“You shall not have in your bag two kinds of weights, a large and a small. You shall not have in your house two kinds of measures, a large and a small. A full and fair weight you shall have, a full and fair measure you shall have, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. For all who do such things, all who act dishonestly, are an abomination to the LORD your God.” Deuteronomy 25:13-16
A dishonest man spreads strife, and a whisperer separates close friends. Proverbs 16:28
Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear. For your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies; your tongue mutters wickedness. No one enters suit justly; no one goes to law honestly; they rely on empty pleas, they speak lies, they conceive mischief and give birth to iniquity. Isaiah 59:1-4
Jesus, concluding the ‘Sermon on the Mount,’ (Matthew 7:24-25) said to put His words into practice so that when trouble comes your house will stand because it has been built upon the rock. Now we need to understand the meaning of what Jesus said. Why is it that if the words are so simple, why do we have so much disagreement about what the ‘right way’ is? The religious answer would likely be that the ‘right way’ is obvious, and those who ask such questions lack faith. Okay. Here is what is ‘obvious’ to me.
Trump is the untouchable icon of the Christian Right. Even now, as Putin’s madness and murder ravages the lives of millions, our politicians still fear crossing Trump in his praise of Putin (He just doesn’t approve of the war, and claims that if it weren’t for the stolen election this wouldn’t be happening—eyes roll…) The reason for this is simple—the power, votes, fund-raising, the culture, belongs to Trump inc. The Christians have been very supportive even the shadow of the January 6th coup attempt. (There may be a crack in the armor though…)
I’ve heard that democrats want to destroy the country in a myriad of ways; perhaps especially by bringing up past injustices that the diminishing white majority does not wish to look at. What really is the issue is one of power and authority. I recently heard a sermon on ‘Practical Teaching’ which concluded, very assuredly, that if one leaves church angry, one is just rebelling against the conviction of the Holy Spirit. What confidence in your authority pastor! But this is just a posture which has been handed down to us since humans have been humans and accelerated with the birth of mass Christian media. This mass media environment creates the hierarchal context in which all teaching takes place.
In the American view of things, bigness, success, power, in the context of ‘in-God-we-trust,’ is seen as having the blessings of God. Pat Robertson and numerous other pioneers (riding the wave of eschatological speculations) amassed money and power to evangelize—the way in which they did it is pedagogical. One uses money as the means (power) to serve the interests of God. (Remember what Jesus said about God and money?) Pyramids are erected, certain rings need to be kissed, to work your way up the ladder. The corporate world works much the same as the church. Since this ‘health-and-wealth,’ dare I say, ‘me’ centered approach, dominates as the ‘Right Way,’ preachers like Joel Osteen can deliver pretty much the same sermon, from any text in the Bible, to grow your faith big to receive God’s blessing. Littler guys must not cross the big boys too much if you’re going to put butts in the seats and money in collection plate. Our obsession with superstars, secular and sacred, is obvious to this malcontent. Celebrity endorsements are a powerful thing.
Our teachers tell us that knowledge is consigned to the pharisees who would like nothing more than to saddle the poor with heavy loads comprised of empty rules. How clever. Faith is separated from knowledge as it is held up as the virtue. As the practice of intellectual scrutiny is diminished, the dominance of the culture which feeds on the faithful thrives—leaving the faithful ill equipped to bring up the question of what Jesus meant when He talked about serving God and money. The connection in the sermon about practical teaching completely divorced the concept of authority (which as the Creator—Jesus has) and what the pharisees were doing which was just making stuff up so they could be the authority having respect and admiration of the faithful. Same thing happening today.
We are so caught up with money and power as a means of doing God’s will, we will look the other way from obvious dishonesty and fraud. This comes back to the Christian Icon, Trump, and how such a bad man could have amassed such devotion. The cognitive dissonance is astounding; most of the Republicans side with Ukraine yet still back the man who praises Putin as a brilliant leader. He lies, cheats, hides, steals without regard for the discord he sows or the people he hurts. When he praises a bloodthirsty dictator who is doing something most Republicans do not like, I can only come to conclude that people who freely empower Trump want a dictator themselves. The Bible has been and is used to endorse slavery. If one gives the dictator what he wants, he or she will not incur the wrath of God’s hand on earth—and may even be richly blessed with power and money yourself. If you question this, or point out the dissonance, you are faithless and disobedient.
We have lost our way. What is obvious to me is not at all obvious to millions. Who is right?
I’m not going to trust in ‘chariots and horses.’ I will keep believing that it is not okay, at all, to endorse a liar and an obviously morally vacuous man as ‘our’ champion. I believe no one is above the law—and that the legal system for the rich is structured in such a way that justice can be delayed for as long as one has the resources to tie things up. I remember all the Bible has to say about people who claim to speak for God making predictions that don’t come true. But despite all this, all the dirty tricks, all the lies, all the endorsement of brutality, the democrats are worse for wanting to talk about systemic injustice. We believe swimming in the cesspool our lords have engineered for us to swim in is, all the mudslinging about this and that (as I’m slinging as well,) if not a holy thing, the expedient thing to do in service to God. We cannot see the mess we are in because we cannot see for the firehose of bullshit being blasted in our faces every day. What is obvious is not obvious.
Our pharisees, our religious lords, have taught us to not think, but to do what you are told to do by those duly blessed to issue marching orders. The worldly philosophers do not see this as love, but rather it is antithetical to the Christian message—which is love. Millions are falling away from the faith, the house is crumbling, and Christians do not understand why. It’s just the ‘forces of Satan’ and the wickedness which is the faithful explanation—our failure to yield to proper guidance. Love is supposed to transcend all this, to seek to understand and be understood, for this is what create connections between people—this shows another human being their worth. Isn’t the central message of the Bible that God worked painstakingly to reveal Himself (even appealing to reason—Isaiah 1:18) to His creatures? Why then will not even consider the notion that there are many wrongs that need to be talked about.
This is related to all the cover-ups so common in the Christian world. It is unacceptable to not do everything in your power to avoid the appearance of evil. Stuff gets out; and when it does come out, often because the seculars revealed the truth, the damage is immense. Cover-ups are some of the evilest things that Christians do. This is what all the hullabaloo about social justice is about. Christians deny, but the truth is getting out—making the church appear to be evil, patriarchal, and authoritarian in the eyes of many. Christians fight back by pointing out all the libertine sex stuff in our society, name your own hated perversion, while creating a culture where in abuse cases the assumption of benefit lies with religious authority (or those who the authorities have given a mulligan—or two, or three, or as many as necessary.) Dangerous predators are protected as women and children who are actively taught that those in authority are their protectors thus denying them a voice, all to avoid the appearance of evil and to forward a vision of utopia of peace and plenty to the world as witness of our ‘truth.’ This does not add up to the worldly philosophers as equal love for all.
It is time for confession and a serious reckoning with what we’ve been taught as being obvious. All the ‘signs’ say the Christian Right’s reliance on power, it’s protection of criminals, it’s maintenance of oppressive hierarchies which leaves millions without a voice, leaves a serious impression of corruption upon the outsider. It is truth which sets us free. But if we choose to remain obstinate to not question what we’ve been taught we will cleverly invent various schemes to place the blame elsewhere turning the whole mess into a culture war.
We are told that ‘love covers a multitude of sins’ (1 Peter 4:8) yet the Church’s finger pointing about the sins of the world is biting them hard—because it is hypocritical. We’ve created a theology which supposes the evidence to salvation be adherence to certain ‘norms.’ The book ‘White Too Long’ gives an ugly look at those norms which are the very kind of things the conduits of God’s power on earth would very much like to leave submerged. Salvation is not found in following rules, it is found in loving truth and in loving period. The truth is that everyone is equal, everyone deserves a voice, and everyone should be afforded the dignity of a reasoned argument to this or that position. A primary undermining of the Christian witness to the world involves the white churches view that it is their culture which will bring salvation to the world. The ‘others’ ought to be grateful for our benevolence. This is screwed up to the core.
Offering an alternative to this view, the very act of listening is an act of love. But we don’t listen, we tell. The very act of hashing out differences, admitting to being wrong, trying to understand, is love. Covering up, saying there is little to forgive, is not. Salvation is not found in human condemnation; conviction is the Spirit’s job. It is what is in the heart that matters, mere appearances are illusory. It is not might which saves but love.
What is love? You know the list. Do we practice the list? (1 Corinthians 13.) Do we love what is noble and pure? (Philippians 4:8) I’d say if we did, we’d avoid hitching our wagons to political fortunes and to amoral liars like the Trumps. But then I’m a divider as well (Titus 3:10.) Now we circle right back around to who is right. Truth is at the very center of the conflict. Traps, false dilemmas, and other modes of fallacious reasoning, haunt us. We must be loving but are also called to be as ‘wise as serpents’ (Matthew 10:16) placing us in the very difficult position to have to reason with people, and to defend yourself and the weak. Wolves are in the middle of the flock, does the Bible teach us to leave each other to the wolves?
I’m not sorry to say that leaving things to ‘it feels right’ and ‘let go, let God’ just doesn’t cut it to discover biblical truth. Biblical literacy continues to decline as all the superstars who’ve been teaching us the practical applications of our faith. The connection here is obvious to me. It is my belief that a good leader (and teacher) should strive to work him or herself out of a job. What does the illiteracy surveys tell us about what kind of job they’ve been doing? Just have faith and obey authority—we’ll tell you what to do. We have a culture which sees the ‘right thing’ is what the culture tells you to believe and do. They are not really interested in training up other shepherds—that would cut into their action. As the edifice crumbles, as people leave the church, the sermons seem to ramp up the necessity of doing more without too much examination of what we are doing and why. The dissonance has built to the point where the people have a lot of angst about why the church is in decline but have no training or inclination to do some self-examination over the way we do church—what we are telling the world about who we are.
We are telling the world that we are pragmatists willing to overlook lies and evil to bring about a greater good through adherence to proper authority. We get our undies in a bunch about what ‘proper’ means, but in the end, the philosophy of authority remains as the wolves feed. Many of our pastors are just not bright enough to see this parroting what they’ve been taught by their higher ups. All this wrapped up in feelings, assumptions, and well-meaning piety. We think it is good and pious to back liars and criminals because we’ve been taught to do so.