We have said very little about the "Hyles problem" since it started,

and for a very good reason. In the first place, it is none of our
business, and if it was it wouldn't have been handled like Pip Squeak
Scumner handled it. His circulation was going "to rot" because of his
attacks on the Bible, so he figured the best way to increase sales
would be by converting The Biblical Evangelist into a sort of Neo-
evangelical Enquirer or Midnight. I assume "circulation" increased.
Failures (and God knows America is filled with Christian failures) like
nothing better than to talk about David and Bathsheba: they do this
because they are the Lord's enemies (see 2 Sam. 12:14), and God is
their enemy (Phil. 3:18).

   The greatest mystery about the "trashing Hyles" fad is how God used
the man like He did (and will do), knowing everything that Scumner and
all of Hyles' enemies knew, and MORE.

   There is the age-old problem. I observed it before I had been in the
work ten years. I observed that every Christian that got placed on the
shelf permanently was a Christian that became an "EXPERT" in someone
else's business.

   Since that time (about 1950), I have seen it happen over, and over,
and over, and over again. Every time a Christian (minister or not)
became a professional snooper in order to "get something" on someone he
was jealous of, God permanently ditched him. I know of at least ten
Christians here in Pensacola who have been on the shelf for twenty-
five years, and I know of others (nationwide) that have been on the
shelf for thirty years. They were "castaway" because of JEALOUSY and
the direct violation of Romans 14:4,10, which is in every translation
of every edition of every English version on the market. (Scumner was
never much when it came to handling English Bibles.)

   Scumner was told by God not to receive an accusation against an
elder unless two or three witnesses were present (1 Tim. 5:19) and
those were instructions to a pastor in a local church, not a muckraking
newspaper publisher, running out of subscriptions.

   "THEM THAT SIN REBUKE BEFORE ALL" (1 Tim. 5:20) was a pastor's
charge to HIS congregation; not a charge to a Pip Squeak evangelist
with not enough spirituality to put in the left eye of a blind mosquito
and NO CONGREGATION.

   If the Pip Squeak had really had something against Brother Jack. he
should have gone to him personally with it (Matt. 18). The fact that it
took him TEN YEARS to get his act together shows two things:

   1. Whatever Brother Hyles was doing during those ten years God was
using him, knowing more than Sumner could assemble in the same length
of time, and, at the same time, God wasn't giving Sumner the time of
day.

   2. If all of this was known by all of these jealous critics whom God
is NOT using--and I haven't seen the name of one enemy of Hyles listed
yet that had a batting average of .00001--why the delay? If these boys
are all such bold, aggressive, militant, macho "crusaders for
righteousness" who dared to "beard the lion" and expose the "great,"
what were they doing in 1975, 1976, 1977 1978, 1979, 1980, `81, `82,
'83, etc.?

   Well, they were riding Jack Hyles and using him and getting glory by
being associated with him.

   (Don't kid Ruckman, you little campfire brownies. Go kid some sucker
like Bobby Jones the Third or Curtis Hudson. Don't kid old man
"Ruckman," kiddies. I got my boot camp on the road without a life
insurance policy or a hospital insurance policy in sixty-eight years,
raising three amilies of ten children, whlle putting more than 130
young men into the ministry.)

   I said, "You were riding Jack Hyles and using him and getting glory
by being associated wilh him." That's why you kept your mouth shut IF
you knew of anything amiss.

   Now, if I published what I have heard from the ENEMIES of Hutson and
Bob Jones Jr., or the enemies of John Rawlings, or the enemies of J.
Frank Norris, or the enemies of Billy Graham, or the enemies of Tim
Lee, I could put out a good "Midnight-Enquirer," but I have better
sense and more regard for the brethren, and the cause of Christ.

   I only take issue with a man on one issue, and everyone knows by now
what that issue is. It has nothing to do with anyone's personal life or
conduct. I assume "all have sinned and come short of the glory of God,"
and "all flesh is grass," and "there is not a just man upon the earth
that doeth good and sinneth not." I never put Hyles, Jones, Graham,
Rawlings, Vick, Hodges, Noel Smith, Sunday, Moody, Torrey, Finney, or
John Rice in any other bracket.

   ASHES TO ASHES, AND DUST TO DUST.

   I operate under the principle that the wisest, best, and most godly
men who ever lived made a perfect MESS of things at times. You don't
have to read the Old Testament through one time to get THAT message.
David slinging mud at Daniel, or Joseph slinging mud at Moses, or Noah
slinging mud at Abraham, is just too comical for words. Jack Hyles
"STOOD to his Master," and his Master used him. Lester Roloff "STOOD to
his Master," and his Master used him. Dr. M. R. DeHaan "STOOD to his
Master," and his master used him. John Rawlings "STANDS to his Master,
and his Master uses him.

   God hasn't used Sumner for anything but a garbage can for twenty
years. I figure if you enjoy reading a dung sheet like his it must be
because you have a heart and a mind full of manure.

   Where does "Ruckman" stand in all of this? Who cares? Not me.

   I had no bone to pick with Brother Jack except the Book, and I laid
off of that bone three years ago. I am still picking that bone with
Curtis Hutson and Bobby the Third and will till God calls me home, as
neither one of them are going to take a real stand for the BOOK no
matter how much pressure is put on. They have an "intellectual
fixation" that forces them to pretend to be "scholarly," and it will
finish them off like it finished off Hymers, Hudson, Robertson, Schaff,
Waite, Farstad, Hort, and the rest of them.

   1. I like Brother Hyles. I have always liked him. I have never
gotten much from his preaching or teaching, but I have always admired
his love for people, his burden for souls, and his courage.

   2. I assume if he is a redblooded male like Frank Norris or David
(or myself), he will certainly have his problems with the flesh, and he
will not bat a thousand anymore than we did, or anymore than B.B. Crimm
or Jack Wood did (all three are from Texas).

   3. I assume that perhaps one third of the information on him was
correct and two-thirds was IMPLICATION, INNUENDO, and CIRCUMSTANTIAL
EVIDENCE that would not hold up in any court.

   4. I conclude that if one-third of it was true, Jack Hyles would
still make a better man dead than Bob Jones III would make alive. If
one- third is true I believe it would take five men the stature of
Bobbie Scumner to reach to Hyles's KNEE.

   I take the Lord's side in such matters. God blessed him, God used
him, God honored and prospered his work knowing everything the
muckrakers knew and undoubtedly a great deal more besides. I recognize
the "spotlight syndrome" so characteristic of effeminate Christians:
they want to be the center of attention--homosexuals have that "female
trouble." The best way to get it is take on "the number one gun" and
holler "Boy, if you just knew what I know!" and "You just don't know
all the truth. Let ME tell you something...." By attaching themselves
to a man that God used and is using and will use, their stock goes up;
someone notices them who otherwise would have never known they were
alive. There is One, however, who doesn't notice them at all, and that
is the One that they wanted to use them, but He refused to do it.

   I conclude the reason why God did not choose to do it is because He
knew something about their PERSONAL lives that would make Jack Hyles
look like St. Francis of Assisi. At least that is how it comes out.
Some day we will know why Bobbie Scumner split a church, a school, and
a family, to increase subscriptions to a gossip sheet that I wouldn't
use to wrap light bulbs in. Some day it will "all come out in the wash"
(Eph. 5). Until then, I am Jack Hyles's friend, whether he is mine or
not. I am Harold Henninger's friend, whether he is mine or not. I am
Bob Gray's friend, whether he is mine or not. I am John Rawlings's
friend, whether he is mine or not. I am Claude Bonam's friend, and Tim
Lee's friend, and Don Edwards's friend, whether they are mine or not. I
pick my own friends, and nobody decides anything for me, one way or
another. That is where I stand on the Hyles problem. I am Hugh Pyle's
friend, and I am the friend of Victor Sears, Brad Weninger, and Roland
Rasmussen. What they think about me is immaterial to me as what Hutson
or Hymers thinks of me. I judge a man by his manliness and his fidelity
to the Book. I am with Jack Hyles and against Bobbie Sumner and anyone
who thinks he (Sumner) is a man.