Here is my take on Hal . . .

1. I heard him during his Jesus Power and Light Company days working for Campus Crusade in the 60s. He was making cocky and confident statements back then that put the terminus ad quem for the Second Coming at 1988 (for reasons already cited in #3 above). His first book only put it in writing.

2. Hal has the same gift that John MacArthur has: the ability to sound convincing and absolutely authoritative, even if he were reading the telephone book. This means that differentiation between true and false, right and wrong, prophetic and pathetic get lost in the shuffle sometimes. The man is able to convince a crowd.

3. I pastored a church just a couple of miles from where he had his ministry back in the 80s/90s. The man is a celebrity in every sense of the term. At this point, he is famous for being famous, not for being right. This has allowed him to get away with manifestly wrong calendarizing, multiple marriages/divorces (3 or 4?), and a pretty "brusque" leadership style. His disparaging comments about Reformed theology are not much different from those of Tim LaHaye, another celebrity preacher.

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Dennis E. McFadden, Ex Mainline Baptist (in Remission)
Atherton Baptist Homes, CEO
First Baptist Church of Alhambra, Member, Transformation Ministries (CA)

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