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An Interview With Scot Loyd
In this episode of Amateur Faith Night, hosts engage in a candid conversation with Scot Loyd, a professor and former minister, about his upbringing in the United Pentecostal Church (UPC) and the lasti...
An Interview With Scot Loyd
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Speaker A
This is amateur faith night, a podcast where real life friends talk about real life religion, where questions are encouraged, doubt is talked about, and following Jesus is our main priority. Let this be a starting place for you to research things and study them out for yourself. God is bigger than all of our questions, and it is okay to not have all of the answers. All right, y' all ready? Yes. Good.
Speaker B
Y.
Speaker A
Good?
Speaker C
Yeah.
Speaker A
All right, guys. Okay, so I'm super excited to introduce our guest. This is Scott Lloyd. I'm probably. Most people know who you are, I would think, like, at least seen your stuff in. In, like, the groups that we're in online or your blog. Scott was nice enough to write a recommendation for my book, so yay there. Thank you. I appreciate that. He's also a professor at the Help me out Jamestown University. University of Jamestown. Which one is the way you say it?
Speaker C
University of Jamestown, Jamestown, North Dakota.
Speaker A
What's the temperature?
Speaker C
Right now it's in the 50s, but it's going to be freezing by the end of the week.
Speaker A
I'm so sorry. That sounds awful. But you liked it, though, right? Didn't you like it last winter?
Speaker C
Well, it's. It's a novelty, but the. The novelty wears off very quickly, and then it becomes a nuisance. So it starts snowing in October, and it doesn't leave until the first week of May. When they flew me in for my interview, I was previously in Oklahoma. Originally, I'm a native of Arkansas, and so when. When they flew me in, the plane was descending into Jamestown, I looked out the window and I was like, man, the dirt is so white up here. It was. It was the last week of April, and there was still snow everywhere. And. And then last year, they say, was one of the most snowfield winters they've had, and they're actually calling for snow on Halloween. So here we go.
Speaker A
Well, yeah, I have no words. That sounds awful. I'm sorry. I have a dream to move to Florida or, like, Georgia or somewhere south, because I don't. Can't do the snow. But I used to live in North Dakota. Fun fact.
Speaker C
Oh, yeah.
Speaker A
Yeah. In Fargo, but I don't remember. I think I was like, four, so thankfully.
Speaker C
Well, I spent the majority of my life in. In Arkansas, where it's sweltering most of the year, so. And I also did a stint for four years in Louisiana, where if you walk outside. Yeah. It's like you're breathing underwater. So that was. So I've been from one extreme to the other. And so now we're. We're Doing this.
Speaker A
Better you than me. But I'm glad that you like it. I'm glad for you. All right. So you have something pulled up on your phone? Is there something you want to ask or.
Speaker B
Well, I just. I just wanted. Scott, if you could maybe go into a little bit deeper dive of your post from five days ago. We were talking about growing up in the UPC and them scaring the hell out of children at the age of like 6 and 7. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Speaker A
Well, because you grew up UPC and you were actually a minister, right?
Speaker C
Right. Yeah. So grew up in the United Pentecostal Church, a small UPC church in Blytheville, Arkansas. It's about an hour north of Memphis, Tennessee, right below the boot hill of Missouri. So right as you cross into Arkansas, that was our little town, and that was home. My grandmother was the spiritual leader of our family, and she was single, raising five children on our own. My grandfather passed away before I was born. And as the story goes, the. The. The family lore is that she received a personal revelation of Jesus name baptism. She had no preacher, no pastor, and she eventually found a church that preached the same message. And this was in the beginnings of. Of the. The merger, the Pentecostal UPC merger that formed the United Pentecostal Church in 1945 and found a small group, and they eventually became a part of a larger group. And she was. She was a landmark in that particular church. And so by the time I came along, I came along rather late in my mom and dad's life. I was the baby in the family. I was born in 1971. And so by the time I came of age, that was our church. Although my dad never went to church, thankfully, that was my saving grace, because that meant that we always had a television. So I had a window to the world. But everything else, everything that you guys talk about on your program, I experienced. And I was fully immersed in that culture. So I discovered early on that there's two ways to. To get attention. You can either be very bad or be very good. And because I had no athletic talent or musical skill or charisma to speak of, I opted for being very good. And I sat on the front pew of our church and I was a Bible quizzer, and I did everything that I just immersed myself in it. And of course, growing up in that small Pentecostal church, the apocalypse was a big deal, right? So that was part of the United Pentecostal Church culture, making sure that we were steeped in not only oneness theology, but also a certain brand of eschatology. And by the time I came along, it was dispensationalism. We all taught the Search for Truth chart and we got to the, to the book of revelation. There were seven distinct dispensations and a dispensation was a 2000 year period. It started with God's promise, it ended with God's judgment. And so we were in the sixth dispensation waiting for the seventh. Yeah.
Speaker A
Do you remember that or did you just recently go through that again?
Speaker C
I remember all of that. I told, wow, that's pretty impressive. Yeah, I, I could, I, I could reel off for you now a lot of those lessons because not only did I sit through a lot of Search for Truth Bible studies because my, my sister, who is 10 years older than I am, taught them along with her husband. But I also, as soon as I was old enough, I remember when I was probably 10 or 11, I got my first mini Search for Truth chart and I had a big old Bible and I carried it to school. I was that kid. I was really obnoxious about it. It's amazing that I survived high school, but I did and I taught the Search for Truth. I believed it. I had in study hall, I would pull out my Bible and unfold it and just to have an opportunity to have an opportunity to witness to people about the truth. And so I was ready for the apocalypse.
Speaker A
Did it work?
Speaker C
It didn't work at all. I was just a weird kid. Right. So I was just odd and out of place. But one good thing that my UPC church did give to me, and I tell everyone this, even though I have profound disagreements and we'll get into all of that, the good thing that UPC gave me was an ability to read and study and understand the Bible. And of course back then it was the King James version of the Bible. So I remember before I could even read and write, having my grandmother's Bible open and tracing letters and doing all of that. So, so by the time I got into school and learned to read, my reading comprehension skills were through the roof because everything that I'd been taught, everything I read, everything I studied was the King James Version of the Bible, which is very difficult. Right. But yeah, so, so somewhere, what I was referencing in the post the other day was somewhere around, I don't know, it was probably the first or second grade. On Wednesday nights, the youth group was given charge of the, the service and they called it the Wednesday night youth service. And what we would do, we would Go to church on Wednesday nights, and the pastor would get up, make a few preliminary remarks. We'd sing some congregationals, and then he would turn it over to the young people. And so the young people were divided into groups, and every Wednesday night, they had to present some sort of lesson. Well, young people being young people, especially in the late 70s and early 80s, they were all about novelty and doing something new and fresh and innovative. And so they put on these morality plays. We called them skits. And a popular theme of those skits were. Was the. Was the apocalypse and the coming of the Antichrist. And so according to dispensational theology, which we all embrace, which, by the way, I didn't even know there was anything outside of dispensational theology. Eschatology, Right. Which. Which only gives you three choices, basically, it's a rapture either before the tribulation, in the middle of the tribulation, or after the tribulation. I thought that was all there was to Bible prophecy. I didn't discover anything else until I was in my 30s. Right. And so it was. It's based on scaring us to death about all of these bad things to come. And remember I was coming of age when the movie the Omen was very popular. I don't know if you guys remember that movie, not go back and look it up. It was about the Antichrist. Rosemary's Baby was another popular film. And I remember one time I stayed home with my dad from church on Sunday night, and that was the movie of the week. And I was like, God's out to get me, right? That's his judgment. But I'm sitting here on this Wednesday night, and the young people are in charge of the service, and they open with a radio booth, and it says on the air, and it's flashing, and there's a couple of people standing in the radio booth, and they're saying, breaking news. I don't know if they said breaking news. I don't think that was a thing back then. But something like that, right? Like, news flash, this just in. And they talked about Israel being surrounded and being invaded by Russia and all of these horrible events starting to happen, planes crashing and just all of these bad things. And then in the middle of their mock radio broadcast, they turned out all the lights in the auditorium. Somebody blew a bad trumpet, and then the lights came back on. And mind you, I'm a little kid sitting on the front pew watching all of this. And I look to my right and I look to my left, and people that were sitting beside me are gone. And I'm sitting there, I'm freaking out, right? This is. This is traumatic stuff. And no wonder I was waking up at night, you know, with nightmares. It's funny, I've got the aurora borealis behind me here. And I remember in the mid-80s one night, and I think it was April, we could see the northern lights really far south in Arkansas. And my brother who lived next door to us came and woke us all up and said, come outside. Nobody knew what was going on. And then they started immediately talking about the return of Jesus and somebody dropped a nuclear bomb in Memphis. And this is the radio that's going on and I'm hearing all of this, right? And so that form of eschatology, which was popular and still popular today in a lot of circles, anytime anything bad would happen in the world, for instance, especially what's happening now with Israel, people would get all excited. And when I say excited, they would literally get excited that they want these bad things to happen. They want the slaughter of millions of people, because in their mind, this accelerates the timeline for the return of Christ. As if Jesus is sitting in heaven with a checklist saying, right, okay, two more things to happen, and then I'm going to return. And so if you read the Bible, obviously, and you understand scripture, the return of Christ as it was understood by the disciples was always imminent. Nothing has to happen for Jesus to return. He's going to return. And then the whole idea of the Rapture, right, that was just. That was something that became popular in the mid 19th century. John Nelson Darby, the Plymouth Brethren, he got this innovation, the Scofield Study Bible, took it on and. And ran with it. And then Tim LaHaye writes, Left behind, and the rest is history. And now it's very difficult to speak to anyone intelligently about the end times because they were scared to death their entire childhood. And of course, nothing happened. And these kinds of wars continue to happen and happen over and over again. And instead of seeing it as an opportunity to be purveyors of peace in the world, as Jesus intended for us to be Christians, too many Christians are applauding war and applauding the deaths of people, and many of them right in Israel and in the Palestinian territories. Many of the Palestinians that are being slaughtered have nothing to do with Hamas, and many of them are Christians.
Speaker A
Yep. So.
Speaker C
So that was a scary event. And I think that kind of attitude continues to perpetuate this, this false narrative that does a disservice to. To the Christian witness in the World.
Speaker B
So going back a little bit, you said you're about the age of six, seven, somewhere in there. Correct me if I'm wrong, but would this have been about the same time President Jimmy Carter was trying to negotiate the peace deal? So that had all the patriotic conservative Christians all up in arms.
Speaker C
Okay, right, yeah. So obviously Jimmy Carter's one term presidency, I, I, I, I faintly remember the Ford presidency, but Jimmy Carter was the, the really the first presidency that I remember. And you know, his involvement in the Middle east was, was a big deal. And of course Jimmy Carter was, was, was a fundamentalist Christian, he was a Baptist, he was very vocal about his faith. He was a Democrat as well. Right. And that was probably the last time, Right, the last time that a, a Democratic president was closely aligned with evangelicals. And of course the evangelicals didn't like him at all. And then they brought in the Reagan revolution in the 1980s and that's when I really started to pay attention to these things. And of course I remember when Ronald Reagan was shot. I remember getting off my bus, my grandmother greeting me with all of these apocalyptic enthusiasms like the President's been shot. You better make sure you're ready for the rapture. And it was just a scary time. Right? And then of course, the infamous in 88, 88 reasons that the Lord is going to return in 1988. And of course that book was spread all over our small congregation. There were sermons that were preached and of course no one knows the day or the hour. But it could be.
Speaker A
But it could be. Yeah, it could be.
Speaker C
Are you ready? Were you ready? And of course we lived in this kind of insecurity, right, that the Lord was going to return and we were going to be all left behind. Because remember, the UPC doctrine is all about eternal insecurity there. You've got to do more, you've got to jump higher, you've got to be more holy. You've got, no matter how good you were, there was that chance that in the moment when Christ returns, you've thought something or done something in word or deed or thought that disqualifies you for salvation, which just totally in, in hindsight boggles the mind.
Speaker B
So a timeline. We've got Carter and the negotiation of the Middle east peace. Then we've got Reagan with tear down this wall. And of course, what, what was Russia? Is that, I'm going to say it wrong. Moag, what's the term that they use in the Bible? They, they say that signifies Russia.
Speaker C
Yeah, I know what you're talking about. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B
So Gorbachev, tear them down, tear down this wall and then not long after we've got.
Speaker D
Operation Desert Storm.
Speaker B
Right. So I mean, it's, for us Americans here, it's been, we look at as being relentless and just building up in the end times. But from my understanding, when I talk to fellow Christians from overseas or missionaries, they're like the whole idea of dispensationalism and the whole idea of, you know, we're living in the last days kind of thing. It's not really as prevalent overseas, I think is so much as it is here in the U.S. yeah. Have you found that or heard that?
Speaker C
Yeah, I think you're right because it's, it's a very ethnocentric idea, isn't it, that the United States is somehow at the center of God's plan, that our alignment with Israel, that everything that has happened for the 6,000 years, if you look at biblical history to this point now centers around the United States of America. So there was a, there was a French philosopher by the name of Jean Boulevard, and I'm butchering his name, but he famously said, if you can't be there at the beginning, you want to be there at the end. And so I think that is what this fascination is. Right. We all want to matter. We all want to be unique in the history of the world and in God's plan. And so we weren't there on the day of Pentecost. Right. Although in the UPC they famously traced their origins to the day of Pentecost, again, to make that movement significant. But to say that we are the generation, we are the ones that witness the return of Jesus and all these apocalyptic events, it makes our otherwise insignificant and meaningless lives have significance. And not only significance, but prophetic and eschatological significance. That we were the generation when Christ chose to return and unfold all of these events. And so I think that is one of the reasons why people continue to perpetuate these ideas. And just the bottom line is it sells, right? So if, if you are a part of this consumer driven, capitalistic society in the United States, that, that, you know, we've been conditioned all of our lives to be consumers and buy things. Well, if you're a religious capitalist, if you're a pastorpreneur, then you've got to have a reason to sell books and you've got to have a reason to get people to tune in or to donate. And anything that you can connect to the Apocalypse, it's just cha ching Right.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker B
Well, I think what's also dangerous to like, young people in the. In the laypersons, in the congregation is the idea of, if God's coming back in the next 20 years, why do I need to worry about the environment? Why do I need to worry about higher education? Why. Why would I go through that effort and the money in the meantime if I'm. If it's never going to have a return on my investment? And so it's more of like what you said. What can I do for myself right now is really the only concern, I think, especially with a lot of the young people in the UPCI now today, because they're still being told that they're the generation. I mean, Jennifer and I just listened to a message probably about a year ago, Jack Cunningham, reluctantly.
Speaker A
Jen listened reluctantly, because Jeremy has a sickness. Anyways, keep going.
Speaker B
But Jack Cunningham, which, I don't know if you're familiar with him, he's very prevalent in the organization. He told the young people at. What's the name of the big conference the young people have?
Speaker A
Youth Congress.
Speaker B
Youth Congress, that their generation would be it. He guaranteed it. And I'm just like.
Speaker A
But that's what they said with us.
Speaker B
Exactly. But at the same time, it's like, you know, why put any type of investment in yourself or your future if there isn't one?
Speaker A
Right. Well, and Jeremy and I've had this discussion a lot, like, I never went to college and he dropped out because. Why? We got married young because we didn't want to go to hell for obvious reasons, because we thought the Rapture was going to happen anytime. Right?
Speaker D
What do you mean?
Speaker C
Fornication? Better to marry than burn, Right?
Speaker A
Right. Right. So I. Good God, I was 18. You're young and stupid at 18. And I, in our heads, we were like, oh, well, the Rapture is going to happen anyway, so what difference does it make? We'll just get a job and, you know, buy this crap hole little house and might as well pop a kid out now because you never know when the Rapture is going to happen, right? So if you want the opportunity, might as well get that done. But here we are, 22 years later and right around the corner.
Speaker C
Yeah, yeah, but this is it, right? And so if you think about it, you know, when, when, when, when preachers and conferences perpetuate that idea, what does it do to the constituents that are hearing that message? Young people that were very much like me, that are fully invested, that believe that this is the truth, it makes you feel very, very special. And you know, an unremarkable young person, very much like I was, standing out in that crowd, in that emotional fervor of that moment, you're going to feel very important. You're going to feel very significant. And collectively, it's going to rally your passions as a generation to perpetuate the organization and to perpetuate the institution. So, you know, the leaders and those that are invested in that movement see this very much as a way. And of course, they're true believers. I have, have no doubt of that. But the thing about culture, right, is that when we're immersed in it, it's very hard to see it. It's very hard to understand what is happening. If you ask a fish about the water that they swim in, the fish is going to be like, what's this water you speak of? But all of the people that are invested in the United Pentecostal Church have a very real investment in perpetuating that and making sure that it moves forward in a positive way. So eschatology is a means by which they can motivate young people. And just like you said, Jeremy, if, if you, if you don't have this feeling of responsibility for the planet, for the economy, for the future, look at what is happening in Israel right now. No one that I've heard in the Christian community says, you know what, we need to step back and, and, and figure this thing out. We need to, we need to figure out how we can get these people to resolve their differences and come together and to live in harmony and peace. Nobody is invested in that because they see this as a fulfillment of prophecy and they see it as their ticket out of this world. So it's not their problem. So they're able to wash their hands of anything that requires difficulty or nuance or, or hard work. Because, see, you wouldn't want to be you, right? That's sort of the attitude that a lot of these dispensationalists have when it comes to Bible prophecy. It's a thought stopper, right? So if you want to talk about politics or you want to talk about resolving nuanced and complicated issues in a way, you know, that, that, that furthers the conversation. They're like, well, you know, this is, this is all God's plan. This been going on forever. Nobody's going to figure it out. Nobody's going to solve it till Jesus comes back, so move on. We don't have to think about it. We don't have to worry about it. We just pick a side and keep moving.
Speaker D
Yeah, Scott, Going back just to something you touched on is I didn't grow up in this environment. I was, you know, not associated with religion growing up. You found it later in life, just non denominational. But one of my themes that I've had over this podcast with these guys is how intentional is the manipulation of power of the leaders of the church. Or going back to what you said, it's they true believers. And I've said it a lot, you know, with the kids and some of these people, like I, they genuinely believe in this, but that's just all they know. Like it's. Where is that line of, okay, people taking advantage of a, a culture or I really believe this. And this is, you know, they're just perpetuating this, what they've been taught and what they were taught. And you know, it's the kind of like a fine line there of there. I don't think those people are evil, but at some point I think there are some evil people mixed in there trying to, you know, take advantage of their power position. Basically.
Speaker C
Yeah, I, I think you're exactly right. And so one of the, one of the classes that I teach at the university is group dynamics and leadership. And one of the things that we study is the fact that groups have a certain function in society. So if you look back at how civilization evolves, it can be argued that religion, and I'm just saying, I'm not referencing Christianity specifically, but religion in general serves as a unifying force to civilization. So human beings out there gathering and forging and making their way in the world. And then you have the agricultural evolution where they start planting seeds and reaping harvest, and how do you keep the elites, the people at the top, right, in power when you've got all of these people down here that don't have the same power, they don't have the same autonomy, they don't have the same ability in society because they weren't born into the right family. Well, part of that is religion, right? And so you look at how religion develops and, and you have a certain ruling class, elite class known as priests that are right up under the kings. And the kings use religion to keep the masses sort of in control. And because you believe that God has ordained the king, that God has ordained the priest, then all of these people that are just doing their best, right, to survive every day, and, and the little bit that they have left over, they have to share with the king. And why do they have to do that? Because God says so, or the gods dictate or Our holy book says. And so you go back and you trace that line all the way through civilization. The same is true with groups like the United Pentecostal Church. And this is true for every institution and every organization. There's a reason that, that people join groups and not all of them are bad, Right? Community is good. Having people that agree with you about certain things builds alliances and helps you survive mentally and physically and emotionally, and helps you move forward. But you're exactly right, because what ends up happening is that those that are in power, those that are leading the organization, if we're talking about the United Pentecostal Church, are now in a position where if they told the truth about what they believe, or if they told the truth about the history of the United Pentecostal Church, or if they were just honest and said, you know what, we've made some changes and now we go to sporting events. Now a lot of people have TVs, even some men have facial hair. It's not a. Not a big deal, right, anymore like it used to be. But they won't talk about those changes. They won't talk about the reasons that they have evolved, even though it's been very, very slow. And the reason is because they have a vested interest in maintaining that structure. And if they come out as the leadership and as the gurus and say, we were wrong about some things, then that opens up the door to be wrong about other things. And so everything at the top has to be with dogmatic certainty that this is the only way to be saved, that you've got to believe it this way. And then this whole culture that they're now branding as apostolic identity grows up around that, right? And even though it differs from region to region, you have people that generally are applying that. And they'll say, well, you know, this is something we choose to do. Nobody forces us to do this. I do this to get closer to God. But what they're missing is that group dynamic and that element of culture that says you don't have to enforce rules for them to be. Be abided by, and culture says everybody that is going to make it and succeed and do well in our group is going to abide by these expected norms. And even though they may not be written down, even though in some churches nobody ever says, you've got to do this, people fall in line because the culture serves to perpetuate itself. And the people at the top are in a position where they can't change, because if they introduce too much change too quickly, they have a rebellion and a backlash, and it costs them their livelihood. And so it's very difficult. I'm paraphrasing a famous quote here. It's very difficult to convince a man that he is wrong about something when his. When his salary depends on him continuing to be wrong about that.
Speaker A
Right. Have you been following any of, like, the recent David Bernard videos or comments from General Conference?
Speaker C
Somewhat. And so David Bernard is part of, obviously, he's the general superintendent of the United Pentecostal Church, but he's also a part of a scholarly group that I belong to called the Society for Pentecostal Studies. And so most every year he's there and I see him and I talk to him about some of these things. And I remember one year, famously, I talked to him specifically about the Trinity because, you know, and I follow you guys, and you've had wonderful discussions. And for me, the Trinity was the. Was the most difficult doctrine for me to grasp. And the Oneness was the last thing to fall right for me because we were so steeped in reading the Bible through the lens of oneness theology. So every time you read a scripture, you know, I and my Father are one. Deuteronomy 6, 4 Hero Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. Everything you saw through the lens of the oneness. So when you got into the Gospel of John, that was really difficult, right, to jump through those hoops, but we made it fit. And so it took me about 10 years to understand and to embrace the doctrine of the Trinity. And so I had a conversation with him, and it was cordial. It was nice. They had some students there from Urschen delivering some papers on defense of their theology. And. And I asked some questions in session. And then afterwards, I pulled him aside And I said, Dr. Bernard, you know that the majority of people sitting on your pews believe that Trinitarians preach three gods. And he's like, yeah, I know that that's a common misperception. And I said, well, why don't you explain it to them? Why don't you tell them that they're wrong about Trinitarians? And then, you know, he started to backtrack and say things. Well, we, we. It's because we believe that somebody has to be baptized in Jesus name. We believe that that's important. But here of late, right, he's even been backtracking on that. So it's, it's very difficult to pin anyone to the wall theologically because they have so many regional differences and because you guys know the history of the UPC, the, the doctrine of Acts 2:38 was something that Southern pastors in general eventually took over the organization and pushed out other people that embraced justification by faith alone, through grace alone, on the account of Christ alone. And so, relatively speaking, Acts 2:38 insistence as the plan of salvation is a new development. And you've got. But you've still got generations that grew up only hearing that. So they embrace that. And so what happens in the UPC is they are handed a doctrine and then they're given the instruction now make it work. So instead of starting with the Bible and following the evidence where it leads, they start with the. The presupposition of this is what we believe. Now let's read the Bible to confirm what we already believe to be true. And so David Bernard writes all of these books, but he's not following the evidence, right. To take it where it leads him logically. He's starting with the pre supposition that Acts 2:38 is the plan of salvation. He's starting with the presupposition that all these holiness standards are principles in the Bible. And then he does all of this research. And so all of these doctrines develop after the fact. And so all I would ask from the upc, you know, I'm not trying to tear down an organization. Like I said, they've given me lots of wonderful gifts. I still have family that's involved with them. All I'm asking from the UPC and what I asked from David Bernard that day was simply to be honest with their constituents, be honest about what's going on. But unfortunately, like so many institutions, especially when you get group dynamics in play, is they have a vested interest in keeping it going.
Speaker A
It's so interesting to me to like, read the comment section under all of these things that are being posted. Basically, you can tell just by reading it, the constituents of the upc, they're not all on the same page. No, at all. And then they get frustrated with people who point it out. You know, like, we're the ones with the problem. But I recently commented on. Natalie from Berean posted originally that clip from David Bernard from General Conference where he's basically condemning everyone else to hell, which all of us here know that's what he was doing. But now he's backtracking, obviously, because he got called out on it. But he thought at that point he was only ministering to people at the conference. Right. So he was just ministering to his peers and people who would get it when he got called out in public. Now he's kind of like backpedaling. And I didn't really mean it like that. And so Natalie called him out on it, and I don't know if he's ever actually responded to that. I don't know. He did respond to the video, but I don't know if he called or if he responded to her call calling him out. But anyways, just going through those comments I had mentioned, even, like, it's obvious that no one's on the same page here because some of the people you'll speak with will say, well, yeah, God is the one that saves you. You're saved by faith, not by works. And then, then they go on to say, you know, the Acts 2:38, but you have to do this and this and this. So really it's not by faith, but when you point that out, then they start backpedaling. So I don't even think that even the UPC themselves are clear on what they believe. And I think it's because, like you said, it's morphed from the 40s on and it's changed so many different times and so many little things like facial hair and shorts on men and whatever. It's just all. It's never been consistent, even in the short amount of time that the UPC has been around as an organization, which I always bring out is younger than my grandpa. So, yeah, it's really not that long.
Speaker C
Yeah. And the goal post keeps moving. Right. So if, even if you repent, you're baptized in Jesus name, you're filled with the Holy Ghost, speaking in tongues, that doesn't guarantee you salvation because then you've got to go on and live a holy life. And how do you define that? Well, it depends on your pastor, it depends on your church, it depends on your district. So if you have to change churches, then you have to find out what do they preach. And like any human institution, the United Pentecostal Church has its progressive wing and it has its conservative wing. And of course, it is in the best interest of leaders like David Bernard to make sure that they keep moving forward. So, you know, Tom Fred Tenney, the district superintendent of Louisiana, used to famously say, it's not about the right wing, it's not about the left wing, it's about the bird flying. And so, you know, he would, he would say, you know, we've got to, we've got to keep this thing moving forward. And so, you know, his style of leadership, which Louisiana was always a very progressive district in the United States, relatively so compared to other districts. In fact, a Lot of times they were, you know, referred to as the liberal district or all those liberal churches down there. And that was due in large part to the late T.F. tenney's leadership, because he was a consummate. He was a consummate diplomat. He knew how to say the right things to the right people, depending upon which room he was in. In fact, I remember sitting in a room with Brother Tenney, and I started recounting all of this history that we're well aware of of the two factions in the upc, because, mind you, I had never heard that history. I grew up in the upc, but I didn't hear that history until I was in my 20s. And a former teacher of mine, Lauren Yaden, shared this information with me. I was at his son's wedding. And when he told me that there were people in the UPC and he was one of them, especially from the Northwest, that believed basically what I had heard all my life, what Baptists believe about salvation, I literally almost fell off of his couch, right? Like, why. Why have I never heard this before? And so I asked Brother Tinney about this, and Brother Tenney entertained me for a little bit and was willing to talk about it. But when I. When I got to the point of the Trinity and wanted to talk about the finer points, I remember literally he got up and left the room, like, mid sentence. And it was because I was surrounded by a bunch of people from our church. And, you know, he was. He was exercising discretion in that moment. And he knew he was either going to have to tell the truth about the history, and this could open up a can of worms, right? Especially for people that don't have the context. So I understand the leadership strategy there, but what I don't appreciate from my experience with UPC leaders, and I literally had my pastor do this on several occasions. I remember having conversations with other church leaders about Calvinism and about Reformed theology. And we were having, you know how those conversations can get. And we were having one of those conversations. And I was going through that whole phase, right? So there's a phase as you're. As you're exiting the upc, you sort of get bogged down in a lot of those doctrines where they literally should put you in a cage and not let you out for two years. So I was going through that phase and I was asking all of these questions. I remember out of the corner of my eye, I was talking. I saw my pastor enter the room. He surveyed the room, saw what we were talking about, and literally turned and left the room because he didn't want to talk about it. A. He didn't know what we were talking about. He had neither the capacity nor the understanding to talk intelligently about those particular doctrines, and he just didn't want to get in it. And so that goes to your point that a lot of these UPC folks, if you start talking doctrine, if you start talking finer points of the Bible, they get very uncomfortable. And then usually what they do is they play the God card and they say, well, I'm just following the Spirit and whatever the Holy Spirit tells me to do until it comes to Jesus name, baptism. And then it's all about what the Bible says. Right. And so they want to have it both ways. For things that make them uncomfortable, it's all about the Spirit. But when things that they're, you know, dogmatically certain about, they. It's all about what the Bible says.
Speaker D
So I'm wondering with. I'm gonna try to formulate this where it makes sense.
Speaker C
Yeah. And I'm sorry, Gary, I know we're leaving you out of a lot. I don't.
Speaker D
Don't worry about it.
Speaker C
I'm.
Speaker D
I'm. I don't have a lot of the information like you guys do. I didn't grow up in it. But I'm wondering with the way, like Jen mentioned, this is such a young sect, you know, it's only been around for a little bit. I think it was probably easier for some of these leaders back when it began to kind of confine and keep everybody, keep them segregated from the knowledge or the. You want to say the truth or whatever it is. But I'm wondering with how information gets around now, how they train you guys basically, like you said, Jen and Jeremy are the same way. They're very studied. They have a very regimented. Like they can go in and read something and they're very focused on stuff We. You are. You don't think you are. But I'm wondering if they've kind of built in their own demise, so to speak, to where, you know, when you. I truly believe some of these leaders have led people to God and to Jesus, maybe indirectly. And once that spirit gets in you and you get that hunger for truth, you start, you know, these guys did almost like a clandestine study behind the scenes when they were wanting to get out. So with. With that being said, have they built in their own kind of demise to where these people are now so curious about questions like you're asking about to where, you know, now the pastors don't even Want to talk about it, they turn around and leave. And like, man, these guys are almost too smart for us to keep hidden or keep under control, so to speak.
Speaker C
I don't, I wish that were the case. I, I think for some like, you know, like Jennifer and Jeremy. And for me, I always say that the, the church gave me the tools to eventually leave that church. So they taught me how to study the Bible. I was a Bible quizzer. I committed a lot of Bible to memory and I became very, very good. I went to Stockton to Christian Life College right out of high school. And I remember clapping out of the Book of Acts class, right. I didn't even have to take it because I knew it so well. I knew the doctrine so well. And so they gave me the tools to, so that eventually, you know, the spirit of truth leads you into all truth. And it led me right out the door of the United Pentecostal Church. And that's what happened to me. Unfortunately, I think there is a large constituency of people within the United Pentecostal Church and this is true for every denomination, for every human institution. There's a lot of people that sort of fall into that cultural trap where, you know, this is my community, these are my relationships, this is my family, this is my reality. And yes, if there's some people that do some wackadoodle things, well, that's not my church. And so I'm going to hang in there. And yeah, every once in a while I have some questions, but it doesn't, my questions do not trump how I feel at that Sunday night altar service. It doesn't change how I feel at, because of the times. It doesn't change how I feel at Landmark or General Conference. So I get caught up in the emotion and all of the questions, all the intellectual questions that I might have or the inconsistencies that I see sort of are swept away in that cultural undercurrent as this is my family. And one of the reasons that I left, in addition to, you know, just knowing the Bible and knowing that a lot of this didn't, didn't add up, was that, that I never really did anything. I mean I made a living barely as an evangelist for 13 years. I preached revivals for some big name pastors in, in the church and did that and, and, but I never saw, no one was ever going to take me seriously like they, they, they wanted to use me for my talents and abilities and wanted to any way that they could use me to, to sort of perch up their own kids kingdom or their own ministry. But beyond that, I mean, I never had more than a local license in the United Pentecostal Church. I joke that, that when I left and I just let my credentials expire. I don't think anybody noticed. I don't think anybody really noticed that I had left. And, and here's another thing, right? So you have the, the halo effect. In communication studies and psychological studies, we call it the, the halo effect and the demon effect. So people that you like, you give them more leeway to do things that you might disagree with. So, you know, and I was never one that I was going to outright confront them or start a podcast, you know, where I'm dismantling the upc. I leave that to the professionals like you guys. So. So what I did, right.
Speaker A
No, not professionals.
Speaker C
I would, so I would, I would, I would try to have conversations. I would, I would still preach in UPC churches and I would preach about grace. I would go through the epistles and I would talk about, you know, the, the grace of God is what saves us. It's not works. And I would, I would, I would go as. I mean, I, I preached grace all the time. And what happened is, is that because I had the halo effect, people would impose on me, like, oh, that's different. I haven't thought about that. But of course, he's talking about Acts 2. 38. And so I've. I found that unless you're just like you, with people especially, that are steeped and invested in perpetuating the status quo within a culture, you have to be really pointed and direct, because if not, especially if they like you, they're just going to assume that you're just like them, only just a little bit different, and it's not a big deal. And so there's a lot of people like that in the organization that choose to stay for a lot of reasons. And the, the issue with me is, I think it was, I, I just, I, I don't know what would have happened if I would have ended up with some, some folks that would have taken time with me to say, you know what? We're really going to invest in you. We're going to give you. Every opportunity that I had within the UPC was one that I made. And, you know, I preached for the guys. Like, I preached revivals for Wayne Huntley, for Jeff Arnold, for, For all. And I was busy as an evangelist, and I did all of that. But it, but in the end, it was a, it was all transactional relationships. It was like, here, come and make my Church excited or pray some people through to the Holy Ghost and we'll give you an offering and then we'll see you next year. Maybe if we have room in our schedule or it was like, you set up this event, run it for us, and, you know, get a lot of people to come out for our church. But when we're done, you're not really part of, of, of what we're doing. You're not part of the legacy here. So those were issues that I had. And I think a lot of those transactional relationships stem from the UPC's view of God. If you think about it, they see God as a transaction. And so it's God, I give you all of these things. And in return, I expect my Sunday night blessing. In return, I expect to be healed. In return, I expect, you know, wealth and prosperity and a, a good comfortable life because. And you even. It shows up in their language. Right? So. So now they've sort of adopted the, the language when it comes to holiness standards is these are things that I'm doing because I want to gain power or authority with God. So they don't talk in terms of salvation. They sort of learned that lesson. But now it's, I want whatever I give up for God, he's going to return it to me in anointing. And so they, they, they.
Speaker B
Wait a minute, manipulate God?
Speaker C
Yeah, exactly. They make God, they reduce God and their relationship to God to a vending machine. And so I put in the quarters of my praise and my worship, my tithe, my holy living, my sacrifices. And when I push the button, God, I expect you to reciprocate. And if you think about the language of a revival service or the language of a conference, or the language of a Sunday night or Sunday morning service at a Pentecostal church, you will hear rhetoric like, you're only going to get out of this service what you put into it. When the praises go up, the glory comes down. So it's all about. Right? It's all about what you. Exactly. And God is not God. God exists in their economy. God exists to serve them right and to bless them and to help them. And then everything else is just collateral damage, you know, when things don't make sense in their brand of theology.
Speaker A
When we took Gary to youth convention service, he's like, why is the motivational speaker screaming at me? Because it was all about, you need to do this, you need to do this, you need to do this. It wasn't about Jesus.
Speaker D
That's why I said, I don't Think I heard Jesus's name mentioned at all, you know, but yeah, yeah, it was interesting to see those. The youth. I think we talked about it on one podcast. Like, I didn't doubt the genuine feeling that those kids were feeling. And you could see they were. Were very engrossed in it and they were experiencing something. It was just. I don't know what the emotion would be. Sad or kind of just felt bad that on the. The nature of the way they were receiving it, but didn't doubt that something was going on inside of him.
Speaker A
I will never forget your face. Like, I will never forget that night.
Speaker C
It was.
Speaker D
I've never been to anything like that before.
Speaker A
So it was his hands in his pockets. And of course, we dressed UPC because we didn't want to, like, stand out, right? And of course, as soon as we got there, people we used to go to church with were like the ushers and taking our tickets and stuff. And I'm like. But we saw in the back row and Gary's face, hands in his pockets, just like.
Speaker D
It was. I didn't. I had never experienced that before. It was quite.
Speaker B
You should have seen him. When I said, they're about to bring out the snakes, I was ready.
Speaker C
I always joked, you know, that. That. That upon reflection, it felt like my church was just like one chorus away from someone bringing out the snakes, Right? And so we were encouraged. We were encouraged to behave in ways that on Sunday night that if we. If we mimicked that behavior one block away at the grocery store at Walmart, we would be arrested.
Speaker A
Right?
Speaker C
But it was celebrated at our church, right? I remember Jeff Arnold famously preaching a sermon at. Because of the times, it's time to take leave of your senses. And that was his whole thrust, right? That you can't think your way to God, so you've got to turn off your brain and you've got to feel your way. And now that's not to say that we aren't emotional creatures. And that's another gift, I think, that the UPC did give me, even though it was abused and even though it was extreme, was that to be a holistic, flourishing person? You can't just be a brain on a stick. We are emotional creatures, and that is part of who we are. And God designed us that way to respond to him, but not in a way where our thinking is checked at the door. And the. And we're led by our emotions. And so in a lot of ways, the. The UPC talks out of both sides of their mouth when they declare as Scripture does that the heart is wicked, but then in an emotional fervent service, they encourage you to follow those passions and to go with it. Right. And I joke that, you know, we were all told as young people to abstain from sex. And then they would put us in close quarters to one another and for hours at a time to music popping and, you know, whispering in people's ears as they're rocking back and forth, crying. And we had to walk out of that and have, have no impure thoughts. I mean, come on.
Speaker A
Right, Valid point. That's a valid point.
Speaker D
Makes you want to get married at 18, right?
Speaker A
I mean, clearly. I mean, but we did our duty. We were trying to reproduce and build the church. Right. So we did what we were supposed to do. But you seem like a really introverted, like reserved. Not introverted probably, but very reserved person. Did you get into like the demonstrative worship and stuff too?
Speaker C
Yeah, I did. And it was, it was, it was out of character for me. And I remember being very self conscious about the first time that I actually danced. I remember I was probably 12, 13, and it was one of those services, right, where everything is happening. And so I went to the back of the church, I turned my back and sort of found a dark corner. And then I would start jumping and moving around a little bit. But I was always very conscious of that until. Right. I was in, in the pulpit. And it was my job as an evangelist to get a response from a group. And then, you know, it was, it was very performative at that point. And I don't mean performative in that I was, it was fake or I was being hypocritical. It was. We use the, the term performative in an academic way. We're talking about how people within a group or within a culture are expected to behave, to fulfill the desires and the requirements of the larger group. So it was. Go ahead.
Speaker D
I was going to say, because I'm. I still struggle with it. Even in our church, you know, we have a lot of hand raisers and.
Speaker A
Okay, look, our church is nothing like those kind of services, but let's just throw that out there.
Speaker B
We're a step away from the frozen chosen. I mean, come on.
Speaker D
Yeah, I have a hard time outwardly demonstrating my worship to God. And a lot of times it weighs on me. Like, you know, I'm a horrible Christian for not, you know, raising my hand. Or do I just. I struggle with it big time. You know, I do it in other ways.
Speaker C
But the reason you probably. And I'm not trying to psychoanalyze you, but probably.
Speaker A
Oh, let's do.
Speaker C
Yeah, probably the reason you struggle with that is because there, there aren't any expectations from God on you to perform that way. Way, but you're feeling the pressure from everybody else doing it. And so, yeah, what you're experiencing in your church is the same thing that we experienced in our church to the extreme. And it. But not only did it have to do with our worship styles, it had to do with. With how women dress and how men dress and how they behave towards one another and how we treated the pastor and how we treated the pastor's family and how we talked about doctrine and, and even how we fellowshiped. You know, it was okay to go out to the Mexican restaurant after church and, and eat and laugh and joke and have fun, but, you know, you couldn't go over someone's house and watch a movie or you weren't supposed to anyway, and you couldn't, you couldn't do other things. Right. That. That are totally innocent and fun. I remember we were part of a progressive church one time, and it was funny because outside of church, all of the women wore pants, cut their hair. Yeah. So it was a really progressive UPC church, and it was in Louisiana. So they. I mean, it's. It. It was okay there. Depending on the church, people might talk about you, but depending on the church, you could behave that way. But then we had like a harvest fest around Halloween time, and my wife wore pants to the event. And afterwards the pastor called me and said, hey, I don't want to talk. I don't want to. Again, he didn't want to have the conversation about whether or not women should wear pants. But he said, just out of respect to everybody else, when, when your wife is on campus, could she abide by the standards or wear a dress? He didn't say abide by the standards. He said, just wear a dress or a skirt. Don't wear pants on. And he was. I could tell he was embarrassed about saying it. He. He knew it was stupid what he was saying, but he said it and he meant it. And that was the culture that was being enforced. And so what happens in the UPC is a lot of times the. The tail ends up wagging the dog because you have a lot of preachers and pastors that say, yeah, this is stupid. But then you got those old timers out there that have lived it their entire life, and if you change too quickly, too fast, they're going to get mad at you, and those finances are going to walk out the door. And so you try to, you try to drive that truck down the middle of the highway and it's top heavy. Right? And you're, and, and I feel for some UPC pastors, some of it bring, some of them bring it on themselves. But there are a lot of guys out there that, that are just confused and they're in too deep and they don't have any other alternatives to make a living. And so they've got to toe the party line.
Speaker A
That's, that's the sad reality of it. It's like it's, that's your livelihood. What else are you going to do? You've dedicated your entire life and career to that. And then once you figure out that you're wrong, I mean if you walk away, literally lose everything.
Speaker C
And that would have been me had I not gone back to school. I mean if I, if I hadn't had the avenue to the academy to teach that, that would have been me, you know, because I, I, I have no skills outside of doing what I'm doing right now with you guys.
Speaker A
You look like you have something else to say.
Speaker D
No, not really.
Speaker A
Oh, you had your phone.
Speaker D
Say something, Jeremy.
Speaker C
I know.
Speaker A
So much pressure and I'm sorry, I didn't mean to put it on you. Well, thank you, Scott, for the discussion and all the thought provoking points that you made.
Speaker C
You're welcome. I hope I didn't talk too much. I, I tend to get excited about these things and I hope I didn't dominate the conversation.
Speaker D
So I was just thinking if like you have an online class I could take.
Speaker A
Gary's like sign me up.
Speaker C
Yeah.
Speaker A
No, you're definitely a professor though. But I love it. Yes, it comes, it comes across very eloquently.
Speaker D
Yeah.
Speaker A
Better, better than the three of us would ever said any of that.
Speaker D
Well, I mean we're professionals.
Speaker A
Yeah.
Speaker D
Put a lot of.
Speaker A
Right. Right.
Speaker B
Well, if he, if he's the professor, then I'm Gilligan.
Speaker C
Yeah.
Speaker A
We're not even going to open that can anyway.
Speaker C
I used to get in trouble for watching that on Sunday morning. So. Yeah, my mom. Right. So she was, My dad had the tv. He would always sleep in on Sunday, Sunday morning. And of course any other day of the week we could watch tv. But on Sunday morning, for some reason we were getting ready for church, you know, and so I mean, and that's was the only day of the week when I was a kid when Gilligan's island came on and I wanted to watch it, but I would get in trouble for watching TV on Sunday morning before we went to church.
Speaker A
Dang it. At least you had a tv. Jeremy had a TV for a while.
Speaker B
For a while, yeah. When I was about 8, my dad started going to church and that's when the TV left.
Speaker A
So, yeah, yeah, I think I was like third grade when we got rid of ours.
Speaker D
Our TV was the only way our family communicated. Still to this day, when we get together, we talk about TV shows completely opposite.
Speaker A
Yeah, somebody had said something at work a few weeks ago about a TV show from, like, the early 90s. And I was like, dude, I grew up Pentecostal. I have no idea what you're talking about. I have no clue. You're gonna have to dumb it down.
Speaker C
And, you know, I, I, I, I, I do want to say that I, I really appreciate what you guys do. It's very important. And anytime someone shares their story, I encourage people, share your stories because that's, that's what if, if the UPC is ever going to change, that's what's going to change it. I, I'm all, I'm, I'm a Bible nerd, I'm a theology nerd, and I, I love debating doctrine and talking, but challenging their doctrine isn't, isn't going to change them. It might make some people think, but you're never going to have David Bernard say, you know what? You make a good point. I'm going, my next podcast, I'm going to renounce Acts 2. 38, and I'm going to get right on that. Thank you. I've seen the light. That's never going to happen. But what will happen is ordinary people like you guys telling your story, saying, this is what I experienced. Write your story, Jennifer. Thank you for your books. Thank you for what you're doing that's so important, because those stories and your experience will be there long after you and I exit this place. And, and that's for future generations. And there's always going to be somebody like you or like me that says, wait, this doesn't make sense. I wonder if there's anything written about this. And they're going to be able to find your work. They're going to be able to tune into this podcast. So thank you guys for what you're doing. It's, it's really, really important. And to anybody that's listening, whether you were involved as heavily as I was, or, or were a minister, or you just went and sat on a pew, tell people your story, write it down, post it to social media, share it with all of your friends talk about it and talk about it again because people need to hear your story, and you never know.
Speaker A
You never know who's listening. Yeah, but Scott has a blog which is. What's it called?
Speaker C
Scott Lloyd Blog. Real creative, perfect. 1T and 1L. My family couldn't afford the other consonants.
Speaker A
Okay, I will put a link in in this podcast so that way people can find your blog. Because, you know, you're very well spoken, very good writer. So I appreciate everything you do as well. So thank you. Right back at you. All right, anything else you want to add, guys?
Speaker B
I'm going to ask you the same question I asked Jonah, and I'm sure you've had conversations with Jonah.
Speaker C
Gosh.
Speaker B
Bigfoot. Friend or foe? I mean, especially now that you're in North Dakota. I'm sure you've seen him silhouette back.
Speaker D
There in the aurora.
Speaker C
Probably so. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I. I entertain all things science fiction and. And hold out the possibility that there are many things in this world that have yet to be explained, but perhaps, perhaps one day they will.
Speaker D
Yeah, that's a trailer right there. There we go.
Speaker A
I love how you said science fiction. Don't tell Jeremiah and Andrew from Cultish, though. They might get a little upset with me. All right, well, thank you again, Scott. I appreciate it.
Speaker B
Thank you. Thank you for your time.
Speaker A
We will talk to you later.