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By In Culture

Does Politics Have any Place on the Pulpit? How to Speak to Kings 101


One of the issues that has presented itself to the Christian Church, especially in the last 100 years, is the problem of politics and the pulpit. It was an issue in Bonhoeffer’s day as the Church, especially Christian pastors, went quiet on major cultural-political issues out of fear of being deemed “too political.” This is a problem in the American Church just as it was in the German Church in the pre World War II era. Eric Metaxas points out in his book Letter to an American Church. If it is a problem there, it is so much moreso a problem in the Canadian Church. I heard many such comments whispered from the pews of Reformed Churches in the years heading up to the COVID tyranny of 2020-?. I’ve heard it with increased frequency in the last couple of years. This has lead me to reflect deeply on Scripture and pray about what God demands of the preacher in a time like this. And so I’ll begin by posing a question: does politics have any place in the pulpit?

I submit that this debate is not about whether politics are in the pulpit, but how we preach on politics from the pulpit. Everyone engages in politics of some form or another (whether secular, totalitarian, pagan, or Biblical). It is another question if it is guided by a proper interpretation of the Scriptures.

Be Ye Not Political:

I use the language here that Eric Metaxas uses for the title of the 11th chapter of his Letter to the American Church. This has become an additional commandment in much of the Canadian Church as we silence our pastors and/or as pastors self-censor. Of course, there is something here in this command that we should be warned against. The answer to the problems of our society is not found in the politics and policies of men. The answer is found in the Scriptures. The answer to sin comes from God in His revelation of Jesus Christ. As a Christian Church, we also have to take care not to align ourselves with a political party, although we must “abhor what is evil and love what is good” (Rom. 12:9), wherever it might be found, including in political parties and state leaders. We must also avoid political alliances with evil in order to accomplish a single isolated good. But at the end of the day, there is no Biblical command that says “be ye not political.” It is more a matter as to how to be political.

Is the gospel at the front end? Is the Word of God central? Is worship central? Is the city of God the city that transforms the cities of men? How does it transform the cities of men? These are all important questions.

But in order to understand more what is going in here, we must first acquaint ourselves with secularism.

The Lie of Secularism:

Secularism does not simply refer to the old idea of the separation of church and state which is a good ideal, when understood rightly. Secularism refers to the separation of religion and state, that the state can govern by morally neutral principles, by a social contract, maybe incorporating some of the natural law.

But the problem with secularism is that it is an impossibility. Man is inherently religious. He will either worship the state or he will worship science or he will worship something or someone else. Man needs a higher authority. For that reason, secularism as an ideal has failed at its inception. It failed the minute someone thought it up.

Nevertheless, we continue to promote the lie as a society. That way the Christian faith is kept out of politics, that is, politics being the activities associated with the governance of a country or other area.

The Church has become deeply secularized, separating faith and business, faith and politics, faith and family. But the resounding motto that our people should hear both in the pew and in all of life is this: if Jesus is not Lord over all, then He is not Lord at all. This is the truth that is taught throughout the Scriptures, but especially as we find it in Colossians 1:18–20: “And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.

Here is the problem. When God’s Laws are mocked, especially the preachers and teachers in the Church cannot be silent. It is an impossibility. It is an impossibility because the initial place that His authority is made manifest is in the Church. The pastors have been given the holy and sacred duty to declare the crown rights of King Jesus.

Christians and Kings:

We see themes of believers standing before and speaking to kings throughout the Scriptures. We hear the true God of the Bible described this way in Deuteronomy 10:17: “For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who is not partial and takes no bribe.” Solomon speaks to his son in Proverbs 22:29: “Do you see a man skillful in his work? He will stand before kings; he will not stand before obscure men.” And again in Ecclesiastes 8:3 “Be not hasty to go from his presence. Do not take your stand in an evil cause, for he does whatever he pleases.” King David writes in Psalm 119:46–47 “I will also speak of your testimonies before kings and shall not be put to shame, for I find my delight in your commandments, which I love.” Daniel stands before Nebuchadnezzar and Beltashazar to speak the Word of God. John the Baptist rebukes Herod for taking his brothers wife (as a side note: I remember reading of one commentator who claimed that John the Baptist was a young minister who had a promising career that was cut short by political preaching). Paul stands before various kings until he finally brings the gospel to Caesar after Christ commissioned him in Acts 9:15–16: “But the Lord said to him, ‘Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.’” We hear Jesus described by John as “the ruler of kings on earth” in Revelation 1:5 and by Paul to Timothy as “the King of kings and Lord of Lords” in I Timothy 6:15. Jesus Himself says in Matthew 28:18 that “all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me” and that we are to teach the nations all things that He has commanded after going out and baptizing and discipling them. We find this promise in Revelation 21:24: “By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it…” (Remember the principle of “now and not yet” for that passage from Revelation.)

Does the Call to Repentance include Kings?

Jesus writes in Luke 24:46–48 “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.

I’ll cut right to the point. Yes, repentance for the forgiveness of sins must also be declared to our civil authorities, regardless of how “political” that might be deemed. This is our basic duty and task as a Church, as a Christian people. Just as Paul was a witness of Christ to Jews, to Gentiles and the children of Israel, so we are witnesses to the reality of Christ’s suffering, His resurrection, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in His Name to all nations – that includes Canada.

We see it in the annals of Christian history, as Ambrose called King Theodosius to repentance, Patrick brought the gospel to the kings and princes of Ireland, John Knox called out the sins of the queen of Scotland, Abraham Kuyper tried to bring Biblical principles to bear as the Prime Minister of the Netherlands for a time.

The prophet has a duty to cavil against the evils and pride of all men and call them to bow the knee to Jesus Christ and to find their life in Him. And he has a duty to do it in a particular way. As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:1–3: “Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing.

Throughout Christian history, Christian kings have sought to bring the laws of Christ to bear, such as Constantine, Charlamagne, King Alfred, William the Silent, and other Christian kings and leaders of the post-Reformation era.

In order to call for repentance, men need to repent of something, they need to turn away from something and turn to something. The primary thing is a recognition among the kings and leaders of the earth that Jesus is Lord over all, and that in order to rule rightly, they must bow the knee to Him. If Jesus is Lord of all, then His principles for justice and law that are found throughout the Scriptures, are the best principles to rule by. Anything that stands in opposition to those principles is fundamentally rebellion against Him, and in His goodness, He died for rebels, to deliver them from their rebellion. We find the promise inPsalm 68:18: “You ascended on high, leading a host of captives in your train and receiving gifts among men, even among the rebellious, that the LORD God may dwell there.” We find the fulfillment in Ephesians 4:8 where Paul applies this to Christ: “Therefore it says, ‘When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.’

Conclusion:

The clear conclusion of what we find in the Scriptures is that the implication of the gospel message that Jesus is our final prophet, priest and king is that there are massive political ramifications to the call to repentance and faith in Him. And yet, the kingdom of Christ advances differently than the kingdoms of this world. The kingdom of Christ advances through the bold preaching of the gospel message, the call to bow the knee and yield allegiance to Jesus as King, the king who came to serve and give His life as a ransom for many (Mk. 10:45). It advances as bold martyrs give up their lives rather than betray or deny their Lord and Master Jesus Christ. As the blood of the martyrs has watered the dry and stony grounds of godless and unbelieving nations, the church has sprung up out of it. This is because we have a God who knows the way out of the grave. It advances as kings and presidents and prime ministers get down on their knees and say to Jesus Christ: “My heart I offer to you Lord, promptly and sincerely.”

So yes, politics do have a place on the pulpit. Jesus speaks to the governance of a specific region, especially when that government begins to mock His laws and Word and despise or even persecute His holy Church. Secular politics are a lie. And no pastor should either assume a lie or preach a lie. The Bible and the truths therein should set the agenda. The Lordship of Christ over all things is central. All men, all parties, must bow before His throne.

This means that those bearing the Word must first and foremost be in submission to it, in their warnings, encouragements, exhortations and praise.


Note: The header photo is an illustration by the Dutch painter Peter Paul Rubens of St. Ambrose barring King Theodosius from the sanctuary after the Massacre of Thessalonika. He would not allow the king to enter until he repented of this massacre.

Note: This is part of a series of items relating to ecclesiology that I am posting on Kuyperian Commentary. You can find other work on my Substack account. My latest essay on Kuyperian is important background to this one.

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By In Culture

Alistair Begg and Gay Weddings

I want to acknowledge that Alistair Begg’s ministry has been an illuminating journey into exegetical faithfulness. Five decades of opening your Bible and examining it verse-by-verse is the ol’ fashioned evangelical method, which has birthed much fruitfulness in this country and produced remarkable teachers. It worked for Martin Lloyd-Jones, John MacArthur, and many who followed in their train.

While I have not followed Begg’s ministry in over a decade, I know his fervor and sense of the holy from the testimony of many respected leaders in the Reformed world. So, it’s with enormous sadness that I have watched a man who should be ending his pastoral career at the height of ethical orthodoxy in his preaching and teaching utter unconscionable rubbish.

For those tuning in, here is the lengthy section from his interview with Bob Lepine:

BEGG: And in very specific areas this comes across. I mean, you and I know that we field questions all the time that go along the lines of “My grandson is about to be married to a transgender person, and I don’t know what to do about this, and I’m calling to ask you to tell me what to do”—which is a huge responsibility.

And in a conversation like that just a few days ago—and people may not like this answer—but I asked the grandmother, “Does your grandson understand your belief in Jesus?”

“Yes.”

“Does your grandson understand that your belief in Jesus makes it such that you can’t countenance in any affirming way the choices that he has made in life?”

“Yes.”

I said, “Well then, okay. As long as he knows that, then I suggest that you do go to the ceremony. And I suggest that you buy them a gift.”

“Oh,” she said, “what?” She was caught off guard.

I said, “Well, here’s the thing: your love for them may catch them off guard, but your absence will simply reinforce the fact that they said, ‘These people are what I always thought: judgmental, critical, unprepared to countenance anything.’”

—–

I have waited patiently to give honor to whom honor is due, but nothing has clarified his position. I often give these elderly statesmen honor (I Tim. 5:1). I want to believe Begg has not kept up with the times or failed to see the negative world and its ramifications. Or perhaps Begg stays away from these political discourses, and the moment he spoke into it, he butchered the pastoral applications. I am hoping for an ethical epiphany.

(more…)

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By In Culture

The Pastor’s First Duty

Pastors have a fundamental responsibility to shepherd within before they can shepherd without. While the negative world provides us plenty of opportunities to uphold truth, if those propensities and proclamations are not shaped by the garden of the Church first, the opinion pieces will fail to get a hearing. They will only draw the untrained and uncivil pugilist to your corner, who eventually may swallow the young clergy. Therefore, that percentage dynamic should be heavily weighed in favor of the immediate parish concerns (I Pet. 4:17).

While much of theological and pastoral output can benefit the outside community, the minister’s primary goal is to meet the needs of his people. He is a local shepherd, accountable to a local body (Heb. 13:17), connected to a local people.

We are experiencing a monumental decline in pastoral candidates in mainline traditions and a slight decline in more conservative bodies like the Missouri Synod Lutheran.* While there are sociological demands for modern pastors to confront every conceivable moral issue, the minister represents God to his visible assembly, whom he addresses from the pulpit and to whom he administers the elements of bread and wine. His particular dispositions must be used accordingly; his gifts need to be activated rather than re-creating him after the image of some publicly acclaimed character.

While there is tangible evidence of institutional dereliction among seminaries, there is still a more significant fault among those who have demands of pastors that do not place them first at the feet of their congregants before the feet of outside inquiries.

Of course, every pastor has a public face, but his local image shapes that public image. To reverse that dynamic is to create influencers rather than shepherds. The decline of candidates stems from expectations that ministers must embody nearly renaissance gifts, and no man can endure that level of pressure for sustained periods of time.

Too much pastoral theology in our day, put the Table and Pulpit secondary, and the political halls and podcasts as primary. But ministers are heavenly professionals tending to the first garden of God before moving into the land and world.

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By In Culture

Love the Sinner. Hate the Movement.

A MATTER OF LOVE

Generally speaking, every Christian has some level of understanding that God has called us to love. It is kind of the point of being a Christian, right? Paul says if we do not have love, we are nothing. Jesus said that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. And He did not provide such a glorious and precious Son to reproduce more Grinches on Mt. Crumpit or more Ebenezer Scrooges on Business Street in London. 

God saved us and did it through the greatest act of love ever recorded to make us loving people. Jesus even said that they (the world) will know that we are true disciples of Jesus by the way that we love one another, which means how we love other Christians (John 13:35). But, Jesus also taught us that we are to love our enemies and to pray for the ones who persecute us, which means our love must extend beyond the people who attend Church with us. We must be willing and ready to love anyone, even those who hate us most ferociously. 

And this is where the confusion occurs. Just because we are to love people does not mean we are to love what they do or the sinful movements that they have ensnared them. It is my contention, and what I will be arguing here, that standing against a MOVEMENT is wholly necessary, and it is one of the chief ways that we genuinely love the PERSON. 

For a moment, pardon me for my pungency. I will grab the flame thrower to light a couple of candles, and I will do this on purpose. Sometimes, we need a mother’s soothing lullaby to help us fall gently to sleep. Yet there are other times when we need to be shaken from our slumber by the father because the house is on fire. Today will be more like the shaking. 

THE ABORTION MOVEMENT

I said above that we must love the sinners caught in sinful movements while hating the movements that trapped them. This is true. Which means we must not hate women who have had abortions. We must love them (profoundly so). This means we must love them enough to hear their stories of pain, to empathize with their struggle, but also to refuse to sugarcoat what they have done and to bid them to repent for murdering one of their children. If that language seems overly harsh, perhaps you are part of the problem.

Think about it, how many children in this country, and around the world, have to brutally die before we start taking this issue seriously? How many heartbeats need to stop for us to go beyond conservative incrementalism and heartbeat bills to flat-out abolish this disgusting, immoral practice? And let me just ask the obvious question: can our actions really be called loving if we allow this culture of death to continue? Are we really being kind to all the innocent babies who were chopped up into bloody pieces inside their mommy’s womb or chemically roasted by toxic abortifacients when we say things to the mother like: “It wasn’t your fault” or “You had no other options.” How sick and demented do we need to be to believe this garbage? Biblically speaking, abortion is the wanton sacrilege of human life, plain and simple, and total abolition of it is the only just outcome. To tell a woman anything else is to lie to her, make excuses for her sin, and allow her to believe the lie that God is not enraged over the shedding of innocent blood. He is the one who heard Abel’s blood crying out from the ground, and He is the one who hears every tortured fetus screaming from the cold metallic pan. And He will avenge them. 

From a Biblical and ethical standpoint, there is nothing morally different between a woman getting an abortion and hiring a hitman to kill her toddler. In both instances, she bought and paid for a professional to kill someone she was supposed to love, care, and protect. We must stop euphemizing our language and call this precisely what it is. Abortion is not healthcare. Abortion is the intentional, inexcusable, and unauthorized decision to terminate a precious life that belongs to God alone, who endowed it with significance, dignity, and personhood. 

And, while you may still be reeling from my descriptions, this is precisely how we love people. We love them by telling it to them straight and by pointing them to the risen Christ as their only hope. We love man and woman by exposing the lethality of sin, which is awful news, and then by providing them with the remedy, which is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He is the only one who can heal the wounds of a mother who killed her child. He is the only one who can forgive a man for pressuring his wife to let medical serial killers in planned parenthood dismember his legacy. He is the only one who can forgive the murderous doctors who have gallons of blood dripping from their hands. And the only way to truly be loving is to point everyone to Him. 

And, what I find most astonishing is how the amazing grace and tender mercy of our perfect spotless savior totally and completely buries all of our sins! As reprehensible as abortion is, and as much shame as that should induce if left to our own devices, a woman who turns to the Lord Jesus Christ is not only forgiven but her shame is also eliminated! Her sins have been washed white as snow, and He restores her to royalty in His Kingdom. She has been given a new and glorious nature that cannot be taken away from her. She is healed! She is loved! She is restored! She is no longer known by a scarlet letter. And she may well worship in eternity alongside her aborted child. How? Because He took the curse that she deserved and gave unto her the honor she could never earn! Jesus Christ, her Lord and Savior, overpowered the putrescence of our iniquities and rescued us for His glory and our great good. This is true for all sinners! Why do we hold back from declaring this message? Why do we think this is unloving? And because of that, why do we entirely pervert this glorious Gospel by avoiding nearly half of it, skipping past the bad news of sin and death, to accommodate a sinner’s fragility? If you throw out the bad news, the good news makes no sense! If you throw out the need for a savior, you no longer have the Gospel! That is not the path of love or how we ought to love anyone. 

At the same time, while I love the woman who has had an abortion, I must hate the abortion movement with every bone in my body. I will ever be at war against this modern day temple to Moloch! Why? Because it is the movement that is promoting, cheering on, and subsiding the murder of nearly a million image-bearing humans every year! This movement was dreamt up in the recesses of hell, fueled by the power of demons, and has captivated a swampy and pathetic government of fiends who would rather kill its citizens than lose political power or funding. I will love the person enough to hate such a despicable movement. And I will hate the movement enough to make war with it all my days. 

THE LMNOP MOVEMENT

We must not hate the sodomites or lesbians who are caught in nature-denying, God-hating behavior. We also must not hate transgender people who have denied one of the most basic tenets of reality: their own biological gender. And, furthermore, we must not hate human beings who are mired in such delusional confusion, that single persons now want to identify as plural pronouns, or the genetic human who now want to use a litter box instead of a toilet. This is not to mention the kind of mental disorder that would cause a homosapien to identify as a two-spirit penguin. This would be hilarious if it were not true. Being true, I am heartbroken for them. I am shocked and grieved that such an apparent mental health crisis, of this magnitude has broken out in the Western world, and the “adults in the room” are trying to cure it with identity politics and clever deceptions. This is like trying to put a fire out with gasoline or trying to plug that hole in the Titanic with bubble gum. Instead of receiving the help they need to confront such vivid and wretched delusions, people today are force-fed horse manure from a society that absolutely hates them and a medical establishment that is profiting from lopping off their genitals. 

Remember, love always seeks the best for a person. And what is best for a person is what God says in His Word. We must love men and women who are being led to the slaughter enough to point them away from these diabolical fantasies, the damned identity politics dreamt up by demons and instead bid them to turn to the truth of the Holy Scriptures. We must love them enough to call them out of their sins and perversions, leading them toward the belly of the fiery abyss. We must love them enough to call them to repent and turn to the Lord Jesus Christ before it is too late. Placating them is not loving them! A parent who gives into every demand of the child to reinforce their inner totalitarianism is not loving them!

In the same way, patting people on the head, leaving them with warm and fuzzies in their sin, while they are eternally separated from a Holy and Righteous God, is to despise them! It is to wish them doubly dead with a disturbing smile on our faces. That is not love; we must love the person enough to behave differently! 

But, simultaneously, I pray that the LGBTQ movement dies a thousand deaths. A movement that cheers on abominations mocks the living God with flags of rainbow-colored debauchery and prays upon the most insecure and impressionable minds. A campaign that calls its victims to abandon nature and reason for social clout and swelling subscriber lists. A movement that is championed by an unhinged government that will take children away from their parents for not allowing them to degrade their own bodies in the most lude, disgusting, and abhorrent ways. A movement that is weaponized by doctors who threaten body butchering as the only escape from suicide. A movement peddled by freaks on Youtube and TikTok that promise you will be well-liked, ever-celebrated, and left always with a feeling of belonging if you would only come out. I loathe that movement. And I will do whatever it takes to see it come to a total and complete end. Why? Because it is destroying men and women, and it is devouring children! It is toxifying the country my children will inherit. And it is damaging the social fabric of the nation. 

Very simply, we are called to love our enemies, love the ones who are caught in soul and body-degrading sins, and love them enough to speak the truth to them before it is too late. Yes, and amen! But we are never commanded to love the ideologies that are destroying them. We are never once called to cheer for the movements that trap humanity like fish in the net. Yet, as I said before, this is where so much confusion has occurred in the Church these days. This is where the enemy has divided and conquered in legionous ways. By leaving the Church in the West so divided on this issue, typically into four camps as it related to this issue, we have become easy pickings for the author of these Luciferian fables, the lord of darkness himself.  

For a moment, I want to sketch out three erroneous views and how those views are wrong, and then I want to end with the right approach. 

THREE ERRONEOUS VIEWS

1) LIBERALISM- THE DEMONIC LEFT 

This view barely needs to be explained. Proponents believe the sinner and the movement should be lauded, supported, and championed. This means that there is no view of sin or hell, there is no Biblical understanding of what love is and what it calls for, and all that is left is just a watered-down “gospel of tolerance,” and the twin bricks of “love is love” and the “you do you’s” that pave the path to destruction. This view is not the Biblical Gospel because it begins with the assumption that what people need most is acceptance of their sins instead of repentance from them. And sadly, this view has infected entire churches, denominations, and conventions.  

Every lumberjack lesbian pastor to every dove-award-winning male musician who now sings in dresses proves my point. This is not loving, and they are not Christians. They have abandoned Christ for hedonism and pluralism. They have abandoned the Biblical Gospel for infatuation with immorality. They have not chosen the path of love but are on a highway to hell. And thankfully, they are not very difficult to spot in the wild. Just look for the bright colors or the 6’4 muscle bound woman on the swim team who still has a cringy bulge. 

We must reject the lie of liberalism. Instead, we must love each and every person caught in sin. We must love them enough to call them to repent. And we must be at war with ideologies that ensnare them. 

2) FUNDAMENTALISM – THE HATE-FILLED RIGHT

On the other end of the spectrum is a nearly equally abhorrent view. Instead of being known for unbiblical and degenerate forms of tolerance and love, this group is known for its rigid intolerance, as well as a refusal to love anyone. And while the fundies rightly understand the need to hate the sinful movements that trap so many souls in the bogs of sin, they forget that they are also sinners and peddle a gospel that is devoid of humility or grace. They turn their pharisaical ire upon anyone and everyone who exists “out there,” and they chide them all to hell. 

Sadly, this view has also infected the Church in small but shrinking pockets that usually do not spread as quickly as liberalism since no one likes being around them enough to join them. Where does this disease show up? It shows up in every megaphone screaming street preacher who is not out there to see men and women saved but to remind them they are damned. It shows up on Sunday mornings in every Westoroesque Church where the blowhard behind the pulpit screams, “God hates fags.” It shows up wherever men and women caught in these sins become the object of our hatred instead of the mission field we have been sent to. 

We must reject the hate of fundamentalism. Instead, we must love sinners enough to get to know them, eat with them, and call them to repent. We must be at war with the ideologies that ensnare them and the pride that entangles us. 

3) EVANGELICALISM – THE MUSHY MIDDLE

The evangelical Church is always trying to land in the mushy middle, whose spine seems to be made of pudding or jello. And, before you object, let me remind you that the vast majority of squishy pastors these days will not preach on the reality of hell, the ugliness of sin, or the dire need for repentance because of the holy, righteous wrath of God. I have been to these churches. I have served on staff in these churches. Where men are so afraid of offending men that they regularly offend their God by either apologizing for God’s Word or refusing to herald it. How many sermons have you ever heard on the covenant curses in Deuteronomy 28, the list of sins that are called abominations, or any other topic that our society is struggling with in any meaningful way? If there is a potential for offense, the modern-day pastor runs like a coward from the battle. And this is not mere opinion. It is an epidemic in evangelicalism. 

This gets to my point. You cannot love someone you are lying to, and if you refuse to tell them the truth or call them to repentance, then you are lying to them. That is like knowing a man has stage 4 cancer, and instead of giving him the diagnosis so that he can begin the treatment or settle his affairs, you refuse to tell him because it may hurt his feelings. That is the opposite of love! That is to become the equivalent of a moral monster. And it was certainly not the way Christ loved people in the Gospels. Yes, He knelt down in the sand to restore a sinner, but He also said, “Go and sin no more.” In fact, there is no single account where Christ doesn’t point out the sin, call the man or woman to repentance, and extol them to holy living moving forward. To adopt an ethic that Christ will vomit out of His mouth just to save face in public is not loving. It is criminal! That is the picture of a very sinister sort of hatred that watches as a person asphyxiates when all they needed was to be turned onto their side. In this case, men and women must be pointed to Jesus Christ! He is the hope! He is the cure! To trade in the Gospel for niceties is repugnant, unloving, and something every cowardly pastor will answer for. 

Furthermore, you cannot hate a movement that is destroying human beings when you refuse to call it out. I am talking to you, pastor yellow-belly, when you sit silently on the sidelines as sexual predators fester, as women in your congregations believe the lie that it was just a clump of cells, and as diabolical trends in Hollywood disciple your people, just remember that your silence was akin to hating them. You wasted your office. You impaled your people on the post you were supposed to care for them with. And you have hated your own ministry. When you have mold growing in your home, you spray it; you don’t ignore it. And yet, your sugar and spice mentality that never rocks the boat, never calls out evil in our society, has let something far more sinister seep in and spread among your people, and you did nothing to stop it! Instead of being the salt of the earth, you have become the high fructose corn syrup that has made our society fatally unhealthy, and I am calling upon you to repent! 

Yes, you should love the person. Love them enough to confront their sin and call them to Christ. And yes, you should grow a backbone to perform the role of shepherd, who not only pets the sheep but takes out a sawed-off shotgun to take down the wolf. Repent, brother! 

THE RIGHT VIEW

4) THE BIBLICAL APPROACH 

Now, the right approach is the Biblical approach. Look at what Paul says about this: 

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. – Ephesians 6:12

Paul tells us that our struggle is not against the individuals caught in the nets of sin. Instead, our war is against the net makers, the wicked powers who are making the traps that drag men and women away to their doom (2 Timothy 2:26)! This certainly includes evil politicians, woke corporations, and degenerate government agencies who spend taxpayers money on evil. But Paul is alerting us to the power that is underneath them all and fueling them. He is telling us of the kind of power that caused Roman men to find it socially acceptable to abandon their female infants to the elements because they wanted a son. We are talking about the kind of power underneath the hubris of the Enlightenment, which captivated men’s hearts with scientific pride instead of humility before their God. We are talking about the elemental forces, the rouge spirits in high places, and the kind of power that gave birth to the bastard child named liberalism, who questions the authority and veracity of Holy Scripture. The kind of power that is underneath every godless movement, from the Freudian psychology that undermines faith in God to the Sangarian ethics inflicting genocide upon the womb to the Kinneyism that unleashed rank sexual perversions upon our populace. Paul is telling us that behind every Hitler, Stalin, and Mao, behind every pagan ideology and philosophy, and behind every movement that brings devastation and rebellion upon man are the demonic forces led by their commander Satan, who want nothing more than to destroy the masterpiece of God’s creation, man and woman. God called male and female – in covenant marriage, reproducing offspring to the glory of God, and extending His dominion to the ends of the earth – “very good,” the hounds of hell cannot keep themselves from trying to destroy us. It is in their nature, and we must resist them (James 4:7). 

LOVE THE SINNER. HATE THE MOVEMENT

I know this article may seem a tad inflammatory to you, but I make no apologies. I simply implore you not to be soft on movements like abortion and sexual deviancy. Because underneath them is the power of demons who want nothing more than to pervert, manipulate, butcher, and destroy God’s creatures. If you are soft on these movements, you are complicit with the war crimes of demons, and you are a reviler of the humanity you claim to love. 

Our job is to love the sinner enough to call them to repentance. And to hate the movements that accost them. Dear Christians, the mission Christ has called us to requires that we declare the true Biblical Gospel no matter who it offends and that we continue advancing until every sulfuric stinking gate of hell falls limply down. We aim as emissaries in His Kingdom to see all of Jesus’ enemies put under His feet. He will do that work, but He has also called us to be about that work (praying, declaring Christ, making disciples, having godly children, attending public worship, feasting at His table, etc. ). We live in the Kingdom of Christ and we pray to see abortion abolished so that no more child is decapitated in her mother’s womb. We labor in Jesus’ fields to see sodomy eliminated and a wholesome, godly, and covenantal view of sex and marriage proliferated. And as Christians, we do not bury our talents in the sand… We keep after it, worshipping, praying, seeking Him, and doing what He has commanded us to do until all two-spirit penguins are entirely extinct because we do not believe allowing people to live in their madness or delusions is healthy, proper, or holy. We labor till every family comes under the blessing of the Lord Jesus Christ, as promised to Abraham, and until our enemy is put swiftly under our saviors heel. Until that day, we must love people enough to herald the one true Gospel to them and we must hate the sinister movements sufficiently enough to work for their demise. No other behavior is Biblically legitimate.  

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By In Culture

Where are the pro-life majorities?

Abortion is the deliberate ending of a pregnancy somewhere along the path between conception and birth, and it has been the subject of controversy for at least half a century, if not longer. In the United States, the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v Wade (1973) took the issue out of the hands of the several states and declared a constitutional right to abortion, the Court undoubtedly assuming that it had settled the issue for good. That proved to be a severe miscalculation because the ruling sparked an acrimonious division between those styling themselves pro-choice and pro-life. Pro-choicers argued that a woman has a right to her own bodily integrity and that this right includes the personal decision to end a pregnancy. Pro-lifers, to the contrary, argued that the foetus growing in the womb is a person who deserves to live and not merely a mass of tissue to be disposed of at will.

For a time, it seemed that the pro-life position had a demographic advantage. The argument went something like this:

Pro-lifers and pro-choicers represent two divergent subcultures. Pro-choicers are less likely to be religiously observant and generally have fewer children. They disproportionately inhabit the large urban centres where most abortion clinics are located. They are less persuaded by arguments that the unborn child is a human being worthy of protection and have a (religious!) belief in individual autonomy. Many pro-choicers do not even bother to marry and are content to live in childless relationships with members of the opposite sex.

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By In Culture, Podcast

KC Podcast – Episode 118: Christians and Horror

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By In Church, Culture

The Death of Mainline Churches

One of my predictions in 2023 is a relatively certain one. It pertains to the continual decline and fragmentation of Mainline Protestant Churches.

In the late ’90s, Thomas Reeves warned the liberal, mainline churches against “smug denominationalism.” He used C.S. Lewis’ language as a cautionary tale about the direction of liberalism both in the political and religious spheres. His book was aptly entitled “The Suicide of Liberal Christianity.”

In 2020, mainline Protestants were bleeding numerically, shutting down their ornate buildings, which were ironically transformed into modern pubs all over Europe. They possessed one of the “lowest retention rates in any tradition” (Pew Research). From 2007-2017, they lost over five million members, and the children of these members were going farther and farther away from any religious manifestation. But even back in 1996, Reeves noted that the decline of mainline churches has “been eroding for better part of this century.”

The culprit in the 20th century is the same in the 21st. According to Reeves, “their defining theological doctrines have been largely forgotten.” While there is a modicum of hope in Reeves’ 26-year-old book, he concludes with profound pessimism. Should the mainline churches continue unchanged in their direction, they will proceed “on their steady slide toward complete irrelevance (211).”

The mainline consisting of PCUSA, ELCA, American Baptists in the USA, United Methodists, etc., have taken trajectories of death throughout. They have sought to bestow power on inclusivism and anointed corrupt priests to lead the way, and to hell, they led.

Conservative ecclesial bodies must invest in catechetical discipleship and build a reservoir of resistance against liberalizing forces without and battle locally and nationally against such forces that seek to crawl their way into the midst of the assembly.

Reeves was right that smug denominationalism is a temptation for many of us. Many of our conservative churches have grown during supposed crises created to ensure complacency among the populace and within the church. But, in God’s kindness, never was reading leaves such an easy task.

The task of the conservative corpus is to seek the good of the city by building on that eternal city. In the midst of the tranquility of growth and theological prosperity, may we not grow weary in well-doing. Smugness tickles our vanity, but humility steadies our march.

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By In Politics

Brazil’s Election and the Failure of the Evangelical Pastor

This is a sad day for my home country. Lula won a narrowly divisive runoff election this Sunday and will begin his third term as president at the age of 77. Convicted of corruption, he served 580 days in prison, and after his release, he became the symbol of victimhood.

He sought old partnerships and was able to reanimate a nation to the old causes of social transformation through the state. It didn’t matter the misery incurred by such policies in Venezuela, Cuba, or Argentina, Lula’s charm and political capital earned him overwhelming victory in the poorest part of my country, the Northeastern part (where I grew up). Lula functions in some ways like a Neo-Pentecostal leader who appeals to the poor through promises of prosperity, offering a Gospel as convoluted as a Marxian paradigm. And the people said, “Amen!”

Bolsonaro, on the other hand, was the Tropical Trump; if Trump could dance and recite the Lord’s Prayer, he would be the Orange Bolsonaro. Bolsonaro is equally charismatic as Lula, and the oddity of the whole thing is that wherever he went in the Northeast, he was received with immense approval. But politics is a tricky business. The people may love a candidate, political inclinations, or moral declarations, but they are easily seduced by flattery and promises of statist charity. I’d also happily admit to Bolsonaro’s number of blunders throughout, but the options were so universally contrary to one another, leaving Brazilians with no excuse.

The tremendous benefit is that this entire thing has awakened a conservative resurgence in my home country. Conservative principles are now much more common than before Bolsonaro’s election. I suspect the various movements will only continue to grow. Certainly, the environment is ripe for a conservative nationalism that sees Brazil’s interests, morally and economically, as the heart of a prosperous nation.

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By In Church, Culture

A Creational Apologetic for Mockery

Several recent essays have offered a rich description of what has happened to the winsome phenomenon. Evangelical writers and theologians once known for defending the good have sought to minimize Gospel realities by maximizing opportunities for ecumenical endeavors. These endeavors did not produce the fruit expected, and, instead, it has led inevitably to the prodigalness of the evangelical left.

The result is a Babylonian conundrum leaving these figures defending the other side instead of protecting the voices most closely aligned with the cause of the Gospel. The winsome project has led to the adulteration of the good by compromising the good. My premise is that these authors have failed to see the Church’s role as that of protecting the creational order and priorities at all costs. These priorities negate the winsome strategy and advocate for something more distinctly aggressive regarding our relationship with ungodliness in this world.

To provide a bit of a rationale for what I call “A creational apologetic for mockery,” let me begin by offering some propositions and then conclude with some observations about the state of things in the Church.

First, I argue that creational theology compels us to use mockery against evil. Creation, by its very nature, is an apologetic against principalities and powers. Sun, moon, and stars are not merely heavenly descriptors but symbolic ones which proclaim the heavenly reality as the mode of operation for all of history. This reality presents the dignity of man, the labor of man, the complementarity of woman, and the establishment of priestly categories as fundamental antagonists to the attempts of evil men and their institutions to reverse the created order. Thus, the creation account supplants other accounts with an ideal established order and decency for both private and public arenas.

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By In Church, Culture

#NATCON and David French

The National Conservatism movement has received much attention from various media publications. I have detailed my experience and annotations in the latest Perspectivalist podcast, and don’t want to belabor the point too much. Much of the work is being done in the background, and conversations about the future are happening all around.

One of the latest pieces on #NatCon2022 comes from The Dispatch, written by Alec Dent, representing the leftist side of the Evangelical/Roman Catholic wing. David French, the founder of this national media company has articulated a vision of politics that opposes any state imposition of a moral code. He even argues favorably for the liberty for drag queen hour in public libraries:

“There are going to be Drag Queen Story Hours. They’re going to happen. And, by the way, the fact that a person can get a room in a library and hold a Drag Queen Story Hour and get people to come? That’s one of the blessings of liberty,” French said.

Suffice it to say, my body of writing opposes such absurdities. I affirm that the very essence of the Christian faith compels the body politic to legislate Christian morality. Further, that deacons of righteousness exist to pass righteous laws. In my estimation, that entails removing obscenities like drag queen hour from all public spaces and spheres. The spheres belong to Jesus, and opposition to it is opposition to Jesus as Lord.

When I was invited to be interviewed by the journalist from the Dispatch, I came prepared to answer several different questions, and should I have taken the Doug Wilson approach, I should have recorded the 15-minute interview. But I learned a valuable lesson, and thankfully the author quoted me briefly but accurately while overlooking the body of my main points.

The concern from the Dispatch is that we build a movement that minimizes liberties for unchristian groups and unchristian practices. The goal, according to them, is to provide a society where social liberties are accepted in the public square and that Christians should advocate for a virtuous and winsome approach in our engagement.

But the Statement of Principles from National Conservatism offers a stark alternative, which is that “where a Christian majority exists, public life should be rooted in Christianity and its moral vision.” Even its main philosophical head, Yoram Hazony, a Jew, states that biblical Christianity should be the source of any society. He understands that America is a sea of Protestant, biblical faith, even though only 65% of the population identifies with Christianity.

When asked whether #NatCon favors the presence of atheists, the journalist quotes me:

Some national conservatives are still willing to work with the post-religious right—so long as everyone remembers who is running the show. “I wouldn’t mind them joining the cause, as long as they submitted to the general rules and principles thereof, which I think can be guided by sacred scriptures,” Rev. Uri Brito, who delivered one of NatCon 3’s benedictions, told The Dispatch. “I would not want to be a part of a movement where atheists are guiding that movement.”

The quotation is not inaccurate, though it misses my entire build-up to it. Fine and dandy. I reaffirm that there is no future in the United States where atheism is leading. I agree with R.R. Reno that atheists may find #NatCon appealing because of our defense of country and its priorities, but they will undoubtedly demur regarding faith and family.

In the interview, I delved further into other aspects of what a true nationalism should look like and proceed from, which is an ecclesial conservatism. I developed those in my ten theses over at Kuyperian and hope others may benefit from them as well. I argued with the Dispatch that fundamentally, any movement towards a Christian orientation must be ecclesially focused and that the first priority of any true Christian nationalist is that of worshipping the Triune God. I also spoke favorably about the resurgence of Christian, Classical education and how necessary it is to re-engage our Western tradition and train our children to see the West not as a curse but as a crucial piece of our history and that Christendom flourished through this history.

Overall, I am pleased to see intensified attention on #NatCon and the principles that undergird it, and hope to see these conversations even more prevalent in the days to come.

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