Paul's Passing Thoughts

I have been very busy of late doing my version of church: everyday living that’s not tagged with a particular time and place. Those of us who believe in justification by new birth emphasize the fact that worship is all of life. When you are truly born again, you don’t go anywhere, in particular, at a commanded time, to get more Jesus or to “worship.” Everything you think, say, and do is your worship. lately, my worship has been more hours at work as a Medication Technician leaving me with few opportunities to blog. This new addition to my worship (career) requires a lot of focus and leaves me without an inspiration for something to write even when I get time. That is, until today when my inspiration was lit up when a ministry associate sent me the following link, Lynda Randle: How God’s People Must Respond to Racial Division in Our Nation.

It is my assertion that the evangelical church is completely antithetical to the heart of God, and this article is just more evidence. A MAJOR theme in the Bible is unity and a call to God’s children to be peacemakers. Per the usual, what flows from the church is both illogical and divisive, and the aforementioned article written by “Christian” musician Lynda Randle is no exception. No surprise, then, that the article was published by Answers in Genesis who built a giant boat museum and call it a box (ark). The whole premise of the museum is to prove that Noah built a sea worthy ship, when in reality, the ark (Hebrew for, “box”) was nothing more than a huge floating box. And so it is with the mindless church. Calling a boat a box is indicative of church logic across the board. Answers in Genesis, and their museum which in no way, shape, or form resembles a clear description of the ark in the Bible, is just more shameless church commercialism while scolding those who believe in the American Dream and its supposed “consumerism.”

The problem with writing any article like this is a temptation to get side tracked with other elements of the church’s massive hypocrisy and contradictions. This article is about its race-baiting as a way to cause division in the face of the Bible’s warning against participating in factionist activities like gossip. With that said, let us examine the article, which is framed by 3 major points that she makes.

First point, “Understand that racism isn’t dead.” That, of course, is a lie. In a country the size of America, the existence of something doesn’t make it a systemic problem. Leprosy exists in America; that doesn’t make it a pandemic. It’s not just a lie because racism was brought back by the Obama era, racism was so dead that it was not even successfully brought back to life. Systemic racism is clearly a false narrative being pushed on our society to cause division because a unified culture is hard to control, and the church, per the usual, is all in when it comes to tyranny.

Secondly, hold my beer, America was supposedly founded on Judeo-Christian principles, but 245 years later racism is alive and well? Huh? This can be added to a list of, “What the hell has the church been doing in America for 245 years?” Recently, the president of the flagship seminary of the SBC bemoaned biblical illiteracy in the church. Say what? People have been going to church three times a week or seven if there’s a tent revival and they are yet biblically illiterate? The church itself admits that it is a failure. Much like the Democrat Party, it creates the problem and then claims to be the solution. For certain, it calls its own members totally depraved sinners saved by grace and then claims to be the solution for “present sin.” What a wonderful business to be in when you can create your own supply and demand. Racism is just another sin for the church to add to its inventory.

Furthermore, on this point, like ALL race-baiters, Randle suggests that prejudice is unique to the black community. No, the Bible makes it clear that condemnation overall is systemic in the world as a whole. To suggest that racism, a word that, in and of itself, implies prejudice against anyone who is different in any way, is an organizing principle in America unique to the black community, is just an ignorant point of view meant to deliberately stir up strife.

On the second point of the article, Randle suggests we “Expand our Circle of Friends.” She was born in 1962, which only makes her 8 years younger than me. Hence, she is a liar who knows that in the 80’s no one cared about race or even gave it a second thought. Again, racism failed to even make a comeback; it’s a false narrative propagated by tyrants, because supposedly, government control is the only hope for controlling racism. People are totally depraved and must be compelled to do good by ruling authorities, which somehow are moral by default. This is why church craves a return to the church-state that formed its founding principles.

On her third point, she states, “Welcome diversity at Christian events and in leadership.” To suggest black pastors are not visible leaders in the evangelical church is absurd. And like many pastors, they create unflattering headlines way too often. She also puts the responsibility on white churches to be diverse, which is totally disingenuous. Even a child knows that black churches are just as segregated as white churches. In addition, there are Latino churches, Korean churches, Chinese churches, and the list goes on and on. Yet, the article states, “There have been many times when Randle was the only person of color to speak or perform at a Christian event.” So, what of it? From time to time Susan and I visit the church of the black pastor who married us and we are the only white people there. So what? It doesn’t mean he’s racist.

Race-baiting isn’t a problem IN the church, it’s a problem WITH the church along with many other problems inherent with the unregenerate. Race-baiting is just another sin in the church inventory of “present sin” to be saved from. The inventory must be large in order to “make the cross bigger and not smaller.”

As time moves forward, the church will identify sin more and more in the same way that the secular world identifies sin. That’s because, like the world, the church is in the condemnation business which creates a supply and demand for authority to compel people to be good.

That is, however they define the good according to a reality they also create.

paul