Snake handling in the BIBLE

John Kissinger [08/04/2015 12:32 PM]
Charles Page why are you not listed as prime contributor?

John Earp [08/04/2015 12:44 PM]
Though I have always felt these folks were quite misguided and misled in their interpretation and application of Mark 16, for a time I still found documentaries about them fascinating. I no longer do. It is nothing but a sad, tragic foolishness. I am sure most are sincere, but sincerity never makes up for stupidity.

John Earp [08/04/2015 1:15 PM]
Though I have always felt these folks were quite misguided and misled in their interpretation and application of Mark 16, for a time I still found documentaries about them fascinating. I no longer do. It is nothing but a sad, tragic foolishness. I am sure most are sincere, but sincerity never makes up for stupidity.

John Kissinger [08/04/2015 1:27 PM]
I was healed in a snake handling church in AL so I better hush @Joey Elia

John Earp [08/04/2015 1:31 PM]
My comments were specifically and only directed at the practice of snake-handling itself. That is a sad, tragic foolishness that in no way proves anything spiritually except that one is willing to risk one’s life to ‘prove’ they are anointed.

Charles Page [08/04/2015 1:34 PM]
early workers in The Publishing house endorsed snake handling. James Slay explained to us at Lee college how to handle snakes!!! It worked for him – as your faith so be it unto you!

John Kissinger [08/04/2015 1:36 PM]
In my personal experience I handled no snake, but what I saw in the small backwoods church in Sand Mt., AL scared the sickness out of my body. Not sure if it was faith, but I know it was a miraculous healing on the spot and nobody can convince me otherwise. I was also delivered from prejudice against snake handlers thou I never became one!

Charles Page [08/04/2015 2:02 PM]
I have a snakephobia, is there help for me?

John Earp [08/04/2015 2:07 PM]
Yes, it is true that the CoG bears the dubious distinction of being associated with the origination of snake-handling.

John Earp [08/04/2015 2:10 PM]
My objections to the practice as a proof of salvation/anointing aside, I don’t hate snake-handlers at all, I don’t believe it should be against the law to practice it, and I also am sure many of them are sincere Christians. Misguided but sincere.

Charles Page [08/04/2015 2:15 PM]
doubt that COG originated the practice… many rugged mountain people handle snakes anyway apart from faith in God.

Charles Page [08/04/2015 2:16 PM]
just proves you ain’t skeered of snakes, venomous or not.

John Earp [08/04/2015 2:35 PM]
My understanding is that Hensley, a CoG evangelist, was the first to proclaim and practice snake handling.

John Kissinger [08/04/2015 3:00 PM]
Seems I’ve read that somewhere as well (thou not openly admitted)

Pentecostal Theology [08/04/2015 3:07 PM]

No, snake-handling is neither ‘literal’ nor ‘biblical’

Charles Page [08/08/2015 12:09 PM]
read the Tennessee’s SO’s testimony to the COG Evangel Oct 23, 1915. They had a garter snake, copperhead, and a rattle snake. “all the saints there wanted to handle snakes”

John Earp [08/08/2015 12:43 PM]
Note, I did not say the CoG originated the practice. What I said was the CoG is associated with the origination of the practice. That is, Hensley was an independent preacher who gained regional notoriety for handling snakes around 1910, joined the CoG in 1912, was licensed as a CoG evangelist in 1915, and whose snake-handling was even promoted by AJT in the CoG Evangel for a time. (See _Like a Mighty Army_, 1996 edition, pp. 167-168)

John Kissinger [08/08/2015 12:52 PM]
How did you figure? http://ourcog.org/serpent-handling-west-virginia-pastor-dies-from-snake-bite-yahoo-news-httpt-co892jb9xf-ourcog/

John Earp [08/08/2015 1:09 PM]

John Kissinger [08/08/2015 1:28 PM]
George Went Hensley (1880–1955) introduced snake handling practices into the Church of God Holiness, an association of autonomous Christian Methodist congregations, founding the Dolly Pond Church of God in Birchwood, Tenn. in 1910. Although illiterate, Hensley became a licensed minister of the Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee) in 1915 (Encyclopedia of American Religions gives the year as 1909; the Encyclopedia of Religion in the South gives it as 1913.) After traveling through Tennessee for several years conducting Church of God-sanctioned services, he resigned from the denomination in 1922. He established churches, known as the Church of God with Signs Following, in Tennessee and Kentucky. http://hauntedeclipse.blogspot.com/2013/10/abandoned-church-of-serpent-handling.html

Charles Page [08/08/2015 3:36 PM]
sept 1914 Evangel saints were handling hot light bulbs in the spirit.

John Kissinger [08/08/2015 4:27 PM]
this little light of mine… http://www.charismamag.com/blogs/the-plumb-line/24037-is-trance-evangelism-coming-back-in-vogue

Lennie Marx [08/08/2015 5:21 PM]
If Snake handling was form G-d The Apostle wouldn’t have dropped his in the fire, Acts 28:3-6! Any question? www.haic.org

John Kissinger [08/08/2015 5:22 PM]
did you miss the IF clause or you just wanted to advertise your site?

John Kissinger [08/08/2015 6:00 PM]
Fl/La Pentecostals also handle gators and now Rick Wadholm Jr will tell us about ND/SD exclusive Pentecostal praxis ???

Rick Wadholm Jr [08/08/2015 6:06 PM]
We handle blizzards. ?

David W. T. Brattston [08/10/2015 8:38 PM]
How can I contribute articles to Pentecostal Theology?

Curtis Oney [08/16/2015 4:16 PM]
I don’t believe in tempting God. I think if we are saved and so happen to come upon a snake and had to pick it up, then God will protect us. But I don’t believe in doing it for show.

Timothy Carter [08/16/2015 8:09 PM]
The article don’t load but that is okay I think snakes are creepy I mean CRREEEEPPPPPYYYYY!!!!!!!! I am NOT going to play with one. No not me!

John Kissinger [08/17/2015 8:09 AM]
loads fine – read the discussion under