Bishop Marvin Sapp has been in the press for all the wrong reasons as a video of him asking ushers to close the doors of the church as he tried to solicit an offering from attendees at the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World Conference in Baltimore last July went viral. Sapp maintains the whole thing was just a misunderstanding and said in an interview with CBS News Texas that he’s received hate-filled messages and even death threats at his Chosen Vessel Church in Fort Worth, Texas.
But now, the gospel singer-songwriter is trying to take control of the narrative, using the words that started the controversy in a new song called, you guessed it, “Close the Door.”
“I was like since they’re capitalizing on it, I’m gonna capitalize on it as well,” he told CBS News Texas.
“The last few weeks have been tough. Misunderstood, misrepresented, misinterpreted, and even maligned. But I’ve learned that when life hands you lemons, you don’t just make lemonade… you build the lemonade company,” he captioned an April 16 Instagram post announcing the song, which is set to be released on Good Friday.
Sapp says his song symbolizes him closing the door on the noise from the critics and rising above the negative feedback.
“’Close the Door’” isn’t just a song, it’s a soundtrack for survival,” Sapp continued on Instagram. “Just like He closed the door on death, Hell, and the grave, I’m closing the door on the noise, the pain, and everything that tried to break me.”
But while Sapp’s post received over 6,000 likes and lots of encouraging comments from fans, others online are not ok with Sapp trying to capitalize off the controversy.
“No, this don’t work for me,” said Funky Dineva Dose on TikTok. “It’s not humble. It says that your apology wasn’t genuine; like you tap dancing on the face of your parishioners.”
“Close that door,” wrote someone in the comments.