Posted on 08/10/2010 3:01:03 PM PDT by LibertyinChrist
So please be apprised of the following report regarding Assemblies of God and particularly Emerge Ministries Inc.
SPECIAL INVESTIGATION REPORT
By James Sundquist
Rock Salt Publishing http://www.voiceoftruthradio.com/james.htm
July 9, 2010
HOW ASSEMBLIES OF GOD LEADERS MAKE MERCHANDISE OF MEN'S SOULS
CBS NEWS: ASSEMBLIES OF GOD SEIZES AND PADLOCKS CHURCH:
DURST & DURST
&
AN ANALYSIS OF EMERGE MINISTRIES, INC.
Complete 36 page report available at: www.voiceoftruthradio.com/james/dnd.pdf
Well once again, the local church lost...NY Supreme Court ruled that AG Church is hierarchical. This case is similar to the lawsuits by the Episcopal Churches in Northern Virginia...i.e. Diocese lost, then won.
My original investigation on this story is posted at: http://www.voiceoftruthradio.com/james/dnd.pdf
CALIFORNIA COURT OF APPEALS SENDS AOG SOUTHWEST DISTRICT (SPLAD) PACKING...RETURNS CHURCH PROPERTY TO LOCAL CHURCH: SOURCE: http://www.allbusiness.com/legal/trial-procedure-decisions-rulings/12311341-1.html
Below you will find the news of the Supreme Court Ruling in New York regarding Crossway Christian Center AG Church in the Bronx.
AUGUST 4, 2010 UPDATE:
Duane Durst had banked on credential holders (particularly in New York) remaining silent and they did not disappoint him. Their silence has been deafening! "Evil will triumph when good men do nothing." But this will be a Pyrrhic victory...one with devastating consequences!
I find it brutally and tragically ironic that George Wood would produce a video entitled:
SIN BY SILENCE "to discuss the issues of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE and how the CHURCH should respond", http://www.sinbysilence.com/newsletter/ag.html
Yet exalt and equip the actions of Duane Durst who has orchestrated his own form abuse and against his own people at Crossway Christian Center as though the only form of abuse that counts is one which uses physical violence as opposed to emotional manipulation, ostracization, and control. It is not just domestic abuse, but abuse in the house of God by thugs in the pulpit which can be even more devastation and effects producing deeper and more long lasting wounds and permanent scars. So where is his outcry against Duane Durst for what he did to these people and many other pastors and churches? With interventionists like George Wood and Duane Durst, who needs enemies? In the Sin By Silence video, George Wood tells that that a church should be a refuge and a place of compassion. So where does Crossway Church now find a refuge and compassion, now that the AOG leaders have padlocked it and seized it?
August 4, 2010
OPEN LETTER TO DUANE DURST, DISTRICT SUPERINTENDENT ASSEMBLIES OF GOD, NEW YORK DISTRICT
Dear Duane Durst,
It appears that you have no intent of responding to my letters to you regarding Crossway Christian Center, Emerge Ministries, and Jonathan Durst. Scripture requires you to respond but it is evident that you are showing complete contempt for them, as you have with this church and historical testimony against you. You refuse correction, refuse reconciliation to those brothers and sisters in Christ you have personally shipwrecked... road-kill vs. what the Good Samaritan did for a robbed and beaten stranger by the road, and you refuse to make restitution. You had a great opportunity to end your lawsuit against this church, and failed to do so. Now you have beat them and beaten them up at the New York Supreme Court, no doubt believing that you are doing God a favor. AOG National Superintendent George Wood and all AOG District Superintendents must now be licking their chops, because there would then be a precedent for plucking and commandeering any AG local church, leaders in the AG decide to seize even though they this congregation(s) had voted to disaffiliate from the AOG. You may consider this a great victory. But you surely know that a host of AG Credential Holders still believe that local churches are autonomous and sovereign... though you can exploit them by threatening their credentials and employment and extort them to take mental health counseling, if they don't comply with your diabolical agenda. They don't believe that constitution gives you absolute sovereignty over their property, bank accounts and assets. So there are judges on the earth, then there is the Judge of the Whole Earth, Jesus Christ Himself. The Judge of the whole earth will do right! You will stand before him for what you have done. If you gained the whole world, at what price? Your soul? You may be oblivious to the impact and effect this would have on members throughout the AG in the U.S. and abroad. But you sir have sown the wind, and will in the end reap the whirlwind. Your day of reckoning and national infamy may come sooner than you think. You may think if you are successful in your agenda that the fruit of the spirit will abound. But the truth is that it will bear the ultimate rotten fruit, for a thorn bush can not produce figs. Now you have become a derelict watchman on the wall, and worse instead of fending off the wolves, you recruit them to take out your own sheep. Not satisfied, hardening your heart, you pursue them like the chariots of Pharaoh's army. Is it even possible to be more reprobate than that...TWICE DEAD?
I think there might have been a time when you served the Lord with a pure heart, judged rightfully, showed mercy to those caught in the thicket. So my question for you is this. What happened to you? And when did this happen? I can see why someone would do what you did whose conscience has been seared like a hot iron, but what is your motive who is supposed to be a shepherd who guards and protects his flock? Perhaps if you were righteous at some point in your life or in your service in the AOG, there was a fork in the road. You took the wrong road. You could have been a Gaius that John commends in III John. You could have been an elder of good repute...what an elder is required to be. An elder should be respectful, hospitable [wow what hospitality you exhibited at Crossway Church], gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. Did it ever occur to you to fear the words of Peter and Jude when they warned about “experts in greed...without the slightest qualm...for whom the darkest gloom is reserved forever”? You may not think this is greed, and justifying it by saying, like Saul did with his plunder “but I did it for God”. But the people whose church was stolen from them won't see it any other way. The Church at large will see right through this pretense, as will even the world. Instead because you publicly did the opposite, by threatening and wounding pastors and congregations, persecuting the saints with emotional abuse, shunning, psychological blackmail and manipulation, you have fallen in to disgrace and into the devil's snare. Do you think there would now be any sick member in Crossway Church [or any other AG church now in your district] in their right mind that would now come confidently to you as an elder to lay hands of them...the very one who precipitated this crisis and plague? Instead you chose the path of Diotrephes. You and your son Jonathan Durst are both similar to two other infamous sons...Hophni and Phineas, priests who expropriated the sacrifices for themselves or their own agenda, effectively telling this congregation: "give us your church, or we will take it by force!", except in this case instead of two sons, it is father and son. Duane Durst attacks the church and his son Jonathan attacks the messenger! God thought this was serious enough abomination that he destroyed these two wicked priests in the First Book of Samuel ! But Durst is the worst because he and his AG District would be able take the offerings from this church and the rest of the AG Churches to finance his lawsuit against them. Are there any of these offerings in the AG treasury available to the members of Crossway Church to pay for their defense against Durst's assaults and lawsuit? You have brought the way of truth in to disrepute not just within the Assemblies of God, but the church at large, and even the community because your lawsuit is public but also because your pillaging and terrorizing Crossway Church with thug tactics right in God's sanctuary in full view of the public. So after what you have done, do you think you can honestly expect anyone to ever trust you again?
“Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where [is] the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk [therein].” Jeremiah 6:16
The saints of Crossways Christian Center Church may never find refuge in you [how could they when you sue them], but they will find refuge in the Lord. But He will be there strong tower and refuge. But woe to them by whom it comes, including AOG Credential Holders who idly stood by in silence...so cal called “good men who do nothing”...precisely how evil triumphs! The Lord Himself is acquainted with the pain and sorrow you have brought upon his people by you. What you have done is cruel and inexcusable. Therefore, I pray that if there is any fear of God left in your heart, that you will take heed and repent...and run after all of those brothers and sisters in Christ that you have destroyed to make restitution, in accordance with Matthew 5!
I pray that the Lord will comfort the saints of Crossway Church in their hour of desolation brought upon them like a hammer by the leaders of the Assemblies of God.
Sincerely in Christ,
James Sundquist
************
Sincerely in Christ,
James Sundquist http://www.theperfectpeaceplan.com
Ping for later
my eyes hurt!
I have no idea from reading this what claim the author is trying to make...
I attend an AofG church, and the structure of the organization is such that the denomination does not own the local church property - the local congregation does, and it is managed by the board of elders. Does this concern property that was purchased by the district? I know the districts may purchase property for offices, campgrounds, bible colleges, etc, but I am not aware of them owning properties for the local congregations.
As a veteran of a number of “Church War” engagements, I have the following observations:
(1) Yet another very public “black eye” for the Body of Christ
(2) Yet another example that man is totally depreaved — even the redeemed of the Lord remain prone to err unless yielded to His Holy Spirit constantly
(3) Yet another perfect demonstration of the flawed system of the majority of denominations Ordination process and maintenance of ministerial credentials.
(4) Yet another example of the dangers of a heirarchical church polity, in which authority is vested in men (Bishops, etc) or Councils outside or “above” the local church. There will ALWAYS be issues and conflict in churches, because they are composed of imperfect people. But elevating that BEYOND the local level MULTIPLES and spreads those problems, it does not generally aid in solving the issue more quickly nor more satisfactorily.
Beware those who can pronounce judgment on the local church from above...Only the Lord of the Church should have power over its life and death.
Wow this is sad. We are youth pastors in the AG.
What was the reason that this pastor had his credential revoked? All it said in the documentation was “ministerial ineffectiveness”.
If the congregation wants to remove themselves from the AG and keep the pastor, they have every right to do that.
Wow this is sad. We are youth pastors in the AG.
What was the reason that this pastor had his credential revoked? All it said in the documentation was “ministerial ineffectiveness”.
If the congregation wants to remove themselves from the AG and keep the pastor, they have every right to do that.
It’s rarely that simple — even in a denomination that claims to be based on “local church autonomy.” I’m from a Baptist denomination that claimed that — and it simply isn’t true on a number of levels — when it suits the heirarchy to interject itself.
The IDEAL is local church autonomy. The Biblical pattern is local church autonomy AND intercongregational cooperation. BUT, when humans are involved, they bring with them their passions, their depravity, and inevitably, it corrupts the work of the Kingdom God intends His Church to carry out. It doesn’t have to — if we submit to the Spirit and seek to be filled constantly. But too often humans DON’T. It’s the constant and quintessential struggle of the church...
NY SUPREME COURT RULING SLAMS ASSEMBLIES OF GOD
LEADERS GEORGE WOOD AND DUANE DURST WHO SUED AND HIJACKED
BETHEL ASSEMBLIES OF GOD CHURCH
COURT RULING: http://www.perfectpeaceplan.com/james/aogbethelmassena.pdf
[January 7, 2010 Update: Not satisfied with the destruction they have already wrought, the AOG is taking them to court again: Notice of Appeal was filed in the Appellate Div. of St. Lawrence County Supreme Court against local AOG Church]
Are you one of 22 Assemblies of God local churches in the crosshairs of Durst & Wood for takeover of your church property and bank account?
The New York Supreme Court stopped them in their tracks,
but you could be next!
FOR COMPLETE REPORT & INVESTIGATION:
http://www.perfectpeaceplan.com/post/assemblies-of-god-serial-bullies-from-the-pulpit/#more-33
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