesn't like salad.

He finishes up with lots of blather about how God will help you succeed, checks his phone during the altar call, and reminds them one more time of the power of the bible.

Edited March 1 by thoughtful
fixing link

[thoughtful]

Becky still has no contributions to her MS walk team.

The walk, in general, has about a quarter of their goal pledged:

https://events.nationalmssociety.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.event&eventID=1954

 

[Dana723]

22 hours ago, thoughtful said:

Why was this his life? He says, "As you know, my wife - she asked someone, for over 20 years, to take my life." He says she admitted it to him. "The thing is, she didn't know she was asking my city of refuge to kill me, and he said no."

 

...what?

[thoughtful]

1 minute ago, Dana723 said:

...what?

IIRC, this man has previously spoken in church about his wife wanting to have him killed, and I think I put it in one of the recaps, but I can't find it now.  Baker didn't act the least bit surprised, and there were no gasps from the congregation, when he brought it up this time.

For some reason, according to the story, she kept asking the same guy to do it, and he kept refusing.

For twenty years.

That's all I've got.

 

[Joyster]

I think Jacob is currently living in North Carolina with either Gary’s dad or sister. Gary’s brother got married today, and there was a family photo with Jacob in it. Gary and his other children were not in the photo. Also, a couple of weeks ago Gary’s brother posted an evening nerf gun fight and dinner at the mall, and Jacob was on the edge of one of the pictures with his cousin.

I wonder how Jacob is being schooled. Gary’s sister sends her children to a Christian school and his brother’s children appear to go to a school. 

[thoughtful]

Caleb posted this video on his Facebook page, adding "Amen and Amen."

Spoiler

 

I don't know if he realizes that the YouTuber who posted this excerpt is against people like Gray, Hyles, Schaap and our friend Baker.

Comments (wish I'd found this before one was deleted):

Spoiler

 

 

[thoughtful]

Pastor Baker is in California. He commented on this morning's service, though:

Spoiler

I wonder if he watched instead of going to church where he is, watched and then went to church (possible, due to the time difference), or just wanted to let them know they'd better behave before settling in with his morning coffee.

The person running the service in his stead makes sure they know the rules for March Madness - this past week's challenge was handing out tracts.

He warns them about filling out the paper saying how many tracts they handed out; they may not take credit if they put them on cars or left them in public places (hear, that Gary?) - they have to have been handed to a person. Oh, and, if anyone gave two different tracts to the same person, that only counts as one.

I guess there have been inklings of cheating going on in this heavenly competition.

This week's challenge is leading people to Christ. He says "God is keeping record of all of it. He says their only competition is the devil, and they're "gonna see if we can give him a bloody nose or something."

If the only competition is between them and the devil, why are they counting things?

Y'know, I almost skipped listening altogether, since Baker isn't there. And yet, they still managed to disgust me.

And this was only the announcements.

[TacoBellKimmy]

On 3/1/2024 at 7:32 PM, Dana723 said:

...what?

I'm behind on Bro Gary, but that was my exact reaction. I'm ALMOST curious enough about this idiot to do further research, but thankfully @thoughtful takes it for the team. Many thanks! 

[thoughtful]

1 hour ago, TacoBellKimmy said:

I'm behind on Bro Gary, but that was my exact reaction. I'm ALMOST curious enough about this idiot to do further research, but thankfully @thoughtful takes it for the team. Many thanks! 

You're welcome!

If, by "this idiot," you mean the man who told the story, we don't even know his name. If you mean Pastor Baker, there's lots of stuff in these threads, and I've recently found some more. But I'd be happy to have you join me.

This seems to be a forum for conservative evangelicals. I found a few old threads of people discussing Baker.

https://www.fundamentalforums.org/threads/dave-baker-muslims-unite-with-baptists.7267/

https://www.fundamentalforums.org/threads/fallen-in-grace-ministry.9020/#post-186857

https://www.fundamentalforums.org/threads/dave-baker-and-mrs-riplinger-teaching-a-kjvo-extreme-class.6214/

[thoughtful]

Between the buzz caused by some sort of sound problem, and the boring nature of the sermon, I gave up on listening to the rest of the morning service.

Baker commented on the evening service, as did the Trumper:

Spoiler

The usual Sunday evening request for blessings reaps a man who says he helped some people change a tire while talking to them about coming to church, another who says that life is a blessing, some birthdays, a woman who invited a family she saw at Aldi to come to church, and someone who explained how to go to heaven to a blind man in a hallway somewhere who couldn't really speak English.

Preacher for this service is one of Baker's sons. He is also too boring for me. I check the end - Gary is asked to do the dismissal prayer. They don't send a microphone out for that, so he can barely be heard, but at least we know he was there.

I wonder if he was not invited to his brother's wedding, didn't want to go, needed to stay home due to Becky's health, or what.