What do you think of the Church of Jesus Christ With Signs Following?

I'm talking about the people commonly known as "snake handlers". They take this verse literally:

And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; 18 they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.鈥?br> Mark 16:17-18

I live in WV, not very far from a sociologically famous snake handling church in a place called Jolo. I went to school here in WV for a little while, and my anthropology teacher (who was an atheist) had spent some time studying them. He had become friends with the leader of the church, and had seen them doing their thing.

These people go up onto the mountains and collect snakes. They fill up jars with strychnine, which is a VERY serious poison, and they bring these items to their church service. Then they drink large gulps of the poison and hold fistfuls of snakes.

here is a picture:

http://www.ljworld.com/billsnead/gallery...

in school we watched some tapes from my professor's time with them and saw them literally drinking the poison. He sent a sample of the poison to a laboratory and it was found that one sip was strong enough to kill 20 men.

Now, I understand there are some theories as to how they can survive the snake bites, but I haven't heard any explanation of how they survive the poison.

please note, I do not condone this practice in any way, and believe it's totally unbiblical

Yep, we still have some of those across the state line in Virginia too. I live not too far from one of those churches. I'm not too sure they still do the snake part, but I know they still do the drinking the poison.

It was explained to me that the way they survive the poison is that they drink EXTREMELY small amounts of it in order to build up an immunity to it, then increase the amounts over a long period of time until they are able to drink fairly large amounts without being killed by it. There are some accidents that still happen anyway.

I have read a book about them. I also saw a show about them on public tv. I think they are sincere. but i don't believe we are to take the bible that literally. i think they take the bible out of context, giving all christians a bad name. especially those subscribing to any pentecostal persuasion.

It's hardly unbiblical since it is taken straight from the gospels.

Nonetheless, strychnine was once available in a pill form and was used to treat many human ailments. I would imagine their dosing is within those parameters.

the bible also says dont tempt the Lord thy God

These folk are misguided.

Edit: Come to a black church....there are no snakes, but everyone still jumps around and screams.

wow