Rather Expose Them Christian News Blog

GERMANY TOTALLY CUCKED: FOLLOWING RAPE, MURDER OF 19 YEAR OLD WOMAN IN FREIBURG, FATHER & OTHERS PLEAD FOR TOLERANCE TOWARD MUSLIM OFFENDER & MIGRANTS

GERMANY TOTALLY CUCKED


WARNS ABOUT 


“POPULIST ISLAMOPHOBIC HATE 


SPEECH” AFTER RAPE/MURDER

MARIA LADENBURGER KILLED 

BY MUSLIM MIGRANT

Daughter of top EU official RAPED, MURDERED by Muslim Migrant

BY PAMELA GELLER
SEE: http://pamelageller.com/2016/12/daughter-top-eu-official-raped-murdered-muslim-migrant.html/republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
Yesterday I reported that a Muslim migrant had brutally raped and murdered a young woman in Germany who was a member of an organization that helped refugees. Today there is more. Maria Ladenburger was the daughter of a high-ranking EU official.
They are saying the Muslim migrant is 17 years old. That is a lie. If tried as an adult, he would surely get a stiffer sentence.
The dead girl’s father is Dr. Clemens Ladenburger, a lawyer who works as the right hand man to the legal director of the European Commission. This is the poison fruit of the EU’s pro-invasion polices. Is Maria’s father still an ardent supporter of the Muslim invasion of Europe?
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DAUGHTER OF TOP EU OFFICIAL RAPED AND MURDERED IN GERMANY – AFGHAN MIGRANT ADMITS KILLING

By Rob Virtue, Allan Hall and Monika Pallenberg, The Express, December 4, 2016 (thanks to Dr. Andrew Bostom):
AN Afghan migrant has admitted the rape and murder of a medical student, who also worked voluntarily at a refugee centre.

Maria Ladenburger, the daughter of a high-ranking EU official, was returning from a party in the university city of Freiburg in Germany when she was assaulted on a cycle path. She was raped and then drowned before her body was found in the River Dreisam. The shocking incident happened on October 16 but details have only been released after an arrest on Friday.The suspect, an Afghan migrant, was caught after police found DNA on a scarf near the path.

The scarf reportedly belonged to Maria.
They also found a strand of hair on a nearby blackberry bush.
Officers then trawled CCTV to see find people with a similar hairstyle, which led them to the suspect.
Following his arrest the suspect, aged 17, pleaded guilty to the attack and will be sentenced next year.
The unnamed migrant arrived in Germany last year as an unaccompanied minor and lived with a local family in the city.
Maria Ladenburger murder - EU official daughter killed by refugee
Maria Ladenburger, daughter of an EU official daughter, was murdered

Ms Ladenburger reportedly worked in her spare time helping out in refugee homes in Freiburg.But it is unclear whether she ever met her murderer before he took her life.The dead girl’s father is Dr. Clemens Ladenburger, a lawyer who works as the right hand man to the legal director of the European Commission.

On October 26 he and his wife Frederika placed a memorial notice for Maria in the Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper.
The teen worked voluntarily at a migrant centre
The teen worked voluntarily at a migrant centre
Maria's father works at the European CommissionFACEBOOK
Maria’s father works at the European Commission

It read: “Maria was for 19 years a singular ray of sunshine for our family, and that she will remain.”We thank God for this gift, that he made you with us.  We are sure that she is safe with him.”A funeral requiem was held for Maria on October in Notre Dame des Graces Church in Brussels.

On December 6 this year Maria would have been 20.
David Müller, head of the police’s Special Commission, said: “Through interviews and a web-based survey, we were able to reconstruct Maria’s final hours.

“The 19-year-old student had been at a party. By 2.37am, she left the party. Maria then cycled home, as usual. The young woman had been the victim of a sexual offence and a violent crime.”The horror killing piles more pressure on Chancellor Angela Merkel who opened the nation’s borders to more than one million migrants since 2015. Earlier this week she was blasted by a father-of-four who said he no longer felt safe because of the migrant inlux.

But Dieter Salomon, the mayor of Freiburg warned people not to “apply perpetrator background for sweeping judgements, but to view it as an isolated incident”. 

________________________________________________________________

EU parents of daughter raped/murdered by Muslim migrant 

COLLECT FUNERAL DONATIONS FOR MIGRANTS

BY PAMELA GELLER
SEE: http://pamelageller.com/2016/12/eu-parents-daughter-rapedmurdered-muslim-migrant-collect-funeral-donations-migrants.html/republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
todesanzeige-maria
What’s worse: jihad or the sanction and support of its victims?
It is depravity, a sickness of the soul or perhaps it speaks more to a moral bankruptcy.
Like the daughter of one of the victims of the San Bernardino jihad slaughter, who said, “I just kind of didn’t understand how people could be that ignorant about another religion” said Kate Bowman, recalling the day her father, Harry Bowman, was murdered. Who doesn’t understand, Ms. Bowman? The dead or the jihadis?
This is hardly unique. Maria Ladenburger, the rape/murder victim of a Muslim migrant and whose father is a senior EU official, told people to not bring flowers to the funeral but give money to a pro-migrant organization that works to stop deportation of “refugees.”
These are the acts of a conquered people. Their daughter was brutally raped and murdered by a Muslim refugee and her parents are urging donations to an organization for migrants.
Unfortunately the organization “Weitblick Freiburg” deleted the Facebook posting with the comments, but this article reports that that Facebook users were outraged because Maria’s parents used her murder to raise funds for Muslim refugees.  “Weitblick Freiburg” works to stop the deportation of “refugees.”
Thanks to Markus who sent me the death notice (above) on Facebook. Assuming it is authentic, charity appeal is in the last sentence on the bottom.
Google translate:

FREIBURG: PARENTS OF THE MURDERED MARIA L. COLLECTED ON FUNERAL DONATIONS FOR REFUGEES

THE THOUGHTFUL VEREIN WEITBLICK FREIBURG EV PROMOTED THE SAME DAY FOR LESS DEPORTATIONS.

Mit erst 19 Jahren musste Maria qualvoll sterben. 2

With only 19 years Maria had to die very well.

It must be inconceivable for parents: Her 19-year-old daughter, Maria L., never returned from a student party. On October 18 her body was found on the river Dreisam. The autopsy revealed that Maria was brutally raped and then unconsciously thrown into the river. There she drowned.
The perpetrator is a 17-year-old Afghan asylum seeker
The search for the culprit is finally over : A 17-year-old Afghan was due to one belonging to him black scarf, its probably refugee helpers donated bicycle and a black hair, which lay in the riverbed, converted and finally arrested. Its DNA corresponds to that found in the body of the victim. The perpetrator was illegally submitted to Germany in 2015 and was one of the so-called unaccompanied minor refugees. He had already appeared in the context of a fight, but was not deported.
Mary’s parents collected at the funeral for a refugee project
At the end of October, the parents of Maria L., who came from a middle-class academic family, had a mourning display in the FAZ. In this, they wrote that they did not want to get flowers at the burial as usual, but that the mourners should donate money instead: on the one hand for the education work of the Catholic Church in Bangladesh, on the other for the association “Weitblick Freiburg eV” .
“Weitblick Freiburg eV” makes the same day advertising against deportations
The latter has been massively for the interests of asylum seekers, which with the great asylum glut have come the last two years to Germany and is cynically explicitly active in Freiburg asylum centers. Even on the day when the assassination of the 17-year-old Afghans was struck by the murder of Maria L., the club did not shrink from moving the drum for asylum seekers and for deportations. This is a behavior that is not very important for many Facebook users.
Es muss für Eltern unfassbar sein: Ihre 19 Jahre junge Tochter Maria L. kehrte nie von einer Studentenparty zurück. Am 18. Oktober wurde ihre Leiche am Fluss Dreisam gefunden. Die Autopsie ergab: Maria wurde zunächst brutal vergewaltigt und danach bewusstlos in den Fluss geworfen. Dort ertrank sie.
Der Täter ist ein 17 Jahre alter afghanischer Asylbewerber
Die Suche nach dem Täter ist nun endlich vorüber: Ein 17 Jahre alter Afghane wurde auf Grund von einem ihm gehörenden schwarzen Schal, seinem vermutlich von Flüchtlingshelfern gespendeten Fahrrad und eines schwarzen Haares, welche im Flussbett lagen, überführt und nun endlich festgenommen. Seine DNA entspricht der am Leichnam des Opfers gefundenen. Der Täter war 2015 illegal nach Deutschland eingereist und zählte zu den so genannten unbegleiteten minderjährigen Flüchtlingen. Er war bereits im Rahmen einer Schlägerei strafrechtlich in Erscheinung getreten, wurde jedoch nicht abgeschoben.
Marias Eltern sammelten auf der Beerdigung für ein Flüchtlingsprojekt
___________________________________________________

GERMAN GOVERNMENT WORRIES ABOUT ISLAMOPHOBIA AFTER MUSLIM REFUGEE RAPES & KILLS WOMAN

Warns citizens it will be monitoring angry Facebook posts

BY PAUL JOSEPH WATSON
SEE: http://www.infowars.com/german-government-worries-about-islamophobia-after-muslim-refugee-rapes-kills-woman/republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
The German government has reacted to the shocking news about a Muslim migrant who raped and killed a 19-year-old woman by warning that it would be watching Facebook posts carefully for instances of Islamophobia.
A teenage Afghan asylum seeker was arrested on Friday for the alleged rape and murder of a medical student in Freiburg which took place last month.
The victim’s father is a senior EU official and a vehement supporter of the migrant policy that has seen over a million “refugees” pour into Germany over the last year.
The aftermath of the murder was made even more bizarre by the fact that the victim’s parents used her funeral to raise money for charities that are working to bring more “refugees” into Germany. The victim herself was also a “refugee activist”.
As if the story couldn’t get any more disturbing, the German government’s response was to warn German citizens who expressed anger over the incident on Facebook that it would be on the lookout for Islamophobic hate speech.
Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel asserted that the murder should not be used to stoke anti-migrant sentiment.
“Such horrible murders already happened before the first Afghan or Syrian refugee arrived here,” Gabriel told the Bild newspaper. “We will not allow incitement after such violent crimes, no matter who commits them.”
In reality, the German government’s own statistics show that violent crimes have skyrocketed since over a million migrants arrived in the country.
The only individual with a shred of common sense appears to be the chairman of the DPoIG police union, Rainer Wendt, who said that the murder could have been prevented.
“We wouldn’t have this victim, and so many others, if our country had been better prepared for the dangers that always go along with massive immigration,” he told Bild.
Those concerns are not shared by Angela Merkel’s government, which is more pre-occupied with hunting down German citizens for inflammatory Facebook posts.
After the mass molestation of women in Cologne on New Year’s Eve, the German government and media conspired to cover-up the incident.
Reports of rapes, sexual assaults, crime sprees and violent attacks conducted by migrants in German cities are now commonplace and have led to a surge in popularity for the right-wing Alternative For Germany (AfD) party.
“We are shocked by this crime and at the same time we see that our warnings about the uncontrolled arrival of hundreds of thousands of young men from Islamic-patriarchal cultures are written off as populist,” said AfD co-chief Joerg Meuthen.

WATCH TRUMP MAKE OBAMA LOOK CLUELESS~DARKNET SITE TAKES DONATIONS FOR TRUMP ASSASSINATION

WATCH TRUMP MAKE OBAMA LOOK CLUELESS

Obama hit by the ‘Trump effect’ as inauguration day nears

Even though he has yet to take office, Donald Trump is already convincing companies to keep jobs in the US or move manufacturing stateside. Meanwhile, Obama is bumbling around talking about magic wands.
WATCH: TRUMP ANNOUNCES ERA OF PEACE

DARKNET SITE TAKES DONATIONS 

FOR TRUMP ASSASSINATION

“We have to go further as it will require much more than cyber attack to defend ourselves…”

Darknet Site Takes Donations for Trump Assassination
A website on the Darknet is collecting donations to allegedly help organize the assassination of both President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence.
Launched earlier this week, the website warns of the “political, environmental and social consequences” of a Trump presidency before urging readers to assist its cause.
trump-darknet-small
“As you are all well aware, the consequences of having Donald Trump and Mike Prence as the leaders of the free world is extremely dangerous,” the webpage says. “The political, environmental and social consequences will change the United States for the worst.”
The group claims to belong to a prominent “underground organization” that is now shifting tactics from cyber attacks to physical violence.
“We are part of a well-known underground organization that always defended and protected the rights of all people against crooked governments and regimes using different cyber attacks, but now, we have to go further as it will require much more than cyber attack to defend ourselves to avoid civil war or another world war.”
Visitors are asked to donate Bitcoin in order to cover the costs of equipment and bribes, which will be paid to alleged assets throughout the federal government and even the Secret Service.
According to CSO writer Steve Ragan, the group’s Bitcoin wallet has received more than $88,000 since March 2016 – although only $119 has been collected since the assassination website went live.
A Darknet-based email address is also provided for anyone willing to provide expertise or intelligence to the group.
Despite the provocative nature of the website, investigations into crowdfunded “murder-for-hire” Darknet sites have revealed them to belikely scams or run by law enforcement.
Infowars was unable to reach the Secret Service for comment.
Related: The Assassination of Donald Trump

RICK WARREN: FORGET SOLA SCRIPTURA, BUT THERE IS “PLUS SCRIPTURA”

RICK WARREN: FORGET SOLA SCRIPTURA, 
BUT THERE IS “PLUS SCRIPTURA” 
BY BUD AHLHEIM
SEE: http://pulpitandpen.org/2016/12/01/rick-warren-forget-sola-scriptura-but-there-is-plus-scriptura/republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
rw2
When the apostle Paul was writing his final letter to Timothy, he failed to include a number of things that are so frequently hurled about the Christian church today as utterly important, especially when it comes to hearing from God.
For example, the apostle did not instruct his young protégé on the importance of listening for God’s “still small voice” for personal and ministerial guidance. He didn’t remind Timothy about the importance of astutely discerning between God-sent, spiritual “impressions” for direction as opposed to those which might be of a distinctly more carnal nature.  The apostle of our Lord also forgot to advise the young minister about the importance of circumstances God may orchestrate in order to provide spiritual guardrails to guide him down the correct, providential path.
Flash forward from those 1st century apostolic epistles, that time when “the household of God was being built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus being the cornerstone,”(Ephesians 2:19-20; The true church, btw, is still being built on this basis.) to the 21st century church and you’ll find spiritual hucksters galore who are eager to disregard what we have been taught in the faith that was “once for all delivered.” (Jude 3) Once, apparently, wasn’t enough, so modern charlatans and frauds are redelivering a faux faith that more favorably aligns with the modern mind, with its urges for being “spiritual but not religious,” and for self-centered comfort and divine appeasement of our wishes rather than for a faith that requires obedience to “take up your cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23)
rew

Ever wonder about the actual width of the “wide path?” Look at these follower stats for a clue, perhaps.
It is here, in the midst of an “it’s all about you,” seeker-sensitive stage, where Rick Warren stands, delivering “another” faith under the guise of “the faith.” Warren, who is known for his discern-less, ecumenical alliances, his complacency with regards to orthodoxy, and his embrace of all things mystical, contemplative, and “spiritual,” has, in his recent Pastor Rick’s Daily Hope, corrected the apostle in his instructive oversight to Timothy.
11-25-16-awesome-relationships-four-ways-god-speaks-to-youWarren, in his post, Four Ways God Speaks To You, has minimized what the apostle maximized, and elevated what the apostle didn’t even mention. He has made Scripture equal to experience, precisely the formula of so many other false teachers in the modern church.  The four-pronged answer from “Pastor Rick” is in response to an ill-framed, rhetorical question. “How do I tune in so that I can hear God’s voice?”
The premise presupposed by this query is that God wants to speak to you, but that He’s unable to unless you become sufficiently “tuned in” to His divine wavelength. Though this is popular spiritual mythology today – which Warren is all too eager to consistently exploit – nothing in Scripture indicates the inability of our Sovereign God to make Himself known. There is no esoteric, mystical, spiritual wavelength on which God is transmitting to our ill-tuned spiritual radios. It’s new age hogwash.  (You wanna hear God speak?  Start flipping pages of the Holy Writ.)
But, in Warren’s daily devotion, he gives his readers an answer to this question.
According to Warren, God speaks to you in four ways:
“1. God speaks to us through the Bible.”   If you are actually doing what Christ said would define His disciples, abiding in His word (John 8:31), you’ll recognize that this method of divine speech is THE method of divine speech. God chose to reveal Himself in the Word, the Word that became flesh and the Word that would, by sovereign providence, become Holy Scripture, fully realized, finally closed, and ultimately eternal. (Psalm 119:89) If Rick would’ve stopped at point one, and pointed his devotees to Scripture, it would’ve been right in line with the apostle’s exhortation to Timothy.
But for Warren – as with so many other slick-tongued, ear-scratching charlatans that plague the modern church – Scripture ain’t enough. Evidently, God can’t say everything He needs to say – and hasn’t said everything He intended to say – in His Word.pexels-photo-27476-large
“2. God speaks to us through teachers.”  No doubt Warren needs to include this point to perpetuate his own position but the Bible-imbibing believer will understand that God uses teachers who “preach the Word.”  (2 Timothy 4:2) To the extent that a teacher or preacher infuses his lessons and sermons with Scripture, Christ will speak through that Scripture to feed His sheep.
This is why expository preaching is so critical. Feel good stories and morally-inclined sermons, sans Scripture, have zero nutritional value for the flock, but such calorie-void fast food, if accompanied by whiz-bang Hollywood-like staged theatrics and music, can create repetitive seatings of goats in the pews who cannot, of course, be fed actual sheep food. (Survey, perhaps, any of the 25,000 or more at Saddleback for more information.)
“It means to preach the Bible in such a way, that the meaning of the Bible passage is presented entirely and exactly as it was intended by God. That’s the challenge – the divine Word coming through the preacher.” John MacArthur on expository preaching
(As to Warren himself, this article from Tim Challies summarizes with a notable point about the Saddleback pastor. “One need only read Warren’s books or listen to a few of his messages to realize how often he explains and applies passages incorrectly. I assume this is because he has not taken the time to first humble himself before the Scripture and determine what the passages really mean. So do not be confused and presume that Warren is an expository preacher.”)
“3. God speaks to us through impressions.   Impressions? The God of the universe wants to speak to me, something that obviously has to be critical – this is GOD, after all – and He has to resort to psychological, mystical, and highly subjective, New Age, subliminal effects to get His point across?   Really?  Lemme check the color of my aura cuz Rick’s point is really giving me a dark, antagonistic feeling like something’s really amiss here. Call it an impression.
This is utterly unbiblical, but this mystical nonsense sells to those who’ll quickly abandon the Word in their hands for the almost-always carnal, “still small voice” in their heads. Though we have to resort to Scripture to understand this, the Sovereign God of the universe has made it clear that, given His omnipotent nature, He can, has, and will communicate via any means He will choose.   On one singular occasion, with a bonafide prophet, He used that oft sought after “still small voice.” But you ain’t a prophet. I ain’t a prophet. And Rick Warren most certainly ain’t a prophet. Not all of Scripture is prescriptive for us.  Just because God led Israel with pillars of cloud and fire, don’t expect that sort of divine guidance today.
How does God speak today? Read and study Hebrews (and the entire New Testament) for a thorough answer, but here’s a rather perspicuous Scriptural clue.
“Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son” (Hebrews 1:1-2)
It’s important not to underestimate the impact that our “flesh” has on these “impressions.” Paul exhibited his own practical battles with the flesh in Romans 7.
For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.  Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.  (Romans 7:15-19)
Paul was not speaking merely of succumbing to sinful temptations. It was not only the act that was sin, but his fleshly-inspired thoughts too. (1 Samuel 16:7)  Just verses earlier, in Romans 7:8, Paul confessed that “sin … produced in me all kinds of covetousness.” The singular solution that Paul knew and gave is found in Romans 7:25, “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.” The “law of God” was not for Paul, nor is it for us, a subliminal transference of divine instruction. It was not an “impression.”  It was the Holy Scripture through which God had both revealed Himself and established His expectations for His chosen creatures.  You can live the rest of your entire Christian life and never have a warm fuzzy, but you’ll always have the truth, and guidance, of God in His Word.  Assurance, instruction, and guidance come from the Word.  Scripture is God’s voice.
 “The Spirit and the Word must be combined. If I look to the Spirit alone without the Word, I lay myself open to great delusions.”   George Mueller
But for Warren, so long as you don’t go to the extreme of thinking “every impression is from God” or to the extreme that “no impression is from God,” you’ll be in the middle … right where God can speak. This is epic false teaching consistent with a “wide path” theology.
 “4. God speaks to us through our circumstances.”  Though God is entirely sovereign and though there is no single event in the universe that occurs that is not in accord either with His explicit or His permissive will, the only way in which we can identify “God speech” through providentially coordinated circumstance is by being saturated in the Word. It is this that allows one with even a superficial reading of Romans 1, for example, to identify God’s current judgment of sin in the world.
To the extent that we understand His written Word, we are capable of seeing the sovereign hand of God at work in circumstances, for there are none in which He is inactive. But the preeminence of the Word is paramount. Apart from the Truth that He has given us in Holy Scripture, we remain – at best – limited to noble conjecture and uncertain speculation about interpreting the events around us.  Yet we need not focus on or fret about circumstances,  because “we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”  (Romans 8:28)
But according to Warren, “If we’re going to live a life of significance, God’s got to make constant course corrections, and one of the things he uses to do that is the circumstances that come into our lives.”
First, where, exactly, does Scripture tell us we are to live “lives of significance?” We are regularly exhorted to live “lives of obedience,” but “lives of significance” seems glaringly absent from the pages of our Holy Writ.
 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.  All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.   2 Timothy 3:14-17
In a preemptive Scriptural rebuke to the musings of false teacher Warren, here are the apostle Paul’s four points …  are all fixated on one thing … Holy Scripture.
  1. Scripture is salvific, the starting point for anyone seeking to hear from God. “The sacred writings … are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.”
  2. Scripture is good for teaching and reproof. This pair of attributes speaks to the “sound doctrine” (Titus 2:1) elucidated by God’s Word. Through it, we learn what is true and, thereby, are able to identify what is false.
  3. Scripture is good for correction and training in righteousness. These two attributes speak to the power of Scripture to guide our conduct. It corrects us by the convicting aid of the Holy Spirit when we err in sin, and, when consistently digested by the sheep, it trains us to arrive, finally and ultimately, at the fruition of Christ’s ambition for all His sheep … Be holy for I am holy. (1 Peter 1:16)
  4. Scripture makes us complete or equipped (Paul used two forms of the same Greek word here). The apostle was pointing out that the man of God that Timothy was to become could rely completely on His revelation in His Holy Scriptures.  Nothing else was necessary.
Unlike Rick Warren, Paul made clear the singular priority of Scripture. Keep in mind, too, if it had been remotely important for Timothy – who was effectively being passed the non-apostolic mantle of Paul’s ministry – to know how to listen to subjectively-interpretable impressions or distinguish between the flesh vs. spirit voices in his head, or how to read the circumstances of his life in order to hear God’s voice, Paul would have made those things clear. But Paul recommended none of these things simply because these things are not necessary, or Scripturally-prescribed,  for us to know when, where, or what God is speaking.
Peter echoes Paul’s sentiments regarding the preeminence of Scripture. Though, unlike Paul, he was an “eyewitness of his majesty,” and though he heard the “voice borne by the Majestic Glory,”  Peter says we have something far more valuable than what his eyes saw or his ears heard. “We have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention.”  (2 Peter 1: 16-21)
It may not be enough for Rick Warren or for those seeking spiritual “experiences,” but Scripture was more than enough for the apostles. It is certainly enough for us.
“Whatever is to be revealed by the Spirit to any of us is in the Word of God already. He adds nothing to the Bible and never will.”  Charles Spurgeon
[Contributed by Bud Ahlheim]
See also:

JAN MARKELL (& ERIC BARGER): EMBRACING THE SPIRIT OF ERROR

JAN MARKELL: 
EMBRACING THE SPIRIT OF ERROR
SEE: http://pulpitandpen.org/2016/11/30/jan-markell-another-dangerous-wolf-in-sheeps-clothing/republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. – 2 Timothy 4:3-4
Jan Markell, radio host of Understanding the Times Radio has exhibited an extraordinary lack of discernment. Once viewed as a sound discernment ministry, speaking out against the heresies of Roman Catholicism, ecumenism, and many other false teachers parading around in the church, Markell’s Olive Tree Ministries has slid deep into apostasy over the last few years.
It began when Jan Markell started promoting Jonathan Cahn’s book, The Harbinger, back in 2012. The Harbinger was a book on the NY Times Best Sellers list that made arduous claims regarding the application of Scriptures to the United States and twisting them completely out of context. For example, Cahn claimed in the book that Isaiah 9:10“The bricks have fallen down, but we will rebuild with smooth stones,” is a reference to the rebuilding of the World Trade Center in New York. The book is replete with false information, bad doctrine, and twisted Scriptures. Yet, this didn’t deter Markell, as she and Cahn were both contributors to the Christian news website, Worldnet Daily, who was also heavily promoting the book at the time.
Markell, and her partner-in-crime and co-host, Eric Barger, co-hosted a radio program in July of 2012 in which, according to the description, “continued questioning Jonathan Cahn on important issues and accusations flying around the Internet and on radio.” The radio program then spent the remaining time defending Cahn’s false teachings, twisted Scripture, and dangerous theology. Markell and Barger were confronted by multiple ministries, including Worldview Weekend, regarding their continued promotion of this dangerous book and false teacher, yet she persisted in sin and continued to ignore the Scriptural warnings given to her.
Before this debacle, Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend was a regular fill-in and supporter of Markell’s ministry. As stated before, she was apparently a strong proponent of sound biblical doctrine and a solid discerner of truth. At the time, it was baffling that she could become so caught up in this false teaching and such a staunch defender of heresy. After Howse decided he had no choice but to distance himself from Markell’s ministry, Markell’s co-host, Eric Barger put out an article repudiating the “kind” of discernment that had been perpetuated around them. I personally reached to Markell, asking her to consider the truths being presented to her by Howse and others, and to seek reconciliation. Eric Barger responded via email,
Just so you understand, my article was not about any individual but about the culture in the discernment community. It has become “push my pet peripheral theologies and call it discernment” and you dare not disagree with some of them or suddenly YOU become the target.
Worst is that some discerners have decided that rejecting pleas for dialog before going public against others is the way to go. It’s shoot first and talk later. I won’t repeat stuff from my articles here but knowing what I know from behind the scenes, I am first shocked, then saddened, and finally in a state of no confidence concerning the work and integrity of some of that I thought were the most trustworthy people in our circle. No wonder the heretics and emergents laugh at us.
Markell, herself, also responded to me via email, saying,
We’re not calling out Brannon Howse here. We’re addressing the entire discernment community who chooses to heavily bash, bash. I know he is naming me on his program and you might ask him to lay off. There is a rule in radio that you do not do that. 99% of radio networks throw off any ministry that calls other broadcasters out by name and scolds them. It is just not ever done. It is as unprofessional as you can get. We have stayed light years away from even naming the discerners we have in mind here, although they have all tried to roast this ministry, Eric Barger, etc., and many, many more.
Now, keep in mind, that Markell’s ministry was a discernment ministry that regularly engaged in public attacks against others that they deemed to be false teachers. However, when they are confronted about their public promotion and perpetuation of false teachings, all of a sudden, this kind of discernment is unacceptable.
Fast-forward four years later, another one of Jan Markell’s co-hosts reaches out to Pulpit & Pen with a complaint against us regarding our exposing of the false teachings of Anne Graham Lotz. Brandon Hines posted an article on Lotz, who was heavily promoting Pagan prayer circles and the Jewish mystic, Honi. Jill Martin Rische writes to us and threatens to expose Pulpit & Pen on her and Jan’s next radio program. She says,
Just because some people today have twisted circle making to their own ends does not make the ancient judicial practice of it pagan mysticism or witchcraft—and just because Anne Lotz quotes Honi from the Jewish legal text, the Mishnah, does not make her guilty of endorsing mysticism.
We are currently finishing a segment on polemics and internet apologetics (I co-host with Jan Markell on Understanding the Times radio), so we will add to it an examination of the Pulpit and Pen’s methodology. You are welcome to send me a statement or I can excerpt your comments here. Whatever all of you say, printing accusations against another believer based on poor historical research is bearing false witness and you should retract this article and apologize to Mrs. Lotz.
First, the extent that Jill, Jan Markell’s co-host, goes to defend this heresy is astounding. But keep in mind, Markell had already told me that “there is a rule in radio that you do not do that,” that is, publicly attack another ministry. So, Markell tells us that it’s against the rules to publicly attack another ministry on radio, while her co-host is writing to us threatening to publicly attack our ministry on their radio program. Needless to say, we told her to pound sand, and we never heard from her again.
But their promotion of false teachings and bad theology has not ended. On November 19, Markell hosted a radio program with patriotic political Scripture-twister, Michelle Bachmann, in which they compared Donald Trump’s presidential win to Elijah’s victory over the prophets of Baal. Bachmann, who said back in July, that God may be “lifting up” Donald Trump because he “might be the only one who can save America,” said on Markell’s program last week regarding Trump’s victory,
This in my mind can only be described as something analogous to Elijah and the prophets of Baal, because in the natural, never would this have happened. This only happened in the supernatural and I believe it is because believers saw that we were on a precipice.
Brannon Howse responded to this by tweeting,
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and
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“If Michele Bachmann wants republican victory over false prophets like Elijah why pray with false prophet like Lou Engle? Dems don’t do this,” Howse says.
Markell, it appears, has jumped onto the bandwagon of the New Apostolic Reformation’s false teachings regarding modern day prophets and apostles. The kind of Scripture-twisting and heresy that Markell used to fight against has now become the foundation of her ministry. She has become deeply immersed in unbiblical traditions of men. Markell was once surrounded by solid Bible teachers, yet continually refused to acknowledge the Scriptural truth the presented her with. This is a mark of a false teacher. She was easily drawn away to man-made myths. Now she has surrounded herself with false teachers, like Jonathan Cahn, Michell Bachmann, and others, to suit her own passions–prophetic patriotism. Her first passion, it seems, is not the promotion of the Gospel or the cross, but the salvation of America and Israel as a nation.  She has put herself in a position to where she will partner with any false teacher or promote any false doctrine, as long as it advances this cause. Jan Markell and Olive Tree Ministries has become a dangerous hotbed of unsound teaching and is a ministry that should be marked and avoided.

SALVATION ARMY (PART TWO): CHURCH OF THE RED KETTLE: IS GOD JUST A HIGHLY EFFECTIVE FUND RAISING TOOL?

SALVATION ARMY (PART TWO): 
CHURCH OF THE RED KETTLE: IS GOD JUST A HIGHLY EFFECTIVE FUND RAISING TOOL?

BY BUD AHLHEIM
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
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“There is no limit to how complicated things can get, on account of one thing always leading to another.” E. B. White
E.B. White’s observation of the obvious is assuredly the case when looking at the goings-on of The Salvation Army. Things get very complicated when trying to determine exactly what the Army is and exactly what truly drives them. While it cannot be argued that it isn’t zealously humanitarian in its ambitions, as we pointed out previously there is a very real sense in which adherents to Army doctrine may genuinely be motivated to perform good works – and many of them are, indeed, “good” – in order to maintain their own salvation. The “salvation” of the Army is tentative and unless one works at it, assurance of its efficacy is absent. Such is the faulty synergistic gospel to which the Army subscribes and – whenever it happens to – proclaims.
But, as White observed, things quickly become complicated when analyzing the Army. The Army is a church. It’s a denomination. It’s a charity. It’s an international relief agency. It’s a humanitarian initiative. It’s a government ally in corrections and rehabilitation services. The Army, according to its website, is engaged in the most high-profile categories of social need, from elderly services, human trafficking, hunger relief, homeless services, prison ministries to disaster relief.
Yet, fundamentally, the Army presents itself as a Christian organization and identifies itself as a church in the evangelical tradition.
Our mission: The Salvation Army, an international movement, is an evangelical part of the universal Christian Church. Its message is based on the Bible. Its ministry is motivated by the love of God. Its mission is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and to meet human needs in His name without discrimination. (Source)
Perhaps the most astute observation about the state of the modern church, including the Salvation Army – to the extent it might be considered a “church” – comes to us from John MacArthur. The most defining characteristic of the contemporary evangelical church, he says, is “a spiraling loss of confidence in the power of Scripture.”
With the Salvation Army, evidence for its disregard of Scripture is easily seen in such things as its faulty gospel with an insufficient God and a not-fully-atoning Savior, and its refusal to duly administer the Christ-commanded ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. While its confidence in the power of Scripture is glaringly absent, the Army does seem to exhibit full confidence in one thing in particular – the power of its coffers. The Salvation Army is a mammoth money-making machine. If fund-raising were a gift of the Spirit, the Army would be a demi-god.
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According to Forbes listing of The 50 Largest U.S. Charities for 2015, The Salvation Army ranks second. Only $30 million shy of The United Way in the top spot (In case you didn’t know, the United Way is itself a major donor to and strategic partner with the Army. The United Way is also, by the way, a financial supporter of Planned Parenthood.) The Salvation Army raked in over $4.1 Billion in revenue during 2015. (By comparison, consider the 2015 Great Commission Giving program of the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest evangelical denomination according to Pew Research Center. That reported total came in at just over $613 million from over 46,000 contributing, cooperating churches.)
(Some variations in list tabulations of charities exists. For example, according to an October 2016 report by The Chronicle of Philanthropy, a source often cited by news media, the Salvation Army ranked 6th. Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund took the top spot, bumping out United Way.)
The Army’s revenue was twice that of Feeding America, the number three charity on the Forbes list. The combined 2015 revenues of Goodwill Industries ($927 M), the American Cancer Society ($840 M), the American Red Cross ($735 M), the American Heart Association ($546 M), Samaritan’s Purse ($467 M), and Save The Children ($448 M), for example, do not match the Army’s sizable footprint in nonprofit America. The “church” of the red kettle is a behemoth.
When thinking about church and wealth, what comes to mind but the Roman Catholic Church? According to a CNN Money report from September 2015, the Vatican Bank has over $8 billion in assets. Aside from the literally priceless art, artifacts and historic relics (How can a value be placed on such things as Mary’s Holy Belt, or John The Baptist’s Head, or The Tunic of The Blessed Virgin, or, indeed, the very Chains of St. Peter?), the decadent wealth of Rome has been, from the days of Tetzel’s indulgence-selling crusades, a long time source of angst among Protestants and even some Catholics. Still, the $8B figure is certainly not indicative of the actual net worth of Rome. Two sources give a clue to this. One report, from the International Business Times, states that, in 2014, the Catholic Church in America was generating upwards of $850 million per week from parishioner donations. According to a 2012 report in The Economist, the American Catholic Church operated an annual budget of $170 billion.
But considering the nearly two millennia which Rome has had in which to enrich itself through global expansion, illicit doctrinal indoctrination, and untold civil alliances, and though it’s unlikely to topple the opaque fortune amassed by the apostate of the Tiber, the much younger upstart church of the Salvation Army – it celebrated 150 years in 2015 – hasn’t done such a bad job in accruing fabulous financials for itself.screen-shot-2016-11-26-at-5-49-24-am
In the Salvation Army’s 2015 Financial Accountability Statement, the “church” claims total assets of $58.6 Billion, of which $2.7 billion are in cash or cash equivalents. Its Canadian operation is reported (by Charity Intelligence Canada) to have nearly another $1 billion in funding reserves, bringing the Army’s North American war chest total to nearly $4 billion on hand.
Where does the Army generate this revenue? There are multiple revenue streams that are, as E.B. White suggested in the opening quote, complicated to trace. Starting at the watch-dog groups seems to produce little clarity.
While there are various charity wwatchdog groups – the major ones are GuideStarCharity NavigatorGiveWellCharityWatch, and the BBB’s give.org, it appears that the Army, because of its religious affiliation, isn’t reviewed by most of them. The site give.org does give “Accredited Charity” status to the Army, with positive marks for the “Standards For Charity Accountability” that it reviews. The Army is unreviewed by Charity Navigator, and the entry from Guidestar is less a review than a summary of the services engaged upon by the Army that seems merely gleaned from its own website.
screen-shot-2016-11-26-at-5-29-53-amBecause the Salvation Army is a non-profit religious organization, its annual reports it are not subject to scrutiny beyond its own internal oversight but they do provide information regarding the sources from which its magnificent revenue flows. According to the data from its website, the Army reports that 62% of 2015 revenue came from “Direct Public Support.”
While the iconic Christmas-time red kettle crusade may be the most visible fundraising initiative of the Army, it is merely one small marketing effort employed to fill the Army’s coffers. According to the Army’s summary of its “124th Red Kettle Campaign,” the 2015 revenue generated by generous-minded holiday shoppers totaled just over $144 million. But the holiday bell-ringers provide a well-placed, polished image of the Army to the general public and provide a “feel good” moment for the coin tossing kettle donor.  (Oh, those seasonal kettle donations are not earmarked by the Army for Christmas-time aid to the needy; the donations generated by bell-ringing attendants – often by court-ordered “beneficiaries” of the Army, by volunteers, or by low-paid employees – go into the Army’s general fund.)
The Army hires professional marketing firms to assist in its ongoing pursuit of “direct public support.” One such firm, True Sense Marketing, generated $265,814 for the Baton Rouge Army office, being paid a fee of $73,999 – or nearly 28% of the haul – for its oversight of the fundraising campaign. Apparently, True Sense has found a major client in the Army, naming its own blog “The Ringer: Straightforward thoughts and insights from fundraising professionals.” (Financial data drawn from The Salvation Army – Baton Rouge 2014 IRS Form 990 Return – Source)
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In addition to individual donations, which are solicited in every conceivable way – including direct mail and television advertising – the Army has enormous support from corporate donors. Walmart, Sam’s Clubs, Kroger, Harris Teeter, Papa Johns, Hanes, JC Penney, and Big Lots are a few notable supporters during the holiday season. Other corporate donors include Target (the retailer most recently newsworthy for its support of transgender bathrooms in its stores), FedEx, UPS, Entemann’s, Sprint, Macy’s Inc., Walgreens, and Hobby Lobby.
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Jerry Jones, Charlotte Jones Anderson, Commissioner David Jeffrey
The Army’s image has been bolstered during the NFL season with the aid of Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones who is a vigorous supporter of the organization. Salvation Army ads ran during the Thanksgiving Day Cowboy’s game featuring yet another corporate sponsor, 7Up/Canada Dry. (In the event the Army actually paid the$300k-700k for the airtime – the going rate for a 30 second NFL broadcast commercial – one wonders why, only back in June the Army was getting headlines for having to close a homeless shelter in Peoria, IL due to a lack of “government funding.” The funding loss that precipitated the shelter’s close? $190,000.)
The Army reports that its second major source for revenue are from sales to the public. The organization operates 1,237 thrift shops around the nation. Reselling donated goods, the stores – and the collection/warehousing/distribution operations behind them – are often manned by laborers assigned to the Army’s rehabilitation work programs, often by court order.
While revenue flows through the cash registers of the thrift stores, it’s also hauled by the truckloads from the massive recycling operation behind the scenes. Items that are not store-worthy for resale are often sold for their scrap value, particularly items with metal content. It’s reported that laborers in some Army intake warehouses dismantle unsellable electronics for the metals, even clipping power cords from appliances to strip out the copper wiring. One insider reported that such recyclables are sold to scrapyards for upwards of $7000 per truckload. No doubt, this is a savvy profit-producing maneuver – free inventory that’s tax-deductible for the donor, and that’s either sold for full profit in a thrift store or is recycled for full profit.
Complaints from employees (a few random screen grabs are shown below) about store operations, management abuses, and disrespectful managers are replete. The Army reports that it employs over 65,000 people, so complaints are to be expected perhaps. Employees who are often court-ordered “beneficiaries” of Army programs report mistreatment, disregard, and, of course, “low pay,” a complaint responded to with the retort that the “rehab program” of the court ordered participant is a “work” program, not a “therapeutic” one.
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The third substantial source of church … err … Army revenue is from the government. In 2015, the Army reports taking in over $352 million in government funds. Some of these funds are for the direct benefit of the Army, such as the $30,000 it received as a “green infrastructure” incentive when building its new city headquarters in Harrisburg, PA. Other grants pass through Army coffers for social aid programs it administers on behalf of the government, such as the $46,000 given to theMissoula, MT Army for its “winter shelter program,” or the unspecified amount provided to the Army in High Point, NC to help pay “your electric bill during hot summer months.”
It’s important to note that government grants to the Army are not pure pass throughs. That is, grants allow for the administering agency – in this case, the Army – to retain administrative and overhead costs associated with the agency’s implementation of the grant. A retention of 10% or more of the grant’s total value is not uncommon.
(While government grants to the Army are not “dollar for dollar” pass-throughs to their targeted recipients, neither are the public donations and corporate contributions. CNN Money reports that “The Salvation Army typically spends 82% of donations on aid.” Other notable charities? The Red Cross is at 91%; Feeding America is at 98%; Feed The Children is at 92%. World Vision is at 85%.)
Another credit to E.B. White’s “one thing leads to another” comment is gleaned from the Army’s entanglement with the government, particularly in its extensive “correctional services” efforts. In many municipalities around the country, the Salvation Army is utilized by civil courts to administrate rehabilitation programs such as “batterers intervention, anger management, and drug and alcohol abuse treatment programs.” The fines, penalties, or dues related to the court are often due payable not to the local magistrate, but to The Salvation Army.
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Source: http://www2.duvalclerk.com/departments/misdemeanor/
To further consider are complaints of abuse by court ordered “beneficiaries,” a term used by the Army to reference those ordered to participate in its programs. Stories persist of the Army’s strong-arm tactics in commandeering a substantial portion – in some cases, 75% has been claimed – of social welfare benefits to which the individual might be entitled. In return for acceptance into the “work” rehab program, the lodging “beneficiary” is provided “three-hots-and-a-cot,” required to work at zero or below minimum wage, and forfeits a portion of their social welfare benefits, such as food stamps, to the Army. It is claimed that redemption of food stamps by the Army represents a significant portion of the food with which it reports to serve over 56 million meals per year, primarily to the over 10 million “lodgings supplied” it claims.
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Source: http://truthin7minutes.com/Salvation.php
Now, pause a moment and remind yourself … the Salvation Army, despite what it does or what most people think it is, considers itself a church, a Christian ministry. To quote the Army’s third-person description of itself again … “Its mission is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and to meet human needs in His name without discrimination.”
Consider your church, or your denomination, or any other evangelical denomination that you know besides the Salvation Army. Do you know any with such vigorous fundraising priorities? There certainly aren’t any that, for the frequently gospel-void and myopic focus of relieving temporal human misery, match the Army in money making effectiveness. Did your church get any government grants this year to help those in need in your community? Or, like most churches, did it simply pray and itself fund the outreach – hopefully (unlike the Army) replete with Gospel recitations – to the needy it sought to serve?
The Army finds itself unfavorably disobedient to Scripture’s teaching to be in the world but not of it. Paul warns the church “not to be unequally yoked” (2 Corinthians 6:14) with unbelievers. How valid, then, is “yoking” with the government to solicit funds for the purposes of social justice? Perhaps, like its presumptuous claim of divine exemption to disregard the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, the church of the Army has presumed to operate on the assumption of a similar divine pass to permit its unscriptural alliances with the world and its reliance on secular entanglements to perform its “God-given” eternal mission.
In fact – not to argue the validity of Christians doing “mercy-based” acts of kindness in an unbelieving world – the New Testament gives ZERO examples of such engagement with the world to achieve social justice ends, alleviate human misery, or, even, of feeding the pagan poor. We aregiven the example of the New Testament church being exhorted by Paul to aid the famine-suffering saints in Jerusalem, but we read nothing of a campaign by the church to alleviate all hunger in the city. (See Acts 11:291 Corinthians 16:1Romans 15:26, for example. In fact, 2 Corinthians 8:1 – 9:15 is a rich testimony of Christian charity, borne of the “relief of the saints” in Jerusalem.)
Noble though they may be, acts of mercy and deeds of charity are not the Gospel.
“At one time, “holistic ministry” was an expression intended to move Christians beyond proclamation to include deeds of mercy. Increasingly, however, “holistic ministry” refers to deeds of mercy without any proclamation of the gospel—and that is not holistic. It is not even halfistic, since the deeds of mercy are not the gospel: they are entailments of the gospel. …Judging by the distribution of American mission dollars, the biggest hole in our gospel is the gospel itself.”  D.A. Carson
Though the unscriptural alliance of the Salvation Army with the world is evident enough, the fact remains enormous volumes of cash flow through it. While “the ends justify the means” isn’t a Christian platitude, the Army’s intentional secular alliances seem to employ such consequentialism. There is little ground on which to argue that the Army doesn’t do some temporal good, but the Christian’s first priority is obedience to God, who then determines – and most certainly will achieve – His ends. (Paul never applied for Roman grants to feed starving Jerusalem unbelievers … or believers.)
It’s to be expected that anything remotely Christian will be attacked by a pagan world spiraling ever deeper – as God releases His restraining mercy – into wickedness and depravity. Though the world today is quick to scream for tolerance, the culture defiantly refuses to exhibit this lofty trait when it comes to Christians or Christianity. (Of course, Scripture tells us such things will happen. Take a look at 2 Timothy 3:1-9, for example.)
The Salvation Army has not been immune to such attacks. But, how does it stand when the darkness attacks? Not well.
For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.  Mark 8:38
In a legal case in which the option to stand firm for the gospel (such as the Army knows it) and the social mission to which it claims to be called of God, the Army chose to forego a firm stance on its Christian convictions and, instead, accommodate the secular demands of the prosecuting litigants against it. (Can it really be considered “persecution” when you end up giving in?)
The New York Times (and the Huffington Post and the New York Civil Liberties Union) reported on the case. “The Salvation Army on Tuesday settled a decade-old lawsuit that charged it with engaging in religious discrimination by requiring its government-funded social service employees to reveal their beliefs and to agree to act in accordance with the Christian gospel. As part of the settlement, approved by a federal judge in Manhattan, the Salvation Army will distribute to its New York employees who work in programs that receive government financing a document stating that they need not adhere to the group’s religious principles while doing their jobs, nor may they be asked about their religious beliefs.”
In addition to relinquishing their stand for their convictions, the Army also agreed to pay $450,000 to settle claims made against it for “proselytizing” by two “former employees.”
Why would the Army yield on its previously held convictions? Perhaps it was the threat of loss of nearly $188 million in grant money from New York government that persuaded them. The writer for the Huffington Post titled his article on the case, “The Salvation Army’s White-Flag Surrender to Secularism,” an apt summation perhaps, but a pathetic testimony for a supposed “Christian” mission in the world.
God may provide but the grant money was a sure thing. Besides, look at all the good we’re doing. One can just imagine the rationalizations of consequentialism going on in the Army’s HQ. The soup kitchens and homeless shelters in New York would remain open thanks to the Army’s cowering while onlookers saw what really mattered most to these “Christians.”
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The Army’s Tiber-like financial statement reports over $58 billion in assets. A significant portion of these assets are its vast real estate holdings. While the Army operates many different sorts of “missions,” from homeless shelters to group homes to corrections-related half-way houses, and though the value of these facilities is substantial, so too are their vast holdings of other commercial real estate.
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While the National Headquarters of the Army in Alexandria, Virginia (pictured) may be valued at $9 million (according to the Alexandria Property Appraiser’s website), other state-based headquarters are equally as expensive. In Florida, the Army’s state headquarters in Lutz (shown below) shows a market value of just over $13 million. The 100,000 SF Texas headquarters carries a value of over $5 million, itself being only one of 53 properties owned by the Army in Dallas. In California, a block southwest of the Moscone Center in San Francisco is the $11 million Golden State headquarters.
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Florida State Salvation Army Headquarters
But beyond the facilities operated for social services and the corporate facilities are the Army’s holdings in single-family, residential properties. These holdings are substantial. Two news articles, one from the East Coast, one from the West, feature prominently an investigation into these holdings in their respective cities.
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The first comes from the Los Angeles Times. In that article, titled “Salvation Army is a residential real estate powerhouse,” the author writes that “In Los Angeles and Orange Counties alone, the charity owns 87 homes and condominiums worth about $52 million.”
A similar journalistic review of the Army, this time from the Tampa Bay Times, found an equally impressive portfolio. The article, “Salvation Army is part church, part charity, part business,” states that, “Few donors realize the Salvation Army owns a $12 million Florida headquarters in Lutz, a $3 million office complex in New Port Richey and dozens of homes in the Tampa Bay area – all part of a largely tax-exempt local real estate portfolio worth about $75 million.”
Why the substantial residential real-estate holdings? Beyond the obvious “it makes good business and investment sense” response, these homes are for the use of Army officers. It’s a perk of officership. In the LA Times story, an officer whose day job in the Army found him overseeing a 54-bed treatment center for alcoholics and drug addicts found him living in an Army-provided $1.3 million Santa Monica home.
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One of numerous Florida homes owned by Salvation Army
The Tampa Bay article reports that “Officers, who are ordained clergy, live rent free in the homes, including some that cost as much as $300,000. The organization provides them with cars, health insurance, furniture, and Internet service. It even pays the homeowners’ association dues.”
“And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”Matthew 8:20
Though Army officers are not themselves getting wealthy for the service they render to the organization – the typical salary is around $36,000 annually – the Army itself, under the auspices of helping the needy and promoting the gospel, is amassing a fortune. And when the general public discovers this, the initial shock is quickly overcome by distaste and consternation.
“I just have a problem with them standing out there with their kettles at Christmastime and people putting their hard-earned money in there when they own millions and millions and millions of dollars of real estate. … It just doesn’t look right. I don’t like it.” (Source)
Both the LA Times and The Tampa Bay Times cite Daniel Borochoff, President of CharityWatch (formerly known as the American Institute of Philanthropy) in response to the recognition of the Army’s vast real estate assets. “They want to be able to project an image that they do this dedicated work for peanuts.” (Source)
“It creates an appearance issue because John Public thinks, ‘I give the Salvation Army my hard-earned 50 bucks and it’s going to go to this fancy home I can’t afford to live in.” (Source)
(Worth noting is that The Salvation Army is not among the “Top Rated Charities” in any category ranked by Charity Watch. “Groups included on the CharityWatch Top-Rated list generally spend 75% or more of their budgets on programs, spend $25 or less to raise $100 in public support, do not hold excessive assets in reserve, have met CharityWatch’s governance benchmarks, and receive “open-book” status for disclosure of basic financial information and documents to CharityWatch.” SOURCE)
sagay1The Army & The LGBTQ Issue
In 2012, during an interview on an Australian radio broadcast, an officer (who is, don’t forget, an ordained minister) responded to a question which left the clear impression to many that the Army believes that “gays should be put to death.”
(Just for grins, compare that to this leading Southern Baptist pastor who suggested not that gays should be put to death, but that those opposed – on Biblical grounds – to his church’s gospel-void, affirming embrace of homosexuals should be put to death.)
Nevertheless, the Army officer’s comments created a whirlwind of outrage. The Army was quick to offer a clarifying apology stating that “The Salvationist Handbook of Doctrine does not state that practicing homosexuals should be put to death and, in fact, urges all Salvationists to act with acceptance, love, and respect to all people.”
(Aussie salvo apologies are nothing new, apparently. The Salvation Army, again in Australia, issued an apology in 2006 related to 500+ claims of child abuse occurring over numerous decades in its Children’s Homes throughout the continent. Though no longer on its website, the archived webpage of the Army’s “response to child abuse allegations” may be found HERE.)
But the effective headline of “Salvation Army Thinks Gays Should Die” did, itself, not die with the apologetic response. The photo-shopped graphic shown above has been extensively shared across social media.  Now, nearly five years later, the Army website continues to feature an “About Us” link which directs to “The Salvation Army and The LGBT Community” page. The pithy comments distinguish the Army’s discrimination-free position among “The People We Serve,” “The People We Hire,” and “The People Who Support Us.” All three groups find embrace of and acceptance by the LGBT community.
The Army’s comment about “The People We Hire” is – for a “church” with the self-touted mission to proclaim the gospel – particularly curious. “The Salvation Army embraces employees of many different faiths and orientations. Our hiring practices are open to all, and we adhere to all relevant employment laws, providing domestic partner benefits accordingly.”
This “church” hires people of “many different faiths?” Hmm. And it also “provides domestic partner benefits?”   If you’re in a Scripture-obedient church, you probably won’t be able to find these practices repeated at home (or touted as Biblically valid, either.)
The Army’s aggressive response to appear “pro-gay” is perhaps best seen in Australia where the contentious issue of an anti-bullying program for schools is being hotly debated. Called the Safe Schools Program, it is less an anti-bully initiative than it is an effort to indoctrinate Australian children into LGBTQ acceptance. The website for the effort, SafeSchoolsCoalition.org, features the tagline, “A Public-Private Partnership In Support of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Queer and Questioning Youth.” In complete support of this initiative, which offers such curricula resources for youngsters as “Growing Up Queer” and “OMG I’m Queer,” is none other than the Salvation Army. (More about this issue can be found HEREH/T: Dianne Snider)   The Army’s statement of support can be read HERE.
The Army & Abortion
To many, no doubt, the Salvation Army has a seemingly morally palatable statement regarding abortion. It uses such favorable phrases as “all people are created in the image of God,” “human life is sacred,” “responsibility to care for others … including unborn children,” and “life is a gift from God … we are answerable to God for the taking of life.”
But, reading further, the Army’s statement makes clear that, in certain cases, it is pro-abortion, a position that may sit well within liberal churches, but certainly not within Bible-believing ones. “The Salvation Army believes that termination can occur only when carrying the pregnancy further seriously threatens the life of the mother; or reliable diagnostic procedures have identified a foetal abnormality considered incompatible with survival for more than a very brief post natal period.”
The Army’s statement continues. “In addition, rape and incest are brutal acts of dominance violating women physically and emotionally. This situation represents a special case for the consideration of termination as the violation may be compounded by the continuation of the pregnancy.”
While the internet is replete with warnings about the Salvation Army’s support for abortion, including from Catholic-oriented websites (See HERE or HERE, for example) there is no direct evidence (that we could find) of monetary support from the Army to Planned Parenthood. Many web and news sources cite a subscription-only service, Life Decisions International, a pro-life watchdog organization, that has placed the Army on its “dishonorable mention list,” not because of its outright financial support to Planned Parenthood, but for “troubling connections” between the two.
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A couple of interesting associations do exist. As previously mentioned, one of the revenue sources for the Salvation Army is United Way, which claims a neutral stance on the issue of abortion.  United Way is also a monetary donor to Planned Parenthood.
(A 2015 list of United Way chapters donating to Planned Parenthood is HERE. This 2015 article fromLifeNews.com looks at United Way’s defense of its funding for Planned Parenthood. This 2016 article from The Daily Signal also features a look at the United Way’s pro-abortion donations.)
Given the billion-dollar stature of the Army in the world of philanthropy, it’s not surprising that some of their resources go to procuring high profile fund-raising agencies to help them maximize their “help the needy” revenue appeals. It’s already been established that the Army is eager to abandon Scriptural commands for the church to avoid worldly entanglements, so retaining a high-powered secular consulting group is hardly an issue for them.
Enter The Bridgespan Group, itself a non-profit organization with its own mission: “We work to build a better world by strengthening the ability of mission-driven organizations and philanthropists to achieve breakthrough results in addressing society’s most important challenges and opportunities.”
Bridgestone’s list of clients for whom they provide “strategy consulting” includes Planned Parenthood Federation of America and The Salvation Army.  The question, perhaps, is … would your church be comfortable having its name alongside Planned Parenthood on the client list of a church-paid consulting group?  How far does “do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers” (2 Corinthians 6:14) actually go, one must ask.
screen-shot-2016-11-27-at-5-03-28-pmThe Army and Political Activism In America
American Christianity and politics don’t – at least from the evangelical church point of view – have a wall of separation. Particularly in the latest presidential election has the evangelical industrial complex come out in full political swing, anointing the perhaps previously un-anointable. So arguing that the church in America should stay out of politics might find one defending a lonely position. But what every evangelical would likely agree on is that, whatever your political proclivities, you should never be deceitful about them.
That simply wouldn’t be Christian. Yet that is what the Salvation Army seems to have done, at least in one statement.
In a response written on the website of the Salvation Army Northern Division clarifying the organization’s stance on the LGBTQ issue, you will find the following statement. “It is not The Salvation Army’s practice to spend funds on lobbying. The Salvation Army is apolitical and concentrates its resources on providing relief and compassionate care to those in crisis.” (Source)
Hearkening back to a Clinton-esque form of defensive rhetoric, your understanding of the Army’s statement may depend on what the definition of “apolitical” is. If you take the straightforward meaning of “apolitical” to be “not interested in or involved in politics,” then you’ll find the Army – an evangelical, self-proclaimed “church” – to be engaging in outright deception.
How can this be? Because the Salvation Army is anything but apolitical.
In the 2016 election cycle, though mere pittances compared to the sizable check writing ability it has, the Salvation Army made numerous contributions to numerous campaigns. The top recipient?Bernie Sanders. Runner up? Hillary Clinton. Ted Cruz came in a distant third. (Source)
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Now, to clarify, these political donations were made by “individuals and affiliates” in the name of the Army. But, considering that officers swear an oath of allegiance to the Army that includes, among other things, the affirmation to “abstain from alcoholic drink. tobacco, the non-medical use of addictive drugs, gambling, pornography, the occult, and all else that could enslave the body or spirit,” it seems likely that if the military-like command of the Army wished to restrict such political activity in its name, it could easily do so.
For the 2016 election cycle overall, the evangelical church that (again, allegedly) is The Salvation Army gave 83% of its political contributions to Democrat candidates, who, as we know, happen to be quite “pro-LGBTQ” and “pro-choice.” Outranking Sanders and Clinton in total Army political donations was the DNC Services Corporation, the acronymic corporation of the Democratic National Committee. The Army gave 14% to Republican candidates for office.
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Is God just a highly effective fundraising tool for The Salvation Army?  
When taking a broad look at The Salvation Army, there is much about which to be concerned – if you’re a Bible-informed believer.  As a church, it knowingly violates many clear commands of Scripture – no baptism, no Lord’s Supper.  As a church, it willfully entangles itself with the world in order to fulfill its “mission from God,” but is equally ready and able to relinquish its presumed faith-focused commitments when challenged with the loss of funding because of those beliefs.  Though enjoying the tax advantages of a non-profit church and the polished image of a charity that helps attract countless Christian donors,  it yields to secular demands when potential financial loss as a result of that faith-based image seems to loom.  While employing thousands, it rewards them with low pay and promises of eternal security for obedience while it rewards itself with a staggering portfolio of immense assets.  It claims the Bible as its guide but is eager to promote culturally-palatable positions on homosexuality and abortion.  Though it claims to be disengaged from politics, the Army consistently allows affiliates to align it with, most often, left wing agendas that many within evangelicalism would find worthy of anathematizing.
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It certainly seems that, for all its noble claims, the modern Salvation Army has discovered that God, even in a faithless world, is a terrific marketing tool.  And when He’s not, they’ll skip the Deity and just point to their work … “Doing the most good.” For all the temporal good it may do, the success of the Army seems less a function of obedience to God than it does to a well-orchestrated marketing plan that relies on deft image management, professional consulting, and savvy profit-building business plans.
As E.B. White said, one thing does always lead to another. In the Salvation Army, it seems, it always leads to one particular place – its coffers. But the one thing that it hardly ever leads to is the gospel … and that is simply because … The Salvation Army is not a church.
[Contributed by Bud Ahlheim]