My Tribute, Defense and Critique of Charlie Kirk

Posted on September 21, 2025 by StriderMTB

This is thorough and long, so get comfortable:

INTRODUCTION

Ten days ago I was holding my precious son, Levi, who had been born three hours earlier. I glanced at my phone and saw the headline that Charlie Kirk had been shot. Five seconds into the video, I knew he had not survived the hit. Then something hit me—a wave of surprising grief. My son had just entered the world, and Charlie had just left it. Because I believe life is sacred, its origin begins with God and its exit ends with God. All will stand before the judgment seat of God. Every knee will bow before God’s Son—the King of kings. That’s what Scripture assures us. In a world filled with uncertainty and doubt, that is one assurance you can bet your life on. So choose your soul allegiance wisely. To be clear, Charlie Kirk wasn’t perfect, and I will offer some criticism at the end of this post. He’s with the Lord now, and I think he would want me to.

PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS

Despite his shortcomings, there is no doubt Charlie lived in the light of eternity. He was also provocative at times, but so were John the Baptist and Jesus (“brood of vipers,” “blind fools,” “den of robbers,” etc). Try to show up at a university with just a white table and a microphone without being provocative or controversial and you might draw a dozen people. Charlie would attract crowds of thousands—many of them protesting his presence. He welcomed the protests and tried his best to invite some of the protesters to dialogue with him. Sometimes I would listen to Charlie’s back-and-forth conversations with university students while I was driving or washing dishes. At times, his on-the-spot answers to hard questions were less than ideal, and I would think, “Oh, Charlie—you could have answered that question better.” Other times, I was astounded, humbled, and taught by his insight, wisdom, patience and grace with students who were filled with dripping vitriol for him. Sometimes they would walk away changed, realizing the man they had encountered was not the fascist, racist, bigoted man their TikTok videos or professors told them to despise.

NUANCE & ADMIRATION

One doesn’t need to agree with Charlie on every point to admire him on other points, just as one doesn’t need to embrace all of former President Obama’s policies to appreciate virtues in his personality. That all-or-nothing mindset is one reason the United States is so polarized. The right-wing has contributed to that as equally as the left.

CALL TO CHRISTIANS

And now we get to the heart of my post—especially if you call yourself a Christian. A follower of Jesus doesn’t need to love Trump to appreciate Charlie as a Christian evangelist who faithfully bore witness to the life, death, and resurrection of our Savior. In his thirty-one years of life, Charlie’s light shone brighter and further than some of his Christian detractors on the progressive left want to acknowledge. Jesus said, “Blessed are you when men slander you and say all manner of evil against you because of Me.” In that sense, Charlie is blessed. But that doesn’t mean I have to watch passively from the sidelines and let slander happen to Charlie without giving him his due defense.

RESEARCH & SLANDER

As painful as it was, I searched out the posts, the reposts, the articles, the tweets, and the statements of Christians I knew to be on the left side of the political aisle—just to see how bad the slander was. And it was bad. Far worse than I thought. “Bearing false witness” was just the tip of the iceberg. A lot of it was due to neglect, ignorance, and basic laziness. That’s another critical point I want to make—because it can (and often does) happen on the right just as easily as the left.

TRIBAL SOURCES

Too often people run to their safe “sources,” their “spokespeople,” or their tribal Facebook group to ask: “Am I allowed to like this person—grieve this person?” “What’s the bullet-point summary I’m supposed to have for this?” “Is this person affiliated with anyone we’re not supposed to like?” “What are the talking points I need to sound informed when I’m really not?”

OUT-OF-CONTEXT CLIPS

In regard to Kirk’s assassination, I was saddened and shocked at the skewed, out-of-context sound bites that Christians on the left had peppered into post after post about their fellow brother in Christ on the right. It was easy to tell who had invested the time to listen at length to Kirk’s contextual analysis of controversial issues, and who sprinted off to their nearest online echo chamber to find the cliff-notes version from their rank-and-file mouthpieces.

CORRECTIVE REPOSTS

Thankfully thousands—literally thousands—are reposting Charlie in his own words, giving people the full context on some of his most controversial statements that have been cut, chopped, and selectively edited to slide into a verbal ammo belt and be discharged from a safe distance. They are discovering Charlie Kirk in a more charitable light and realizing that even though he wasn’t the second coming of Jesus, neither was he a white supremacist, a racist, a bigot, a sexist, or a fascist.

BIPARTISAN WARNING

Both the left and right must stop being duped by mealy-mouthed pundits who act as gatekeepers of their information. It goes without saying that the worst offender on the right is obviously Trump. Though I am grateful for many of his initiatives that have made common sense common again, truth-telling is not one of his virtues. Christians on the right must stop letting him set the bar. But what about truth-telling on the Christian left regarding Charlie Kirk? It’s been awful in some sectors, and that’s next.

PAVLOVITZ CRITIQUE

I think the worst offender on the Christian left has been the liberal author and pastor John Pavlovitz. What are some examples? Pavlovitz called Kirk hateful and a racist. But what Pavlovitz didn’t tell you is that Kirk’s favorite author and intellectual was the Black professor and sociologist, Thomas Sowell, who grew up in Harlem and who Kirk cites time and again to back up his statistics. Kirk considered Sowell his intellectual mentor and one of the smartest people of our age. He advocated that everyone read Sowell, the towering Black intellect. So racist, right? But there’s much more. What Pavlovitz didn’t tell you is that Kirk personally organized some of the largest conferences for young Black leaders called Young Black Leadership Summits. What Pavlovitz didn’t tell you is that Kirk built on the success, feedback, and enthusiasm of those summits by organizing Young Hispanic Leadership Summits. Why? Because he wanted all Americans, regardless of race or color, to excel.

KIRK—THE JEW-LOVING ANTISEMITE?

Pavlovitz called Kirk an antisemite. But what Pavlovitz didn’t tell you is that Kirk was a tireless defender of Israel’s right to exist and one of the most articulate defenders of Jews living in Israel. What Pavlovitz didn’t tell you is that Israel’s government called him one of their most lion-hearted friends. What Pavlovitz didn’t tell you is that Kirk went to Oxford and weathered attack after attack for arguing that, under the surface, the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” means Palestine will be free when it is free of Jews. What Pavlovitz didn’t tell you is that the context of Kirk’s alleged “antisemitism” was his criticism that some of the biggest financiers of Marxist institutions and radical ideologies come from liberal Jewish donors (think George Soros). To call that antisemitism is like saying if you criticize Bill Gates you must hate computer programmers.

DISHONEST EMPATHY QUOTE

Pavlovitz repeatedly paraded out this dishonestly edited quote of Kirk: “I can’t stand the word empathy, actually. I think empathy is a made-up, new age term that — it does a lot of damage.” Pavlovitz said this was an example that Kirk (and conservatives) don’t believe in compassion. What Pavlovitz selectively edited out was Kirk’s follow-up sentence where he extolled the idea of sympathy over empathy because no one can truly feel what another person feels. The second line was: “But it is very effective when it comes to politics. Sympathy, I prefer more than empathy.” Kirk was making the point that “empathy” is often used in political culture to ingratiate oneself to a community for votes (i.e., “I feel your pain”). As a result, it pushes people toward making decisions based on emotional identification rather than principles or facts. He wasn’t talking about the passing of one’s beloved grandma; he was talking about political narratives and how sympathy is better. Pavlovitz had borne false witness.

DISHONEST HOMOPHOBIA CHARGE

Pavlovitz said Kirk was hateful and homophobic, but he ignored Kirk’s homosexual friends and colleagues who came forward to say Kirk was always gracious and respectful despite his scripture-based disagreement with their sexual partnerships. Pavlovitz (who is a revisionist that ignores the biblical witness on sexual immorality) has fallen into the trap of thinking tolerance must equal agreement rather than its historical definition, which implies civil disagreement.

DISHONEST MISOGYNY CLAIM

Pavlovitz calls Kirk a misogynist and, along with other commentators, wants you to think that Kirk’s views on the sexes and marriage can be reduced to “women getting back in the kitchen.” In reality, Kirk promoted women throughout his organization, but he also believed motherhood was sacred and ought to be promoted as a genuine career path for women. He lamented that secular society and feminism have diminished motherhood as second rate. Reducing such beliefs to misogyny is just more slander.

DEI & BLACK PROFESSIONALS

I have seen other Christian commentators on the left pull out a host of Kirk’s comments and nibble them down to the most offensive size possible before rolling them out for public consumption. The biggest example circulating is a selectively edited video where Kirk says he would be concerned to fly on a plane with a Black pilot. Sounds bad on the face of it. However, the full clip and context involved a back-and-forth discussion about how Black professionals could become potentially undermined by DEI initiatives that place race above merit. He saw DEI as a roadblock for true Black advancement because it would create a cloud of suspicion over Black professionals who did earn their jobs by merit alone. He saw DEI as doing long-term damage regardless of short-term gain because in some professions, we want to know the most qualified got the job, not the most marginalized. He also anchored his view in the stated dream of MLK that the day would come when a Black man in America would be judged by the content of his character and not the color of his skin. He saw DEI as a total betrayal of MLK’s dream and ultimately unhelpful for Black professionals.

BLACK & HISPANIC OUTREACH

If you ever listened to Charlie Kirk at length, you would hear his heartbeat time and again for more Black Americans to see America as a land of opportunity more than a land of oppression holding them back. He genuinely wanted to see more Black Americans thrive and rightly identified why fatherly absence, unhealthy cultural norms, and victimization were holding Black Americans back from potential gains. He had a huge following of Black conservatives who agreed with him, and it was growing bigger by the month! The fact is that Charlie Kirk probably changed, motivated, and inspired more young Black and Hispanic Americans than many of the entrenched, insipid leftist professors who have criticized him. Far too often people reach for the low-hanging fruit of racism and bigotry to insulate themselves from taking a hard look at viewpoints that challenge their own.

RIGHT & LEFT FAILINGS

I am convinced that many leftist professors and elites would rather see Black Americans remain poor but remain liberal than wealthy and become conservative. But I also am convinced some on the right would rather see long-staying, hard-working illegal immigrant families torn apart and tossed back across the border than provide them a pathway toward citizenship and risk being categorized as pro-amnesty. The kingdom of God must transcend these divisions and seek the good, true and right wherever it is. There is an ever-present danger that politics and culture bear on the one who wants to follow Jesus without question. This is true for those on the right and the left.

PROGRESSIVE COMPROMISE

For example, progressive Christians have tossed aside clear biblical teaching on sexuality to avoid being labeled phobic or bigoted. It’s not just the Old Testament they are tossing out—it’s the teachings of Jesus. On the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus speaks about sexual immorality in strongly condemning terms. The key word he used for sexual immorality was “porneia.” That was a category reference that every 1st century Jew knew to be a reference to the four sexual prohibitions in the Levitical code: adultery, homosexuality (literally “a man lying with a male as with a woman”), incest, and bestiality. We don’t need to wonder what Jesus had in mind. He was intentionally using terminology that was common-place language for the Leviticus 18 sexual code—and everyone in his day knew it. No one had to question what he meant as revisionists try to do today. In Revelation 2:20, Jesus’s words are even stronger, condemning those who lead or enable others into sexual immorality (porneia).

LOYALTY & LEARNING

Only Jesus deserves our unquestioned loyalty and allegiance. I think Kirk exemplified that loyalty time and again under immense pressure. But he made some missteps, and we can learn from his shortcomings and faults. At times, Kirk let his emotions get the better of him and he lacked prudence and tact (as do I). Other times, I think he allowed political platforms on the right to be his compass on complex issues more than the teachings of Jesus. His positions may have been consistent with the Republican Party, but that is not necessarily the call of God on our lives. I think he missed the mark on what do with illegal immigrants who have been rooted and working in the US for years. Below I will share some remarks on illegal immigration and America’s gun ownership/culture.

IMMIGRATION ANALOGY

To begin, I’m not so naive as to think Democrats were motivated by love and compassion in making the borders easily passable for illegal immigrants to claim asylum. Nonetheless, they are here, and many have been here for years. You can’t capture millions of them and toss them across the border to solve the problem of a porous border any more than you can confiscate millions of guns from millions of legal citizens to solve school shootings. It’s just not going to happen. Millions of illegal immigrant families as well as millions of legal guns are in the US, and they are there to stay. They are part of the landscape of America, like it or not. Moving forward on these issues is going to require reasonable compromise from both sides.

TRUMP & COMPROMISE

Trump’s rhetoric is often unhelpful, un-Christlike, and beneath the witness of the Kingdom of God. Therefore, we can’t adopt it as our own. Yet he has valid points too. The criminal element is real. Very bad actors are taking advantage of our hospitality, getting arrested for serious crimes and being released without bail to prey on others all over again. The compromise? End sanctuary cities, enable ICE to identify and capture the worst criminal elements who have crossed the border, provide a pathway for quick citizenship to millions of immigrants who have proven themselves, and then secure the border and keep it secure or the next wave of migrants will keep the wages of America’s newest citizens low by willing to work for less. There is a reason why Trump won the Hispanic vote in Texas and swept many border counties from Texas to California.

SCHOOL SHOOTINGS

Erasing the Second Amendment is a non-starter. Start with closing the online loophole. It doesn’t make sense that buying from a licensed dealer requires a background check but buying from a stranger online might not. It’s silly and stupid, and conservatives must assuage their fears about a national registry / future confiscation and be willing to compromise on this point. Next—schools have to stop being soft targets. Shooters look for vulnerable places. Stadiums, music concerts, casinos, courthouses, jewelry stores, banks, and airports all have layered levels of security that our schools lack. An armed guard is not enough. Schools shouldn’t be softer targets than the places where we keep our money, board our planes, or watch people throw a ball.

TRUMP’S MISSED OPPORTUNITY

Lastly, it was wrong that Trump did not ask for flags to be flown at half-mast at the horrific slaying of a state Democrat, Melissa Hortman, and her husband. He did publicly comment on it and denounce it, but he could have done more. It was a missed opportunity. Trump misses many. Even now, Trump’s rhetoric is unhelpful in the wake of Kirk’s death. It’s unfortunate that he arrives on many scenes acting more like a woodsman cutting lumber for a raging fire than a fireman arriving with water. Followers of Christ are called to be peacemakers, and we have to arrive on scene as “firemen.”

GROUP IDENTITY

When emotions become the currency for cultural and political conversations, we become bankrupt as a society. It all stems from group identity politics. People are so afraid today to be seen as betrayers of their group identity that discussion becomes dangerous, debate becomes deplorable, and tolerance is seen as treason.

CHARLIE KIRK’S LEGACY

I believe the legacy of Charlie Kirk will be that he modeled genuine engagement with his detractors and critics. Many on the left said he was a fascist. Unsurprisingly, their liberal school history classes failed them. Fascists don’t GIVE the microphone to the other side; they TAKE it away. Week after week, year after year, Charlie Kirk put himself in the lion’s den of criticism, debate, and discussion, and he generously gave the other side the microphone to yell at him, curse at him, argue with him, and at times have a civil discussion with him. It was marvelous to see. I’ve never seen anything like it. When asked why he did it, he said that when people stop talking, they start shooting.

TESTIMONIES

Charlie Kirk, despite his faults, was a genuine follower of Christ and a very articulate defender of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. I went to his YouTube page the day after he died. There were thousands of people saying things like, “I was an atheist and Charlie changed my mind, and now I’ve been going to church for three years.” “I was on the road to becoming transgender and Charlie saved my mind with hard truths.” “I hated Charlie with all my guts, but as I listened to him, the Holy Spirit got a hold of me and I’m now a follower of Jesus.”

CONCLUSION

Charlie Kirk is with his Lord and Savior, not because he was a Republican but because Jesus was Lord of his life. Is Jesus yours?

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Christian Martyrdom vs Christian Progressivism and Christian Nationalism

Posted on March 1, 2025 by StriderMTB

Recently seventy Christians were beheaded in their house of worship by Islamic militants in the Congo. Imagine if you reversed the order of those words—it would be front page news in every publication. It’s hardly a blip in this week’s news. 

This shouldn’t be too surprising. Jesus said his followers should not seek assimilation but persecution from a rebellious world passing away. 

That being said, it’s worth noting that 50,000 Christians have been murdered for their faith in the past 10 years. That is the most conservative estimate. Many researchers consider the number to be significantly higher due to underreporting and challenges in data collection in remote areas. In Nigeria alone over 7000 Christians have been murdered for their faith in just the past 3 years. 

We tend to think that the mass persecution of Christians was something that occurred in the distant past under the Roman empire. But decade after decade, the persecution and martyrdom of Christians in the modern world has eclipsed those numbers time and again. 

The number of Christians the atheist regime of the Soviet Union put to death between 1937 and its collapse in 1991 is probably close to a million. Since then, Islamic expansion in Africa and the Middle East has been the leading cause. 

While many of our brothers and sisters in foreign lands are courageously staying faithful to the scriptures, many Christians in the West are tripping over themselves for how fast they can surrender up the Scriptures to be culturally accepted by a fallen world. Yet Jesus warned us “If they hated me, they will hate you” (Matthew 15:20).

That being said, other churches are surrendering to the temptation to drape Jesus in the American flag and over-borrow political power from a fallen world, such that politics can find itself in the driver seat rather than a passenger in the car. I DO believe Christians need to be involved and engaged in the political realm, but we must also resist its influence in our hearts when we no longer have a heart to “pray for our enemies and do good to those that persecute us” (Matthew 5:44)

To be salt and light, we neither need to be assimilated by a fallen world, nor do we need to try and politically assimilate it into God’s image. Our focus? The kingdom of God.

Why? Because the risen Jesus, Lord and Savior, is not in the middle.

He is above it all.

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Christmas as Rescue

Posted on December 26, 2024 by StriderMTB

I love Christmas as much as the next person. But we must remember that the true meaning of Christmas is found in the word rescue more than holiday. When the angel appeared to Joseph and told him not to be anxious about marrying Mary, because the child she was carrying was conceived by the Holy Spirit, the angel then instructed Joseph that the child’s name should be Jesus “because He will save his people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21).

I will never forget the first time the true meaning of Christmas profoundly struck me. It was Christmas Eve 2006 and I was traveling from Thailand to Vietnam only passing through Cambodia. My bus had problems and we were not going to make the Vietnamese border before it closed, and so I had to spend Christmas in the capital city of Phnom Penh. The next morning, not really knowing what to do, I simply asked a taxi driver to take me to the number one tourist spot in the city. That happened to be a place called Tuol Sleng Museum. I thought I was going to see great art. Big mistake. I had no idea that it was the former torture center that was run by the brutal Khmer Rouge that tortured and killed thousands of men, women and children.

Survivors said it was like the gates of hell had opened up and swallowed humanity. After about an hour of walking through the center, seeing bloodstained tiles and documented pictures of unspeakable torture and death, I broke down in tears on the steps outside. I remember being angry at God. These were my thoughts, “God, this is Christmas! Why am I here? I deserve to be happy on Christmas. It’s a holiday. Instead, I am seeing the worst humans can do to other humans. I wanted to be happy on this day, not sad. I wanted carols and cookies not crying.”

Then, in that still small voice, God spoke to me. “ My son, Matt, you are witnessing Christmas behind the scenes, behind the veil. I did not look down upon the earth and see carols and cookies. I saw what you now see. I saw that the Khmer Rouge lives in the heart of all people—even yours. You are seeing the reason there had to be a first Christmas— my Son dispatched to earth on a mission to save people from their actual sins and potential sinfulness. I saw that my world did not need another holiday, it needed rescue.”

Take a moment to OFFEND yourself in order to gratefully find YOURSELF in the eternal words: “… His name shall be Jesus because He shall save His people from their sins.” Blessings and Shalom ❤️

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Comparing the Hope of World Religions in the Light of Karma Law

Posted on April 1, 2024 by StriderMTB

Easter 2024 has passed. As someone who has been involved in missions in Southeast Asia since 2006, I have studied the beliefs of many in the region and have some thoughts.

Does the resurrection of Christ offer a unique hope to every soul on the earth?

Yes. Consider the following:

If you follow Hinduism, your future hope lies in having paid off enough of your karma debt to avoid the 28 hells ruled by Yama, the god of Death, and be reincarnated higher up the caste system.

If you follow Buddhism, your future hope lies in making enough good merit to offset the justice of your karma debt, avoid the 8 levels of tortuous hells, and their 128 subsidiary hell realms, and be reincarnated with less poverty, sickness and bad luck in your next life.

If you are a follower of Islam, your future hope lies in having done more good deeds than bad deeds, so that when Allah weighs you on the scales of cosmic justice, your good outweighs your bad, and you avoid the 7 levels of Islamic hell to enter paradise.

At the heart of these religious ideas about cosmic justice lies the idea of karma—you get what you deserve.

Only in Jesus Christ is the “law” of karmic justice broken. In fact, Jesus flips it on its head. Instead of us getting what we deserved, the Son of God took on human flesh to take upon himself the death we deserved in order to give us what we don’t deserve—grace, forgiveness and eternal life.

Therefore, if you are a follower of the way of Christ, your future hope lies in his finished work on the cross that set you free from the law of sin, and death and the grip of hell that was broken, when he defeated hell from the inside and rose again victorious, King of kings and Lord of lords.

If you are an atheist, you can only “hope like hell” you are just a bi-product of blind and purposeless evolution when you take your last breadth.

Lastly, if you are a follower of religious relativism that slanders all religions by mashing them together into a collective stew that appeals to your personal taste and denies their orthodox beliefs as wrong, your essential hope is that you got it right when they got it wrong. And now your only duty is to define good and evil for yourself and assume God was acting silly when he talked about repentance because he just wants you to do your best so he can reward you. But then you’re back to karma law.

Best to remember that “we all fall short of God’s glory” and humbly receive the pardon he offers us through the Son he sent to you and for you.

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A Liberal Jesus Misses the True Meaning of Christmas

Posted on December 26, 2023 by StriderMTB

In Matthew 1:21 Joseph is told, “Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit…and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Take a moment to dwell on that last part: “…for he will save his people from their sins.”

That is not a “feel good” message for an increasing number of liberal Christians who want a Christ made in their own image that doesn’t bring up their sin. They often strive to replace the truth of Jesus coming to save us from our sins with almost any alternative, such as:

He will help you connect with angels.

He will teach you to follow your heart.

He will make you feel better about yourself.

He will help you uncover the power of loving yourself.

These substitutes just won’t do for Christmas. The true Jesus, the One that died and rose again to conquer sin and death, and who promised to return to judge the world in righteousness, is the only authentic Jesus of Christmas. Why? Because the first Christmas marked the beginning of a divine rescue mission, not a self-improvement program.

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Israel Jews vs Palestinian Arabs: A Christian Position

Posted on October 14, 2023 by StriderMTB

With the recent terror attack, the “SS” Hamas – Nazis think they have scored a victory in Israel, but it’s really a shovel for the grave of their own future and sadly for any decent Palestinian that privately disagrees with the constitutional charter of Hamas that is fanatically committed to Israel’s total destruction.

Imagine Jews in 1937 trying to broker a peace deal with Hitler, while he is drafting his “Final Solution” for their total elimination, and you can grasp the kind of evil that lies spiritually cloaked behind Hamas as an earthly entity.

When it comes to political and territorial disputes, I think that our sovereign Lord is less interested in taking sides and more interested in taking over. I believe this is insinuated, when the Angel of the LORD appeared to Joshua long ago on the eve of battle, and Joshua asked, “Are you on our side or the side of our enemies?”

The Angel of the LORD gives a telling response: “Neither. I am commander of the army of the Lord, and now I have come. (Joshua 6:13-16).

As a follower of Jesus, I believe that Jesus is King of the kingdom of God, and as such, He has come, is coming, and will come to take over. Now is the time for us to place our lives under His authority and have our disordered lives be re-ordered under His rule.

Moreover, as a follower of Jesus, I believe with all my heart that He is the promised and prophesied Messiah for both Jews and Muslims, friend and foe, I am committed to preaching the good news of His Kingship that began 2000 years ago when He rose from the dead and said to His followers, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also now send you” (John 20:21).”

These are words from a Savior that knows true peace is first grounded in reconciliation with God through the remission and forgiveness of our sins.

Whenever we watch the human capacity of evil unfold in horrific ways (even in church history), we are confronted with two truths:

1) The human heart needs to be redeemed.
2) The depth of suffering that the Son of God endured for our redemption from sin and death.

We are all invited—now—to enter His present and coming kingdom through repentance and faith. That means nothing less than admitting we need a Savior and asking Jesus to reorder our prideful, self-centered and rebellious lives under His rule. Jesus also had these words to say,

“Because lawlessness will multiply, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be delivered. This good news of the kingdom will be proclaimed in all the world as a testimony to all nations. And then the end will come” (Matthew 24:12-14).

The day will come when Jesus the Christ (Messiah) will come in all His glory and everything and everyone that clings to this fallen world passing away will perish with it. You might ask, “Isn’t the resurrection of Jesus just a big fairy tale?” My advice: I would ask you to have the courage to read all of Matthew 28, and then ask yourself a different question, “What if it’s all true?”

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Penal Substitutionary Atonement: An Internal Dialogue

Posted on August 4, 2021 by StriderMTB

Below is an internal dialogue in my own head over the theory of Penal Substitutionary Atonement (PSA). For what its worth I think the view can be partially valid, but only to the degree that God is not the Punisher. I wrote a book on the atonement in 2019 and have had a fair amount of positive feedback. I presented a new model that finds the middle ground between Penal Substitution and Christus Victor. I call it Perfectus Liberatio (Perfect Liberation). If you shoot me a message, I will be happy to send you a link where you can get it for only $1. I am now re-editing that book to expand my view into a full-fledged theory. I want to share my own internal debate that made me eventually realize (especially as a missionary) that the view cannot provide clear answers to the most basic questions I have heard on the mission field. Feel free to share how you see things. Shalom, Matt.

THE DIALOGUE BEGINS:

NON-PSA ME: What is the essence of the Penal Substitionary Model?

AFFIRMING PSA: The essence of the Penal Substitutionary Atonement model is that God is pouring out His wrath on Jesus, to punish Jesus to death for our sins, and this allows God’s justice to be satisfied or sufficiently re-paid for grace to be extended without God’s justice being compromised.

NON-PSA ME: I agree that Christ suffers the consequential penalty of sin our place—death—and I even believe that can be interpreted as “punishment.” But why assume God is the PUNISHER extracting payment for sins out of Christ’s suffering? I see verses that say God “surrendered Jesus up” to death, or “gave Jesus over” to death.

AFFIRMING PSA: God has to be the Punisher, because God is pouring out all His hatred, indignation and punishing wrath on Jesus as our sin-bearer to pay back His offended justice. Jesus must absorb God’s wrath so we can avert it.

NON-PSA ME: Ok, let’s start there. I’m already lost. What exactly is God doing to Christ in pouring out His punishing wrath? What is Christ absorbing?

AFFIRMING PSA: What is God doing that Christ is absorbing?

NON-PSA ME: Yes, please tell me. Is God inflicting punishment by afflicting Christ with whips and thorns and nails?

AFFIRMING PSA: No, that is the Romans and wicked men.

NON-PSA: Is God pulling out the beard of Jesus? Is God hitting or beating Jesus?

AFFIRMING PSA: Don’t be silly. We know that was also the Romans guards.

NON-PSA ME: So, I ask you again, what exactly is God doing to Jesus?

AFFIRMING PSA: I already told you. God is punishing Jesus for our sins.

NON-PSA ME: How?

AFFIRMING PSA: Well… he is pouring out his wrath on Jesus.

NON-PSA ME: What does that mean?

AFFIRMING PSA: It means divine punishment.

NON-PSA ME: See–we are going in circles. Please unpack what God is doing to Jesus that can be described as God punishing Jesus via divine wrath.

AFFIRMING PSA: Well, Jesus is being crucified.

NON-PSA ME: We are back where we started. Is God’s wrath inflicting Jesus with whips, thorns and nails? Does Jesus need to reach a threshold of pain to make the atonement work?

AFFIRMING PSA: Not exactly. I wouldn’t want to say it like that.

NON-PSA ME: So, exactly, what is it?

AFFIRMING PSA: I already said it is God punishing sin. He can’t let sin go unpunished.

NON-PSA ME: Ok, so again, what is God doing to Jesus so that sin does not go unpunished?

AFFIRMING PSA: He is putting Jesus to death on the cross–which is our deserved death.

NON-PSA ME: Is God directly putting Jesus to death? Is God directly executing or killing Jesus?

AFFIRMING PSA: Well, not directly, but indirectly through others.

NON-PSA ME: So, Jesus is indirectly absorbing God’s wrath through others killing him?

AFFIRMING PSA: Yes.

NON-PSA ME: And this indirect absorption satisfies and pacifies God’s wrath?

AFFIRMING PSA: Yes.

NON-PSA ME: What about the two thieves on either side of Jesus who are also being crucified? Are they satisfying and pacifying God’s wrath for their sins since they are getting what they deserve?

AFFIRMING PSA: No, I wouldn’t want to say that.

NON-PSA ME: Why not?

AFFIRMING PSA: Because it is impossible for them to pay back their sin-debt by being crucified for their sins.

NON-PSA ME: But if Jesus is being indirectly crucified by God as punishment for sins, and they are also being crucified, why aren’t they also pacifying God’s wrath in virtue of being crucified like Jesus.

AFIRMING PSA: The difference is they deserved to die. They are truly guilty.

NON-PSA ME: I understand that. But if Jesus is absorbing God’s wrath so that we don’t get what we deserve, but they are actually getting what they deserve, then why doesn’t their deserved crucifixion pacify God’s wrath against them?

AFFIRMING PSA: Because being punished by God’s wrath is more than crucifixion?

NON-PSA ME: We are back where we started. What exactly is the nature of God’s wrath that is being poured out on Jesus? Unpack it.

AFFIRMING PSA: We deserve hell. So, God is pouring hell out on Jesus. Jesus is suffering an eternity of hell in 3 hours on the cross. God is inflicting Jesus with an infinite amount of punishment in hell in 3 hours.

NON-PSA ME: Where does the Bible say anything like you just said?

AFFIRMING PSA: Well—it doesn’t, not exactly or specifically.

NON-PSA ME: Well, I want to stick with exact statements in the Bible so we can unpack them—especially if you say the core of the gospel is God’s wrath punishing Jesus in my place. I want to know what that means—exactly.

AFFIRMING PSA: Well, the Bible explicitly records that Jesus wondered why God forsook him. Sin separates us from God. Jesus was experiencing separation from God as punishment for sins.

NON-PSA ME: But if Jesus is experiencing separation from God, then how is God pouring out His wrath on Jesus. Wouldn’t that require proximity, not separation?

AFFIRMING PSA: It is a mystery.

NON-PSA ME: Is it mystery because the Bible says it is, or because you can’t find clear evidence for it?

AFFIRMING PSA: Jesus is definitely absorbing God’s wrath because the Bible says Jesus is our propitiation, which means “place of averting wrath.”

NON-PSA ME: Even if the English word “propitiation” is a proper translation of the Greek word “hilasterion” which is translated as mercy seat 28 times in the Greek Septuagint, it would still only mean Jesus’s death for sin averts God’s wrath from us. It would say nothing about Jesus absorbing God’s wrath. What is the biblical evidence to say: “Jesus’s death AVERTS God’s wrath from us because Jesus ABSORBED God’s wrath for us?”

AFFIRMING PSA: The Bible says the wages of sin is death. We have to have Jesus being punished by God’s wrath for our sins because Jesus takes the penalty—our wages—which is death.

NON-PSA ME: I agree that Jesus takes the consequential penalty of our sins, which is death, but that is the farthest we can take the idea of punishment. None of that requires the extra addition that God is the Punisher! The Bible says God “handed Jesus” over to death and “delivered Jesus up” to death. We also know his death was determined by God and not accident. Yet it says nothing about personally punishing Jesus in wrath to extract payment for sins. That has to be assumed. To the degree PSA includes this assumption is to the degree we should not consider it explicitly taught in the Bible.

AFFIRMING PSA: But our sins offended God’s justice and put us in debt to His justice. For God to be just, He needed His justice to be satisfied through re-payment of sins before He could extend us forgiveness. By punishing Jesus for our sins, God justice is paid in full.

NON-PSA ME: So, are you suggesting that God’s grace is reimbursement and God’s forgiveness comes through re-payment?

AFFIRMING PSA: What do you mean?

NON-PSA ME: It sounds like your argument has four connecting points: 1) Our sins put us in debt to God’s justice. 2) God had to first get the judicial “capital” to “fund” a judicial offer of grace to us. 3) God funded that just offer through His justice getting reimbursed, and 4) that reimbursement was acquired by extracting payment for sins out of Jesus’s suffering death.

AFFIRMING PSA: Well, the way you put it makes it sound like a transaction settlement, and not grace.

NON-PSA ME: Where have I gone wrong or misunderstood you?

AFFIRMING PSA: I don’t know if you have, it’s just that it sounds better when I hear it from my R.C. Sproul or John MacArthur.

NON-PSA ME: One last question. If God was extracting satisfaction or re-payment out of Jesus’s sufferings on the cross, were the crucified thieves in any way also paying God back for their own sins?

And around and around we go. These are the questions you get on the mission field (I’ve bee in S.E. Asia for 15 years) from probing minds who are not impressed by fancy, theological words that they can’t even understand anyway. When you have to break it down into simple language, it makes Penal Substitution into Payment Substitution–and that is hard to square with the Bible.

Posted in Apologetics and Athiesm, Church and Culture, Critiquing Calvinism | 18 Comments

What is and what is NOT Christian Nationalism

Posted on January 21, 2021 by StriderMTB

Time to ruffle some feathers 😬. I’ve been working on a comprehensive book that deals with spiritual warfare, and recent events have brought back to mind part of chapter I wrote last year about the “leaven of the Pharisees and Herod.” I will save those remarks for the end.

I am increasingly concerned about seeing sincere followers of Jesus becoming sucked into what can only be called the poison of “Christian Nationalism.” What is it? For starters, what is it not? It is NOT everything the media says it is. It is NOT about enthusiastically voting for your candidate of choice (like Trump), or about being involved in the political sphere and attending political marches on the left or right. It is NOT about wanting to see a nation, like America, draw closer to Judeo-Christian values that reflect/return to the principles of our founding fathers. It is NOT the belief that America has had a unique, Christian heritage and been a force for good at times. It is NOT being anti-vaxx (which many secularists are too). Nor is it the belief that a conspiracy of collusion defrauded your candidate of an election (as many democrats insisted for 4 years when Hillary lost, and now many republicans are insisting to explain Trump’s loss). All of that is understandable passion merging with grief that may or may not have a provable, evidential basis. But it is not the point of this post to explore that.

That being said, we are in new territory–unproductive territory. All fair-minded people should have a legitimate concern that Trump’s divisive rhetoric emboldened fanatical, zealots on the right to storm the Capital to overthrow a congressional vote (the soil of revolution), and that media/tech companies are now over-reaching in their suppressive response and emboldening fanatical zealots on the left to tolerate ONLY what they deem tolerable and intimidate all outliers (the soil of totalitarianism).

All of these issues are worthy of consideration, but they are outside the scope of “Christian Nationalism.” Before defining it, one more distinction needs to be made. I am not talking about national pride per se. Patriotic nationalism, in and of itself, is not necessarily wrong. In point of fact, in WW2 it was “British nationalism” that enabled the patriotic Brits to stand strong and weather the unrelenting blitz of nightly bombing raids from Nazi Germany–without surrendering.

So finally, what is the poison of Christian Nationalism? In short it confuses the kingdom of God with nation-states. It is the unbiblical idea that God wants us to “christianize” nations (like America) through political revolution and power, instead of expanding the kingdom through heart repentance and revival. Even worse it is the idea that the 2nd Ammendment of the US constitution overrides the New Testament and gives you the right to ignore Christ’s command to “love and do good and pray for those that persecute you because of Me.” To be sure, if you think biblical admonitions like “fight the good fight of faith” and “faith without works is dead” have anything to do with a “Christian militia” preserving your religious liberty, or violently bringing about political change in America, you have fallen prey to Christian Nationalism. It is as Satanic a lie as anything! Resist it. Flee from it! EVERY time the Church jumps into bed with a political marriage partner to establish a theocratic trajectory for a nation, we ALWAYS lose the kingdom of God as Jesus preached it and lived it. There are ZERO exceptions in history.

Jesus spoke directly to the poison of merging His kingdom with political power. He once gave a warning to his disciples that many have failed to consider: “Watch out; beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod” (Mark 8:15).

The leaven of the Pharisees is RELIGIOUS HYPOCRISY. The leaven of Herod is using religion for POLITICAL POWER. To avoid both is wise. To merge both is utterly destructive. Church history is stained with irredeemable events when professing Christians ignored Christ’s warning and reached for such toxic leaven—“baking” it into what they thought was God’s kingdom.

To the degree the Church biblically pursues the kingdom of God first, is to the degree the Church will always glorify Christ in the earth. Sadly—criminally even—Church history is chock full of examples where professing followers of Christ departed from seeking first the kingdom of God and sought to build national kingdoms to their liking— earthly kingdoms that PREYED on enemies instead of a Christlike posture that PRAYED for enemies.

The name of our Lord and Savior has been so thoroughly maligned and trampled underfoot by a callous indifference to the kingdom of God as Jesus preached it and lived it, that only a radical reorientation and re-commitment to deny our self-centered idols and pick up our cross for the sake of Christ can restore what we have lost. We are living in an age where the greatest threat to the kingdom of God advancing in the earth is not coming from OUTSIDE the Church but WITHIN its walls—from the left and the right.

Overly right-wing Christians live out their faith before an unbelieving world AS IF their first loyalty and allegiance is to their own national flag and political self-preservation. Overly left-wing Christians live out their faith as if biblical morality is obsolete and optional and therefore needs to be updated in accordance with their natural desires and self-interest. Both have fallen into unbiblical compromise with the world.

As Christians we may well face persecution in a future American society that restricts a free expression of Christianity that offends the totalitarian sensibilities of others. Jesus did not say to resist it, but to EXPECT it. He said, “If they hate and persecute the Master they will also hate and persecute his servants” (John 15:20).

The point is, those that seek to follow the Son of God, who said, “My kingdom is NOT of this world, for if it was, my servants would fight” (John 18:36), will never be justified in fighting to “christianize” America through political power.

Posted in Church and Culture | Tagged , , | 7 Comments

Disavowing media bias while not avowing Trump: Part 2

Posted on October 24, 2020 by StriderMTB

*I wrote this for my facebook a couple days ago. At the date of this posting, some press outlets are starting to pick up on the NY Post story—but mostly to dismiss it out of hand. This is Part 2 that concludes my thoughts from my earlier post. It will be more strongly worded 😅🤝

A press that doesn’t trust you with the facts is the first step towards a future government that wont trust you with a vote.

The reason this has been on my mind more than any other time has been the difficulty in finding fair, centrist reporting all last week and this week on e-mail exchanges found on Hunter Biden’s laptop that PURPORT to show that his father, a man currently running for President, may not have been truthful in saying he never involved himself with, or met with board members of the Ukrainian company his son sat on—and was paid rediculous amounts of money for despite having no discernable role. The Biden campaign’s rebuttal is now a subtle backtracking of what Biden said earlier. They are no longer unequivically saying he never met with them, but that “no record of a meeting appears in the vice-president’s official schedule”—which some are saying is coded language for, “may have met unofficially outside the Whitehouse.”

Even worse is the recent New York Post article alleging that the laptop contains information that purports to show there may have been a quid-pro-quo to sell access to his father. NOTICE I said, “purports to show” not “reports to show.” There is a distinction to be made and the role of the press is to investigate the facts and report on it its merits—not bury or suppress the story. So far they are content to say, “Nothing to see here, it’s just Russian disinformation.” But when the Director of National Intelligence rebuts that claim and says there is no evidence that the CONTENTS are due to Russian disinformation, and the FBI says they have nothing to add to rebut the Director’s conclusion, then you would expect them to at least give a fair amount of reporting on that! But even that gets buried.

It MAY be nothing. But for almost 4 years mainstream news outlets 24 hours-a-day chased after every anonymous tip, stretched every assertion, reported every possible speculation—all in an effort to prove that Trump was involved in either criminality or impeachable collusion to win the 2016 election. Those investigations turned up nothing indictable, but they did allow us to see the thin veneer of Trump slough off to reveal a narcissistic juvenile whose verbal tirades and pride became self-inflected injuries to his own Presidency—far worse than any the media could inflict. He is by far his own self-made enemy. But the press couldn’t get enough of it. They gorged themselves on his emotional tantrums like a tabloid and gave little time and space to report on anything else going on in the world— thus compromising their integrity further.

Even more damning has been their obvious desire to quickly bury anything of possible merit that came out of Trump’s administration, like: 1) prevailing over ISIS strongholds while keeping the US out of expanded wars that defense contractors would have loved, 2) enacting prison reform that freed many black Americans from the Clinton crime bill of the 90’s, 3) successfully mediating the first viable peace treaty to occur in the middle east in the past 25 years, 4) aggressively going after opioid distributors and traffickers, 5) pushing for the approval of generic, prescription drugs that has slashed prices and finally broken the lobbying stranglehold of US pharmaceutical companies, 6) creating a task force and legislation that cracks down on human trafficking and commits the US to being the largest donor to the Global Fund to End Modern Slavery, 7) brought unemployment of blacks and hispanic Americans to historic, all-time lows.

Had the party on the other side of the isle done any of this during their 4 years, the press would be fawning all over it and endlessly reporting on its positive trajectory. The point is: All of the above is GOOD stuff—as in “common good” that all political parties can celebrate. Thus to honestly report on it is to give Americans “common ground” to agree on the “common good” at a time when we are so divided. They are opportunities to pull toward the center. But the press can’t bring themselves to do it. Why? Because they think THEY are running for re-election.

For example, just last month, Trump announced plans to release billions of dollars to black American entrepreneurs to reclaim their inner cities and reignite the economy—instead of dolling out more welfare dependency programs that rob future generations of dignity. It’s a great plan! It will also designate the racist KKK as a domestic terrorist organization for the first time ever. But have you heard anything about it? Probably not—because the press can’t highlight billions of dollars that Trump wants to give black, small businesses to ignite black communities AFTER they’ve incessantly declared him to be an irredeemable racist that hates blacks!

The only thing CNN can bring themselves to do is publish two hit pieces on the black rapper Ice Cube for daring to work with Trump on the plan—essentially trying to castigate Ice Cube as a traitor to his own race.

But racial minorities are waking up—they know they’ve been played for decades. Their districts have only crumbled under 50 years of democrat-led leadership from school boards to mayors to governors. Though not intentional, their policies have decimated the black family, incentivized single-mother households and driven out tax-paying businesses. The largest income drivers of abortion are placed in black inner cities. A generational genocide has robbed black Americans of their current voting power—19 million black lives have been aborted so far. 19 million!! The number is staggering. You may not want to say “abortion is murder” but you can’t deny “abortion is death.” IF Trump wins the next election it may only be because he received an increase of 15% of the black vote and 30% of the hispanic vote.

I am convinced the main driver of division today is the press getting their talking notes from corporate ownership of media empires that want to create the narrative—not report on it.

HOWEVER is there also lots of BAD Trump stuff to report on? Absolutely! Trump is pathological and self-obsessed. Some of the things he says and does are morally indefensible. But we know all that “stuff” because it is the only thing the mainstream press wants to divert your attention to and report on. They can’t allow you to become too conscious of anything positive to unite around—if it can be traced back to his administration.

In conclusion, all I want to see is at least a small measure of the media’s “investigative journalism” prove their neutrality by surrendering up a headline or two that at least informs readers of an FBI investigation that may or may not prove damaging to Biden. They certainly didn’t lack that kind of “headline enthusiasm” in regards to Trump. Let’s not kid ourselves. The left-leaning press was never willing to concede THEY and Clinton lost the election in 2016. And that is the point. The press thought THEY were running for election! And the same thing is playing out again. In the end, it may serve their purposes—or it may backfire BIG again.

Either way, my desire is to mourn with those who mourn and rejoice with those who rejoice. Recognizing the legitimate concerns and hopes of both sides, by avoiding both candidates, is my preferred way.

Posted in Thought of the day | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments

Disavowing media bias while not avowing Trump: Part 1

Posted on October 24, 2020 by StriderMTB

Time to get slightly political—because that’s always FUN, right? 😅 As someone who voted 3rd party write-in during the 2016 election and will attempt to do so again with an absentee ballot, I’d like to take a middle-of-the-road approach in regards to the current state of US politics and the press. You can decide which following description fits which candidate best, but the mere fact that the US is faced with a choice between personified (A): Diarrhea of the mouth, and (B): Diarrhea of the brain, tells us we are in desperate need for a counter-balancing third party. But I’ll save that for another time.

My real concern is the utter collapse of the press to remember what their sacred duty is: To report the news without bias. This commitment must come before the ambitious, egotistical pursuit of opinion columns/segments.

Of course the news industry is itself a collection of flawed human beings trying to navigate the terrain between their personal preferences and the journalistic career they have chosen. But we should expect them to know the difference. No matter the internalized pressure to take sides and shield their candidate of choice, we should fully expect them to withstand the pressure and hold the high ground of independence. This ground is shrinking with each election. In 2016 Hillary Clinton received a whopping 200 endorsements from newspapers across the US one month before the election. In comparison Trump received six. The ridiculous trend of newspaper, editorial boards collectively endorsing candidates is only getting worse.

In point of fact, the news publication USA TODAY use to pride itself on being a centered publication that refused to endorse political candidates in order to remain neutral and independent. But for the first time ever, they have publicly announced their support of a presidential candidate. You can guess which one. We expect such compromise from the New York Times, but when formerly centrist news outlets follow suit, this is a sign of truly bad things to come.

What we are seeing today is the complete capitulation of the press to give up their essential role of objectivity and independence. The failure of the press to remain centrist in their reporting is why so many news outlets have recently popped up along a left and right spectrum to solely cater to the needs of their entrenched readers. I’m not a journalist. I have not chosen a career where I have copious amounts of time to devote towards finding out the truth on political matters for the benefit of others to make informed decisions. I definitely lean politically conservative in most of my observations of the cultural-political landscape. So I rely on centrist reporting that just gives me the facts and allows me a perspective that lies outside my natural bias.

This is almost becoming impossible to find today. The fact-checkers need to be fact-checked and so on and so forth. In a world of ideological bias, objectivity is about as rare as finding a snow leopard… in the Sahara. Yet it still remains a worthy pursuit—for the press most of all. One cannot truly comprehend how sacred their role is until you live in certain un-named countries outside the US where the press is either an extension of government propaganda or is bankrolled by outsiders to oust a government. Information is indeed power. It can bring down governments or shield them from opposition. Yet the role of the democratic free press is not to decide WHICH outcome THEY want.

To the contrary. They are the carriers and couriers of information and must always remain distinct from it. The minute they merge their own identity into the content of the information they are carrying, they have lost their “calling.” Under the heat of their own bias seeking expression, they become like a bucket that molds itself into whatever “form” of information they selectively choose to carry. From that point on, they find it nearly impossible to re-shape themselves in order to carry information that comes in a different form—a form that runs contrary to the political affiliation they merged with earlier. If the American press cannot congregate enough reputable personal to hold the middle ground and just report the facts—no matter the source—then we can fully expect to see an increasing political divide reflect that failure by splitting the US into two national identities. Those national identities may one day manifest into another civil war—led by civilian militias on the right against militias on the left.

There is still time to avoid this, but given the fact that much of the press has completely given up even the pretense of trying to look unbiased, a great vacuum is now occurring—sucking remnants of the center into the left and right. This isn’t about Trump or Biden. This is about the US descending into a state of increased division and distrust because the press refuses to hold the middle ground of neutrality where the common good can be found in common facts. This negligence is only going to cause cringeworthy, fringe news sources to multiply 3-fold in the next four years—no matter who wins the election.

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