Pastor confronts man with rifle during sermon on violence

When a distraught man carrying a rifle entered the Heal the Land Outreach Ministries in Fayetteville, North Carolina, the presiding pastor, Larry Wright, had to make a quick decision.

Wright, who is also a City Councilman, stepped down from his pulpit where he was giving a sermon about senseless deaths in his community and approached the man who was brandishing a rifle in the air with one hand and a loaded ammunition clip in the other.

Wright, a stout 6’2″ and a retired soldier, asked the man, “Can I help you?”

Wright told the Fayetteville Observer that if the man was at all belligerent, he was going to tackle him. The armed man was calm, allowing Wright to take the rifle away without any confrontation. After patting the man down, the pastor had four strong deacons come and embrace the man, in hopes of making him feel welcome.

Wright began praying for the man who is then said to have fallen to his knees before weeping.

Someone had dialed 911 during the ordeal, but Wright asked that the police remain outside as he finished his New Year’s Eve service. The man sat in the front pew, and, at the conclusion of Wright’s sermon, came forward and asked for salvation.

Wright embraced him and whispered to him that police were outside waiting because his actions had scared many in the church.

The unidentified man told the pastor he had just gotten out of prison, had a new job and a new bride. The man looked to be in his late 20s or early 30s, Wright said.

The incident, reminiscent of the moving salvation scene between Billy Bob Thornton and Robert Duvall in The Apostle, seemed too good to be true for many.

Via TFO:

 

Police Department spokesman Lt. David McLaurin said the incident was noted as a “Call for Service.’’ Notes regarding the call, McLaurin said, indicated the man was taken to Cape Fear Valley Medical Center at his request as a voluntary commitment.

 

As comments poured in arguing that this was all a hoax, Wright addressed the claims. “This was not staged. It’s all true. I never met this person before…To God be the glory,” he said.