Should Pastors be Masons

[Bishop D.L. Bryant-Kemp, Sr.]

Often times people turn their faces and frown on the Masonic Fraternity. I would like to pose the ? if a Pastor who belongs to the Masonic order is considered a devil worshipper What is a Pastor who is a QUE, NUPE, SIG, ALPHA. Im just curious because I know well known Pastors who are Masonsbut keep it on da hush. Let me know what you think.


Bishop D.L. Bryant-Kemp, Sr., D.Min

[Bishop D.L. Bryant-Kemp, Sr.]

Here we go again. A non mason telling me a Mason a 33rd degree mason its a cult. And then to say everything is done in secret IS A LIE.

For non members of anything it is not your business what goes on behind closed doors. I guess my church is a secret society to. Becuase what goes on on te business side of our church is NOT PUBLIC INFORMATION,

And do you know why we use Jehova along with Baal and Osiris it is because w believe that the God we serve will lways prevail over any demon or trial that comes our way. We take Pauls writing literal when he said to the church @ Rome if God be for you WHO can be against us.

Bishop Kemp

[Lonnie Kluttz]

Being a mason is being part of a cult. It's a secret organization and everything is done in secret. There are rituals that are done, blood oaths and more. Now tell me if God wants any pastor involved in that. The password for a 33rd degree mason is the name of two demons and and the name of God. Jehovah, baal and osiris. Wake up people and stop thinking that everything is o.k. just because everyone is doing it. If you have to hide what you do, then what you are doing is not of God.

God bless

[terrance douthard]

HEY BISHOP, SINCE I PERSONALLY KNOW YOU I'LL SAY, IKNOW YOU'RE DEFINITELY NOT A DEVIL WORSHIPER. LOOK FORWARD TO ATTENDING YOUR ANNAVERSARY

[Bishop D.L. Bryant-Kemp, Sr.]

The problem with listening to former Masons is they do not always tell the truth. Did they tell you that at the begining of a mtg we read scriptures/pray and sing a song of worship. Did they tell you that at the end of a mtg its the same thing. I highly doubt it. Let me make somthing very clear Prince Hall Masons have no dealings in any type of devil worship. I mean if that where the case some of the most prominant Pastors who many by tapes from and loves to hear on a weekly basis on tbn, the word network, the church channel Etc. would have no Anointing. And I know for sure I am ANOINTED, Dr.King , Bishop Long , Rev. W.J. Shaw , Dr. E.V. Hill, Bishop Paul Morton and the list goes on, & on all of these great men are/where ANOINTED.

And how could that be if we are all devil worshipers. Does the WORD of God notsay no man can serve two masters Either you will Love one and hate the other.

Please do not try to endow me with false facts about Prince Hall Masonry because I know entierly too much about it. Again I am one and Im on the inside you all go based of what someone told you Im going by experience.

[terrance douthard]

ALL I;L SAY IS. I'M NOT EDUCATED ON WHAT THE MASON'S ARE ABOUT SO I WON'T SPEAK ON IT

[MARIE PAUL]

You can justify this by saying must profess faith in God and the Lord Jesus Christ....Anyone can profess faith in God and all this cults they alway name God, Jesus Christ in the beginning of their ceremonies, because they know HE is first in everything, But base on the fact that I've known a few masons who have truly accepted Jesus as their personal savior, in their testimonies, masonic is devil worshiping....... who gives this man the wisdom to know what's good and bad in the bible....... this is the problem then and now......people used the bible to justify their organization authenticity......as far as I am concern everything in the Holy Bible is good for us and our soul. I know for a fact Masonic members are sworn to secrecy so we might never know what this organization is all about.

[Bishop D.L. Bryant-Kemp, Sr.]

While most of what was posted by my dear brother is correct alot of it is INCORRECT as it relates to Prince Hall Masonry. I need to make very clear of one thing.

The statement the Masons do not conform to the Bible we make it conform to us is by in no ways TRUE that is a false statement.

And in no way of the Masonic Foundation is demonic/Satanic devices. Please do not take what you have read or have studied to be factual.

I am a 33rd Degree Mason Past Master of My Lodge Past Patron of The Order of the Eastern Stars, Grand Chaplain of the Most Worshipul Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Minnesota,, Member of the Shrine, Member of the Knights Templar and A Masonic Educator to Pastors & Churches who have been given MISINFORMATION.

Again I cannot speak for any other bracnch of Masonry but I can speak for the one whos faith is in God and he is the Author and finsher of our Faith.

Bishop D.L. Bryant-Kemp,Sr

[terrance douthard]

HEY BISHOP, YOU GOT TO TOUCH ON REV. HANCOCK'S FINDING'S. WOW NEVER KNEW ANY OF THIS STUFF

[Eric Hancock]

In the final analysis, Masons do not adjust their beliefs to fit the Bible, the Bible is adjusted to fit their beliefs. A Mason's loyalty is never to God but to the Lodge. Coil has concluded that: "The prevailing Masonic opinion is that the Bible is only a symbol of Divine Will, Law, or Revelation, and not that its contents are Divine Law, inspired, or revealed. So far, no responsible authority has held that a Freemason must believe the Bible or any part of it." Masonry's only concern is that each person must swear by the most holy book he knows, so that he will then keep the oaths of Freemasonry. (See Endnote #2 again.)

2. God. Masons require one to believe in God to be a member, but the candidate is never required to say what god he believes in -- "Masonry ... requires merely that you believe in some deity, give him what name you will ... any god will do, so he is your god" (Little Masonic Library, Macoy Publishing, 1977, 4:32). Masons commonly refer to their deity as the "Great Architect of the Universe" (G.A.O.T.U.) or the Supreme Being. God is further described as Grand Artificer, Grand Master of the Grand Lodge Above, Jehovah, Allah, Buddha, Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, or Great Geometer. (The "G" in the Masonic ring can refer to God; it can also refer to geometry.) Masons claim that the actual name for God has been lost (cf. Jn. 14:8,9; Phil. 2:9-11; 1 Jn. 5:20) [HJB].

3. Jesus Christ. The name of Christ is seldom referred to in Masonic literature, apparently due to Masons not wanting to offend their non-Christian members. Some Masonic leaders even teach that the Messiah will not be an individual, but "the perfection of the human race." One such leader thinks that the stories about various Messiahs have their origin in the most ancient of religious beliefs -- Solar Worship. Masons, therefore, consider the discussion about the deity of Christ to be an endless, futile argument. When quoting from the Bible, references to Christ are omitted, and prayer is never allowed to be offered (in a "well-ordered" lodge) in the name of Jesus Christ. Masons do not care whether a person privately petitions God or Jehovah, Allah or Buddha, Mohammed or Jesus, the God of Israel or the "Great First Cause," but in the Lodge, the only petition allowed is to the "Great Architect of the Universe." [HJB] Clearly then, Freemasonry does not believe that Jesus Christ is God, nor that salvation is available only through Him (cf. 1 Jn. 4:3). Freemasonry is a religion without a Savior.

At the heart of Masonry is a secret Luciferian doctrine which a Mason only comes to understand as he reaches the higher levels. Manly Palmer Hall, another of the great authorities on Masonry, writes, "When the Mason ... has learned the mystery of his Craft, the seething energies of Lucifer are in his hands. ..." (Manly Palmer Hall, The Lost Keys of Freemasonry, p. 48). The Apostle John warned that those who deny that Jesus is the only, all sufficient Christ, and that He came once and for all in the flesh, have embraced the spirit of Antichrist (1 Jn. 4:1-3). That Jesus was not the Christ, but that He had attained to the state of "Christ-consciousness" available to all mankind, is again part of Masonry: "Jesus of Nazareth had attained a level of consciousness, of perfection, that has been called by various names: cosmic consciousness, soul regeneration, philosophic initiation, spiritual illumination, Brahmic Splendor, Christ-consciousness" (Lynn F. Perkins, The Meaning of Masonry, CSA Press, 1971, p. 53).

4. Sin. Sin is seldom referred to in Masonic literature. The reality of sin in the Biblical sense is denied (much like the Christian Scientists); Masons think that any "shortcomings" can be overcome by greater enlightenment. Yet in attaining the degree of Master Mason, the symbolism implies that a person is redeemed from the death of sin and sin's pollution. [HJB]

5. Salvation and Future Life. Masons think that salvation refers to being brought from the material to the spiritual; i.e., when man returns to "his forgotten inherent spirituality." Masons believe that the degree of Master Mason is symbolical of old age, which allows a person to happily reflect on a well-spent life and to "die in the hope of a glorious immortality." Because they deny the reality of sin, Masons see no need of salvation in the Biblical sense. They see salvation as a step-by-step enlightenment, which comes through initiation into the Masonic degrees and their mysteries. [HJB]

In the 19th degree of Scottish Rite Freemasonry, the initiate is told that attachment to Masonry's "statutes and rules of the order" will make him "deserving of entering the celestial Jerusalem [heaven]." In the 28th degree, he is told that "the true Mason [is one] who raises himself by degrees till he reaches heaven" and that one of his duties is "To divest [him]self of original sin ..." Masons clearly teach a salvation by works, or character development, not a salvation by faith in Christ alone. Even in the 32nd Degree, a Mason never can nor will find the "light" he is looking for.

[Eric Hancock]

All I ever pretty much seen in the church was Masons and Elks,Some go by the book Chronicles where Solomon called out the Masons to build the Temple,,I gotten this information from a long ago study

THE SOLOMON TEMPLE IS THE HEART AND SOUL OF FREEMASONRY!

Now that we have amply demonstrated that the genuine Christian has no close affinity to Solomon's Temple, because He destroyed it and annulled the Levitical Priesthood that accompanied it, let us examine how important this temple is to the practice of the Masonic religion.

"Of all the objects which constitute the Masonic science of symbolism, the most important, the most cherished, by the Mason, and by far the most significant, is the Temple of Jerusalem. The spiritualizing of the Temple is the first, the most prominent and the most pervading, of all symbols of Freemasonry ... Take from Freemasonry its dependence on the Temple; leave out of its ritual all references to that sacred edifice, and to the legends and traditions connected with it, and the system itself would at once decay and die ... " ["Encyclopaedia of Freemasonry", by Albert Mackey, MD, 33º and Charles T. McClenachan, 33º, Revised Edition, by Edward L. Hawkins, 30º and William J. Hughan, 32º, Volume II, M-Z, published by The Masonic History Company, Chicago, New York, London, 1873, A.G. Mackey, 1927, by the Masonic History Company.]

Let us repeat the critical understanding that the noted 33º Masonic author, Albert Mackey, has just given us:

"Take from Freemasonry its dependence on the Temple; leave out of its ritual all references to that sacred edifice, and to the legends and traditions connected with it, and the system itself would at once decay and die ... "

Therefore, the first understanding we want you to grasp is that Freemasonry is absolutely, completely, 100% devoted to the Solomon Temple, without which the entire structure and foundation of Freemasonry would die! Thus does Masonry stand in stark contrast to genuine, Biblical Christianity. In other words, Freemasonry is rooted at its deepest foundation to the First Covenant of the Old Testament, while Biblical Christianity is rooted to the Second Covenant of Jesus Christ as delineated in the New Testament!

Mackey makes this fact quite clear also: "Masonry has derived its temple symbolism, as it has almost all its symbolic ideas, from the Hebrew type ..." [Ibid] Since the Old Testament was written originally in the Hebrew, and the New Testament in the Greek, Mackey is clearly stating that Freemasonry is rooted in the Old Testament!

In the Masonic Bible, quoted above, the Temple Illustrated Edition, the author of the Foreword sheds some further light upon the importance of Solomon's Temple to Freemasonry.

"The traditions and romance of King Solomon's Temple are of great interest to everyone who reads the Bible. They are of transcendent importance to Masons. The Temple is the outstanding symbol in Masonry, and the legendary story of the building of the Temple is the fundamental basis of the Masonic rule and guide for conduct in life ... The cream of Masonic historical and philosophical writing has been drawn upon for his description of the Temple and its relation to Masonic ritual." [The Holy Bible: The Great Light In Masonry", King James Version, Temple Illustrated Edition, A.J. Holman Company, 1968, Forward entitled, "The Bible and King Solomon's Temple in Masonry", by John Wesley Kelchner].

Let us review the important segment:

"The traditions and romance of King Solomon's Temple ... are of transcendent importance to Masons."

The word, "transcendent", is used by genuine Biblical Christianity to describe God Himself. Just as the dictionary explains, God is truly "transcendent", "to pass beyond the limit that humans can grasp"; "to exist above and independently of material experience or the universe". In other words, Solomon's Temple is to the Freemason what God is to the genuine Christian!

Thus, belief in Solomon's Temple transcends all of Freemasonry itself, existing above and independently of it. Masonry has placed its "transcendent" faith in a building that the True God Himself destroyed, not once, but twice!