A terrible trend

Noah would instantly recognize America today.

I’ve only had two “visions” that I know were from God, and I say “only” with holy fear and trembling, because having such things happen is life-changing in nature.* One vision, I’ve told you before; it’s the one that led to me believing and following Christ. The other, I have never written about, until today.

Prays Mill Baptist Church, Douglasville, Georgia. Image: Google Maps

Back in the late 90s, I was installing communications equipment in the cupola of the clock tower at the Walter F. George School of Law, at Mercer University in Macon. That building is on Coleman Hill, the highest ground in the city. As far as I know, the cupola at the top of the clock tower is the highest point in Macon. I was able to look down on The Fickling & Co. Building’s roof, and that’s the tallest building downtown. (As an aside, back in those days, I used to climb whatever without any fear. Getting to the top of the cupola was no picnic.)

Standing in that high place, I looked out over the city, which was covered with an overcast. The Lord showed me that this overcast was a spiritual covering. He showed me a blanket over the city and the area. “This is the spirit of religion,” I heard, and saw the clouds as an insulating, suffocating layer that prevented prayers from being heard, prevented God’s people from hearing, and stifled love among the brethren in Christ. It was a sobering vision, but I had no idea what it really meant.

In those days, I had a burden to win souls, and signed up for Steve Hill Ministries. Hill was the evangelist at the very pentecostal and charismatic Brownsville Revival and was taking the revival on the road. I wanted to bring that to central Georgia. I called hundreds of pastors, and got a lot of “no”s but some said yes. I was (miraculously) able to secure a booth at a meeting of the Georgia Baptist Convention, part of the Southern Baptist Convention, in Macon. I didn’t mislead anyone about what I was doing or with whom I was working.

After a few hours working the booth, I was approached by the leaders of the meeting, who, quietly, humbly, and even sheepishly told me “we’ve had complaints.” About what? Were we rude? Did we offend? Well, not really, they answered. It’s just that many of the pastors don’t want a pentecostal ministry here in a Baptist meeting. So we were asked to leave, and we did.

The spirit of religion stands in opposition to the Body of Christ, and the purposes of our risen Savior. Many churches live, preach, sing, and endeavor to save people in Christ’s name, under the suffocating blanket of that spirit, which is carefully tucked in, repaired, and maintained by demonic forces. While they pretend to welcome all, they really spend their time preening over self-righteousness, and trashing anyone who doesn’t imbibe their flavor of religion.

It’s not particularly surprising to me to hear that a minister in Douglasville, Georgia, who has become well-known in “Southern Baptist Calvinist” circles, and as a “TheoBro” lied for several years, denying he maintained secret social media accounts and email addresses he used to slander other Christians. Josh Buice was asked to step down from G3 Ministries after the elders at Prays Mill Baptist Church found “clear and comprehensive evidence” of this practice. A statement issued by PMBC wrote that Buice’s actions “were not only sinful in nature but deeply divisive, causing unnecessary suspicion and strife within the body of Christ, and particularly within the eldership of PMBC.”

However bad the sin is, the elders at his church wrote “we do not believe at this time that his sin is necessarily permanently disqualifying.” In other words, their pastor and president of a ministry with enough influence in the “former SBC” category of churches lied to the faces of people he secretly trashed online, and continued to lie despite undeniable evidence proving he did it, until the weight of that evidence was simply too heavy to continue the charade (or the other option, him being fired versus resigning, was too painful for him). But that itself has the seeds of redemption. As for me, I would never trust a person who did that to ever work in public ministry again.

Christians attacking Christians is the essence of the spirit of religion. Over things like infant baptism, transubstantiation of the elements of communion, pews versus chairs, having a cross in the sanctuary, what the ministers wear, the language used to preach or praise God, what instruments are played during worship, the color of the carpet, who is allowed to serve as an elder, if women should preach or teach, and I have only scratched the surface—it’s all religious garbage and the plan of the enemy to keep the true purpose of the body of Christ from being fulfilled.

Just before Yeshua went to his betrayal and the cross, he told his disciples, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35.) When Yeshua prayed for all believers in the Garden of Gethsemane, he prayed “I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” (John 17:22-23.)

He didn’t pray that Christians would be known or be one in doctrine, or scriptural interpretation. He didn’t pray that Christians would carry a cross in one hand and a sword in the other to strike down heresies. He didn’t pray that Christians would go out into the world but keep looking inward to find the defects in each other’s faith. He didn’t pray that his disciples would ask God to send a suffocating blanket to protect them from those who sought to preach differently from them. He prayed for love, and love is what that suffocating blanket sucks up like paper towels in a puddle.

It doesn’t matter how many people attend a church, or listen to a preacher, or how influential the preacher or modern-sounding ministries with cool names like “G3” might be. It doesn’t matter if a church leaves one fellowship because its politics might have moved outside their own comfort zone. It doesn’t matter if the preacher is a dynamic “TheoBro” with an $800 suit and a well-trimmed beard.

In the days of Noah, “the Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.” God saw Noah, and said “Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways.” (Genesis 6:5, 11-12.)

Moses didn’t write that the people weren’t religious. They undoubtedly were religious. The Apostle Paul found the Athenians on Mars Hill to be very religious, as well. About two thirds of the New Testament deals with Christians attacking other Christians, or acting without love—love of God, their fellow brethren, and the truth.

Noah, if he were alive today, would recognize this world instantly. People like Josh Buice, who secretly trashed other Christians, would be a familiar sight to him. Outwardly religious, but wicked in practice, secreting sins and covering them with lies.

There is only one way, one Lord, one faith, one baptism. That doesn’t mean we all do the same things, as believers. It means that love is the cornerstone of our faith, the chief cornerstone being Christ, who professed his love, and proved it in power, with his life. Without love, no doctrine has value, no theology is valid, no interpretation or prophecy is true, no preaching is powerful. It’s all manipulation, lies, and wickedness stifled under the comforting blanket of the spirit of religion.

It’s only by God’s grace, under such a wicked and strangulating system that anyone can hear the Gospel, believe it, and therefore be saved. The vision God gave me over 25 years ago didn’t tell me how to remove the wet blanket over Macon, or anywhere else. I have no power to do that. The blanket can only be removed by love, and it takes more than one person to do it. Two people might poke a hole, but the demons are quick to repair it. But a thousand people might tear through; a million might shred it.

What does a million Christians acting in love, acceptance of each other, and charity look like? I don’t know, because I haven’t seen it. I live in the United States, where that doesn’t happen. Perhaps it looks like communist China, where believers are persecuted for their faith.

Maybe the time will come when Christians, acting in love, will be persecuted in America. Perhaps that’s what’s needed to wake us up from under the warm, comforting, suffocating, strangling blanket of death we’re so used to, that Old Time Spirit of Religion that divides us and keeps us from love.

Another word about that Qatari 747-8. The jet gift is indefensible, but to those who would defend it, because Trump said it’s stupid not to accept such a gift when the current VC-25A “Air Force One” aircraft are expensive to maintain and need to be replaced:

Did you know there are two VC-25A aircraft? There are always two, one is a backup. The president needs a backup in case the first aircraft breaks. The Qataris are only offering one 747-8. Even if the DOD spends, what, $500 million or more, to convert that jet into something resembling Air Force One, the original VC-25A aircraft will still need to be maintained, because there must be two aircraft available. Savings: $0, cost: maybe $1 billion.

If the Qatari jet is converted and in use, when Trump leaves, the jet is done, and will go to his library. The cost to “deconvert” the aircraft? I don’t know, maybe another $500 million or $1 billion. And what replaces it? I suppose it will be the VC-25Bs that Boeing is set to deliver in 2027, or 2029, or whenever that company has milked the last dime out of the government. Savings: $0, cost: $1 billion.

So Trump’s logic is we should spend another $2 billion, plus all the costs of maintaining the current VC-25A fleet, plus the cost to finish the VC-25B fleet, so he can fly in a more rococo aircraft worthy of someone like him, versus the aging VC-25As. Some gift (spelled “g-r-i-f-t”). As in, “don’t look a grift horse in the mouth.”

*Joel 2:28: “And afterward, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions.” Visions are truly for everyone: “all people.” We should see more of it.

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