Help for Alex

Justin Peters

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Hello, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Justin Peters. I hope that this finds you and your family doing well today.

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I want to thank you so much for joining me for this podcast. Very special podcast.

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Those of you who have been following my channel for a good while, you know that I never ask you to send money to support the ministry.

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Some people do, and I'm very grateful for that, but it's not something that I ask for on this channel. There have been a few videos that I've done, a couple of them, in which

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I have asked you to financially support some projects that were very worthwhile.

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A book publishing project by Conrad and Bayway in Africa, and then there's also been a couple videos that I've done asking for you to help support some precious brothers and sisters in Christ who genuinely needed some help.

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A year or so ago, a family had lost their husband and father, a precious

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Christian family, and then a year or two before that, a husband and wife who had their house burned down, and they had a little baby at the time.

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Many of you did and supported those worthwhile projects and you are a tremendous blessing to them, and I thank you for that.

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This is another one of those videos. It centers around a story that you might be familiar with.

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So in 2004, Kevin Malarkey and his then six -year -old son,

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Alex Malarkey, were driving in a car and they had a car accident. Kevin was thrown out of the car, largely unhurt, nicks and but nothing serious.

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Alex, however, was left a quadriplegic. His spinal cord was severed and he is a quadriplegic to this day.

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He is now 24 years old, so he's now a young man. But the story really starts in, well, obviously starting with that, but in 2010, a book was published by Kevin, the father, and Alex, his son.

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Of course, Alex was a child at the time, so he didn't write the book, obviously, but his father, Kevin, did, presumably with some help.

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But at any rate, Alex made the claim that he went to heaven. And so this book was written entitled,

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The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven, supposedly a true story of Alex going to heaven at the time of his accident or shortly thereafter.

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And this is just another one of those installments in the heaven tourism genre. And there for a while, it was a bestseller.

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It sold a lot of copies, a million -plus copies, and so made quite a bit of news in the

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Christian publishing circles. Well, those of you who know my theology, you know I do not believe in such tales.

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No one goes to heaven today and comes back to tell about it. But a funny thing happened three, four years after the book was published.

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So Alex would have been 14 -ish, somewhere in that neighborhood. Funny thing happened to Alex.

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Alex got saved. God genuinely saved Alex. And Alex did exactly what you would expect a true

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Christian to do. He came out and he publicly, well, let me back up.

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He tried to publicly say that he did not go to heaven.

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He and his mother, Beth, of course, he told his mother. His mother could see the change in him.

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And Alex started saying, mom, I did not go to heaven. This is, I just wrote this for attention.

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You know, I made this claim for attention, but I didn't go to heaven. And so they tried to make, they made efforts to contact the publishers,

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Tyndale Publishing, and then some Christian bookstores, Lifeway, I'm looking at you, to tell them that they, that this is not a true story.

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But they would have none of it. And Kevin, unfortunately, the father, would have none of it because this was bringing in substantial amounts of money to him.

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Well, long story short, Beth Malarkey, the mother, got in touch with Phil Johnson, then with me.

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And so I, I'm contacting Lifeway, some of the powers that be at Lifeway, telling them that this did not happen.

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Well, this was in, this was in 2014, May of 2014.

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Well, all of my efforts and Phil Johnson's efforts were rebuffed and just like, blah, blah, blah, just dismissed.

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And so, well, funny thing, in January of 2015, it was picked up, well, pulpit and pen wrote about it.

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And then the, then it spread like wildfire on the national news media.

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In fact, it went globally. And I think for a day or two, it was the number one story in the world, as far as the number of people reporting on it.

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So it made big, big news. The boy who claimed to go to heaven recants his claim.

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He did not go to heaven. So it made international headlines. And then Lifeway had to come out and make a statement.

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In fact, I'll read this statement to you. This is a statement from Lifeway. Lifeway was informed this week that Alex Malarkey has retracted his testimony about visiting heaven as told in the book,

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The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven. Therefore, we are returning to the publisher the few copies we have in our stores.

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End of statement. That's a lie. That is a lie. And I have the emails to prove it because I sent,

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I emailed the powers that be. And if you're watching this video, you know who you are.

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That is a flat out lie. But at any rate, unfortunately,

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Kevin, the father has, the family is a broken family.

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Alex and his mother Beth live in Ohio. Kevin is in Colorado.

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And they are living in this home. And Kevin has the title to the home.

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And he is trying to evict, or I guess now legally has successfully evicted

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Beth and Alex from the home that they need for Alex's needs.

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I'm showing a couple of pictures here. Alex must have this large, large electric wheelchair that has to recline for his health, has a ventilator on it.

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So this is a massive piece of equipment. And Alex cannot live in just any old home.

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He needs a home that has doors wide enough to accommodate his wheelchair. Alex has faced an awful, awful lot of challenges and obviously still does.

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He is, back in 2009, when he was 11 years old, he was the first child to undergo the

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Christopher Reeve surgery, which will allow him to spend at least some time off of his ventilator.

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So they're facing eviction from their home by Kevin who wants to sell the house. And so this house had already been customized to fit

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Alex's needs, but the house is in Kevin's name. And so he has a legal right to do it. And that is what is happening.

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So they are in need of help. And I am asking you, in fact, down below in the description, there's a link to two things.

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There's a link to an article that just came out, my understanding, I think today or yesterday, an article giving you more details about this situation.

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And then also a link down below in the description to the

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GoFundMe page, where if you're able to do so, and you so want to, then please do support

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Alex and his mother Beth. They've got to find another place.

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They can't, as I said, they can't find just, they can't just choose any apartment or any home. He has special needs.

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And so they are, they are in dire straits. This by the way, is a picture of Alex at his baptism.

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I posted this four years ago, 2018, when I still had my Justin Peters Ministries Twitter account.

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And so anyway, you can read what I wrote there. He was, I believe in baptism by immersion, because that is literally what the word baptizo means.

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But Alex was sprinkled, but for very understandable reasons, of course, he gave his testimony and, and he was baptized.

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So at the time that this book was written, back in 2010, they were going to a, a bad church, a word faith church, go figure, that a church like that would encourage a tale like that.

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But at any rate, I digress. So this is in a good church. And I, that is, that man there,

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I assume is the pastor, but at any rate, this was a, this was at his baptism.

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So if you would, dear ones, please do support Alex and his mother, Beth. They're good folks.

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God has done an amazing work in Alex's life. In fact, even if God were to heal

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Alex of his paralysis, and God could do that if it was his sovereign will to do so.

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But even if he did that, that miracle would pale in comparison to what

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God did for him when he saved him, when he saved him from his sins. And that is the greatest miracle of all.

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So it's my joy. It's my privilege to be able to help in some way. My ministry will also be donating.

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I'm not going to ask you to do anything that, that I'm not doing. So Justin Peters Ministries will also be donating to support

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Beth and Alex. Okay. So, and if you can't, please do pray for them in this difficult time.

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All right, dear ones. Thank you. Thank you so very much. Until our next time together, may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of his