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Truth Serum

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Ohio

Unless otherwise indicated all Scripture quotations are from the King James Version of the Holy Bible. Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are from the Holy Bible. New International Version, © 1973, 1978, 1984 by The International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan.

Truth Serum Media & Publications

P.O. Box 201006

Cleveland, OH 44122 USA

www.tsmpub.com

www.truthserumpublications.com

Church Folk Going To Hell In A Hand Basket

ISBN 978-0-9839280-1-0

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011937105

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or any other – except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission in writing from the publisher.

Printed in the United States of America.

ISBN: 9780983928089

-ACKNOWLEDGMENTS-

Special thanks to everyone at Faith Printing, especially JaNell Lyle for her expertise and guidance, and Laurel Berkel for being such a warm spirit; thanks for your patience and meticulous eye to detail.

Special thanks to Truth Serum Media & Publications Assistant Editor Aliece Stewart and Evangelist Antoinette Clay for their prayers and support.

A. Davis: Wishes to thank God for His countless blessings and favor. I thank my mother, Delores Davis, for all of her nurturing and tough love and my father, the late Marvin Davis, for his wisdom and counsel. I am indebted to my longtime friend Evangelist Ena Davis for all of her support and my Pastor Rickey Wayne Adams Sr. of True Gospel Missionary Baptist Ministries in Painesville, Ohio, for his spiritual guidance. I send expressions of gratitude to all my loving siblings and extended family and friends.

Dr. D. J. Lundy: Wishes to thank God for the opportunity to co-author this book. I am grateful for the careful and constant support of Dr. C. T. Lundy. I am indebted to my daughter Dr. Jennifer for the hours spent reviewing and suggesting important changes. I thank God for the encouragement and technical support of my granddaughter Maia. I send my love to my extended family and friends.

Dr. M. Maynard: Wishes to thank God, my creator, for giving me life and the boldness to believe the impossible is possible. I send a supersized portion of my love to my spouse, children, and grandchild. I send love to all of my extended family and friends.

C. Wilcox: Wishes to thank God, who is the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. I want to thank my spouse for being my biggest fan and always supporting me. To my three children who are truly a blessing from God, you are my pride and joy. To my mother, I could not have become who I am without your love and guidance. I send love and gratitude to all of my extended family and friends.

-TABLE OF CONTENTS-

INTRODUCTION

1Flat-Liners

2Disorder—The New Fabric

3This Is How We Do It!

4Dollar Dollar Bill Y’all!

5Lest Thou Forget

6Teach and Preach Jesus

7Keep It Simple, Stupid!

8Who Died and Left You Boss?

9The Hand of the Diligent

10Testilying Instead of Testifying

11Cool Like That!

12Stinking Thinking

13A Lusting Fungus among Us

14Brainwashed and Bamboozled

15See, Hear, and Speak No Evil

16Halfway Saved

Poetic Nuggets by C. Wilcox

-INTRODUCTION-

Going to hell in a hand basket is an idiom used to identify the hasty downward spiral the church finds itself in without effort. Christendom is out of control and getting worse as the days go by. The bible warns that the time will come when lawlessness will abound in the land. This lawlessness does not exempt church folk. The bible also informs us that God is coming back for a church without spot or wrinkle. This ensures that many things in their current state are getting ready to be shaken out of their places and put back into order. A breaking is coming and it will not be without pain. Here you will find slices of perspective from the authors. Each writer comes from their own experiences and accounts. This book is not about biblical doctrine and is not an educational tour on the bible but about what is transpiring in these end times and where change has to come. The house starts with you. We are vessels, and we should be the walking church. Church is in you and should be everywhere you go.

The universal church is sliding on a banana peel with one foot stable in an unstable world. Ooh, the taste of a slice of perspective! Satan has not changed his tactics. He is not doing anything differently than he did in the Garden of Eden. The enemy is still beguiling mankind. We are now witnessing the time that even the elect of God are being beguiled. There is no exempt status from the cunning craftiness Satan deals to those who dare to sit at the table and play with his deck of cards. Warning: be careful how you tread when you begin to read this book. The spirit may find some church folk right where they are. I can hear the spiritual Elevator Operator calling out, “Hand basket going down; next stop—Hell!”

We have dared to tread upon the serpent’s territory and provided more than the slither he deceives with. We have provided a full slice of perspective. By the end of this book we pray you will have eaten a whole pie.

Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons. And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden. And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself. And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat? And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat. And the LORD God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat. And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

Genesis 3:1-15

-Chapter One-

FLAT-LINERS

images Evg. Davis’s Reflective Perspective

I remember in my youth I attended a church that was extremely dead. The deliverance of God’s word through the half-hearted pastor was tragically pathetic. We could not even remember what the topic or title of the message was about. The loud moaning and groaning sound he made did no justice to God’s sacred word. My family did not waste anymore time on Sunday or any other day to attend this church. A return visit there was usually only for a wedding or funeral. You have to know when you are in a flat-liner’s church. A flat-liner simply put is spiritually d-e-a-d. Lifeless.

I remember on a particular Sunday at this church, things were very chaotic. In the basement, some members were smoking and others were standing around chatting when suddenly we heard above our heads in the sanctuary a big commotion. A literal fight had broken out in the choir stand. The fight was between the pastor’s wife and another woman. It was obvious why! After services were dismissed early because of the drama, I saw the pastor sitting in his study with the door opened. He had his shirt off with a sleeveless T-shirt on and a cigar in his mouth. He was talking with another woman about the incident. Giving this scene the benefit of the doubt, it still was not a good look considering what had just occurred.

What type of impression or impact did the behavior in this church have on anyone? There was a distorted comfort level in the church from the old to the young. It trickled down from the pastor throughout the congregation. The atmosphere was live as you please all week with very little, if any, respect for the house of God on Sunday. The tragic irony is people were deceived into thinking that if they physically and outwardly showed up for service on Sunday morning, this would pay their bill with God. Many church folk still think this way today.

As the years went on scandals surfaced involving this pastor, his staff, and congregants. Sound like with all the news reports in our current day, nothing has changed much with church folk down through the years.

Her priests do violence to my law and profane my holy things; they do not distinguish between the holy and the common; they teach that there is no difference between the unclean and the clean; and they shut their eyes to the keeping of my Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.

Ezekiel 22:26 (NIV)

Many of the things we see happening in the church today are not new. The prophets of old encountered the sin of a wicked generation. Ecclesiastes 1:9-10 declares that there is nothing new under the sun. God called the prophet Jeremiah in his day to warn those that were corrupt about doing things their way. Even in those times there were both leaders and people who were comfortable and loved being in their rotten, immoral, and decaying state.

The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof?

Jeremiah 5:31

Yet a loving God, a long suffering God, always seeks to find us and calls us to repentance. In Jeremiah 6:16 God summoned the people to ask for the old paths where the good way is and to walk in it. When we purpose in our heart to strive to be better people and amend our ways, God wants to grant us tremendous blessings. God promises to establish His people in an ungodly world with tangible blessings, safety, posterity, and prosperity. Since God has invested so much in us, shouldn’t we repent and give our lives to God in service?

images Dr. Maynard’s Panoramic Perspective

It is time for the fivefold ministry gifts to bring the defibrillator out of the back office when they head into the sanctuary. Apostles, pastors, teachers, evangelists and the prophets should be walking under the anointing strapped with a lightweight portable automated defibrillator into services everywhere they go. It is time to send an electric shock through God’s people to raise the dead like Lazarus with the unadulterated power of the spoken word. In local churches all across the globe you will find many that are dead as a doornail sitting in the pulpit, dead standing at the podium, dead sitting in the pew, dead shouting in the pew, dead ushers in the back by the exit, and a dead visitor who thought it was a nice service walking out the exit, still dead. You will also find the group that needs to be saved. These are the people on the other side of the exit (the world), dead as expected. It’s time for resurrection power to be made manifest!

Flat-liners are people that if hooked up to a hospital monitor, you would see a straight line across the screen. There would be no activity, which would indicate they are dead. The person is dead by cardiac failure or brain trauma. I would like to stress that my use of these very serious conditions are not to make light of them. I am showing from a spiritual aspect the seriousness of such a state in the life of the believer. Anyone called to minister the gospel should know the procedures for emergency first response. The current status of the church is an emergency situation. In first response you are to check, call, and care. You must first access the scene; use discernment to check the pulse of the house. Call God’s 911 to release the heavenly host before you put your mouth on it. When God gives you the clearance, prepare to use the AED. Let the Holy Spirit be your guide, attach the pads in the spirit, put the plug in, and push the button. If necessary resume to chest compressions and CPR with the word until the house is revived. It is time for revival to hit so church folk can live and not die.

An AED is an automated external defibrillator; in the natural a defibrillator does not have the ability to reverse brain death. Brain death is completely irreversible in the natural. It is a loss of all brain function, and the person is clinically and legally deceased. However, the exception is the spiritual defibrillator in Christ, the great I am, the resurrecting power. Christ has the ability to be whatever you need Him to be. It appears some Christians unfortunately received trauma to the brain and have not yet recovered. This means the brain is sleeping.

It is time for the church to awake out of slumber.

Awake to righteousness, and sin not; for some have not the knowledge of God: I speak this to your shame.

1 Corinthians 15:34