Let's get something straight. I never asked to do what I do. I liken my situation to David and the Israelites when facing Goliath. The Israelites did nothing. They were not willing to lift a finger. David felt compelled to answer. Likewise, the Christians around me would not raise a finger to defend the truth (or perhaps could not defend it because they were not equipped to do so). I kept feeling this pressure inside me to answer, but I tried to suppress it over and over and over again. I am shy, introverted, and do not like confrontation (but if it comes knocking on my door, I will answer it, because I also do not put up with bullies). Finally, I let it have its way. I felt a release like a weight being lifted from my shoulders. I have been doing it ever since, for the past 20 years! You Christians who snub me and make all sorts of accusations against me, what have you ever done? Or are you content to go to church on Sunday and then for the rest of the week keep your mouth shut and not say anything to anybody (effectively telling others to "Go to Hell!")?
I am not perfect, nor do I profess to be. As I previously stated in Confession, found to the right in the Site Navigation, I am not always the most gracious when I write the truth. It is something I struggle with. But that is not always a bad thing. And it certainly is not a condition of being "unloving" or "hateful," as I have been accused. Christians today have this ridiculous notion that you always have to be soft, polite, calm, and gentle when speaking to others, and that simply is not true. These Christians either have not read, or do not know, their Bibles. Elijah mocked the prophets of Baal. Paul was vulgar when he suggested those bothering the Galatians castrate themselves. Jesus was abrupt . . . a lot. [If you'd like, you can even substitute the word "abrasive" for "abrupt" throughout, because do you honestly believe Jesus was concerned with the feelings of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and scribes when He spoke to them and called them such things as "brood of vipers" and "whitewashed tombs"? Jesus was harsh with these people and those who required it. Sometimes it is necessary for a Christian to be harsh.]
People are marching into Hell like they are walking over the edge of a cliff. If you truly loved an individual, and you saw him blindly walking toward the edge of a cliff, would you politely and calmly say, "Uh, sir. If you keep going that direction you are going to fall off a cliff," or would you try to grab his attention by yelling, "Stop! You're going to die!" and even tackling him to the ground? Being a little more forceful is not a sign of "hatred" or being "unloving." That is a ridiculous notion! That is the thinking of a post-modern effeminate culture. Would you care for me to share some sermons from Charles Spurgeon, Leonard Ravenhill, Paris Reedhead, A. W. Tozer, Paul Washer, etc., where they deliberately offend people? Are they being unloving when they do this, or is it because of love that they do it? You think they are allowed to do this because of their calling, but nobody else is allowed to do this? Really?!?
Let me ask you a question. What was the single most thing that Christ hated and repeatedly confronted head-on? Hypocrisy! We are commanded to be imitators of Christ. Paul tells us that what we see and hear in him, to do. If Christ and the Prophets and Apostles were allowed to be snarky and use satire and sarcasm and be abrupt because of their office, and preachers are allowed to be snarky and use satire and sarcasm and be abrupt because of their calling, but the rest of us are not allowed to do so because we are supposed to be soft, polite, calm, and gentle, do you know what that is? That is hypocrisy! Christians who hold to this false notion of "love" turn Jesus and the Apostles into hypocrites. How? Because they are telling us that Jesus and the Apostles were saying, "Do as I say, and not as I do." Guess what? That is precisely what the Pharisees were doing with Israel, and it torqued Jesus! These Christians make Jesus guilty of the very thing He condemned, which means they make Him to be sinful and not sinless. Do you honestly believe that Jesus confronted false religion the way He did, but that He expects us to do so differently? Seriously?!? Have you ever read any of the works of the Reformers or the Puritans, or even the early church fathers? Were they "hateful" or "unloving" in some of the things they wrote? You are unquestionably outnumbered in your thinking.
"In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets." "You shall love your neighbour as yourself." Think about those for a moment. If you were immersed in some cult and/or following some false teaching, would you not want someone to do anything and everything in their power to wake you from your stupor? Which would be more loving, for them to pat you on the head or for them to slap you in the face? Which is going to get your attention? Every single Christian reading this is now in silence because they realized that they have just contradicted themselves. The idea that "no one ever brought anyone to Jesus by being abrupt" and that "being abrupt has driven people away from Christianity" is false! I have heard plenty of testimonies over the years of people who were saved because of the "tough love" that a saint showed them. You Christians who think the only approach to witnessing and winning souls is the soft, polite, gentle approach, how many people have you ever brought to Christ? I have had more than a few e-mails over the years from people thanking me for having said what I said in the manner I said it.
Certain cultures, if you try to discuss certain things with them in a soft, calm, gentle manner, think you are not taking them seriously and that you are mocking them. When people are passionate about something, they expect a certain kind of response. Soft, calm, and gentle is not an indication of passion. This soft, calm, gentle nonsense is a result of our effeminate culture; always concerned about offending someone or other. Do you think Jesus was worried about offending people? Read your Bible! Jesus offended people all the time! And He did so on purpose. Especially the religious! Again, would you care for me to share some sermons from Charles Spurgeon, Leonard Ravenhill, Paris Reedhead, A. W. Tozer, Paul Washer, etc.?
The truth is, there is a time to be gentle, and there is a time to be abrupt. Guaranteed that Solomon would agree with me. Christians cannot always be "nice." Sometimes people do not listen and mentally check out when you are being soft, calm, and gentle, and you need to be abrupt in order to grab their attention and shake them out of their stupor. The soft, calm, and gentle concept is a result of failure to know and study humans and human behaviour, and why they act the way they do and how to deal with that.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said, "I am perhaps vulgar, but it is not intentional, save that I must and will make people listen. My firm conviction is that we have had enough polite preachers." He was not vulgar in the sense of using foul language. He was vulgar in the sense of being common, rustic, rude, or unrefined. And he did not apologize for it! Do you not think people were offended by Spurgeon when he spoke? In addressing the core foundation of Dispensationalism, seeing a distinction between Israel and the Church and separating Old Testament saints from New Testament saints, Spurgeon referred to this doctrine as "stupid" (Jesus Christ Immutable, January 3, 1869,). Yet Christians today find this word to be "unacceptable" or "offensive." I do not agree with calling a person stupid, but calling their behaviour or false system of beliefs stupid is quite a different thing. The two are not equally related. You could be the most intelligent person on the face of the planet and still do stupid things. The one is not a commentary on the other.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said, "I am perhaps vulgar, but it is not intentional, save that I must and will make people listen. My firm conviction is that we have had enough polite preachers." He was not vulgar in the sense of using foul language. He was vulgar in the sense of being common, rustic, rude, or unrefined. And he did not apologize for it! Do you not think people were offended by Spurgeon when he spoke? In addressing the core foundation of Dispensationalism, seeing a distinction between Israel and the Church and separating Old Testament saints from New Testament saints, Spurgeon referred to this doctrine as "stupid" (Jesus Christ Immutable, January 3, 1869,). Yet Christians today find this word to be "unacceptable" or "offensive." I do not agree with calling a person stupid, but calling their behaviour or false system of beliefs stupid is quite a different thing. The two are not equally related. You could be the most intelligent person on the face of the planet and still do stupid things. The one is not a commentary on the other.
I do not have a respect for what J. C. Ryle termed as "Jellyfish Christianity"; that "Christianity" that is spineless and afraid to be abrupt when the time calls for it. The misconception here is the idea that you somehow cannot be loving when you are abrupt. If that were true, are you being unloving when you discipline your child? Is God unloving when He disciplines you? No, it is because you are loving that you discipline. To not do so would be unloving. Likewise, to not be abrupt when it is required is also being unloving. You profess to love people, but then are not loving enough to startle them and shake them from their slumber while they descend into Hell on a greased pole. Oh yeah, I can feel that love. I do not know about you, but if I was about to walk into heavy traffic, I would want someone to grab the back of my shirt and yank me back onto the sidewalk. Oh, but I suppose that would be "unloving."
I have a passion for the Word of God and for the truth. Does that mean that I should just sit idly by and allow false teachers and destructive teachings to run rampant and unchecked? Should I not try to wake up those who are being seduced and sucked into these things by whatever means necessary? Guess what? You are not going to do so with a soft, polite, calm, gentle attitude. I have debated hundreds of individuals from numerous walks of life and belief systems, both in person and online. Most of these individuals are highly forceful to the point of being deliberately offensive. I do not let this aspect bother me because it is God they are at war with. If they are soft, polite, and gentle with you, then you should be the same with them. That is respect. However, as my experience has informed me, the only way to grasp these people's attention and have them seriously listen to what you are saying is to meet them with a forcefulness that is equal to the one they are showing you.
Ripping verses out of their immediate context and forcing them to try and back your narrative of "love and gentleness" is not godly in the least; it is a pretense of godliness. Christians who snub their noses at me and accuse me of being "hateful" or "unloving" have quite obviously never engaged in the type of work I do. I would question if they have ever done any kind of witnessing, or if they just hide behind the church walls and sing Kumbaya as if everything in the world is okay. I have been doing this for the past 20 years! What have you been doing?
But I digress. It has been my desire for quite some time to read through my previous blog articles to see if there are any rough edges that I can smooth out in order to be a little more gracious. There is always room to grow. But it seems that perhaps I might need to be a little more abrupt with the religious, the way Jesus was in confronting their hypocrisy and false notions. The church does not determine who is called to a particular position. God calls individuals to these positions, which is why He says they are "holy callings." Like I said, I never asked for this. I am doing what most Christians do not want to do or refuse to do (and often times are unable to do because the church has failed to equip them to answer such things). How many times have I listened to Christians in church talk about their work place and some co-worker saying such-and-such that they had no idea how to answer. I answer these kinds of things all the time! The church's responsibility is to recognize these callings; not to try and control them. The church is not a dictatorship. That is what cults do. Christ's church is organic and relational; not mechanical. At least it should be if it is a biblical church.
I apologize if any of this has come across as prideful on my part. That was not and is not my intention. It is not easy to strive to be humble when people anger you with their accusations and false concepts of what it means to show love to others. As the Apostle Paul felt the need to defend himself, so I felt the need to defend myself. Sometimes the religious need to hear what they do not want to hear. They are not "above the law," as it were.