When the Rev. Jamie Coots, co-star of National Geographic Channel\u2019s reality TV show \u201cSnake Salvation\u201d was bitten on the hand by a rattlesnake, he refused medical treatment and died in less than two hours. Coots, who was leading mid-February services at the Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus\u2019 Name in Middlesboro, Kentucky, and his followers represent a sect of Christianity that incorporates snake handling into worship, relying heavily on Mark 16:17-18 for support. The beloved pastor, who survived numerous snakebites in the past, is not the first to die in this manner since George Went Hensley introduced snake handling to Appalachian churches in the early 1900s. Coots died the way he lived, faithful to his beliefs.<\/p>\n
Some people classify snake handlers like Coots as cultists, but there is a distinction between cults and sects.<\/p>\n
A cult is a religious organization whose members claim to be Christians, and who use the Bible and Christian terms, yet who deny the central beliefs of historic, biblical Christianity. More to the point, a cult is based on a counterfeit Christian message.<\/p>\n
Our Jehovah\u2019s Witness and Mormon friends, for example, belong to movements that deny biblical doctrines inherent to orthodox Christianity.<\/p>\n
Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses deny the Trinity, the deity of Christ, His atonement on the cross, His physical resurrection, and salvation by grace through faith — all non-negotiable Christian doctrines.<\/p>\n
Mormons, in a similar fashion, hold unbiblical views of God. They teach, for example, that Jesus and Lucifer were brothers born into the spirit world through sexual relations between Elohim and a goddess wife and that \u201cas man is, God once was; as God is, man may become.\u201d<\/p>\n
Our snake-handling Pentecostal friends, however, embrace the core doctrines of the Christian faith. Therefore, they are not members of a cult, but of a sect, which may be defined as a group that embraces orthodox doctrine but has established its own identity and teachings distinct from the broader Christian community.<\/p>\n
Coots truly believed that Mark 16:17-18 is a command: \u201cAnd these signs will accompany those who believe: In My name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new languages; they will pick up snakes; if they should drink anything deadly, it will never harm them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will get well.\u201d<\/p>\n
As Andrew Hamblin, 21, pastor of Tabernacle Church of God in LaFollette, Tennessee, told The Tennessean daily newspaper, \u201cTo me it\u2019s a mandate. You don\u2019t have to do it to go to heaven, but you do have to believe it is the word of God to take up serpents.\u201d Hamblin begins each service with a warning: \u201cThere\u2019s death in that box,\u201d pointing to snakes in stacked wooden and glass containers.<\/p>\n
There are sound reasons to reject the interpretation of Mark 16 that Hamblin and others embrace. First, manuscript evidence indicates broad uncertainty about whether verses 9-20 were part of the original autograph of Mark\u2019s Gospel. As the Holman Christian Standard Study Bible explains, \u201cEither Mark ended his Gospel here [verse 8], he never wrote an intended ending, or his original ending has been lost.\u201d<\/p>\n
A second reason to reject snake handling as normative for the church is that we see no commands for it elsewhere in Scripture, either in the Gospels or the Epistles. Nor do we see it practiced in the early church.<\/p>\n
Third, we must distinguish between what the writers of Scripture record and what they command. If this passage truly is canonical, it likely describes God\u2019s miraculous preservation of His people under extraordinary circumstances. For example, the apostle Paul was bitten by a viper, yet survived (Acts 28:3-6).<\/p>\n
Finally, God does not instruct us to entertain death in a box. We should never tempt God or test His sovereign will. The \u201cspiritual high\u201d described in these worship services may be more of an adrenaline rush than \u201cthe closest thing to heaven,\u201d as Hamblin describes it.<\/p>\n
God may allow us to live to a ripe old age or take us home prematurely in divine discipline (see 1 Corinthians 11:27-32). We do not need to test His sovereignty by claiming snake salvation.<\/p>\n
Even so, we should remember that snake-handling Pentecostals are our brothers and sisters in Christ. We should love them and speak well of their passion for God, even if we do not agree with their interpretation of a disputed passage of Scripture.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When the Rev. Jamie Coots, co-star of National Geographic Channel\u2019s reality TV show \u201cSnake Salvation\u201d was bitten on the hand by a rattlesnake, he refused medical treatment and died in less than two hours. Coots, who was leading mid-February services at the Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus\u2019 Name in Middlesboro, Kentucky, and his followers represent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1796,231,1794,4741,4740,4739,4738,4742,1074],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5438"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5438"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5438\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}