Jordan Riley shook up the internet recently with his now-retracted video “3 Types of YouTube Channels I DON’T Recommend!” Last month, Riley attacked Supersessionism as a dangerous doctrine invading the Church and was called out for his tendency to fire from the hip in his clickbait videos. This set off a hornet nest of high-profile Christian YouTubers against him and he has since backpedaled from the initial video. Even after releasing an apology video, Riley failed to improve the situation and has hemorrhaged at least twenty-five hundred subscribers since the initial video. But there are more sinister and sinful accusations behind the drama that have been revealed in the aftermath, as several of the channels he attacked have since made response videos.
The irony is not lost that in the video Riley is condemning YouTubers who employ clickbait and sensationalized titles when he does the same, and every critic who has responded has called this hypocrisy out. Although Jon McCray of “Whaddo You Meme?” is also cited as a sensationalizer, for his content is mostly about pop culture and celebrities, there are worst facets surrounding McCray that need to be called out as he is a theistic evolutionist and a Third-way liberal. This further accentuates that Riley does not often employ the best evidence in his videos.
John Henry of Gospel of Christ
John Henry hosts the channel Gospel of Christ which has about 723K subscribers and was called out in Riley’s categorization of sensational videos, something he and several others laughed about when the video was released.
In his response video, Henry claims that in 2023 Riley contacted him via Facebook trying to make a deal whereby they would promote one another’s channels. At the time Riley was a fraction of his 72K subs and was dwarfed by Gospel of Christ. Riley went on to recommend his channel in a now-hidden 2023 video and then proceeded to “aggressively” pester Henry seeking his shout-out in return. The insinuation is that Riley wanted to extort larger channels for shout-outs in order to grow his channel. At some point, Riley delisted the 2023 recommendations video which featured Gospel of Christ and Revealing Truth as channels he endorsed.
Brylan Riggs’s Response
Brylan Riggs is a YouTuber with about 404K subscribers who was also listed under the Sensationalist category by Riley. He too responded to the video, piggybacking off the claims of Henry. Like Henry, Riggs also accuses Riley of employing the shout-out extortion scheme against him. Riggs said that Riley spammed his Instagram with requests for shout-outs. Riggs further takes issue with the others who are called false teachers, especially Mike Winger, who Riley has long called a false teacher. Winger was paired with Allen Parr, who has promoted Critical Race Theory in the past while also validating false teachers like Priscilla Shirer. The two are not the same.
The two had a fruitful conversation on YouTube in which Riley’s hypocrisy regarding thumbnails was further exposed. Although clickbait thumbnails can be excessive, they are not necessarily sinful nor even deceptive. For whatever reason, everyone in this category of YouTube uses them rather than putting the subject of the video in the title.
Revealing Truth
Revealing Truth is hosted by Sean Christie that has 72K subscribers and was also recommended by Riley in the delisted video. Christie is a continuationist whose content calls out the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) movement. Christie initially insinuated that Riley misunderstood him to be a Calvinist and Cessationist, which is unsubstantiated. This assumption is because Riley’s is a MacArthur-bro who tends to critique any who falls outside those two camps. In the video, Riley used Matthew 7:21-23 which could imply that Sean Christie was not saved, which blew up this beef and was the “misunderstanding” which provoked Riley to eventually retract the videos. The basis of the apology video is this use of Matthew 7. Christie also talks about his experience with faith healing in that he attests to healing people with laying of hands but does not contend he has the gift.
As an aside, Cessationist do not deny that God miraculously heals today, they would characterize the act as being of God, not of an active sign gift. Moreover, the reason Pentecostals bear their namesake is from the assertion that the sign gifts had reemerged, something that possesses eschatological significance. This implies a belief that they had ceased. Not all Continuationist or charismatics believe this, but that is the history behind this debate, so it is proper to understand where they are coming from when engaging them.
The above comment by Justin Peters on the response video proves that one can be an avowed Cessationist without castigating all charismatics as heretics, that there can be good-faith dialogue on these issues. Although they have similar theology, Peters proves a stark contrast to Riley in how he handles these disagreements.
Christie goes further than the others to insinuate that Riley is motivated by greed simply because he objects to doing videos that would fail to generate views or adequate return in what was perhaps a uncharitable characterization that a critic could levy against anyone who dare talks about Christian issues on YouTube instead of solely focusing on teaching the Gospel.
John MacArthur Idolatry
A while back, Caleb at iThinkBiblically called out John MacArthur for his stance on whether it was acceptable for Christians to bake gay wedding cakes. Apparently, Jordan Riley commented on the videos stating that not only was MacArthur correct, that his cognizant participation in a sinful transaction does not make him culpable of sin.
This is a good encapsulation of why Capitalism and Free Markets are not moral systems. iThinkBiblically contends that Riley is idolatrous of John MacArthur, even going so far as to appeal to a previously held position of MacArthur that was contradicted by the controversial comment. Riley has a tendency to rely on MacArthur to make his arguments for him, including his historically illiterate claim that Supersessionism is a dangerous teaching that is invading the church.
There is being a fan of John MacArthur and there is being a simp.
Apology or Damage Control
In the fallout of the mess he created, Riley did issue this apology before later retracting the initial video. In the video comment sections, he maintains that he did not implicate that Christie was unsaved, but was apologizing for causing confusion.
He would also delete this Facebook post.
Riley was claiming to be the victim of several attacks despite having attacked first. There have been multiple deleted videos and deleted posts.
This apology posted on YouTube stood up longer, but has also been deleted. The contents leaves one to wonder whether this was damage control.
The bulk of the statement apologizes for the insinuations made against Sean Christie. While Riley admits to being “black and white,” much of his other conduct in the video was outright hypocritical and reckless.
Then there was a second apology, because the first was evidently not enough to stave off 2000 subs.
In none of the apologies has he retracted his claims of other creators sensationalizing through clickbait which is a plank in his own eye, if ever one was to be found. Moreover, he has not redressed the claims made by at least two witnesses that he has functionally bashed content creators who failed to give him the shout-outs he repeatedly asked of them. While these apologies could be useful in mending the beef with Revealing Truth over the poor use of Matthew 7, he has not confessed to the hypocrisy which is the worse offense.
Conclusion
Christian YouTube does not need Jordan Riley. The channels he bashed do much of the same content, perhaps with superior quality and without a pattern of reckless teaching. The internet does not need another channel attacking low-hanging fruit with superficial presentations when there are greater threats at hand. It is probable that he attempted to leverage larger platforms to grow his own channel, and thus acted with spite in the rescinded video. Furthermore, he has a tendency to attack good believers over secondary issues, amongst them would be Mike Winger, someone who has vastly improved in his courage at actually calling out false teachers. No matter their audience, it does not matter how many Calvinists or Cessationists call out the likes of Benny Hinn; it was far more impactful when Mike Winger did.
In the end, Jordan Riley’s recklessness is why he should be marked and avoided.
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2 Responses
this 2000s looking fred durst wannabe obviously has jew money backing him in some way. secessionism is biblical and all this love for israel is an american big-eva doctrine.
As much I like John MacArthur that is one area that I disagree with him on. Because the “love” of the current government of Israel that many Christians have in the USA is making them hypocritical because the gov is fine with Homosexuals. Also the reverse is also true in leftist circles, a lot of leftists are ironically for Hamas Muslims killing Homosexuals. Plus the fact that the current administration’s party in Israel have prop up Hamas so they can have the excuse to invade and take over the region.