Hello,
My name is Brent Walmsley, and I am a Seminary Graduate (Fuller 2009) and former Ordained Baptist Minister. I now work as a teacher in Los Angeles and live with my wife, and our children, and by children I mean our two cats and dog, Renzo!
So, what am I doing writing a Substack? Over the last few years, I, like many people that grew up in Evangelical culture began to “Deconstruct” which is just a fancy word for “started to question my beliefs.” I’ve been active on Tick Tok and tried to explain why I did so, as well as helped facilitate the Life After Secret Community on Facebook (come find us!) and even met this fantastic fellow, Scott Okamoto, working to organize get togethers in Los Angeles with other Exvangelicals. Sadly, we had trouble organizing people and then the pandemic happened (but you should very much read his book and you can hear me on his Podcast here).
So, if I am being honest, part of me would like to see myself move on from this chapter of my life. It was a part of my childhood, some of it was good (I still have a lot of close friends, and I think ironically in trying to indoctrinate me it just caused me to question more) but much of it was bad (I learned a lot of negative attitudes about the world around me). As much as I’d like to just walk away, as I’ve continued to observe Evangelicalism it’s just become worse. When I was in it supporting someone like Trump would have seemed unthinkable, something I was clearly very wrong about.
My theory of the case is this, there are a lot of really good people sitting in Evangelical pews, and far too many pastors have sought whatever status they feel embracing a guy like Trump offers them, and this has caused them to double down on white supremacy, homophobia, and misogyny. I sadly don’t think these men have a solid set of principles that they base their beliefs on, so they will shift easily to whatever they feel will increase the amount of money in their offering plates, to the point they will even follow the direction of a Reality TV show host. The Bible actually predicts this, “For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.”1 The American Evangelical Church today looks little like Jesus and a lot like these narcissistic con men that are following Trump’s example in their churches.
So, I think most of these leaders would like people like me to just move on, quit talking about this, because they know that many in their congregations are asking questions, wondering if this is really the Jesus they signed up to follow, and if what they are being told is really adding up and it would bother them to know that there is someone like me to tell them it is not, at all, the Jesus they signed up for and does not, at all, add up.
I want to make this a dialogue with such people, I hope to point out some great books that have helped me on this journey, point out some of the craziness that passes for Evangelical Leadership (the TheoBros) and help provide a resource for those that are asking questions, or would like to help those trapped in one of these buildings led by con men to do the same.
I hope that you will join me on this journey, please feel free to subscribe, and I’ve even resurrected my high school email account (Walmz@Aol.com) for you to send questions, comments, or TheoBros to roast.
Let’s do this!
1 Timothy 4:3 NIV