(Church Leaders) – Pastor Tony Spell of Life Tabernacle Church in East Baton Rouge, Louisiana is still defying state government orders concerning church gatherings. Drawing more than 1,000 people at his services during the pandemic, Spell has already been charged with a misdemeanor and arrested for other aggressive actions.
However, the embattled minister doesn’t seem to be slowing down, even as Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards has loosened restrictions to allow churches to reopen at 25 percent of their normal capacity. Doubling down on his defiance, Spell announced he would open his church this weekend to 125 percent of its capacity and welcome guests from other states, including New York.
“We will comply with the Governor’s orders, whenever they sell popsicles in hell and set up an ice skating rink in the lake of fire and sell tickets for admission,” Spell said in a video posted to his YouTube account. “We will never comply with any anti-God, anti-church, anti-free-American Christian order that says ‘do not have a church,’” the pastor emphasized.
The title of the video update is “Change of heart” because Spell says he has changed his position after telling reporters earlier that day that the church plans to comply with the Governor’s orders when hell freezes over, essentially. Instead of simply defying the Governor’s orders, Spell explained, the church plans to “become more vile yet and thus” by operating at 125 percent of the capacity specified for its building. READ MORE
