“We were making peanut brittle and left for about 20 minutes and when we came back, everything was filled with smoke,” church member Greg Lightfoot said, describing the front entrance of the chapel.

The church’s kitchen is located in the rear of the chapel, 115 Jessica Drive.

When the pair discovered smoke leaking out the front doors of the chapel about noon, they attempted to extinguish the flames with a hose and fire extinguisher until fire officials arrived.

Victoria Fire Department Battalion Chief Roger Hempel said a third-party call came in at 12:47 p.m. to report a small kitchen fire at the church.

“At this time, we’re still investigating, but there was no major damage to the structure,” Hempel said.

There was some fire damage to the kitchen cabinets, he said.

Lightfoot indicated he and Armstrong may have failed to turn off the stove when they left the kitchen.

“We may not have turned the knob all the way off,” Lightfoot said.

Fire officials were able to put out the fire in about 10 minutes. No injuries were reporter.

“Thank goodness, it could have been a lot worse,” Lightfoot said.

Victoria County Fire Marshal and Victoria Sheriff Department also responded the fire.

VICTORIA ADVOCATE

Al Sharpton visits Apostolic church in support of the church's rights.

PEMBERTON, NJ – August 28, 2010. A New Jersey town, under the threat of a federal lawsuit, appears to be rolling out the red carpet for a church. 

The Apostolic Church of Deliverance found and leased a property in Pemberton that was ideal for its plans, which include a future daycare. Chicago attorney Noel Sterett tells OneNewsNow the church then sought zoning approval.

“But what they came to find out was that the Borough of Pemberton didn’t have a zone anywhere in its municipality for churches to locate as of right. In other words, a church was prohibited to locate anywhere in Pemberton unless it got the express approval of the planning board of the borough,” Sterett reports.

The lengthy process, which had no public opposition, cost the church about $40,000, but to no avail. The attorney contends that violates federal law, so he filed a lawsuit. But on the eve of a hearing to ask for an injunction against the town, the council, the planning board and their attorneys had a meeting and decided that under the provisions of the Religious Land Use and Institutional Persons Act of 2000, the church should be permitted to use the property.

“They passed a resolution, which, praise God, recognized that the church should have been treated as a permitted use,” Sterett explains.

So the lawsuit is on hold until the town takes official action and grants the church its rights under federal law.

Civil rights activist Al Sharpton’s voice boomed through the tiny church on Washington Street on Sunday as he delivered his opinion on a local zoning dispute. “Servicing people of the community should be commendable, not debatable,” Sharpton said. “What harm is there in opening a house of praise?”

MudFlats

Pastor Larry Webb Files Federal Lawsuit Against Santa Rosa Sheriff for barring the ACTS Program from the jail.

SANTA ROSA, FL - August 16, 2010. A complaint and injunction were served Friday against the Santa Rosa County Sheriff.

The Federal lawsuit brought by Pastor Larry Webb on behalf of the First Apostolic Church seeks to prohibit Sheriff Wendell Hall of Santa Rosa County, from barring the Church’s faith based alcohol substance abuse program from the Santa Rosa County Jail. 

Charges alleging inmates have been denied Baptism rights and the removal of volunteers from the jail is something questioned by Bishop Cecil Downing, President of the Santa Rosa County “Inter Faith” Board and Jail Chaplin Morgan Miller.

“We have allowed inmates to be baptized as requested,” Bishop Downing said.  “We have never stopped any church to come in at the inmates request.”

The motion for injunction indicates that the group had been previously barred from the Jail in a prior instance in 2008, but the matter was resolved after intervention of the American Center for Law and Justice (“ACLJ”).

Pastor Webb’s group alleges that the action barring them from the jail was taken by the Santa Rosa County “Inter Faith” Board, and was initiated by a “doctrinal dispute” over proper baptism rights. 

“The Alcohol Chemical Treatments Series (’ACTS’) Program is an award winning faith based program approved by the Department of Corrections and offered in a dozen facilities in the State of Florida, and hundreds of correctional facilities across the country,” said Pastor Webb.

“We are involved mostly in the re-entry program for the Florida Department of Corrections. We have over 400 inmates participating through my church alone a week, and I do nine ACTS classes Monday through Friday at five different facilities.”

Chaplain Miller stated part of the issue was the board changing chemical dependency classes.

“They were running the ‘ACTS’ classes and we stopped getting the class rosters as of April 2009,” Miller said. “Because of this issue the board voted to use another chemical treatment service.

“The First Apostolic Church still has members on the board and Pastor Webb comes in every Thursday night. This is just all related to the ‘ACTS’ class.”

Santa Rosa County’s “Inter Faith” Board works to make sure all religious denominations are serviced at the jail.

Miller noted Baptist, Apostolic, Methodist, Catholic, Pentecostal, and Christian faiths are represented as well as other denominations including those of the Muslim and Jewish faiths.

“We don’t have the time and space to set up services for all faiths and denominations,” Miller said. “We use the inner faith approach, but if someone wants to speak to a preacher from a specific faith, then I will contact who they request.

Bishop Downing and others on the board were not aware of the lawsuit until it made the news.

“I found out about the lawsuit on Facebook,” Downing said. “I really don’t see a problem. We had rules and regulations set up and we followed them. In doing this we switched programs.”

The program the Santa Rosa County “Inter Faith” Board switched to is one called, “The Most Excellent Way.”

“This is not just a program to help with chemical dependency by all dependency’s,” Miller said. “It deals with those who feel like they are addicted to porn, alcohol, drugs, smoking, and other issues through a faith based program.

“The difference here is this program is open to all pastors and lay people to help, where the ‘ACTS’ program was something administered only by the pastor and members of the Apostolic Church.”

Pastor Webb feels his group has been singled out over a disagreement over doctrine.

“We have put 11000 volunteer hours in the past four years, and over 3300 participants in the program,” Webb said. “The program has never been barred from any facility in the State of Florida, other than in Santa Rosa County.  In the vast majority of instances we are invited into the facilities by prison and jail officials. 

“We are a court approved substance abuse treatment program, and at the time we were barred from the jail some inmates had been court ordered to participate.”

Attempts to obtain a comment from Sheriff Hall for this story was unsuccessful.

The counsel representing Pastor Webb and the First Apostolic Church felt religious discrimination is the only issue at hand here in this case.

“There is no legitimate explanation for what happened here…other than religious discrimination,” said Carolyn Jones, Esq., local counsel for Golding PC, New York in its Jacksonville, Fla., office. “Inmates have been denied religious classes which are a crucial step in their rehabilitation and reintegration into society…

“We are also looking at whether religious rights have been denied to inmates, and we suspect that there has been an improper establishment of religion by officials adopting one side of a purely religious dispute.”

Attempts to contact Pastor Webb by the Press Gazette were unsuccessful as of press time.

Santa Rosa’s Press Gazette

Q: Mr. Boora, as a leading British/European Apostolic author, scholar and writer–who is also an expert on Indian religions growing up in a Sikh Indian family. Tell me about your new books: Apostolic (Acts2:38) and Post-Apostolic Baptism (28:19) volumes 1 and 2?

A: Well, I studied theology and biblical interpretation some years ago with the renowned University of Wales through Kings Evangelical Divinity School. While studying theology, I studied a subject that touched on Apostolic theology, so to speak.

It was this that spring-boarded me to research the subject of baptism in Jesus name in more detail. While researching, it made me realize that Apostolics have commonly quoted the Encyclopedia Britannica and Hasting Dictionary to name a few, for support of baptism in Jesus name. But these were merely top surface materials on the subject, since the greater depth and facts lay uncovered for decades in a theological and historical sense, with the exception of the New Testament of course.

These books cite hundreds of citations that show baptism in Jesus name was performed throughout the ages since the Early Church to the present time. Most of these citations are unheard of in Apostolic circles or resources due to it being researched in Europe instead of United States.

Q: Can you give an example of your research and scholarship?

A: Yes, for example, The New Testament of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in The Original Greek[1] 1860 A.D., notes the following:

“He that is baptized in the Name of Christ, is baptized in the Name of the Holy Trinity: for the Father and the Holy Spirit are inseparable from the Son. One person of the Holy Trinity does not exclude another but includes it…To be baptized in the Name of Jesus, is to be baptized in the Name of the Triune God, which could not be, unless Jesus Christ were God.”[2]

This foregoing quote recognizes the validity of baptism in the name of Jesus, since the author notes that Jesus is God and in His name is baptism invoked and performed, since in His name (Jesus) includes Father and Holy Ghost, therefore the validity of baptism in the name of Jesus is evident from the above quote. The quote also notes that during that period of time baptism in the name of Jesus flourished, hence the reference to it.

Another example in the United Kingdom is found in a work dated about 1866 A.D., entitled Re-Union of The Church – The Church and the Word Essay on Questions of The Day by Various Writers, which notes that dissenters were starting to baptize regularly in Jesus’ name, probably in Liverpool, England:

“…but the form which is now becoming common among Dissenters “I baptize thee in the Name of the Lord Jesus.”[3]

Another well noted British scholar, the late Professor Arthur James Mason (1851-1928), former Vicar of All Hallows, Barking and Master of Pembroke College Cambridge, and Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity Cambridge University (for his bio see Who’s Who, 1905 fifty-seventh year issue p. 35) adds to the list of scholars and is in close proximity to the Anglo-Catholic view, that baptism in the name of Jesus only is a valid form of baptism as recognized by the Catholic Church. A notation of this appears in his work published in 1893 A.D., entitled: The Relation of Confirmation To Baptism As Taught in Holy Scripture and The Fathers (2^nd ed.) published by Longsmans, Green & Co., London (1893).

What the late British Cambridge University scholar and professor is informing us, is that, despite the stigma associated with the Jesus only baptismal formula, in that, it being termed by some as invalid despite scriptural evidence (Acts 2:38), the Catholic Church in Rome and the West in this era appeared to accept its candidates as correctly baptized, as noted by the preceding commentator. This view is brought out when discussing the issue of confirmation and baptism. Mason’s work notes quite distinctively that baptism in the name of Jesus is nevertheless sufficient to secure salvation. Thus, as Professor Mason notes (see p. 132 of the version published by Bibliolife, LLC):

“Baptism, though uncompleted by confirmation, is nevertheless sufficient to secure salvation… and this, even if the formula be … only the name of Jesus Christ.”

Therefore, the United Kingdom was home to baptism in the name of Jesus for centuries. However, volumes 1 and 2, as you personally know Mr. Baumeister, contain innumerable references, citations, journals, articles, treaties and book references–with reference to the recent findings from the 9^th century in the United Kingdom with respect to possible baptism in the name of Jesus–and thoroughly explains how the ‘actual’ transition took place from Jesus name to the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, which is sometimes commonly misunderstood among Apostolic people.

Q: Mr. Boora, I have read your work which has also been read by numerous other people around the world which include pastors, bishops, ministers, students, etc, and it has to be said that it is the most comprehensive well researched, scholarly and academic theological Apostolic work published on baptism in the name of Jesus out there, can you tell us a bit more about your work?

A:  I would have to say, that to learn more about the published works, about volumes 1 and 2 can be obtained directly from the publisher Xlibris at the following website:  http://www2.xlibris.com/bookstore/author.aspx?authorid=58258  Or they can contact the Apostolic School of Theology directly and speak with them regarding my work that is being used for university level courses as recommended reading texts for students.

[2] Ibid at p. 50.

[3] Blenkinopp, Edwin, L. Edited by Rev. Orby Shipley, M.A. Re-Union of The Church – The Church and the Word Essay  on Questions of The Day by Various Writers. Longsman, Green, Reader and Dyer, London (1866), p. 180.

According to a report from Kennett Police Department Officer Paul Vandeventer, at approximately 7:04 a.m., on Sunday, Aug. 15, Jason Candler, 30, of Jonesboro, Ark., was traveling north on Highway 412, approaching the South Bypass when he changed lanes into the southbound lane, continued across the South Bypass, and ran off the road on the north side.

Vandeventer reports that Candler’s vehicle struck a highway road sign, continued down the ditch, struck another road sign, and began to roll and flip in a northeasterly direction, striking the sign for the First United Pentecostal Church and eventually coming to a rest after striking the church itself.

According to the report, probable contributing circumstances included driving too fast for the conditions, violating a signal/sign, inattention, and alcohol.

No details were available as to the severity of the injuries to Candler.

Candler’s vehicle, a 2003 Ford F150, was reported as totaled and towed from the scene by Allgood’s Towing of Kennett.

Daily Dunklin Democrat
KAIT8.com

In Farooqabad, Shiekhupura district, three Muslim co-workers of a Christian man allegedly raped his 16-year-old daughter at gunpoint the night of July 21; the following evening in Gujar Khan, Rawalpindi district, more than a half dozen madrassa students decided to “teach these Christians a lesson” by allegedly gang-raping the 12-year-old girl.

The students at Jamia Islamia Madrassa had been harassing Christians in the villages around Gujar Khan, said the pastor of the church to which the girl’s family belongs, United Pentecostal Church.

“They openly announce that ‘the Christians are our enemies, we should not talk to them, eat with them or do business with them,’” Pastor Shakeel Javed told Compass.

The students often beat Christian children who come to play on the school grounds, telling them to convert or leave, he said, adding that on Sundays they throw stones at the church building.

A school teacher who said she was witness to the alleged rape told Compass that when she came across the madrassa students the evening of July 22, she overheard one saying, “We will teach these Christians a lesson they will never forget.”

“Three or four Christian girls were washing dishes near a pond,” Rana Aftab said. “These guys ran towards them, and the girls started running. One of them fell on the ground, and these madrassa students got hold of her and took her in the fields. I tried to stop them, but they were 15-16 in number.”

Seven or eight of them raped the girl, whose name is withheld, while the others looked on, Aftab said.

“She kept yelling for help, but no one heard her cries,” Aftab said.

They left the girl in the field, and some villages took her home to her father, Pervaiz Masih, Aftab said.

Masih was devastated, and the girl’s mother fainted when she saw her, Masih told Compass.

Masih and Aftab went to the police station to register a complaint, but the officer in charge refused to register it, Aftab said.

When Compass contacted officers at the police station, they initially refused to comment, but eventually one admitted that they are under pressure from Muslims leaders and extremists to refrain from filing a First Information Report (FIR) on the alleged crime.

Kidnapped

In eastern Punjab Province’s Farooqabad, the Christian father of the allegedly raped 16-year-old girl said he was later kidnapped and tortured.

In his complaint to police, Ghafoor Masih of Kot Sandha village said he was working the fields when three men who work for his Muslim employer overpowered his daughter at home and dragged her into one of the rooms of the house at gunpoint.

His daughter, whose name is withheld, told police that the three men raped her while keeping her from screaming for help by threatening to shoot her in the forehead with a pistol. The family accused Rashid Ali, another Muslim identified only as Maan son of Muhammad Boota and an unidentified man who also worked for Masih’s employer, Hajji Rashid Jutt.

The next morning, July 22, Masih went to the Saddr police station in Farooqabad, but Station House Officer Inspector Nasseer Ahmad Khan refused to register a First Information Report (FIR), labor leaders said. Aslam Pervaiz Sahotra, chairman of the Bonded Labor Front, and Zia-ud-Din Khokhar, chairman of Equality for Minorities, later approached the Shiekhupura district police officer with Masih’s complaint, and on July 28 the official sent an application for a FIR to Saddr Police Station.

Under pressure from the superior officer, on July 29 Inspector Khan registered the FIR under for “gang-rape at gunpoint,” family members and clergy said.

As Masih made his way home after the filing of the FIR on July 29, however, two other Muslims who work for his employer, Jutt, allegedly intercepted and kidnapped him, the family members said, and took him to Jutt’s farmhouse. There Jutt, the two men – Muhammad Irfan and Muhammad Usman – and another worker for Jutt, Fazal Karim, allegedly shackled and tortured Masih, leaving him in critical condition.

Inspector Khan told Compass that he has arrested Jutt, Irfan and Usman for kidnapping, as well as the suspect identified only as Maan for the alleged rape of Masih’s daughter.

Joseph Francis, national director of the Center for Legal Aid Assistance and Settlement, condemned the alleged rape of the 16-year-old girl.

“Muslim landowners and their relatives see Christian girls or women as their chattel,” Francis said. “Such vicious incidents are not being stopped by the government, and day by day the rate of rapes of Christian girls is escalating instead of plunging.”

Sahotra and Khokhar added that many such cases go unreported as impoverished Christian families often do not have the resources to pursue justice.

Religion News Blog

“I’m truly humbled and honored to follow in the footsteps of some legendary clergymen who brought this organization from humble beginnings to where it is today,” Bishop Ellis said. Bishop Ellis heads one of the largest churches in Detroit. The funeral for civil rights icon Rosa Parks was held at Greater Grace in 2005.

The church also garnered international attention for a special service it held in Dec. 2008 to pray for a bailout of the auto industry. The service featured SUVs on the altar. Ellis became pastor at Greater Grace in 1996 after his father, Bishop David Ellis, died. The church now has about 6,000 members with 300 ministries, said church officials in a news release. The church, on 7 mile in northwest Detroit, is part of a 20-acre complex called “City of David” that includes a 4,000-seat auditorium, TV studio, banquet hall, and other facilities. Its operations also include the New Rogell Golf Course, believed to be the only golf facility in Michigan owned and operated by African-Americans.

The members of Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, started in 1906, are mostly African-American. “With God’s help, I’ll work to continue in that tradition of excellence as we reach for higher heights in Kingdom work,” Bishop Ellis said.

Freep.com

Had it been a Sunday, the women who rammed her s 500 Benz straight through the brick wall of the Life Application Apostolic Bible church,  could have hurt parishioners. The car landed right where they sit on Sunday.

Ajayi said, “This is tragic event.  Thank the Lord no one was hurt. Property can be replaced.”

The driver is a 47 year old patient at the Metropolitan cardiovascular consultants where she was headed.

Venita, a worker there, said the women just couldn’t stop.    Venita said she’s thankful the car barreled in the other direction, “I was sitting right there.  She’s blessed.  We’re blessed. Everybody is ok.”

It appears the driver stepped on the accelerator, instead of the brake. Police have a bit of advice for people who might be in a hurry behind the wheel.

Col. Henry Tippett, a spokesman for the Prince George’s County Police said, “People need to be a little more careful when they’re trying to park in a busy shopping center.”

Police say the driver and her passenger were taken to a hospital with minor injuries.
The driver faces no criminal charges… just several citations.

9 NEws Now