You can file this under “I don’t get it”… Not doubting at all that this man may have repented, but would God set him up again, in a large TV ministry after it was the temptation from money, and power he dealt with the first time which caused his fall ? I don’t know.
Jim Bakker dreams big in Missouri.
Just a quote or two from a large article. Read the article…its interesting.
“It’s a little like Disneyland,” one stunned visitor says.
“A miracle,” says another. “It is God’s work.”
This is even more than Jim Bakker promised them. For months they had heard Bakker on his TV show touting his impending move here. Bakker, the disgraced TV minister of PTL-and-Tammy-Faye fame, said the day was coming when he would no longer broadcast his bare-bones show from inside a converted restaurant in nearby Branson, as he had for five years. He talked about moving to a sprawling complex being built for him as the new headquarters for his television ministry, the heart of a 600-acre development named Morningside.
A FAMILIAR PLEA
Jim Bakker waits 41 minutes into his one-hour show to make his plea.
He begins by noting they have been off the air for six weeks.
“We have really gotten behind financially,” he says, fingering a crease in his khakis. “So we really need a miracle. The cost of moving, just to get the stuff you need — and we needed to get a few more microphones, we didn’t even have enough time to get the bugs worked out of things. It just takes a lot of money.”
He is talking directly to the camera now. He says he has a music CD for “a love gift of $30″ and a DVD about marriage for a $55 donation. He decides to offer a recording of his sermon about prison, just $20.
Off to the side in the audience sits Gloria Elliott. Few people have stood with Bakker longer. A singer, she began working with Bakker in 1969 when he was on “The 700 Club.” She was there when Bakker was on top of the world, when Heritage USA was a place of “total class from the moment you pulled onto the driveway.” She was there when Bakker tumbled. She now sings on his TV show once a month.
She knows there are skeptics. “Some folks say he’s doing the same old thing again,” she said.
The show band begins playing louder, forcing Elliott to nearly shout.
“But I’m telling you — and you don’t have to believe me — his heart is right,” she said. “It is in the right place.”
Upon his release from prison, Bakker mailed me a book condemning the prosperity gospel he once preached with a personal note saying, “I have finally learned about not serving God and mammon (Matthew 6:24) which I had never known before”. He has again regressed into the Prosperity Gospel and like the magic books in Acts, his book should now be burned as well. Yes, a dog DOES return to his vomit!
2 Pet 2,22
…and the context.
I’m still kind of stunned by this…I knew he had a small church or group who met weekly, but didn’t even know he was back on the air.
I had read his one book, ‘I Repent’ (believe that was the title) when it was released, my Mother had sent it to me. My hope after reading it was that he truly had, and that God could use him to warn other prosperity ministers of the pit falls he fell into..
it doesn’t appear that is happening.
He has a website up:
JIM BAKKER SHOW
After looking around on it, i see under links he has his son Jay Bakker’s link up on his website:
http://www.revolutionnyc.com/
If anyone doesn’t know about Jay’s “ministry” just looking at his webpage should give you an idea.
Ken Silva also put up a post and video last summer on Jay’s beliefs…
Emerging Church “Pastor” Jay Bakker: One Punk Under God
David and arabella, it appears you both are correct;
It is sad that so many fail to identify with the “prosperity” issue from a biblical context which extends beyond financial gain. The worldly understand it from a financial standpoint only. I guess Jim should have come out of prison and lived in a barn instead of a home to confirm that he finally now lives the “word of God” vs. just preaching like so many pastors still do today.
I love Jim Bakker and his wife not withstanding their six adopted kids who are great!
Pastor Bakker is the trying to support the Morningside CTN programs and in return
for contributions givens away tons of survival food,and supplies and has become
so zealous not to profit that at times I think he is giving the farm away to prevent
criticism from ignorant quasi-christians and just fools who haven’t a clue how this
man of God resolved his “wrongdoings ” of the past / He is now 70 a spirit filled
icon with a wife that my wife and I love like a sister. The ministry is awesome and
I believe he is at peace with himself but is so emotional the hurt has gone deep
in his soul. I say just keep plugg’in away dear friend as we who know you are
blessed immesureably. Jim Bakker is a great man of God!
Das Palm Harbor Florida
David Larson, can you not see what hero worship you betray in your words .- “He is now 70 a spirit filled ICON”??? -
If true, that alone disqualifies him as he is elevated far too highly. Jesus’ ministry was without iconic status or money and our call is to follow HIS (JESUS) example.
I have no idea where the state of Jim’s heart really lays, but understanding what he has now ‘resumed’ rather speaks for itself and fills me with much sadness.