The idea started at the University of California at Berkeley. The idea that I’m talking about is software developers building an “Online Hate Index” for social media companies like Facebook and Twitter. Thus, “hate speech” could be removed without any sort of human involvement, according to Campus Reform.

The “idea,” according to an article in the University of California alumni magazine, sounds profoundly innocent. I mean who wouldn’t want to control hate speech, right? We all have been on Facebook or Twitter threads that have turned into examples of human cesspools of the unregenerate heart.

However, while this course of action may seem innocent, it has the potential to be very dangerous and censor more than just “hate speech.” The problem with this idea, along with many others in human history which want to control what we say, think or do, is that it doesn’t recognize the condition of the heart. While this idea may have good intentions, good intentions often lead to human suffering and carnage. The problem with any program like this one, that aims to prevent “hate speech,” is that it is developed by humans themselves and will ultimately fail because of the condition of the heart that is unchanged by the gospel of Jesus Christ.

History tends to repeat itself, and we are doomed to repeat it if we do not remember our past. To those who have studied the past and know about pre-World War II Germany, this type of “list making” has an eerie resemblance to pre-Hitlerism and the efforts of the Reichstag to control society. It was this “list making” that eventually led to the ability of Hitler to carry out the extermination of more than six million Jews (and tens of thousands of others such as political prisoners). While this new “hate speech” control program may seem like a far reach from what Hitler did, everything has to start somewhere. Just as the Reichstag had good intentions of helping German society, all it took was for one madman to pervert a good intention and make it into an evil one.

How will they define “hate speech,” who will be those who are considered the “haters” and added to the “Online Hate Index?” Simply, like in any dictatorship over freedoms, it will be the people that oppose the popular opinion or the opinion of the reigning regime. So in other words, those who speak the truth, mostly the first on the list of censorship will be you and other Christians. Knowing the message of Christianity is an offense to those who are perishing, the gospel will be censored and marginalized. Today, Christians are already dealing with censorship for having an unpopular opinion in the public square and on social media. This new tool will only add to that hardship and difficulty in spreading the truth about Christ and the Gospel message.

There are more far-reaching and profound implications of such a censoring tool and an “Online Hate Index.” Social control tools like this program could be used to ultimately punish Christians for their biblical worldview. Once one is placed on the “hate speech list” one could be subjected to all kinds of unforeseen consequences. If these lists are made public or employers are granted access to these lists, the people on these lists could inadvertently find themselves unemployed, shamed publicly or worse.  In today’s social activist charged world those finding themselves on such hate speech lists could easily be ostracized from society. If you can control what people say or able to say, you can control the masses at large.

I will use treatment to help the sick according to my ability and judgment, but never with a view to injury and wrong-doing. Neither will I administer a poison to anybody when asked to do so, nor will I suggest such a course. Similarly I will not give to a woman a pessary to cause abortion.

A portion of the earliest surviving version (c. 275 AD) of the Hippocratic Oath.

Over the course of centuries, the Hippocratic Oath has been rewritten to reflect the values of different cultures.

Today, contrary to common belief, most medical schools do not require new physicians to swear the Hippocratic Oath.

Overall, in 2017, approximately 56% of new physicians took the Hippocratic Oath and 17% of new physicians took an oath specifically written by the medical school faculty they attended. Also to note, in America, the oath does not include the above quoted portion.

[Life News] Stephanie Ho’s passionate desire to abort unborn babies is difficult to understand.

It makes sense that the young Arkansas abortionist wants to help women in need, but there are so many better ways to help women than to make a living off killing their unborn children.

Ho recently wrote a piece for the Washington Post about her work with Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion chain in America. In it, she complained about her medical school not teaching abortion, people not accepting her work, abortion regulations and more.

“Where I grew up, in the River Valley of western Arkansas, nobody said the word ‘abortion’ out loud,” she wrote.

Ho chose to attend medical school at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, and then complained that the school did not teach them how to perform abortions.

“Over four years, the most exposure we got to the topic was a half-hour guest lecture,” she wrote.

Ho continued:

That implicit disapproval carried over to my residency in family medicine, which I began in 2008 at UAMS West in Fort Smith. Second-year residents gave presentations on a topic of their choice — and mine, on abortion, was the most highly attended and contentious that year. A senior faculty member vocally disagreed with my description of abortion as a common medical service, interrupting every few sentences and quoting the Bible at me. Someone dubbed me the “abortion chick,” and the nickname stuck. Whenever a patient at the clinic wanted to learn more about terminating a pregnancy, the staff would call me in to talk her through her options, even when I wasn’t scheduled on a shift. My fellow physicians didn’t feel comfortable sharing information about abortions.

She claimed to have faced even more discrimination during her third-year elective rotation when she wanted to go out of state to learn how to do abortions.

“The residency director said it was not an appropriate elective for a family medicine resident, and that he would have to talk about it with the other faculty physicians at Fort Smith,” she remembered. “Then he said that the program didn’t permit residents to rotate out of state.”

After graduation, she said she could not find anyone willing to hire her in conservative Arkansas because of her insistence making abortion part of her practice. Ho opened her own practice, but it did not go well.

She “lived paycheck to paycheck,” and it eventually failed. That’s when she began working as an abortionist for Planned Parenthood in Arkansas.

“Today, I am one of four physicians regularly providing abortions in Arkansas, which is home to 1.5 million women. Who else is going to speak up for them?” she proudly stated.

“My patients sit through 48-hour waiting periods and mandatory follow-up visits, which impose costs — gas money, time off from work, overnight stays, child care — that many can barely afford,” she continued.

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Micaiah Bilger and originally published at Life News]

In November, Pulpit & Pen reported that Pastor John Gray made a bizarre decision to let church members come up and take money from the offering plates, after which people happily went and helped themselves. Then, we reported that Pastor Gray gave his wife a Lamborgini and the public was a bit incredulous about his apparent materialism, but his prior move of “sharing” the offering made more sense. It was a brilliant public relations move that would preempt his own over-the-top generosity. Now, it’s been reported that John Gray admitted to his congregation that he cheated on his wife, to whom he gave the expensive luxury car.

The pieces are fitting together.

Some adulterous men get their wives flowers. But when you roll with Oprah and Joel Osteen, you get your wife a 200k luxury car.

A video has surfaced of a pre-sermon talk by Gray in which he admits to cheating on his wife.

This was his first official sermon as the new pastor of Relentless Church. The theme of the church is currently, “reset.” Please note; he admitted his affair on his first day as pastor, after he was selected by an “Apostle” to pastor the church, not while the church was making the decision.

Having recently been an adulterer might be something the church should consider.

Gray admits to being a bad father and husband in the video (4.30 timestamp). The congregation laughed and applauded when he (seriously) said he’d been sleeping on the couch. He then blamed the congregation for not caring enough about his family because he was “producing” (5.00 timestamp).

He then admits that he started listening to the “wrong voices” and “let people get too close” and his wife found out (6.30 timestamp). His wife, who is also a “pastor” of the church, stood on stage and said she prayed for both the other individual (who later she calls “the strange woman,” a KJV reference to a promiscuous woman) and her husband.

At the 6.49 mark the lady pastor said the “other person” was a 16 year-old and said they could “go back to the pit of hell.” [Editor’s note: Some have suggested that this was a reference to how Gray was acting, and there is confusion at this part]. At the 8.55 mark she again mentioned that it was a “16-year-old who couldn’t get a date” [see comment above].

After admitting to adultery (with a hint of spiritual abuse), the congregation applauded wildly at the 10.50 mark. Watch the video below.

The sermon video from that day (notice, he’s in the same suit and shirt) is posted on the church website. In that video, Gray claimed that an “Apostle” gave him “the keys to the church,” and admits feeling disqualified. But have no fear, for Gray says that God told him, “You can’t disqualify yourself” (6.30 timestamp).

Gray then claims that he was attacked by the devil in 2018. He then ranted for several minutes about why people shouldn’t put him on a pedastal. Gray then told people to mind their own business (11.00 timestamp).

At the 16 minute mark he stopped the talk to pull out his cell phone and send funds to the church in order to “sow” and requested that they do the same.

The acknowledgment came roughly a week after news began to be reported in primarily “urban” news that Gray’s wife beat his mistress and either paid her to have an abortion or she had a miscarriage from the beating.

 If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. ² Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach,³ not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money.⁴ He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, ⁵ for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church? (1 Timothy 3:1-5)

[Editor’s Note: As you read above, there has been some confusion as to what Mrs. Gray meant regarding the “16-year-old” comments. We’ll leave it to the listeners to decide. Therefore, we have amended the title of the article].

The Apostle Paul laid out the requirements for the man who fills the pastoral office in 1 Timothy 3:

“He must be one who manages his own household well, keeping his children under control with all dignity ⁵ (but if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of the church of God?)”

Consider the case of Gregory Duane Locke, the immensely popular internet pundit and founding pastor of Global Vision Bible Church (GVBC) in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee.  In addition to local members, Locke’s church accepts “internet members” who watch sermon webcasts and donate online.  Locke’s Facebook page, upon which he markets his “On Point” web videos, has over 1.6 million likes.  His videos typically feature Locke giving no-nonsense straight talk about political and biblical matters.  In a recent video, Locke condemned the behavior of disrespectful children and took a hard line about the rights of parents over children who “sleep in” their beds and “eat from” their tables. “He who makes the gold makes the rules,” Locke proclaimed.

Unfortunately, Locke has no credibility to speak to this issue as a pastor or a father.  Locke is a deadbeat dad yet he has the gall to give parenting advice.  According to sources very close to Locke himself, none of his four children live with him.  His eldest son lives with Locke’s terminally ill mother, Judy Sumner, and has lived with her since Locke separated from his ex-wife Melissa over a year ago.  At one time, Mrs. Sumner was taking care of all four of Locke’s children.  Locke’s second-oldest son resides in a boys home.  His two youngest children (a biological son and a foster daughter) live with Melissa.  Sources also reveal that Locke has been consistently delinquent in his child support and alimony payments to his ex-wife (who is recently remarried to a former pastor).  According to a November police report from Rutherford County, Tennessee and local sources, Locke spewed profanity in front of his children during a child exchange and argued with his ex-wife over his past due debts.

The only children who do reside with Locke are the children of his 2^nd wife, Tai.  These children come from two different biological fathers, neither of whom is Locke.  Tai was serving as the church secretary when Locke separated from his wife of twenty years.  Tai is currently being marketed on Facebook as the “first lady” of GVBC. 

For all intents and purposes, Tai is an apostate homewrecker if not a gold-digger.  It’s hard to blame her given that her pastor is such a nefarious scoundrel.  It is a reproach to Christ’s church that a man like Locke masquerades as a man of God when really and truly, he is an adulterous internet religion huckster.  Locke lives the life of a lost person, not of a blood-bought Christian.  All the while, his family has suffered from a lack of emotional, spiritual, and physical support.  Apart from his adultery, Greg fails to meet the scriptural requirements for the office of pastor.  He clearly has failed to manage his own household well.  Given that GVBC executive pastor Jarrod Almond was recently fired under a cloud of suspicion of financial impropriety, there is good evidence that Locke has also failed to properly manage church affairs.  In the wake of his personal moral failings, the physical attendance at GVBC has dwindled.  Nevertheless, Locke remains popular on the internet, where he puts on a Christian face.  Sadly, the face presented to those closest to Locke is one of rageful anger.  Locke resembles more the “Ramblin’ Man” of his Allman brothers namesakes than he does a shepherd of Christ’s flock.

How many church-goers and observers will this false pastor turn away from God, raking in internet donations along the way?  Only God knows and only God can save Greg Locke, a man who needs the prayers of the saints for his repentance. His family also desperately needs the prayers of the saints. They have been left with a derelict, dead-beat earthy father but can still hang their hopes on a Heavenly One.

*Please note that the preceding is my personal opinion. It is not necessarily the opinion of any entity by which I am employed, any church at which I am a member, any church which I attend, or the educational institution at which I am enrolled. Any copyrighted material displayed or referenced is done under the doctrine of fair use.

Much is being made these days in American society and in Evangelicalism over the concept of reparations. Thabiti Anyabwile, an SBC pastor and thought-leader in this area recently tweeted the following:

For 10 minutes Christopher Hitchens engages in the false analogy of the restoration of ancient Grecian artifacts on the part of the British Museum. He labors over this analogy attempting to find some supposed link between that and the current issue of slave reparations that is once again being put forth by many leaders in the black community, most interestingly, from black churches.

Over at Baptist Global News you will find an article entitled, White Baptists and racial reconciliation: there’s a difference between lament and repentance, by Wendell Griffin. Now, in the interest of transparency, I have always thought that the racial reconciliation movement was always a movement not nearly as interested in reconciliation as it was in shifting the conservative evangelical vote in America and as a result, increasing entitlements. The racial reconciliation movement has continued to push the boundaries in this regard. The conversations of this movement began with vague generalities around reconciliation. On the surface, the language was filled with Christianese. It sounded pious, right, spot on in many cases. But it was, nevertheless, short on details. Now we see that the details are being advanced. It feels very similar to a bait and switch tactic. The initial wave of these details began with intense attacks against the conservative political party and its leaders in American government. These were relentless. People who had already signed on to the RR movement through peer pressure to the idea were and are more easily convinced to shift their politics leftward. Then there was the emotive celebration of MLK. This was a direct appeal to the shallow-minded emotional American Christian. In addition to this, there has been a steady stream of attacks and disrespect directed levied toward Law-Enforcement and this has come even from men like Matt Chandler. Now the edges are pushed once again as we come to what I believe is the main concern: $$. You see, if you are sincerely interested in reconciliation and that is your primary goal, you are not going to introduce ideas that you know full-well will get in the way of your supposed goal of, reconciliation. I will come back to this point.

So, what is the Christian to think and do where reparations are concerned? Well, since the Scripture is our final authority, we must turn to Scripture to see how it informs us on this idea. Therefore, it is to Scripture we turn. The idea of restitution seems to be closely associated with our modern concept of punitive damages and is very closely associated with biblical texts that deal with property rights.

Exodus 21:33-22:15 goes into great detail regarding property rights and restitution. The common factors are clear. First, in ancient Israel, God established the theocracy in such a way that the idea of property rights was protected by the concept of restoration and restitution. There was a system of justice and equity provided for loss of rights and for anyone who deprived someone else of those rights through negligence or willful intent, payment would be demanded or else. Second, the deprived was always an individual who had an inherent right in place. Third, the negligent party was also an individual who was culpable by way of their direct action or involvement in the incident. When someone says that reparations and restitution are clearly biblical concepts, they are not wrong. The question is, are they wrong in how they are attempting to apply them today? Is their model for reparations and restitution aligned with the Bible? Based on a straightforward exegesis of the appropriate texts, it seems to me that the answer is no. I want to turn your attention to those texts ever so briefly.

We see the command in Lev. 6:5 to add 20% to the value of what was stolen or lost as restitution. If you steal $100 from your friend, you are to return to him $120. Think about this for a moment. What happens if you are a thief for 20 years before entering the Christianity community? What if, over those 20 years, you swindled hundreds of thousands of dollars from people? What are you to do? What if you cannot remember everyone you wronged over the course of those 20 years? What if the wife of the man who cheated you out of $20k just buried him? Is she on the hook? Are his kids or grandkids on the hook? And before you go demanding what is “rightfully” yours, what about all those people you have wronged? Have you paid your debt? Have you done your duty? As a reminder, these command involve individuals directly involved in the transaction in the context of an ancient theocracy around 3500 years ago.

In Numbers 5:5-10 we clearly see that restitution shall be paid to the offended or to that party’s relative if he has any. If he does not have a relative to which restitution can be made, it will go to the Lord by way of the priest. So, if a man has taken what was not his, he shall restore it back to the property own from whom he took it plus 20%. If the property owner is not living, then the guilty party will make that same restitution to his relative.

Proverbs 6:30-31 tells us that in general, men do not despise a thief who steals because he is hungry. Nevertheless, even in this situation he is to repay sevenfold even if it means all the substance of his house. These are strict standards indeed. It makes me wonder if those who are clamoring for reparations have given this idea the sort of critical thought it deserves. It would seem to me, based on some of their other positions expressed by certain individuals, that very little critical thought has gone into the concept of modern-day slavery reparations.

Finally, we come to Zaccheus, the NT example so often given by proponents of slavery-reparations. Some suppose Zaccheus went above and beyond the requirements of the law for restitution, saying he would give back 400% (full amount + 3x the full amount) of what he had taken from those whom he had wronged. Marshall comments on this point:

For συκοφαντέω cf. 3:14** where it is used of a characteristic sin of soldiers who may have aided tax-collectors. The conditional clause is to be translated ‘From whomsoever I have wrongfully exacted anything’, and thus does not put the fact of extortion in doubt, but rather its extent. The normal recompense for money illegally acquired was the amount plus one fifth (cf. Lv. 6:1–5; SB II, 250), but fourfold recompense (τετραπλοῦς**), i.e. the amount plus a threefold penalty was demanded of rustlers (cf. 2 Sa. 12:6; Ex. 22:1; Jos. Ant. 16:3); similar practices appear to have been known in Roman law and in Egypt (Derrett, 284; O. Michel, TDNT VIII, 105 n. 154).^[1]

Now, the important thing to remember is that Zaccheus’ offer for restitution was only to those whom he had συκοφαντέω (sukophanteo). This is the Greek word rendered in the NASB, defraud. It means to put pressure on someone for personal gain, harass, squeeze, shake down, blackmail. Here it means to secure something through intimidation, extort, or blackmail. It cannot be emphasized enough that this restitution was being undertaken by an individual who committed the actual offense and that the ones being restored were those who had been defrauded. John the Baptist used this same word συκοφαντέω in Luke 3:14: “Some soldiers were questioning him, saying, “And what about us, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Do not take money from anyone by force, or accuse anyone falsely, and be content with your wages.” (Luke 3:14, NASB) In this instance, the NASB renders this same word, “accuse anyone falsely.” Again, the idea of blackmail or extortion comes to mind. Think about the false witnesses that were paid to falsely accuse Christ. This practice would have been forbidden by Christ without question.

The point is that the transaction about which we are concerned always and only involved an individual person acting willfully to defraud or willingly chose not to do their duty concerning another to whom such duty was due. Inherent in the Biblical concept of restitution is the concept of property rights as well as an unlawful act on the part of a willing person to defraud another.

As I come back to Christopher Hitchens’ argument for reparations, it should not be lost on those reading this that Hitchens was a militant atheist. Having passed into the next life and into the hands of a holy God, Hitchens is no longer an atheist. It is interesting to see a theologian like Thabiti Anyabwile call on a pagan, God-hating atheist to support his push for reparations. What moral ground could Hitchens offer in defense of his argument? He has nothing but nature doing what nature does. In other words, Hitchens, as an enemy of everything and anything Christian has no standing in the Christian community to event participate in the conversation. It is telling that men like Anyabwile and Griffen are taking their cues from pagan society rather than from Scripture rightly interpreted.

Now, we come back to the question, does the argument for slavery reparations for black people living in America a sound argument or not? Well, it is only sound if it is logically valid and true.

1. Anyone in ancient Israel, living in the theocracy, had a right to reparation and restitution when their property rights had been defrauded by another person living in the theocracy.
2. Black people living 150 to 400 years ago were defrauded of their property rights by mostly white Americans living 150 to 400 years ago.
3. Therefore, modern black people are due reparations and restitution by modern white people.

What is wrong with this argument? First, the laws regarding reparations and restitution were given to ancient Israel 3500 years ago. These laws were specifically given to that theocracy at that time and for specific reasons within God’s overall plan of redemption. The law that contained those commands has been made obsolete by the new covenant. Heb. 10:9 informs us that Christ takes away the first in order to establish the second. As Gentile Christians, we do not live under the Mosaic law, but we do live under God’s law, the law of Christ. Second, the reparation/restitution (R/R) transaction involved only the individual trespasser and the individual trespassed. Only in instances where the trespassed was deceased did the transaction involve a relative. No mention is made however of the scenario in which the offender is deceased. So, you had to be an ancient Israelite living in the theocracy under the Mosaic law and you have to be directly involved in the incident. Even in the NT example to which reparations proponents appeal, Zaccheus was concerned to make right only those whom he had personally defrauded. Zaccheus then adds nothing at all to strengthen the R/R position. Coming back to the argument, because there is no relationship between the first and second premise, the conclusion is a non-sequitur. This mean the argument is not valid, let alone sound.

For some time now the evangelical churches, mostly the SBC, at the behest of the ERLC and Russell Moore, have pushed hard on the idea of racial reconciliation. Many of us were puzzled as to what the issue was that required addressing so that reconciliation could take place. Well, as we have come to see, it appears that racial reconciliation means the following:

• Celebrate ungodly heroes like MLK as godly heroes.
• Change your voting preference to line up with the agenda of the overwhelmingly liberal black community.
• Downplay political leaders who favor infant murder (abortion) for social gains elsewhere.
• Renounce white privilege. Hate whiteness. Detest old white guys.
• Repudiate Martin Luther, Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield and other giant theologians of the Christian faith. They were racists and slave owners. In other words, pull the foundations out from under the evangelical churches.
• Install affirmative action in staffing in the churches.
• Open the tax-coffers and create a massive economic entitle program for all black Americans to restore them or repair them to their former slave state.
• Free tuition for black students.

The idea of reparations is immoral for a number of reasons. For starters, no black American alive today has suffered or been defrauded because their ancestor was a slave 150+ years ago. There is no reliable data linking economic suffering and ancestral slavery. The causes of economic failure seem more situated in the choices and decisions of the individual than any other single factor. In ancient Israel, the only person who is due reparations is the one who was actually defrauded or that person’s living relative at the time. The only person who is obligated to pay reparations or restore is the person guilty of the transgression. There is no precedent in Scripture for that person’s heirs to repair unless they were a participant in the fraud. So, the transaction we are talking about had to occur during the lifetime of the transgressor at a minimum. Individuals transgress, not non-human entities. Not only are these laws governing an ancient theocracy that no longer exists, they were never extended to those outside the covenant community in that theocracy. In other words, the parties involved ought to both be in the covenant community. In other words, implicit in these laws is that both parties are inside the covenant community. Strangers were not to be mistreated or wronged, but the laws of reparation are issued within the covenant to the covenant people who have bound themselves to that covenant.

What is happening right now in the reparation movement is that a certain segment of the population is seeking to take what never belonged to them in the first place from those who have not actually wronged them personally, directly, or otherwise, to begin with. And that, from what I can tell, is stealing. What is worse is that these leaders are attempting to use the Bible, to use Christian morality in order to engage in unethical practices. What is worse than using our good God for to line your own personal checking account by stealing from others and using the government and the churches to do it? A pastor lining up on this side of the issue should be terminated immediately. There is no place for this kind of egregious incompetence in leadership in the churches.

Another interesting aspect of this argument or debate is that those who are arguing for reparations are the very same ones mostly likely to repudiate even the idea of property rights. They come from a socialist/Marxist ideology for the most part. And they are making arguments against the idea of property rights and claiming God rejects such thinking. Well, according to what we have covered, God does not only NOT reject property rights, he ensured them in the theocracy 3500 years ago. The bigger problem is if you repudiate property rights, reparations cease to be an issue. The only way the argument for reparations can work is if one assumes the legitimacy of property rights, something most of these folks deny. If you don’t have a right to that property, then you cannot be defrauded of it.

Finally, you thought the racial reconciliation movement was a sincere, genuine, heart-felt effort to bring black Christians and White Christians together. As it has unfolded, however, what you are finally starting to experience is the wizard behind the curtain. It has been about entitlements, economic advantage, and power all along. It is a backdoor way to change the structure of things so that a certain segment of the population benefits economically. It isn’t about equality at all. It is about advantage, an edge, power. I have witnessed a push toward liberal ideologies and politics, a change in attitude toward law enforcement and civil authorities, a drastic disrespect toward the civil leader, the down-playing of infanticide, a push for feminism, homosexuality under the guise of SSA, and now, the final “show me the money” straw. After all, it was this same Wendell Griffen who measured white repentance by how they voted in his article: On election day, I’ll be watching for signs of repentance from white evangelicals. Such a perspective is anything but Christian.

What does racial reconciliation look like? It looks like white guys hating white-ness (whatever that means). It looks like the church throwing our giant theologians under the bus, destroying that which has served the church so well for so long. It looks like voting democrat. It looks like belittling abortion. It looks like hating LEO. It looks like hating the president if he is white and conservative. It looks like embracing feminism. It looks like embracing homosexuality. It looks like demanding the government adopt a policy on open borders. If borders are open, more people can vote democrat. Wow, it really is about power after all! It looks like writing a check to black Americans who feel oppressed and disadvantaged because 150-400 years ago, ancestors that they never knew were slaves to white people that their white counterparts never knew.

The bottom line is that you are going to take $$ out of my bank account even though I lived in a state that fought on the side that ended slavery. I never owned or defrauded a black person in my whole life. Yet, somehow, it is supposedly a Christian principle to take from me and give to someone else who hasn’t even been defrauded in terms of slavery. Less than 5% of Americans today have ancestors that owned slaves. Not only that, it is estimated that the median for slave holding states was around ~25 % of white people who owned a slave. That leaves 75% who did not. You will have to prove that you have ancestors who were slaves and then you will have to prove that a white person descended from a slave owner. That is virtually impossible to do.

In light of the clear evidence from Scripture that restitution is nothing like what some people are claiming it is today, one has to honestly ask the question if reconciliation really is the goal after all or is it something else? If you want to reconcile with me, which means you want to end hostilities between the two of us because we are estranged, do you think demanding money from me is the right approach? Do you think it’s the right approach especially if I haven’t actually defrauded you personally or that you haven’t actually been defrauded by me personally? Wendell Griffen, in his article mentioned above writes the following: My immediate reaction after reading the report was that SBTS appears more interested in – and hopes to be commended for – detailing its sinfulness about racial justice than repenting from it. And then Griffin makes this incredible statement: A robber who will not at least promise to make reparations does not deserve credit for publishing an announcement about having engaged in a career of robbery.

Wendell, and most of the black leaders in the black community clearly do not understand grace, nor do they understand repentance. It wasn’t Al Mohler or SBTS who committed the sin in this instance. For starters, a non-human entity cannot sin. This means that when someone says SBTS must repent and pay reparations, at a minimum, they are talking about the men who sit on the board. So, when I say SBTS, I mean the men sitting on the board. Whom did these men defraud? Does anyone have a “right” to a seminary education? No, they do not. Do seminaries have a right to exclude men whom it believes are not qualified to enter ministry or the seminary? Yes, it does. That is where you start.

The next question is this: Was it wrong for SBTS to refuse admittance to the school based on the criterion of melanin? Of course, it was wrong. Is this policy anything like stealing from someone? No, it is not. There were always other options. You see, Martin Luther King should not have been admitted to the seminary, not because he was black, but because, as it turns out, he wasn’t qualified to be there. Only Spirit-filled men need apply. The group justice mentality involved in this situation adopts the view that people often have certain sweeping rights. Given this, SBTS was not defrauding anyone of something they owned. It was not depriving them of their own property rights which is precisely what the ancient laws on restitution address. It is apples and oranges. Not admitting someone to your school is not the same as stealing their car, their bread, or their coat.

Finally, Griffen insists that repentance in this instance will look like reparations. So, here it is in a nutshell. In order to achieve racial reconciliation, the white man has to repent for the anguish he caused over the years through slavery and racism. Many naïve pastors are buying into this narrative, not because it’s true, but because of the political pressure being placed on them by their fellow SBC leaders and fellow pastors. Follow me here. Reconciliation equals repentance. Repentance means bringing forth fruit. And in this case, that fruit is money, free tuition, affirmative action in pastoral staffs, etc. You get into school because you’re black even if there are 20 other more qualified candidates. That doesn’t matter. It also doesn’t matter that none of those candidates ever defrauded you or anyone else in their life. You get the associate pastor’s position over 4 white candidates based only on the ground that you are black even though the others were all far more qualified than you. This is Matt Chandler hiring a black man who scores lower in quality versus a white guy who scores slightly higher. The best candidate does not get the job. Do you think this helps or hurts the congregation? Does that sound anything like biblical restitution? The reason it don’t is because it isn’t. Not even close. The really big elephant in the room is the arrogance of these men who think they can tinker with God’s structure by adding their own criteria to the qualifications for an elder. This behavior is more than outrageous.

How does the board of a seminary repent of bad policies that are racist in nature? How does a church repent for such wickedness? They change the policy as well as their practice. An employer who becomes a Christian who had in the past not hired black employees for jobs has no obligation laid upon him by Christ to find all those he rejected and give them money or jobs. How he repents is that he now hires the best person for the job without regard for the level of melanin in their DNA going forward. That is how he repents. The seminary admits the best students in the same manner. And the church hires the best pastor in the same way. That is biblical repentance. Current men at SBTS have repudiated racist policies openly and publicly. Those policies have been changed for some time now. That is what it looks like when men correct wrongs. But now you see what racial reconciliation is mostly about: money. The cards are on the table, the truth has been exposed, the toothpaste is out of the tube. There are few things more repugnant than people insisting on being given something that they do not deserve on the basis that they share an accidental DNA trait with someone who was slighted decades, and in some cases, hundreds of years ago. There is nothing gracious, nothing humble, nothing loving, nothing forgiving, and therefore, nothing Christian about it.

^[1] I. Howard Marshall, The Gospel of Luke: A Commentary on the Greek Text, New International Greek Testament Commentary (Exeter: Paternoster Press, 1978), 698.

The Archdiocese of New York found molestation accusations against Archbishop Theodore McCarrick to be credible. On July 28, Pope Francis accepted his resignation as his molestation against both minors and adult seminarians came to light. Although a new case of abuse is about to break, the molestation originally in question was McCarrick’s rape of an altar boy at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in 1971 and 1972. Now, it seems that the Vatican is trying to paint the 1971-1972 abuse of the altar boy as “consensual.”

According to James Grein – another molestation victim of McCarrick – accusations of molestation against the first altar boy in ’71 and ’72 were dropped because according to him:

The credible evidence has been dropped because the altar boy went to St. Patrick’s Cathedral to solicit sex from McCarrick.

The altar boy in question was molested in the sacristy and lavatory of the cathedral before a Christmas Mass.

Grein, who is reporting the account of McCarrick molesting the altar boy consensually (according to Vatican investigators, not Grein), was baptized by McCarrick as an infant and then molested by him, beginning at age 11.

Because the here-to-fore unnamed altar boy from 1971-72 was 16, he was at the age of consent and the Romanists considered him a “consensual adult.” Homosexual sex in the church’s sacristy, notwithstanding.

Grein was molested regularly by McCarrick during Confession, which is taken more seriously by the Vatican than molestation or gay sex happening in the lavatory or sacristy (the priest’s dressing room). Because the other victim was 16 – and not 11 – and because it wasn’t in the confessional booth, it will likely not be followed-up by Vatican investigators.

[HT Lifesite News]

The Pope is as much of a Marxist as Tim Keller…and that’s saying something.

As if the Jesuit pontiff couldn’t make it any clearer, the Vatican News press outlet posted celebratory comments lauding Fidel Castrol and the 60th anniversary of Cuba’s Communist Revolution.

You remember Fidel Castro, right? According to university studies, the death toll from Castro’s politically-motivated murders of his own people range upward of 141 thousand. Tens and tens of thousands of political dissidents were thrown in prison. More than 2 million Cubans fled as political refugees. The commies used Castro’s island nation to point missiles at the United States. For the sake of “human flourishing,” the Castro regime was hardly a thing worth celebrating.

Leftists and communists around the world were congratulating Cuba on New Years Day for the 60th anniversary of their brutal regime, and the Vatican followed with its own congratulations.

The Vatican news post celebrated the victory of the Castros:

The historic anniversary was celebrated with an official ceremony in which the former head of state and leader of the Cuban Communist Party, Raúl Castro, and the current president of the nation, Miguel Díaz-Canel, participated.

And:

The Cuban Revolution celebrated its 60th anniversary this January 1, 2019. On the island, the historic anniversary was celebrated with a ceremony in Santiago de Cuba, in the cemetery of Santa Ifigenia, where Fidel Castro is buried, who died on November 25, 2016. To the main national forces on January 10, 1959, the dictator Fulgencio Batista fled 26 months of guerrilla war led by brothers Fidel and Raul Castro. From Santiago, Fidel Castro proclaimed the beginning of the revolution the victory of the counterculture.

The Vatican has been sympathetic with the Castro regime in Cuba since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, and with Cuba losing its financial and diplomatic backer, Castro had to turn to the Roman Catholic Church to replace Russia as their chief patron. Along with Francis’ well-documented Marxist beliefs, the celebration of the Communist Revolution in Cuba is just one more indication that the current Vatican is an enemy to both Democracy and Capitalism.

After outrage, the Vatican deleted the article and related posts, but not before people could screenshot them.

[World Magazine] Tired of bad news out of America’s courthouses? Worried that so many judges in those courthouses seem to have lost their way? Concerned that the religious liberty clause in our Bill of Rights means less and less in this terribly secular age?

Well, here’s a cheery note as the new year gets under way. A judge in Green Bay, Wis., ruled in December that churches—and other religious organizations as well—are free to preach and teach distinctives of their particular beliefs even if those beliefs might at first appear to be in conflict with local civic ordinances.

The specific issue before the court was this: The city of De Pere (a small Green Bay suburb of 23,000) a little more than a year ago had enacted several new nondiscrimination policies, typical of those adopted in recent years by local governments across the country.

Most controversial, of course, was the focus on gender issues—addressing gender identity and sexual orientation in housing, employment, advertising, and public accommodation. From the beginning, the city said that its policies applied to all “places of public accommodation”—and claimed that churches and other religious organizations were indeed such “places.”

The city’s attorneys argued that any time a church opens to the public, the city has the right to impose its own values on such a church.

But five De Pere churches, along with a local religious broadcaster, responded with an emphatic dissent. And they were willing to go to court to test the matter.

The appealing churches, and the broadcaster, argued that the city ordinance would forbid traditional and Biblical teaching on such issues— and thereby impose on their constitutionally protected freedom of speech. They argued as well that their hiring practices might be unduly restricted, and that they might be penalized in the future for refusing to host homosexual weddings or similar events.

The churches also emphasized that if it had been allowed to stand, the ordinance would be the first in America to deem churches as places of so-called “public accommodation.” The precedent might be enormous.

On the other hand, from their point of view, the city’s attorneys argued that any time a church opens to the public, outside its “traditional role as a house of worship,” the city has the right to impose its own values on such a church.

So what constituted “opening to the public”? The lawyers proposed a very broad measuring stick. One test, they suggested, might be whether a church allowed its facilities to be used as a polling place. That would stamp it as a “place of public accommodation.” Or if the members of the church got together to offer bottled water to runners in a marathon, that too would suggest they were a “public” outfit—and therefore subject to the controversial ordinance.

County Judge William Atkinson ruled otherwise. The judge made it clear that the De Pere city ordinance was an unconstitutional violation of the fundamental right of churches to be free from having to compromise their sincerely held religious beliefs due to edicts from government.

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Joel Belz and originally published at World Magazine]

In 2016, the New York Times ran an article about the 551 times Donald Trump had personally insulted people. It’s safe to say that since 2016, anyone trying to count Trump’s insults would have lost track. However, the insult he just gave new Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, in response to her using the “F-word” toward him, might be the most ruthless take-down that the POTUS has ever dropped on anyone. And, it just went over everyone’s head.

Tlaib, one of the first Muslim women elected to Congress, called for the impeachment of President Trump within hours of being sworn into office. The Muslim, representing a district in Michigan, said:

People love you and you win. And when your son looks at you and says, ‘Momma, look you won. Bullies don’t win.’ And I said, ‘Baby, they don’t, because we’re gonna go in there and we’re gonna impeach the mother****er.’

Aside from the sheer lack of civility from Tlaib, or the irony that rarely has Trump been so blunt or profane (the only time my memory serves Trump used that term was in reference to potential foreign enemies and not fellow Americans), or the irony that Tlaib’s comment is a perfect example of bullying speech, the way Trump responded to Tlaib is jaw-dropping if you consider his words.

Trump said in a press conference:

I thought her comments were disgraceful. She dishonored herself and dishonored her family. I think it was highly disrespectful to the United States of America.

Secularists see this comment at face-value as a random, milquetoast jab at Tlaib. It was not, and the comment demonstrates that Trump has a better grasp of Islam than most Americans.

Tlaib is Islamic. That’s her schtick. That’s why she was elected in Michigan’s 13th Congressional District. Her hatred for Trump is due to his defense of Western Culture, the War on Terror, and his proposed ban on immigration from terrorist nations (which happen to all be Islamic).

One of Islam’s core doctrinal teachings is that of honor and dishonor. These are the equivalent to Christians concepts of atonement or repentance; these are theologically loaded concepts. Anyone familiar with the Quran or Islamic culture would recognize this. Tlaib certainly recognizes this.

In Islam, the use of profanity is considered haram, or that which is forbidden by Islamic law.

In fact, Islamic writings say that to curse is to be “dishonored.”

ن الله حرم الجنه علی کل فحاش بدی قلیل الحیاء لایبال ما قال و لا ما قیل له (کافی، ج۲، ص۳۲۳؛ وسائل، ج۱۱، ص۳۲۹؛ تحف العقول، ص۴۱۶).

The punishment for dishonor for Islamic women is…death.

Furthermore, women who even speak sexually explicit things in Islam have dishonored themselves and their families and are, therefore, punishable by death. Surely Tlaib has crossed that threshold.

Although denied by sympathizers of Islam, there is no doubt of the correlation between so-called ‘honor-killings’ and followers of the Quran. In fact, Trump’s 2017 executive order was designed to track honor-killings among Islamic immigrants in the United States, because the offense is often swept under the rug as ordinary “domestic violence.”

In reality, honor killings and Islam go together like peanut butter and jelly.

Human Rights Watch defines “honor killing” as “acts of vengeance, usually death, committed by male family members against female family members, who are held to have brought dishonor upon the family.”

In Islamic culture, honor killings are carried out upon women who have “dishonored” their family by:

• adultery
• pre-marital sex
• speaking with an unrelated man
• refusal of forced marriage
• being a victim of rape
• speaking lewdly or in a sexually lascivious way in regard to sexual acts

In Islamic nations like Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Jordan, Syria, Libya, Kuwait, Yemen, Lebanon, Egypt, Sudan, the Gaza Strip, Tunisia, Pakistan, Nigeria and Somalia, legal action is typically not taken against the murderer carrying out the honor killing. In fact, even in relatively moderate Jordan, the penalty for an honor killing may be as low as six months in jail. In fact, in certain cases there is no penalty for an honor killing in Jordan, depending upon the reason (killing an adulterous woman has no penalty at all).

It’s hard to see the prevalency of honor killings in Islamic nations and argue it has nothing to do with Islam. But in fact, it does. Take for example this from Surah 4:15 of the Quran:

 If any of your women are guilty of lewdness, take the evidence of four (reliable) witness from amongst you against them; if they testify, confine them to houses until death do claim them. Or God ordain for them some (other) way.

While English renderings of this verse say “commit unlawful sexual intercourse,” the literal Arabic renderings say, “lewdness,” which would include less explicitly sexual acts, like perverted speech or crude behavior (most English renderings of the Quran censor the more extreme translation of the original tongue).

In short, what President Trump basically said was, “If this woman really wants to practice her religion, she should be confined to her house or put to death.”

Perhaps Trump’s understanding of Islam is deeper than what we might at first give credit. His insult truly was a mic-drop type of moment that flew over the heads of most Americans who are not as aware of the danger of radical Islam.

James Hamilton, Professor of Biblical Theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, recently preached from Harry Potter, the fictional children’s book about wizardry. The sermon was at Kenwood Baptist Church, which is also the church of Denny Burk, who serves as director for the Center for Gospel and Culture at the SBTS undergraduate school, Boyce College.

The church member states, “For you Potter fans…my pastor (and SBTS prof) had an evangelistic night where he explored the gospel connections imbedded in the framework of the Harry Potter world.”

Of course, there are no “gospel connections” in the Harry Potter world, because the Harry Potter world is a fictional work created by JK Rowling, who (depending upon which day you ask) is a nominal Christian, a former Christian, or an agnostic. When she announced that the main “wise mentor” character was a homosexual, it was said by a book critic:

My first response was, “Thank you, Lord,” because this helps us show others that these books should not be used in the churches to illustrate Christianity. Because Dumbledore has been revealed as a homosexual, it helps me communicate my message. It helps Christians who are concerned about the use of Harry Potter books in churches, because it makes it very clear that these books are not intended to be Christian, that Rowling isn’t speaking as a Christian. She has introduced values that are contrary to the Biblical message.

And yet, for some reason, Christians who feel like the Bible doesn’t contain enough stories to get its point across have been drawing from Harry Potter for years.

Pulpit & Pen first covered Baptists’ infatuation with preaching from Harry Potter on November 22, 2013, in the article Finding Theology in the Hunger Games and Harry Potter. We pointed out that the then-2nd VP of the SBC, Jared Moore (a SBTS student), had written an entire book devoted to creating a Bible study out of Harry Potter.

What’s sad about this SBTS seminary professor preaching from Harry Potter instead of the Bible is that it’s patronizing to the church, assuming the crowd was Christian. That believers have to be patronized this way and spoken to like eight-year-olds is pathetic. But if the crowd was believed to be primarily lost (it was an “evangelism night”) then it says something even sadder about the state of affairs in Christianity. It says that a SBTS professor and his church don’t believe the Scripture is sufficient to make one born-again, but that it has to be jazzed up by crappy 21st Century children’s fiction. Either way, it shows that Jim Hamilton and others either don’t fully hope for the maturity of fellow Christians or they don’t fully believe in the power of the Holy Scripture to do the work of the Holy Spirit.

When Paul briefly referenced Greek poetry at Mars Hill, he did so to eviscerate it and lift it to scorn, showing its inconsistencies. This is far different from heralding a work of literature whose author and substance stands opposed to the God of Scripture. In short, what Hamilton was doing by invoking Harry Potter was precisely the opposite of what Paul was doing by invoking the work of Aratus.

Another danger behind this type of fiction-preaching is that it can send the message to the less-discerning that the Bible, like Harry Potter, is fiction. After all, if you can extrapolate some spiritual truths from fiction, how do we know the Bible isn’t similarly fiction? Our hope and trust rests not on fiction, but on the historic facts of time and space set forth in the Holy Book.

Then, there’s the apparent danger of treating wizardry and sorcery as mere fantasy. Of this concern, volumes have been written and largely ignored by Christians immersed in pop culture. What separates witches, wizardry, and sorcery from other fantastical topics like zombies, vampires and werewolves is that the latter is pure fiction but the Bible affirms the existence of the former. The Scripture speaks of witchcraft as a real manifestation of satanic power and demands Christians set themselves apart from it (Exodus 22:18, Deuteronomy 18:19-22, Revelation 21:8, etc). Whereas some might lift up CS Lewis’ Chronicles as a precedent of fantastical Christian story-telling (and Lewis is hardly the standard of orthodoxy), the difference is that in Harry Potter the protagonist is a wizard and not the antagonist. Making a hero out of a wizard, rather than a villain, seems to be a twist of Biblical ethics. While contemporary Christians may laugh at our concerns as hopelessly “fundamentalist,” we argue that preaching from a children’s storybook about a heroic witch and likening him to Jesus is hopelessly idiotic.

Finally, this is a terrible example to those in the pews, especially SBTS students who aspire to be preachers of God’s Word. Eisegesis – or adding our viewpoints into Scripture instead of deriving our viewpoints from Scripture – isn’t bad only when it is done to Scripture. Like all matters of ethics, morals are universal. Reading into someone’s work is wrong whether it is the Bible, the United States Constitution or even Harry Potter. Ignoring authorial intent is not a virtue, but a vice. When reading any work of literature, whether divine or terrestrial, the reader should have the utmost concern for what the author meant when he wrote it.

Finding “Gospel themes” in secular fictional literature is eisegesis that doesn’t need to be commended or copied.

Trinity Bible Presbyterian Church, outside a Northern California town named Weed, posted a phrase on its marquee sign that reads, “Bruce Jenner is still a man. Homosexuality is still sin. The culture may change. The Bible does not.”

Cue the outrage.

Not everyone in Siskiyou County was pleased with the sign. A local NBC affiliate reported on the incident and the ensuing protests, quoting the organizer of the protest, Charolette Kalyjian:

Keep it in your church. If it’s not something hopeful for the community, if it’s not loving, keep it in your church,” said Charolette Kalayjian, the organizer for the protest. “Keep it in your house. Keep it – don’t share it with everybody.

Of course, the First Amendment does not quarantine First Amendment rights to within the four walls of the church building.

The reputation of Pastor Hoke, with whom Pulpit & Pen is familiar, precedes him as one who will most certainly not “keep it in [his] house and not “share it with everybody.”

The protest organizer said, “I just want to show that this community is loving, is caring, is supportive and we are not – that sign does not encompass what this community is and I really want to show that.”

Apparently, she wants to show the world that the community doesn’t tolerate diverse points of view and will silence dissent by protest. That’s hardly the ethos of an open-minded community.

See the video here.

Although the word “hateful” was used repeatedly by protestors, it is unclear as to what precisely about the sign was characteristic of hate. It’s worth noting that the protestors aren’t on record disagreeing with the facts set forth by the sign, but only alleged that stating it was hateful.

Pulpit & Pen reached out to Pastor Hoke, who estimated the protestors at less than one-hundred when church began. He also alleges that instead of simply reporting the news, the local newspaper actually helped to organize the protest.

Hoke also clarified the biased-nature of the reporting as done by NBC, stating, “The NBC news guy asked me why I hated homosexuals. And then edited my response to make it sound like I was saying I thought it was offensive for people to say the sign was hateful. While I affirm that the sign is a clear declaration of truth and as such identifies sin, as sin and is a warning and call to repentance, I am not offended by those who hate the truth calling the truth hate. I was offended by the NBC news personality assuming my motives for putting up the sign were hatred.”

Hoke pointed Pulpit & Pen to his sermon on Sunday in which he explained the real reason for the sign, which has yet to be fully covered by the conventional local media.

You can listen to Hoke’s Sunday sermon, Love Warns, here. To follow Hoke on Facebook or to send him words of encouragement, click here.

[Editor’s Note: We will not “keep it in our church.” FYI.]

A one-eyed mutant calf was born in West Benghal in India, and Hindus are now worshipping it as a god.

The one-eyed calf can be seen in a video, also born without a muzzle, barely able to grasp for air and pathetically sticking out its tongue in exasperation. The disorder is called cyclopia, which is a a congenital disorder that occurs in mammals in which both sides of the brain do not form properly.

According to the Daily Mail, locals believe the “miracle calf” is a god.

The Russian Orthodox “Pope” is warning that smart phones will be a tool fo the antichrist to control people.

The Russian Orthodox Church, known as the Moscow Patriarchate, is an autocephalous division of the Eastern Orthodox Church. The Eastern Orthodox Church has many of the same idolatries and heresies of the Roman Catholic Church, but additionally deny Penal Substitution and Propitiation. In short, Russian Orthodox and Eastern Orthodox believers are not Christians because they do not trust in the Gospel. Unlike the Papists of Rome, the Eastern Orthodox church does not submit to a singular “Pope,” but numerous “Patriarchs” in one of its 15 autocephalous Churches.

The Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, whose given name is Vladimir Mikhailovich Gundyayev, says the modern technological innovation of the cellular smartphone will lead to the rise and reign of the antichrist.

Speaking to Russian media outlet, Rossia-1 TV, Kirill said, “Control from a single point is a harbinger of the coming of the Antichrist.”

He continued, “The Antichrist is a personality that will be at the head of the world wide web controlling the entire human race. Thus, the structure itself presents a danger.”

Kirill claims that diversifying ownership and operation of the Internet will help delay the Man of Sin and Son of Perdition as prophesied in the Holy Scripture.

The church leader stressed that “if we don’t want to bring the apocalypse closer, there should be no single [control and access] center.”

Ironically, Protestants consider Popes (particularly the Pope of Rome, but to a lesser extent, anyone who promotes a false gospel and usurp’s Christ authority as head of the church) to be the antichrist.

[HT: The Moscow Times]

[Christian News Network] FORT WORTH, Texas — The leader of a professed church in Texas affiliated with Steven Anderson’s Faithful Word Baptist Church in Arizona, who spoke positively of the deaths of 49 people in the 2016 Pulse homosexual nightclub massacre, has resigned after admitting to being involved with prostitutes, gambling and drugs.

Donnie Romero, who led Stedfast Baptist Church in Fort Worth, announced his resignation before his congregation last week. The video of his tearful statement was posted publicly to the Stedfast Baptist YouTube page on Jan. 2.

“I haven’t been ruling my house well. [I’ve] been a terrible husband and father,” he said. “[I’m] the one at fault in this situation. My wife and my kids, they’re not to blame.”

“I’m very sorry for the hurt this may cause people, the discouragement. I’m so sorry,” Romero stated. “I love you guys. I wish I wouldn’t have let it get to this point.”

Anderson spoke following the announcement, outlining that Romero is disqualified from leadership, and asked those gathered not to “rub his nose” in the matter or to attempt to contact Romero’s wife to obtain the details of the situation.

However, he also published a separate video to his personal YouTube channel the following day, outlining that “the major sin involved was being with prostitutes, and then there [was] marijuana and gambling that were also discovered.”

Anderson said that he did not provide the information during the service, in part, because Romero’s wife and children were present, and he also wanted to give the people an opportunity to process the initial “bombshell.”C

But he outlined that he believed “the right thing to do” was to be transparent about the matter because Romero was in a “public position of trust.”

“I found out about it on Monday, and I confronted him and intervened and then basically stepped in and tried to help the church get through this,” Anderson further outlined to the Star-Telegram. “Churches frequently just cover things up. That is wrong. It’s sad how it makes Christianity look bad and Baptists look bad, but it’s not right to cover this up.”

All videos featuring Romero, other than his resignation, have been removed from Stedfast Baptist’s YouTube channel. Recent video clips had been entitled “Who Will Be Thrown Out of Church,” “Rejoicing Over the Death of the Wicked,” “Destroyed by Manipulation” and “Jezebel and the Feminist.”

Romero had been interviewed in 2016 by local television station Fox4 over concerns relating to remarks expressing satisfaction with the deaths of homosexuals killed in the Pulse nightclub massacre, and his wish that more would die.

“These 50 sodomites are all perverts and pedophiles, and they are the scum of the earth, and the earth is a little better place now,” Romero said. “And I’ll even take it a step further ’cause I heard on the news today that there are still several dozen of these [bleeped out] in ICU, in intensive care, and I will pray to God like I did this morning—I will do it again tonight—I will pray that God will finish the job that man started.”

When interviewed about the matter, he held to his stance, stating that he believes all homosexuals are pedophiles.

“Just like if there is a building that had a bunch of rapists, or a bunch of evil, murderous people, and the building collapsed on them or something happened where they were all killed, I don’t think that is something we should mourn over because they are evil people,” Romero said.

To continue reading, click here…

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Heather Clark and first published at Christian News Network, title changed by P&P]

[Daily Herald] Harvest Bible Chapel says it’s dropping its defamation lawsuit against three critics after a Cook County judge Monday ruled against the church’s request to keep some documents private.

The church announced the move on its website, harvestbiblechapel.org.

The message, ascribed to the Executive Committee of Elders, said the judge’s decision was unexpected. The church had asked in December for discovery to be stayed until the judge ruled on the defendants’ motions to dismiss the case, because the defendants were publishing some of the materials their lawyers had received.

Alternatively, it asked the court to order the materials be kept temporarily from public view.

“Recent events have made it clear that any further private content subpoenaed from third and fourth parties will likely be publicized online,” the elders posted.

“The result is that even if we filed a motion to reconsider, even if we amended the complaint to exclude private matters sensitive to some third parties, the court appears unwilling to protect our many friends, including those with whom we seek to reconcile.

“In good conscience we cannot knowingly subject innocent people, in many instances against their will, to a full subpoena process.”

Harvest sued Julie Roys of Carol Stream, Ryan and Melinda Mahoney of Wheaton, and Scott and Sarah Bryant of Geneva in October. Ryan Mahoney and Scott Bryant write TheElephantsDebt.com website, and Roys is a freelance writer on Christianity, a blogger and a former radio show host.

Melinda Mahoney and Sarah Bryant were included because, the suit said, they provided computers and internet service to The Elephant’s Debt.

The suit accused The Elephant’s Debt of conducting an “ongoing campaign of harassment” and publishing defamatory statements that painted MacDonald in a false light. It said the publication constituted commercial disparagement, interfering in the business of the church — namely, persuading people to become faithful Christians.

Roys in particular possessed subpoenaed records, including items from former workers and elders, about how the church handled reports that one of its youth ministers was sending sexually explicit photos and requests to minors. The minister was charged in October with misdemeanor sexual exploitation of a minor, and disorderly conduct, in Kane County circuit court. The case is pending.

The Elephant’s Debt has criticized the church’s founding pastor, senior pastor James S. MacDonald; his treatment of employees and elders; its finances; and its relationship with Harvest Bible Fellowship, an organization of churches it had founded worldwide. The Mahoneys and Bryants are former members.

Monday night, Scott Bryant said he was not surprised by the ruling, “mostly because it (the request) is pre-emptive. It is hard to shut down free speech,” He suspected Harvest would quickly drop the suit.

“I am in no way surprised at the results,” Ryan Mahoney said.

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Susan Sarkauskas and originally published at Daily Herald]

John Gray is the high-rolling pastor who’s heavily associated with Joel Osteen and Oprah, who made headlines in recent weeks for bizarre behavior. First, he told church members to come up and pilfer the offering plates. Second, he gave his wife a Lamborgini. Third, he confessed to having cheated on his wife, with the car seemingly given as a make-up gift. Now, the pastor is claiming that the criticism is driving him to contemplate suicide and Modalist prosperity preacher, TD Jakes, has come to exorcize from him the demon of suicide.

Many critics of Gray have “put two and two together” and view Gray’s claims of suicidal thoughts to be a manipulative public relations stunt to silence critics who might feel preemptively guilty should the man kill himself.

Gray said:

I literally thought about how I could end my life and still get to Heaven and somehow my kids would not be scarred but there was no way I could figure out how to do it. And I’m not the only person that thought about that. I’m not the only person the devil attacked in that are.

However, on Saturday during a special leadership training at First Baptist Church of Glenarden, TD Jakes showed up to rehabilitate the adulterous and Mammon-worshipping pastor. According to the video (below), Jakes revealed via special revelation that a “Spirit of Suicide” was still lurking in Gray’s home and he rebuked it away.

What you just witnessed was Kabuki theater, a choreographed play in which each actor knows their part and acts as expected. A high profile prosperity preacher was caught fornicating with a mistress amidst a scandal caused by his own insanely self-unaware display of lascivious materialism. The “rain maker” voodoo doctor – or “Apostle” and “Bishop” in this case – then comes to expunge the preacher of his sin and restore him to leadership without any tangible, real, or lasting signs of visible repentance.

In a display that was perfectly predictable, Jakes laid his hands on Gray’s head and shouted at supposed “suicide spirits” (PS that’s not a thing) – thereby laying the fault on the devil rather than on the devilish preacher – and Gray convulses on the floor, shielding his face from discerning glances as he fakes some kind of emotional response.

John Gray – at this point – acknowledges himself to be (1) an adulterer (2) suicidal (3) oppressed by demons. Add “lustful for greedy lucre” on top of that.

He’ll be in the pulpit this Sunday preaching because charismatic doctrine teaches the concept of an “anointing” that is bestowed by Apostles and granted by the Holy Spirit to men, almost entirely independent of their qualifications.

The Holy Bible teaches no such thing.

[Editor’s Note: Please keep in mind that TD Jakes was embraced as a brother in Christ by James MacDonald, Mark Driscoll, and others at Elephant Room 2.0. They’ve yet to repent of that.]

“You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth.” Exodus 20:4

This post is the twenty-third in a series that addresses a list of “40 Harmful Effects of Christianity” that originated on the American Atheists Facebook page and has since made its way around the internet. In this post, I examine the following “harmful effect” from the list:

Harmful Effect #23: The destruction of great works of art considered to be pornographic/blasphemous, and the persecution of the artists.

As is the case with the previous “harmful effect” addressed in this series, this particular harmful effect is not limited to Christianity. History is replete with notable examples of the destruction of art by fascist (e.g., Nazis), communist, and Muslim groups. Certainly, communists wouldn’t destroy art because it was “blasphemous” given that communists are inherently atheistic. However, communist China has outlawed what it deems to be pornography since 1945. So, even by narrowing down the destruction of art to reasons of pornography and blasphemy, the atheist author(s) of this list can’t limit those destroying art for any particular reason related to Christianity. Once again, he has merely pointed out a tendency of humanity that is not unique to Christianity and would, in all likelihood, exist without it.

Furthermore, his claim is feeble by its very nature. Beauty, it is often said, “is in the eye of the beholder.” What is a “great” work of art in the opinion of one may be terribly lacking in the eye of another. At best, the author can lament “the destruction of works of art that some people think is great yet is not esteemed by others.  More succinctly it’s, “Somebody else did something I don’t like to something that I did.”  To this harmful effect, the Christian critic can curtly respond, “boo-hoo.”

Ultimately, Christians can, along with all others, recognize that aesthetic judgments about art are entirely subjective. However, the pinnacle of moral judgment is grounded in the nature of God.  There are things, such as blasphemy, that God has expressly forbidden. The destruction of blasphemous and pornographic works of art is a God-honoring action, despite the objections of those who don’t fear the Lord. At the same time, the art produced by Christians can be aesthetically pleasing, even to those outside of the faith, while objectively respectful to God’s moral demands.

In my next post in this series, I’ll address the following:

Harmful Effect #24: Slavery condoned by religious texts.

*Please note that the preceding is my personal opinion. It is not necessarily the opinion of any entity by which I am employed, any church at which I am a member, any church which I attend, or the educational institution at which I am enrolled. Any copyrighted material displayed or referenced is done under the doctrine of fair use.

Pulpit & Pen has been threatened to be sued hundreds of times. Greg Locke, Clayton Jennings, Jonathan Cahn, Perry Noble, and many more, have threatened to sue us and, in some cases, sent us cease-and-desist letters, which we ignore (or post them online, because they’re funny).

P&P has ruined careers by doing nothing but basic journalism, finding a niche in religious news reporting in a world where Christian media rarely publish hard-hitting, independent and investigative reporting. This occasionally makes famous Christian celebrites (or institutions) really, really angry.

Why have we never been sued, however? It’s very simple. When you sue someone for libel, then the burden of proof is on the plaintiff to demonstrate that your accusations are false (and for civil litigation, usually that they were intentionally false with intent to harm, an almost impossible hill to climb). Because of this, in order to make a proper defense, the defendant (the journalists in this scenario) have the right to make discovery of evidence and are given the power to subpoena witnesses.

The power of discover and subpoena in a libel lawsuit would turn any decent journalist into the absolute worst nightmare for a scoundrel with something to hide. In short, if the scoundrel thought the journalist was bad before, just wait until they can have the subpoena power and start dragging out evidence – on the record – in a court of law.

On certain occasions, Pulpit & Pen has hoped that we would be sued in order to have access to information we didn’t previously have, assured that the court process would allow us unprecedented access to the truth.

However, of all the charlatan careers we have destroyed, not a single person has had an attorney who thought it was a good idea to sue us even though the tangible financial costs have exceeded tens of millions of dollars. In short, there just hasn’t been someone dumb enough to try to sue us for exercising our First Amendment right of truth-telling.

The only time we have seen anyone, perhaps drunk on their own perceived invincibility caused by insulation within their influence bubble, sue anyone for truth-telling speech is Ergun Caner’s lawsuit of two bloggers, which were dismissed with extreme prejudice and he had to pay attorney fees. The judges in those two cases very evidently thought Caner was out-of-his-mind for even thinking his lawsuit could be successful.

The lawsuit from James MacDonald against Julie Roys and a few bloggers (and their wives) caught my attention, then. It is rare – extremely rare – for someone to attempt what MacDonald attempted. It is rare because it is so stupid. What MacDonald and Caner both have in common is within their own little empires, they were unconquerable and unquestionable. The delusion married to that mirage of power apparently left both men with the impression that the secular courts would support their attempt to silence the press. Both men were wrong.

MacDonald and Harvest Bible Chapel asked that records of discovery be sealed and the judge gave the predictable equivalent of “Lol, no.” Even though they claimed to have nothing to hide, with the prospect of their transgressions becoming public, MacDonald and his church dropped their lawsuit.

So then, the blog that became the legal target of silence and intimidation on the part of MacDonald, The Elephant’s Debt, ran a stinging open letter to MacDonald after he and Harvest Bible Church decided to drop the lawsuit. We wanted to share it as a warning to any other “Christian” leader who thinks they can use the American courts against the press.

From The Elephant’s Debt…

Dear James MacDonald and Elders of Harvest Bible Chapel:

Last night, on the 7th of January, you announced to the congregation and to the broader, watching evangelical community that you intended to drop the lawsuit that you have collectively brought against Julie Roys, the authors of this blog and the authors’ wives.   In that statement, you said:

We remain willing to meet with the defendants for a face-to-face resolution of grievances, and we covet [the congregations’] prayers.

Please allow us to begin by stating that we are relieved that you may be returning to a path of wisdom as opposed to pursuing a path of folly by dropping this lawsuit that you filed against the five defendants in this case.  This is a good and necessary first step towards your stated goal of a “face-to-face resolution of grievances.”

However, as you, James, have so often taught in the past, resolution and reconciliation means far more than merely offering words.  It requires concrete acts of repentance that demonstrate the fruit of the spirit and the sincerity of the words beings offered.  To that end, we would like to suggest a small series of public – not private – acts that you could take that would genuinely help move your audience to honestly reassess your character and motivations.

1. Contact your friends at Christianity Today and secure space in their upcoming publication for at least one more op-ed.  In this op-ed, you will publicly confess to the fact that you consistently lied to your congregation, regularly asserting that you were suing three defendants.  You need to further admit that at every opportunity you had to speak about this lawsuit publicly, you failed to acknowledge that you had sued Sarah Bryant and Melinda Mahoney, our two respective wives.  Setting aside, for a moment, whether you were on “biblical” grounds to sue us for what we had written, you know as well as we do that you had neither the “biblical” nor the legal grounds to sue these women.  Your collective decision as the elders and pastor of this church to include these two women in the lawsuit testifies to only one thing: you sought to bring fear and chaos into our families in the hopes of silencing your critics.  And neither the Bible nor the law allows you to use people in this manner.  So you will apologize for suing them, for lying to your congregation repeatedly and for lying to the broader evangelical community. 
2. In the same op-ed that we have encouraged you to write above, you will admit that you have lied about three of the defendants in this lawsuit.  Julie Roys has outlined for you her particular concerns which you can read about on her blog.  As for the authors of this blog, you have lied about us in different ways. In the complaint you filed in Cook County court, you have publicly asserted that Scott Bryant became “divisive after being declined a teaching opportunity that he repeatedly pursued.”  As you well know, Scott never pursued an official position at Harvest as he was gainfully employed in a field he loved.  As to Ryan Mahoney, your public statements are even more egregious.  You have stated that Ryan was “disciplined on three separate occasions while he was a teacher at Harvest Christian Academy for negating James S. MacDonald’s sermons.”  Moreover, you stated that in 2010, these disciplinary actions “resulted in the decision not to renew his teaching contract, at which time he immediately ceased church attendance and began circulating false and discrediting information” about MacDonald.   First, Ryan Mahoney was never disciplined for any reason at any time during his four year tenure at Harvest Christian Academy (HCA).  Second, Ryan and his family left HBC in the spring of 2010 very quietly and continued to teach at HCA the following year while attending other local churches in the area.  It was your decision to require that all teachers become members of HBC in order to remain employed by the school that forced the Mahoney family to reject your two separate contract offers in 2011.  So here is what you need to do.  You need to admit that you lied about these matters and apologize to all three defendants; and you need to mail a unadulterated copy of Ryan Mahoney’s employment file from HCA to his attorney’s office by the end of January 2019. 
3. You need to recognize the fact that you have cost five defendants time, money and consternation.  In addition to that, we have been forced to reach out to a larger audience asking them to help us as we sought to pay our legal bills during this unnecessarily damaging lawsuit.  Therefore, you will need to publicly announce that you are going to pay our legal fees for any and all bills pertaining to this suit (and to the Allstate coverage suit) that we submit to you; and that this payment will be rendered in full within 30 days of receiving each bill that is sent to you.  The funds that you reimburse us will be used to repay our generous donors who stood beside us throughout this affair.

As we said above, this is a reasonable first step in the process of beginning to prove your collective sincerity as you seek to once again reassure your congregation that you desire a “resolution of grievances.”  This should not, however, be read as an exhaustive list.  But barring these public acts of contrition, please understand that your words will not be received as anything other than another cynical ploy to manage your public image.

Sincerely,
   Scott Bryant
   Ryan Mahoney

[Editor’s Note: HT The Elephant’s Debt]

Martin Luther King denied the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, the resurrection of Christ, and the inerrancy of Scripture. On top of that, Luther was a sex-trafficking bisexual and whoremonger. Usually, when Christians – like the ELRC and The Gospel Coalition – promote this lost man it’s because of his contributions to racial equality. One university – affiliated with the United Methodist Church – will use MLK Day this year to promote Luther’s contributions to sexual immorality.

The llinois Wesleyan University will celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. day with a gender identity “teach-in” on January 21. The university is affiliated with the United Methodist Church and it will have two primary speakers, Charlene Carruthers – a “black, queer feminist community organizer” – and an LGBT activist named Dave Bentlin, who is president of Prairie Pride Coalition. 

The event will end with a “session on gender identity and human rights” led by the IWU Pride Alliance. The theme of the event, according to a university news release, is “gender and social justice.” In other words, it sounds like the agenda of The Gospel Coalition, the ERLC, and 9Marx. Frankly, it sounds like the agenda of at least three speakers at this year’s Shepherd’s Conference.

According to Campus Reform…

Carruthers, who received IWU’s Outstanding Young Alumna Award in 2017, authored the book Unapologetic: A Black, Queer, and Feminist Mandate for Radical Movements, which was released in August. 

“Drawing on Black intellectual and grassroots organizing traditions, including the Haitian Revolution, the U.S. civil rights movement, and LGBTQ rights and feminist movements, Unapologetic challenges all of us engaged in the social justice struggle to make the movement for Black liberation more radical, more queer, and more feminist,” a description of the book on Carruthers’ website reads.

Last year, in 2018, Florida State University used MLK Day as a reason to invite a member of the Communist Party to address the students and promote “civil rights.”

[Editor’s Note: HT Campus Reform]

One of the most respected and longest-tenured professors in the Southern Baptist Convention recently wrote a letter defending the Southwest Baptist University professor who was fired for caring about sound doctrine.

We previously brought to your attention the firing of Professor Bass, who was canned by Southwest Baptist University for even questioning whether or not a school dean and a few other faculty members were annihilationists and inclusivists. Despite their explicit denials afterward, Rodney Reeves and Zach Mannis are on audio espousing these heretical doctrines, and so it’s pretty hard at this point to deny. University president, Eric Turner, demanded to see Bass’ personal diary in which he detailed their heresies with documentation, and then fired him for “undermining the integrity of the institution.”

We then explained that in response to the outrage and an online petition demanding Bass be rehired, President Turner and the trustees passed the buck of responsibility to an outside panel (are they not capable of knowing the difference between heresy and orthodoxy?) to David Dockery, who is an ecumenist who considers Roman Catholics to be believers. In that post, we explained that this would be a kangaroo court and the outcome predetermined.

Bass continues to receive support from those concerned with orthodoxy, and perhaps the most notable (and respected) defender is Tom Nettles, a longtime SBTS professor (back before they became the hotbed of social justice liberalism) and Southern Baptist historian who is old enough to remember the Conservative Resurgence during his prime.

You can read Nettles’ letter below, or click here for the pdf.

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Dr. Nettles’ letter speaks for itself and it was blistering, but polite.

By the way, I’d give somebody else’s left arm to find out what Nettles meant by Bass’ “involvement in a meddlesome congregation.” It sounds like maybe his church didn’t “know their place” in the scheme of things. If only I knew the details.

[Contributed by JD Hall]

PS. A reader sent us the following, regarding the “meddlesome congregation comment.” You can see the full pdf here. Take time to read the whole thing. SBU is a doctrinal cesspool, complete with a top-scum of cover-up.