We don’t suffer from an epidemic of misinformation, but a burden of myth-information. Modern censorship prevents us from getting an edge in word-wise.
The self-appointed powers-than-be, those who control liberal governments, education systems, mass media and online behemoths believe they are the repository of all knowledge. Anything that doesn’t match their preferences is de-listed, de-platformed, de-monetized, de-humanized and denied an audience.
Fortunately, they can only control worldly knowledge. Unfortunately (for them) worldly knowledge is, in the end, worthless. It’s the intellectual version of fiat currency, with value only to those who trust it. God does not and God’s people should not.
God’s kingdom is not about knowledge anyway, but about love. Love only exists because there is a God in heaven who cares more about us than He cares what He knows about us. Jesus was and is the living embodiment of that love. “He who has seen Me, has seen the Father,” 1 He said.
As an American, my national heritage is framed by documents proclaiming “God-given” rights. The founders recognized that all good things come from God; 2 any rights we have are ordained in heaven, not dreamed up in a government bureaucracy.
In fact, the US Bill of Rights was written not to endow rights, but to protect people from government taking them away. How much this is endangered now. And it’s not just traditional Christian thinkers in the US who are suffering death by innuendo. It’s spread here to the UK and in most of the English-speaking nations.
The false ‘rights-based’ culture we currently live in has produced a wrongs-based social environment. Rights come from God alone. When people try to create ‘rights’ we only compound wrongs.
The Absolute from which all rights derive is no longer the driving force in Western culture. The perfect absolute has been cast aside in favor of political advantage.
Too many church leaders play along with cultural fictions to win the hand, even as they’ve lost sight of the game. The apostle Paul tells his spiritual son Timothy to “guard that which is committed to your trust.” 3
Too many church leaders have forgotten this charge. They inhabit a Cowardly New World. It remains, as it always has been, for an overlooked remnant of faithful souls to intercede, rise up and be bold. Risk allows us to take good theology and put it into practice in a hurting world.
So let us be light. Light always attracts a crowd in the darkness.
I currently worship in the Church of England, but I admit to a certain level of Anglicanxiety. Not for me myself, but for many leaders. God doesn’t change and doesn’t change His standards; this is clear from one end of the Bible to the other. He even says this about himself: “I am the LORD, I do not change.” 4
Thus it isn’t “Our Father” who is “problematic”, to use Archbishop Stephen’s troublesome phrase. If there’s a breakdown in perception, it’s not on the other end of the line. Some serious self-reflection and repentance is needed in many quarters.
I pray that I’m always quick to repent when this type of self-satisfaction appears in me; such I find repugnant. Holy Spirit is free to point this out to me, and so are you. This is how we get to the fine point of a sanctified life.
All of us who profess to follow Christ must take heed. Whom do we follow, really? And from whom do we wish honor and approval: Christ? Or the world and its institutions full of self-proclaimed knowledge?
They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. I agree. A little worldly knowledge is a dangerous thing. Spirit-filled believers should stay away from it. It lies, misleads and corrupts, and it takes both leaders and the led along with it.
The advice from Paul to Timothy quoted above reads in full, “O Timothy, guard that which is committed to your trust. Avoid profane babblings and opposing views from so-called knowledge. By professing it, some have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with you. Amen.” 5
Yes. Grace be with you. And mercy as well.
1. John 14:9 – Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you such a long time, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father. So how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?
2. James 1:17 – “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no change or shadow of turning.”
3. 1 Timothy 6:20
4. Malachi 3:6a – The full verse (with context) is “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them like gold and silver….Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness…against those who…do not fear Me, says the LORD of Hosts. For I am the LORD, I do not change; therefore you, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed.” [Malachi 3:2-3a. 5a, 5c, 6]
5. 1 Timothy 6:20-21
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