https://www.vcyamerica.org/crosstalk/2021/06/14/u-s-flag-under-attack/
Every once in awhile I grit my teeth and listen to an episode
of this radio programme that represents a fusion of John Birch Society-inspired
ideology and Protestant Fundamentalism. Not everything on the show is bad but
most of it is and some episodes are certainly worse than others.
This episode (linked above) was one of the bad ones. The
entire discussion is rooted in a false premise and as such the whole discussion
goes off the rails.
From the first moment we are exposed to pronoun confusion,
the Church is confused with America and in particular the contrivance known as
Judeo-Christian America.*
It's all rather absurd and represents a confused mish-mash of
different ideas and false conflations of history, theology, and philosophy. But
it markets well to the ignorant and to those whose real god is America and its
mammon system.
The 'Judeo' in this case represents an all too common
Judaizing tendency in theology. As the New Testament does not support any of
their views they turn to the Old Testament and read it and apply it without
properly taking into consideration what the New Testament says, or what it says
about the Old Testament itself. And needless to say such a method utilizes the
Old Testament in a non-Christocentric way. Christ is not the center of the
system, its anti-type and fulfillment. Rather it's treated as a generalised
standalone model that other (non-covenanted) nations can emulate.
To put it simply it's a heresy and a dangerous one as it
results in a massive misreading of the Scriptures and ultimately it perverts
and even inverts New Testament ethics and imperatives.
If these folks knew anything at all about the Christianity of
the New Testament they would discover that there is one coming who will burn
every American flag and will actually eradicate America itself – along with all
the other works of men. America is not a work of the Holy Spirit. It is not
sanctified and set-apart. It is not in Union with Christ. It's not part of His
Kingdom nor does it any way represent it.
It will burn with the other works of men at the eschaton – at
the Second Coming or Parousia of Christ. Christ Himself will burn their flags
and apparently their hopes and dreams.
Rather than worry about waving flags and sanctifying
nationalism (not to mention misrepresenting what America is), if they
understood the New Testament they would know that we are strangers and pilgrims
in this present evil age. We are called to live as foreigners even in America.
It's not our home. It represents the evil world Babel-system that we're called
to bear witness against. This is why the world hates us. We won't help them
build their Babel. We won't participate in their politics. We won't fight in
their wars and kill for their causes. We won't hand over our children to them.
We don't invest in their system, instead we lay up treasures in heaven.
And also we understand that since it's an evil system those
that flourish within it are part of that evil. We live here but we testify
against the world and thus against America as well.
There's plenty of evil afoot in American society. It has
always been so. The nation was born in blood and rebellion. It's not something
recent. What's happening now is that the seeds sown generations ago are bearing
a rotten fruit. It's not communism – the host of the show doesn't actually seem
to know what that is. Actually, it's the fruit and result of libertinism,
capitalism, and the unbiblical Classic Liberalism that is at the heart of the
American system. America is a child of the Enlightenment and this alone
divorces it from the so-called Judeo-Christian or Western tradition – which incidentally
isn't Christian either. In some practical or day-to-day respects the secular
humanist Enlightenment vision of America is better. In other ways its worse. It
really doesn't matter because it's part of the world and doomed to burn.
As Christians we will give praise to God when Christ comes
and the world and its works (which includes the American flag and all the
symbols of America so cherished by the idolaters) are burned and consumed. We
will praise Christ for the righteousness of that act.
What will these 'Christians' be doing? Some will be repenting
and I suspect others will be cursing as they discover they loved their idols,
their mammon and their power far more than they ever did the Christ of
Scripture.
I could get angry listening to an episode like this. But I
don't. I pity these people and I pity those who listen to the show and are led
astray by it.
----
*It's akin to a later episode – Have we been given over?
https://www.vcyamerica.org/crosstalk/2021/07/06/have-we-been-given-over/
The 'we' begs the question, assuming American society is
co-extensive with and/or some component of the Church – or worse, vice-versa.
See also:
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2020/01/vcy-crosstalk-chaos.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2021/03/employing-accommodationist-triad-in.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2020/12/lutzers-trumpite-christianity-and-its.html
https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-lesser-magistrate-heresy.html
https://proto-protestantism.blogspot.com/2015/12/observing-two-december-deaths-and.html
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