The Scourge Of Racism
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The times are more than changing, they are degenerating toward such evil that if the people of Noah’s generation could see it, they would put their hands to their mouths in horror (Genesis 6:5-7, 11-13; Luke 21:10; Romans 1:18-32; 2 Timothy 3:1-5; Revelation 6:1-4, 9:13-21)! These are days of decision about where a man will stand; days when it will be finally impossible to cloak where you stand on the issues of identification with Christ, biblically defined righteousness and good or the world’s redefinitions that are wrong and evil. The day of the silent endorser of evil is drawing to its close. A man is either fully in or out, for or against; no longer able to hide in the anonymity of silence.
Much evil has been carried out in secular and church history because of the silence of the silent majority. American history is no exception and in today’s 2013 blog repost, I am led by the Lord to challenge professing Christians in our nation to examine their souls and prepare themselves for the consequences of being a Jesus follower in these ever darkening days. Pastors stuck in the ego driven mindset of building the largest possible church whatever evil it takes including willfully being silent on the truths of God’s Word beware. Faithful undershepherds of Christ laboring in churches small and large: keep fighting “the good fight of faith,” (1 Timothy 6:11-16, NKJV)!
Silent is not one of the accusations that have been attached to me as the Founder/President of Open Door Communication Ministries, Inc. Too serious and strict, yes; silent--never, though some who claim to love the Lord have wished it to be so! Yet (Ezekiel 33:1-9), the Ministry will celebrate the thirtieth year since its founding with the roll out of its new informational Web Site, www.opendoorcommin.org this Wednesday, August 12th at Noon PST. I extend a personal invitation to our readers to visit the site and have most of your questions answered about the Ministry the Lord brought into being through me to fulfill His will. I hope you will also let the Lord speak to you about helping us as a prayer and financial partner to keep His voice through us active as long as possible (1 Corinthians 16:9).
Originally Posted March 10, 2013
The national crisis created by the vocal abolitionist movement which eventually led to the Civil War had much to do with forcing everyone in America with a stake to finally declare where they stood on the issue of slavery. Up to then, sympathizers from either the North or South could pretty much go along silently with the status quo as it was with no fear of trouble. This was especially true in the churches where the silent many had gone along with the cruel enslavement of blacks seemingly without a twinge of guilt.
In his Letter From A Birmingham Jail during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. took note of this silent many in America’s conservative white evangelical churches that by their silence, were complicit and in point of fact endorsing the legal but biblically immoral oppression of black Americans; a great number of whom were fellow Christians.1 The silent endorsers of evil, of course, are from many diverse backgrounds and circumstances as well as everywhere in and all throughout history. These are persons that mostly from fear of some form refuse to speak up or act to support what they know is right or challenge what is wrong.
Such persons are well represented in the Bible narrative and no where therein more sadly than the account of how the many among the Jewish rulers dealt with the issue of being publically known as a believer in our Lord Jesus. John writes, “Nevertheless even among the rulers many believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess Him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God,” (John 12:42-43, NKJV). Out of fear of what other men would think, say or do to them, most of these many rulers who believed in Christ, held their peace right up through His crucifixion and became silent endorsers of evil.
All throughout my journey as a Christian I have met such men as denominational workers, seminary professors, pastors and church members. They know that I either spoke or wrote the truth from God’s Word, but because of fear of what standing with me might cost them, left me standing alone. They fear the loss of prestige, jobs, 401ks, homes, material things etc. because their priorities are tied to this present world (Psalm 17:13-14).
They remain silent when others around them assail my motives and character failing as they do to appreciate that as an aspiring strong man of God in the image of Jesus Christ, I have genuinely found that “pearl of great price” and set my mind as all of them should likewise on what is above and eternal (Psalm 17:15; Matthew 6:19-21, 13:45-46; Colossians 3:1-4, NKJV)! While there have been exceptions, most notable for me was the courageous effort Ed Malone, a white, Southern Baptist radio executive made to help me produce the Lord’s sobering broadcast call to repentance, From Slavery To Victory: One Man’s Journey in 1994.2
Christianity the religion in all of its cultural variations in the churches and related entities makes it easy to be a silent endorser of evil. Conformity with the status quo in its ranks is a valued and well rewarded virtue. This would be good if in fact, what men were conforming to was purely of God and His Word. But instead--just as the Lord Jesus encountered among His people in the 1st century, what men are expected to conform to are the expectations, doctrines, rules, traditions, thinking and attitudes of sinful men overlaid with the outward veneer of religiosity; among the most wicked, men who corruptly use Scripture to support their own ends and of those more nobly minded but no less deceived, men attempting the impossible effort to please God in the flesh (John 6:63; Romans 7:14-8:13).
In the end, only two men stepped up publically from among the silent many rulers of Israel to identify themselves as supporters of Christ: Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus (Luke 23:50-51; John 7:45-52, 19:38-42). Now, the world’s hatred for professing Christians is increasing and the foretold days of severe persecution draw near (Matthew 24:9). Who will step from the shadows among the silent many in the churches today (that by their silence are endorsing much evil) to publically identify with Christ and suffer with their brothers that do likewise in those days (Mark 8:34-38)?
1 Martin Luther King, Jr., Why We Can’t Wait, (New York: Signet Books, 1964), 90-92.
2 Get your copy of this historic and award winning Radio Special at https://fromslaverytovictory.org/Commemorative-Cassette.
I have written much about why men must be restored at this hour.1 In this post, the Lord leads me to encourage the men who have been restored to and in Christ and are aspiring to be strong men of God in His image!2 You are feeling the growing pressure of hostile rebellion from the world and compromising, professed Christians where you live, work, recreate, shop, gas up, get repairs, socialize and go to church. The Lord has two words for you and me: “stand fast” (2 Thessalonians 2:15, NKJV)! We are to stand our ground while continuing to proclaim the Gospel, witness Christ and contend for the one biblical faith passed down and entrusted to us by the Lord and His apostles!
The phrase, “stand your ground,” has become well known in these latter days thanks to the Florida law that has allowed persons carrying guns to shoot to kill those they feel are a threat of bodily harm to them. Identifying the enemy as “the devil” who leads “spiritual hosts of wickedness” in their unrelenting struggle against us as Christians, the apostle Paul commands that we “Put on the whole armor of God” that we “may be able to stand against” his “wiles” (schemes), “withstand in the evil day and having done all, to stand,” (Ephesians 6:11-13, NKJV).3 Clearly, the great apostle is concerned that we not be moved away from Christ and the faith as is evil’s intent if possible.
The wiles of the devil are many as veterans of spiritual warfare know. He does not fight fair and is extremely crafty, sneaky and deliberately patient waiting for the opportunity to spring traps long before set. For example, having helped foster and exploit manmade and counterfeit forms of biblical Christianity over many centuries, evil is now inciting hostility against them and the real thing which in the minds of the haters are one and the same.4 Nurtured by Christianity the religion of men from its inception, our secularizing nation has been backing away from it at break neck speed since the 19th century ascendancy of the sciences which ostensibly have the natural answers for everything.5
In the process, of course, the rebellion against things Christian involves that which is truly of God and biblical and has reached the point of outrageously ridiculous as it concerns gender, marriage and family. Political correctness, tolerance and moral relativism have also spawned a generation that has shifting boundaries; enabling confusion and lawlessness to proliferate. America is not apostatizing since every single person in it from the beginning until now has not been a born again Christian. But it is forcefully rejecting what was imposed on it by religionists and hoped for by Christ’s faithful. In the midst of this satanically caused matrix of evil, Christian men are commanded to stand!
We are to firmly stand our ground against the continuing onslaught of evil in God’s superior spiritual armor of truth, righteousness, the Gospel of peace with Him, all important faith and the three-fold wonder of salvation: justification, sanctification and the glory to come! We also wield the mighty weapons of God’s Word as a “sword” (Hebrews 4:12) and in accord with the situation, prayers of intercession on behalf of others and/or petition for God’s intervention (Ephesians 6:14-18, NKJV) including with reinforcements (2 Kings 6:8-17; Acts 12:1-11). On rare, Spirit directed occasions, the heavy prayer weapon of imprecation is employed against those deceived by Satan (2 Kings 6:18-23; Acts 13:4-12).
This latter weapon is used only in the rarest of situations because our warfare is not with fellow humans we seek to see saved through repentance and faith in the Gospel! This is why we are to stay alert and prayerful for each other to seize opportunities to preach the Gospel and witness Christ among the lost even while suffering their rejection and persecution; trusting God for vindication as Paul modeled (Ephesians 6:19-20). Standing our ground, we wait on the Spirit’s clear prompt (if it will come at all) before engaging in imprecatory prayer upon those that attempt to hinder others from hearing the Gospel and God’s Word. Such persons include professed Christian impostors, rebels and apostates legion among the numerous forms of manmade Christianity the religion (Acts 13:6-8).
Indeed, when Jude wrote his famous exhortation “to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” he was concerned not about the world outside as a priority, but those from it coming into the churches by stealth as impostors, rebels and manifest apostates (Jude 1-4, 12-19, NKJV). While without repentance they stand condemned (Jude 5-11), we in “holy faith,” continuing prayer “in the Holy Spirit” and “the love of God” “making a distinction,” are to care enough to attempt to reach and if at all possible, yank the impostors and rebels “out of the fire” (2 Timothy 2:24-26; Jude 20-23, NKJV). May you and I stand fast in the evil day to God’s glory (Jude 24-25)! The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"
1 Read all of my posts under the Category, The Cause and my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics, available at all major internet booksellers, by order at your
favorite brick and mortar bookstore or in the Strong Man Store.
2 This encouragement is both for Christian men now and prophetically, those known to God who will read it in the fast approaching future engaged in the most intense
days of spiritual warfare since our Lord’s first century apostles. Glory to God who has gifted, called and blessed me to be used of Him in this way!
3 See the June 8, 2014 post, And Then There Is The War, under the category, Instruction and A Soldier’s Salute posted November 11, 2018 under the category, The
Cause. Also, in the Strong Man Store, purchase the four message audio series, We Are At War!
4 Read the two-part, August 2016 post, Christianity The Religion Of Men, under the category, Instruction.
5 See the September 4, 2016 post, Christianity The Religion American Style, under the category, Call To Repent.
From the beginning until now, God’s faithful have been a persecuted minority (Genesis 4:1-10; 1 John 3:10-15). Our time in America has come and God wants us to remember in Jesus the stuff we are made of through Him (2 Timothy 3:12)! We may be powerless as a minority today to reverse the decline of our nation or effect the repentance of falling away Christians as foretold, but in our endurance to the end we will receive power from Christ to reign with Him on this earth when He returns with the Kingdom as sweet vindication of our suffering. Be encouraged about the future of the faithful today in this edited blog repost that appeared on the last day of 2012.
Originally Posted December 31, 2012
The final deliverance of God’s elect Jews and faithful saints will begin with the Kingdom of Heaven’s declaration of war on Satan and his kingdom. Holy angels faithful to God in their superior numbers and might will engage and prevail against the devil and his angels in heavenly places. The victory of the holy angels will be so thorough and final Satan and his angels will be evicted permanently from their heretofore dwelling in heavenly places (Ephesians 6:12; Revelation 12:7-9). This means there will be no residence any longer for them in the second heaven which is all of outer space beyond earth’s atmosphere or access to the third heaven, the abode of God (Acts 7:54-56; 2 Corinthians 12:1-4).
This moment is a mixed bag for faithful saints. On the one hand it is good news since it means we are yet another step closer to the fulfillment of Satan’s announced judgment, realizing our hope of eternal salvation and the reign of Christ (Revelation 12:10). On the other hand, it is bad news in the near term because the devil and his demonic armies have just lost the war of the ages and are confined to earth with only a very short time (three and one half years) before they are imprisoned in Hades after which a thousand years later, they are finally forever condemned to the lake of fire (Revelation 20:1-3, 7-10).
These fallen creatures are not very happy campers at all and in fact, while the heavens are urged to rejoice over the devil’s defeat by the holy angels and eviction from their environs, all of the inhabitants of the earth including elect Jews and faithful saints are warned to prepare for grief since “the devil has come down to you, having great wrath,” (Daniel 12:1; Revelation 12:12). This is the major part of the “great tribulation” many Christians miss. It is not God’s wrath that is at the core of that brief most evil of evil times, it is Satan’s wrath and he wastes no time venting it against the human objects of it he hates the most: Jews and Christians (Revelation 12:13-17).
God will supernaturally protect His elect number of Jews during this period (Revelation 7:1-8; 12:6, 14), while faithful saints are expected to overcome the devil’s onslaught of deception, works of power and violent persecution (described as war) through patient endurance involving trust in the blood of Christ, their testimony and being willing to suffer death (understanding themselves as “sheep for the slaughter”) in remaining loyal to the Lord (Revelation 7:9-17, 12:11). These are the aspiring strong men and great women of God in the image of Christ my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics, prepares the willing to become!
The “great tribulation” is the final intense evil period of these latter days and the last gasps of existence for Satan’s kingdom when he reigns openly through his resurrected and immortal man patterned on Antiochus Epiphanes of old (Daniel 9:27, 11:36-45, 12:7; Mark 13:14-23; Revelation 13). In its aftermath are the most violent, painful transitory birth contractions of the approaching Day of God’s eternal Kingdom brought by our returning Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ (Mark 13:24-27). He will lead and be a strong support for the elect, remnant Jews who have been waiting for Him without realizing it in the final battle for Jerusalem (Micah 5:3-5; Zechariah 12, 14:1-15; Revelation 16:12-14, 16, 19:11-21).
He comes to fulfill the ancient promises of God and save the people of His ethnic heritage, even Jacob (Jeremiah 30-33; Romans 11:25-36) and the yet living faithful remnant saints who are transformed alive after those that have died are resurrected (1 Corinthians 15:50-53; 1 Thessalonians 4:15-18). Faithful saints from all time that have been the righteous minority in Christ will be powerless no more or ever again (Philippians 1:27-28; 2 Thessalonians 1:3-10)! Finally, the oppressions of the oppressor will cease and the new immortal, righteous majority will rule a world of real peace, justice and equity for all (Psalm 37:11; Isaiah 11:1-10; 51:12-13; Micah 4:1-5; Revelation 5:8-10). Let God fill you fresh with joy, peace and hope by these truths and the power of the Holy Spirit in believing to the end (Romans 15:8-13, 16:20).
As I did seven months later in this edited 2012 repost, I am following last week’s repost reflecting on Amy Winehouse’s death with that of Whitney Houston’s. For whatever all of the reasons, many moderns do not seem to take death seriously nor do they understand that unlike video games there is no reset button to delete its reality and start again. Physical death is typically irreversible except by God as demonstrated by Jesus Christ and even then is only a temporary delay to the inevitable permanent departure from this mortal life (John 11:38-44). Only Christ to this hour has suffered death, been buried and resurrected to immortality (John 19:28-20:18; 1 Timothy 6:13-16; Revelation 1:18).
While I do not declare the eternal end of Ms. Houston as a professed Christian, in this repost I am led by the Lord to soberly challenge all of us that make up His churches to consider yet another means Satan takes some of our number captive with destructive intent. We so easily forget he is called “Destroyer” because that is his perpetual mission and work done so well among mortal humanity (Revelation 9:11, NKJV). I also warn all of the naively idealistic engaged in any pursuits of this world that without a solid grounding in Christ, Satan lurks in the shadows seeking an opportunity to lure you away from your steadfastness in Him (Colossians 1:19-23, 2:4-10; 2 Peter 3:14-18).
Originally Posted February 19, 2012
Stunned and immediately grief filled was my reaction to the news Whitney Houston had died last Saturday. I had just returned from out of town conducting the funeral of an in-law where I used as my eulogy topic, The Reality Of Death. Many in the small gathering prayed to receive Christ thereafter and I am glad. But for the few who did not pray and anyone reading this without assurance of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ, Whitney Houston’s sudden death ought to serve as a sobering reminder that death is possible for any of us at any time. My heart goes out to Ms. Houston’s daughter and entire family.1
I was led by the Lord to write last July 31st of the tragic death of another female singer, Amy Winehouse. While then I wrote of how deeply Ms. Winehouse’s death affected me without knowing much about her background and musical accomplishments, Whitney Houston is another story. Even without all of the details, her story is very grievously familiar to me. In fact, it is for men as a first priority, but also women like Whitney Houston that my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics is written;2 professed Christians in and coming out of the churches for whatever reasons whose lifestyles reflect not the image of Christ in strength, but continued human frailty and weakness in sin.
Though they are not the rule by any means among the churches, Black American churches have a long history of losing their congregants to the world as they go forth to parlay their God given talents into fame and fortune. Without making excuses, it is understandable why since the world stage offers a wider audience and greater financial rewards than the churches for the many that historically come from poverty and sometimes--as in the case of Whitney Houston--middle income homes. Nonetheless, I will never be convinced that the Lord’s Church was intended to be the devil’s bullpen where he can easily call in relief for those he tires of, disables and/or destroys.3
Christians belong to Christ who purchased us with His blood on Calvary. We live for and serve Him using our natural talents and spiritual gifts for His purposes, to His glory! It is about Him, not us. Therefore, whatever occupation Christians go into, we labor under His Lordship and to please Christ (Colossians 3:23-25). The entertainment and sports fields especially are rigged by Satan to trap and destroy those who with starry eyes and little if any Christ-like character pursue them. Whitney Houston--as so many before her--left her church and for a while soared to the highest heights of fame and fortune as an entertainer. She then got trapped by the devil’s sorcery embodied in drugs, alcohol and carnality.
As a disciplined minister, I will not automatically put Whitney Houston in Heaven as so many are doing. Indeed, this is what Satan wants because if he can convince us that sin has no eternal consequences, then his bullpen of churches will stay full with others eager to follow in the footsteps of Ms. Houston. And so, faithful to my calling (Ezekiel 33:1-9), I warn my reader to consider the words of Jesus concerning the life priorities of His disciples in Mark 8:34-38. Too, make no mistake: it is not enough to grow up in a church and perform any work including singing in the choir that saves (Matthew 7:21-23). Nor does God play favorites; we will reap what we sow (Romans 2:4-11; Galatians 6:7-8)! Finally, it is not enough to emotionally believe Jesus loves you that saves, it is faith in and love for Him displayed in obedient lives (1 John 2:3-6).
1 Unfortunately, since writing this post, Ms. Houston’s daughter, Bobbi Kristina Brown, followed her mother in a heartbreakingly similar death in August 2015. She was just
22 years old.
2 The book is available at all major internet book sellers, by order at your favorite brick and mortar bookstore or in the Strong Man Store.
3 For the uninitiated, “bullpen” is a Baseball term that refers to the area and the relief pitchers themselves that warm-up and wait to be called up to replace a pitcher
already in the game. This is fine for Baseball, but not the Lord’s churches with Satan as a manager calling Christians up as naïve players to get in his game with the
intent to destroy them!
Writing about the reality of racism in the first chapter of my book, The Scourge Of Racism, I am taken aback by how apparently many white Americans who also professed to be devout Christians nonchalantly tolerated, practiced and even advocated for racism to continue as the systemic social norm of the culture for over four centuries.1 So much so has this been the case that even now, it appears many especially white conservative evangelicals still feel like they are doing the objects of racism a favor to cease and desist from it as biblically and morally indefensible as it is. Indeed, some have believed God was and is like them in their outlook and supportive!2 But was and is He?
As always, God’s dealings with ancient Israel serve to instruct those of us who will receive correction from His Word objectively read, interpreted and applied! In Psalm 50, God Almighty presents Himself as He who “has spoken and called the earth from” east to west to witness His glorious, loud, fiery and “tempestuous” arrival as He comes to judge His people, Israel, “out of Zion.” Beyond question, “God Himself is Judge.” And while Israel is in view first as the saints gathered to God “who have made a covenant with” Him “by sacrifice,” followers of Jesus Christ the “Lamb of God” see ourselves assembled to the Judge too (Psalm 50:1-6; John 1:29; 2 Corinthians 5:9-11, NKJV).
In language and purpose remarkably similar to Christ’s as Judge among the churches in The Revelation Of Jesus Christ, God calls to His ‘“people’” to listen as He testifies ‘“against’” them (Psalm 50:7; Revelation 1:20-2:7, NKJV). Why do those that profess to be God’s people in large numbers seem to forget He sees and hears everything we do? One reason is clearly the spiritually deadening routines, worship rituals and works of religion! This is exactly what God rebukes the dull hearted, dutifully religious in Israel for as does Christ the church at Ephesus (Psalm 50:8-15; Revelation 2:4-5). Love for God in relationship is paramount; spurring ardent worship and works He rewards!
The foregoing truth explains why many white professed Christians for centuries to this hour could silently tolerate and practice racism in American churches. Just like many in ancient Israel and the churches already by the end of the first century, they were practicing Christianity as a spiritually dead religion of men.3 It was loosely based on the Bible, but became exposed when the racist cultural norms it upheld ran up on the Bible’s transcendent spiritual principles, morals and ethics. Without being born again, many did not have the teaching, will or power to resist the cultural status quo and went along with what their church going fathers, neighbors, co-workers etc. did as racists.4
In God’s sight, devoted racists that have filled and led churches would be among the wicked in Israel He now, turns Himself to judge in the Psalm. He wants to know, ‘“What right have you to declare My statutes or take My covenant in your mouth seeing that you hate instruction and cast My words behind you,’” (Psalm 50:16-17, NKJV)? Too, He indicts the wicked for giving if not overt, tacit consent to evil that included the harming of family and in American history, blacks known to be Christians (Psalm 50:18-20). Ostensibly Christian hate groups (a contradiction in terms if there ever was one) such as the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) terrorized blacks throughout the nation’s South.5
The KKK did this by burning crosses in targeted black yards, destroying property, raping the women, whisking away the men to assault and murder sometimes by lynching as their means of intimating the race to remain in its supposedly inferior place to whites. As with the wicked of Psalm 50, those that carried out their evil works of racism did so in the face of God’s silence believing He was completely like them and supported their evil deeds. But God declares not so and assures His ‘“rebuke’” that will set His charges ‘“in order before’” their ‘“eyes,’” (Psalm 50:21, NKJV).6 There is no place in Scripture God endorses, but only in sovereignty permits such evil until He judges it. He says, ‘“Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,’” (Romans 12:19-21, NKJV) as many have painfully learned.7
Consequently, God the Judge of His people warns the apathetic religious and willful wicked to ‘“consider’” what He is about to say with a view toward repenting; both, He says, ‘“who forget God’” in their sinning, ‘“lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver,’” (Psalm 50:22, NKJV). So much for the latter day false teaching that contrary to His Word asserts God is no threat for temporal or eternal punitive judgment upon sinning professed Christians (Romans 1:18-2:11; Galatians 5:19-21; Hebrews 10:26-31). The Lord does not change or lower His standards. He receives only genuine praise from the heart of obedience He saves (Psalm 50:23)! Having been gracious, merciful, longsuffering and forbearing with racism in His house over four centuries His judgment has come.8
1 The Scourge Of Racism, Copyright 2023, ODCM Publishing Division, Portland, OR, p. 31-32. The printed book is available in the Strong Man Store, all major internet booksellers and brick and mortar bookstores. The just released E-Book is available widely for purchase through your favorite E-Book seller. Watch the book trailer.
2 Many white conservative professed Christians obviously did believe God endorsed their bigoted and discriminatory acts of racism such as notable evangelists Billy Sunday (see the July 13, 2015 Blog post by Dr. Tim Gombis, The Racist Roots Of Evangelicalism) and Bob Jones, Sr. who founded the university bearing his name that openly practiced excluding blacks through the early 1970s. The Fort Worth, TX seminary I graduated from, Southwestern Baptist, in their history is among many that did not warmly welcome non-white students as I briefly touch on in The Scourge Of Racism, p. 34-35.
3 Read the two-part post beginning August 21, 2016, Christianity The Religion Of Men, under the category, Instruction. Also, read the September 4, 2016 post, Christianity The Religion American Style, under the category, Call To Repent.
4 The status quo being preserved within the context of loveless professed Christianity is the arrogance of racial superiority and privileges. God as Wisdom hates ‘“pride and arrogance,’” ‘”the evil way and the perverse mouth,’” (Proverbs 8:13, NKJV). See the November 12, 2023 post, Loving With The Love Of God, under the category, Instruc- tion.
5 The KKK in their full regalia were prominently featured in some Southern white churches (see the image at about the 9:56 mark in the PBS feature, Backs Against the Wall: The Howard Thurman Story). Four school age girls in a Birmingham, AL church bombing were among those murdered by the violence of racial hate.
6 Those who know and love Him appreciate God’s silence in the face of evil is never His active support and approval. Any that would believe this run into serious trouble at- tempting to sustain such a twisted view of God’s silence in the face of His own Son’s suffering at the hands of evil men (Psalm 22). In His sovereignty, God Almighty chooses the how and when of His intervention against evil as in His perfect or permissive will He allows it always to some good end for the one who puts faith in Him (Ro- mans 8:28)!
7 It is a reality of living in an existence with the eternally just God (Deuteronomy 32:4): sin does not go without being judged by Him. This means no racist that has ever harmed or harms the objects of their racism gets away with it. Equally true, the objects of racism that entitle themselves to sin as victims do not get away with it either!
8 The only God ordained avenue of escape is repentance as the apostle Paul stresses (Romans 2:3-4)! Watch this Ministry’s Strong Man Of God Online Rally, Return To The Lord, on YouTube for help.
Still thinking about young 21st century church planters,1 I am not unaware that many do set out with sincere determination to answer God’s call to go, preach the Gospel, make disciples and plant a church. However, some go wrong when they start to believe it depends more on them than God. As a result, they seek to help the Lord and speed up the process of church building with people pleasing compromises of God’s Word and flesh generated ideas. In this edited 2010 Commentary, the Lord leads me to remind all of us that He is concerned about the end and the means. Aspiring strong men of God in the image of Christ are to never do evil to bring about His intended good end.
Originally Published September 2010
It used to be a matter of routine morality that people were just as concerned about how an achievement was made as the achievement itself. Apparently, this is no longer true. In the world and among many Christians today, the end is exceedingly more important than the means used to arrive at it. Justifying the means by the end as a philosophy has saturated every fabric of our society. The character and specifically integrity of Christ in the aspiring strong man of God, precludes his compromising what is right in the sight of the Lord to arrive at even the noblest of ends.2 He knows God is just as much concerned about the means to the end as He is the end itself.
Having abandoned a biblical worldview of life and morality, athletes cheat using performance enhancing drugs for fame and bigger paydays. Teachers adjust student test scores to the end of showing progress and keeping their jobs. Activist judges hide behind legalese and formality to advance immoral social agendas in important rulings while lawmakers bribe each other with money deals to pass needed legislation. Corrupt preachers twist God's Word to justify covetous desires while deacons and trustees steal church money to pay themselves for their hard work. Churches tolerate the known immoral lifestyles of choir members and musicians to keep services jumping.
Professed Christians justify disobedience to God's Word to show the world they love them. The Bible's steps to salvation through repentance and faith are altered by the same folk to fill churches with warm, unsaved bodies. After all, the end game is packed out church worship services. Professed Christian mothers murder their children in the womb to justify timing issues and career ambitions. The Lord, they say, "understands my situation." Professed Christian men lie, steal and commit other crimes justifying their deeds by claiming expediency in the need of the moment. Never mind that the Lord they profess to follow taught no such precept or set an endorsing example.
Indeed, the Lord Jesus Christ was given many opportunities to achieve ends by varying means other than what His Father laid out for Him. For example, at the outset of His ministry He was led into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit to be tempted by the devil (Matthew 4:1-11). After He had completed a 40-day food fast, the Lord was very hungry. The devil approached and suggested He turn stones into bread to prove He was the Son of God. But the Lord told him, "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God,'" (Matthew 4:4, NKJV). Interestingly, Jesus had no concern here about being legalistic as He declared God’s Word!
It is also clear the Lord was not going to prove Himself or use His own power to satisfy His need. He would wait and rely on His Father for all of His needs! In the evil thinking of our day, many would be okay with the Lord Jesus taking care of His need for food and showing off His power to boot in order to silence the devil. But the devil would not have been silenced. As the accuser, he would have immediately charged the Lord with acting independent of His Father and sin for he also knew the Scriptures. The means the Lord would have used to the ends of eating and proving His identity was not righteous. He, therefore, chose not to use it!
The other two temptations the devil brought thereafter were likewise designed to get the Lord Jesus to achieve ends by means that were wicked. In those cases too, the Lord refused to do so standing on and honoring God's written Word! Even in the final hours before His suffering when He sought the Father if there might yet be another means to save us, He submitted to His Father's no and went to the cross as the noblest of ends ever in the history of the world (Matthew 26:36-46). Every aspiring strong man of God in the image of Jesus Christ must in like manner willfully choose moment by moment to achieve every end by means that will also please our heavenly Father. The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"
1 See the September 9, 2018 post, Old Versus New School Church, under the category, Instruction.
2 Learn more about the character of the aspiring strong man of God in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics. It is available at all major internet booksellers,
by order at your favorite brick and mortar bookstore or in the Strong Man Store.
It is truly unfortunate, but not surprising that with all else our nation must deal with at this hour, unresolved racial issues have recently come to the surface again through the citizen and police murders of black Americans, freshly proving racism is not a past thing. The incidents and resulting explosion of initial violent rioting, looting, protest marches and rallies not just by black Americans, but Americans from every hue were sparked by the recorded video of a Minneapolis, MN police officer’s murder of black American male, George Floyd. I wrote about this incident as the Lord led June 21, 2020 in a post under the category, Black History, entitled Has Racial Justice Arrived in America?
This time, among the early voices speaking empathy and counsel into as well as engaging with the crisis are a number of especially younger conservative white Christians. Along with the manifold increase of white Americans across the political and social spectrum in general, conservative white Christians as America’s “moral majority” speaking anything but condemnation into a riotous racial crisis is recent. While there have been apologies for slavery and Jim Crow segregation and endless talking by white conservative Christians with amicable black clergy about racial reconciliation since the 1960s, as I have written in other posts, there has not been any real, widespread progress.1
Our majority white society as a once professed Christian nation propped up supposedly by morals and ethics drawn from the Bible, has far too long tolerated the abuse of its black and other citizens of color in many forms that actually run counter to it (Zechariah 7:8-12; Mark 12:28-34; Luke 10:25-37; Romans 13:8-10). Not biblical Christianity as the order of the day since the nation’s founding, but corrupt, counterfeit manmade forms of it that even allowed for slave owners to commit adultery on their wives with their female slaves; church pastors, deacons and congregants to brutalize and terrorize blacks using burning crosses as a symbol of hate among many other evil acts.2
Such deeds were done while police, judges, educators, businesses, legislators (often as active participants) along with the larger white society through silent indifference were complicit.3 Over the past hundred years the most vocal champions of maintaining the morality of the Bible among professed Christians has been white Americans that self-identify as conservative in their religious, social and political convictions. Many are also intensely patriotic, devoted Americans who ascribe to the phrase “God and Country” as their motto though, on such issues as allowing systemic racism in their churches and other entities, God’s will in Christ has clearly been secondary (John 13:34-35).
However, at this strategic moment during God’s Coronavirus judgment when the festering sore of racial injustice has ruptured once more, younger conservative white Christians are speaking up perhaps finally perceiving, God Himself keeps bringing up the matter because those professing to know Him among their ranks have not dealt with it in accord with His written Word! After all, as I have offered in other posts, a “biblically conservative Christian” is supposed to be about objectively interpreting, applying and preserving the whole Word of God as it is written! In no place does it advocate for or tolerate hating a brother in Christ for any reason (1 John 2:7-11, 3:10-15, 4:20-21).4
Besides being and presenting the world a corrupt if not outright counterfeit form of biblical Christianity, guilty conservative white Christians (to include those calling themselves “Evangelicals”) have been hypocritical by insisting “our nation” uphold their cherry-picked morals and ethics from the Bible while they undergirded its systemic racism to this hour. This reality has been among the chief reasons many former biblically conservative black American Civil Rights activists searching for righteous allies over the years have abandoned the effort among their ostensible like-minded white brothers. Instead, those that are guilty through lack of faith in and impatience with God have to their shame taken up with rebels against Him for help (Psalm 2:1-3; Isaiah 30:1-5; Philippians 3:17-21).
The guilty among de facto apostate black Americans will give an account to God, but so will conservative white professed Christians who have been more loyal to a humanly invented religious, social and political philosophy that permits such sins as racism under the guise of Christianity than to the Lord who calls all to repent! Indeed, why but for sin am I as a black Ministry leader who has remained faithful as a biblical conservative not fully embraced and supported by conservative white professed Christians? Your sinful flesh built conservative philosophy does not welcome those of any race much less inferior black males who speak biblical truth challenging the wicked status quo; one white church elder once intimating this to me by essentially saying I needed to shut up!5
Now, though, the Lord during His Coronavirus judgment is plainly showing racism is one of the issues He is calling the guilty to repentance from among professing Christianity emptied out of its buildings. The authentic younger conservative white Christians coming forth repentant and in the power of the Holy Spirit to actually take a stand with their black brothers are representative of those I spoke of in my June 21st post.6 May the Lord bless you and all others to follow in what is very likely a last chance for conservative white Christians to get on the right side of the Bible and help forestall the eruption of greater ethnic conflict awhile longer in America; conflict ongoing in many parts of the world that fulfills another of the Lord’s foretold occurrences to precede His soon coming (Matthew 24:7a).
1 See the posts, Moral Pressure Rightly Applied, May 4, 2014, Biblical Equality And Equity, July 5, 2015 and Professing Christian Racism Is Sin Too, December 11, 2016
all under the category, Call To Repent.
2 Read the two-part post beginning August 21, 2016, Christianity The Religion Of Men, under the category, Instruction followed by Christianity The Religion American
Style (which shows how even many black religionists to this hour mimic the practice of it by their former masters so pervasive is it) posted on September 4, 2016 and
the two-part post beginning September 11, 2016, American Culture’s Religion, all under the category, Call To Repent.
3 Read the August 9, 2015 post, Silent Endorsers Of Evil, under the category, Instruction. Whether Christians or not, like the white pre-Civil War Abolitionists, it has been
heartening to see current white protest marchers for racial justice carrying signs with wording like “Silent no more” and “Not silent and complicit.”
4 See footnote #9 in the two-part post, The Racial Divide, under the category, Call To Repent, that begins July 29, 2018 to see how the Lord led me to make a distinction
between “conservative” and “biblically conservative” to avoid any confusion about the Christians faithfully obeying His whole Word as it is written! Also, read the April
19, 2015 post, On The Lord’s Side, under the category, The Cause, cited in the footnote for a discussion of why all professed Christians ought to be standing with the
Lord Jesus as Bible conservatives!
5 Get my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics to understand why aspiring strong men of God in the image of Jesus Christ from every hue must be willing to
stand and speak as He commands (Matthew 10:24-33)! Get a print copy or digital download of the book at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble,
ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can also purchase a print copy in the Strong Man Store.
6 I invite those that are biblically conservative from all hues to stand with and support us at this like-minded Christian black American founded Ministry! The Ministry is cur-
rently engaged in a campaign to raise my 2020 full-time salary and is 63% there. Learn more at https://fundrazr.com/salarycampaign1. I am also seeking to raise the
funds necessary to license the music used in and Webcast our still relevant 1994 radio docu-drama, From Slavery To Victory: One Man’s Journey that presents a biblical
worldview of the black American experience from West Africa on our From Slavery To Victory Education Project Web Site, https://fromslaverytovictory.org.
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