Promises Pt. 04

"I might ruffle a few feathers here, but one of the things that you do not want in this person is intelligence, because if he was intelligent he would see right through the pitch and realize the product was too good to be true. Actually, I hesitate to suggest this but, if a Pentecostal Pastor is from a teaching or similar background, then that person should be doubly cursed because he has the intelligence to see through the rhetoric but chooses to ignore it because of the financial rewards involved."

"Having found this marketing person who has that 'charisma that sells', you teach him the sales pitch, you drum it into him so thoroughly that he can spruik it with sincerity."

"This package trades on one of the most powerful weaknesses known to Mankind, greed. It places a time limit on the offer, the 'End Times', it creates a need and fulfils that need. But it is not content with merely having a need met. No, it then creates a want or desire for much more, and fulfils that with the set of ubiquitous steak knives, the promise of something for nothing, the promise of an increase in fortune. And the whole package is marketed as a promise from God."

"But that is where the credibility is lost; God promises no such thing! He promises to meet our needs. Jesus came to fulfil our spiritual needs, not to fulfil our greedy desires. We should be satisfied with having our needs met."

"In a 'Free Market Economy' it is not enough to merely provide our needs. A want has to be created in order to grow. The church uses our desire for wants to be met, so that its want for financial growth is fulfilled; more money equals more power equals even more money and power, etcetera, ad infinitum."

"Your Honour, members of the jury, for every Scripture, every scrap of instant coffee theology, cited by the Shining Light Christian Church, and other similar churches, in support of its ideology, we have cited contextually accurate, contradicting Scripture."

"The leaders of the Shining Light Christian Church practice the very things that their spiritual leader, Jesus Christ the 'Son of God' criticized so strongly. I would again like to read a passage, the passage is again the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 23, also known as the 'Woes', this time I'll read from the Message Bible, only because it sets it out in plain speak, and it tells it more eloquently than I could ever hope to."

"'The religion scholars and Pharisees are competent teachers in God's Law. You won't go wrong in following their teachings on Moses. But be careful about following them. They talk a good line, but they don't live it. They don't take it into their hearts and live it out in their behaviour. It's all spit-and-polish veneer.'

'Instead of giving you God's Law as food and drink by which you can banquet on God, they package it in bundles of rules, loading you down like pack animals. They seem to take pleasure in watching you stagger under these loads, and wouldn't think of lifting a finger to help. Their lives are perpetual fashion shows, embroidered prayer shawls one day and flowery prayers the next. They love to sit at the head table at church dinners, basking in the most prominent positions, preening in the radiance of public flattery, receiving honorary degrees, and getting called 'Doctor' and 'Reverend.'

'Don't let people do that to you, put you on a pedestal like that. You all have a single Teacher, and you are all classmates. Don't set people up as experts over your life, letting them tell you what to do. Save that authority for God; let him tell you what to do. No-one else should carry the title of 'Father'; you have only one Father, and he's in heaven. And don't let people manoeuvre you into taking charge of them. There is only one Life-Leader for you and them – Christ.'

'Do you want to stand out? Then step down. Be a servant. If you puff yourself up, you'll get the wind knocked out of you. But if you're content to simply be yourself, your life will count for plenty.'

'Frauds!'

'I've had it with you! You're hopeless, you religious scholars, you Pharisees! Frauds! Your lives are roadblocks to God's kingdom. You refuse to enter, and won't let anyone else in either.'

'You're hopeless, you religious scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You go halfway around the world to make a convert, but once you get him you make him into a replica of yourselves, double-damned.'

'You're hopeless! What arrogant stupidity! You say, 'If someone makes a promise with his fingers crossed, that's nothing, but if he swears with his hand on the Bible, that's serious.' What ignorance! Does the leather on the Bible carry more weight than the skin on your hands? And what about this piece of trivia: 'If you shake hands on a promise that's nothing; but if you raised your hand that God is your witness, that's serious'? What ridiculous hair-splitting! What difference does it make whether you shake hands or raise hands? A promise is a promise. What difference if you make your promise inside or outside a house of worship? A promise is a promise. God is present, watching and holding you accountable regardless.'

'You're hopeless, you religious scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You keep meticulous account books, tithing on every nickel and dime you get, but on the meat of God's Law, things like fairness and compassion and commitment – absolute basics! – you carelessly take it or leave it. Careful bookkeeping is commendable, but the basics are required. Do you have any idea how silly you look, writing a life story that's wrong from start to finish, nitpicking over commas and semicolons?'

'You're hopeless, you religious scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You burnish the surface of your cups so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides are maggoty with your greed and gluttony: Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides, and then the gleaming surface will mean something.'

'You're hopeless, you religious scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You're like manicured graves, grass clipped and flowers bright, but six feet down it's rotting bones and worm-eaten flesh. People look at you and think you're saints, but beneath the skin you're total Frauds.'

'You're hopeless, you religious scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You build granite tombs for your prophets and marble monuments for your saints. And you say that if you had lived in the days of your ancestors, no blood would have been on your hands. You protest too much! You're cut from the same cloth as those murderers, and daily add to the death count.'

'Snakes! Reptilian sneaks! Do you think you can worm your way out of this? Never having to pay the piper? It's on account of people like you that I send prophets and wise guides and scholars generation after generation – and generation after generation you treat them like dirt, greeting them with lynch mobs, hounding them with abuse.'

'You can't squirm out of this: Every drop of righteous blood ever spilled on this earth, beginning with the blood of the good man Abel right down to the blood of Zechariah, Barachiah's son, whom you murdered at his prayers, is on your head. All this, I'm telling you, is coming down on you, on your generation.'

'Jerusalem! Jerusalem! Murderer of prophets! Killer of the ones who brought you God's news! How often I've ached to embrace your children, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you wouldn't let me. And now you're so desolate, nothing but a ghost town. What is there left to say? Only this; I'm out of here soon. The next time you see me you'll say, 'Oh, God has blessed him! He's come, bringing God's rule!'"

"Every single one of those things that Jesus found abhorrent in the church of his time this church practices today! Every single one of them is true of the Shining Light Christian Church and other similar churches! And they have the audacity to call themselves Christians when they practice the very things that Jesus reserved his strongest criticism for!"

"Think about this Pastor Mayotte, everything that you do is for show, for the show called church. Speaking in tongues, not scriptural, just a part of the show called church. Full immersion baptism, not supported scripturally, it is a public affirmation of a previously made decision, not as you claim an earth shattering moment, just another part of the show called church. And what about tithing? As Christians we are not obliged to tithe, Paul tells us this. We pay taxes to the authorities put in place by God to do the work previously carried out by the church. So why should we pay tithes, especially if we place ourselves in financial hardship to do so? Purely for budgetary reasons. Tithing is so that the church can have some idea of its future cash inflow. Tithing is yet another part of the show called church, part of man's rules, not God's"

"If you were to look closely at the life of Jesus you would see something quite disturbing. Because of his work with the poor and downtrodden, because of his healings, his fame was growing, he had become a victim of the cult of personality. As it tells us in this Scripture, 'Do you want to stand out? Then step down. Be a servant. If you puff yourself up, you'll get the wind knocked out of you. But if you're content to simply be yourself, your life will count for plenty.' Jesus saw his fame getting in the way of his work so he had to step down, allow himself to be crucified. Do you honestly believe that he, of all people, couldn't have avoided crucifixion? But in the Pentecostal church the 'cult of personality' is rife. The churches are built on it, the churches thrive on it."

"Think about this; 'Your lives are roadblocks to God's kingdom. You refuse to enter, and won't let anyone else in either.' You interpret the Bible to suit your agenda and if someone challenges that interpretation you will not countenance that challenge. 'It is wrong!' you say, 'End of story!' you say. 'It's on account of people like you that I send prophets and wise guides and scholars generation after generation – and generation after generation you treat them like dirt, greeting them with lynch mobs, hounding them with abuse.' If someone comes along and tells you that you just might be wrong in what you are doing, you rise up against that person, without giving a thought as to whether that person is right or not. You are right! End of story."

"So it is with the promises that you have made, you claim that they are from God, but if anyone has the unmitigated gall to tell you that they are not God's promises, the lynch mob appears."

"If you shake hands on a promise that's nothing; but if you raised your hand that God is your witness, that's serious'? What ridiculous hair-splitting! What difference does it make whether you shake hands or raise hands? A promise is a promise. What difference if you make your promise inside or outside a house of worship? A promise is a promise. God is present, watching and holding you accountable regardless. God is everywhere, he sees all, he hears all."

"Jesus was critical of the greed and hypocrisy that existed within the church of his time. That same greed and hypocrisy is extant in the church of our time and no more so than the Shining Light Christian Church and other similar churches that follow the 'Prosperity Doctrine'."

"'You burnish the surface of your cups so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides are maggoty with your greed and gluttony: Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides, and then the gleaming surface will mean something.' Is there a difference between the burnished outside of the cup and the 'Blessed by God' façade of the Shining Light Christian Church? No!"

"In his evidence my client stated that his business success was because he built a substantial product. He employed contractors over a long period of time, men that he could trust, and they did not betray that trust. He set a reasonable price for the houses that he built, a price that would give him a modest and comfortable return on his investment. His houses were always sold before completion because of his reputation for business and structural integrity. He also stated that when Pastor Mayotte and other Pastors in the church approached him to carry out work for them, he refused because they wanted something that, in their words, 'it didn't matter how it was built as long as it looked good'. This attitude is synonymous with this church's ideology, structural integrity is not important, just so long as it looks good."

"Jesus was crucified, not for claiming to be the 'Son of God', or that he was the 'King of the Jews', but because of his criticism of the church. He was branded a heretic because of his criticism of the church. My client, while not claiming to be Jesus, has been metaphorically crucified because of his criticism of the church. Just as Jesus was justified in his criticism of the church, we contend that my client had every justification for his criticism of this church."

"For every Scripture, every bit of instant coffee theology, cited by the Shining Light Christian Church, and other similar churches, in support of its 'Prosperity Doctrine', we have cited contextually accurate, contradictory Scripture."

"For every Scripture, every bit of instant coffee theology, cited by the Shining Light Christian Church, and other similar churches, in support of its worship practices of speaking in tongues, tithing and full immersion baptism, we have demonstrated that the Scripture was either mis-interpreted, taken out of context, or contradicted by other Scripture."

"In short we have demonstrated, conclusively, that this church has not only broken its promises to its people, it has broken the laws put in place by the authorities of this country, the authorities that the Bible tells us were put in place by God, and on top of that it has broken God's laws when it mis-represented Scripture, distorted Scripture, for its own venal benefit, for profit."

"If you shake hands on a promise that's nothing; but if you raised your hand that God is your witness, that's serious'? What ridiculous hair-splitting! What difference does it make whether you shake hands or raise hands? A promise is a promise. What difference if you make your promise inside or outside a house of worship? A promise is a promise. God is present, watching and holding you accountable regardless."

"Your Honour, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, we hold that this church is accountable for the promises it made. We have proven conclusively that the promises made by this church, the promise of an increase in my client's finances as a reward for diligent tithing, and the threat of punishment for non-compliance, were not, as the church asserts, God's promises, because there is absolutely no credible scriptural evidence, no unambiguous Scripture, to support that assertion. It is their own promise, and they alone are responsible for honouring those promises. They alone should be held accountable for those promises."

"The church could argue that my client should have known better. But there was no transparency in its teaching, the church actively discouraged the seeking of truth, actually concealed the truth, not only from my client but all others who attended the church. 'Your lives are roadblocks to God's kingdom. You refuse to enter, and won't let anyone else in either.'"

"This church will probably claim that if there is a sin involved it is a sin against God and that they will be judged when they get to heaven, if they get there. Big deal! That doesn't help the people that they are hurting in the here and now. Where I ask, is their unconditional love? We contend however, that while they have sinned against God, because they have sinned against the authorities put in place by God, they have also sinned against man. It is this secular sin that concerns us in this court and it is a secular judgment that we seek. In the matter of a spiritual judgment, that is between Pastor Mayotte, his church, and God. This court has no jurisdiction in that arena, and we do not seek a judgment in that arena."

"Your honour, the Shining Light Christian Church is an Assemblies of God business franchise, and the Assemblies of God church is, in turn, a franchisee of the Pentecostal church. It is a business enterprise that uses some, but by no means all, of the teachings of Jesus to justify its 'Christian church' status for taxation purposes, but its real purpose is the pursuit of commercial gain. In pursuit of that gain it uses business practices that, if it didn't hide behind its Christian church status, would have found it in contravention of many trade practices, and under the scrutiny of the relevant legislative authorities."

"Your Honour, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, it is our contention that you have no course of action open to you other than to find in favour of my client and award damages accordingly." Henderson sat down and looked across to the defendant's table. It was populated by some unhappy people.

Johansson slowly got to his feet. "Your Honour, I have to admit that I am impressed by the Counsel for the Plaintiff's faith, just as I am impressed by my client's faith. The difference between them is that Mr Henderson's faith is based on his interpretation of the Bible. Pastor Mayotte on the other hand, has based his faith on the literal Bible, the Word of God, the true word of God. According to some people, in particular the members of the media here assembled, I should just walk out the door and abandon my client to his fate. But I'm not going to do that and do you know why? Because my client is an honourable man who believes in what he does and does what he believes in. This he does to the best of his ability. He is a deeply religious man and there are those among the people here who would condemn him for that. He is a very devout Christian and there are those here who would condemn him for that. He has faith in what he does and there are those here who would condemn him for that. He has faith in the teachings of his church, and there are those here who would condemn him for that. These are just a few of the reasons that those here would condemn my client but, at another time and under different circumstances, those same people would hold my client up as an example of all that is good in this world."

"So what is the difference? It all depends on attitude. Your attitude to people, and what they do, very much guides how you view that person. Your attitude to yourself and what you do very much guides how you view other people. If your attitude to people does not agree with your attitude to yourself then there is a problem, for no matter what that person does, what that person stands for, you will always view him with disdain, with scepticism, even hatred and loathing. That person may not have done anything wrong but in your eyes, simply because of how you view the world around you, that person is guilty."

"There is no denying that Pastor Mayotte may not be the most intelligent man in the world, he hasn't, as the learned council for the Plaintiff has, a Doctorate in Theology. There is no denying that Pastor Mayotte may not be the most inquisitive man in the world. But the man you see before you today is one of the most loyal, trusting, faithful and consistent people that you will ever meet. It may be true that he didn't question the teachings of the Pentecostal church, because he has placed his trust in a church of God. He is not alone there. Many, many millions of people have trusted a church of God. It may be true that, in hindsight, he should have questioned the teachings, but he had been led to believe by the church that he would be doing the wrong thing if he did so."

"My client is guilty of nothing more than a misplaced trust in a higher authority within the church. This is not something that is confined to the Pentecostal branch of the church, other churches issue edicts that not all of its clergy and officials agree with, but they have to obey those edicts, for if they do not they risk serious repercussions. Other churches may also be guilty of practices that are abhorrent in our eyes. So, my client, Pastor Matthew Mayotte, if my learned friend opposite has proven his case, is a victim of that same monumental con game. He could be said to have been stupid because he was merely following the teachings that had been promulgated by a higher authority, namely his parent church in the United States, but being stupid is not a crime, and on that basis I would ask that you find that my client has no case to answer and that the plaintiff should take the matter up with that higher authority, the parent church."