Jack: Are King James Bible believers church splitters? Whoo! That sometimes happens.

David: This is one I have such personal connection to. In the last 14½+ years that I've worked here at Chick (I got an email address pretty quickly and people learned they could write to me, and especially as I started writing articles and books and stuff), people have told me their private situations. And I have found that people were 1) church planters or 2) pillars of the church, who had been in a congregation for years, and right there in the Statement of Faith it said, "We believe that God has preserved His words" and "The King James Bible is the only book we believe in English is God's words." Really simple. It makes it so that everybody is on the same page, quite literally, you can read the same words, pass down the same understanding, and have unity in the faith.

Well, guess what? They sent me these letters, saying "You won't believe what happened." And usually, I do believe what happened. What happened is a person went to college, came back from college, a person was added to the staff, became an associate pastor, a youth pastor, or a new minister. And in each of those cases, they came back with their "new understanding and knowledge" and started subverting the people and slandering the King James Bible.

And then, it was not on a Wednesday night, and not on a Sunday night, but usually (it just was in my email) on Thursday nights, they'd get together, quietly, and rewrite the Statement of Faith, and rewrite "What We Believe," so that it no longer said "the King James Bible." And the very next Sunday, two things happened: 1) they started making fun of and denigrating the King James Bible in church, and 2) they called anybody who said, "What are you doing?" a "church splitter!"

Who really split that church?

Jack: That's a sad statement. And I believe it. It goes on all the time.

But then the question becomes, "What do you do with it?" What if your church decides to move away from the King James Bible? You have to decide what you are going to do for you and your family. Sometimes you have the fellowship there that you want to stay with... Again, it's a personal choice. And nobody should condemn you for what you decide is best for you and your family.

Although my thought is, and I heard this from somebody, "You should go where you are celebrated, not where you are tolerated." So that is something to think about.

Now sometimes what's involved in church splits is not just the Bible issue, but many other things. And you have to decide, do you want to get involved in a fight like that? Because many times it creates animosity. And the idea is we're supposed to live at peace with all men (Romans 12:18), especially the brethren (Galatians 6:10). So you don't want to get into that sort of a thing, if you can help it. Unless you feel strongly that the Lord wants you there and wants you involved, and you need to deal with these issues, then you can decide to do that. But otherwise, if it's just about the Bible issue, and the church as a whole is moving away from it, then maybe you should try to find a place where they do actually believe the scriptures, the King James Bible.

David, you said that you should...I can't remember.
This is why my hair is gray.

David: What I was saying was that there is an opportunity. Some of my friends, like in Canada and other places, have had churches where they are so many miles away, they can't find any church that is like that. So then they look for a church that at least tolerates their reading the King James. And the advantage of that, if you can find people who will allow you to be there, not trying to make waves, just standing in faith, and you read your Bible, and if they will tolerate you, then when they come to that point where they may actually have the questions, you will be there. And you can help answer them. And maybe the Lord will use you to turn things back around.