AD Robles is a part-time YouTuber who emerged to prominence in the fight against Social Justice. He is a part of Fight Laugh Feast, a Moscow adjacent podcast network, and is also on the board of Right Response Ministries. So when the news about Joel Webbon broke last week, being on the board, he knew for quite some time. AD Robles responded to James White’s video attacking Joel Webbon, and he calls out specific lies tr inaccuracies in White’s assessment of the situation.
AD Robles points out that James White’s instincts that the local church be the authority on the matter, citing Baptist polity.
One of the key inaccuracies in James White’s video is that he conflates the different past churches of Joel Webbon. Whereas Joel Webbon would not consider his “glorified Bible study” a church, both James White and AD Robles would say it was a church. However, in recognizing this, AD Robles points out that Joel Webbon submitted to his authorities and heeded their counsel. In hindsight, their counsel looks bad, but it’s difficult to judge someone repentant a decade later for faithfully following less than ideal counsel.
James White lumps this church in with Webbon’s former church that penned the letter prior to being reconciled to Webbon and even inviting him to preach at their church.
Despite claiming at the beginning that it’s not Webbon’s role to judge how this situation was adjudicated, he went on to judge how this situation was adjudicated.
Additionally, White addresses myths as prominent narratives, such as Webbon not being saved at the time, which he cites a generic social media post. White would peddle his own propaganda about people at Webbon’s church heading into Eastern Orthodoxy. There was a social media personality who had a cup of coffee at Webbon’s church who publicly went on to Roman Catholicism, but blaming Webbon for people who infrequently visited his church during a brief stint living in Texas is a massive stretch. (This is me citing what I know, to be charitable to White’s claim.)
Lastly, in a despicable smear, James White compared Joel Webbon to Robert Morris, clumsily referencing his recent arrest. AD Robles calls this MSNBC level, and says that this is what James White really wanted to say in his video.
James White is crashing out, as the kids say, and it’s embarrassing to watch at times.
3 Responses
Any man in the church who seeks to build up a public following is leading himself into temptation, and many, if not most, will succumb to that temptation with prideful behaviour. The turf wars that you describe on a daily basis serve not to build up the Kingdom of God, but only to puff up these men’s egos. The humble Christian would do well to seek the counsel of local shepherds and not give any of these men further support as they seek to exalt themselves and not Jesus.
So we have James White throwing darts at Joel Webben. And why Webbon instead of a thousand other pastors that White might say things about? Because of some OTHER reason, something deeply disturbing to White. This, I think, is the crisis in the Reformed Baptist identity, which Webbon has been making acute for people in White’s circle. The Reformed Baptists have been reaching into non-Baptist resources (eg Kuyperianism or Thomism) to build up their own theology which they find highly lacking in areas (that is, in their inheritance from their Evangelical/pietist past).
I don’t buy that there is a Calvinist pastor alive who hasn’t committed adultery or fornication while a pastor because they hold to the WCF that says “God has determined ALL THINGS, WHATSOEVER comes to pass” and that makes them believe God predestined ALL THEIR SINS, and then they fall like Steve Lawson; and on this basis, I am absolutely certain that James White has done the same as or worse than Joel Webbon. Its just the inevitable result of believing the WCF.