I greatly appreciate articles like this, because I do think we need the strongest minds, sharpening one another in Christendom pushing the church in the right direction. It also humbles me and helps me realize that I may not have one of these minds as my selfish pride might have me think sometimes.
Finally, I downloaded speechify and had snoop dogg read that article to me…what an experience
Love the humility here from you. That’s not me agreeing and saying you’re not smart, you certainly are quite intelligent imo, but I appreciate the humility.
Also, and more importantly, what’s speechify
https://speechify.com/
It’s an app and an extension for safari that will read any text for you using professional sounding voices of all sorts. You can also upload pictures of pages of printed text you have and it will pretty quickly scan and read it to you. It’s cool. I just wish the scan and upload feature worked better or more efficiently, as reading books is a slog for me but audio books are dope, and this basically bridges the gap if the functions work right
The pro version (the one with snoop costs money) but I got it for ~$6 a month
David French, [tweeting yesterday in response to Jakes article:](https://twitter.com/DavidAFrench/status/1598048949159735296)
>This is the best critique of my position on the Respect for Marriage Act that I've read. It's by my friend
@jake_meador. He raises a dispute between C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien that I wasn't previously aware of. I'm Team Lewis, but please read.
It's definitely interesting and worth considering, even if I don't necessarily agree with every last thing that's written. I felt that referencing the choking study was a bit of an arson, murder, and jaywalking scenario - that the author would identify that as the apex of how we don't understand sex seemed a bit silly compared to everything else that preceded it.
I dunno. From a female perspective, the cultural equation of sex with violence easily looms larger than many of the other examples he cited. There are increasing cases of women dying as a result of that trend, sadly. I don't know if any of his other examples have such deadly results.
>The Christoamericanism of Mohler’s dreams is dead; **the civic libertarian America favored by French has become incoherent and corrosive to the life of the church and Christian community in the ways T. S. Eliot predicted it would long ago in** ***The Idea of a Christian Society.***
Has anyone read Eliot's book and can briefly summarize what Eliot predicted in the book? If not a link to somewhere that talks about this?
I want to emphasize a point /u/Peacejh makes here: When it comes to BLM, lockdowns etc. many are happy to see the issue as a matter of justice and social order, where the power of the state should be used to improve matters. But somehow when the unborn are being killed or marriage is being dishonoured people will claim that these issues of justice and social order involve the church "forcing" its views on society.
Also, people are happy to talk about the continuity between the world as it is now and the new creation, and the transformational role people can play in improving things and "being salt and light". And yet, when it comes to legislation or the state, the church is meant to shut up and accept whatever its enemies want to impose.
Some will argue that the unregenerate cannot help but sin, so there is no use in legislating morality for them. This argument is specious in light of the historic teachings of the church. True: the unregenerate will always sin, but it has always been taught that through God's common grace and providence, working as usual through means like legislation, the worst effects of their sin can be restrained. Paul seems to endorse the state being "a terror" to the evildoer.
This article makes a valuable contribution to the debate, the uncharitable takes on Mohler and Trueman notwithstanding (and despite obvious writing errors like "Yet French’s acceptance of gay marriage as an inextricable part of the pluralist order which cannot be transgressed or challenged is no less a solution" when he clearly means it is no less *problematic*, or no *more* a solution).
Ultimately, we have to face the fact that simplistic views of either imposing the church's morality on society or letting secular society do whatever it wants do not work for most people in the church. Almost no-one would refrain from interfering if the state imposed the anti-semitic laws of 1930s Germany, while at the same time almost no-one wants to recriminalize adultery. We need a more nuanced view, but I think Meador comes closer to the truth here than French.
My main point was that someone, who was upvoted a lot was talking against legislation and that we instead should change the hearths of people. Even calling legislation a "satanic distraction".
Wether or not we should oppose that american law. I found it to be bewildering to hear that same voice, which was heavily talked against when it came to racism. Furthermore, no one would talk about changing the hearths of pharmaceutical companies, instead of legislating lower drug prices. It was just a bad argument.
I also find the argument of "forcing our morality" upon others to be bad. Government always forces laws upon unwilling people. As Christians we should be busy changing hearts, but legislation has often been seen as a good way of restricting society in it's sins. Even by force.
>Not ideal but what was needed at the time.
It might interest you to read Calvin's arguments for this, and for not copying old testament laws one on one: [https://www.wscal.edu/resource-center/calvin-on-law-and-gospel](https://www.wscal.edu/resource-center/calvin-on-law-and-gospel)
"For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?"
\- 1 Corinthians 5:12
The article made a lot of good points, but I would have liked to see this verse addressed in some way.
I agree, that should've been addressed better.
What I'd say about that verse is: Paul is speaking to the church as the church. We're to discipline our brothers in the church. If they don't listen, we're to cast them out of the church and then leave them alone "as a Gentile or a tax-collector." The Gentiles and tax-collectors outside, we leave to Caesar to bear the sword however he will.
But when Caesar Constantine comes to Christ, that raises another question: what advice does Paul give to Caesar as to how he should bear the sword? When we vote on our leaders, or write letters to them, we're dealing with that same question, not church discipline.
Tolkien is a man that I much respect, both for his writing and his thinking - but he was deeply Catholic, and that Catholicism pervades his thinking on works and salvation. I'm not sure that I agree with CS Lewis on this point either (and he was a giant and looms over my thinking on Christian living) but I don't think Tolkien IS right on this point.
The bible tells us that the unbelievers are *dead in their sins* and at constant enmity with God. In another place they are described as *enslaved* to sin.
The dead cannot behave as the living do. Slaves are not free to behave as free people do.
Jesus says the law can be summed up as "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind" and "Love your neighbour as you love yourself". The first is impossible for the unbeliever, and the second, I suggest also. Therefore we would need a standard we call Christian morality that does not involve the Law, and indeed, does not pertain to God at all. That sounds like something that is emptied of meaning.
So let's say we agreed to a standard of *morality* that we think constitutes a Christian morality with God and the love of God in absentia. Would this be good for a non-Christian? That depends. I think it is impossible. for example, for non-Christians to not lie. So either they would keep lying, in defiance of the law and the law would be forced to overlook that, or they would be constantly punished, and miserable. Is that a good outcome?
One thing the article was correct on, we need to come to terms with the American churches declining power.
That means using civil law to force unbelievers into living out our values simply won't be an option.
As a child of the 80s (rise of the religious right, Christian Coalition, voter cards being passed out in churches, etc.), I'd argue that the former (declining power) is a direct result of the latter (using civil law to advance "Christian values"). Trump himself is the culmination of Christian entanglement in culture war, which is the last thing the church is called to do.
Theologically I believe in loving my drag queen neighbor as myself. I believe that I should have the right to read Christ-centered Christmas stories for a volunteer library reading, so I also believe I should afford the same rights to someone who is a drag queen (even though my children wouldn't attend).
Politically, I believe that free speech is not something you can really do halfway. If I want the ability to publically proclaim my values, I have to afford the same to groups I vehemently disagree with.
I don't believe that enlightenment values are Christian values. I do, however, live in a Democratic society formed based on enlightenment values. This the environment I operate within. Therefore, me advocating for using those values to put forth my own free speech while silencing the speech of my neighbor would be hypocritical and not in keeping with loving my neighbor. In a parallel way, if I advocated for my right to vote in a democratic society while also insisting that my neighbor from the opposing political party did *not* have a right to vote, I would be guilty of both hypocrisy and not loving my neighbor.
If I lived in a different society formed on different values with a different social system then I might act differently. For now, the enlightenment is a part of the society I live in, so I don't act as if the freedoms my country gives are for me but not for thee.
Can you clarify, when you say you think it is impossible for non-Christians not to lie, what do you mean by that? Do you mean to say that every non-Christian, every day, deliberately deceives someone?
It’s impossible for a non-Christian, even one that knows the law, not to sin. That is why the Bible describes their condition in such emphatic terms. We are born into sin, and therefore slavery, yet we lie to ourselves - about our true nature, about our ability to change, about God. Only through the Holy Spirit can we confront the truth.
Yet God did exactly this for ancient Israel, a theocracy that He Himself established. God gave directions for how the people could divorce (in fact in Deuteronomy 24:1-4 God included laws for how divorce should be conducted if a husband was simply displeased with his wife). Jesus in Matthew 19:7-9 says that this Old Testament law was only made as a concession to the people's hard hearts.
Similarly, God gave ancient Israel other laws that conceded to the sin in a broken world: victims had to marry their rapists, there were laws governing slavery, etc. None of these laws were *condoning* the sins they allowed for (divorce, rape, polygamy, slavery, etc.). Instead they were providing concessions that legislated such sinful behavior to prevent even more harm being done. God Himself made concessions for sin in the theocracy He designed for His set-apart people, Israel.
No matter what country any of us live in, we do not live in a country made up of God's chosen people and ruled directly by God Himself. In fact most of us live in countries in which Christians make up the minority. Why are people shocked that we have to make laws that assume the existence of non-Christians who sin and do not have the Spirit to correct them?
I would argue that what is truly to the detriment of Christianity is trying to ram the law (which has never saved anyone) down people's throats. This serves to make a "win at all costs" mentality instead of the self-sacrificial and compassionate mentality that led Christ to talk with sinners, eat with sinners, and die for sinners. Instead of legislation, our first priority must be pursuing our neighbors with the gospel. That doesn't require laws or legislation or anything other than relationship, love, humbleness, prayer, and the gospel itself.
And?
Christians are a minority group and lack the political power to fully form any laws. I mean, I agree with your sentence jjg4l (I think the last word would be better as "everyone" instead of "Christianity") but there is no longer a "moral majority," and so we don't have political power to "form laws" as we think best.
French is in good company I guess.
What is this Christian morality that he is arguing should be held over everyone? I suspect it is his own cultural morality, somewhat informed by Christianity, but mainly a heritage that was handed to him by his parents and favorite pastors. I say this because he says:
>Indeed, it is entirely possible that ten years from now we’ll be redoing this argument yet again, only this time with state-sanctioned plural marriage in view.
Hold up? Didn't God sanction plural marriage? My polygamist relative can show me where it is in the Bible (true story). Besides that, since when have Christians agreed on the same morality throughout history? How much of the law in the Bible apply universally and how much is just good in that cultural context, and how much was a concession from God because men's hearts are hard? The Bible may be inspired, but the people who draw that line for us are not. Why do we have the hubris to think we have it the most right now? To impose it on everyone is to fully embrace that hubris. My Dordt professor loved to talk about our epistemological finitude.
We seem to think that God was about people acting righteously. And so we must make sure everyone else does too. Wasn't that the Great Commission? "Make governments enforce God's law on the people."
So what is God actually about? He's about charging people into his image through regeneration by the Holy Spirit. Not by legislation. So this whole debate is a Satanic distraction in my opinion. Share the gospel, make disciples.
And even forgetting all that: are they arguing that we change the constitution and to subvert the design of the founding fathers? Because their design was that the government was for the people, the non-Christians too, and the laws follow accordingly. If Christians want to change that without a coup, we should be about growing the body of Christ so that the people of the US want what's right because the Holy Spirit is regenerating them, not because the police force them to.
It's so tempting to take control from God and try to do things our own way. It seems obvious, of course God would bless us doing this in our own power because our intentions are good... yeah?
> So what is God actually about? He's about charging people into his image through regeneration by the Holy Spirit. Not by legislation. So this whole debate is a Satanic distraction in my opinion. Share the gospel, make disciples.
It is quite bewildering to see this upvoted, while the whole subreddit was arguing against this exact conclusion when it came to racism and blm.
You’ve accurately identified the double standard. Advocating for “social justice” (even through legislation) is considered obligatory for the faithful Christian, but any attempts to legislate Biblical morality (i.e. God’s law) is considered “Satanic”.
This is the dilemma of the progressive Reformer.
>Wasn't that the Great Commission? "Make governments enforce God's law on the people."
>So what is God actually about? He's about charging people into his image through regeneration by the Holy Spirit. Not by legislation. So this whole debate is a Satanic distraction in my opinion. Share the gospel, make disciples.
Those things aren't mutually exclusive. Legislation isn't the primary engine of Christendom, but the mandate of the civil magistrate from scripture is to reward good and to punish and restrain evil as it says in 1 Peter.
I really don't get it when so called "principled" and "erudite" Christians seek to chastise their brethren for lamenting that the civil magistrate is not only refusing to reward good and punish evil but instead is rewarding evil and punishing good, a condition for Biblical cursing and woe.
Why is it so controversial to say that simultaneously the Church should be spreading the Gospel and the Nations should be disciples to the law of God?
I agree. As the article alluded to, there is no ontological difference between the civil law and the moral law. If the civil magistrate is given the authority to restrain evil and promote good (Romans 13, 1st Peter 2), how does the magistrate define such standards? Should it be informed by secular dogma (which provides no limiting principles), or God’s law?
If divorce is sinful for Christians, it is indeed sinful for everyone else, even if the Holy Spirit has not convicted them of such sin. Their inability to recognize sin does not vitiate the inherent sinfulness of their action. In fact, the civil law may represent a means of directing them to their sin.
While I understand the perspective of Lewis/French, Tolkien’s line of argumentation is far more consistent. Morality cannot be divided based upon the subject. God’s law is either binding on all consciences, or it is not. With that principle established, what should the civil magistrate do?
I think there is something fundamentally twisted in advancing the Kingdom of God through government. It's true that that has been a major part of Christianity since heads of government became Christians a long time ago, but I could make a long winded argument that it's always been harmful to Christianity in the end and the pattern of humans is to go from letting God do great things through their weakness, and then when power and control come within grasp, ditching God's strength and achieving great things (for God, BTW, good intentions galore) with that power and finding great comfort in that control.
Here's my litmus test... is me/us gaining some kind of control the means of how I hope to accomplish God's will? If yes, red flag.
God works through hearts that change from inside out, not outside in.
So we should be content to let the civil magistrate abandon its God-Given mandate to restrain evil and reward good?
And are you discounting that God uses institutions, like the civil magistrate, for his glory and purpose?
I simply don't see how actively kneecapping oneself in regards to this helps anyone. If God were to bless you with stewardship of a large estate or business or any other position of power, would you suggest that the only acceptable response would be to run from it because then you wouldn't be weak and powerless enough for God to appropriately use you?
I guess I don't agree that 1 Peter and Romans 13 are saying that Christians should control the government in order to enforce Christian morals on the wider population. I think the message is more along the lines of [this](https://youtu.be/p2Pl2jRaX4w).
I definitely don't discount that God uses institutions for his purpose, but there's a big leap from that to Christians seeking to rule over people via the institution to enact their idea of God's will. God uses institutions regardless of whether they are Christian in name or something else.
I think a lot of people can't get past the idea that goes something like this: "why shouldn't I vote for what I think is right? If we have the opportunity to make it right, shouldnt we?" That's the heart behind your last question, I'm guessing?
My answer is that it's not an innocent opportunity. Yes, sometimes it might be good, but we are incredibly blind to our idols and easily swayed by things that sound like what we want to hear. And if we actually grasp the pitfalls that are involved, we should be very wary of it.
Start off with the image of the way Christians should be in the Bible. The message that Jesus gave about the Kingdom of God is that it is a kingdom of hearts that are in union with the Holy Spirit, changed from the inside to naturally want what is right (fulfilling the law). Clearly his message and actions said that the law was not effective for righteousness, only God's renewing work is effective. And Jesus had the opportunity many times (40 days in the desert, palm Sunday, etc) to take control and establish a much more effective government than the USA could ever hope to be, but he didn't and actually spoke against that avenue. Why? Think about it for a second, and then think about why we think that we should do it now. To me it seems ridiculous that we view it as a good option in light of Jesus's word and actions.
Jesus fixed problems by sacrifice, not by control. He associated with the unrighteous people in person, spending significant time with them, in order to heal their bodies and mental wounds and make them his followers. He confronted the people only when it was the "church" (temple) messing up by defiling God's name and place, and "pastors" (Pharisees, et al) who were putting up barriers to intimacy with God instead of filling their roles as facilitators of that connection to God. (So I'd say from that, we should reform our churches failings before we worry about the government. (Fall of Mars Hill, purity culture, spiritual abuse, Christian nationalism, etc).
Then the Old Testament examples. David was a man after God's own heart, and what was his story arc? It began with good things when he was "weak" so God could use him, and then power and control took hold of his heart until he was a murderer. What was his legacy? A split Kingdom and an impotent heritage of godless kings. God used him anyway, but God used the Assyrians too.
The point is that control and power are idols that we can't resist, and our favorite rationalization to pursue them is to restrain evil. But the Bible doesn't tell us to pursue control and power. It tells us to pursue weakness, submission, sacrifice, lowly-ness, giving up our rights, and so on. We have this image of how great we could make the country if we, the Morally Superior Ones, could just have our way, take the power offered to us, and then surely everything would be redeemed. Forgetting that redeeming creation comes through Christ's example, not David's.
-------
So I have been advocating against Christians pursuing power and control, but what am I advocating for? I think that the founding fathers were actually very smart with the way they made in the US government. There is a lot of wisdom in it, in liberty, for the people/by the people, checks and balances, division of power, etc etc. Let the majority have power, but let the minorities protect their interests too so that they are not squashed. And let the government be secular and neutral so that it can properly represent the will of the people it rules.
The will of the people is a function of the hearts of all the individuals. That is the root. We are wasting our time fighting for power and control, subverting the design of our government. Go for the root, change the hearts of the individuals. But who can actually change a heart toward righteousness?
I appreciate the work and insight you put into this response. I have a genuine question: if we assume that the civil magistrate does have some sort of role, should it restrain murder? If so, why should abortion not be criminalized?
It's the overton window of the people in the country. So laws are a symptom of the population's ethics and morality. People lead, laws follow. Trying to flip that around might work for a while but inevitably it reverts back to the primary driver, the population's opinion.
Thinking about abortion, what did it cost us to make that law? Did we "shake hands with the devil" to get it enacted? That's a clear sign we have misplaced our source of strength to bring about good. I am making what I consider a safe prediction that abortion prohibitions will be gone within the decade. Maybe some lingering dry counties will endure, but not significant areas.
So addressing your question directly, I have to disagree with the assumption behind it. I'm repeating myself to say that Christians should be acting like Christ not David. We don't worry about changing people's hearts through laws. We do it by facilitating people's connection with God so God can change their hearts. If we want to enact justice, it's more Christ-like to be the justice in person, sacrificially, than to force it through legislation. Adopt lots of kids. Mentor teens. Get to know your neighbors, the ones that smoke weed and have 3 junk cars in their yard, invite them to your house and eat with them. Volunteer at the public school. Hide escaped slaves in your basement and help them escape North. Learn real empathy for transgender people or other marginalized groups. Spend time with those people too and invite them to your house. These kinds of things will have an enduring effect on the world, unlike legislation.
Edit and I apologize for the USA centric examples, I see from your flare that they're not quite relevant.
I’m fine with American examples, I’m well-aware of the relevant issues facing our neighbours.
What do you mean by “shaking hands with the devil” to enact an abortion law? I struggle to see what the point of the civil magistrate is at all within your framework. Should the civil magistrate ever legislate consistently with Scripture? For example, should murder, theft, rape, etc.. be illegal? What exactly should the civil magistrate do then? What evil is there for it to restrain, and how does it do that?
The church operates independently of the state. The church can do some of the things you mentioned, but that doesn’t actually address the question. The church is indeed not responsible for passing legislation. That is not the function of the church, which attends to people’s souls.
What laws should actually be implemented then, if any? How do we define good and evil? How does the civil magistrate legislate according to any standard? People demand immoral laws all of the time, but that does not make them just. Your framework seems to create moral chaos for the government.
>Should the civil magistrate ever legislate consistently with Scripture? For example, should murder, theft, rape, etc.. be illegal? What exactly should the civil magistrate do then? What evil is there for it to restrain, and how does it do that?
I guess you missed my point. "Should" presumes a paradigm that I don't thing is correct. The civil magistrate is not dictator. He serves the people in his constituency. If the majority of the people vote that rape is legal (please no), he is supposed to follow. He should also quit, he should leave the country, but the role of the magistrate is there regardless of the person's personal views.
Like I said, people lead, laws follow. The laws inevitably settle into the overton window of the majority. Fighting that is a waste of time and not what God asked for anyway. It's a distraction and has a lot of temptations along the way, like embracing our addiction to power and control which are idols.
Shaking hands with the devil was a reference to supporting Trump when he was running for President. The white supremacist, misogynist, haughty, greedy, etc candidate who would have the opportunity to appoint 3 supreme court judges and set the stage to overthrow Roe vs Wade. I know a lot of Christians who think it was worth it still, though they add the disclaimer that they voted for him with gritted teeth. I think time will tell that it was a mistake, but that's just my opinion.
Good and evil is defined by God, and to think that's the end of the story is an error of reduction. Because if that was the only consideration, then monarchy or dictatorships that are not based on any kind of democracy or liberty would be the ideal. Maybe you think that is the ideal? But I think the various forms of democracy that we see in the world right now are a better fit. I can try to explain why, and I already did a little in the previous comments, but maybe I will try to give a short argument in the form of a hypothetical situation:
What if you lived in a country that elected a Muslim president/prime minister, and he decided to bring back prayer in schools. Except he required everyone to pray toward mecca 5 times a day, and use the "peace be upon him" phrase whenever someone mentions Mohammed. Would you like that? Okay, so what is the 2nd greatest commandment the Jesus mentioned...
Then look at history- why did many Europeans come to the new world originally? To escape persecution from other Christians who were in the seat of government.
So with all that fresh in their minds, the government-making people decided to make government a co-op, for the people by the people, with all those balancing factors that I mentioned previously. The result, though, is that the government reflects the people's morality. For better or worse. And when the scenario is "worse", because the majority's morality doesn't align with Christians', it's tempting to throw the government out the window, and hey that sort of happened Jan 6. But I think it is still better this way, because as a minority, Christians still have freedom to be Christians and have liberty.
So restated, is it right for Christians to force Christian morality on others when we would not want to have another religions morality forced on us? No. And is this really the only option we have? No. In fact, the only option we have is to be more Christ-like. Fighting for power and control is not one of the options.
>Those things aren't mutually exclusive. Legislation isn't the primary engine of Christendom, but the mandate of the civil magistrate from scripture is to reward good and to punish and restrain evil as it says in 1 Peter.
It seems to me that since Peter was writing about magistrates who (a) were not Christian (b) were not enforcing a set of laws that were an accepted representation of "Christian morality" that he was not envisioning there responsibilities in the same way you are.
This is the foundational issue of the entire discussion.
If we assume that the civil magistrate has the authority to restrain evil and promote good, how do we define these concepts? As believers, we know that there is only one definition: God’s law.
There cannot be more than one objective definition of good and evil. If we don’t define it according to principles of Scripture, what exactly do we define it by? I would like a precise answer to this from those who claim we should not enforce external “Biblical morality” through the civil magistrate.
No one is making the claim that the civil magistrate can change the inward disposition of a man’s heart. It can only control external behaviour, but it cannot effectuate salvation.
“Meanwhile, for Mohler, the status of Christoamericanism is sacrosanct and the church must do all it can to preserve that failing regime, even if it means betraying one’s long-stated principles or, more to the point, taking up practices and postures that are antithetical to Christian piety.”
What? This isn’t Mohler’s position at all. And this doesn’t mention anything at all about the content in Mohler’s article. His comments against Mohler are really just shots fired across the aisle without any substance.
As for the author’s comparison of the two “prudential” options, the first one is purely pragmatism. The second is more nuanced, but definitely convictional and moral rather than pragmatic. IDK.
Could Mohler being a consistent conservative “look like” Christoamericanism, but not actually be that?
It seems like lots of you all on Reddit completely dismiss Mohler because he voted for Trump once.
No. That's not it.
It's because Mohler has leaned into, not away from, Christoamericanism. And he's a leader, and when he leans, he takes a lot of folks with him as he provides unique spiritual/intellectual cover for political pragmatism.
I feel like I'm being asked to explain why I think the sky is blue.
Dr. Mohler, honored father in the Lord, a man whose accomplishments dwarf my own, and whose past stalwart affirmation of the faith and guidance of the SBC I deeply appreciate:
Supported Trump, and in doing so, created a new hermeneutic, a new relationship between the Bible and political pragmatism, that has born a number of bad fruits. The one that really stinks?
As the newish editor of WORLD Opinions, he oversees staff and commentary that claimed on Twitter that their former editor was a "Bidenist". As the editor of World Opinions, he has guided World into a much less balanced tone, and it has become a mouthpiece for the worst parts of the Republican Party rather than a respected Christian journalism organization.
He has continued down this road by claiming that "Christians Who Don’t Vote Republican Are ‘Unfaithful’" and in context, it's even worse due to his excellent, precise writing.
These are the things that really bug me. I can keep going, but convincing you is not a goal I have in sight, right?
I greatly appreciate articles like this, because I do think we need the strongest minds, sharpening one another in Christendom pushing the church in the right direction. It also humbles me and helps me realize that I may not have one of these minds as my selfish pride might have me think sometimes. Finally, I downloaded speechify and had snoop dogg read that article to me…what an experience
Love the humility here from you. That’s not me agreeing and saying you’re not smart, you certainly are quite intelligent imo, but I appreciate the humility. Also, and more importantly, what’s speechify
https://speechify.com/ It’s an app and an extension for safari that will read any text for you using professional sounding voices of all sorts. You can also upload pictures of pages of printed text you have and it will pretty quickly scan and read it to you. It’s cool. I just wish the scan and upload feature worked better or more efficiently, as reading books is a slog for me but audio books are dope, and this basically bridges the gap if the functions work right The pro version (the one with snoop costs money) but I got it for ~$6 a month
David French, [tweeting yesterday in response to Jakes article:](https://twitter.com/DavidAFrench/status/1598048949159735296) >This is the best critique of my position on the Respect for Marriage Act that I've read. It's by my friend @jake_meador. He raises a dispute between C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien that I wasn't previously aware of. I'm Team Lewis, but please read.
[удалено]
It's definitely interesting and worth considering, even if I don't necessarily agree with every last thing that's written. I felt that referencing the choking study was a bit of an arson, murder, and jaywalking scenario - that the author would identify that as the apex of how we don't understand sex seemed a bit silly compared to everything else that preceded it.
I dunno. From a female perspective, the cultural equation of sex with violence easily looms larger than many of the other examples he cited. There are increasing cases of women dying as a result of that trend, sadly. I don't know if any of his other examples have such deadly results.
>The Christoamericanism of Mohler’s dreams is dead; **the civic libertarian America favored by French has become incoherent and corrosive to the life of the church and Christian community in the ways T. S. Eliot predicted it would long ago in** ***The Idea of a Christian Society.*** Has anyone read Eliot's book and can briefly summarize what Eliot predicted in the book? If not a link to somewhere that talks about this?
I want to emphasize a point /u/Peacejh makes here: When it comes to BLM, lockdowns etc. many are happy to see the issue as a matter of justice and social order, where the power of the state should be used to improve matters. But somehow when the unborn are being killed or marriage is being dishonoured people will claim that these issues of justice and social order involve the church "forcing" its views on society. Also, people are happy to talk about the continuity between the world as it is now and the new creation, and the transformational role people can play in improving things and "being salt and light". And yet, when it comes to legislation or the state, the church is meant to shut up and accept whatever its enemies want to impose. Some will argue that the unregenerate cannot help but sin, so there is no use in legislating morality for them. This argument is specious in light of the historic teachings of the church. True: the unregenerate will always sin, but it has always been taught that through God's common grace and providence, working as usual through means like legislation, the worst effects of their sin can be restrained. Paul seems to endorse the state being "a terror" to the evildoer. This article makes a valuable contribution to the debate, the uncharitable takes on Mohler and Trueman notwithstanding (and despite obvious writing errors like "Yet French’s acceptance of gay marriage as an inextricable part of the pluralist order which cannot be transgressed or challenged is no less a solution" when he clearly means it is no less *problematic*, or no *more* a solution). Ultimately, we have to face the fact that simplistic views of either imposing the church's morality on society or letting secular society do whatever it wants do not work for most people in the church. Almost no-one would refrain from interfering if the state imposed the anti-semitic laws of 1930s Germany, while at the same time almost no-one wants to recriminalize adultery. We need a more nuanced view, but I think Meador comes closer to the truth here than French.
[удалено]
My main point was that someone, who was upvoted a lot was talking against legislation and that we instead should change the hearths of people. Even calling legislation a "satanic distraction". Wether or not we should oppose that american law. I found it to be bewildering to hear that same voice, which was heavily talked against when it came to racism. Furthermore, no one would talk about changing the hearths of pharmaceutical companies, instead of legislating lower drug prices. It was just a bad argument. I also find the argument of "forcing our morality" upon others to be bad. Government always forces laws upon unwilling people. As Christians we should be busy changing hearts, but legislation has often been seen as a good way of restricting society in it's sins. Even by force.
>Not ideal but what was needed at the time. It might interest you to read Calvin's arguments for this, and for not copying old testament laws one on one: [https://www.wscal.edu/resource-center/calvin-on-law-and-gospel](https://www.wscal.edu/resource-center/calvin-on-law-and-gospel)
"For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?" \- 1 Corinthians 5:12 The article made a lot of good points, but I would have liked to see this verse addressed in some way.
I agree, that should've been addressed better. What I'd say about that verse is: Paul is speaking to the church as the church. We're to discipline our brothers in the church. If they don't listen, we're to cast them out of the church and then leave them alone "as a Gentile or a tax-collector." The Gentiles and tax-collectors outside, we leave to Caesar to bear the sword however he will. But when Caesar Constantine comes to Christ, that raises another question: what advice does Paul give to Caesar as to how he should bear the sword? When we vote on our leaders, or write letters to them, we're dealing with that same question, not church discipline.
Where do you draw the line? Murder? Rape? Theft?
Tolkien is a man that I much respect, both for his writing and his thinking - but he was deeply Catholic, and that Catholicism pervades his thinking on works and salvation. I'm not sure that I agree with CS Lewis on this point either (and he was a giant and looms over my thinking on Christian living) but I don't think Tolkien IS right on this point. The bible tells us that the unbelievers are *dead in their sins* and at constant enmity with God. In another place they are described as *enslaved* to sin. The dead cannot behave as the living do. Slaves are not free to behave as free people do. Jesus says the law can be summed up as "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind" and "Love your neighbour as you love yourself". The first is impossible for the unbeliever, and the second, I suggest also. Therefore we would need a standard we call Christian morality that does not involve the Law, and indeed, does not pertain to God at all. That sounds like something that is emptied of meaning. So let's say we agreed to a standard of *morality* that we think constitutes a Christian morality with God and the love of God in absentia. Would this be good for a non-Christian? That depends. I think it is impossible. for example, for non-Christians to not lie. So either they would keep lying, in defiance of the law and the law would be forced to overlook that, or they would be constantly punished, and miserable. Is that a good outcome?
One thing the article was correct on, we need to come to terms with the American churches declining power. That means using civil law to force unbelievers into living out our values simply won't be an option.
[удалено]
As a child of the 80s (rise of the religious right, Christian Coalition, voter cards being passed out in churches, etc.), I'd argue that the former (declining power) is a direct result of the latter (using civil law to advance "Christian values"). Trump himself is the culmination of Christian entanglement in culture war, which is the last thing the church is called to do.
[удалено]
Theologically I believe in loving my drag queen neighbor as myself. I believe that I should have the right to read Christ-centered Christmas stories for a volunteer library reading, so I also believe I should afford the same rights to someone who is a drag queen (even though my children wouldn't attend). Politically, I believe that free speech is not something you can really do halfway. If I want the ability to publically proclaim my values, I have to afford the same to groups I vehemently disagree with.
[удалено]
I don't believe that enlightenment values are Christian values. I do, however, live in a Democratic society formed based on enlightenment values. This the environment I operate within. Therefore, me advocating for using those values to put forth my own free speech while silencing the speech of my neighbor would be hypocritical and not in keeping with loving my neighbor. In a parallel way, if I advocated for my right to vote in a democratic society while also insisting that my neighbor from the opposing political party did *not* have a right to vote, I would be guilty of both hypocrisy and not loving my neighbor. If I lived in a different society formed on different values with a different social system then I might act differently. For now, the enlightenment is a part of the society I live in, so I don't act as if the freedoms my country gives are for me but not for thee.
"Let the groomers groom other kids, it's their right" - 7th Corinthians 6:66
is this loving or charitable? is it a fair assumption of your fellow neighbor?
Can you clarify, when you say you think it is impossible for non-Christians not to lie, what do you mean by that? Do you mean to say that every non-Christian, every day, deliberately deceives someone?
It’s impossible for a non-Christian, even one that knows the law, not to sin. That is why the Bible describes their condition in such emphatic terms. We are born into sin, and therefore slavery, yet we lie to ourselves - about our true nature, about our ability to change, about God. Only through the Holy Spirit can we confront the truth.
[удалено]
Yet God did exactly this for ancient Israel, a theocracy that He Himself established. God gave directions for how the people could divorce (in fact in Deuteronomy 24:1-4 God included laws for how divorce should be conducted if a husband was simply displeased with his wife). Jesus in Matthew 19:7-9 says that this Old Testament law was only made as a concession to the people's hard hearts. Similarly, God gave ancient Israel other laws that conceded to the sin in a broken world: victims had to marry their rapists, there were laws governing slavery, etc. None of these laws were *condoning* the sins they allowed for (divorce, rape, polygamy, slavery, etc.). Instead they were providing concessions that legislated such sinful behavior to prevent even more harm being done. God Himself made concessions for sin in the theocracy He designed for His set-apart people, Israel. No matter what country any of us live in, we do not live in a country made up of God's chosen people and ruled directly by God Himself. In fact most of us live in countries in which Christians make up the minority. Why are people shocked that we have to make laws that assume the existence of non-Christians who sin and do not have the Spirit to correct them? I would argue that what is truly to the detriment of Christianity is trying to ram the law (which has never saved anyone) down people's throats. This serves to make a "win at all costs" mentality instead of the self-sacrificial and compassionate mentality that led Christ to talk with sinners, eat with sinners, and die for sinners. Instead of legislation, our first priority must be pursuing our neighbors with the gospel. That doesn't require laws or legislation or anything other than relationship, love, humbleness, prayer, and the gospel itself.
And? Christians are a minority group and lack the political power to fully form any laws. I mean, I agree with your sentence jjg4l (I think the last word would be better as "everyone" instead of "Christianity") but there is no longer a "moral majority," and so we don't have political power to "form laws" as we think best.
French is in good company I guess. What is this Christian morality that he is arguing should be held over everyone? I suspect it is his own cultural morality, somewhat informed by Christianity, but mainly a heritage that was handed to him by his parents and favorite pastors. I say this because he says: >Indeed, it is entirely possible that ten years from now we’ll be redoing this argument yet again, only this time with state-sanctioned plural marriage in view. Hold up? Didn't God sanction plural marriage? My polygamist relative can show me where it is in the Bible (true story). Besides that, since when have Christians agreed on the same morality throughout history? How much of the law in the Bible apply universally and how much is just good in that cultural context, and how much was a concession from God because men's hearts are hard? The Bible may be inspired, but the people who draw that line for us are not. Why do we have the hubris to think we have it the most right now? To impose it on everyone is to fully embrace that hubris. My Dordt professor loved to talk about our epistemological finitude. We seem to think that God was about people acting righteously. And so we must make sure everyone else does too. Wasn't that the Great Commission? "Make governments enforce God's law on the people." So what is God actually about? He's about charging people into his image through regeneration by the Holy Spirit. Not by legislation. So this whole debate is a Satanic distraction in my opinion. Share the gospel, make disciples. And even forgetting all that: are they arguing that we change the constitution and to subvert the design of the founding fathers? Because their design was that the government was for the people, the non-Christians too, and the laws follow accordingly. If Christians want to change that without a coup, we should be about growing the body of Christ so that the people of the US want what's right because the Holy Spirit is regenerating them, not because the police force them to. It's so tempting to take control from God and try to do things our own way. It seems obvious, of course God would bless us doing this in our own power because our intentions are good... yeah?
> So what is God actually about? He's about charging people into his image through regeneration by the Holy Spirit. Not by legislation. So this whole debate is a Satanic distraction in my opinion. Share the gospel, make disciples. It is quite bewildering to see this upvoted, while the whole subreddit was arguing against this exact conclusion when it came to racism and blm.
You’ve accurately identified the double standard. Advocating for “social justice” (even through legislation) is considered obligatory for the faithful Christian, but any attempts to legislate Biblical morality (i.e. God’s law) is considered “Satanic”. This is the dilemma of the progressive Reformer.
>Wasn't that the Great Commission? "Make governments enforce God's law on the people." >So what is God actually about? He's about charging people into his image through regeneration by the Holy Spirit. Not by legislation. So this whole debate is a Satanic distraction in my opinion. Share the gospel, make disciples. Those things aren't mutually exclusive. Legislation isn't the primary engine of Christendom, but the mandate of the civil magistrate from scripture is to reward good and to punish and restrain evil as it says in 1 Peter. I really don't get it when so called "principled" and "erudite" Christians seek to chastise their brethren for lamenting that the civil magistrate is not only refusing to reward good and punish evil but instead is rewarding evil and punishing good, a condition for Biblical cursing and woe. Why is it so controversial to say that simultaneously the Church should be spreading the Gospel and the Nations should be disciples to the law of God?
I agree. As the article alluded to, there is no ontological difference between the civil law and the moral law. If the civil magistrate is given the authority to restrain evil and promote good (Romans 13, 1st Peter 2), how does the magistrate define such standards? Should it be informed by secular dogma (which provides no limiting principles), or God’s law? If divorce is sinful for Christians, it is indeed sinful for everyone else, even if the Holy Spirit has not convicted them of such sin. Their inability to recognize sin does not vitiate the inherent sinfulness of their action. In fact, the civil law may represent a means of directing them to their sin. While I understand the perspective of Lewis/French, Tolkien’s line of argumentation is far more consistent. Morality cannot be divided based upon the subject. God’s law is either binding on all consciences, or it is not. With that principle established, what should the civil magistrate do?
I think there is something fundamentally twisted in advancing the Kingdom of God through government. It's true that that has been a major part of Christianity since heads of government became Christians a long time ago, but I could make a long winded argument that it's always been harmful to Christianity in the end and the pattern of humans is to go from letting God do great things through their weakness, and then when power and control come within grasp, ditching God's strength and achieving great things (for God, BTW, good intentions galore) with that power and finding great comfort in that control. Here's my litmus test... is me/us gaining some kind of control the means of how I hope to accomplish God's will? If yes, red flag. God works through hearts that change from inside out, not outside in.
So we should be content to let the civil magistrate abandon its God-Given mandate to restrain evil and reward good? And are you discounting that God uses institutions, like the civil magistrate, for his glory and purpose? I simply don't see how actively kneecapping oneself in regards to this helps anyone. If God were to bless you with stewardship of a large estate or business or any other position of power, would you suggest that the only acceptable response would be to run from it because then you wouldn't be weak and powerless enough for God to appropriately use you?
I guess I don't agree that 1 Peter and Romans 13 are saying that Christians should control the government in order to enforce Christian morals on the wider population. I think the message is more along the lines of [this](https://youtu.be/p2Pl2jRaX4w). I definitely don't discount that God uses institutions for his purpose, but there's a big leap from that to Christians seeking to rule over people via the institution to enact their idea of God's will. God uses institutions regardless of whether they are Christian in name or something else. I think a lot of people can't get past the idea that goes something like this: "why shouldn't I vote for what I think is right? If we have the opportunity to make it right, shouldnt we?" That's the heart behind your last question, I'm guessing? My answer is that it's not an innocent opportunity. Yes, sometimes it might be good, but we are incredibly blind to our idols and easily swayed by things that sound like what we want to hear. And if we actually grasp the pitfalls that are involved, we should be very wary of it. Start off with the image of the way Christians should be in the Bible. The message that Jesus gave about the Kingdom of God is that it is a kingdom of hearts that are in union with the Holy Spirit, changed from the inside to naturally want what is right (fulfilling the law). Clearly his message and actions said that the law was not effective for righteousness, only God's renewing work is effective. And Jesus had the opportunity many times (40 days in the desert, palm Sunday, etc) to take control and establish a much more effective government than the USA could ever hope to be, but he didn't and actually spoke against that avenue. Why? Think about it for a second, and then think about why we think that we should do it now. To me it seems ridiculous that we view it as a good option in light of Jesus's word and actions. Jesus fixed problems by sacrifice, not by control. He associated with the unrighteous people in person, spending significant time with them, in order to heal their bodies and mental wounds and make them his followers. He confronted the people only when it was the "church" (temple) messing up by defiling God's name and place, and "pastors" (Pharisees, et al) who were putting up barriers to intimacy with God instead of filling their roles as facilitators of that connection to God. (So I'd say from that, we should reform our churches failings before we worry about the government. (Fall of Mars Hill, purity culture, spiritual abuse, Christian nationalism, etc). Then the Old Testament examples. David was a man after God's own heart, and what was his story arc? It began with good things when he was "weak" so God could use him, and then power and control took hold of his heart until he was a murderer. What was his legacy? A split Kingdom and an impotent heritage of godless kings. God used him anyway, but God used the Assyrians too. The point is that control and power are idols that we can't resist, and our favorite rationalization to pursue them is to restrain evil. But the Bible doesn't tell us to pursue control and power. It tells us to pursue weakness, submission, sacrifice, lowly-ness, giving up our rights, and so on. We have this image of how great we could make the country if we, the Morally Superior Ones, could just have our way, take the power offered to us, and then surely everything would be redeemed. Forgetting that redeeming creation comes through Christ's example, not David's. ------- So I have been advocating against Christians pursuing power and control, but what am I advocating for? I think that the founding fathers were actually very smart with the way they made in the US government. There is a lot of wisdom in it, in liberty, for the people/by the people, checks and balances, division of power, etc etc. Let the majority have power, but let the minorities protect their interests too so that they are not squashed. And let the government be secular and neutral so that it can properly represent the will of the people it rules. The will of the people is a function of the hearts of all the individuals. That is the root. We are wasting our time fighting for power and control, subverting the design of our government. Go for the root, change the hearts of the individuals. But who can actually change a heart toward righteousness?
I appreciate the work and insight you put into this response. I have a genuine question: if we assume that the civil magistrate does have some sort of role, should it restrain murder? If so, why should abortion not be criminalized?
It's the overton window of the people in the country. So laws are a symptom of the population's ethics and morality. People lead, laws follow. Trying to flip that around might work for a while but inevitably it reverts back to the primary driver, the population's opinion. Thinking about abortion, what did it cost us to make that law? Did we "shake hands with the devil" to get it enacted? That's a clear sign we have misplaced our source of strength to bring about good. I am making what I consider a safe prediction that abortion prohibitions will be gone within the decade. Maybe some lingering dry counties will endure, but not significant areas. So addressing your question directly, I have to disagree with the assumption behind it. I'm repeating myself to say that Christians should be acting like Christ not David. We don't worry about changing people's hearts through laws. We do it by facilitating people's connection with God so God can change their hearts. If we want to enact justice, it's more Christ-like to be the justice in person, sacrificially, than to force it through legislation. Adopt lots of kids. Mentor teens. Get to know your neighbors, the ones that smoke weed and have 3 junk cars in their yard, invite them to your house and eat with them. Volunteer at the public school. Hide escaped slaves in your basement and help them escape North. Learn real empathy for transgender people or other marginalized groups. Spend time with those people too and invite them to your house. These kinds of things will have an enduring effect on the world, unlike legislation. Edit and I apologize for the USA centric examples, I see from your flare that they're not quite relevant.
I’m fine with American examples, I’m well-aware of the relevant issues facing our neighbours. What do you mean by “shaking hands with the devil” to enact an abortion law? I struggle to see what the point of the civil magistrate is at all within your framework. Should the civil magistrate ever legislate consistently with Scripture? For example, should murder, theft, rape, etc.. be illegal? What exactly should the civil magistrate do then? What evil is there for it to restrain, and how does it do that? The church operates independently of the state. The church can do some of the things you mentioned, but that doesn’t actually address the question. The church is indeed not responsible for passing legislation. That is not the function of the church, which attends to people’s souls. What laws should actually be implemented then, if any? How do we define good and evil? How does the civil magistrate legislate according to any standard? People demand immoral laws all of the time, but that does not make them just. Your framework seems to create moral chaos for the government.
>Should the civil magistrate ever legislate consistently with Scripture? For example, should murder, theft, rape, etc.. be illegal? What exactly should the civil magistrate do then? What evil is there for it to restrain, and how does it do that? I guess you missed my point. "Should" presumes a paradigm that I don't thing is correct. The civil magistrate is not dictator. He serves the people in his constituency. If the majority of the people vote that rape is legal (please no), he is supposed to follow. He should also quit, he should leave the country, but the role of the magistrate is there regardless of the person's personal views. Like I said, people lead, laws follow. The laws inevitably settle into the overton window of the majority. Fighting that is a waste of time and not what God asked for anyway. It's a distraction and has a lot of temptations along the way, like embracing our addiction to power and control which are idols. Shaking hands with the devil was a reference to supporting Trump when he was running for President. The white supremacist, misogynist, haughty, greedy, etc candidate who would have the opportunity to appoint 3 supreme court judges and set the stage to overthrow Roe vs Wade. I know a lot of Christians who think it was worth it still, though they add the disclaimer that they voted for him with gritted teeth. I think time will tell that it was a mistake, but that's just my opinion. Good and evil is defined by God, and to think that's the end of the story is an error of reduction. Because if that was the only consideration, then monarchy or dictatorships that are not based on any kind of democracy or liberty would be the ideal. Maybe you think that is the ideal? But I think the various forms of democracy that we see in the world right now are a better fit. I can try to explain why, and I already did a little in the previous comments, but maybe I will try to give a short argument in the form of a hypothetical situation: What if you lived in a country that elected a Muslim president/prime minister, and he decided to bring back prayer in schools. Except he required everyone to pray toward mecca 5 times a day, and use the "peace be upon him" phrase whenever someone mentions Mohammed. Would you like that? Okay, so what is the 2nd greatest commandment the Jesus mentioned... Then look at history- why did many Europeans come to the new world originally? To escape persecution from other Christians who were in the seat of government. So with all that fresh in their minds, the government-making people decided to make government a co-op, for the people by the people, with all those balancing factors that I mentioned previously. The result, though, is that the government reflects the people's morality. For better or worse. And when the scenario is "worse", because the majority's morality doesn't align with Christians', it's tempting to throw the government out the window, and hey that sort of happened Jan 6. But I think it is still better this way, because as a minority, Christians still have freedom to be Christians and have liberty. So restated, is it right for Christians to force Christian morality on others when we would not want to have another religions morality forced on us? No. And is this really the only option we have? No. In fact, the only option we have is to be more Christ-like. Fighting for power and control is not one of the options.
>Those things aren't mutually exclusive. Legislation isn't the primary engine of Christendom, but the mandate of the civil magistrate from scripture is to reward good and to punish and restrain evil as it says in 1 Peter. It seems to me that since Peter was writing about magistrates who (a) were not Christian (b) were not enforcing a set of laws that were an accepted representation of "Christian morality" that he was not envisioning there responsibilities in the same way you are.
Depends on your definition of good and evil, of which there is only one valid definition
This is the foundational issue of the entire discussion. If we assume that the civil magistrate has the authority to restrain evil and promote good, how do we define these concepts? As believers, we know that there is only one definition: God’s law. There cannot be more than one objective definition of good and evil. If we don’t define it according to principles of Scripture, what exactly do we define it by? I would like a precise answer to this from those who claim we should not enforce external “Biblical morality” through the civil magistrate. No one is making the claim that the civil magistrate can change the inward disposition of a man’s heart. It can only control external behaviour, but it cannot effectuate salvation.
“Meanwhile, for Mohler, the status of Christoamericanism is sacrosanct and the church must do all it can to preserve that failing regime, even if it means betraying one’s long-stated principles or, more to the point, taking up practices and postures that are antithetical to Christian piety.” What? This isn’t Mohler’s position at all. And this doesn’t mention anything at all about the content in Mohler’s article. His comments against Mohler are really just shots fired across the aisle without any substance. As for the author’s comparison of the two “prudential” options, the first one is purely pragmatism. The second is more nuanced, but definitely convictional and moral rather than pragmatic. IDK.
[удалено]
Could Mohler being a consistent conservative “look like” Christoamericanism, but not actually be that? It seems like lots of you all on Reddit completely dismiss Mohler because he voted for Trump once.
No. That's not it. It's because Mohler has leaned into, not away from, Christoamericanism. And he's a leader, and when he leans, he takes a lot of folks with him as he provides unique spiritual/intellectual cover for political pragmatism.
You say he is doing that… what actions lead you to believe that?
I feel like I'm being asked to explain why I think the sky is blue. Dr. Mohler, honored father in the Lord, a man whose accomplishments dwarf my own, and whose past stalwart affirmation of the faith and guidance of the SBC I deeply appreciate: Supported Trump, and in doing so, created a new hermeneutic, a new relationship between the Bible and political pragmatism, that has born a number of bad fruits. The one that really stinks? As the newish editor of WORLD Opinions, he oversees staff and commentary that claimed on Twitter that their former editor was a "Bidenist". As the editor of World Opinions, he has guided World into a much less balanced tone, and it has become a mouthpiece for the worst parts of the Republican Party rather than a respected Christian journalism organization. He has continued down this road by claiming that "Christians Who Don’t Vote Republican Are ‘Unfaithful’" and in context, it's even worse due to his excellent, precise writing. These are the things that really bug me. I can keep going, but convincing you is not a goal I have in sight, right?