🚨 https://preparewithlionel.com ORDER NOW! Winter Prep Bundle Preparedness Starts With Personal Responsibility ◉ Follow LIONEL on X: https://x.com/LionelMedia ◉ SUBSCRIBE to the LIONEL NATION Newsletter https://bit.ly/4gVpdcQ ▶ SUBSCRIBE to the LIONEL NATION Newsletter. https://bit.ly/4ouBt68 Jim Bakker just died at 86, and his death gives us a moment to revisit one of the great warnings of American religious and media history. The story of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker was never simply about televangelism. It was about what happens when faith becomes television, television becomes celebrity, celebrity becomes money, money becomes power and power develops its own gravitational field. That is why I think about Erika Kirk. I am not comparing Erika to Bakker's crimes. Bakker was convicted of fraud. I am comparing the psychology of fame, power and institutions. Jim and Tammy Faye became more than broadcasters. People trusted them, prayed with them, cried with them and felt they knew them personally. Emotion became intimacy. Intimacy became loyalty. Loyalty became power. Erika did not begin as the center of Turning Point USA. Charlie was the gravitational center. Then Charlie died and suddenly Erika became the widow, the keeper of the legacy and the leader of the institution. Grief, faith, memory, politics, money and celebrity now occupy the same space. Fame changes the environment around a person. People agree more quickly. Donors seek proximity. Cameras follow. Crowds cheer. Eventually it can become difficult to tell where affection ends and power begins. That is the danger. An institution can stop serving the mission and begin serving itself. The lesson of Jim Bakker is not that Erika Kirk will become Jim Bakker. The lesson is that nobody is immune from the gravitational pull of fame and power. Never confuse the mission with the messenger. Never confuse charisma with character. Never confuse religious language with accountability. And never allow questioning a leader t