United Pentecostal Pastor Roy Grant And A Funeral

Last night I heard about a funeral conducted at Calvary Gospel Church of Madison, Wisconsin during their normal evening service time on September 25, 2019. While there was a pop-up announcement on their website and a mention on their church Facebook page, it has been shared there was no sign seen at the church to warn any possible visitors that service was cancelled and a funeral was being held.

I have written extensively about this United Pentecostal Church and the sexual abuse that has occurred there for decades. John Grant and his son, Roy Grant, are the pastors. There is so much more concerning them and this church that will be covered in the future, by myself as well as others. For this article I will mostly let the event speak for itself and share minimal commentary.

I’ve never in my entire life seen or heard something so insane!

A woman who attended the funeral left very angry and upset at what she witnessed from Roy Grant. I am sharing, with her permission, a portion of what she wrote. It is sad and disturbing that someone would do this at a funeral and equally bothersome that no one attempted to stop it, but instead most in attendance appeared to be supportive. I guess that shouldn’t surprise me as I watched John Grant receive a standing ovation from members after a local reporter covered some of the cases of child sexual abuse which occurred during his time as pastor and went unreported by him. Below are the woman’s thoughts on what happened.

“I am so pissed! I just came from a friend’s funeral at my former church. What started out as a lovely memorial service for a wonderful person took a sharp left turn down weird street when the pastor tried to raise him from the dead! I kid you not. You can’t make this stuff up! He asked God to show that he is sovereign by having my friend ‘pass back over into the land of the living.’ Then he paused and said ‘I told God I’d give him a minute’. Then there was a moment of silence. Near the end he said ‘or just knock.’ . . . The atmosphere was super weird and uncomfortable. To make matters worse, some guy spoke up and said ‘when 2 or more agree…I agree with you, pastor.’ Soon other people from around the standing-room only sanctuary were saying ‘I agree.’ Finally the pastor said ‘Whoever agrees, please stand.’ Everyone except a handful of people stood up. . . Then he closed the service like nothing happened!”

This man was brought back to life once before (thru medical intervention-not like at a prayer service or anything). But it was kind of like they expected him to be brought back again and couldn’t just let him Rest In Peace.

I went to the website where they stream the services live to see if they had done this for the funeral and they had. Anyone may go there to watch for themselves, though the September 25, 2019 broadcast will only be temporarily available. This portion of the service starts around the 1:02:35 mark and ends at 1:09:24. Below is my transcription of what Roy Grant said and in the brackets are what was happening.

“So here today, in front of all of these witnesses, on the behalf of a promise made to a friend. Somewhere between the line of insanity and faith, I don’t know. But I humbly call out before God, with faith believing, make this most humble request. In the name of our precious Lord and Jesus, Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, I ask for Jeff [last name omitted], a mighty man of valor, to arise from the state that he is in and cross back over that barrier into the land of the living. [Short period of silence] I promised the Lord I would go a minute of silence. And since we can’t see our brother, just knock bro. All you gotta do is knock. [longer period of silence]

“I believe God is trying to say something to us here tonight. [brief silence] As I said earlier, that God is a sovereign God. I neither give life and it’s not my job to take a life. But I no less believe today, now, than I did at 5 o’clock, 6 o’clock, a week ago, a month ago. I’ve never done anything like this before in my life. It’s been a long week since Brother Jeff passed. I’m sure it’s been long for the family. I don’t mean to embarrass anyone. I don’t mean to make light of anything. I still b… [he cuts off his word and then there is brief silence]

“Let’s just do this. If you agree, let’s just stand and lift our hands toward heaven. [people stand and raise their hands] You see, this isn’t putting me on the spot. I’m not the one being put on the spot, it’s God. Lord, I pray that your hand would be upon us this day. God, we are exercising our faith, we’ve never experienced anything ever like this. I’ve never done anything like this. I’ve never been here before. We’ve got your word says where two or three agree. Praise God, praise God, praise God. [walks down to casket that is in front of the pulpit] Even now Lord Jesus, God, I pray God over this casket. God I pray, Lord I don’t know how all this works [he laughs], but I know you’ve done it before. I know you’ve done it before. In Jesus name we pray, Lord Jesus. Thank you Jesus, thank you Jesus. Praise God, praise God. Praise God. [walks back to pulpit]

“I’m not going to belabor, we’re not going to beg, we’re not going to plead. I did write two alternate sermons. I chose the first one because it required faith. Required laying it all out there. And I wrote two endings. You could say, well why did you write two endings? Because I wanted to give God an opportunity if he chose to be sovereign. You see, the Scripture tells us we shall not all sleep. We sang the song, ‘when we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that would be.'” [he then goes back to talking about the deceased]

Audio only version – Since the video will only be available a short time, I have added a link to the audio only version, which was edited by them as it is shorter than what was live broadcast. The time stamp is different for this as it starts at the 46:22 mark and ends at the 53:09 mark.

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