The Current Church in America

I'm glad to live in a time and a country where, after 2000 years, we've finally got it right. Thanks to the political "Christianity" we've chosen to follow, the American Church at last practices the kind of fiscally-conservative, self-determined, individual-rights Christianity that Jesus taught.

Conspiracy-thinking

"For thus the Lord spoke to me with mighty power and instructed me not to walk in the way of this people, saying,

'You are not to say, "It is a conspiracy!"
In regard to all that this people call a conspiracy,
And you are not to fear what they fear or be in dread of it.
It is the Lord of hosts whom you should regard as holy.
And He shall be your fear,
And He shall be your dread.' " (Isaiah 8)

It's a very timely word to anyone who seeks to follow God in America these days. My e-mail is continually awash in warnings
of conspiracy: shamefully, most of it from Christians whose thinking has been corrupted by "conservative" politics.

What is "conspiracy" ? It's those people who are plotting (usually secretly) to harm us. Richard Nixon (a master plotter himself) put
the conspiracy-mindset well on one of his secret Watergate tapes: "Make no mistake about it: they are out to get us."

Conspiracy-thinking grows from a partisan worldview: that it all comes down to "us vs. them." Nixon could have been the poster-boy for that worldview. It's clearly widespread among current "conservatives" too, and the Christians who follow them. But like conspiracy-mindedness, partisanship (or "factionalism") is a sure sign we're not walking in the Spirit. (Galatians 5:20)

God put His finger on the matter. People who see the world filled with enemies plotting against them are fear-stricken. People driven by fear tend to be irrational and violent. Inducing fear has always been a powerful tool of unscrupulous politicians (Nixon again comes to mind, as do current "conservatives") for those reasons.

Most of the conspiracy e-mails I see add lying to their sinfulness. (If there's any doubt who's behind the partisanship, fear and irrationality of conspiracy-mindedness, just call to mind who Jesus said is the "father of lies.") You know the e-mails I mean: "they" are going to remove Christian crosses from military cemeteries, take our guns, make our courts recognize Sharia law, take "under God" out of the Pledge of Allegiance and "In God We Trust" off our money, and outlaw Christmas.

The media won't tell us about this grand conspiracy, of course: they're part of it. So (the anonymous e-mails say) is our secretly-Muslim President, the United Nations, the World Council of Churches, the World Monetary Fund, and the Boy Scouts. Make no mistake about it: they are ALL out to get us.

Those who choose to believe lies can always be easily manipulated by Satan. But God's warning doesn't make a distinction between imaginary and real conspiracy. He spoke to Isaiah about a real pact of foreign kings joining to destroy Israel. Similarly, the Communist leaders of the recent past were very candid about their purpose, publicly proclaiming, "we will bury you." But God told Isaiah even a real conspiracy was not to be feared: it was HIS determination that man's plot "will not stand." So he determined about Communism in our time.

Those who feared the real conspiracy of Isaiah's foreign kings, and those who feared Communism, were no different in God's eyes than those who today fear that our human government will make it a crime to say "Merry Christmas." They fear man more than they fear God. They fear conspiracy (a sin which God forbids): and manifest their disbelief that God rules, and that His power is greater than anything evil men and the enemy can do.

The conspiracy-minded show that their real faith is in Satan.

"Christian Media"

There's always seemed something a little bogus about the idea of "Christian media."

Christian media's offerings have never really been to my tastes; but it's more than just personal tastes. In practice, it's always seemed somewhat inauthentic: news, music and opinion deliberately skewed to fit a narrow predetermined purpose. Something like people who set their news feed to ONLY provide them gossip about professional wrestling or rap-music. It ends up being a fragmentary reflection of reality, and not-quite-true.

Seems like "true" and "reality" should be the watchwords for Christians, since Jesus is the Ultimate of both. In practice, for those whom I know to be typical consumers of Christian media, it seems primarily a way of identifying yourself as a member of "the club." In practice, I find good secular news-organizations (not Fox News, for example), reporting mundane daily news on the traditional journalistic criteria of setting forth facts, have more of Jesus about them, more truth and reality, that "Christian media."

Our theology is that Christ is in the world: "built-in" as the Logos through Whom all that exists came into being, born and living in human flesh among men as Jesus, and active today through the Holy Spirit. Even today I've heard two "secular" news-stories on NPR to which my spirit excitedly said, like Peter from his fishing-boat, "It is the Lord !!" Yesterday Jesus spoke unmistakably from a book I was reading, in the words of a Vietnam veteran describing his 40-year after-war struggles.

I don't know that any of the people in these instances were Christians. It doesn't matter: they witnessed of Jesus. I'm impressed that in His final hours, the Roman governor Pilate, Pilate's wife, the High Priest Caiaphas, the thief crucified beside Him, the Roman soldier standing guard as He died, even the sign posted above His head on the cross, witnessed in their different ways Who Jesus IS...and none were His followers. "Christian media" would not have interviewed or put any of them on the air.

Do we believe our theology ? Or is Jesus' Presence so hazy in the real world He created, where the Holy Spirit works, that we can't see him ? Is His voice so indistinct it's drowned out by reality, and we can't hear Him ?

Peter recognized Jesus when he saw Him. Recognized Him even though He couldn't possibly be there, alive. "Christian media"...indeed, the Church itself...doesn't act as if it believes He's here at all, except within the walls of our club-house.

"Christian" media, and the widespread "conservative" hatred of secular media, have the same deleterious effect on the Church. Both promote the idea that Christ can't be found "in the world." Deleterious because it's untrue, according to our Christology. Deleterious because it teaches Christians to only look for Him within church walls: and that atrophies the spiritual expectation, and ability, to see Him anyplace in the "real world" !

Wrong again, Church.

Wake up, Church.

Church, Repent your unbelief !!

Two Questions for the Church

If your religion doesn't equip you to tell right from wrong, what good is it ?

If you don't care about the difference, what's wrong with you ?

Christian Orientation 101

Orientation as a Christian is a simple process: one step, the same step each time, in every circumstance. Skipping that step insures that you will miss Jesus.

Jesus said He IS "the truth" (John 14:6). He said satan is "the father of lies" (John 8:44). All who believe what Jesus says will orient their lives, hearts, words, and acts accordingly.

Like Jesus, truth is real. Truth is verifiable, and owes nothing to opinion. Like Jesus, truth is one: "I'll follow my truth, and you follow your truth" is a lie (see above, "father of lies"). Like Jesus, truth is sovereign: every other criteria is subject to it.

There are no lying Christians, and no Christian lies. "No lie is of the truth." (I John 2:21)

The whole of a Christian's orientation in life consists in this: who loves Jesus must love truth. Who follows Jesus must follow truth.

Hocus Pocus

The magician's main trick is misdirection. If the audience' eyes are all on the pretty assistant as she secures each lock with a loud "click!!", it's a simple matter for the magician to slip a hidden key from his mouth to his hand without anyone noticing.

Misdirection: get the rubes to look the wrong direction, so they miss the obvious, and they'll BELIEVE the deception.

Abortion, gay marriage, and all the other MORAL "issues" by which "conservatives" claim Christians' allegiance...who exactly told Christians the place to fight those moral battles was the political arena ? Was it Jesus: or politicians on the make for Christians' votes ?

Misdirect Christians' focus to political "issues," and the deceiver can even slip a priest of anti-Christ past us as the "Christian" party's candidate.

And nobody will notice.

Drawing the Line

Ted Williams was the last man in baseball to bat over .400 (.406 in 1941). He credited his visual acuity. Williams claimed he could see the spin of the ball's stitches from the moment it left the pitcher's hand, letting him distinguish a fast ball from a curve and anticipate the ball's placement and motion.

An interviewer asked Williams about his legendary batting skills. It was simple, Williams said: he made it an absolute rule to never swing at a ball unless its path would touch the strike-zone.

"But with your eyesight," said the interviewer, "surely you could have connected with pitches that were only an eighth of an inch outside, or a quarter-inch. Couldn't you have gotten even more hits that way ?"

"No !" Williams said. "If I did that, where would I draw the line ?"



The Church' first charge is to draw the line. God's has entrusted no one else with His spiritual acuity to distinguish good from evil. But the Church follows its own batting philosophy.

Ronald Reagan took office preaching rebellion: "...government is the problem."

George W. Bush used the anniversary of 9/11 to teach blasphemy. In the same words with which scripture lauds Jesus, Bush told us the "ideal of America" is "the hope of all mankind," and "the light [that] shines in the darkness."

Eighty percent of American evangelicals in 2012 voted their personal choice was to be led by a priest of anti-Christ.

Where does the American Church draw the line ?

A parable

Two rival politicians were on the platform, ready to pitch their candidacy to a crowd of voters.

The first politician took the microphone and began to build his case. He represented the party of the great Abraham Lincoln, he told the crowd. Moreover, he espoused the principles of Lincoln. As his speech progressed, he compared himself to Lincoln in more particulars. By the time he made his final humble plea for listeners' votes, it was clear the candidate was the near-reincarnation of Lincoln.

The second candidate took the microphone. "It's true my opponent bears a striking resemblance to the great Abraham Lincoln," He began, and paused. When he had the full attention of the surprised crowd, he rasped, "If you can imagine a short, fat, dishonest Lincoln."

Some say America is a Christ-like nation. That may be true...if you can imagine a rebellious, violent, greedy Christ.

How apostate is the Church ?

It's a sticky question to even ask. "Apostasy" is ordinarily the cry of those promoting a partisan view (always self-flattering, of course) of who is "really Christian" and who is not. In such cases, it should rightly be regarded as a matter of personal opinion; usually slightly unhinged (not to mention prideful) opinion, at that.

But treating every question as a matter of mere opinion is a teaching of the world's political culture. Given that source, there can be no surprise that it is untrue: and that it is favored by the dishonest. More to the point, the world's teaching is useless in questions of spiritual discernment, as "apostasy" manifestly is.

Christians have access to the Spirit's Own discernment. And we can't but discern that scripture regards apostasy as a reality, and exactly defines it (which definition, for Christians, must be taken as the absolute operative meaning of the word). Christians who blow off all talk of apostasy as "just your opinion" do so contrary to scripture and the Spirit.

Scripture's definition of "apostasy" is neither highly technical nor a matter of theological hair-splitting. Like all scripture, the word is meant to be understandable and readily applicable for all who hear it. "Apostasia" (for example, in II Thessalonians 2:3) means what it says: in Greek, "apo-," away from + "histemi," stand: in its various English translations, "falling away," "desertion," "defection."

Jesus put very simply what it is to be a Christian: "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me" (John 10:27), and "A stranger they simply will not follow..." (v. 5). Apostasy is following any-One but Jesus.

The Old Testament's formulation is equally clear and simple: it is when God's people "follow" or ("serve") "other gods." Apostasy is breaking the first commandment: "You shall have no other gods before me." Apostasy is the deepest possible disobedience to what Jesus said was the greatest commandment: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind." (Matthew 22, Mark 12, Luke 10).

It's not a game of theological inches to say Mormonism's "Christ" is another than He of Biblical Christianity: the highest Mormon "Prophet" says it is so (http://www.ldschurchnews.com/articles/31188/Crown-of-gospel-is-upon-our-heads.html): and no one heeding the Spirit's discernment could mistake the two.

It's not a matter of opinion that our vote shows who we desire to be led by. So the election just past tells us where the heart of the Church in America is: 79% of "evangelicals" desire to be led by the priest of a demon who claims to be Jesus.

Are Christians following Jesus ? Is the Church pure and without blemish, ready to welcome its Bridegroom ?

God, our Father, send your Spirit of deepest repentance on our hearts lest we die !!

Can the Church Hear Jesus ?

"And He also told this parable to some people who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and viewed others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself: ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, the sinner!’ I tell you, this man went to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted.” --Luke 18:9-14


"There are 47 percent of people who will vote for the president no matter what...who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what ... These are people who pay no income tax ... [M]y job is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.” -- Mitt Romney


Mitt Romney's comments are not surprising. He follows an anti-Christian spirit: he believes its teaching that the Bible is full of "corruptions," and that the Jesus of the Bible is a false god. He has every "religious" reason to disregard and despise Jesus' words in our gospel.

Romney himself is hardly the issue, and has lost his political platform. But the spirit by which he is led, and leads, continues: and through the deceit of politics, that spirit continues to mislead Christians, those whose actual desire is to hear Jesus and obey Him.

Through politics, that spirit has taught God's beloved Body of Christ to live by the evil attitudes of the enemy. The Church loves rebellion because Ronald Reagan taught it that "Government is the problem."

The Church blasphemously loves America in place of Jesus as "...the hope of all mankind...That hope still lights our way. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness will not overcome it." George W. Bush told us so.

Meanwhile, the Church holds itself righteous, and views others ("liberals," the poor, illegal aliens, Muslims, etc., etc.) with contempt.

Jesus said "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me." The simple fact is that when the Church follows the priest of a demon, it is NOT following Jesus.

To any who WILL hear, God is commanding repentance. May the Spirit of Christ fiercely purge the Church' heart of its sinful pursuit of its own way, and save those whom God loves and calls !!