Blog on the Lillypad
Friday, March 12, 2004
 | Letter from a Survivor
[edited to protect family identity] While searching for an old schoolmate I stumbled upon the news of Jack Hyles death. I am sitting here stunned because I don't know how to feel. Revenge isn't the correct word because I had no hand in it. Justice? Why justice for another when I'm in need of so much grace. Relief and pain I guess are my biggest emotions. |
I was 12 when ...we moved back to Garland, TX. I was in the middle of my sixth grade in 1981. My father enrolled my sister and me at Miller Road Baptist Church School.
...Jack Hyles' son, Dave (we never called him David), became the official pastor shortly thereafter. I enjoyed my school. For the first time, I enjoyed going to church. Oh, I had always been in church and never hated it, but I had....well...it was .....something that I looked forward to. Everything seemed to be going great. My parents were still struggling with issues, but we had the greatest pastor who was glad to give 'counseling' to my mom. Interestingly enough, my infant brother who was twelve years younger than me could not stand to be around Dave. My brother would break out into hysterical fits if Dave walked into the room. I wonder if my brother knew or sensed something.
I made it through the eight grade at the MRBC School. Things didn't turn out quite right, though. Something changed in the dynamics of my family. At the time I didn't have a clue. I was spending the night at my best friend's house on 'THAT' evening. We watched my friends father, a deacon at MRBC, leave the house very late one evening only to return even later. I too was SHOCKED when "Brother Dave" (I never call anyone by their titles anymore...especially not BROTHER or SISTER!) resigned. The church at large was not privy to the reasons. My mom was horrified thinking it was because of HER. I soon learned what had happened when my mom confided in her friend only to be shocked to learn that her friend was involved too. I learned later that my mom's pleas for help from Dave's father, Jack Hyles were met with deaf ears. Well, we kids had their own information network and.......we found out which one of us kids was the one who found the briefcase. Fortunately, from my recollection, the briefcase was locked and had to be opened by the father of the boy who found it.
My family fell apart after the Dave incident. My parents divorced, we moved, and many changes took place. To this day I cannot stand being 'preached' at. If you've ever sat through a 'Hyles' sermon, you've been preached at. For years, the bitterness and anger would never subside. At thirty-five, I thought I was over most of it, but I'm sitting here in tears over the memory of it knowing that I should forgive and be understanding but instead knowing that if I were ever in the presence of Dave Hyles I would have an overwhelming urge to deck the man. "You have MY permission to deck Dave."
I can not express to you how appreciative I am that you were instrumental in removing Dave Hyles from the communities in which he finds work in a church. If I can ever be of any help in this endeavor, please let me know.
You know, I have a Bible in which I have the signatures of many of God's great men. As it turns out, I also have the signatures of some men that God loves very much, but that should not be in the positions they are in. That Bible lays unused and packed away. If I ever get my Bible signed again, it would be by the Janitor or the Nursery workers. Mr. Stevens, Brenda's husband, was my eighth grade teacher. If you ever happen to communicate with him, please tell him thank you for all he did for us kids.. and tell him I love him.
Well, thank you for your time..and thank you for your blog.
[signature]
If you feel the need to reprint this, you might want to leave off the
surname....for my mom's sake.
oh, and "You have MY permission to deck Dave." :-)
 | My Reply
Thank you for your e-mail. I'm sorry for the loss and the grief that your family suffered. Even though God has allowed Dave to continue in his ways, I don't think it's because God looks askance at what you and others have suffered. Sometimes God wants events to build up and build up until an irrefutable account exists that shows that all of us need the grace of God for our sins to be forgiven. |
Baptist Fundamentalism is a sect that praises men and sets up so-called "heroes of the faith" who praise themselves and boast of their "soul winning" and church building as evidences of their righteousness. There has to be a witness
against them to constantly shed light on the truth: that we are all sinners and Christ is the only righteousness of man.
There is no other acceptance with God for man except through the merits of Christ, and so---I believe---deceivers like Jack and Dave Hyles and their machine form a continual witness that God is true, and every man a liar by contrast. The testimony of that strata of the IFB sect is that they are righteous by their works, able to impress God and each other; but the testmony of their actions is that God's Word is still true: God is righteous, and they are sinners.
That doesn't make it easy for the people who have directly suffered from the Hyles Dynasty. But there is still a graciousness of God to you to enable you to know God, get past Dave Hyles, even to get past your parents' divorce and your mother's foolish sin, and be a purposeful Christian who evidences that all that we have is in Christ.
You can forgive and yet still grieve over what happened to you and your family. Joseph told his brothers that they had intended to wrong him for evil, but God had intended it for Good. He let go of any grudge, but he still took plenty of precautions regarding his brothers, and God never blamed him for that.
I think all of us have to deal with the big wrongs in our lives over and over again by committng them into God's Hands frequently as we grow. After all, you were just a child. Your perspective on what happened surely changed as you grew, and perhaps several times you revisited the wrong done to you and saw it with new eyes. And each time, perhaps, you had to deal with the pain and loss all over again. That's normal for everybody.
Forgiveness is the act of committing the wrong done to us to God in the faith that God is working the evil of others in our lives for good. I guess that means that neither you nor I can deck Dave (smile), but we can see that---even as he has destroyed others---he has destroyed himself and turned himself into something horrible to contemplate. Your letter seemed very restrained regarding him, sad but not angry. Perhaps you have forgiven others more than you realize.
Thank you for writing, and God bless you.
