If not for Dave Hyles.............

[Fresh Air]

Right. So when a group of rich men came to their relatively young new pastor and demanded that it was them or the buskids he should have found a way to keep both. Because it is so healthy in the long term for a pastor to placate rich powerful longstanding members who give him ultimatums...

That is neither logical nor wise. Pastorally speaking. Wilkinson, I do not deny that you know FBCH well but you don't know very much about pastoring, that's for sure.

 

[RAIDER]

Right. So when a group of rich men came to their relatively young new pastor and demanded that it was them or the buskids he should have found a way to keep both. Because it is so healthy in the long term for a pastor to placate rich powerful longstanding members who give him ultimatums...

That is neither logical nor wise. Pastorally speaking. Wilkinson, I do not deny that you know FBCH well but you don't know very much about pastoring, that's for sure.

I'm glad Wilkinson is on the FFF.  He has been around FBCH for a long time.  I sometimed enjoy his perspective.  Because of a lot of the recent problems he seems to have a negative spin on everything from the past FBCH/HAC.

 

[Tennessean]

Right. So when a group of rich men came to their relatively young new pastor and demanded that it was them or the buskids he should have found a way to keep both. Because it is so healthy in the long term for a pastor to placate rich powerful longstanding members who give him ultimatums...

That is neither logical nor wise. Pastorally speaking. Wilkinson, I do not deny that you know FBCH well but you don't know very much about pastoring, that's for sure.

Bro. Hyles seemed to learn from this incident. In the 70's, 80's and 90's you could go to FBC on a Sunday morning, walk into the Pastor's Sunday school class, stay for the morning service, go to your car, and drive home and never run into 1 bus kid.

He planned it so that the Sunday Morning Only Crowd could attend without seeing the bus kids. I'm not criticizing him. He will answer to the Lord for the church he pastors just like I will answer to the Lord for the church I pastor.

 

[Fresh Air]

Bro. Hyles seemed to learn from this incident. In the 70's, 80's and 90's you could go to FBC on a Sunday morning, walk into the Pastor's Sunday school class, stay for the morning service, go to your car, and drive home and never run into 1 bus kid.

He planned it so that the Sunday Morning Only Crowd could attend without seeing the bus kids. I'm not criticizing him. He will answer to the Lord for the church he pastors just like I will answer to the Lord for the church I pastor.

I remember him saying in a Saturday night class one time, 'If I feed the people well on Sunday morning they will let me use their buildings to reach people.' It explained a lot of how/why things were set up as you describe. And I can see both wisdom and danger in that.

 

[Bravo]

Right. So when a group of rich men came to their relatively young new pastor and demanded that it was them or the buskids he should have found a way to keep both. Because it is so healthy in the long term for a pastor to placate rich powerful longstanding members who give him ultimatums...

That is neither logical nor wise. Pastorally speaking. Wilkinson, I do not deny that you know FBCH well but you don't know very much about pastoring, that's for sure.

I could be wrong but I get the impression BG is saying the whole thing could have been worked out without having to drive off a portion of the church. We generally assume these rich folks were bad people when we hear this story, what if that wasn't the case?

 

[RAIDER]

Right. So when a group of rich men came to their relatively young new pastor and demanded that it was them or the buskids he should have found a way to keep both. Because it is so healthy in the long term for a pastor to placate rich powerful longstanding members who give him ultimatums...

That is neither logical nor wise. Pastorally speaking. Wilkinson, I do not deny that you know FBCH well but you don't know very much about pastoring, that's for sure.

I could be wrong but I get the impression BG is saying the whole thing could have been worked out without having to drive off a portion of the church. We generally assume these rich folks were bad people when we hear this story, what if that wasn't the case?

That's why I in a previous post I asked BG to tell us what could have been done differently.

 

[Fresh Air]

I could be wrong but I get the impression BG is saying the whole thing could have been worked out without having to drive off a portion of the church. We generally assume these rich folks were bad people when we hear this story, what if that wasn't the case?

I understand the point and it is a valid one. I also know that in my experience, both personally and of friends, when rich men who hold positions in the church get the bit between their teeth you will never again get it back. It isn't about control/power as much as it is about leadership and direction. Wealthy people need handled carefully, or should I say respectfully and thoughtfully, but when they throw their weight around placating them ala Neville Chamberlain in 1939 leads to much bigger problems down the road.

 

[RAIDER]

I could be wrong but I get the impression BG is saying the whole thing could have been worked out without having to drive off a portion of the church. We generally assume these rich folks were bad people when we hear this story, what if that wasn't the case?

I understand the point and it is a valid one. I also know that in my experience, both personally and of friends, when rich men who hold positions in the church get the bit between their teeth you will never again get it back. It isn't about control/power as much as it is about leadership and direction. Wealthy people need handled carefully, or should I say respectfully and thoughtfully, but when they throw their weight around placating them ala Neville Chamberlain in 1939 leads to much bigger problems down the road.

What is amazing is that preachers get a bad rap for "favoring" those with money.  They don't want to run them off.  In this case Dr. Hyles is getting criticized for "supposedly" trying to run off the rich folk.

 

[16KJV11]

I could be wrong but I get the impression BG is saying the whole thing could have been worked out without having to drive off a portion of the church. We generally assume these rich folks were bad people when we hear this story, what if that wasn't the case?

I understand the point and it is a valid one. I also know that in my experience, both personally and of friends, when rich men who hold positions in the church get the bit between their teeth you will never again get it back. It isn't about control/power as much as it is about leadership and direction. Wealthy people need handled carefully, or should I say respectfully and thoughtfully, but when they throw their weight around placating them ala Neville Chamberlain in 1939 leads to much bigger problems down the road.

What is amazing is that preachers get a bad rap for "favoring" those with money.  They don't want to run them off.  In this case Dr. Hyles is getting criticized for "supposedly" trying to run off the rich folk.

And that's the difficulty in trying to judge situations in which  none of us here were privy to all the meetings or conversations.  We just know the end result. 

 

[RAIDER]

I could be wrong but I get the impression BG is saying the whole thing could have been worked out without having to drive off a portion of the church. We generally assume these rich folks were bad people when we hear this story, what if that wasn't the case?

I understand the point and it is a valid one. I also know that in my experience, both personally and of friends, when rich men who hold positions in the church get the bit between their teeth you will never again get it back. It isn't about control/power as much as it is about leadership and direction. Wealthy people need handled carefully, or should I say respectfully and thoughtfully, but when they throw their weight around placating them ala Neville Chamberlain in 1939 leads to much bigger problems down the road.

What is amazing is that preachers get a bad rap for "favoring" those with money.  They don't want to run them off.  In this case Dr. Hyles is getting criticized for "supposedly" trying to run off the rich folk.

And that's the difficulty in trying to judge situations in which  none of us here were privy to all the meetings or conversations.  We just know the end result.

Exactly!  It is amazing that none of us have ever heard anything about the "other side" of the story.

 

[cast.sheep]

It's so easy to stand in hindsight and see what could have been done differently.  The thing is...what if he HAD made a different choice?  We don't know what the outcome of that would have been. Maybe it would have been worse than what actually happened. 

My brain is tired from trying to wrap it around all this...haha!  Maybe that's what Philippians 3:13 means about forgetting those things which are behind.  Who knows.  Not me. I went to Hyles-Anderson...I'm no Bible scholar.  (giggle)

 

[BALAAM]

I am positive that I heard jh say in his later years that if he had had a little more wisdom and knew back then what he knew now that he would no have had to have a church split.

 

[bgwilkinson]

I agree wholeheartedly in the worth and importance of the bus ministry.

I worked on an A bus route in the 70s 80s and 90s.

I was writing to point out the problem that was caused at FBCH by choosing the bus ministry over the rich people. Bro. Hyles could not tell the rich people what to do and it galled him to no end.

So he plotted to get rid of the rich people.

He set up what is called a false dilemma, by asserting he could only keep one or the other, but not both.

Thus the false dilemma.

He said he had to choose between the rich people and the bus kids, remember his famous rallying cry, "I'll take the bus kids"?

He was not a diplomat and did not believe in doing right by all the members. He wanted his way period.

He was always a my way or the highway kind of guy.

He could have and should have kept the rich people and the bus kids. He did not need to create the false dilemma.

I believe he could have worked with the rich people and enlisted their help with the bus ministry instead of turning it into a knock-down drag-out fight, splitting the church.

We are hurting today because he chased those rich people away. He chopped off part of Christ's body and threw it away.

Jesus wants both the rich and the poor, he wants everybody, not just the poor or just the rich.

It is quite ironic that our new auditorium sits on the site of the Edward C. Minas Co. department store. This was the premier department store in the whole area in the early 20th century.

I believe the LORD had in mind having the new auditorium there all along, It could have been built there in the late 80s or 90s when the Minas store was moved to south Lake county, but for one problem, and that was the bad blood Bro. Hyles generated all those years before between those rich people and himself.


This is my humble opinion and how I see it.

So what would the agreement looked like between the rich people (who were really fine with the bus ministry) and Dr. Hyles (who wanted the bus ministry)?

There were several problems associated with the bus ministry in those days.

1. The bus kids were not controlled in the early days as they were when it became more organized and a security dept was instituted to help control them. This was before the days of security and TV cameras looking at all the hard to patrol palaces.

2. Mr. Minas allowed parking in his garage and parking lot for church people. In those days parking was at a premium a bit like in a large city. The bus kids had a tendency to get into the garage and parking lot and damage cars and steal items out of them.

3. This was an expensive problem as it tended to discourage customers from coming to Down Town Hammond.

This is how it started. The complaints did not go to the church but rather to the Minas store parking attendants.

Mr. Minas got the reports of every incident and many times paid for the damages out of store funds to keep the peace with his customers who were bringing in the money to pay the bills.

The solution that I knew about was having the bus kids come to a facility that was away from the drive-in people. Mr. Minas had offered to help with funding that facility, but for some reason which I do not know, Bro. Hyles did not agree, but rather insisted on having them in the 523 Sibley building.

There could have been an amicable agreement and everyone would have been happy.

If you know the history of our church you will know that that is one of the solutions, plus the latter start time at the main facility.

Bro. Hyles wanted the bus kids but did not have a plan worked out in the early days to accomplish it without generating numerous complaints and massive problems.

Mr Minas Jr. died in 1980 and was allowing free church parking in his garage and parking lot. He was not the bad guy. He love FBCH. If he had wanted to hurt the church he could have close his parking lot and garage to all FBCH parking, he did not even charge the church for the parking, but yet was regularly demonized.

The difference was the church was now controlling the bus kids and providing parking lot attendants as well as full-time security.

Full disclosure. My company worked for the Minas company in the 70s and I would meet with Mr. Minas Jr. to go over our work progress. We supplied and maintained business systems connecting the 3 stores.

He still loved FBCH as it was his home church and his fathers church. He was greatly saddened by what had gone on between himself and Bro. Hyles. All those years their offices were less than two blocks apart and they never did reconcile before he died.


This is my opinion and how I see it.

 

[bgwilkinson]

I am positive that I heard jh say in his later years that if he had had a little more wisdom and knew back then what he knew now that he would no have had to have a church split.

Yes he said that repeatedly.

 

[TidesofTruth]

If not for Dave Hyles' exposed sin and Jack Schaaps' exposed sin and numerous other's exposed sin including our own we would go on never re-examining ourselves always thinking we were somehow better, wiser more righteous instead of who and what we truly are.  I would hope as one would examine the Dave Hyles' of this world that they would find what in him is still within you(me) and do the work with the Holy Spirit to root it out.  This is why Church Discipline must be practiced.  I am seeing glimmers of hope.

 

[Tennessean]

I agree wholeheartedly in the worth and importance of the bus ministry.

I worked on an A bus route in the 70s 80s and 90s.

I was writing to point out the problem that was caused at FBCH by choosing the bus ministry over the rich people. Bro. Hyles could not tell the rich people what to do and it galled him to no end.

So he plotted to get rid of the rich people.

He set up what is called a false dilemma, by asserting he could only keep one or the other, but not both.

Thus the false dilemma.

He said he had to choose between the rich people and the bus kids, remember his famous rallying cry, "I'll take the bus kids"?

He was not a diplomat and did not believe in doing right by all the members. He wanted his way period.

He was always a my way or the highway kind of guy.

He could have and should have kept the rich people and the bus kids. He did not need to create the false dilemma.

I believe he could have worked with the rich people and enlisted their help with the bus ministry instead of turning it into a knock-down drag-out fight, splitting the church.

We are hurting today because he chased those rich people away. He chopped off part of Christ's body and threw it away.

Jesus wants both the rich and the poor, he wants everybody, not just the poor or just the rich.

It is quite ironic that our new auditorium sits on the site of the Edward C. Minas Co. department store. This was the premier department store in the whole area in the early 20th century.

I believe the LORD had in mind having the new auditorium there all along, It could have been built there in the late 80s or 90s when the Minas store was moved to south Lake county, but for one problem, and that was the bad blood Bro. Hyles generated all those years before between those rich people and himself.


This is my humble opinion and how I see it.

So what would the agreement looked like between the rich people (who were really fine with the bus ministry) and Dr. Hyles (who wanted the bus ministry)?

There were several problems associated with the bus ministry in those days.

1. The bus kids were not controlled in the early days as they were when it became more organized and a security dept was instituted to help control them. This was before the days of security and TV cameras looking at all the hard to patrol palaces.

2. Mr. Minas allowed parking in his garage and parking lot for church people. In those days parking was at a premium a bit like in a large city. The bus kids had a tendency to get into the garage and parking lot and damage cars and steal items out of them.

3. This was an expensive problem as it tended to discourage customers from coming to Down Town Hammond.

This is how it started. The complaints did not go to the church but rather to the Minas store parking attendants.

Mr. Minas got the reports of every incident and many times paid for the damages out of store funds to keep the peace with his customers who were bringing in the money to pay the bills.

The solution that I knew about was having the bus kids come to a facility that was away from the drive-in people. Mr. Minas had offered to help with funding that facility, but for some reason which I do not know, Bro. Hyles did not agree, but rather insisted on having them in the 523 Sibley building.

There could have been an amicable agreement and everyone would have been happy.

If you know the history of our church you will know that that is one of the solutions, plus the latter start time at the main facility.

Bro. Hyles wanted the bus kids but did not have a plan worked out in the early days to accomplish it without generating numerous complaints and massive problems.

Mr Minas Jr. died in 1980 and was allowing free church parking in his garage and parking lot. He was not the bad guy. He love FBCH. If he had wanted to hurt the church he could have close his parking lot and garage to all FBCH parking, he did not even charge the church for the parking, but yet was regularly demonized.

The difference was the church was now controlling the bus kids and providing parking lot attendants as well as full-time security.

Full disclosure. My company worked for the Minas company in the 70s and I would meet with Mr. Minas Jr. to go over our work progress. We supplied and maintained business systems connecting the 3 stores.

He still loved FBCH as it was his home church and his fathers church. He was greatly saddened by what had gone on between himself and Bro. Hyles. All those years their offices were less than two blocks apart and they never did reconcile before he died.


This is my opinion and how I see it.

What a lot of information that never has been revealed before. The first thought is that someone other than Cindy Schaap should have written Jack Hyles biography. If this story is true, and it seems that it is, it should have been included in the chapter about the second church split.

Next thought that comes to mind is that a young Jack Hyles had to deal with the same problems most pastors do. i.e. You start a bus ministry run by a group of people who are laymen. Most of the workers are well meaning but probably untrained. There was only 1 SS class for each age group and the teacher was probably overwhelmed by an influx of bus kids. It was easy for some of these bus kids to dodge the SS Superintendent and play in downtown Hammond. Every church who starts a bus ministry has these types of problems.

 

[bgwilkinson]

It's so easy to stand in hindsight and see what could have been done differently.  The thing is...what if he HAD made a different choice?  We don't know what the outcome of that would have been. Maybe it would have been worse than what actually happened. 

My brain is tired from trying to wrap it around all this...haha!  Maybe that's what Philippians 3:13 means about forgetting those things which are behind.  Who knows.  Not me. I went to Hyles-Anderson...I'm no Bible scholar.  (giggle)

That's because Mr Minas was demonized and people shunned him. I'm sure if anyone would have stopped by his office he would have gladly talked with them.

 

[brainisengaged]

Funny, once in my line of business I was contacted by a potential client. All was going swimmingly as we discussed the particulars of her hiring my services. When I asked her name for the contract, her last name was Minas. I exclaimed with delight that the name was very well-known to me as a member of First Baptist Church. Her tone changed, became far less cordial, and I never heard from her again. This was at least 15 years ago, but it obviously left an impression. The family was hurt by all that transpired before my time...to me it was just a name of a building and a bit of lore from long ago. It all has more 'flesh' now. Interesting information / perspective bgwilkinson.

 

[RAIDER]

It's so easy to stand in hindsight and see what could have been done differently.  The thing is...what if he HAD made a different choice?  We don't know what the outcome of that would have been. Maybe it would have been worse than what actually happened. 

My brain is tired from trying to wrap it around all this...haha!  Maybe that's what Philippians 3:13 means about forgetting those things which are behind.  Who knows.  Not me. I went to Hyles-Anderson...I'm no Bible scholar.  (giggle)

That's because Mr Minas was demonized and people shunned him. I'm sure if anyone would have stopped by his office he would have gladly talked with them.

BK, if this injustice was done in the way you described it, why did you remain at FBCH? 

 

[prophet]

I am positive that I heard jh say in his later years that if he had had a little more wisdom and knew back then what he knew now that he would no have had to have a church split.

Yes, he did admit this, and brought back many people to testify to us of those early years.
Those of us who grew up there had many friends who were on the other side of those early years' mistakes. We had to play peacemaker, and bear the burden of admitting how wrong we were, as a church, to allow the division of the body of Christ over personality clashes and differences of opinion.

FWIW, we traded one type of undue influence for a worse one...