February (Web-only) 2002

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Mike Warnke is back
Former Christian comedian Mike Warnke is returning to the spotlight with his second autobiography. His first, readers will recall, was exposed as a hoax by Cornerstone magazine in 1992. Warnke's popular 1973 book, The Satan Seller, claimed that he spent his college immersed in drugs and alcohol, wore his hair long, and led a Satanist group of 1,500. Cornerstone's exposÉ effectively ended Warnke's days as the top Christian comedian. Now, ten years after the piece that brought the Jesus People USA publication national attention, Mike Warnke is responding with Friendly Fire: A Survival Guide for Believers Battered by Religion, published by Destiny Image, a charismatic book publisher. The first chapter of Warnke's book, available for free at the publisher's site, talks about his 1992 experience:

At times the stress was so bad that I broke out in hives. I couldn't sleep, my hair came out by the fistful, and I was unable to eat anything that didn't upset my stomach. … Within two months, everything I had worked so hard for was gone. From a guy who had his own plane and 50 employees, I was reduced to the point of one day standing in a Kroger grocery store with a coupon for baked beans and a coupon for toilet paper but only enough money for one or the other. … Was I a fake, a charlatan, a deceiver, and a liar? No. I never lied about my testimony and I never ran a fake ministry. That being said, however, let me hasten to add that all was not right in the Warnke world. … My life was out of control. I had no spiritual accountability. Decisions concerning the ministry were based on the bottom line rather than on spiritual priorities. … When the storm of controversy hit, everything I had built for 22 years suddenly ...