That isn’t the greatest resolution on the picture so I don’t know how well you can read it. What I wanted to emphasize and warn you about is what I call “the usual suspects.” The evangelical church and associated organizations almost always utilize their “go to” people. Whether it be a conference or a new book that needs endorsing or some teaching series like this one, you can be sure that the list of “speakers” and authors will include the same names over and over and over. This in itself is a danger because far too many Christians consider what these people say to be “gospel.” Often it isn’t.

I don’t put all the people listed here in the same bin, but there are some names that leap right out at me and are like red warning lights flashing. One is Voddie Baucham. He is a pastor and he teaches the no-divorce-ever-for-any-reason and no remarriage unless the ex is dead positions. I confronted his teachings several years back in a blog post and I can tell you that he is not teachable. I received more nasty attacks from his follower-worshipers than just about any other article I have written. One evangelical magazine that was all set to feature and discuss my first book published the article but then all of a sudden it disappeared. The only explanation I was given was that some “influential” sources complained that I was too harsh and they had better, in the interest of their magazine, delete the article. So they did. This was very close to the time I wrote that Baucham critique.

And yet, here is Voddie on this list. We are supposed to run to listen to him teach us what God says about the church. And I am telling you, if you naively sit at these guys’ feet, you are going to have a load of bondage dumped right on you.

You also see Sam Waldron on this list. I wrote a critique of a book he wrote on how the father is the priest of the family. I pointed out how that is an unbiblical notion and that this is the very kind of thing that fuels domestic abusers in their patriarchy. Was Sam open to the criticism. Nope. He circled his wagons and stuck to his guns. And yet, like Baucham, here he is on this list of speakers.

There are other names here that I would have concerns about, but this is enough to tell me that whatever these guys are teaching about the church in this book and DVD series is nothing we need to be listening to. When they decide to do a series on how they have mistreated abuse victims and covered up for their abusers (don’t hold your breath or you will die of lack of oxygen), then I will take a listen.

And a final note: these things I am saying here are the very things that so many pastors and churches and Christians get all angry about. They insist that we have no right to speak this way about “brothers in Christ.” Well, the Apostle Paul called Peter on the carpet publicly. I think we are expected to do the same when necessary.