For most of the last three-plus years, one of the “latest big things” in the charismatic/Pentecostal world had been unfolding out of Dalton, Georgia. Supposedly, Jerry Pearce and Johnny Taylor had gotten their hands on a Bible that was flowing with oil.
Pearce and Taylor have shown off the Bible at Dalton’s Wink Theater on a weekly basis. They have also been traveling all over North America, stopping at least once out my way in the Charlotte area. People have claimed to have been healed and felt the presence of the Holy Spirit when they touched samples of the oil.
Many of you know that I’m charismatic myself. However, something about this didn’t pass the smell test. Well, it turns out that this really was a fraud. The Chattanooga Times Free Press has uncovered what appears to be irrefutable evidence that the oil supposedly flowing from that Bible is nothing more than ordinary mineral oil.
The Times Free Press wrote about the increasingly popular gathering in November 2019. The next day, someone contacted the newspaper saying Pearce was a regular customer at the Tractor Supply store in Dalton. The person said Pearce often bought large amounts of mineral oil — a clear oil similar in appearance to the oil Pearce claims is coming from his Bible.
In December 2019, two Dalton Tractor Supply managers visually identified Pearce and said he consistently bought gallons of mineral oil. However, company policies barred them from providing more specific customer information.
The Times Free Press then asked scientists at UT-Chattanooga to take a look. Chemical tests of the oil Pearce was touting “strongly suggest that the sample is mineral oil”—and was “a nearly exact match” to the mineral oil sold at Tractor Supply.
When confronted with the evidence, Pearce and Taylor essentially said, “La-la-la, can’t hear you!”
Pearce said the managers at Tractor Supply are lying. He and Taylor repeated they do not have to defend their work, something they said in November.
"Everything we do is in the light," Taylor said. "I don't know how we could defend it other than it just comes up out of the Bible."
However, in what can only be described as a whopper of a coincidence, Pearce and Taylor later announced that the Bible hadn’t flowed with oil since January 10. They haven’t distributed oil since February 4, and have also called off the weekly services in Dalton.
Sounds like a couple of literal snake oil salesmen have been busted.
(h/t Friendly Atheist)