I hate to break it to you, but the time when Christians play games is over. The time for trivial pursuits is long over. The time for just trying to be ‘nice’ and ‘winsome’ and not rock the boat is well past its use-by date. Instead, we are in desperate need of committed disciples of Jesus Christ to affirm truth – regardless of the reaction.
Of course, the overwhelming need for courageous truth-tellers has always been with us, since lies are everywhere and at all times found. Plenty of champions for truth could be mentioned here. Let me feature just some. The Psalmist put it this way: “I have chosen the way of truth” (Psalm 119:30).
Plenty of proverbs speak to this, such as Proverbs 13:5: “The righteous hates falsehood,” and Proverbs 29:27: “The righteous detest the dishonest.” So too Jesus: “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32).
And again: “You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44).
A long line of more recent truth proponents could also be mentioned, such as:
“Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.” G. K. Chesterton
“Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.” Aldous Huxley
“People do not believe lies because they have to, but because they want to.” Malcolm Muggeridge
“The further a society drifts from the truth, the more it will hate those that speak it.” George Orwell
But fear of telling truth is an ever-present danger. One example of a spineless wonder who is so utterly fearful and paralysed by the woke mobs can be mentioned. Recently the uber-woke New Zealand Prime Minister Ardern stepped down. That was great news, but many of us wondered if her replacement would be any better. Well, now we know. Consider this short news item:
New Zealand’s new prime minister was left struggling for words at a news conference after a reporter asked him to define the term “woman”. Chris Hipkins, who took over after Jacinda Ardern’s resignation, was asked to explain how he and his government define the word. The politician appeared to need some time to think before giving his answer.
“Um… to be honest that question has come slightly out of left field for me,” Mr Hipkins replied. “Well biology, sex, gender. Um.” He then paused again before saying: “People define themselves, people define their own genders.” When pressed further Mr Hipkins said “people identify for themselves”.
He actually said this when the question was repeated: “It is not something that I have a preformulated answer on”. Good grief, what a useless wonder. If that is too hard for him to figure out, he should not be trying to run an entire nation. He needs to go back to kindergarten and learn a few basics about life.
Talk about being a mindless woke zombie. This is the madness of living a life of lies. BTW, Hipkins was married (to a WOMAN) for two years (but is now separated), and has two children. But he is totally clueless as to what a woman is. Maybe that is why they are separated! And maybe that is why the world is going to hell so fast with utter nincompoops like him running things.
Perhaps I can offer one more example. Someone commented on my site recently that as Christians we might be “rude” if we call people by their actual pronouns. I replied:
I and others just spent some time here trying to make the case that the most loving thing we can do for others is tell them the truth, and that allowing people to live in delusion, lies and deception is not only unloving, but sinful. So I am not at all worried about being “rude” in this case. I AM worried about people destroying themselves because we might be too afraid to speak much-needed truth to them.
So many have had to stand for truth even though it has been so very costly. Consider Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Writing from Moscow on February 12, 1974, just before he was exiled, he penned a short piece called “Live Not By Lies.” If that sounds vaguely familiar, it should. Rod Dreher used it as the title of his exceptionally important 2020 book. See my review of it here.
The entire essay by Solzhenitsyn is well worth reading, but here are a few choice quotes:
Things have almost reached rock-bottom. A universal spiritual death has already touched us all and physical death will soon flare up and consume us and our children. But, as before, we still smile in a cowardly fashion and mumble with our tongues tied. What can we do to stop it? We haven’t the strength. We have been so hopelessly dehumanised that for today’s ration of food we are willing to abandon all our principles, our souls and the efforts of our predecessors, as well as all the opportunities for our descendants, Just don’t disturb our fragile existence!…
Our path is not that of giving conscious support to lies about anything at all. And once we realise where the perimeters of falsehood are (everyone sees them in his own way), our path is to walk away from this gangrenous boundary. If we did not paste together the dead bones and scales of ideology, if we did not sew together rotting rags, we would be astonished how quickly the lies would be rendered helpless and would subside. That which should be naked would then really appear naked before the whole world.
So in our timidity, let us each make a choice: whether to remain consciously a servant of falsehood (of course, it is not out of inclination but to feed one’s family that one raises one’s children in the spirit of lies), or to shrug off the lies and become an honest man worthy of respect from one’s children and contemporaries.
The war over sexuality is just one crucial area where truth is so very much needed. A few days ago I mentioned one champion who has decided that truth-speaking is paramount. Former lesbian Rosaria Butterfield came out quite strongly on the diabolical lies of the trans militants. Let me quote just a bit of what she had to say:
Transgenderism is satanic. We who once promoted “pronoun hospitality” lent false credibility to a wolfish theology that fails to protect the sheep. Instead, it eats them alive. Do you love your neighbor? Do you love your Lord? Do you believe that Jesus alone is “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6)? Does Jesus save us from our sins, or do we delegate this task to the priests of our day—the therapists?
And earlier this year we had another brave saint who stood strong on truth – also on the area of sexuality. Rev. Calvin Robinson gave an impassioned and truth-laden talk at an Oxford Union Debate opposing the motion, “This House Supports Same-Sex Marriage in Church.” He said in part:
I may have trained at the last remaining sound Anglican seminary in the country – just up the road at St Stephen’s House – but I am only a newbie deacon. Perhaps I am wrong on this, so let’s consult people far wiser than me, starting with the Church Fathers.
St Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica, quite clearly identifies Matrimony as being between one man and one woman, beneficial for “begetting of children” and for the good of offspring for both educational and developmental purposes, “necessary for the perfection of the community” and for the worship of God.
St Paul describes marriage as, “Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh.” in which he is mirroring the language of Genesis, where God tells man and wife to “Be fruitful and multiply”.
Both Aquinas and Paul refer to Matrimony as a Sacrament. A holy mystery in which one man and one woman are joined together in a conjugal union with the potential to be blessed by the grace of God with children, to start a family for the worship of God.
He continued:
The Bible backs all of this up, it is very clear throughout on this matter. Marriage is between one man and one woman for the purpose of procreation. Sex outside of marriage is a sin. That is the same for heterosexuals as it is for homosexuals. Although, the Bible is also very clear that same-sex sexual relations are abhorrent.
And before some smart aleck starts asking me if I’m wearing mixed fabrics – there is a difference between moral laws and ceremonial laws. Christ came to fulfil the Old Laws. Both the issues of marriage and homosexuality are addressed in the New Testament. In Paul’s epistles, but also in the Gospels. Jesus talks of marriage in Mark and Matthew, both in the context of heterosexual union.
So my question to the bishops would be, do we not believe in the authority of the Scriptures any more? Can we pick and choose which parts of the Gospel we adhere to?
The Church is Christ’s bride. Jesus is described as the bridegroom so that we may know how he relates to us. Two grooms would be pointless; Christ is already in union with the Father and the Holy Spirit; it is us he is inviting in. Two brides are what we’re looking at here; the Church is attempting to marry itself and leave Christ out of the picture.
We are directly talking about undermining God’s plan as he has revealed it to us. We are replacing his authority with our own.
And his closing words were powerful indeed:
So as I wrap up, my message to the proposing side is, do not lead people astray. Do not be the wolves in sheep’s clothing or the false teachers the Bible warns us about. Remember your obligation to defend the faith. Stop teaching about diversity, inclusion and equality. Get back to teaching about Redemption and Salvation!
This is spiritual neglect. Help people by telling them the truth. Be kind to them by supporting them through their struggles and reminding them Christ suffers with them, and be compassionate by leading them to Christ when the world tries to lead them away from him.
The Church is imploding. The faithful masses have stopped turning up on Sundays. We are seeing the most rapid decline of Christianity in this country that we may have ever seen. Do not accelerate this with heresy.
You do not have the authority to bless sin! When I hear the bishop of London on record saying these new prayers will mean priests can bless same-sex relationships, some of which will be sexual in nature, I hear the devil at work. Bishops are promoting the idea of sacramental sodomy. Let them be anathema! Repent!
And to the rest of you. I have no doubt some of you will consider me a bigot, a homophobe. But I am neither of those things. I am simply a follower of Christ. A Christian. We are naturally counter-cultural, and if the so-called liberals were truly diverse and tolerant, they would embrace us just as they embrace everyone else.
There is a growing Christophobic attitude around this public debate and an ugly level of hypocrisy. We rarely see people hold Moslems and people of other faiths to the expectations they hold us Christians to. Who is calling for Islam to embrace gay marriage? Who is calling for the Quran to be updated to modern norms? Yeah, I thought not. It is at the same time patronising to people of others faiths and intolerance toward Christians. Shame. But in the words of St Athanasius of Alexandria:
“If the world is against the truth, then I am against the world.”
See him deliver this speech here:
Well done indeed Calvin. We need many more bold and loving truth-tellers in this very dark age of lies and deceit. Who will join Calvin in standing against the satanic onslaught of deception and delusion? As Calvin rightly said, we must “help people by telling them the truth.”
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