A megachurch pastor may have figured out a way to lure unsuspecting rednecks into his church by giving away free AR-15’s to people who register to come to worship services. Pastor of River of Tri-Cities Church in Johnson City, TN, Todd Holmes, made the announcement on Instagram last week.
Of course, we’re always opposed to gimmicks and giveaways to lure people into Church. We’re of the sacred belief that what you win people with, you have to keep them with. Some churches give away cars. Some churches put on extravagant circus performances. LifeWay and the Southern Baptist Convention have even given away Harley-Davidsons. But most churches don’t give away guns no matter how useful they are.
As Big Tech continues to censor conservative publications like ours, we must increasingly rely on supporters to continue our work. Much of our work, particularly as it revolves around a biblical worldview on social and cultural issues, isn’t even allowed to be shared on social media anymore. This reduces our traffic and causes us to move more of our work exclusively to Substack. Members who subscribe to us on Substack will gain exclusive access to all of our work, free of ads and other annoying pop-ups, as well as member-only access to our podcast archive and controversial moderated content. Please consider supporting us today by subscribing at:
We can say emphatically that at least this guy probably knows his potential audience. We’re not arguing that owning an AR-15 isn’t a good thing–everyone should own one. It’s a God-given right protected by the Constitution. But a cursory glance through the church’s website, though, demonstrates that this pastor and the rest of the church staff probably have very little knowledge of Scripture and the church is probably not well-fed with the gospel and sound preaching.