Dr. Robert Sumner passed away in December 2016. The Biblical Evangelist newspaper is no longer being published and the ministry of Biblical Evangelism has ceased operation.

The remaining inventory of his books and gospel tracts was transferred to The Baptist Tabernacle of Los Angeles and may be ordered here.

Incidents and Illustrations
Evangelist Robert L. Sumner

WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU ARE KIDNAPPED! First, take a hymnbook like Al Smith’s Singspiration Inspiring Hymns, turn to the opening page – hopefully one will be handy (if not trust your memory) – and starting singing the old German song, “May Jesus Christ Be Praised” – and keep going, if necessary, all the way to numbers 519, 520, 521, 522 and 523 on the back page: “Dresden Amen,” “Threefold Amen” (either the one by Mary Young or the traditional one), “Fourfold Amen,” and the “Sevenfold Amen” – or use whatever hymnbook you have handy. It shouldn’t be long before the kidnapper pulls over, stops the car, opens the door, unties you, and encourages you to leave!

Well, that might not work for everyone, but it sure did for 10-year-old Will Myrick of Atlanta. He was in his own front yard, minding his own business, when he saw some cash on the ground. When he stooped down to make it his, suddenly someone from behind grabbed him and tossed him into a car waiting at the curb and was whisked away.

Told not to say anything, Will defied his captor and started singing a gospel song, unfamiliar to me, “Every Praise Is to Our God.” And I mean he started singing it – over and over! That caused Mr. Kidnapper to repeatedly let loose a string of his favorite naughty words and continuously tell Will to “shut up.”

Perhaps my suggestion of singing every song in the book might not work as well as the lad’s trick. He just kept singing the same praise song over and over and over. In fact, that went on for three solid hours, at the end of which, the villain in the case pulled over and stopped the car, opened the door, and told the young crooner to scat. He did! Believe me, he did!

In fact, he ran to the door of the nearest home and asked the person who responded to call his guardian. That was Codetta Bateman. It seems Will had been born to parents who were atheists and been raised by his godmother, Codetta.

And that had turned out to be the best thing Will could ever have asked or hoped for. She took him to church where he heard about God and His wonderful redemption, developing “a passion for the Bible.” In fact, when asked who his best friend was, he responded, “I always think that God is with me everywhere I go.”

Since the incident, Willie has given his testimony on a number of talk shows, even appearing with Arsenio Hall and also singing a duet with Grammy award-winning artist Hezekiah Walker. And what did the duo do for a number? Why, “Every Praise Is to Our God,” of course. After all, Walker is the one who wrote it!

[Later: After thinking it over, I believe Will had the best plan: sing the same thing over and over. I suggest my late friend Merrill Dunlop’s “I Believe the Answer’s on the Way. I believe the Lord has heard me pray.” It would not only be a good testimony; it has the kind of haunting lyrics that would scare the devil out of the kidnapper!]

LIFE JUST GOT CHEAPER IN NEBRASKA! Lawmakers in the Great Cornhusker State passed a decree banning the death penalty in their Cornhusker state, becoming the 19^th state to do so. Governor Pete Ricketts promptly vetoed it! The brilliant lawmakers then rallied 30 votes (the exact minimum necessary for overriding) and it became law.

As Ricketts noted in his veto, “Repealing the death penalty sends the wrong message to Nebraskans who overwhelmingly support capital punishment and look to government to strengthen public safety, not weaken it.”

What is next? Following Norway’s lead in making the maximum penalty for murder 21 years in prison? A couple of years back, you may remember, Anders Behring Breivik went on a shooting spree and killed approximately 100 people, many of them young people and children. Found guilty on all charges, he received 21 years total for that slaughter! That is around 10.92 weeks per killing.

Oh, in case you want God’s take on the matter, here it is: Exodus 20:13, “Thou shalt not kill” [lit. murder] and, Genesis 9:6, “Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.”

Put us on God’s side in this matter, not the side of politicians who seem to be more concerned about votes than virtue, ballots than biblicism.

By the way, the lady liberal on FoxNews’ “Outnumbered” said, “I don’t believe in this eye for an eye stuff” (making her smarter than God, who said it). They were discussing those two convicted killer convict escapees from Clinton Prison in New York at the time. Pardon me, but if they had been executed for their vicious crimes, there would have been no problem with an escape terrorizing citizens for about three weeks!

A HIGHBROW TAKES THE LOW ROAD. Do you remember when it was considered vulgar for a lady to use even Mark Twain’s imitation profanity, like gosh [for God] and darn [for damn] and heck [for Hell]? Real vulgarity was reserved for bars and brothels by men trying to appear tough (but only coming across as ignorant). Women were too refined to stoop that low. 

No more!

The proverbial sailor could take lessons from some of the prominent television women who are hired for beauty (obviously, not brains) – and since beauty is something one is born with, there really should be no cause for pride, any more than a man born with a photographic mind should be proud that he remembered to stop and bring home a quart of milk and a loaf of bread as per wifely request on leaving for work that morning.

We mention it now because one of ESPN’s feminine sports voices (you know, one describing a pro football game who has never played one down, never spiraled one pass, or never slashed off tackle once in a real game – just hired because they look good on camera and memorized how to talk the talk), played the fool recently. Britt McHenry, let loose with what the media called “a foul-mouthed rant” against a worker at Advance Towing in Arlington (VA) following the impounding of her car.

ESPN, that should have fired the immature 28-year-old woman (or at least washed out her mouth with lye soap), merely suspended her for a week (what a horrible punishment). The news item didn’t say, but most of such style suspensions are at full pay (you know, being punished with a paid vacation)! I guess they figure one with such an ego would consider it punishment to be off-camera for seven days.

From the video of the McHenry incident that went viral, apparently Britt also ridiculed the worker’s appearance, especially regarding her weight and missing teeth – as well as noting a school drop-out could do her job with the towing company.

Britt said she expected to learn from her mistake. While that doesn’t often happen, let’s hope so.

A THREAT TO “GET” US HERE! If you live in California, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan or Virginia – and have a tendency to be fearful – maybe you better skip this item. Be that as it may, ISIS leader Bismillah Ar Rahman Ar Raheem, following the shoot-out in Garland, issued a memo called “The New Era,” which he also identified at “the Golden Era,” apparently meaning it is for the followers of Mohammad. In it he warned that the Muslim brand of terror wasn’t just for the Mideast any more, but was coming to the United States of America.

Saying the next half-year would prove it, he threatened:

We have 71 trained soldiers in 15 different states ready at our word to attack any target we desire. Out of the 71 trained soldiers 23 have signed up for missions like Sunday, We are increasing in number bithnillah. Of the 15 states, 5 we will name… Virginia, Maryland, Illinois, California, and Michigan. The disbelievers who shot our brothers think that you killed someone untrained, nay, they gave you their bodies in plain view because we were watching.

The next six months will be interesting, To our Amir Al Mu’mineen make dua for us and continue your reign, May Allah enoble your face …

May Allah send His peace and blessings upon our Prophet Muhummad and all those who follow until the last Day.

Well, we can’t say we haven’t been warned, can we? If the country were in someone else’s hands than our current administration, it wouldn’t scare us quite as much.

WHY BILL & HILLARY HAVE SO LITTLE FREE TIME! The answer seems to be that they have so many funerals of friends and business associates to attend.

Dr. John Gowdy wrote an article, “Body Bags,” in which he detailed – with names – how many of their friends and associates had funerals after dealing with this couple. At first I thought I’d run it as a Guest Editorial or a short article, but there is too much involved – it would simply take up too much space – so I decided just to give a summary of what Gowdy reported. By the way, it is amazing how many “suicides” were listed for people after associating with the Clintons. Why would people want to kill themselves after working with them?

Starting with the Arkansas days (and “Whitewater” experiences), he names and describes twenty-seven cases of fatalities (at least one of the 27 involved more than one person; in fact, two little boys – plus others who “succumbed” before the case could reach the Grand Jury).

Following the 27, he listed the sudden deaths of seven people connected in the last mentioned item of the previous paragraph, the “Ives/Henry” case (Kevin Ives and Don Henry; known as “the boys on the track case”). It seems the youths were thought to have stumbled on the “airport drug operation,” big in Arkansas at the time. According to news reports they were lying on the rails when a train ran over them. First listed “accidental deaths,” a later autopsy report said the boys had been killed before being placed on the rails.

One of the seven victims had been stabbed 113 times (which reminds me of the fictional southern sheriff who found a dead criminal that had been stabbed with a butcher knife 39 times and declared, “worst case of suicide I ever saw”). And speaking of suicides, another victim in the Ives/Henry case had been shot, mutilated and burned in a trash dump – and the coroner actually ruled it “suicide”). I kid you not.

Finally, Dr. Grady listed personal bodyguards of the Clintons who died of mysterious causes or suicide – a total of twelve victims, including two with the rank of Colonel, two with the rank of Major, one with the rank of Captain, and a couple with Sergeant positions.

That is a grand total of nearly 50 (46 to be exact) named by Grady of the Clinton friends and coworkers dying mysteriously or accidentally after associating with the couple. Think of all the time expended by the Clintons going to memorial services; the money spent on cards and flowers; plus all the other inconveniences they must have had. Pity the poor couple. No wonder Bill has to work hard to “pay the bills.”

Someone protests, “That was all coincidental.” It was? That reminds me of another story. Pat and Mike were arguing about miracles and Mike, like Bill O’Reilly, said there “twarnt no such thing.” Since they were construction workers fashioning tall buildings, Pat argued, “Mike, suppose you were working on the 27^th floor tomorrow and while walking a beam, slipped and fell 27 floors. Yet you weren’t hurt; picked yourself up and went back to work. Wouldn’t that be a miracle?”

Mike responded, “No, that would be an accident.”

“But,” protested Pat, “suppose the very next day you were at the same spot on the same floor and slipped again, falling 27 floors, again getting up unhurt? Wouldn’t that be a miracle?”

“No, that would be,” Mike smiled, “a coincidence.”

Becoming exasperated, Pat maintained, “But suppose the very next day it happened again: same floor, same spot, same result. Surely that would make it a miracle, wouldn’t it?”

“No,” Mike insisted, probably with a twinkle in his eye, “by then it would a habit!”

By the way, you now can add to the above list of fatalities/accidents the White House chef when the Clintons lived there. Yup, bad case of suicide for him, too. Just like many of the others!

 “LOWER” ACADEMICS! Clark College, located in downtown Vancouver, Washington, will apparently teach anything for a buck. In its “Winter 2015” issue of Explorations (a guide to courses) it featured some humdinger classes for idiots and morons.

For example, under the title of “Recreation & Wellness,” its section featured such winners as “Crystal Healing for the Beginner” where prospective students were invited to “discover the power of stones,” assuring them stones were not “dead matter,” but “fully alive, powerful and vibrate with energy!” Was I drowning stones when, as a kid, I took stones off the bank or shore and sought to see how far – and how many times – I could skip them across the water, watching the ending when they sank beneath the surface and ended on the bottom of the river/lake/pond/ocean? How cruel of me!

Someone named V. Khamkeo was the instructor for that course. He was also the fearless leader for classes on “Eastern Wisdom: A beginner’s Journey” (about Buddha, but “not a class or religion,” merely an opportunity to “open your heart on an eastern philosophy’s ‘way’ of thinking, a way of living”). Prospective students were told, “What better choice than to live it with joy, peace, grace, love and compassion?” Each course would set you back $79 in tuition.

And, if that really excited you, a student could take the “Eastern Wisdom & Crystal Healing Combo” that combined the above two for only $135 (a savings of $23 smackers).

Or for $85 each, Khamkeo would teach “Japanese Reiki for Healing” (a Japanese hands on natural way of healing) and/or “Reflexology for Health” (“used for thousands of years by different cultures … to improve our health”). And prospects were urged, “Let Vivi offer you guidance (so that is what the initial V stood for). Comers were warned, “Please come with clean feet, and dress comfortably. You might not want to leave the massage table!”

Under the “Fitness” section, instructor J. Ross would handle two $69 (each) classes: “Tai Ci Sun Style 73 Form” (Sun Lu-tang created “an uniquely powerful style of Tai Chi,” placing “great emphasis on Qigong, making it especially effective for cultivating internal energy and enhance healing and relaxation”). Winter term students would learn forms one-to-50 of the 73 different forms!

The other class, same tuition price, was Tai Chi-Yang Style 24 Form, the one “most widely practiced.” No youth under 18 would be allowed to take this class (we have no idea why) and attendees should wear “loose, comfortable clothing and comfortable shoes.”

In the same category, instructor B. Lindberg would teach “Therapeutic Yoga: Beginners’ Session” and “Therapeutic Yoga: Intermediate Session,” both with a $99 tuition price tag. For the second, classes are open to all legal adults but the beginners must be at least 15 (under 18 must have parental or guardian consent).

Lindberg (apparently no kin to the famous flyer) also teaches “Yin Yoga” for $73 tuition. It is a form of Hatha Yoga.

The Spring Issue of Explorations offered classes on boozing (Mixology Class and Northwest wines vs. French Wines), apparently for budding bartenders. J. Rose and a B. Lindberg would be teaching their Tai Chi and Yoga classes again.

I decided to pass. And pity the poor boobs who paid good American money to attend!

Oh, I forgot; if you nauseate easily, Clark College’s Foundation magazine for Spring 2015 has a four (large) page story (complete with three photographs) entitled, “Same-Sex Couple Adopt Infant Girl, Find Community Network Essential” by Rhonda Morin. One of the perverts featured was alumnus Andrew Garland-Forshee, apparently the wife in the partnership because the other pervert, Rodney Garland-Forshee, was called “the husband.” Garland-Forshee, we are told, “follows the Jewish faith,” but since that is the name for both perverts, it was unclear to me which one was Jewish. Apparently both do, since later in the article it spoke of the couple’s “Jewish community.”

The article ended by one of them saying, “Family is created in lots of different ways.” Not God’s family, my friend; not God’s family!

By the way, whatever happened to reading, writing and arithmetic?

HIGHER EDUCATION REACHES NEW LOW! Last May, at the final exam for the Performing for the Self class of the Visual Arts department at the University of California San Diego, it was a requirement that students arrive for the test stark naked. The course syllabus said the prerequisite was “a gesture that traces, outlines or speaks about your ‘erotic self(s)’.” Indeed, it does. It speaks volumes!

The mother of one student described the qualification to be both “unclear” and “perversion.” We agree, at least with the perversion part of the charge.

The “scholars” (sic) at the “higher education” (sic) at UCSD responded, “If they are uncomfortable with this, they should not take the class.” You know, the old, “If you are offended with the program, change the channel!”

There seems to be one problem with that philosophy, however. The course is a prerequisite for getting into a verbal performance art class. In addition, if you don’t show up for the final buck naked you can’t take the test, hence lose the credits for the course.

The alleged good news: fully 95% of the students get an “A” in the class. Apparently, only the really fat and ugly don’t!

And who is the pervert that teaches the class, who also shows up for the joke naked? He is Professor Roberto Domintuez – and has been for the past 11 years.

Oh, did we mention that you are financing the course? That’s right; it is funded, at least in part, by United States government grants. Surely you wouldn’t be so narrow minded as to object, would you?

SHOULD SOMETHING BE DONE ABOUT THIS WICKED SPEECH? Well, the radical (and pathetically ignorant) folks at the Military Religious Freedom Foundation are at it again. It seems Maj. Gen. Craig Olson publicly thanked God for his accomplishments in the Air Force. He also admitted to his hearers that he was a “redeemed believer in Christ” (horrors, right MRFF?) and again gave credit to God. The idiots at MRFF (it is pretty much the show of one nut, Mickey Weinstein, who has apparently dedicated his life to ridding God and all religion from our military), want the pound of flesh next to Craig’s heart in retaliation.

Why? What does the MRFF want done to Major General Olson for his horrible, unforgivable speech? Nothing less than his being “court-martialed” will do, of course. They kindly (sic) recommended to authorities that the military leader be “aggressively and very visibly brought to justice for his unforgivable crimes and transgressions,” adding that all the others who cooperated in this treasonous action also be investigated and then punished “to the full extent of military law.”

And where did General Olson make his traitorous remarks? It was at a National Day of Prayer Task Force speech on May 7. Obviously, the NDPTF should lose its tax exemptions, too, for sponsoring such an un-American program.

Or should Weinstein just be locked up in a loony bin where he obviously belongs?

BOSTON BOMB TERRORIST LEARNS FATE! The animal who placed, beside a little 8-year-old boy and other children, his bag of deadly bombs with all the nails and metal bits to tear human flesh to bits at explosion, then stepped a safe distance away for himself, and finally pushed the button to cause the explosion that produced death, limb loss, maiming (17 people lost legs), and other injuries, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, was first found guilty on all 30 federal charges.

Then that same federal jury, three days later, ignored all the pleas to spare the life of the poor “little kid” they said was only acting under the undue influence of his radical, fanatical big brother. Those folks pleading for mercy – who may have been both soft of heart and soft in head – including “Sister” Helen Prejean, a Roman Catholic nun who has made a career of running around the country testifying in capital punishment cases, wanted him to only get the rest of his life, possibly up to 70 years, at taxpayer expense, the latter picking up the tab for food, shelter, clothing, medical expenses, color TV and other amenities.

Yet as far as we know, this vicious killer never showed the slightest remorse or repentance for the three people killed and over 260 injured when those two pressure-cooker bombs packed with shrapnel that he had placed behind a group of children (one of whom, Martin Richard, was killed), exploded on April 15, 2013, close to the Boston Marathon finish line.

In fact, prosecutors opened their case in the penalty phase by showing an incredible photo of him giving the finger to a security camera in his jail cell months after his arrest. Prosecutor Nadine Pellegrin declared, "This is Dzhokhar Tsarnaev —unconcerned, unrepentant and unchanged." She emphasized that he was so heartless he planted the bomb on pavement directly behind the children. Eyewitnesses said he slouched in his seat during most of his trial, appearing bored.

The defense called him a “good kid” and brought to the stand friends, relatives and teachers who said he was a “sweet and kind boy.” One even testified that he wept when he was watching the movie, “The Lion King.” He could weep over an animal, but not human beings.

Older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, got his death sentence earlier, just a few days after the bombing, when police shot him and brother Dzhokhar ran over him with the car they were using during a getaway attempt.

OUR ANTI-GODLY GOVERNMENT STRIKES AGAIN! It was a popular verse with such old-timers as Dr. J. Frank Norris and Dr. John R. Rice, one they quoted repeatedly in their ministry battles. It is Isaiah 54:17, “No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD.”

Yet a United States Marine, Lance Corporal Monifa Sterling, was tried and convicted in a military court-martial at North Carolina’s Camp Lejune for having that verse on her desk (a computer printout on a small strip of paper) – and refusing the order of a noncommissioned officer to remove it, a staff sergeant whose complaint was that she didn’t like the “tone” of it! Not only so, the sergeant cursed at her in giving the order and when Monifa showed up for work the next day Sterling’s personal desk “decoration” (bearing her verse) had been tossed in the trash!

Among other penalties (the government called the verse “verbiage”) of the punishment phase was reduction in rank from Lance Corporal to Private (i.e., to the very bottom) and being booted (dishonorably) from the Marines. She was also found guilty of “failing to go to her appointed place of duty, disrespect toward a superior commissioned officer, and four specifications of disobeying the lawful order of a noncommissioned officer.” Whew!

Part of her problem may have been from the fact that she chose to represent herself at the trial. (What was it Honest Abe Lincoln said about someone doing that having a “what” for a client?) Thankfully, she abandoned that plan and now has the Liberty Institute and ex-U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement (he’s the guy who helped Hobby Lobby win its battle against the government’s Affordable Care Act and now a law professor at Georgetown University). She is currently out of the Marines, unemployed, and trying to find work.

Believe it or not, both the lower and appellate courts ruled the Religious Freedom Restoration Act did not concern in her situation because displaying a Bible verse doesn’t represent “religious exercise.” But Michael Berry, the Liberty Institute attorney assigned to her case, bluntly noted, “Restricting a Marine’s free exercise of religion is blatantly unconstitutional.”

Has our government deteriorated under the present administration, or what? Remember my article in our last issue, “Mr. Obama’s Love For Christianity”?

OPERATION L & P (Lake & Polk Counties). Did you hear about this one? It was a huge child sex ring in Florida that police worked on diligently for two weeks preparing the trap. Over 100 arrests were made of perverts in those two counties, Lake and Polk, more than a score who believed they were traveling to Clermont thinking they were going to have sex with children; the other approximately fourscore were booked on prostitution charges.

Grady Judd, of the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, declared, “These are very dangerous people and they are after our children.” It seems a number of the perverts were employed working with children at Universal Orlando, Sea World and even Walt Disney World (apparently none still hold jobs there following their bust by the law)!

By the way, one of the rascals was Ahmed Saleem, “… well known as a community outreach leader interacting with teens in and around the Orlando area,” according to Officer Judd. He founded Saleem Academy for “empowering Muslim youth globally” and was the Orlando coordinator for CAIR, the Counsel On Islamic American Relations.

Hey, if sex with a small child was good enough for his prophet, Muhammad, why not for him?

Oh, did we mention that Saleem’s car had a license plate saying, “Invest in children.” Of course! Without children you cannot sexually molest children!

DON’T MESS WITH TEXAS (WOMEN)! For years the Lone Star State slogan has been “Don’t Mess With Texas.” Originally a quip intended to stop tossing trash from moving vehicles, it has come to include all variations. In fact, I have long sported a cap (when I wear anything on my head, that is) saying, “Don’t Mess With Grandpa!”

One would-be robber/assailant in the Houston area learned the hard way that it also includes “Don’t Mess With Texas Women!”

Here’s the story: A cowgirl (for want of a better description since we don’t have her name) pulled into an Exxon service station on FM 2100 (for you Yankees, the FM is short for Farm-to-Market) about six in the evening (probably on her way home from a hard day rounding up cattle, or some other ranch chore).

She didn’t have time to even exit the auto and start pumping petrol before an idiot jumped into the passenger side of her vehicle, flashed his knife, and mouthed the equivalent of the old “your money or your life.” She politely acquiesced and reached over for her purse to get the goods.

Unfortunately for the criminal, the “goods” was the hand gun for which she had a concealed carry permit and before he could yell, “I demand my rights,” she had squeezed the trigger, lodging a bullet in his left shoulder.

The bad guy probably muttered something like, “Oops, wrong dude,” jumped out and started running for his life, perhaps up nearby Saddle Creek Farms Drive. About a fourth of a mile away he collapsed from loss of blood and police had no problem corralling him. He was immediately rewarded with a helicopter airlift to a nearby hospital for free taxpayer treatment. Fortunately, for our criminal justice system, he will survive and have his day in court (and then his years in the slammer)!

Yes, “Don’t mess with Texas” covers a multitude of situations. And who knows what would have happened if this little lady, a young ’un in her mid-30s – whom Harris County Deputy Thomas Gilliland said was “cool as a cucumber” – hadn’t obtained a concealed carry permit and had her trusty six gun nestled in her purse?

As the reporter telling the story noted, “Once again, a good person with a gun stopped a criminal. It’s sad that gun control cultists spend so much energy attempting to pretend that incidents like this don’t happen every single day.”