Church Is Not Working

CHURCH IS NOT WORKING! BY Pam Sheppard, author of the Fake Jesus: Fallen Angels Among Us, Faces of the Religous Demon, The Making of a Prophet, and To Curse the Root. Christian television would work if it repeated the same message of salvation over and over again. People would be able to be saved in their living room. Then if they went to church, at least their salvation would be assured, in spite of any error they might be taught. However, preaching a salvation message every day would not work "in the world's system of media communciation" because ratings are based upon diversity. This is why the mega TV preachers are prone to add to or take away from the pure and simple gospel. Jesus crucified, buried and raised doesn't play well for either television or radio. All babes in Christ need someone to feed them the word of God. They need to be able to ask personalized questions and receive answers relevant and specific to their needs. Even a Christian talk show can be deceiving because people who are untrained and unskilled in the word of God will take the advice they hear sent to a particular caller, and improperly apply it to their own particular situation. After I was saved and still a babe in Christ, I fed myself off of the tapes of Kenneth Copeland, Kenneth Hagin, Fred Price and several others. I pumped one tape after another into my head. I misapplied the scriptures on faith to some real life situations where if I had had a personal teacher, I could have learned a lot quicker and avoided the pitfalls. Instead, I took what these preachers taught out of context, and wrongfully applied their teaching to my own life. Every one needs an elder who can answer questions. As clear as I myself try to make things when I bring forth the word, invariably, someone misreads or misinterprets my teachings, even now. To counteract this problem, anyone who wants to contact me by email or by phone to ask me a question about something that I taught can do so. I answer each and every question. Christian churches of today would work if they took the advice that Jesus gave to the 7 churches of 2000 years ago. It was one word. REPENT!!!! The problem is that they won't. Sardis didn't heed the warning. Nor Ephesus or any of the rest of them. And guess what!? Those original churches no longer exist. I would have to search out what happened to the church that the Lord commended called Philadelphia. But all of the rest of those churches are nothing but rubble and broken peices of stone, toppled by earthquakes. NO MORE "CHUCH AS USUAL AT OUR LOCAL ASSEMBLY I pastored 2 AME Zion Churches, one in Norwich New York and the other in Saratoga New York. I also served for several years as an associate minister in my home church in Albany New York. From my 22 years of ministry within a denomination, I must attest to the fact that the damage had been done many years by generations before my time. Therefore, sin is now so intrinsic that it is almost impossible for denominational churches to repent. I may not have had the kind of revelation that I have now, but for the most part, I did not preach error and I was walking in the righteousness that I knew at the time. Overall, I preached a message of repentance and power. It didn't matter. The people, both minister and laity refused to hear. So I started Healing Waters in 1996 while still in the denomination.. A year and a half ago, I realized that the "church" model was not working at Healing Waters either. So I revamped it.. For example, no more do I do a passive bible study where I do all the work and lecturing and the people just sit there in front of me. I used

to do four bible studies a week, two in the morning and two at night. No more. Everyone who wants bible study must do an independent study based upon the message that they heard on Sunday. They prepare what they have learned for me, either in writing or by telephone, rather than the other way around. They also prepare questions based upon what they did not understand in the teaching. I hold these bible studies in conference calls over the telephone. Individual counseling sessions are available for all those who need it. The service itself is also "different." It is more like an AA meeting than a traditional church worship service. However, the emphasis is the word---at least an hour. After the word is a question and answer period, a time of testimony and prayer. I rarely do public deliverances but if the spirit leads, demons could get cast out after the children have left the service. We don't over emphasize singing anymore. We may or may not sing a song or two. We leave it up to people to listen to worship music in their private devotions. Little emphasis on the offering. We leave it up to the member to send their offering over the web. No one leaves our gathering or "meeting" with their problem unless they want to. Sometimes after the word has gone forth, all of our attention will go toward getting one person delivered in a particular area. We do not insist that people come to our gathering every time the doors are open. We direct them to the website. If the unsaved come in looking for truth, they leave "saved."No more "dress up" for Sunday. I wear jogging suits, fashionable of course, lol. No more churchy clothes unless a person wants to. Everyone is "comfortable" in whatever they want to wear. I will not tolerate people coming to church out of form and fashion. I asked one young man who has been coming to church because of his girlfriend, "why are you here." He said "I don't know." I said "well, til you know, don't come back." One of my other regular visitors thought "Oh, that is awful. How can a pastor tell someone NOT to come to church" She herself has not been back since I said that. My motive was this. If visitors do not know that those who come to church are searching for Jesus, then they will just sit in my congregation , and become more and more confused. Visitors who do not understand who Jesus is will be in even a worst state than they were in BEFORE they came to church. They may even pick up a religious demon due to becoming habituated to church attendance, a form of godliness that denies the power thereof. As I write this, it is January 1, 2007. These changes in the way we assemble at Healing Waters were made on Sept 11, 2005. The Lord revealed in 2006---- just a few months ago in fact--- that Healing Waters was not really built upon a clean foundation in 1996 because I was with a secret sin at the time, with the man who became my 3rd husband shortly after Healing Waters was founded. Even though I got married, the ministry was still "unclean." In fact, the Lord revealed that Richard was sent by the devil to infiltrate my ministry from the ground up. It was Satan's intention to spoil Healing Waters before it even got started. It almost worked because I was deceived into believing that the Lord was in this. He wasn't. Cool. No problem. Better to know now than never. Don't get me wrong. God was in control and knew that I needed to " go through" -so that I could help others similarily deceived. The goal was to know the truth. Now that I know the truth, I thank God everyday for not allowing me to become a successful pastor of a large church or a mega preacher. I thank the Lord that He would not grow my ministry Himself while I was unclean and He would not allow the devil to grow it either. Now that the devil is out of my local assembly, I will see where the Lord takes me and my ministry in 2007. July 8, 2007 I was shown that those who assemble with us have been living two lives: a Christian face before me when we assemble and a worldly face at home, on the job and in the local community. I have shut it down as of July 8th. TODAY!