In the past several days, two individuals - each of whom is a highly respected and admired member of the community in this area - have volunteered to me their opinion of WGSR Star 39: the television station "serving" the market around Reidsville, North Carolina.
The first person said that WGSR is an "embarrassment" and that it "makes the people here look dumb".
The second person was more precise in their assessment: that WGSR general manager Charles Roark is not a serious broadcaster, that he is only out for "tabloid television" and that Reidsville's television station never tolerated such "nuts like Johnny Robertson" when it was operating as WAEU Channel 14 several years ago.
I agree, one hunnerd percent. WAEU had a much more professional operation than what has transpired under the "leadership" of Charles Roark. And a man as evil as cult leader Johnny Robertson would never have been allowed the airtime on WAEU. Back then, the station practiced civic responsibility. To have let Robertson and his self-described "Church of Christ" cabal use the station's facilities would have been like letting David Koresh broadcast for four hours a week just because he had enough money. And I've no doubt that if Koresh were alive and active in this area, that Charles Roark would sell him airtime.
But anyhoo, back to Johnny Robertson (who a number of people have also told me that I wasn't wrong in comparing him to Jim Jones a few days ago)...
I happened to catch Robertson's broadcast at 10 p.m. last night on WGSR. The highlight of the show was Robertson's son out harassing people going into churches with a camcorder, calling himself a "reporter" with an outfit called the "Religious Review Multimedia Group".
First of all, there is no such thing as "Religious Review Multimedia". It's something that Johnny Robertson pulled out of his own butt, just to add an air of legitimacy to his twisted activities. And second, his son is a horrible reporter (but I guess he's working for WGSR in a sense, so that jibes). From my understanding, this is a fifteen-year old kid that Robertson is sending out to do this kind of stuff.
But as it turns out, exploiting pre-adults is something that Johnny Robertson is rather fond of.
This blogger received some information not long ago and has been working to confirm it. The Knight Shift can now report that Johnny Robertson, of the "Martinsville Church of Christ" in Martinsville, Virginia, has been handing out twenty dollar bills to the children of his congregation. But this isn't money he's giving out of the goodness of his heart. No folks: Robertson has been passing out the bills to the kids, with orders to confront fellow students and even teachers in the schools that they attend. The instructions to the "Church of Christ" cult's youth are: "if you can prove that your denomination is in the Bible, I will give you twenty dollars." Just as Robertson has publicly offered thousands of dollars on live television to anyone who can offer biblical evidence of denominations.
(Personally, I think that the seven churches described in the Book of Revelation correspond precisely with denominations as we understand them today. But I'm not holding my breath for Robertson to make good on his offer...)
It's already been well established that neither Johnny Robertson's "Martinsville Church of Christ", or the "Reidsville Church of Christ" that his henchman James Oldfield runs, is financially self-sufficient. That Robertson is being funded by the proverbial "mysterious Texans" out west.
This is what all his donors in Texas give money to support? I mean, Robertson and Oldfield complain all the time that other churches and preachers don't care about the Bible... yet they spend their entire time not only not talking about the Bible, but instead condemning those churches and preachers. And now, Robertson is apparently using that same funding to send children out to harass others?
Once again I have to ask: how is this demonstrating Christ's love and grace to a lost and dying world?
No wonder so many people laugh at Christianity.
(But a lot of people are also laughing at Johnny Robertson and Charles Roark...)