Category: Evangelism

Top Down, Bottom Up, or Inside Out?

Is the Christianization of America more likely to happen from a Spirit-wrought revival of the populace that seems to arise from nowhere? Or from a Christian prince who seems to pop up from nowhere and uses political power to impose his views on the people? Or is some third option most likely?

Rev. Rich Lusk
Question Raised on X

Just to be clear from the outset here. While I do think that Rev. Lusk can be quite insightful from time to time on the whole, since he is one of the worst practitioners of what is now known as “Federal Vision,” I consider him at the very best heterodox and at very his very worse heretical.

However, he asks a good question here that has been bandied about a good bit by folks lately so I thought I would weigh in on the matter.

If we could reduce the question to its essence it amounts to this;

“Will Christian renewal/reformation be top down or bottom up?”

My answer to this question finds me ripping off from the black Marxist Van Jones who was Obama’s Green Jobs Czar at one time. Van Jones likes to talk about “change being top dow, bottom up and inside out.” And honestly, this is a maxim that has been pursued by Marxists for generations — often quite successfully. It’s also been pursued by Christians in history as well. In point of fact I would argue that it is a biblical principle.

So, my answer to Lusk’s query is that it must be all at the same time. At various times I suppose one will lead and the other follow but on the whole I look at history and I see all three happening whenever a nation pivots from its previous historical/theological/worldview antecedents.

I see it, for example, in a book I finished last month on the Spanish Civil War. Both the Nationalists and the “Republicans” were fighting for a renewal/reformation for their nation as understood as coming from their different beginning points. Both sought top down solutions. The Roman Catholic Nationalists had their Franco and others. The Republicans had their Francisco Largo Caballero and others. However, both parties also sought the support of a bottom up constituency and they both fought for hearts and minds (the inside out component).

If you want to go behind that to consider how Charlemagne would use the sword to convert tribes in his orbit of rule one sees again the top down approach being married to a bottom up approach. After these pagan tribes were “converted” Christian missionaries would then swarm over them to knead Christianity into the individual lives of those previously pagan but now, because of Charlemagne’s sword, Christian tribes.

If one reads their Old Testament Scriptures one finds that both Reformation and Deformation come and go with the coming and going of Righteous or Un-Righteous Kings leading the way. The OT Scriptures indeed seem to support more the idea that Reformation and Deformation come from a top down matrix.

Part of the problem behind people accepting that Reformation could come down in a force manner as being led by a Christian Prince is the fact that the American mind is so infected with the Democratic mindset. We want to insist that Reformation will only come as a bottom up “Spirit led” revival. Certainly, with God all things are possible, but consider that God marries means to ends and currently the means that would lead to an end of a “Spirit led” revival are not present. There is very little proclamation of the whole counsel of God in pulpits today in even putative conservative churches. The enemy has completely captured the places where the most intense catechism occurs; the Government schools and the Universities, as well the media industry (entertainment and “news”) as well as most of the Churches in the West today. Then there is the fact that the publishing houses are almost all captured territory as well as the gaming industry. In light of that could bottom up Spirit led revival still happen? Sure … because God is sovereign all things are possible. However, when we look at history, history suggests that a bottom up Spirit led revival is not going to happen apart from a movement that is also top down and inside out.

And most pietistic Christians don’t want to hear that. They would prefer to think that God always works His ends without means that He Himself has raised up. A Christian magistrate has often been the top down means God uses to prompt bottom up Spirit led revival.

From The Mailbag — Randy Watkins asks; “Do You Even Understand The Gospel”

Randy Watkins, (who I don’t know from Adam) left a comment on Iron Ink in response to one of my posts on Kinism. The comment was so good I thought I would turn it into a short post. Randy wrote asking;

“My question would be – do you even understand the Gospel? Do you even know Jesus? Kinism is nothing but pseudo-sterilized racism.”

Thank you Randy for these questions. Let’s take them one by one.

First, I do understand the Gospel. The Gospel is announcement of the good news that Jesus Christ, being the long promised Messiah, came to live, die, resurrect, ascend and sit in session at the right hand of God to vindicate God’s name and to provide redemption for all who call upon the name of the Lord. The Gospel teaches, Randy, that Christ can do this because he was the penal substitutionary atonement who provided satisfaction, by the spilling of His blood, in the place of sinners who deserved God’s wrath for committing the sin(s) of rebellion against a thrice Holy God. In and by His death Christ turned away the wrath of God (propitiation) by taking away our sins (expiation) so that men could have peace with God. In this sacrifice Christ pays the ransom price required for sin committed by sinners and in doing so is the means of our reconciliation. The Gospel teaches that the elect have the righteousness of Christ imputed (put to their account) to them while their sins are imputed to Christ. In light of this finished work of Christ for the elect God commands all men (regardless of race, ethnicity, or religion) to repent and so be united to Christ and numbered among the people of God. This Gospel pronouncement is to go out to every tribe, tongue, and nation, in their tribes, tongues, and nations.

As to your second question, by God’s grace alone I have been knowing Jesus now for over 60 years. Jesus means “Jehovah is salvation,” and knowing Jesus means knowing Him as Prophet, Priest, and King sent by God to speak for God, to be the Priest who offered up Himself as the sacrifice for sins, and to rule as God’s mediatorial King in all matters. Further, Jesus was and is the living incarnation of God’s law. Jesus, as the Lion of the tribe of Judah, remains a Judahite and son of David even now and has gathered to Himself a church that is characterized as a confederated church where each national Church together comprises the one people of God. The fact that Jesus has no other Church except a confederated church comprised of different National churches is explicitly taught in Revelation 21

22 But I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. 23 The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine [l]in it, for the [m]glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light. 24 And the nations[n]of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor [o]into it. 25 Its gates shall not be shut at all by day (there shall be no night there). 26 And they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into [p]it.

Finally, Randy, you say that “Kinism is nothing but pseudo-sterilized racism.” I’m sure in a Cultural Marxist worldview that is an insult. However, I don’t live in a Cultural Marxist worldview. To be honest… racism, pseudo-sterilized or otherwise, really has no meaning and is just a pejorative intended to end the conversation. Randy, the word “racism” means everything and so means nothing. Water off of a duck’s back my friend.

May God bless you and keep you Randy Watkins.

On The Virtue Of Forced Conversions

“They open their breasts, while they are alive, and take out the hearts and entrails, and burn the said entrails and hearts before the idols, offering that smoke in sacrifice to them”

Hernan Cortes
Writing of the Aztecs

One bromide that those who oppose Christian Nationalism routinely reach for is the horror of the idea that Christian Nationalists would bring in forced conversions. I want to go on record as saying I have no problem with forced conversions to Christianity as long as we understand what we mean by the phrase “forced conversions.”

There are two ways to look at conversion. On a societal / cultural level when dealing with peoples like the Aztecs mentioned in the opening quote then forced conversion is the only option for a compassionate and God fearing people. Forced conversion at this level should be seen as conversion in an objective sense. This kind of conversion is the bringing in of a Christian law order by the sword that would force a previously wicked people to live under the terms of God’s law on a societal basis. Force would be used to bring in order and righteousness with God’s law in its political use leading the way. In the Aztec example above, sacrifices to the gods would end, laws against sundry sexual perversion would be enforced upon pain of death, property rights would be recognized and people forced to attend worship services.

Now, there can be no doubt whatsoever that most of the people that are being forced into this kind of conversion to Christian social dogmas and order would be converted in a subjective sense of the Holy Spirit taking from them a heart of stone and giving them a heart of flesh but they would be converted in the sense that publicly they would not longer have a social order based on false gods. That kind of conversion would be a positive good think even if there was a need for heart conversion that would be betters still.

This kind of forced conversion by the sword would also have the advantage of preparing the social order for the presence of the Gospel being proclaimed. For example, those people freed by Cortez from the gods of the Aztecs would clearly be more open to owning a Gospel proclamation. Likewise Missionaries would have a more free opportunity to set forth the glories of Christ to a people subjugated by the Christian sword. Those Missionaries would not find their own lives in jeopardy for merely bringing the good news of Jesus Christ to a people long under the tyranny of false gods.

The ideal in forced conversions would be that the change that arrived in a massive social order change brought by the sword would open up opportunities for what we are calling “subjective conversions.” So, objectively the social order is forced to convert to Christ in the sense that the old gods are not allowed to be served, a new law order system is implemented, and the macro structures of society are changed thus making room for subjective conversions wherein people are now gladly forced to convert by the Holy Spirit’s irresistible work of regeneration.

So, mark me down as someone who has no problems with “forced conversions.” Indeed, it is my prayer that forced conversion would be brought to our formerly Christian culture. I would be delighted if Abortion clinics were forced to close down because of a policy of forced conversions. I would be delighted if idols to false gods would not be set up in our capitals across the nation because of forced conversion. I would revel in the Lord’s Day being reconstituted consistent with Blue Laws by means of forced conversion. I would rejoice if because of forced conversion a law order was established that made criminal tattooing, piercing, aborting, and soliciting for Prostitution. Now, even if that happened here I still would understand that the heart is desperately wicked beyond all things and that as such the heart would have to be reached in a way that the sword could not accomplish but that reality doesn’t make the idea of “forced conversions” a bad idea.

Also, we should state that all law orders are examples of forced conversions. There are many things our current State does that yield routine forced conversion to idol gods. The people who decry the possibility of Christianity using the sword for conversion don’t mind the sword being used to convert the majority of America’s children to a false religion via the requirements of the law for the education of children.  Christians are forced, at the point of a sword, to pay taxes for all kinds of things that belong to the bailiwick of false gods that are forcefully imposed upon this nation and work to keep it worshiping false gods.

Finally, it seems to be the case that only Christians have a problem with forced conversions. This may be due to the incredible pietistic influence on the Christian faith. Christians in the West today are not realistic as to the way the world works. Christians are scared to death of the idea of using power in a righteous way. Indeed, Christians tend to think that Christians having and using power is automatically an evil thing. Now, to be sure, Christians having and using power can be an evil thing but it is not necessarily an evil thing and Christians should once again contemplate the honor to Christ it might be to wield power in a Christ like fashion.

The idea of converting by the sword means that you make the adherents of the false gods be martyrs to their false gods. It is not automatically virtuous to be the only ones ever dying for their God, as Christians seem to think.

If Charlemagne and Cromwell had no problem conquering by the sword than neither do I.

Thinking About “Spirit-Wrought Revival”

“One of the ways that we can know that the current vibe shift (which I most certainly welcome) is not yet a Spirit-wrought revival is that there is way too much accusation of others in it.”

Doug Wilson
CREC Pope

This quote got me to thinking in a couple different directions. First, is the obvious irony in the quote. Nobody is better at the “way too much accusation of others” than our own Pope Doug. Wilson has demonstrated repeatedly that the minute somebody else begins to get traction (read Ogden lads, Kinists, Spangler, McAtee, Seabrook, etc.) Doug is right there to accuse them of something. Physician, heal thyself.

The second thing I got thinking about is somewhat unrelated in terms of the point Doug was getting at. Doug wrote above about “Spirit-wrought revival” and that made me think about the general subject of Spirit wrought revival. I started to think if it would be remotely possible for me to agree with Doug upon his identifying “Spirit-wrought revival.” I mean I think Doug Wilson and the CREC are so bad on so many subjects that I can’t imagine that I would conclude that we are in “Spirit-wrought revival” if Uri Brito, Toby Sumpter, and Rich Lusk concluded we were in the midst of “Spirit-wrought revival.” In point of fact if those chaps thought we were in the midst of “Spirit-wrought revival” I might well conclude that we were in the clutches of old Scratch.

And that would not apply to just the CREC mavens. I can’t imagine rejoicing with the Thomists if they started chortling and praising about “Spirit-wrought revival.” Indeed, I would go into my prayer closet and pray that God would shut down their “Spirit-wrought revival.” A few years ago down in Asbury, Kentucky the Wesleyans were all writing about their “Spirit-wrought revival” going on at their College down there and upon witnessing (via video) what they were calling “Spirit-wrought revival” I thought I would wretch.

So, I can’t help but wonder if one man’s “Spirit-wrought revival” is another man’s concluding that “God has turned them over to their sin.”

But, keep in mind dear reader that I am a aging curmudgeon and there isn’t much out there, movement wise, where I would find myself cheering if they started believing that we were in the midst of “Spirit-wrought revival.”

On Those Reputed To Be Jews

“The Six Million constitute a lay religion with its own dogma, commandments, decrees, prophets, high priests and Saints: Saint Anne (Frank), Saint Simon (Wiesenthal), Saint Elie (Wiesel). It has its holy places, its rituals and its pilgrimages. It has its temples and its relics (bars of soap, piles of shoes, etc.), its martyrs, heroes, miracles and miraculous survivors (millions of them), its golden legend and its righteous people. Auschwitz is its Golgotha, Hitler is its Satan. It dictates its law to the nations. Its heart beats in Jerusalem, at the Yad Veshem monument … Although it is largely an avatar of the Hebraic religion, the new religion is quite recent and has exhibited meteoric growth … Paradoxically, the only religion to prosper today is the “Holocaust” religion, ruling, so to speak, supreme and having those sceptics who are openly active cast out from the rest of mankind: it labels them “deniers,” whilst they call themselves “revisionists.”

Robert Faurisson

Former French Professor of Literature at Lyon University
Statement regarding the religious implications of the Holocaust narrativeNow, immediately there will be those who will scream that Faurisson was a holocaust denier. This in spite of the fact that the uber-Leftist Jewish Academic Noam Chomsky once wrote; “I see no anti-Semitic implications in denial of the existence of gas chambers, or even denial of the Holocaust…I see no hint of anti-Semitic implications in Faurisson’s work.” One should also note that if even Auschwitz in the early 90s had to revise their originally grossly inflated death count total down from four million. The Chicago Tribune reported in 1992;

“Jewish and Polish scholars of the Holocaust now agree that the Auschwitz death toll was less than half the four million cited here for four decades. The actual number was probably between 1.1 million and 1.5 million-and at least 90 percent of the victims were Jews.”

It would seem to be reasonable to believe, that in light of this gross overestimation (a gross overestimation that lasted for almost 50 years) of death totals in Auschwitz that it is likely the case that gross overestimations were made in the numbers reported from other camps. The idea that the numbers were routinely grossly inflated has been reported not only by Faurisson but also by others such as David Irving and Ernst Zundel.

I, myself, do not have a concrete opinion on the matter of total deaths suffered by those reputed to be Jewish though I can easily see how it serves as an advantage for those reputed to be Jewish to continue to cling to these numbers. While, I do not have an established opinion on the total death toll on those reputed to be Jewish I do find it curious that so much is made of this death toll in comparison to the horrendous death toll of other tribal communities that receive comparatively little attention. For example, there was a horrendous holocaust of Christian Ukranians by Jewish Bolsheviks under Stalin. Also, there was a horrendous holocaust of Christian Armenians by the  Dönme (Jewish) “Muslim” Turks (members of the Sabbatai Zevi cult). We should also mention that holocaust of over 1 million German “disarmed enemy forces” (nomenclature used to skirt the Geneva Convention treatment requirement for POWs) inflicted by the Allies upon surrendering German troops after WW II, the holocaust visited upon the Khmer people by the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia in the late 1970s, and the holocausts of Mao visited upon the Chinese in both his “great leap forward,” and during the later “cultural revolution.” Indeed, the 20th century could be labeled as the “Holocaust century” — especially were we to add the holocaust of the unborn.

And yet I’d be willing to bet the farm that 9 out of 10 Americans have heard only of the Holocaust visited upon those reputed to be Jews. One is left asking… “Why is that?” A cynic might say that the answer presents itself when one notices what people group it is that has been the guiding light of the Western media / Hollywood since its inception. Those who own the news/entertainment report the news.

Those reputed to be Jews have gotten a good deal of mileage out of their unique ownership of the trademarked word “Holocaust.” They have been able to play the global victim due to their trademark ownership. This is an insurmountable advantage when living in a WOKE global philosophy that prioritizes the oppressed victim over and above the evil oppressor class. Those reputed to be Jews have, because of their holocausted status, have become the greatest victims of them all. In the game of Cultural Marxist poker, where he who is the greatest victim hold the greatest hand, the reputed Jews who were holocausted hold the royal flush against all competing victimhood hands. The reputed Jews who were holocausted are the trump that trumps all trump. Nobody can out victim them.

Their victimhood card was played again just a couple days ago when their Prime minister Netanyahu, invoking the holocaust, said;

“No Nation Came to the Aid of Jews During the Holocaust.”

I think all those boys who died on the beaches of Normandy might argue otherwise.

But, all argumentation is irrelevant. When you hold the royal flush of victimhood nothing else matters, and that was the card, Netanyahu played when he said that.

This returns us thus to the opening Farisson quote. The Holocaust has been turned into a religion. Some wags have taken to calling it “Holocaustianity.” Farisson fails to mention above that Holocaustianity also has its own unique Messiah and the Messiah of Holocaustianity are those who we routinely call “Jews.” They are their own saviors, and one of the means of saving themselves is this new religion wherein all have to bow before their very real tragic history, being required at the same time to ignore the very real tragic history of many other groups who have experienced attempted genocide. If other peoples are to be sympathized with then the sympathy with which those reputed to be Jews are sympathized with becomes diluted and reduced in its guilt invoking power.

Another advantage of Holocaustianity is that serves as a “get out of jail free” card. Any behavior by those reputed to be Jews can be overlooked because, “after all they are the greatest victims of all time.” Whether it is the Deir Yassin massacre, or the sinking of the USS Liberty, or the bombing of the King David Motel, or the ethnic cleansing of Christian Palestinians, it can all be washed away because “we were holocausted.”

Even if Faurisson was wrong about holocaust death totals, the point he makes about the creation of a new religion is spot on. That Faurisson is accurate on this point is seen by that Lawmakers in several U.S. states have recently pushed for laws defining antisemitism so as to censor wrong-speak. One sees the problem here when one considers that there has been no push for laws defining anti-Christian speech so as to censor wrong-speak against Christians. I would submit this is an example of holocaustianity at work. Especially, when living in a climate where antisemitism is defined as disagreeing with someone reputed to be Jewish.

These kinds of things need to be said with the coming of Trump. Trump has surrounded himself with Zionists (Hegseth, Stefanik, Huckabee to name just a few) and Trump has been labeled by Netanyahu as “the greatest friend Israel as ever had in the White House.” Radio Personality Mark Levin recently introduced Trump as “Our First Jewish President.”  In light of all this voices need to be raised warning, (paraphrasing Pat Buchanan here) about the continued increasing Israeli occupation of America.

I shouldn’t need the tag that finds me saying, “I am not pro-Arab or pro-Muslim.” I am not even “anti-those reputed to be Jews.” I am merely pro Christian and I don’t think that anybody but Christians should have special protection in a nation that was established on Christian principles and I am against politically correct poker.