Last Night I once again went on a bit of a rant on Facebook about something that I thought was very much a social injustice this time aimed directly at me! Right now it doesn’t matter just exactly what the issue was just suffice to say that it was institutionalized thuggery and incompetence at it’s finest. This always presses my buttons and I tend to get more than just a bit hot under the collar about these things and I tend to be pretty vocal about it.
In Come the Christians – Predictably my anger is met with a quick chorus of “How dare you talk like that!” and “What kind of “pastor” are you?” and my very favorite of them all “What would Jesus do?” Well lets take a look at just what Jesus would do shall we?
Joh 2:13 Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up
to Jerusalem.
Joh 2:14 And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers doing business.
Joh 2:15 When He had made a whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers’ money and overturned the tables.
Joh 2:16 And He said to those who sold doves, “Take these things away! Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!”
Lets see what was going on here!
This was much more than just a “religious” issue! This had to do with the law and institutionalized thievery. The Jewish people though under the yoke of Roman oppression operated on a theocratic government for the most part and this based on the Torah. The law REQUIRED all Jews to show up in Jerusalem three times a year, Passover being one of them. The law also required them to provide an animal sacrifice. Most people who traveled a long distance did not bring an animal to sacrifice and would buy one that was acceptable at the temple when they got there.
This is where it gets good! So we have vendors of animals that are considered OK by the government (aka the Pharisees) which they will of course sell you at an inflated price. Anyone who has ever gone to a stadium and paid $7 for a hot dog and $12 for a beer knows how that goes! But wait there is more too it! The vendors of animals would ONLY accept the local coin (temple currency) so they would send you over to the money changers who would take the money from your local area and “exchange” it to money the vendors would accept and at NONE too favorable an exchange rate.
People were literally trapped in a system they could not escape and of course everyone was “just doing their job” This is what so INFURIATED Jesus! Angry to the point of creating a weapon and using it!
Lets talk about that whip! This was not just some little bunch of twine he was whirling about oh no! The Greek word is phragellion.
φραγέλλιον
phragellion
frag-el’-le-on
Neuter of a derivative from the base of G5417; a whip, that is, Roman lash as a public punishment: – scourge.
You might know this better as a “cat-o-nine-tails” a viscous weapon to be sure designed to peel the skin right off of a mans flesh. So here we have the prince of peace – Jesus Christ beating the daylights out of people turning over tables and generally standing up for what is right! Sounds pretty demonstrative to me even GASP violent!
The concept of a meek and mild pastor is actually a pretty new one. If you are reading this in the United States you can thank in part a pastor by the name of John Peter Muhlenburg a Lutheran pastor who on January 21, 1776 in the middle of a sermon declared “Now was the time for war” and went straight away from the pulpit to the battlefield and took as many men as would come with him! Thus was born the black robe regiment who was considered so dangerous by the British that these preachers were to be a primary target when ever encountered. So much for shy and meek preachers!
Perhaps the most famous of Patriot Pastors was the Rev. John Peter Gabriel Muhlenberg. In January of 1776 after completing a message from the text, Ecclesiastes 3:1,“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven,” Pastor Muhlenberg stepped down from his pulpit and said, “In the language of the Holy Writ, there is a time for all things. There is a time to preach and a time to fight. And now is the time to fight.” He then removed his clerical robe to reveal the uniform of a Colonial Army officer. That afternoon, he rode off leading 300 men from his congregation to join General George Washington as the Eighth Virginia Cavalry. Pastor Muhlenberg rose to the rank of Major General before the war ended. (1)
I am of this sort – No I will not be meek and mild as some would have me painted. I will not fill the stereotype roll and I hope you won’t either. If we are going to win a war against oppression and tyranny we need men and wom
en who will stand up! People who will speak their minds! Demand excellence and accountability in all walks of life and in all dealings. And if you ask me “what wou
ld Jesus do?” I am going to remind you that going into a fit of rage – turning over tables and beating the daylights out of people with a whip is not out of the question!
PGC
(1) http://www.reclaimamericaforchrist.org/lettertopatriotpastors.htm
The Ugly Face of Racism
Today is January 5, 2017 and less than 24 hours ago we were greeted with the appalling images and video footage of 4 black young
A mentally challenged man tortured unmercifully.
adults torturing a white, mentally disabled man. All the while shouting racial epithets. Nothing could be more clear than this was a case of a bunch of racists taking out their hate on a vulnerable human being.
Racism alive, well and growing.
I knew as soon as the violent rise of Black Lives Matter started taking place a little more than 4 years ago after the defensive shooting of Trayvon Martin that things would become worse, much worse for this nation.
We have seen “peaceful protests” turn into riots on a third world scale with burning and looting not seen since the race riots of the 60’s. Rather than try to quell these issues in a statesman like way the Soros funded Obama administration and Loretta Lynch run justice department didn’t just fiddle while America’s cities burned they poured gasoline on them.
Racism: It’s not just for whitey anymore!
Top row: Brittany Covington, Tesfaye Cooper; Bottom row: Jordan Hill, Tanishia Covington
The social justice world has hammered on one pseudo fact and that is that it is impossible for a white person to be the victim of racism and that ONLY white people can be racist. Now this narrative is mind boggling since it defies even the dictionary definition of “racism”
racism
Sin is the problem – Jesus is the answer
What we need to see in this video and learn from this experience is this the Bible is 100% correct when it says in Genesis 6:5 “And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”
We are running headlong to our own destruction and it is because of hate. Our politicians and their soft associates have continually pushed us into that well of hate. Look at the last election – did we talk about issues or how much each side hated the other side?
Let me be clear on something when you hate you sin. Your violent hateful actions are not G-d driven. You need to get saved. Marching down the street calling for the death of cops, or Trump or Clinton or white people or black people are SIN!
I am angry but I do love you.
I have an old friend from high school – a gay, liberal, African American man. Today he said “I’m a black liberal and even I can see this is a pure hate crime”. In times like this I thank G-d for a reminder of how much I love this guy. Not because we are the same but because love really becomes the answer. Maybe if we who are “good men” would come together and say “The hate stops with me” we could really do something here, get back on track. Yeah things won’t be perfect but maybe we can make the hate diminish when we all start saying It’s not OK.
Yes I am angry about this I wish I could have prevented it – I am angry but I will continue to do my darndest to love best I know how.
PGC