Seminary Course — Multiculturalism And The Displacement Of Biblical Culture

The purpose of this course if to make you familiar with what Multiculturalism is, how it has come about, and the methodologies that it uses to advance its agenda.

Main Texts

The Calvinistic Concept of Culture — Henry Van Til
The Gagging of God — D. A. Carson
The Politics of Guilt & Pity — R. J. Rushdoony

These three main texts will tell you

1.) What Biblical Culture is and where it comes from (Van Til)
2.) How it is that Biblical Culture is being displaced by multiculturalism (Carson)
3.) The concrete methodologies that are being pursued in order to implement multiculturalism (Rushdoony)

On line documentary

Agenda; The Grinding Down Of America — http://vimeo.com/63749370
CULTURAL MARXISM: The Corruption of America — http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIdBuK7_g3M

In this course I am recommending watching the documentaries first because they do a good job over-viewing and highlighting what Multiculturalism is, and where its threat lies.

Supplemental Required Reading

The Supplemental reading will require an ability to read critically. Most of what is said in the bibliography provided is quite good but there are also some strains that need to be set aside. At the very least the list will provide the tools necessary to see what multiculturalism is doing.

The following books should be read in the order suggested.

1.) Cry Havoc — Ralph de Toledano
2.) The Poverty of Multiculturalism — Patrick West, Kenneth Minoque
3.) The Vision of the Anointed — Thomas Sowell
4.) Alien Nation — Peter Brimelow
5.) Suicide Of A Superpower — Patrick Buchanan
6.) Everyday Theology: How to Read Cultural Texts and Interpret Trends — Kevin J. Vanhoozer
7.) Hollywood vs. America — Michael Medved
8.) The Menace of Multiculturalism; Trojan Horse In America — Alvin J. Schmidt
9.) Christ & Culture — H. Richard Neibuhr
10.)Christ and Culture Revisited — D. A. Carson

If the order is followed sequentially as suggested the weaknesses in the later books will be more easily recognizable. The later books still have a treasure trove of necessary information but they also are afflicted with weaknesses as well.

Books #1-3, along with the main texts and documentaries, give a good foundation for what multiculturalism is and why it should be despised by all right thinking Christians. Book #4 deals with how Immigration patterns contribute to multiculturalism. Book #5 gives a plethora of concrete examples of multiculturalism in the works. Book #6 provides more Theological grounding along with that provided by the main texts. Book #7 reveals how Hollywood and the movie industry advances the agenda of multiculturalism. Book #8 has some presuppositional weakness but still provides some good information. Books #9 and #10 are important. Neibuhr gives a template for understanding the relationship between Christ and Culture. Carson challenges Niebuhr on some matters. Carson’s Baptist background shows through. The reader needs to be aware of that. As long as books 8-10 are read in light of all that went before the student will be able to strain out the errors in those books.

The Student will write 15 page book reviews on the three main texts.

The Student will make chapter notes at the end of each Chapter and summarize the thrust of each book in their supplemental reading.

The Student will mark down 15 time sections of each of the Documentaries that they view and discuss the importance of that time section with the Teacher.

Duck Dynasty & The Orifice Scandal

I’ve consistently told the people I serve that when the culture lets the Sodomites out of the closet, the corresponding inevitability is that Christians will take their (the sodomites) former place in the closet. It is the Christian and their love for the Lord Christ that will be shunned in and by the public square. It was said of sodomy, once upon a time, that it was “the love that dare not speak its name.” Now, it is the love that won’t shut the hell up and the Biblical Christian’s love for the Lord Christ is the love that dare not speak its name.

When Robertson’s GQ statements hit the press yesterday I had a friend contact me saying that this might reverse the sodomite tide. I told him, “Robertson will be fired within days.” I should have said “hours.” My friend dissented, insisting that A & E would never fire because of much money they would lose. I just said, “wait and see.” I’m not a prophet. I don’t see into the future. It is merely a matter of knowing which way the cultural winds are blowing. When a social order embraces a worldview, money alone, will not be able to halt the progress of that (in this case — Sodomite) worldview.

A & E is only and their corporate base is only confirming that two antithetical worldviews can not co-exist unless one of them is willing to live as considered Taboo in the Public Square. So, now we are at the decided point where to speak publicly of our great Liege Lord, Christ, and His standard is now considered worthy of being publicly sanctioned. The sodomites now hold the whip hand and they are determined that they are not going back into the closet and that Christians will stay in the closet.

Unless Islam comes to play as a worldview social order contestant, the decided opposition of the social order will be for either Sodomites or for Christians. Never for both. The worldview war in favor of sodomy is a war against Biblical Christianity.

This reminds us that the whole “tolerance” thing that has been screamed for decades now was just a ruse. It is always so when worldview transitions among a people are taking place. Those who initially scream for tolerance and understanding (in this case the sodomites) don’t really wan’t tolerance long term. They merely plead for tolerance in order to give them time to marshal and build their momentum to the day when they can practice intolerance against their enemies. The plea for tolerance is the ploy of the minority who intends to one day become a majority which will shut down any opposition against them.

Do you and your children a favor. Put the sodomites back in the closet.

And I do agree with Phil Robertson. There is something seriously demented and twisted about a man who thinks that another man’s orifice — an orifice that produces excrement — is more alluring than a woman’s orifice that issues life.

Postscript – Keep in mind that R2K tells you that the Church must not speak on sodomy in the public square because that is not the Church’s job. If Phil Robertson were to attend a R2K church he would find no support from the R2K Ministers and Elders because there could be people in the congregation who opposed Phil Robertson and who do, themselves, see it as reasonable that in terms of public square legislation men might prefer other men’s anuses over women’s vaginas. R2K is all for pluralism. And of course R2K Churches would never want to weigh in on something so controversial as whether the public square should support anuses and vaginas each in their proper place.

How The Muslims Take Over

Three stages by which Muslims conquer. This technique has been used for centuries.

Stealth Jihad

Muslim numbers are small percentage wise in a new country where a foothold has been gained. Taqiyya (deception) is a large part of this phase. Muslims falsely befriend the infidel with false friendship. Publicly they put on their “Islam is a religion of peace” nonsense. They advocate for tolerance. They love playing the victim here in order to gain sympathy and in order to give credibility to their diabolical religion.

Defensive Jihad

At this point Islam’s numbers have increased. They continue with both Taqiyya and the victim role. However their numbers percentage wise is greater now and as such they feel safe in denouncing and attacking those who seek to bring to light the history and danger of Islam. Organizations like C.A.I.R. and other Islamic friendly organizations take up the plea for special rights. Sharia Schools and Mosques begin to pop up. Islam begins to bar its teeth while still insisting that it is the other guys fault. If only poor old Islam would be left alone they could live in peace. At this point Islam begins to incipiently attack enemies.

Offensive Jihad

Here the numbers are now in Isalm’s favor and they begin to attack and persecute at every opportunity. The community of Dearborn Michigan is beginning to see Offensive Jihad. Here laws are passed in order to put down the infidel. As this accelerates it becomes illegal to speak out against Islam to denounce it as pagan Anti-Christ. For Islam this is the time to establish their hegemony over all areas of life. As this accelerates the non Muslim people of the book are forced to pay the jizya and become hewers of wood and drawers of water. Non-Muslims who are not people of the book face a far worse eventuality.

These United States are moving towards stage II. Europe is moving towards stage III. There is no stopping Muslims once they gain a toehold.

The below article expands this general outline a bit and deals with concrete numbers.

http://www.islamreview.com/articles/Islam_is_not_a_religion.shtml

The Modern Magnificat

“And Mary said,

“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.”

Luke 1:46-53

Mary’s song emphasizes how God keeps His promises to His people and by way of implication it emphasizes the humiliation of the Lord Christ who was born in such a lowly situation. However, the left in the Church instead emphasizes Marxist themes. In a recent Tim Keller facebook status we see this. Tim wrote,

“Jesus wasn’t born among heads of state but among those who were at the bottom of the social ladder.”

Tim has flirted with this soft Marxism before. In his book “Generous Justice” he basically advocates a soft Marxist “social justice” approach and re-labels it as “Generous.”

The position of Mary (or Zechariah, or Simeon, or Anna, etc.) is not important because they were low on the social ladder but because they were saints of God despite their poverty and oppression. Poverty as poverty doesn’t score you any points in the Kingdom of God if one doesn’t belong to Christ and the people of God. The antithesis in the Scripture is not between Rich vs. Poor but between the Seed of the Serpent vs. The seed of the woman.

The emphasis in Mary’s Song is that God remembers His people who are being oppressed by the Wicked mighty. The whole thrust of Luke’s songs is to demonstrate that God has not forgotten His people despite the fact it might look that way and despite the fact that they are being oppressed by wickedness in high places (Herod, Augustus Caesar etc.). The fact that the Lord Christ is born among the lowly does not prove that lowliness as lowliness is a virtue. After all Jesus was born of the line of great King David and God includes the High Born in the Nativity story by including visitation from the Kings of the East. In Scripture God esteems those in Covenant, rich or poor, and destroys those outside of covenant, rich or poor.

The point in Luke’s Songs is not that God favors poor wicked people over righteous rich people. The point is that God has remembered Israel and that despite her captivity and the low status she has sunken into. This is Redemptive History and what is being accentuated is God remembering His promise to raise up a Messiah. The character of God is what is being put on display, not the status of those whom He is remembering. What is not being accentuated is that God is social class conscious. Believe me, if the story were written today, given how much the Wealthy are hated by the Communist Clergy, God would have His Messiah born among the rich and royal to add the factor of “isn’t God amazing that He brought His Messiah among such ignoble filthy rich people.” However, we don’t see in the nativity narrative of the Marxist clergy is the amazing God who keeps His promises no matter what. No, what we see are the amazing poor people who, “naturally enough” are lifted up. Given their noble poverty they deserve it after all.

Does God bring down all the “Mighty” from their thrones? Did God bring down Job? Abraham? David? Are Zaccheus or Joseph of Arimathea to be counted as less saints in the New and Better covenant because they were wealthy? Is the New and Better covenant characterized now by God hating all rich and loving all poor regardless of their faith or lack of faith in Christ? Has lack of wealth become the new standard of inherent righteousness? Is God now for the proletariat and against the Bourgeois? Did God inspire Das Kapital?

This preoccupation of the Church in the West with Marxist categories completely flummoxes me. God loves the righteous in Christ regardless of their socio-economic status and he hates the wicked outside of Christ regardless of their socio-economic status… even if they are as poor and wretched Dicken’s Artful Dodger.

Why is it that we seem to think that God loves the impoverished more than the Wealthy simply on the basis of their impoverishment? God loves His people in Christ. The Wealthy saints have a charge to keep in terms of their brethren of low estate but those of low estate are not superior to those of wealth if they are both looking to Christ and resting in him, just as the wealthy are not superior to those of poverty in terms of status before God just because they are wealthy.

God hates the unrighteous wealthy wicked because they do tend to oppress the poor but he equally hates the unrighteous impoverished wicked because they do tend to envy the rich. It strikes me that we have made the envious unrighteous wicked poor some kind of gold standard to aspire to. It is all very strange.

Contrasting Gnostic Spiritual With Scriptural Spiritual

“The spiritual is that which is of or by the Spirit. It is not the same thing as spirit, which is invisible and non-physical (i.e. like “breath”). Spiritual is that which is empowered by or shaped by the Spirit. The original creation was spiritual in this way in that Spirit of God hovered over the face of the deep and formed and filled the formless and empty world. The creation which comes under the effects of the curse of sin is re-created by the Spirit so that it might fulfill God’s original intentions for it as creation. So, for instance, when God promises to Abraham that in him all the families of the earth will be blessed (Gen 12.3), I believe that he is promising that families as families will be brought into a state of blessedness. They will have to go through death and resurrection through the waters of baptism (cf. e.g., Rom 6.1ff.), being transformed as a families. But they will be transformed as families, fulfilling God’s intention for the family in creation. Spiritual, in my understanding, is not, then, the opposite of or to be sharply distinguished from physical or material creation. It is not that which parallels but stands outside of the physical. Rather, spiritual has to do with the Spirit empowering and shaping and transforming a very material creation.”

Bill Smith
INFANT BAPTISM, THE NEW MAN, AND THE NEW CREATION: A Response to Stephen J. Wellum’s “Baptism and the Relationship Between the Covenants” in Believer’s Baptism: Sign of the New Covenant in Christ

Given Smith’s observation above we can seee that “Spiritual” in the NT does not mean ephemeral, invisible, or incorporeal. A spiritual reality is not a non-corporeal reality. Conversely, when we are told that “our weapons are not carnal” we are not being told there that our weapons are not corporeal. We are being told that our very real corporeal weapons are to be handled in a way that is in keeping with the Spirit empowering and shaping and transforming a very material instrument — whether that instrument is a protest sign or a evening gown.

“Spiritual” thus has more to do with that which animates the behavior or actions of the actor. Spiritual is the afflatus that animates the Christian in whatever they do in this corporeal world. The Christian, when animated by the Holy Spirit, so as to be walking according to God’s precepts, while full of faith in Christ, is at that moment the “Spiritual Man” — and that status of Spiritual applies whether the Christian is on their knees in prayer or in a foxhole fighting God’s enemies.

That “Spiritual” has to do more with the divine afflatus that animates us then it has to do with some kind of gnostic connection to matters non-corporeal or invisible is articulated by Sinclair Ferguson in his book on the Holy Spirit,

“Energy rather than immateriality is what is in view… While in the natural order ruach may occasionally denote a gentle breeze (as in some translations of Gn. 3:8), the dominant idea in the Old Testament is that of power. The parallelism in Micah 3:8 well illustrates this: ‘But as for me, I am filled with power, with the Spirit of the Lord.’ When used of God (around one third of the Old Testament uses), therefore, ruach does not connote the idea of divine immateriality (spirit, not matter), although doubtless that is implied in the general biblical perspective. The emphasis is, rather, on his overwhelming energy; indeed one might almost speak about the violence of God.” (Sinclair Ferguson, The Holy Spirit (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1996).

The attempt to make “Spiritual” mean something pietistic so that we are passive or so as to support a quietistic disposition in the Christian life, or something disconnected from our daily living in the public square has been one of the most successful tools at castrating the modern Christian. It’s time we started re-thinking this idea of “Spiritual” so as to be better equipped for the times God has given us.