Last year, my husband and I moved from Canada to the United States as missionaries. We originally came from a very small full gospel church and have moved cities a few times since then. We’re now in Carrollton, TX (20 minutes from Dallas). We’ve found it difficult to adjust to all of this putting worship leaders on pedestals as one put it. In our search for a home church we tried this church that everyone was raving about. We were a little skeptical of this one church because the worship seemed to be self-centered, but I didn’t want to be judgmental. So, when I heard this guy (Mike Guglielmucci’s) testimony and the song when it was first introduced, I thought, well this church can’t be all that bad if they are taking the time to profile a guy like this who is obviously a real Christian. Shows you what I know. Love always trusts… My mom always says “If God spoke through a donkey/jackass then He can speak a message through anyone” And it’s true, sometimes you hear a really good message through a song. I truly hope people don’t disregard the message of the song that so many have found hope in Jesus. It’s man who is full of flaws; the gospel isn’t full of flaws. And yeah you’re totally right, we should pray for this guy’s family, how sad it must be for them, I can’t imagine the way they feel. “…pray for those who spitefully use you”.

Right now back home, my mom and dad are going through some of the shock & disillusionment with the whole Ray Boltz thing announced a week ago. http://www.onenewsnow.com/Church/Default.aspx?id=250538
“Better to be a poor man whose walk is blameless than a rich man whose ways are perverse. “Prov 28:6

If you could recommend a solid church in our area, we’d love to know about it. We want to go to a church where worship to Jesus, is well, still worship to JESUS. “If I be lifted up, I will draw all men to me”. But yet somewhere where tunes are current and they still live and obey the Bible. I admire you guys for not selling out to this crazy trend of superstar worship leader syndrome. One of our Pastor friends moved to go pastor a new church and so a new guy stepped in. Well, within a few months they had gone through countless interviews for a new worship leader and they thought they’d found “the one” they wanted. They really wanted him because he was the latest Canadian idol winner. We were like, “I guess the Godliness left when their old pastor left”.

I don’t claim to understand it all, but some people do do it for the greed. Read Romans 1:18-32, Timothy 3 is informative too and Hebrew 6:1-12.

This answer may surprise some or seem inadequate, but I think that on a very basic level, the answer is “We fall for it.” What I mean is, we have to trust people. We can’t let ourselves be cynical and jaded, because this leads to a lack of grace and brotherly love.

I’m not saying “Be gullible.” But this guy gave every appearance to those closest to him (not just a world of “fans”) of being a sincere believer and even minister of the gospel. I don’t know what kind of process his church put him through to become a member and then a leader — hopefully there was some sort of process and some accountability.

But the fact is that, although the Spirit guides us and although He makes wisdom and discernment available to His children, we aren’t promised the ability to see through every lie someone tells us. God doesn’t make us into mind-readers or Jedi knights.

So, you’re right. We do want to tell the world stories of inspiration and providence, to herald the news that God is still at work today. God is still a healer, a provider, a sustainer, a deliverer.

And unfortunately, the devil is still a deceiver and a tempter. So sometimes he is able to pull the wool over our eyes for a short while. And when the truth comes out, it hurts.

One of the mind-boggling things about this case is: how did the man expect to get away with this? Did he really think he could pull this hoax off forever? And that’s what makes it so easy to deceive people initially. You’d think that no one would tell a lie of that proportion, even to his own family, and expect to get away with it. So it must be true.

So I guess my answer is that I’d rather be hurt than hurtful. I’d rather expect the best out of people who have given every indication of being fellow believers than to expect the worst. When that blows up in my face, it will hurt, sure.

And in those cases it is helpful to remember that ultimately my trust is in God, not man. But if I’m going to be wrong about somebody, I’d rather err on the side of trust and love than to think, “Oh, sure. Another Christian is claiming a powerful story of deliverance. I bet he’s a liar,” and then later find out that they were telling the truth.

No offence to Mike or his parents but this guy was not being held up because of his handsome good looks Mike and his story were being talked about because we believed that God was IN the story!! How could we not?? Go back and watch the video, listen to his voice, read what people were saying about his treatments and his illness and tell me what we should have heard that would have made the difference in this scenario??

I don’t know, man. I’m not jumping down your neck but I’m honestly not sure where we go from here. I wrote my thoughts on my blog and the resulting comments and conversations have been incredible (both on the site and through email) but I just don’t know what our next step is.

Aren’t these the stories of inspiration and providence and “seeing-beyond-my-circumstances” that we want the church to tell the world?? How do we reach through the layers of separation between us and the storyteller to verify that what they are telling us is, in fact, the God-written truth?