Pharisees and Pharisaism

We all know the Pharisees, the "hypocrites" Jesus excoriated repeatedly during His earthly ministry. He denounced their hyper-scripturalism that missed God, their traditions they made equal with (or greater than) God's words, their political-social agenda that ignored people's suffering. The Pharisees' self-congratulatory pretence earned Jesus' fury: religiosity separate from God always does.

The pastor's sermon this week was on the parable Jesus told about the Pharisee and the publican. But it was the introductory sentence that hit me: "And He also told this parable to some people who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and viewed others with contempt." (Luke 18:9)

It's the underlying mindset of partisan divisiveness: we ("I," and those who agree with me) are righteous and right, and "they" (those we've chosen to contrast ourselves with) are evil and wrong. Think, for example, of "Christian conservatives' " attitudes toward those they call "liberals" and "godless."

Indeed, there are probably other similarities between the "Christian conservatives" of our time and the Pharisees. If so, Jesus regards them the same.

The Deception of Political Christianity

God never said mankind's problem is evil politics, bad government, or false philosophies. Those works of man are evil because they grow from man's corrupt heart.

God never said the solution to man's problem is improved human politics, human government, or human philosophies. The remedies themselves are from man's corrupt heart, poisoned, and only speed death.

May all who think man's works are the problem, and those who think man's works are the solution, REPENT !!

False Equivalence

It's increasingly clear the cornerstone of today's false Christianity is false equivalence. I'm amazed at how many honest and good believers have never thought to examine, or will not examine, the idea that "conservatism" (itself falsely so-called) is somehow equivalent to Christianity.

One friend, perhaps more thoughtful than others, tells me that he is "conservative" because Christianity is about righteousness. He disavows any blanket endorsement of "conservatism" per se, but perceives "conservatism" as the faction promoting righteousness in its stance against abortion, against feeding those who won't work, against homosexuality, etc.

Given the deeds which "conservatism" increasingly includes: fellowship with (even leadership by) manifest enemies of Truth (Mormons, for example), blatant nationalism (under the guise of "patriotism"), and the continual untruthfulness of "conservative" politicians (like all politicians): my friend is wise to leave himself an "out" from identifying with that faction. Beyond that, I don't buy it.

A faction is a faction, however rationalized; and scripture teaches factions are "a work of the flesh" which excludes people from the Kingdom of God (Galatians 5:19-21).

Nor is identifying righteousness with "conservatism" different in kind from equating the Church with "conservatives." God's Character no more has a political equivalence than does Christ's Body. I solemnly testify here against the idea that there is any human equivalent (least of all a political equivalent) to the Kingdom of God.

May God heal His American Church of spiritual blindness ! May God lead His American Church to repent !!

Variance and Unity

It's always disappointing to be reminded how much I'm at variance with other Christians. It's humbling, and forces me to go back over why I believe what I believe. I'm sure both are part of God's working His purpose.

It feels awful. You like to think you're at one with the other Christians you love and worship with. The Psalmist puts it well:

Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
It is like the precious oil upon the head... (Psalm 133:1, 2a)

Enjoying unity is God's anointing, a blessing. And it wasn't even an operational desire in my life before Jesus. In fact, disagreement had something of pride in it. Disagreeing with a friend, my carnal man could simply say, "Screw you, I'll go my own way." Knowing who Jesus is and what it means to be His Body doesn't allow me that attitude.

Disagreement now is part of keeping my spirit humble. If I'm at variance with other believers, there's always the possibility they may be right. That keeps me checking my leading: this week's disagreement with a church committee made me again re-check operative ideas I've always found rock-solid. Tested again, they still are. I'll continue to operate on them.

When it happens, being in agreement with other believers is a blessing from God. But ultimately, settled peace doesn't come from that: like unity, peace is God's gift, and He gives it to those who do His will. My first rock-solid belief is it's God will our every attitude, idea, thought, word and action be grounded on what He says, in the Bible and in the Spirit.

None of my friends, or any other believing Christian, would say otherwise. Yet millions in the American Church, including most of my friends, have bought the idea that being a Christian means being "conservative." None of those friends, challenged to show a scriptural basis for their belief, have been able to do so. Nor can I. I'm satisfied it's an unscriptural, indeed unChristian, idea.

The supposed equivalence "conservative" is, moreover, a formulation of a temporal human kingdom and society. No wonder that the deeds which grow from that unscriptural operative idea are "deeds of the flesh:" "...enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions..." (Galatians 5:20). Jesus proclaimed and lived the Kingdom of God. So should Christians.

I can't help longing for unity, and feeling frustrated when it tarries. There's always the temptation to grasp at it by agreeing with other believers, or simply keeping my disagreements to myself. But unity doesn't come by believers' agreement with each other: we are one in the Spirit, agreed together in hearing and doing God's will, or not at all.

I'm told my attitude is arrogant. I think rather that arrogance would deny unity altogether and say, "Screw you, I'll go my own way." Arrogance would feel no need to re-check its thinking, and certainly not against anything greater than its own opinions. Is it arrogant to hear God speak, when He commands we do so and promises He will ?

I'm sure my friends, and all the millions of American evangelicals who've bought the false idea that Christianity is "conservative," would agree that our faith must be grounded on what God says. My hope is that they will act on their belief and examine that idea against scripture. My perfect hope is that the Church in America will cast off its filthy political rags and do the work of Him Who sent us to this feeble, poor, lost and diseased country.

God forgive us !!

Think It Possible You May Be Mistaken

The title is in reference to the warning Oliver Cromwell wrote to his Christian opponents.

"...bring not therefore upon yourselves the blood of innocent men, -- deceived with pretences of King and Covenant; from whose eyes you hide a better knowledge! I am persuaded that divers of you, who lead the People, have laboured to build yourselves in these things; wherein you have censured others, and established yourselves 'upon the Word of God.' Is it therefore infallibly agreeable to the Word of God, all that you say? I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken. Precept may be upon precept, line may be upon line, and yet the Word of the Lord may be to some a Word of Judgment; that they may fall backward, and be broken and be snared and be taken!...There may be, as well, a carnal confidence upon misunderstood and misapplied precepts, which may be called spiritual drunkenness. There may be a Covenant made with Death and Hell! I will not say yours was so. But judge if such things have a politic aim: To avoid the overflowing scourge; or, To accomplish worldly interests? And if therein we have confederated with wicked and carnal men, and have respect for them, or otherwise have drawn them in to associate with us, Whether this be a Covenant of God, and spiritual? Bethink yourselves; we hope we do."

-- To the General Assembly of the Kirk of Scotland, 3 August 1650


I'd remind my "Christian conservative" friends of these words, and ask them to apply Cromwell's warning to their faction's ideas and operations. Most of all, I'd beseech anyone in that faction, in Christ's mercy, to think it possible you may be mistaken, and confederated with wicked men to accomplish worldly interests.

Church, REPENT !!

God is Liberal

If the title of this post makes you gasp...or makes you angry...you are operating on the wrong definition of "liberal." You're exactly the person I want to address.

"Liberal" means "generous"...look it up in any dictionary. God doesn't play games with words. He uses a word (in scripture, for example) to mean exactly what it means. He speaks to us straight that way because He WANTS us to understand His thoughts and His heart.

God doesn't twist words. But human politicians do. That's what happened to the meaning of "liberal." A political faction in England a couple centuries ago began to call themselves "Liberal." "Liberal" means "generous," and factions always find it advantageous to give themselves a good name...even if it's not really true.

But human politics being what they are, clever spin-doctors can turn the game on its head. One way to do so is to give your opponents' "good" name an evil meaning. That's what an American political faction did just that a few years ago. They hated the falsely-so called "liberals," so they perverted that word's good meaning to give it their false derogatory meaning.

I have to wonder if Isaiah 5:20 applies here: "Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil..." ?

If you gasp to hear it said that "God is liberal," it's because you operate by that political faction's definition of the word. You've been manipulated to think exactly the way political deceivers want you to think, to serve their purposes. Your understanding has been so deeply corrupted that you think of God HIMSELF in a political faction's definitions !!

My message is simply "REPENT !!" Turn away from that deceptive faction and its perverted teachings, and begin to think honestly. The dictionary's honest definition is that "liberal" means "generous." That's the meaning God intends we understand when He uses the word in scripture. For a true understanding of God, begin to think in scripture's terms.

In real words and true meanings, God is absolutely, unrestrainedly, LIBERAL, now and forever. In scripture's command, we all must praise Him for being liberal. In scripture's promise, our hope is to be liberal like Him !

The Problems of "Christian Conservatism"

"Conservative Christianity" has always seemed a problem terminology. We know what its adherents intend it to mean: bible-believing Christianity. But the appended political modifier always raises a question: as opposed to. . . ?

The implied answer, of course, is "liberal Christianity." By the definition "conservative" Christians wish to claim for themselves, "liberal" Christianity must logically be Christianity that DOESN'T believe scripture, and DOESN'T follow scripture's teachings. That's a problem. None of my "conservative" friends would consider such a thing Christianity at all...as I don't...yet their self-identification as "conservative Christians" is based on what manifestly cannot be, being so.

Probably few "conservative Christians" give any thought to the logical problem. What they can't miss, however, is that by identifying themselves with a modifier they proclaim themselves different, and separate, from other "Christians." Their intent is that we perceive them as they perceive themselves: a class of more-truly scriptural Christians (moreso than any others).

Surely they can't miss either, that desire to identify oneself as more scriptural, more true to the faith, oozes self-pride. And self-pride's manifestation in the Body of Christ is factionalism and divisiveness...contrary the unity Jesus prayed for us ("...that they may all be one; even as You, Father,... and I..." John 17:21) Can there be any regard in which the enemy more grievously wounds the Church than in deceiving believers to think of themselves proudly as " the real Christians" ? None of the evil doctrines of "conservatism" in which he misleads American Christians do as great harm to the Church as the enemy's assault on our unity in Christ with others who are in Him.

Honest criticism of any group must examine its teachings as formulated by its intelligent and articulate adherents. A "conservative Christian" friend who is both has written about what he considers essentially "conservative" in his beliefs: it's a good starting-point. This seems to be his central statement of that philosophy:

What then am I trying to “conserve” as a conservative Christian? In a nutshell, I want to protect the liberty provided by the Constitution and Bill of Rights that allows Christians and all other Americans to live peaceably, under the rule of law, free from government control and oppression, so that we may raise our families and practice our religion without hindrance. Put another way, I wish to conserve the liberty that I believe God has granted this nation, and oppose the soft tyranny of expansive government and secular religion that the statists seek to impose.

Political philosophies are always context-specific (and notoriously changeable). That's true of my friend's belief, whose context is America's human kingdom, at this exact point in time. What he defines as "Christian conservatism" here is obviously about this single nation, America, at this specific moment of its history. Christianity is contrary to such narrow political and national intent.

His operative ideas of "liberty" and freedom reinforce that political and nationalist relativism. His conceives both is the terms of American political culture, rather than as defined by scripture. He goes so far as to say liberty and freedom are "provided by") America's national political culture: with the same waffling generic nod to God we see in America's founding documents, which he cites. I'd question whether this philosophy of "Christian conservatism," based on human operative ideas in preference to scripture's, can be called Christian in any sense.

By those culturally-defined ideas, my friend holds that "Christian conservatives' " mandate is to "conserve" America's temporal human political "liberty," in order to "practice our religion without hindrance." He goes on to liken that mandate to Paul's using the privileges of his Roman citizenship to further the gospel.

The analogy doesn't work. Paul treated his earthly citizenship as incidental (secondary) to the purposes of God's Kingdom. He nowhere urges we seek or "conserve" the privileges of that citizenship as necessary (primary) in order to "practice our religion without hindrance." And we know that Paul's (scripturally-defined) liberty was unhindered by lack of those privileges, when he was in chains in a Roman jail.

Heavily telling against "Christian conservatism" is its already-mentioned lack of scriptural attestation. There's no scriptural evidence that Jesus was "conservative," or taught His followers should be. Rather, we know that Jesus regarded the "conservatives" of His time...the Pharisees...as embodying all the ungodliness and hypocrisy of human politics and religion.

But most telling of all is simply that the idea of "conserving" anything of any human system is contrary to the teaching of the Kingdom of God. Are Christians, transferred to the kingdom of God's beloved Son, told to "conserve" any part of the unrighteous world-system they were saved from ? Rather the opposite. As new creatures, living under God's rule even in the midst of an unrighteous world, we pray for God's Kingdom to reign on earth, as it does in heaven. The idea that God's purpose is to "conserve" anything good in human kingdoms, rather than replace human kingdoms entirely with His, is deeply counter-biblical.

"Christian conservatives" can rightly claim the latter identity: their attitudes, beliefs, and values are very much those of that human faction. The question is whether their core ideas may truthfully be called "Christian." In the absence of scripture's teaching those ideas, I'm not persuaded. And in "Christian conservatism's" operative pride, factionalism, nationalism, et al...I'm convinced contrariwise. I regard my friend's "Christian conservatism" is exactly the "secular religion" he opposes: and the enemy's deceit for calling itself "Christian."

God, in Your mercy, open the eyes of the hearts of Your deceived people !!

Christians and Social Justice

I'm skeptical that controversy has innate value for establishing truth. It never settles...but rather, unsettles...the questions it raises: a pornography of thought, that stimulates desire it can only frustrate. Controversy is essentially a masturbatory exercise of mental and emotional self-indulgence.

One symptom of our society's sickness is that we've created for ourselves a class of "commentators," whose business (literally) is promoting controversy and partisan ill-will. It's a mark of the American Church' waywardness that large numbers of Christians follow such deceivers.

I usually consider it plays into that sickness, and those "commentators' " juvenile desire for attention, to treat their manufactured controversies as worthy of serious thought. But God can use even those to His glory...if Christians are driven to find what HE says on the controversial topic.

One "commentator" recently told Christians to run from any church that teaches such "code-word" doctrines as "social justice" and "economic justice," which are (he says) "perversions of the gospel." Pronouncement such as his, on what the CHURCH should be and should do, must especially drive Christians to re-study and discuss scripture.

This particular controversialist has no part in that discussion. His operative ideas of "the gospel," "the Church," and "scripture" are the false ones of Mormonism. But he doesn't base his claim to manipulate Christians' thinking on "religion;" rather, on being a spokesman for "conservative" ideas. Since many Christians regard the "conservative" label as an imprimatur of political correctness, they buy his disparaging attitude toward "social justice." It's consequently worth examining that attitude against scripture.

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Folklore is that the Inuit have dozens of words for "snow." I'm no ethnolinguist, but I doubt their native language has even one word for "tropical jungle." The vocabulary of the world's political-social system is similarly unsuited for the Church' discussion of economic and social justice: the world's vocabulary embodies the world's thoughts, all of them long-proven flawed and inadequate. More to the point, its human views are complete misdirection for the Church' thinking about biblical teachings.

The AMERICAN Church has additional problems thinking about "justice" (or "liberty," or "freedom," or "rights," etc.). Our national culture has re-defined those biblical concepts in unscriptural ways. Our difficulty speaking to this society about "justice" (for example) is that American society means something different than we do by those words. A further difficulty is that we too are children of American society, and have our own struggle to let the mind of Christ (rather than our society's counterfeit) be our thinking.

The world-system's ideas of "social justice" are counterfeits. The Church must reject them. We are commanded to "take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ" (II Corinthians 10:5): no ideas except those of our Head have a place in Christians' thinking. On that consideration, the Church errs when it predicates acceptance or rejection of "social justice" on the world-system's false ideas and definitions.

The "commentator" above exemplifies that error. He helpfully wrote on a chalkboard for his TV audience, "My definition of social justice is the forced redistribution of wealth, with a hostility to individual property, under the guise of charity and/or justice." The definition by which he rejects "social justice" is manifestly that of the American world-system: indeed, of the narrow "conservative" faction of that human system.

Counterfeits are revealed by comparison with the genuine. False ideas from a lying religion or from human cultures are useless for that purpose. Scripture is the only place we will find the genuine: Jesus' idea of social justice, which we are commanded to make our own operative thinking.

The Bible says far too much about social and economic justice...which is basically righteous conduct toward other people, and with our resources...for even a summary review. Any who honestly wish to know God's mind on those heads can't miss it in scripture. But a keynote for Christians is probably Jesus' first public teaching.

"The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

'The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.'

"Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began by saying to them, 'Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.'

(Luke 4:17-21, NASV)

Jesus announces He is the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy. When John sends to ask if He is the Messiah, Jesus refers again to His deeds in fulfillment of this prophecy. (Matthew 11:4-6) Lest we "spiritualize" Jesus' deeds beyond the plain sense of scripture, the word He uses for "poor" denotes "beggars crouching on the street." (When He means the "poor in spirit," He says so, as in the Sermon on the Mount.) Jesus holds Himself out as the Manifestation of God's Mercy to all victims of sin: and names first those victimized by the world's unrighteous economic system.

Nor does Jesus play the blame game. Ministering to victims is not contingent on whether their suffering results from their personal failings or the failings of others (John 9:2). God's glory is Jesus' whole point and purpose: and God's glory is manifest in our righteousness toward those suffering poverty, imprisonment, illness, despair...no matter how they got into that condition.

Denying that human societies and economies...including our own....foster injustice is simply a lie. Denying the mercy God entrusts to us, to sufferers we deem unworthy...who IS worthy ?...is counter-scriptural. Those attitudes, whether derived from the teachings of a false religion or a false political faction, are emphatically not the mind of Christ. They must never be the thinking of those who follow Jesus.

Let all who have followed false teachings seek instead to know the mind of Christ. Let us all search out what scripture teaches, and follow Truth. Church, REPENT !!

The Wisdom of Silence

"I am learning to shut up more, in the Presence of God...Like when you sit in front of a fire in winter. You are just there...you don't have to be smart, or anything. The fire warms you."

-- Desmond Tutu, on how his relationship with God has changed with age. N.P.R.'s Morning Edition series "The Long View" (interviews with "people of long experience"), 11 March 2010.



ADDENDUM:

A "Christian conservative" friend to whom I sent this quotation objected to it; on the grounds that Tutu is a "false prophet," and that being silent before God is a counter-scriptural teaching.

If anybody wishes to reject this quote, that's their call. But it's worth looking at the reasons for doing so.

My friend sent me some quoted teachings from Tutu that are clearly contrary to scripture. I wouldn't advise ANYone to become a follower of Tutu: but that wasn't my point anyway.

The point is the wisdom of silence before God. If you consider wisdom is a product of human beings, you'd best discern carefully who you listen to. But if wisdom is from God, the question is discerning God's voice: even when He puts His wisdom in the mouths of evil men (Balaam, for example; or Caiaphas, the High Priest at Jesus' trial).

If you consider, as my friend does, that being silent before God is a dangerous anti-scriptural idea, entirely derived from deceptive eastern religions, I'd adduce these scriptures (all NASB):


"...the LORD is in His holy temple: Let all the earth be silent before Him."

Habakkuk 2:20


"Be silent before the Lord GOD! For the day of the LORD is near."

Zephaniah 7a


"Be silent, all flesh, before the LORD; for He is aroused from His holy habitation."

Zechariah 2:13


"Be still, and know that I am God:... I will be exalted in the earth."

Psalm 46:10

Similarly, those who have been in the Presence of God frequently write that its effect was to render them silent. After God spoke to Daniel, the prophet said he became "speechless" (Daniel 10:15). Ezekiel testifies likewise to being "speechless" after the "hand of the Lord" had been upon him (Ezekiel 33:22).


I don't find, as my friend evidently does, that scripture teaches a flat either/or choice here. We are commanded to sing, shout, and praise: we are also commanded in scripture to be silent before God. It seems a matter for spiritual discernment: of being able to differentiate between "a time to be silent and a time to speak." Ecclesiastes 3 says there is an appointed time for both.

Perverting Scripture: II Chronicles 7:14

"If...My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land."

We have heard this scripture used for 30 years to support Christian political "action." It was a proof-text for the Moral Majority. It was the scriptural text for both Reagan inaugurations. It is pervasive in the American Church...as the proof-text for "culture war" and "conservative" Christianity.

I solemnly witness against those who pervert this word of God, and turn it to the evil purposes of the world-system's kingdom.

"If...My people who are called by My name..." These words are addressed to CHRISTians.

"...humble themSELVES and pray and seek My face and turn from THEIR wicked ways..." God tells Christians to do three things: abdicate their pride, seek Him, and meaningfully repent their sins. Where is the "political action" the deceivers have urged on us as God's will ? Where does God lay the blame for our country's sickness-unto-death on abortionists, gays, "liberals," as the promoters of "culture-war" teach ? He says instead that CHRISTIANS must repent.

"...then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land." God makes specific promises: and if we want Him to hear us, forgive us, and heal our land, we need to do what God says. It is therefore critical the American Church hear what God says (not what those who pervert His word make it to say): and deal honestly with our sin (not disingenuously praying He'll deal with other people's sins).

When we will DO what God says, God will be faithful to fulfill His promises. Do we want God to heal our land ? Then let us humble ourselves and seek God's face. Let the Church REPENT !!