Culture War Christianity in American history

In this article, you might find our comments on our previously published articles about Culture War Christians

What Are The Culture Wars?

A History Of The Culture Wars

A Theology of Culture War Christianity

Beyond the Culture Wars

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Jared Stacy writes

What are the Culture Wars?

Think of “culture” as a way of life. It is the sum total of all values, beliefs, and practices making up a communal existence. When God commissions newly formed humanity in Genesis 1 to “fill the earth and subdue it”, he sets men and women into the world with a cultural mandate. His plan was for a human society, united under his rule in the world, ruling with him over the Cosmos as his vice-regents. {What Are The Culture Wars?}

Karl Marx saw how main religion tried to lure people in the ban of the church by false doctrines. It is because the majority of people did not take the time to read the Bible that so many religious groups were able to get people following their false doctrines.

Regularly, people were so prayed for by those doctrines of those churches that they no longer faced the real thing because they preferred to float on those ideas of those churches. It had become so bad that Marx also realised that for many, religion was like an ‘opium for the people’. In lots of Christian and Islamic denominations, their church leaders managed to have their followers, following and worshipping a wrong god and not following the real Christ. since his time still not much has been changed, and there are still lots of false teachers and false prophets around. Marx was disturbed by the knowledge that he saw so many people around him falling for those false human teachings and giving their money away to those churches when there were so many people around them suffering. Marx also noted few dared to question, let alone challenge, church doctrines.

It also bothered several thinkers in the 19th century that the church made no attempt to defend the majority of their churchgoers or parishioners, and did not stand up against the exploitation of parishioners. For far too many centuries, the Roman Catholic Church itself had done everything possible to trot out money from the poorer population.

The German revolutionary, sociologist, historian, and economist, Karl Marx and his closest collaborator, the German socialist philosopher Friedrich Engels’ answer to the ills of society was according to some, just the opposite of the utopian dreamers’ answers. Mainly this, because the ideas of utopists (like Mr. Ampe) seem for many too far-fetched and unreachable. Though Marx and Engels found enough people who, like them, believed that one could change the way people lived and could come to a better world with less inequality. They, too, went for a better world.

Since World War I the world has evolved incredibly on all levels. Politically it was a time of trying out several political systems, getting more than once in a lot of problems and crises. The Western world clinched at the industrialisation and experienced mixed economies floating between all kinds of political thoughts. Even as the western world became less religious and the church got less of a grip on its citizens, the rich continued to control everything and did everything they could to maintain their power.

For Jared Stacy we have come into a Culture War Christianity where elections are consistently framed He looks at legislation, movies, businesses, etc. as affecting the survival of Christianity itself. For him such

hyperbolic rhetoric is typical. {What Are The Culture Wars?}

For him it is clear that Christ should be at the centre of Christianity. But he also expects something for those who call themselves Christian. He writes

When Jesus prayed,

“on earth as it is on heaven”

he was indicating his expectation and desire that the culture of Heaven becomes the culture of Earth by way of his Church. But does Culture War Christianity, the sort launched in the ’70s, contradict the nature of Jesus’ Kingdom? {What Are The Culture Wars?}

So many people had looked forward to the 20th century, hoping that because of all the new inventions, brought forward by the Industrial Revolution, they would be able to create a world where everything would be much easier and giving them more time to relax. The century opened with great hope but also with some apprehension, for the new century marked the final approach to a new millennium. For many, humankind was entering upon an unprecedented era. The English novelist, journalist, sociologist, and historian H.G. Wells’s utopian studies, the aptly titled Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901) and A Modern Utopia (1905), both captured and qualified this optimistic mood and gave expression to a common conviction that science and technology would transform the world in the century ahead.

Already before the seventies of the previous century there was something going wrong in the industrialised world. Even though many countries were allowed to offer independence back to their colonies, they continued to exploit people in their own countries. Even when churches wanted to present God in different ways over the years, people should know That God never changes. He will always be the same and keep to the same Plan He had already from the beginning of times.

The American pastor and current PhD candidate in Theological Ethics at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, Jared Stacy 
wants to call our attention to this basic theological ethic:

The work of God’s rule spreading throughout the world in individual lives and communities will never contradict who God is. {What Are The Culture Wars?}

We would have loved that, but reality shows something totally different. For centuries, the main Christian churches have chosen another path than the disciples of Christ. The majority of people preferred to keep to their heathen traditions and festivals and the Catholic and several Protestant churches followed them and made Jesus Christ (the Messiah) their god. As such, we must say there is a lot of contradiction in what people say God is. For many, He is not the God of Christ, Who is the God of Israel, but is a god who is part of a three-headed godship, the Trinity.

It is not just that difference of who God is and who Christ is that has brought division in the world of believers. The diversity of religious groups has also brought both confusion and discord. Coming closer to the 21st-century tension or strife resulting from a lack of agreement came to bring even more separation between the true followers of the Nazarene Jewish masterteacher Jeshua  ben Joseph (Jesus Christ) and the name-Christians who worship Jesus as their god and do not shy away from also worshipping all kinds of people they call saints, this while the One True God desires full recognition and worship.

We have the impression that the blog writer who also writes for platforms like NPR, the BBC, Current, and For the Church, does not see (or does not know) the multiple camps in Christendom. He only mentions two of them. He writes

To speak generally, mischaracterizations come from two camps. Let’s call one group “conscientious objectors” and the other, “vocal advocates”.

Some accuse conscientious objectors to the Culture Wars of believing that Christianity should have no influence in the public square. They slander these conscientious objectors as faithless & godless, or misrepresent them as conspiratorially hypocritical, secretly harboring a progressive political agenda.

On the other end of the spectrum, some conscientious objectors accuse vocal advocates of conflating Christianity with cultural power. This often leads them to slander vocal advocates as compromising sell-outs, or mischaracterize their advocacy & well-connected influence as grounded in an inherently complicit conservative agenda. No doubt, I believe there are instances of legitimate criticisms from boths sides in Christian spaces. But polarity abounds. {What Are The Culture Wars?}

For him the polarizing gap between vocal advocates and conscientious objectors reveals a vast “no man’s land” in American evangelicalism. This is why he believes his series has pastoral and personal implications for all of us.

Because either you or someone you know is wandering the no man’s land as a refugee from the Culture Wars. {What Are The Culture Wars?}

Many American evangelicals are proud that they (so-called) keep to The 10 Commandments, though all of them already sin against the first commandment, not keeping to The Only One True God, the Elohim Hashem Jehovah of hosts, the God above all gods.

David Hansen correctly says

“The majority of Americans will tell any pollster that they believe in the Ten Commandments. But only a small percentage of those people could even recite the Ten Commandment; and even a smaller percentage have any genuine interest in following them.” {The 10 Commandments in American Culture}

Lots of North Americans should seriously think about their religion and their faith. About that faith Stacy says there is a danger.

On a day of hope, we need a fresh reminder of the danger inherent in an embrace of Christian faith. {The Danger of Faith}

He points out the trap many Americans have fallen into.

It is American consumer Christianity that invites us to “make Jesus Lord of our lives”. This pitch makes Christ a commodity, leaving us—the consumer—with control. The resurrection and ascension is a coronation that happens apart from our consumer choice & control. {The Danger of Faith}

1909 painting The Worship of Mammon, the god of material wealth, by Evelyn De Morgan

The great part of the US population, as well as in other developed countries, is that believers have deviated from Biblical truth as well as become wedded to matter and thus actually honour the god Mammon. Several denominations in the United States make clever use of asking people for money all the time, pretending that they will then have a better life. It has also become so ingrained in people that one can only be successful if one has acquired a lot of money. Consequently, many do everything possible to be as rich as possible (on the material plane) while completely neglecting spiritual wealth. Many have forgotten that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.

Stacy writes

It is hard to deny today that for many, the supposed downfall of America is synonymous with the collapse of Christianity. Jesus confronts this idolatry with his Kingdom. {The Danger of Faith}

Lots of Americans are even not aware of how they participate in idolatry, which they prove by continually clinging to pagan festivals such as Candlemas, Easter, Halloween and Christmas, to name only the main ones, and to cling to money and material gain.

He reigns over a Kingdom that cannot be shaken through the rising and falling empires of this world. {The Danger of Faith}

And throughout history, many kingships or kingdoms and principalities as well as republics have risen and fallen. Never before has man succeeded in creating a nation or empire in which everyone was comfortable and where justice was done to everyone. Several Christians, in imitation of Christ, have tried to make people understand how best to live in unity with fellow human beings, plants and animals.

The 1963 March on Washington participants and leaders marching from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial, as mass protest movement against racial segregation and discrimination in the southern United States that came to national prominence during the mid-1950s.

When we look at the German culture struggle of the 1870’s (kulturkampf) it’s clear that the American Civil Rights movement was a “Culture War” too. King’s commitment to non-violence laid a distinct Christian foundation for the Civil Rights movement. But white evangelicals of the time either distanced themselves from King, or denounced the Civil Rights movement entirely, with calls to “just preach the gospel.”  {A History Of The Culture Wars}

writes Stacy.

But not many white Americans were really willing to go to preach what was really written in the gospel. They prefer just to take some phrases out of context to repeat them so that people come to believe them.

The forty odd years from this origin point until today witnessed the end of the Cold War and an insurrection at the US Capitol. Between these bookends, Culture War Christianity made itself known & felt in American society through movements. (See, Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne; Stan Gall, Borderlines: Reflections on Sex, War, and the Church; Frances Fitzgerald, The Evangelicals; Tim Gloege, Guaranteed Pure; historical treatments on these movements) {A History Of The Culture Wars}

Stacy reminds his readers:

The arguments and relationships in the antebellum South were transported via Lost Cause theology 100 years into the future, seen in white evangelical responses to the Civil Rights Movement. But these leaders could not ignore the impact of King’s kulturkampf. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

He assures his readers that

Culture War Christianity started after the Civil Rights Movement, not before. It borrows the playbook of the CRM. Ironically, it thrives on a sort of “persecuted minority” mindset, borrowed from the Civil Rights movement, but not actually indicative of the communal experience in its main constituents: white evangelicals. A minority mindset is a prominent characteristic of God’s people in the Scriptures. However, this mindset is not characteristic of evangelical experience in the United States. Race relations and evangelical’s historic participation in the moral establishment offer two historical keys that present a necessary critique of modern Culture War Christianity. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

He believes it is impossible to understand the history behind Culture War Christianity apart from race relations in the United States. So, we begin where we left off, with this statement:

The Culture Wars began when white American evangelicals took the activist playbook from the very Civil Rights leaders they opposed, to advance a moral agenda they could support.

…

Some were overtly political, like the Moral Majority or Christian Coalition. Others would serve the notion of family values, yet retain political influence, like Focus on the Family or Promise Keepers. Local churches and expansive media (books, radio, television) formed the local grassroots communities made these movements possible.

While this all may seem quite familiar, especially if you inhabited spaces within white American Christianity during the last 40 years, a history of the Culture Wars would be best served by going back 2 centuries to look at the phrase “Culture War” itself. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

In his blog he then goes back to the 19th century, across the Atlantic Ocean where the Germans provide us with a glimpse into a framework upstream to both the Civil Rights Movement and “Culture War Christianity” at a time when a new world order was being born. In that era, he recognises the central position of the Catholic Church, facing new threats to its grasp on power.

From the political power of the nation- state to the intellectual frameworks of liberalism and Darwinism, the winds were shifting. In response, the Church produced a flurry of theological statements and denouncements meant to stem the tide of ideas that threatened its hold on the Old World Order. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

Portrait of Pope Pius IX circa 1864

The Holy See under Pope Pius IX on 8 December 1864, brought an appendix to the Quanta cura encyclical, with a syllabus where the church wanted to have the people see that it was with the times and recognised 80 of the

“principal errors of our times.”

As the errors listed had already been condemned in allocutions, encyclicals, and other apostolic letters, the Syllabus said nothing new and so could not be contested. Its importance lay in the fact that it published to the world what had previously been preached in the main only to the bishops, and that it made general what had been previously specific denunciations concerned with particular events. Perhaps the most famous article, the 80th, stigmatising as an error the view that

“the Roman Pontiff can and should reconcile himself to and agree with progress, liberalism, and modern civilisation,”

sought its authority in the pope’s refusal, in Jamdudum Cernimus, to have any dealings with the new Italian kingdom. On both scores, the Syllabus undermined the liberal Catholics’ position, for it destroyed their following among intellectuals and placed their program out of court.

The Church denounced religious liberty, the nation-state, and other consequences stemming from the “threat of liberalism.” {A History Of The Culture Wars}

For some time there had been bumbling or difficulty in having a good relationship with the Catholic Church. More thinkers also came to speak out about the huge profits the Church was making on the backs of the faithful. Increasingly, there was also the idea of going back to the basics of Christ’s teachings where simplicity was preached and people were taught how to stand up for and care for each other. In the gospel, Jesus set a good example of how not only Christians should live, but actually every human being.

In the 1870’s, the German people, specifically within the Kingdom of Prussia, found themselves in conflict with the Catholic Church over their own Reformation roots and a rapidly secularizing order. This conflict had ramifications for both the Church and the separated German states. As a result of this conflict swirling around the German peoples, individual German States united along highly Protestant lines under Otto Von Bismark of Prussia. (See, Helmut Walser Smith, editor, The Oxford Handbook of Modern German History) This period of conflict and change was given a name: Kulturkampf, or “Culture Struggle”. This German kulturkampf shows us how struggles between competing visions for human existence are sparked by complex reactions between religion, politics, and power. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

It is the clash between people of the common people, as well as philosophers and political thinkers, with the church, that caused very animated conversations in several places in the German Empire about faith, church, and the way we as human beings should choose to arrive at a better world.

After World War II several American religious groups tried to have the power over the American people. They tried to convince them that they were the sole church which preached the truth. Some even went so far to tell the people they were chosen by God and that their church is the only one that can bring them in heaven. For those churches, it is certain that one can only be accepted by God if one follows their rules. Of course, such a saying is absurd, but a large majority of Americans follow that false statement. In the life of faith, it is also certain that no particular church by Jesus was ever designated as the only one to follow.

By studying German kulturkampf, we can begin to see the American Culture War’s false claim to exclusivity and authority by claiming itself to be the sole representative and defender of orthodox Christianity. When we realize this — that American Culture War Christianity is not the single defender of the faith —  it trains us to adopt a healthy critical filter every time a Christian leader describes the “very survival of Christianity at stake” as a smoke screen for unChristian agreements with power. On the other hand, conscientious objectors to Culture War Christianity would do well to consider how “culture struggle” might be a positive expression of Christian faith. There is space to consider positive “culture struggle”. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

King’s kulturkampf was rooted in Christian principles, and sought to dismantle the injustices of racial segregation, subjugation and discrimination within America. With the upcoming of the more conservative Christians, and/or conservative evangelicals, the position between coloured people worsened again and nationalism and (far) right-wing ideas came to the forefront in the States, the same way they did in the 1930s in Europe. Thus, from Europe, we could see the very dangerous development of right-wing rule and the glorification of such despots as Donald Trump, who is a danger to the world.

What would come to define and shape Culture War Christianity in 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s in the US is not at all what King and several serious preachers had in mind. The growing conservatism by the Americans brought forward people who are against equality and who find the white man is the pure race. Even Billy Graham came to criticise segregation but also denounced the non-violent demonstrations as contributing to further violence.

Others denounced calls for desegregation entirely. Back in 1960, Bob Jones Sr. took harder lines at Christians supporting an end to segregation by referring to them as “religious infidels”. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

Several pastors of mega-churches, especially in white neighbourhoods, succeeded in shifting all the faults of the system onto the backs of the blacks and refugees who just’ came and invaded America’, without the government doing enough to stop them. One would think the religious leaders would have their moral reasoning to flow from a theological calculus, but it (for sure) did not come from Biblical teaching.

Stacy writes

Charles Ivory’s masterful Proslavery Christianity examines the white evangelical relationship with black evangelicals before the Civil War. He looks at how these interactions between white and black Christians, slave and free, actually came to shape the white evangelical theological defense of slavery. If we want to understand the Culture War Christianity of Falwell, and other white evangelicals, we need to examine their response to the Civil Rights Movement. I believe their response has its source in the theological calculus of white evangelicals in the antebellum South. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

Ivory writes it was not uncommon for white and black evangelicals to worship within the same church. Indeed, the revival of the late 18th century did not discriminate on the basis of cultural background. But the theological conflict in evangelical churches pre-Civil War centered around conversion. Namely, does Christian conversion necessitate manumission? Today, Christians would argue chattel slavery is indefensible regardless of a slave’s conversion to Christianity. Humanity is not property. However, the historical context of the time made the question of conversion and manumission the frontline theological conflict regarding chattel slavery within evangelical churches. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

In West Europe the people had gone already through that process, knowing that slavery was something one could not accept in a civilised society. On this, several speakers came to draw attention to a system to bring more equality among all people. The road to socialism and communism was thus promoted by several enthusiasts.

Culture War Christianity has long since ossified into the de facto expression of faith for many white American evangelicals.

But those white American Christians have come to love themselves more than someone else and consider themselves as the only ones worthy to govern America. They do not have an eye at all for the indigenous people, because they consider themselves as the rightful founders and owners of America.

For 200 years, white evangelicalism has been an insider. No where has the minority mindset been more pervasive in our modern conception of Culture War Christianity than rhetoric. Phrases like “drain the swamp”, “make America great again”, and “take back America for God” in evangelical politics go right next to “that’s too political” and “just preach the gospel” in evangelical churches. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

We can wonder from who those evangelicals have to take back ‘their country’! Those evangelicals seem not to have any idea what the ‘founders’ of America had in mind and why they wanted religion and government separated.

While separation of church and state was federally enshrined in the Constitution, it did not play out in those strict terms in state and local governments. This changed in the early 20th century, when the Scopes trial, New Deal politics, and internal theological warring between fundamentalists and modernists left a vacuum in American society that evangelicalism used to fill in common culture. Neo-evangelicals like Billy Graham emerged in this vacuum. But for the long of American history, Christians have not only been influential, but privileged.

How can a privileged majority come to see itself as a minority? Culture War Christianity accomplishes this in part by dressing itself in the Biblical and theological concept of a remnant. A faithful few of God’s people who remain loyal to God and his ways in a foreign, godless land. But this theological adaptation does not line up with the historical participation of white evangelicals in the moral establishment of the United States. Yet, the drums of Culture War for white American Christians implied a greater enemy beyond its borders. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

Though the big problem of those Tea Party and conservative or fundamentalist evangelicals is that they are not at all remaining “loyal to God and his ways in a foreign, godless land” they even have betrayed God and His son on several levels. They have created some three-headed god (or three-une being) and political leaders such as Trump as their gods, and consider their American flag as their religious symbol ^{even a Christian symbol}. For sure they can not belong to the faithful few of God’s people, because they do not believe in the Only One True God and because they do not act like People of God. They themselves are part of that ‘dark world’ the Bible is talking about. And now in those times that darkness and of gloominess can be seen everywhere, they also do everything to create division and spread hate, instead of spreading the love of Christ and his great message of a world full of peace. Those evangelicals with other name Christians have made it a sport to make fun of, blacken and curse true Christians. They do everything possible to get people away from those true worshippers of God. They also have some sort of paranoia and consider all people from abroad as dangerous suspects. They fear those coming from outside America would destroy their freedom.

Stacy remarks

the drums of Culture War for white American Christians implied a greater enemy beyond its borders. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

and also see what happened under the influence of certain political figures.

The Culture Wars of white American evangelicalism was not the reaction of the minority against the majority, but the majority against a imagined majority. It is hard to avoid this conclusion given overwhelming support for President Trump. {A History Of The Culture Wars}

Stacy continues writing

In the place of Jesus’ active reign today, we find American Christians given to other reigning power structures: nationalism, racism, misogyny, and bigotry. They are discipled by political—not resurrection—power. This is partly the reason why Culture War Christians took greater issue with Kaepernick’s supposed desecration of the flag than they might with his concerns over police brutality against image bearers. They operate in a power structure other than the Kingdom of Jesus. {A Theology of Culture War Christianity}

Stacys wonders

What if Culture War Christianity long ago bowed the knee to a nationalist, secular conservatism? One with its law & order politics, reticence on issues of race, and idolatry of country? {Beyond the Culture Wars}

Ans says that he has argued this in his series.

Long before white evangelicals told MLK to “just preach the gospel”, there has always been a Christianity domesticated by, and deployed in defense of, the status quo in this country. Frederick Douglass called it before any of us. And in this sort of Christianity, “make disciples” has too often been code for “make people like us” not “make us like Jesus”. {Beyond the Culture Wars}

There lies one of the biggest problems in American Christendom. The majority of Americans does not take time enough to seriously study the Scriptures. For most of them the Bible also only means the New Testament. Lots of those evangelicals also do not understand what that sacrificial offering of Jesus, letting himself be nailed at the stake, means. For them it is very difficult to grasp how a man of flesh and blood could give himself as a lamb for whitewashing the sins of many.

Some of those white evangelicals living in the United States of America are convinced they are the only ones who can  Make America Great Again and build up the most correct state. They forget how so many people before them have tried already to construct an ideal state. They should know it shall only happen under Jesus Christ that we shall be able to live in a perfect world.

Let us also not forget Niebuhr’s saying,

“any good worth doing takes more than one lifetime.”

According to Jared Stacy

This should give us pause before we entertain pragmatism to bring about change in our lifetime. It was Jesus who said,

“what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and lose his soul?”

This should give us pause as we count the cost of pragmatism to reveal the Kingdom of God. {Beyond the Culture Wars}

He ends his article series by saying

After all, the cross is not a symbol of cultural superiority for white America, but of surrender and sacrifice in the Kingdom of God. We must measure our motivations by the Cross, and our methods. Take it from me. A millennial. The generation who was born in and shaped by the ‘Jesus & John Wayne evangelicalism” in its prime. {Beyond the Culture Wars}

And recognises the problem

Culture War Christianity allows you to have a Christian worldview and reject the Cross.   {Beyond the Culture Wars}

By which he hopefully means: rejecting the ransom offering of that Jewish Nazarene master teacher, Jeshua ben Josef, or Jesus Christ, the Messiah.

It substitutes other, more pragmatic means to really get things done. But in the Kingdom of Jesus the only strategy available for implementing a Christian worldview is the Cross.  {Beyond the Culture Wars}

We have to do away with the false teaching in Christendom and have to go back to the Biblical teachings and keep to them, adhering to Biblical Truth and not human doctrine.

We should recognise the danger of that growing conservative evangelism.

For all it’s posturing about the morality of America, Culture War Christianity has stopped its ear to calls for ethnic & economic justice. Has tied its hands in response to sexual scandal and abuse in its ranks. Yet expresses incredulity when the world fails to take its sexual ethic seriously. Culture War Christianity can only provide more entrenchment, more combat, and more pragmatism. But crucified Christianity is growing the world over, and—as it has always done— turning the world upside down.  {Beyond the Culture Wars}

Writing from Scotland, the author of the mentioned articles, wants to suggest a simple but humble invitation to venture into the wilderness as an act of faithfulness. For him,

the wilderness meant stepping out of the American pastorate, and out of America. This was my move made in faith. An attempt to combat the rise of cynicism in my own spirit, channeling it into meaningful, faithful action.  {Beyond the Culture Wars}

From Moses, to Elijah, to Christ. Perhaps the wilderness is the place for those disenchanted and disillusioned, those disowned and disinherited from Culture War Christianity, to begin to see the Cross not as a symbol storming the US Capitol, but again as a place where our power grabs go to die. And where there is death to our ability to bring about change, God brings resurrection that changes everything.  {Beyond the Culture Wars}

The Austrian philosopher and Roman Catholic priest known for his radical polemics arguing that the benefits of many modern technologies and social arrangements were illusory and that, still further, such developments undermined humans’ self-sufficiency, freedom, and dignity, Ivan Illich illumines what it is to be in the world, but not of it — just like Jesus.

Jared Stacy offers his words as a simple reflection in the conclusion to his series:

It is astonishing what the devil says: I have all power, it has been given to me, and I am the one to hand it on — submit, and it is yours. Jesus of course does not submit…Not for a moment, however, does Jesus contradict the devil. He does not question that the devil holds all power, nor that this power has been given to him, nor that he, the devil, gives it to whom he pleases. This is a point which is easily overlooked. By his silence Jesus recognizes power that is established as “devil” and defines Himself as The Powerless. He who cannot accept this view on power cannot look at establishments through the spectacle of the Gospel. This is what clergy and churches often have difficulty doing. They are so strongly motivated by the image of church as a “helping institution” that they are constantly motivated to hold power, share in it or, at least, influence it.  {Beyond the Culture Wars}

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Please also do find to read

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3. My faith and hope
4. Utopian dreams
5. Are Christianity and Capitalism Compatible?
6. The Upbringing of Ideas and the Extrapolation of Capitalism
7. A famous individual by the name of Jesus of Nazareth
8. 19th and 20th Century Shifts in bourgeoisie
9. All that is solid still melts into air.
10. Intellectual servility a curse of mankind
11. The New Imperialist Structure
12. Is Christianity a Greedy Religion?
13. Should church members question preachers about the doctrine that is not in the Holy Bible?
14. A History Of The Culture Wars
15. Unhappy people in empty churches
16. Gradual decline by American Christians
17. Christians are increasingly mixing and matching their faith in unexpected ways
18. Being Christian in Western Europe at the beginning of the 21st century #1
19. The decline of religion in the US continues unabated
20. Liberation, salvation and the Latin American voice entering the Vatican
21. Eyes on pages and messages on social media
22. Troubles testing your faith and giving you patience and good prospects
23. The Most Appropriate teacher and Scoffers in our contemporary age
24. Social media for Trumpists and changing nature of warfare
25. Blinded crying blue murder having being made afraid by a bugaboo
26. False teachers and false prophets still around
27. The Field is the World #4 Many who leave the church
28. Unhappy people in empty churches (Our World)
29. Hardships for choosing to follow the real Christ
30. Church indeed critical in faith development
31. Crises of Real, Imaginary, and Symbolic Money
32. International Proletariat
33. The killing of capitalism
34. The Principles of Communism – Friedrich Engels
35. Ability
36. Ability (part 2)
37. Ability (part 3) Thoughts around Ability
38. Ability (part 4) Thought about the ability to have ability
39. Ability (part 5) Thought about the abilities to be under God’s Spirit
40. To whom do we want to be enslaved
41. Compromise and accomodation
42. A Living Faith #3 Faith put into action
43. Not saying Jeshua is God
44. The 17th annual White Privilege Conference a militantly Christophobic conference held in Philadelphia
45. Faith, storms and actions to be taken
46. Christ’s ethical teaching
47. Obeying God rather than man & A Time to Act
48. Entering 2022 still Aiming for a society without exploitation or oppression
49. News that’s fit to print
50. Beyond the Culture Wars
51. January 6: A Failed Apocalypse
52. Hope For, But Not In, Evangelicalism
53. Presbyterians and Reformed Christians, membership and active involvement is part of a congregation’s DNA
54. The Guardian’s view on the world 1st week of June

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22. Cultural Amnesia
23. The Future of Governance
24. False American Dream
25. Thinking Critically about Marxism, Socialism and Communism (All in fewer than 1000 words!)
26. The Missing Faith Dimension of the Capitalism vs. Socialism Debate
27. A Broken system
28. Psychological Warfare
29. Humanities Retribution
30. Walk The Path
31. Reform or Revolution? A Debate (I)
32. Reform or Revolution? A Debate (II)
33. Editorial: what is humane socialism?
34. The virtues of good, enlightened, accountable elitism
35. The Radical Left Needs to Call into Question Existing Social Institutions at Every Opportunity, Part Four
36. End of capitalism as we know it
37. The Future is History
38. The true believer
39. Research Resources: Communism in America
40. “A Spectre is Haunting Europe…”
41. Finding the Ideal, Perfect Community
42. So You Think Capitalism Is Evil
43. Capitalism: The Ultimate Empowerment
44. Capitalism: Misunderstood
45. On the Current Conjuncture
46. The discipled political church
47. Veneration (Gilbert and Gilbert)
48. Christianity and Idealism (Van Til)
49. Brief Insights on Mastering Bible Doctrine (Heiser)
50. A Field Guide on False Teaching
51. Andrew McWilliams-Doty looks at evangelicals
52. Evangelical: Leave It or Love It?
53. How the term Evangelical has grown to blur theology and ideology
54. Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics – An Interview
55. Which Christians Actually Evangelize
56. Is it Time to Abandon “Evangelical?”
57. Warped Christianity
58. The 10 Commandments in American Culture
59. Communist Infiltration, What Did Bella Dodd REALLY Know – YouTube
60. German priest contradicts pope and backs pornography as sexual ‘relief’ for celibates | Catholic News Agency
61. Sports Star to Be Jailed 10 Months for ‘Transphobic’ Message
62. What is at stake in the buffer zone debate? | Isabel Vaughan-Spruce | The Critic Magazine
63. Win for Christian ministry after judge refuses to strike out discrimination case – Christian Concern
64. Watch the body language in this heated exchange yesterday between Canada’s Justin Trudeau and Chinese Emperor Xi 👀 | Not the Bee
65. Episode 21 – Stella(r) (Hypo)Creasy and the Gov Crackdown on Free Speech – YouTube
66. Senate advances same-sex marriage bill amid religious freedom concerns – Catholic World Report
67. America/Brazl – After 50 years, the mission of Cimi is still “to defend with courage and prophecy the cause of the indigenous peoples” – Agenzia Fides
68. The Christian Father -Conferences of the Men’s Group – YouTube

A History Of The Culture Wars

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Find also to read

1. Andrew McWilliams-Doty looks at evangelicals
2. How the term Evangelical has grown to blur theology and ideology
3. Which Christians Actually Evangelize
4. Is it Time to Abandon “Evangelical?”

Jared Stacy

Culture War Christianity has long since ossified into the de facto expression of faith for many white American evangelicals. In Part One of this series (which you can find here) we introduced the American Culture Wars. As a whole, this series examines the historical & theological shape of Culture War Christianity in comparison to Jesus’ Kingdom through the lenses of these two camps, conscientious objectors and vocal advocates. We concluded last week with a descriptor: Culture War Christianity tends to make enemies, not love them.

This week, our second part examines the historical orgins of the Culture Wars. If you’re pressed for time, I present a TL;DR that takes 2 minutes, and you can return to read the article at your leisure…

TL;DR (Too Long; Didn’t Read Summary)

The key to understanding modern Culture War Christianity is the history of American race relations and Christianity. This article locates the birth…

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What Are The Culture Wars?

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Find also to read

1. Andrew McWilliams-Doty looks at evangelicals
2. How the term Evangelical has grown to blur theology and ideology
3. Which Christians Actually Evangelize
4. Is it Time to Abandon “Evangelical?”

Jared Stacy

The next four articles form a series to engage this question. We’ll examine the history & theology of “Culture War Christianity”. My goal is to locate the Culture Wars in American history, but also describe the shape of these Culture Wars so we can examine how they relate to the shape of Jesus’ Kingdom.

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What are the Culture Wars? Think of “culture” as a way of life. It is the sum total of all values, beliefs, and practices making up a communal existence. When God commissions newly formed humanity in Genesis 1 to “fill the earth and subdue it”, he sets men and women into the world with a cultural mandate. His plan was for a human society, united under his rule in the world, ruling with him over the Cosmos as his vice-regents.

With a technical and theological definition of “culture”, we can now imagine a “culture war” as…

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Evangelicals & Seduction

Following the previous posting, we continue to look at how Stephen Best looks at the American Evangelicals & Seduction, which may for us Europeans something very weird and incomprehensible wondering if those Americans are not better at using their own mind to make up their own ideas.

How is it possible that the majority of white US evangelicals were seduced into Trump’s dangerous political schemes?

When they heard so many bad things that he had done in the past and could see how he had treated women, plus how he had created all sorts of ‘untrustable businesses, showing clearly he would not be the best one to run properly a business or to become a respectful leader.
We wonder how their followers could come to trust his lies, and could wipe away his malicious and criminal behaviour.

How is it possible that those who call themselves Christian could go for a man who clearly showed no respect to others and carried a lot of racism in his heart. They now share the responsibility in encouraging racism, division, and sedition within the USA, and instead of making America great again they choose for someone who could break America and creat division as never before.

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To remember

• American evangelicals their complicity in Trumpism > testimony + leadership = unreliable + negligent going forward.
• interweaving of God + country = evangelical’s Patriotism > Christian Nationalism.  Christian Nationalism.
• concept of ‘Manifest Destiny’ (John Louis O’Sullivan) = mission to expand its influence across all of North America => America’s wars with Mexico + the Indians+ expansion into Alaska.
• Manifest Destiny > mission of promoting + defending democracy throughout the world > bias American ideology and politics. – growing ideology => Christian Nationalism
• American vision >  fascination with the ‘New Jerusalem’ <=  early Puritans left for America with the sense of being an oppressed people.
• Puritans aimed to build the Kingdom of God or their version of a Christian society = blending of religion + politics.
• Christian nationalism = political ideology about American identity  => idealizes + advocates fusion of Christianity with American civic life
• Christian Nationalism = collection of cultural myths, traditions, religion, + historical interpretations.
• Evangelicals in a struggle with liberalism / socialism that threatens their way of life –  feel mocked +  dishonored, unheard + marginalized.
• perceived risk: immigrants, LGBQT , law enforcement weakening, abortions persisting, support for Israel declining, + Evangelicalism diminishing, => Evangelicals feel their backs are up against the wall.
• alliance of American Evangelicalism + Donald Trump =>  restoring  USA > conservative Christian society.
• patriotism, Christian Nationalism, traditionalism, evangelicalism, denominationalism, + spiritualism =/= sustainable foundations in life =/= biblical foundations.
• Christian foundations = spiritual realities  understood through Scripture, taught with faith + wisdom, received with sincerity, + realized through inward working of Holy Spirit in life of a Christian.  => secure + define new life while not depending on Christian governments, economies, religion, or social norms.
• need to re-examine our foundations

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Stephen Best

By Stephen Best

How is it possible that the majority of white US evangelicals were seduced into Trump’s dangerous political schemes? How is it possible for so many of their leaders to have encouraged their followers to trust his lies, and enable his malicious and criminal behaviour? How is it possible that they now share the responsibility in encouraging racism, division, and sedition within the USA?

For at least 60 years, evangelicals throughout the world have appreciated the contribution and leadership that the US has brought to the global work of God. Yet today, because of their complicity in Trumpism, that testimony and leadership is for the most part unreliable, if not negligent going forward.

If we are honest most Christians outside the USA have found the US brand of Evangelicalism a bit different to begin with. And that’s mostly due to it’s interweaving of God and country.

The blending…

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Evangelicals: For The Love Of Trump

For many Christians in Europe, it is unbelievable how it was possible that Donald Trump got such a liking and followers in the Christian camp.
We are curious how they would now look at that wolf in sheepskin.

The pictures we keep receiving from America let us wonder how it comes that so many Americans who claim to be Christian can still be so racist and are not able to bring forward brotherly love for those who have another opinion and other religion than theirs.

As the writing of this leader of some church networks and charities may insinuate lots of Europeans may have lost their belief in the Land of Freedom and of the Christian spirit racing through the United States of America, once having been a great nation, but now with and after Trump, having lost all credibility.

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To remember

• not US citizens = bewildered by overwhelming support US Evangelicals > President Donald Trump.
• sensationalism + rising division within US =/= subsided = Evangelical’s persistent fixation with Trump => growing tension .
• Am. Evangelicals + Donald Trump = strange bedfellows > Donald Trump = extension of God or = guardian of American Christian Culture =  deeply flawed confidence.
• Furthermore for them to continue to encourage that notion and put their faith in him, even after Trump losing an authenticated, legal, and fair election is unimaginable but nonetheless foreseeable.
• Trump regularly warned rally attendees that “Christianity is under siege.” +  suggested > forces “chipping away at Christianity,” + accused Democrats of waging a war on Christmas.
• US Evangelicals modeled a faith in God that came alongside governments + institutions regardless of party in leadership.
• showed admirable confidence in public system + prayerfully supported their leaders. > changed = terms Evangelical + Republican = synonymous.
• declining Christian population within US + subsequent weakening Christian culture  => understated fear amongst white Evangelicals.
• Trump guaranteed Evangelicals pushback against insurgence of immigration, abortion, and socialism.
• world viewed Trump = bigot, racist, bully, slanderer, liar, autocrat, narcissist, + swindler, wild Maverick,
• believing in Trump, Evangelicals > flagrant discrimination, deception, subversion, injustice, intimidation, preferentialism, + irresponsibility on multiple levels.
• Evangelicals mostly ignored Trump’s dreadful behaviour > US Evangelicals flirting with Christian Nationalism => testimony now joined to Donald Trump’s secular agenda.
• patriotism + spiritual faith entangled + left unchecked = state religion that coerces religious values through laws = anti-bible.
• God’s Kingdom =/= need democracy or autocracy to increase + =/= need capitalism, socialism, or communism to survive.  =/= left / right / liberal / conservative / green.
• Kingdom = richness + flavour of Christ in us > moving forward because of passionate commitment of God, regardless of where we live and what type of government we have.

Through association with Trump, white Evangelicals have been complicit in stoking the fear and sedition that we now see within the USA.  They have enabled him and left him unchecked.  Very few Evangelical leaders have publicly spoken with the courage of the likes of Senator Mitt Romney, Beth Moore and John Piper.

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Find also to read:

• Evangelicals & Seduction > Evangelicals & Seduction

Stephen Best

By Stephen Best

I possibly, like others who are not US citizens, am bewildered by the overwhelming support that US Evangelicals have shown President Donald Trump.  Prior to the 2020 presidential election, eighty-two percent of white American evangelicals were prepared to further Trump’s reign.[1]  (See [2])

As a father and grandfather to US citizens, and as a concerned ally for our southerly neighbors, I am both surprised and troubled that the sensationalism and rising division within the US has not subsided. This growing tension is partly due to the Evangelical’s persistent fixation with Trump. In other words Evangelical Christians are partly at fault for the existing turmoil.

Evangelicals and Donald Trump are strange bedfellows. To see Donald Trump as an extension of God or as the guardian of American Christian Culture is a deeply flawed confidence. Furthermore for them to continue to encourage that notion and put their…

View original post 1,906 more words

Religion and the essence of devotion

Necessary parts in the daily walk with God

A proud Christ-follower who believes that we are all on a journey in life writes:

Religion is the essence of devotion. Our religious activities are to be an outpouring our our absolute devotion to God. Religion and relationship are necessary parts in the daily walk with God. And in speaking of religion in this way we can get a better glimpse at Christianity in a global sense. There are many traditions throughout Christendom that seem quite strikingly different than what any one of us may be used to, but they are simply unique ways to express the relational devotion we have to God. {The R&R of Christianity}

In the previous two writings, we talked about people who have a very restricted view of what a Christian would or should be. Lots of Christians are convinced that people who do not believe the human doctrine of the Trinity may not or can not call themselves Christian. They forget that the word Christian is made up of “Christ” and the suffix” ian”, denoting a follower of Christ. Then they should come to see and know who Christ is. For non-Trinitarians Christ is the Nazarene Jewish master teacher (or rebbe) Jeshua ben Yosef, Jesus the son of Mary (Miriam) and Joseph, born in Bethlehem. The word Christian gives an indication that it is about a follower of Christ or Kristos, the anointed Messiah. Naturally, it depends on what or whom, one wants to accept as a “follower”.

Christians, Lutherans, Wesleyans, and other followers

Normally a follower is considered to be someone who believes in a particular system of ideas, or who supports a leader who teaches these ideas. In the case of Christians it are people who follow the opinions or teachings of Christ Jesus, in particular, those teachings notated in the Messianic Scriptures (or New Testament: the four gospels and writings of the apostles and the revelation of St. John).

As the world accepts a Lutheran is a follower of Luther or a ‘belonger’ or accessory and supporter of the Lutheran community or Lutheranism, around that what was started by the German theologian and religious reformer who was the catalyst of the 16th-century Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther. When we speak about a Lutheran we think of a person of or relating to the religious doctrines of Martin Luther, or relating to the Protestant denomination adhering to these doctrines. especially the doctrine of Sola fide or justification by faith alone.

According to similar usage, a Christian is a follower or someone who has a strong interest or pays close attention to Jesus Christ and is willing to follow his guidance, command, or leadership. For that guidance of Christ the person must Not follow the rules of other human beings, but can follow the trusted Word like it is notated in the Holy Scriptures.

A Lutheran should follow the writings of Luther, but when we look at the Lutheran Church we can see there are a lot of changes in that church which would not be liked by Luther (take for example the role of the women in that church today.) With Christians we see a similar gross deviation from the teachings of the teacher Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus leading his followers out of a system of oppression

It should not be forgotten that Jesus came along to lead his followers out of the ungodly Roman system. He also wanted to show to Jews and non-Jews how important it is to come back to the Divine Creator and to worship only One True God instead of the many gods of that time. Jesus was a very devout Jew, who did not worship himself (as several name Christians want us to believe). Jesus remained faithful all his life to the God of Israel, Who is a Singular Eternal Omniscient Supreme Spirit Being. No man can see God, but Jesus wanted everybody to figuratively come to see God and to accept Him as their heavenly Father.

There was not only the Roman oppressor; there were also the priests, Pharisees and Sadducees, who wanted to have power over the people. Like many theologians today, they too wanted to make Scriptures more complicated than they really are. Jesus explained the scrolls and showed how people have to live more to the spirit of the letter, than to the interpretation of those temple workers. Jesus also preached an alternative form of government, speaking of a jurisdiction outside the Roman state, based on the perfect law of freedom, outside the tyranny of men who would rule over their brothers and neighbours. He first chose Jewish people who believed in One Singular God, (the God of the Jews), the God of Abraham, Who is One and not two or three. A real Jew never would agree with the Trinity. At first, the people who joined the Jewish sect (or group) the Way, were all Jehudiem or Jews who did not betray their Jewish faith. It was only later when goyim or people from other nations, cultures and other faiths started joining the group of followers of Christ, problems raised under the Jewish community, of which many did not want non-Jews in their ranks and in their synagogues or prayer houses.

First-century Christians

The Way to God

Jesus always said people had not to thank him but God. He always said he was less than God, but that he was the way for people to come to God and the way to life, and that people should believe in him and be in union with him, like he is in union with God.

“I am the door; by Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.” (Joh 10:9 KJ21)

“But if I do, though ye believe not Me, believe the works, that ye may know and believe that the Father is in Me, and I in Him.”” (Joh 10:38 KJ21)

“Jesus said unto him, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me.” (Joh 14:6 KJ21)

“9 Jesus said unto him, “Have I been so long a time with you, and yet hast thou not known Me, Philip? He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak unto you I speak not of Myself; but the Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works. 11 Believe Me that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me; or else believe Me for the very works’ sake.”

“12  Verily, verily I say unto you, he that believeth in Me, the works that I do he shall do also; and greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto My Father. 13 And whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If ye shall ask anything in My name, I will do it.”

“15  “If ye love Me, keep My commandments. 16 And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever” 17 even the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him. But ye know Him, for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”

“18  “I will not leave you comfortless; I will come to you. 19 Yet a little while and the world seeth Me no more, but ye see Me. Because I live, ye shall live also. 20 At that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. 21 He that hath My commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me; and he that loveth Me shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will manifest Myself to him.”” (Joh 14:9-21 KJ21)

“that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, art in Me and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me.” (Joh 17:21 KJ21)

“by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.” (Ro 5:2 KJ21)

“for through Him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.” (Eph 2:18 KJ21)

“by a new and living Way, which He hath consecrated for us through the veil (that is to say, His flesh),” (Heb 10:20 KJ21)

Following teachings based on Jesus his teachings

In the first century of this common era, more and more people came to follow the apostles their teachings, which were based on those of their master teacher Jeshua (Jesus Christ). They all agreed with the teachings of Jesus and became unified, forming the early Christian church with a system of charity, hope and respect for the rights of each other, requiring that each person would love their neighbour as themselves in a system of mutual, not governmental support.
Those joining the movement of The Way did agree to those Jewish teachings of Jesus and his apostles. For them, it was also clear that Jesus was showing a way to untangle people from the captivity of the social contracts they had made with the state of Rome and Judea, and the tribute and obligations they had become snared by. He proclaimed to call no man “Father”, as they called their Roman benefactors, but stated that the One Who made them alive is their Father Who is in heaven. The perfect law of freedom indicated that man’s unalienable rights stemmed from God and nature, and not governments of men. This was a system of anarchy, by strict definition, without the complex system of tribute that led to the decadence and decline of society, and the corruptible force of the state to back it up.

Not believing in a different God than the Jews

The early Christian church was not persecuted for their belief in a different God or a Kingdom in Heaven, but for their opting out of the mutual taxation system and seeking to live apart from the kings and overlords, the gods many, who demanded their tribute.

Path to walk

For those early followers of Christ it was important to give worship to the same God Jesus worshipped and to leave all those other gods at the side, non touched and not glorified. For them, it was clear that all glory belonged to God. They knew they had not to bow down in front of graven images, and always had to keep their soul diligently, all the time loving Jehovah as their God of gods, and not somebody else. It was also clear they, like God’s People (the Jews), had to walk in God His ways and not following human traditions which were not according to God’s Will,  for they had to keep Jehovah God His commandments and His statutes and His ordinances. Their devotion should fully be for Jehovah God and not for any other god, be it the Caesar, Baal, Apollo, Zeus or any other.  Those who were drawn away, and came to worship other gods, and came to serve them, were turning aside from the way which Jesus and his God have commanded mankind. Though God warned already in the past that the world would turn away from God and shall have false worship. He warned that evil will befall mankind in the latter days; because they will do that which is evil in the sight of Jehovah, to provoke Him to anger through the work of their hands.

“”Only take heed to thyself and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life; but teach them to thy sons and thy sons’ sons,” (De 4:9 KJ21)

“16 in that I command thee this day to love the LORD thy God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply; and the LORD thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it. 17 But if thine heart turn away so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away and worship other gods and serve them,” (De 30:16-17 KJ21)

“For I know that after my death ye will utterly corrupt yourselves and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you. And evil will befall you in the latter days, because ye will do evil in the sight of the LORD to provoke Him to anger through the work of your hands.”” (De 31:29 KJ21)

“For all the gods of the nations are idols, but the LORD made the heavens.” (Ps 96:5 KJ21)

“He that keepeth the commandment keepeth his own soul, but he that despiseth His ways shall die.” (Pr 19:16 KJ21)

“Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but what matters is the keeping of the commandments of God.” (1Co 7:19 KJ21)

A God demanding exclusive devotion

Today we see how lots of people have made or taken themselves other gods than the Only One True God, the Elohim Hashem Jehovah. Even from those who call themselves “Christian” there are many who bow down in front to graven images or kisses books and pictures as a sign of their devotion. They should know that Jehovah God requires exclusive devotion.

“But I had pity for Mine holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the heathen whither they went.” (Eze 36:21 KJ21)

“”Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD: Now will I bring back the captives of Jacob, and have mercy upon the whole house of Israel, and will be jealous for My holy name” (Eze 39:25 KJ21)

“God is jealous, and the LORD avengeth; the LORD avengeth and is furious. The LORD will take vengeance on His adversaries, and He reserveth wrath for His enemies.” (Na 1:2 KJ21)

“Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them; for I, the LORD thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me,” (Ex 20:5 KJ21)

“For thou shalt worship no other god; for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God,” (Ex 34:14 KJ21)

“For the LORD thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God.” (De 4:24 KJ21)

“And Joshua said unto the people, “Ye cannot serve the LORD, for He is a holy God; He is a jealous God; He will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins:” (Jos 24:19 KJ21)

“And further, my son, by these words be admonished: of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness to the flesh.” (Ec 12:12 KJ21)

“For as I passed by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription: ‘To the Unknown God’. Whom therefore ye worship in ignorance, Him I declare unto you.” (Ac 17:23 KJ21)

The God greater than Jesus

Jesus not able to do anything without God

Jesus, his talmidim and the apostle Paul declared The God Who is greater than Jesus and without Him Jesus could not do anything.

“Then answered Jesus and said unto them, “Verily, verily I say unto you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He seeth the Father do; for what things soever He doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.” (Joh 5:19 KJ21)

“Ye have heard how I said unto you, ‘I go away and come again unto you.’ If ye loved Me, ye would rejoice because I said, ‘I go unto the Father,’ for My Father is greater than I.” (Joh 14:28 KJ21)

Jesus submissive to his God

Jesus his disciples also knew and wanted others to know that even their master was submissive to God and also submitted to Him whom he beheld as the only True God.

“5 Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, 7 but made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in the fashion of a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death—even the death of the cross.” (Php 2:5-8 KJ21)

“But I would have you know that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God.” (1Co 11:3 KJ21)

“And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son Himself also be subject unto Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all.” (1Co 15:28 KJ21)

The churches and gods of man

But today many have several gods, like “material possession” (Mammon) or find themselves under slothful tribute to an emperor and a system that is not for their benefit. For many, their eye and worship is on material goods or on people who can gloriously show off their acquired wealth. Many covet their neighbour’s goods in a vain pursuit of “free” health care, education, welfare, unemployment benefits, social security and government protection. They have traded their inalienable God-given rights through social contracts both implied and explicit. Their churches are not ordained by God, but are corporations granted status by the state. Many want even bigger churches and want to spread hate for those churches which do not want to align with them. In many of those main churches they denounce the followers of whom they consider an anarchist, because for them Jesus is God and all who contradict that are not just contradictors but objectionable individuals. Those Trinitarians do not want to see that real followers of Christ have to be like Christ, united with Jesus and be one with him the same way as Jesus is one with God.

God in Christians

For real followers of Christ, there is the belief that God is in all of them, and that they have to attract others to come also under Christ, to become children of God.

“3 Know ye not that as many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? 4 Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, so we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this: that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. 7 For he that is dead is freed from sin.” (Ro 6:3-7 KJ21)

“And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.” (1Co 15:49 KJ21)

“But because of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who from God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness, and sanctification and redemption,” (1Co 1:30 KJ21)

“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things have become new.” (2Co 5:17 KJ21)

“For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature.” (Ga 6:15 KJ21)

United in Christ serving the God of Christ

Those in Christ should be united and serve the same God Jesus served. They should fully be devoted to Jehovah God, having no other gods than Him. Real Christians are those willing to have only One God and to study His Word, His ordinances so that they too can do God’s Will, like Jesus did not his own will but did the Will of his heavenly Father and asked his followers also to do the Will of his heavenly Father, Jehovah God. In case Jesus is God he naturally would always have done his own will and then he was all the time misleading people and praying to himself.

Jesus not knowing many who call themself Christian

Several people, calling themselves Christian forget that at the end times, when they would be coming in front of Christ, there could be a possibility that Jesus shall say not to know them, because they did not do the Will of his Father. To call oneself Christian or to become part of the Body of Christ one has to do the Will of God and be as a brother or sister of Christ Jesus and those following him.

“But the field, when it goeth out in the jubilee, shall be holy unto the LORD, as a field devoted; the possession thereof shall be the priest’s.” (Le 27:21 KJ21)

“And I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven. This sore travail hath God given to the sons of man to be exercised therewith.” (Ec 1:13 KJ21)

“”Not every one that saith unto Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but he that doeth the will of My Father who is in Heaven.” (Mt 7:21 KJ21)

“For whosoever shall do the will of My Father who is in Heaven, the same is My brother, and sister, and mother.”” (Mt 12:50 KJ21)

“And He went a little farther, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.”” (Mt 26:39 KJ21)

“He went away again the second time and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if this cup may not pass away from Me, unless I drink it, Thy will be done.”” (Mt 26:42 KJ21)

“For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is My brother, and My sister, and mother.”” (Mr 3:35 KJ21)

“And He said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible unto Thee. Take away this cup from Me; nevertheless not what I will, but what Thou wilt.”” (Mr 14:36 KJ21)

“And that servant, who knew his lord’s will and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.” (Lu 12:47 KJ21)

“saying, “Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Thine be done.”” (Lu 22:42 KJ21)

“Jesus said unto them, “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work.” (Joh 4:34 KJ21)

“38 For I came down from Heaven, not to do Mine own will, but the will of Him that sent Me. 39 And this is the Father’s will who hath sent Me, that of all which He hath given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the Last Day. 40 And this is the will of Him that sent Me: that every one who seeth the Son and believeth in Him may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the Last Day.”” (Joh 6:38-40 KJ21)

“but bade them farewell, saying, “I must by all means keep this feast that cometh in Jerusalem, but I will return again unto you, if God wills.” And he sailed from Ephesus.” (Ac 18:21 KJ21)

“Take them and purify thyself with them, and bear their charges with them, that they may shave their heads; and all may know that those things of which they have been informed concerning thee are nothing, but that thou thyself also walkest orderly and keepest the law.” (Ac 21:24 KJ21)

Picking and choosing like a kid

Lots of people who call themselves “Christian” not at all follow the teachings of Jesus and pick and choose texts from Sriptures how it soots them best.

But you don’t pay attention to that do you my little lambs? No, you pick and choose like a kid going through a candy store deciding what to spend his quarters on. You choose what fits your sick sense of morality, and then toss the rest like it never existed. The fact that you become utter hypocrites apparently doesn’t bother you. Neither does the fact that it doesn’t fit my morality. But you care just as much about my definition of morality as I do yours. The only difference between us, is I’m not forcing you to try to live by my morality. {Of Christianity and Modern Morality}

rightly remarks someone who calls himself The Bastards 2013 (Where The Bastards come to share the word!) He, like lots of atheists saw how a bunch of Evangelical pastors were laying hands on Donald Trump in the White House and how one prominent evangelical leader immediately tweeted out the image with the caption:

“President Trump is bringing God back to America.” {In God We Obfuscate}

This “Bastards 2013” also wrote:

You talk about love and tolerance and yet your actions speak of hate and seclusion. You talk about America needing to find it’s moral center and returning to respecting one another and finding joys in the diversity of America. Then you back a man who is none of those. Donald Trump is your reflecting God. He is the face of your fake bullshit religion and from this day forth you will be forever known as the frauds and charlatans you are. Your speeches about god and love will be laughed at and ignored. Your attempts to say that this is Christianity will be endlessly mocked by those of us who know better. More importantly, when your god falls, and his presidency is nothing but a pile of ashes, you will have nowhere to run. Your sins will be laid bare and the scarlet letter of hypocrisy will be forever tattoed onto your forehead. While you preach the word of a megalomaniac, he is busy mocking Puerto Ricans as they struggle to survive after back to back hurricanes. As you attempt to speak about love and kindness (which you know nothing about) your god calls black men who are peacefully protesting inequality “Sons of bitches” and “traitors.” Meanwhile he speaks in front of a group of neo nazis and homophobes and says “It’s so nice to be around friends. So many friends.” You are the lowest form of human. ISIS is evil and should be eradicated, but at least they own who they are. They make no false speeches about love and acceptance when they don’t believe in it. They don’t shake the hands of the people while silently prepping to stab them in the back. You are nothing but low level talentless snake oil salesmen. You prey upon those who have been stricken desperate by your shitty unethical policies. You sell them a cure and make them believe that you and only you can help them. Then you sit back in your six homes, watching the peasants stumble around trying to find some sort of relief. {The Reflecting God}

This shows how careful Christians have to be with their actions, because by their words and deeds others shall make a portrait of them, often thinking all Christians are “so”. Often Trinitarians show to be very intolerant and often take very awful actions against those who do not want to accept their Trinity.

Traditions of man

Throughout the ages, mankind had several gods and had celebrations for them. The Roman Catholic Church willing to capture as many heathen as they could, integrated many heathen festivals in their system. Christmas and Easter are the two most important ones still celebrated by the majority of Christians.

Lots of human traditions entered the life of those who call themselves Christian, though not many of them seem to wonder if they would be all right in the Eyes of God. That way Christendom became totally different from first-century Christianity.

A Religion of a relationship

Bringing a “Thought from a Pilgrim of Truth”, Perry Tripp, a father, husband, and a pastor writes

There is another thing that tends to happen when someone views Christianity as a relationship rather than a religion. The terms of the relationship begin to get a bit blurry. God and King, Master and Lord, get discarded for the much easier to handle Friend. When God becomes solely our friend, we lose the fear of the LORD, and our relationship with Him becomes unbiblical. Again, this is where religious devotion comes in. We are His servants, His children even. We must remember that God has been and will always be great, higher and holier than we are. {The R&R of Christianity}

Christianity should be a religion of a relationship with Jesus Christ and with Christ his God, Jehovah the God above all kings and gods, but also about the relationship with others and other things (human beings, nature – plants and animals).

Fear God

Many who have made Jesus as their god have lost the fear of God or fear for God. Our religion should be an expression of that fear for God. In the end it will be Him that preserves the faithful, and plentifully shall reward him that deals proudly with the Truth, having the courage to speak out and show the world That Only One True God, the God of the kings David, Solomon and Christ. Strangely enough Trinitarians are giving the word Christian an othe meaning than then “ian” to the “Christ” would suggest. They do not see the fundamentals connected to being a Christian, nor the need to know about the God of Christ, Who is the God of the Bible. Those Trinitarians minimalise the act of Christ and do not value Jesus his act of submission to God and his complete sacrifice for humanity. Strangely enough many who call themselves Christian but worship a three-headed god dare to say, like the pharmacy student Teni:

God wanted His people to stand out from the people around them.
…
The bible makes us understand that God Almighty the creator of the whole universe is the One and Only true God. That means, every other god, is actually non-existent and made up by people’s imagination and craftiness. {4 Mmisconceptions that need to be cleared about being a christian}

though they do not believe in that Only One True God.

Bringing honour to the Only Right God

Bringing honour to such false gods is at the same time dishonouring God and misusing God’s Name and God’s Title. those who call themselves Christian should witness to the goodness of God in a world that has ceased to acknowledge His existence, let alone His sovereignty over the Cosmos. It was God’s son, Jesus who gave his followers an assignment to tell those around them about the Divine Creator and His promises, the good news of the Gospel of the coming Kingdom of God.

Those calling themselves Christian, should as followers of Jesus Christ, not only keep to his teachings, but follow the example of Christ, being servants of God, Jesus and others, and this even to their own peril. We should have a friendship realtionship with Christ as our brotherbut we are not to consider ourselves as equals with God, in the same way Jesus never considered himself equal with God. We owe only Jesus his God, the Elohim Hashem Jehovah, all of our devotion and allegiance.

 

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Preceding

Not About The Name Of The Godhead Of Jesus

Rhetoric and Biblical Truth

Confrontation by people telling lies to force others to avoid the targetted groups

Religions and Mainliners

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Additional reading

1. People are turning their back on Christianity
2. Blindness in the Christian world
3. Not liking your Christians
4. Not all christians are followers of a Greco-Roman culture
5. Christian in Christendom or in Christianity
6. Christianity is a love affair
7. To be chained by love for another one
8. Many forgot how Christ should be our anchor and our focus
9. Jesus and God
10. Only one God
11. A Father Who begat a son
12. Jahushua, Joshua, Jeshua or Jesus an Immanuel or God with us an incarnated God or a human being?
13. The sent one from God
14. Knowing Jesus Rabboni
15. Jesus son of God or God the son
16. Jesus son of God
17. Jesus Christ the Messiah
18. Seeing Jesus
19. Focussing on oneness with Jesus like Jesus is one with God
20. Reasons that Jesus is Not God
21. God son king and his subjects
22. Not saying Jeshua is God
23. Sayings of Jesus, what to believe and being or not of the devil
24. Jesus begotten Son of God #19 Compromising fact
25. On the Nature of Christ
26. The Son can do nothing of his own accord
27. The son of man given authority by God
28. The Nazarene master teacher learning people how they should behave
29. Doctrine of Christ
30. One Mediator
31. Commandements of Christ
32. Statutes given unto us
33. Relationship with God, Jesus and each other
34. Memorizing wonderfully – Additional verses: Psalm 34 Tasting and blessing Jehovah God
35. Extra verses to remember by the reading of Psalm 45 A Great name to Praise God
36. Not words of any organisation should bind you, but the Word of God
37. A learning process for each of us
38. Paul’s warning about false stories and his call to quit touching the unclean thing
39. Matthew 15 Calvin’s view
40. Matthew 20 It is never too late
41. Matthew 20 Are you willing to work for Jesus?
42. Matthew 25 Jesus ministry drawing to its dramatic conclusion and warning to be ready
43. A strange thing might happen when you come under Christ
44. As brothers and sisters showing that you are followers of the real Jesus or being a Jeshuaist sharing responsibilities
45. Demanding signs or denying yourself
46. Attitude of a Christian
47. As Christ’s slaves doing the Will of God in gratitude
48. A heart full of love is a fundamental requirement
49. Christianity without the Trinity
50. Doubting and going astray
51. Main churches losing population share
52. How do trinitarians equate divine nature
53. Europe and much-vaunted bastions of multiculturalism becoming No God Zones
54. Thought for today November the 6th: Indifference
55. Is it a Jewish or a Christian faith
56. Religious imagery used by pop artists
57. Avoiding friction and distraction in the body of Christ
58. Today’s thought “Fools despise wisdom” (March 23)
59. False opposite true worship which exalts the God of Israel
60. How should we worship God? #14 True worship
61. In a time when we must remain in our place
62. Memorizing wonderfully 18 Proverbs – Fear of God, Wisdom and instruction
63. Symptom of tzara’at a white spot on the flesh
64. Today’s thought “Folly and Wickedness of Men” (January 06)
65. Today’s thought “Sound an alarm for the day of Jehovah that comes” (November 19)

 

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Further related

1. Pouring Into Others (comeawake.org)
2. Being Christian
3. Being Christian Takes Practice
4. Being Christian On Day One
5. What Does It Mean to be a True Christian?
6. Being A Cultural Christian Is Not Enough
7. The Quiet in the Land
8. Martin Luther’s Seal
9. Today in Church History Erasmus Loaded the Reformation Cannon
10. ROFLMAO — what would Luther’s 95 Theses sound like in an corporate office email memo to all staff?
11. Swedish Lutherans: Synodical and congregational minutes on baptism and membership in the 1850s
12. A Bonhoeffer moment and a barstool conversation between Luther, Bonhoeffer and a Finnish theologian — links and quotes for future reference
13. Lutheran Women and Their Impact on History
14. Luther an’ Me‘
15. Dear Church’: A tapestry of discipleship and a call for white folks to ‘do good white folk work’ to help dismantle racism
16. Progressive Christianity
17. Check Yourself, Christian
18. Unchurched
19. Come To Me To Have Life
20. Sheep and Goats, Faith and Mercy
21. Reformation 2020. The Righteousness of God at the Present Time
22. It Matters
23. Commitment to Christ Means Commitment to His Church (Blogs Revisited)
24. What the Coronavirus Reveals about Protestant Piety
25. Lutherans vs. Coronavirus
26. Attitude is Everything
27. Is the Trinity scriptural – or is it pagan nonsense
28. Fully God and Fully Man
29. December 11,2020: Finding the “O’s” in God’s message
    Satan’s Lie: You Can Become God
30. Is Jesus God? – Adnan Rashid vs Samuel Green
31. Proof that the disciples did not preach the trinity!
32. How the Trinity Debate has Influenced Our Reading
33. A Trinitarian Christian claims he can explain the trinity…guess what happens next?
34. Mohammed Hijab vs David Wood, Tawheed vs Trinity
35. Is Jesus God? Debate between Pastor Stanley Sjoberg and Sheikh Ahmed Deedat
36. Trinity vs Tawheed, Adnan Rashid vs Samuel Green (Part 1)
37. Trinity vs Tawheed – Adnan Rashid vs Samuel Green (Part 2)
38. Of Christianity and Modern Morality
39. 4 Mmisconceptions that need to be cleared about being a christian
40. Matthew 20:26
41. Psalm 56 – Fear and Trust
42. Heaven, work, and duty
43. The Church – Body of Christ
44. Funhouse God
45. Our Heavenly Home 
46. Listening While White: Respecting the Image of God in People of Color
47. Deepening our Faith: 2nd Sunday of Advent 2020
48. He is Faithful
49. Catholicism – a False religion based on idolatry man made doctrines pagan traditions
50. Completing the great commission
51. Where is wisdom found?
52. the high cost of not trusting God
53. Above the voice of men
54. Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid
55. Fear of God – Temor de Dios
56. The Fear of God
57. Fear Brings Contentment
58. Pleasing and Not Pleasing People for the Glory of God
59. You´ve overcome

Month of freedom and liberty with Independence Day or Deceived day

Udo Ndah of Purple Rays thinks that July is the month of freedom and liberty!

I would love to be able to say “amen” to that, but I am afraid there are some figures in our present day who are bringing that freedom into a great danger and have made Independence Day July the 4th more into their own Donald Trump Day.

In one of our national languages we have the word “tromper” and “tromp”, to “deceive” and “deceived”.
I cannot resist the fact that several Americans must nevertheless come to the realization that they have made a serious mistake in the election of the current president. They also should have to come to know that anything that cost their peace would not only be too expensive but also something to avoid. And the present leader of the United States of America has had his finger already too many times on the “Red Button”.

 

Udo Ndah writes

July has one of the longest lists of Independence Day anniversaries; more than twenty days of the month are Independence celebration days for various countries including good old Uncle Sam (USA)! {Happy New Month of July!}

But where is that good popular old symbol for the United States Uncle Sam gone to?

Fox speaks about a “Great Awokening” (sic)

comparable in some ways to the enormous religious foment in the white North in the years before the American Civil War.

And tells us

It began roughly with the 2014 protests in Ferguson, Missouri, when activists took advantage of ubiquitous digital video and routine use of social media to expose a national audience in a visceral way to what otherwise might have been a routine local news story. It’s as if a special July energy triggers the ‘freedom hormones’ in humans urging them to break both individual and collective fetters! {The Great Awokening}

About Ferguson Trump showed his real face at several occasions or confrontations with the press. Nearly five years later, Fox does not seem to see that Mr. Trumps has made July the 4th in a Trump Day and has used  it for political election action work. Though they note that Trump has made white racial resentment more visible than it was before and remark

but at the same time, white liberals have become much more attuned to racism — seeing more of it not necessarily because the world has changed but because their own attitudes toward longstanding features of it have changed. {The Great Awokening}

Fox agrees that Trump’s presidency itself is probably a driver of the shift on LGBTQ issues, weapon matters, and racial thinking. Donald Trump and his allies’ support may for the world outside look like he is for the Jews. But they should see he is more for Israel’s right-wing government, which itself has made common cause with some European anti-Semitic nationalist movements. Others such as the historian David Henkin claim that many of Trump’s Orthodox supporters

“are the descendants (literally, in many cases) of Jews to whom the white nationalism of the post-1965 Republican Party was already resonating 30 or 40 years ago in debates about affirmative action, segregation, colonialism, and law enforcement.” Both theories, however, overlook Orthodoxy’s own position on anti-Semitism and the crucible in which it was formed.

Even Trump having a Jewish son in law, did not hinder him to more than once to give anti-Semitic remarks. Trump his strong support for Israel, the spiritual and religious centre of Judaism, does not make of him a saint.
The seeming contradiction between an American president who never misses an opportunity to boast about a largely symbolic embassy move and conversely misses every opportunity to denounce white nationalism, is according to some no contradiction at all. It comes as little surprise that the two American pastors that Trump delegated to bless the opening of the Jerusalem embassy respectively claimed that Hitler was a messenger sent by God and that Jews who do not embrace Christ are damned. Many Trump adepts by interviews from our Flemish television stations were or are convinced Trump is also a messenger of God.
Pastor Robert Jeffress responded,

“I have never said anything derogatory about the Jewish people. I talked about the oneness we share in worshiping the same God in the Scriptures.”

Though he and Trump worship a tri-une god whilst Jews, like me and other real Christians worship the Only One True God of Israel, the Elohim Hashem Jehovah, Who is an invisible God of love. In other interviews that pastor further explained,

“Jerusalem has been the object of the affection of both Jews and Christians down through history and the touchstone of prophecy.”

And Jews, Jeshuaists and real Christians do know that Jerusalem is going to be the capital of the Kingdom of God, But that does not mean that it is up to an American president to decide when it would be time to have Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

Jeffress’ focus on Judaism and disinterest in the global socio-economic well-being of Jews is borne out from recent polling data gauging American evangelical attitudes toward Jews and Israel. A 2017 LifeWay Research Poll revealed that upwards of 80 percent of American evangelical Christians believe that events surrounding the establishment of the State of Israel were the fulfilment of Bible prophecies that show we are getting closer to the return of Jesus Christ. On the other hand, only 20 percent of those polled understood these events in strictly geopolitical terms.

For many Americans Trump looks like the one preceding Jesus Christ bringing total liberation for the world they want to live in, without coloured people, without Hispanics, without Mexicans or any South American.
Those Americans do forget that lots of people had a marvellous idea of the nation they would have loved to live in. Many laid down their lives so that one day their progeny could feel proud of what the pioneers did and proud of that free country they could live in

Those ancestors had hopes that they and their offspring could exercise their treasures of traditions and values without fears of oppression and shadows of injustice in a nation where all the religions could reside with common opinions and behaviours and there not being to much difference of being on the top and those at the bottom.

Yesterday on the 5th of July 2019 Donald Trump used independence day to have hit his day, wanting to show to France, North Korea, Russia, that he too could govern a nation where there is place for military show and people parading for him as the masterful director of a great nation.

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Preceding

Prince of Wales warning that the world is in danger of “forgetting the lessons of the past”

Apocalyptic Extremism: No Longer a Laughing Matter

Russian involvement in US elections

Americans their stars, pretension, God, Allah and end of times signs #1 Abrahamic religions

Americans their stars, pretension, God, Allah and end of times signs #2 War on God’s Plan, Name and title

Trump’s rhetoric is infusing a culture of Anti-Semitism

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Find also to read

1. 2014 Human Rights
2. Does he really not know #1 Lies and money laundering
3. Does he really not know #2 Casinos and inner circles
4. Time to get out of the gridlock
5. Donald Trump his America

Seeds from the world creating division and separation from God

These days we can find more than one politician trying to sow division in his own country and in the world. The are very handy bullies who can keep their outlook unchanged like a good strong high quality wig. their periwig may be their trade mark, hiding what is underneath that peruke. Like postiches are fake people may not forget those words spoken by such politicians may also be fake.

We can hear those politicians, which claim to be Christians, picking on Jews, Muslims and immigrants, trying to hide the internal more important matters, and trying to please the people their tickling ears, who want to find a scapegoat for all the problems of their own country. The last few years our Jewish community already felt the pressure, having to face an increase of bullying, making that several Jews decided to leave Belgium and to go to Israel, where the violence seems to frighten them less than here in Belgium.

Shoebat asks why Christians, before they start ‘picking on Jewish, Muslim or immigrant dumpsters, are joining another dumpster instead of cleaning up the growing neopaganism in their own backyard?’

Fact is, so many, be they Catholic, Orthodox or Evangelical, are looking the other way, that for the sake of being anti-immigrant, they support the heathen. {The Greatest Abandonment Of Christianity In The West Is Happening And The Whole World Is Being Plunged Into Paganism As Biblical Prophecies Reveal}

He should know, like the whole world should know, that at this present day satan, the adversary of God, is throwing a lot of seeds on this globe which shall infect many other seeds wanting to grow up on this earth which is warming up for a less pleasant climate change and for bad times to come.

It are those seeds sown by the adversary of God, which are clearly no seeds of love, or seeds of peace, who by growing up, getting bigger than the slower growing seeds of godly people, that want to convince those who believe in the True God, that they are wrong and that they should believe in the god of the world, making that they shall have it much better than now as believing naive guys.

Those contemporary seeds want those who believe those very old books to come to see that the symbols they are carrying are the signs for better times. They are proud of their tattoos which should be a sign for the world that the world belongs to them. In a way, they are right. The world belongs to them. God has given the world in the hands of man. The adversary of God already for some time has the right to proof to the Divine Maker he can do it better than the Creator Himself.

In ancient times there where the idols of Egypt and it looks like we are gone back to them. We can see many carrying again those very well known symbols of the sun and pagan elements.

Europe and many of the slavs are veering away from Christ’s church returning back in masse to pre-Christian paganism, all with deities that honor “the sun” just as John predicted in Revelations. {The Greatest Abandonment Of Christianity In The West Is Happening And The Whole World Is Being Plunged Into Paganism As Biblical Prophecies Reveal}

At the closing times there will be division. People shall come to fight each other for many reasons, one of which religion shall taken as a point of discussion. The different religious groups fighting against each other, even Christians forgetting the agapé love of the preaching of Christ and his apostles, not willing to be open minded for people who have an other faith or come from other nations.

Isaiah 19 speaks of neopaganism spread from Egyptian mythology which will be the hallmark of the world prior to Christ’s coming. The ultra-nationalist movements from Europe all the way to slavic nations derive from Thor, the sun god in Norse mythology was also the Egyptian Osiris and Kneph, the Phœnician Bel or Baal, and it is accepted freely when slavic neopagans call upon the same God when they invoke Perun.

The American and European Alt-Right’s obsession with a mythical ancient Egyptian deity, Kek, is also Egyptian, while “the Hindus, Persians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and Celts have all yielded striking comparisons [to each other], and the Norse Gods display significant resemblances to members of other pantheons” (A History of the Vikings, Oxford University Press, P.p, 319). {The Greatest Abandonment Of Christianity In The West Is Happening And The Whole World Is Being Plunged Into Paganism As Biblical Prophecies Reveal}

In the previous years we could feel how the right wing movements became more into the light, not hiding any more, but shouting loud, wanting to get rid of Jews and Muslims. Again Christian churches where silent, in the same way a mosques did not come out to tell people ISIS and other  Muslim fundamentalists where not real Muslims but bringers of hate, not acting like a Muslim should do.

All over Europe we can see the right wing parties getting stronger, making people afraid of the Muslims, Jews and of those who come to look for refuge. The refugees and immigrants are not welcome for them. There is no place in their heart to foster for those in need or fleeing from the war regions in the East or South.

The Lambda. The symbol of identitarians and many neo-Nazis

Shoebat writes

The devil will use antisemitism, stupid, where every evil is blamed on the Jews. And this is currently brewing like never before since WWII. While critiquing Jews is valid, the evil is this unbalanced view that is sweeping western nations like a storm accusing Jews to supersede gentiles in doing mischief. And its coming from claiming Christians who do not consider that antisemitism in Christianity is a heresy, condemned by the church as mortal sin since it stems from ultra-nationalists leading their nations to commit genocide. Today, there is a tremendous rise in antisemitism. It has become a silent reality getting us ever closer to fulfilling Zechariah 12. {A Horrific Storm Of Evil Is Rising Up And Is Sweeping The World, It Is Leading Europe Into The Hands Of The Antichrist}

According to him

Saddam Hussein, also spelled Ṣaddām Ḥusayn, in full Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti whose brutal rule was marked by costly and unsuccessful wars against neighbouring countries.

The first phase began around three decades ago when the West declared war hailing Saddam Hussein as the major threat to the world. And when the true prophets warned “this is a bad idea” the prophets were burned alive. Then it took a decade or two to recognize the prophets were right all along.

Then the next evil phase began when a new spring gushed forth out of the bottomless pit declaring that Middle East dictators are the major threat to the world. The false prophets declare it “an Arab Spring” and they blessed it. And when the true prophets said “this too is wickedness” more true prophets were burned alive. The west then went full-throttle on pumping this Arab Spring to gush forth the waters which became wormwood, and many people died from the water, because it had been made bitter.

The west, as it turns out, commenced an evil plan. Germany aided the Islamist evil dragon Turkey which spewed a flood of Muslim immigrants, locusts if you will, into the heartland of Europe. Now the European masters did not have to convince the masses to aid in the ultimate evil plan, the third phase. Instead the masses on their own declared and complained to their masters that aided and abetted this wormwood shouting that the Muslim immigration is the ultimate major threat to the world. {A Horrific Storm Of Evil Is Rising Up And Is Sweeping The World, It Is Leading Europe Into The Hands Of The Antichrist}

We can clearly see how anti-Semitism was growing in Europe and now has reached the United States of America as well. It is stemming not just from the typical anti-Israel liberals, but according to Shoebath from western conservatives who do not heed Zechariah’s warning.

Today the rise of neopaganism reveals a disturbing trend becoming the fastest growing religion globally and is also virulently antisemitic and contra-believers of God, be it Jews, real or non-trinitarian Christians or real Muslims. We should be alert that there are also groups who may see what is happening to the Jews but want to blame the followers of the prophet Mohammed, making people afraid of those believers of One God.

We must be careful, for those who are trying to frighten people for the worshippers of Allah. First of all those making others afraid of the worshippers of Allah, is that they forget ‘Allah’ is a title which denotes a god and the God. In Belgium and many other countries ‘Allah’ does not pose so many problems because it is a general title being used to denote a god or God, Who gets also other titles over here like ‘Ene’ or ‘Enige’ (‘One’ or ‘Only One’), Elohim, Dieu and Gott, el (not for the girl of female ‘el’) and El Shadai. I got the impression on the net (for the short time I’m presenting there my own ‘Immanuel site’ or blog) that English speaking people want all others to use the same word for God as they do and how many say the Jews killed Jesus and therefore should be punished and done with. (It would be the same as Jews now saying to a Caucasian “you killed my forefathers so I have to kill you’, though perhaps it could well be that this Caucasian’s father or grand parent really has Jewish blood on his hands, though Christ was long ago put to death not by Jews but by the Romans, which many Christians seem to forget.). Some even want that we all would speak English and use what is according to them the only valuable Bible ‘The King James Version’ as if God would only want to reach His people in English. The other-way round in some Muslim countries there are leaders wanting to forbid Catholics and protestants to use the general term for god or God ‘allah’ because they claim ‘Allah’ is only the God of Muslims. Both should know that Allah is the God of all. They also should know that Allah or God  has a name which is even Holy or set-apart, and which should be known all over the world. That Holy Name is Jehovah and is the Name given to the Most High Almighty God of gods, Who is a Spirit and not a human being or a being of flesh, blood and bones, like Jesus Christ was. He is also a singular God and Being One He wants all to worship Him alone and not having people bowing down in front of graven images or making any pictures or sculptures of Him or any other gods.

Today we can see that the pagan rituals are very much increasing again and that lots of people prefer to take part in those human rituals and pagan festivals, instead of holding to the festivals the Most High Elohim has given or demands His people to keep.

By having gone so far away from the mitzvah or commandments of God, man became ‘bewildered’ and has lost the North. Not having a good compass any more man has chosen for the wrong and more attractive paths.

Walid Shoebat seems not to believe that his American compatriots are also infested with the same pesticide as the European evangelicals. He writes

Most Americans think that Evangelicals are the same universality, believing that these are ‘Israel flag wavers’ just like them. The American evangelical being unique is the most ill-informed. When it comes to this issue, they do not realize that the bulk of what identifies itself as European Evangelicals are quite the different breed. Germany is exploding with Odin worship with a church in kahoot with it, while in the U.S. Evangelicals don’t say much fearing to appear as pro-immigrant. {The Greatest Abandonment Of Christianity In The West Is Happening And The Whole World Is Being Plunged Into Paganism As Biblical Prophecies Reveal}

and continues

While westerners are made to focus on “creeping Sharia,” they forget how Christians in Germany welcomed “creeping Nazism”. The rise of Nazism in 1933 upheld “Christian values”. Just as the Next News Network, Gary Franchi Jr, the Evangelical supporting the Soldiers of Odin for their good deeds, likewise, during Nazi Germany, Germans were persuaded by the statement on “positive Christianity”:

“We demand the freedom of all religious confessions in the state, insofar as they do not jeopardize the state’s existence or conflict with the manners and moral sentiments of the Germanic race. The Party as such upholds the point of view of a positive Christianity without tying itself confessionally to any one confession. It combats the Jewish-materialistic spirit at home and abroad and is convinced that a permanent recovery of our people can only be achieved from within on the basis of the common good before individual good.” (from Article 24, 1920 Nazi Party Platform)

And just as these deceived Europeans during Nazism, they are doing it again. Everything repeats, there is nothing new under the sun.

And just as it was in WWII, what they all have in common is “antisemitism” “ultra-nationalism,” and a “racialized” understanding of morality.

Kirchenratswahlen am 23. Juli 1933: Wahlpropaganda mit SA-Unterstützung vor der St.-Marien-Kirche am Neuen Markt in Berlin

And if one thinks it is the Catholic, or the Orthodox who were the main players, I remind, it was the Evangelicals in Germany who were the bulk of the masses deceiving while being deceived in the 1930s. These comprised of 28 regional churches or Landeskirchen, the bulk of German churches, that included the three major theological traditions that had emerged from the Reformation: Lutheran, Reformed, and United. Most, the bulk majority, of Germany’s 40 million Protestants, were members of this church, although there were smaller so-called “free” Protestant churches, such as Methodist and Baptist churches that withstood Nazism.

Flag of the Deutsche Christen or German Christians 1934

During the 1920s, a movement emerged within the German Evangelical Church called the Deutsche Christen, or “German Christians.” The “German Christians” embraced many of the nationalistic and racial aspects of Nazi ideology, which is exactly what we see rising today. Once the Nazis came to power, this group sought the creation of a national “Reich Church” and supported a “nazified” paganized version of Christianity.

{The Greatest Abandonment Of Christianity In The West Is Happening And The Whole World Is Being Plunged Into Paganism As Biblical Prophecies Reveal}

Wandlung der DC-Embleme 1932 – 1935 – 1937

It is very clear for us in West-Europe that we can see a very similar situation as in the 1920ies –1930ies and that we similar dictatorial right wing figures rising up and misleading the citizens of their country. America being the first country in the series where the right wing weapon lobby has won and is going to do everything to get other coloured and other believers out of ‘their nation’. Soon we might see Wilders in the Netherlands and Marine Le Pen following in the footsteps of the new dictator Donald Trump, who shall take care that all those who do not agree with him shall disappear from the stage of his theatre.

Europe and other countries should be aware how they should be careful not to fall in the trap of those bad seed, the weeds being sown all over America and Europe, not to become infested with a dangerous virus, which not only shall kill many of the ones not like by many, but worst of all, killing lots of innocent people and bringing horror all over the world.

We should be warned and better know our real enemy.

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Preceding

Seeds to be planted soon

Seeds of promise

Seeds, weeds and kingdoms

Unbelief, faith and mustard seed

Engagement in an actual two-way conversation with your deities

Solstice, Saturnalia and Christmas-stress

 

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Additional reading

1. Hamas the modern Philistines
2. Religious Practices around the world
3. Unprecedented violence against protesters and social protest
4. Social media a destabilisation tool in the Middle East and Syrian conflict
5. Protest against Tzahal concert in Antwerp
6. Migrants to the West #6
7. 2014 European elections
8. 2015 In the Picture
9. Israel the Oil and Gas Opportunity
10. Foreign workers and immigrants
11. Silence, devotion, Salafists, quietists, weaponry, bombings, books, writers and terrorists
12. A world with or without religion
13. Knife-trust in democratic sore back
14. January 27 – 70 years ago Not an end yet to genocide
15. Nigel Farage called Donald Trump’s victory ‘bigger than Brexit’
16. 25 Orthodox rabbis issued a statement on Christianity
17. The American clouds of Anti-Semitism
18. French Muslims under attack
19. Declaration of war against Islam and Christianity
20. At the closing hours of 2016 #2 Low but also highlights
21. Bible sayings about God
22. Two states of existence before God
23. Disobedient man and God’s promises
24. How long to wait before bringing religiousness and spirituality in practice
25. You cannot change anything in your life with intention alone
26. Looking for answers on the question Is there a God #2 Pantheon of gods and celebrations
27. Picking Stones
28. Apple of Gods eye
29. Have no other gods besides Me
30. Sow and harvests in the garden of your heart
31. Bearing fruit
32. Agape, a love to share with others from the Fruit of the Spirit
33. Improving the world by improving the Faith

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Further related articles

1. An Another Way
2. What Seeds Are You Planting? (365 Days of Daring Faith — DAY 293)
3. Sowing the Wind
4. We Do Not Save, Only Plant
5. our words matter…
6. Spread the Gospel
7. ignite hope…
8. The art of Love
9. The Harvest
10. The Apple Tree
11. The Orchard of Your Life, Tom Moore
12. Faith’s Checkbook: Pruning For Fruit-Bearing
13. Matthew 21:18-22: Withering the Fig Tree
14. Be A Fruitful Tree In Harsh Weather
15. Planted to Bear Fruit
16. You Shall Know Them By Their Fruits…But What is Fruit?
17. Bearing Fruit
18. Bearing Fruit for God – John 15:6-8
19. The First Year of Marriage: Being Spiritual is Not in Tongues-Speaking
20. The Thin Line Between Pride And Greed
21. Psalms of the Salter: Some Thoughts on Really Living for the Lord (Psalm 92)
22. Discernment and God – Philippians 1:9-11
23. What! No Fruit?
24. Cookie a day: Don’t Be A Tree That Gets Cut Down
25. Sanctification by God – John 15:1-4
26. Post-Truth Bears No Fruit
27. 4 Keys To Pleasing God
28. Through Christ – You Can Do All Things
29. Our Fruit Is Found In Christ
30. “Fruit Bearing”
31. Unity: Wisdom is Justified by her Children
32. Why Don’t You Feel Him With You?
33. Abiding in the Lord
34. Following the Leader
35. rise up and resist…
36. Restored faith in humanity
37. Was It Worth It?
38. What a “normal” day for God looks like
39. Life Transformation~ Starts with the Seed, the Word of God
40. Religious Pluralism and Common Sense on Trump’s Inauguration Day
41. Hate Still Great as Trump Administration Begins
42. Here’s What Dr. Seuss Thought About “America First”
43. David Icke and the meaning of Jewish power
44. To anyone who still supports Donald Trump
45. Mario Silva: Persistence of anti-Semitism shows world has yet to learn lessons of the Holocaust
46. What’s in a name? Identity in a reactionary age
47. Defend The Jews: We Must Never Forget The Holocaust
48. Tam Dalyell and anti-semitism
49. London Mayor Sadiq Khan: We Must ‘Redouble Our Efforts’ to Stop Anti-Semitism
50. Populism is breeding racism, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia: UN chief
51. Never Forget… Unless You Are The Russian Usurper Donald Trump
52. Rachel Rozsa *************************** In memory of my grandmother on Holocaust Memorial Day
53. Remember the Shoah, Not Just the Holocaust
54. ‘You Get a Gold Star!’: Alt-Righters Celebrate Holocaust Remembrance Day
55. Alan Dershowitz’ Long Reach
56. After Trump orders entry ban, airlines bar Iranians from US-bound flights | The Times of Israel
57. Trump’s Holocaust Remembrance Speech Doesn’t Mention Jews!
58. Lobby: Trump’s ‘America First’ slogan is antisemitic!
59. The anti-Semite with the Jewish wife
60. Anti-American & Un-Jewish (Jared Kushner)
61. Speak Out In Times of Great Moral Crisis
62. Redemption is sweet
63. Watch “What’s Holding the Arab World Back?” ~ PragerU
64. Hasbara is Desperate to stop David Icke (video)
65. Deepa Kumar: hating Israel, loving Hamas
66. Know Your Enemy
67. Nationalists’ approaches to Jews, Israel and Zionism: Complex relationships
68. United in Idiocy: Milo Yiannopolous vs the University of Berkeley Students
69. Next Week in Jerusalem
70. A former skinhead explains why it’s a mistake for the US to stop targeting right-wing extremists
71. United States Donald Trump news update

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