(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Hey everybody, it's Pastor Jonathan Shelley from Steadfast Baptist Church. I wanted to make a quick video to address handling disputes, disagreements, controversy, things like that. Obviously there's going to always be conflicts and disagreements and sometimes people just don't see eye to eye and I just want to talk about how I believe that we as an independent Baptist Church should handle this and have healthy disagreements. First I want to say that as an independent Baptist Church I believe that we should be able to preach and teach whatever we want. Whatever we're convicted by, the Bible and God's word, because ultimately the pastor is going to be held to a high level of accountability with God and he's going to be judged by God for how he handles himself, what he teaches, what he preaches. Because of that I believe the man of God has the ability to teach and preach whatever he feels like is necessary, whatever his convictions are. Even if that may be unpopular, as a preacher there's a lot of pressure sometimes to trim the message or you're afraid that if you preach a particular sermon that people are going to take it as a personal attack or things like that. Sometimes it is and sometimes it isn't, but at the end of the day we should be able to preach and teach whatever we want. What's going to make a healthy culture is if every independent Baptist Church teaches and preaches exactly what they believe and what they teach. We don't want people to hold back or trim the message. Sometimes it even can get ugly. Sometimes there's going to be people called out, names being named. That's what makes bold preaching. We need to make sure that we understand if we want to have a healthy culture that's going to exist, that's going to happen. It's much better than having underhanded attacks or sly attacks or things behind the back of somebody or backbiting, railing, all these type of things. That's what creates a very unhealthy culture is when people put a facade out and they pretend that they like somebody, but behind their back they're saying things that are basically the opposite, flattery, fake love, things like that. If you have a problem with someone, you should be willing to either tell them privately or you should be able to tell everyone at the same time. Make it open and public. I also think that's another point of having healthy disagreement. If you truly have a problem with someone, I believe there's basically two vehicles that you should employ. You should tell them privately if you feel like that's the appropriate situation. If they aren't interested, rather than just telling a handful of people privately or backbiting and slandering against them, I believe you should just tell everyone openly. I have no problem with people calling other people out. I'll make a specific example. There's been some controversy with two churches that I've been directly involved with and am friends with, Revival Baptist Church and Faith Word Baptist Church. Some of the things that have been taught at Revival Baptist Church concerning the King James Bible have been called out publicly by Pastor Steven Anderson. He's made mention of some of the things they're teaching and how he strongly disagrees with them. I believe he has every right to do so. I think that's going to create a healthy culture. What I do not agree with is people slandering or having private group texts or saying things against people privately. I think that's always wrong. I believe that you either should go to that person privately or just make it public. If you feel bold enough to tell a handful of people in a group text, you should be bold enough to just name the name publicly and call things out. Paul called out Peter publicly. We see even the apostle Paul had problems with Mark and he let his feelings be known made publicly. In Paul's epistles, he's calling out people publicly. I think that actually creates a healthy culture rather than going around and just telling a handful of people or slandering them or lying against them. I don't appreciate a lot of the accusations that have been labeled against Pastor Steven Anderson, calling him ecumenical, which is a false allegation, saying that he's not King James only. That's a false allegation. I understand people attach different definitions to King James only, but that's just a railing accusation to say that he's not a King James Bible supporter. He's turned more people to King James Bible than anybody that I know personally. He champions the King James Bible. He knows it better than anybody I know personally. He's taken the diligence and time to even combat some of this going back to the Greek garbage and false doctrine, ideology, and even supported the King James Bible even more through his own independent study and teaching and preaching God's word. Anybody that makes those type of accusations and slander, I think that's wrong. If you have something to say, you should just say it publicly. That's going to create a healthy church. I also think it's kind of frustrating to see a lot of people despitefully using Pastor Stephen Anderson, where they fill up their church with a bunch of people that he's reached personally and loved and cared for and reached out to and taught them all this doctrine, and then just go behind his back and slander him and say evil things and basically try to pit the people that he's reached against him. Now, if you want to call him out publicly or point out errors that he has or preach against things that he believes, every pastor should have the right to teach and preach whatever they want. That they should understand if they're going to call someone out publicly that that person has the right to defend themselves, that person has a right to teach and preach what they believe and to stand up for their beliefs and influence the people that they've reached. I think that's just going to create a healthy culture when we make things open, we make things public. If I teach something that's wrong and someone decides to say, hey, Pastor Shelley, he taught this and it's wrong, here's what the Bible says, if that's what the Bible says, then praise the Lord. Amen. If they're wrong, I shouldn't be afraid of someone publicly calling me out and telling something that I taught as being wrong, just give me an opportunity to preach the Bible better. I'm not afraid of the truth. If I teach something wrong, point it out, that's great. Obviously, sometimes you've got to use discretion. Maybe it's better to just tell someone privately first and see if they have a chance to fix that. At the end of the day, we as God's ministers should not be afraid of public scrutiny. We put ourselves out there publicly. If we're going to go out and teach things publicly, then we should be willing to face the consequences. I don't appreciate people despite really using Pastor Anderson. Obviously, the churches that I pastor have been majority influenced by Pastor Steven Anderson. I think he's a great man. He's a man who loves the Lord and he loves the Bible. Even though me and him may disagree on really minute, minor things, that's inconsequential to our friendship. That's inconsequential to how I'm going to support him. Even if he teaches things that I strongly disagree with, I'm still going to support the man. I'm still going to love the man. That doesn't apply just to Pastor Anderson. That applies to other pastors like Pastor Boyle. I don't agree with him when it comes to how the King James Bible is being taken overboard and overemphasized, I believe, to an unhealthy point. Even though I fully support his use of the King James Bible, I think there could be bad reasons to defend the King James Bible. If I don't agree with his viewpoint, I'm not going to sit there and pretend like I do. I do think that Pastor Boyle is a man who loves the Lord. I think that he is a good pastor. I think he's a strong leader. Even if I didn't agree with him on 100% of what he believes or teaches, I can still support him and hope that he wins souls to Christ and keeps teaching the Bible and loving his people and doing great works. He's pastoring two different churches and he's trying to sacrifice a lot for his congregation. I would never expect to agree with him 100% on everything he teaches or preaches or believes. That doesn't mean I can't still support him. The Bible even says to love your enemies. I don't believe that Pastor Boyle is my enemy for one second, so I should therefore even love him the more. Love him as a brother. Love him as a neighbor. The Bible even says people that despitefully use you, that we're supposed to pray for them and to bless them and hope that good things happen for them. There have been pastors that have said things about me personally and publicly that I think we're bad and I don't agree with, but I still hope they can win souls to Christ and do good. I think we can have healthy disagreement. I don't have to agree with people 100% to be their friend, to support them, to bless them, and I don't think that you should either. That brings me to my next point. You should just go to the best church in the area, whether you agree with the church or the pastor on 100% of their theology or ideology because frankly, you're never going to. I don't care what church it is on this planet. You're probably going to have disagreements and you need to just find a church that's winning souls to Christ, the King James only, that's trying to serve the Lord and just be a blessing. The Bible talks about people that are in Sardis, at the church in Sardis and Revelation, and that church has some major problems, but God still commends those in Sardis. If Christians in the New Testament can go to Sardis, look, they can go to Revival Baptist Church, Faithful Baptist, they can go to a lot of churches and support the men of God and hold their nose at stuff they disagree with and just keep their mouth shut and just basically support the pastor where he can. I don't expect people that come to my church to agree with me on 100% of things, and I know that they don't. But I do expect them, if they come to Steadfast Baptist Church, to mentally and physically go to Steadfast Baptist Church. I think some people, they mentally go to a different church when they physically go to a different one. They'll show up at Steadfast, but mentally, they're at some other church or they want to be at some other church and it's like, if you mentally want to be at another church, you need to physically go to that church. But you should have the right mindset when you go to a church and say, you know what, I'm here for this church, for this pastor, for this message, and I'll disagree where I need to, but at the end of the day, I'll support them where I can as well. And that's going to create healthy disagreement. At the end of the day, both these churches are winning souls to Christ. Both of these men love the Lord, and I'm going to support them as long as they're winning souls to Christ and standing for the King James Bible and doing that which is right. And sometimes people are going to be called out publicly. Sometimes people are going to disagree sharply. And I think that's good. I don't want to go to a cold. I don't want to get joined in where, you know, we all have to just lock step, agree with everything. We have to be afraid about what we preach. I think we should preach everything we believe from the housetops and, you know, basically there's going to be times when people have to go their separate ways. Paul had to call out Peter. Paul had to call out John Mark. But you know what, I believe Mark and Barnabas won a lot of souls to Christ and still did great things for the Lord, even though Paul didn't agree. And later, even Paul reconciles with Mark. So you know, people are going to surprise you. You don't have to be friends with every single person. I think we should be able to be friends with whoever we want. But at the end of the day, you don't have an option of whether or not you love your brother. You need to love your brother, period. You need to support the cause of Christ, period. And even if they're not with us, if they're still serving the Lord, you know, they're not against us. You know, they're serving Christ. And we should not forbid them to serve Christ or attack them. And you don't want to render railing for railing or evil for evil. Even when someone does bad to you, you need to love them. And so, you know, I fully support how Pastor Anderson's handled the situation, calling people out publicly. And if you even listen to his sermon on Ruckmanism in Light of the Bible on Sunday morning, at the end of his sermon, he says that he loves Pastor Boyle, thinks he's a good pastor and wants good things for him. And you know, you should let that ring in your ears. Someone that's been slandered and lied against and been despitefully used, he's still wanting good things for Pastor Boyle, and I want the same. You know, I hate to see tension and division in a church over any ideology that's, at the end of the day, still in support of the King James Bible and soul winning and serving the Lord. There's a lot bigger fish to fry here. And you know, obviously the devil wants to get people out of soul winning and doing the work of the Lord. And if you can't go to a particular church, you need to go to the best church in the area. Or if you mentally need to go to a particular church, you need to physically go to that church. And whatever church you're at, you support that church, you love that church, you love the Brethren, and I want to be in a movement that supports the idea of healthy disagreement. So I hope that helps, God bless you guys, have a great day.