Inbox: Operation Xmas Child

I've been asked about this before and it has actually been on my mind as of late. Having visited several churches lately, I keep encountering Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes, a 'ministry' run by Samaritan's Purse – one of Franklin Graham's cash cows. Between Samaritan's Purse, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, and his other endeavours, Mr. Graham pulls in well over a million dollars a year.

 

Should we support this ministry? People are often shocked when I refuse to take part and reject it. I don't support the premise of Operation Christmas Child (as the New Testament does not support the notion of man-made holy days) nor would I want to support Graham's Cheap Grace Evangelism – remember they put their literature in the boxes. And if that wasn't enough, I simply don't want to support Graham in any capacity whatsoever.

The multi-millionaire Graham is a force for evil in the world. He threw all in with Donald Trump and played a significant role in convincing millions of Evangelicals to abandon any kind of principle for the sake of expediency. As such their decades of Christian politicking were (in the end) reduced to a joke. The people that once preached public morality and a need for leaders with character threw all their support behind a fascistic racist lying thief, an adulterer and rapist, and once he became president – a murderer.

I know, I know – he's not the pastor in chief, he's the president. Well, that's not the argument they used to make. It only demonstrates that leaders like Graham are opportunistic swindler-charlatans and their followers are amnesiac sheep and no one in question has (it would seem) bothered to read the New Testament and understand the nature of the Christian life or the Kingdom of God.

On that note we would do well to remember Graham's steadfast support for the Likud-dominated Zionist state. In light of the ongoing war with Gaza, he was quite keen to fly over to Israel and have himself photographed meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu – another mass murderer, serial liar, and fascist. And I'm not just throwing around the 'fascist' label light. It applies. Additionally, all of this is motivated in an erroneous Judaized theology that subordinates the teaching of Christ and the apostles to a massive misreading of the Old Testament.

And speaking of New Testament rejection, Graham also engages in numerous lawsuits in order to combat municipalities and others that reject his efforts and in terms of just general corruption – his alliances with the political sphere are self-evident.

Isn't he one of the premier Christian leaders in today's America? Undoubtedly that label belongs to him and yet this is just a clear sign of Divine Judgment on the apostate American Church and the Evangelical movement. Franklin Graham has continued the evil legacy of his father who whored out the Church to Nixonian political machinations, American nationalism, and the war effort – Vietnam in those days. He sold out the gospel to the metrics of cheap grace and cultural influence.

A prophet with honour he's called – they name streets after him. In reality Billy and Franklin Graham typify the kind of false prophets we see over and over again in the Old Testament and they represent the kind of perverted Christianity that is being alluded to in the epistles of the New. Their court-ecclesiastic legacy is in direct contradiction to the New Testament and the testimony of true Biblical prophets.

Do not support the 'ministries' of this evil man. Kids will do fine without Christmas shoeboxes. There are other ways to reach them. We don't do evil that good may come. Encourage your church to drop its participation in this programme and to not give money to such wolves in sheep's clothing. Graham's religion is one of mammon and power – it has nothing to do with the New Testament. Let him have his Trumpish messiah – he certainly has no interest in the real one. He may quote Scripture and preach a message that sounds like the gospel but it's corrupted and does more harm in the end. Some might be saved in spite of his efforts, not because of them. Even Roman Catholics can quote Scriptures and sometimes make arguments and appeals that have the gospel message within them.

Paul could rejoice in the word being preached even if it was not always pure or purely motivated. We can be thankful that some are saved but that doesn't mean we support the likes of the false teacher and spiritual fraud that is Franklin Graham.