Violent, Proud Boasters

 

Romans 1: 28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting;

To include those who practice violence, those who are proud, those who boast, and those who invent evil things.

32 who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.

I return to the story of Trump’s first few weeks in office.  Really an unbelievable start, with a major exception being the black mark of openly espousing genocide and forced displacement.  But as Trump has done so often – even beginning eight years ago in his first run – the only difference between him and most politicians is that he says the quiet part out loud.

What has been interesting is to see the violent reaction by many to the corruption being exposed by Musk and his team.  Yes, we knew it was there, but now it comes with names, agencies, and numbers.  And, with such light shed on it, the supporters and perpetrators are doubling down on their support.

Which got me to consider the following:

John 3: 19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.

How evil and depraved must you be that when your deeds come to light you not only don’t back down, you double-down?  Everyone practicing this evil being exposed is bathing in the light of that evil being exposed.

But, for them, is it evil?

From Thomas Aquinas: “For the object of the will is the end and the good.”

…it appears that Aquinas is mistaken when he says that the ends for the sake of which we act are good.

I struggled with just that when I first began studying Thomas.

Clearly, many things we pursue in life are not good. Aquinas does not deny this. He agrees that cognitive errors and excessive passion can distort our moral views and, in turn, incline us to choose the wrong things.

Distorted moral views…this explains it.

Aquinas’s point, however, is that our actions are done for the sake of what we believe (rightly or wrongly) to be good. Whether the ends we pursue are in fact good is a separate question… (Italics in original)

Those who object to what is being discovered when put under light believe what they are doing is good.  They find evil good, and good evil.

Isaiah 5: 20 Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

Returning to Romans 1:

32 who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.

The Third American Civil War

 

A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies

James Fearon, a scholar of civil wars at Stanford University, defines a civil war as "a violent conflict within a country fought by organized groups that aim to take power at the center or in a region, or to change government policies".

If you prefer, you can call it the Third American Revolution:

In political science, a revolution (Latin: revolutio, 'a turn around') is a rapid, fundamental transformation of a society's class, state, ethnic or religious structures.

Really, what is happening right now is both: a war between conflicting organized groups, and a war to rapidly transform society’s state structures.  It is not yet meaningfully violent, although violence has been employed, until now exclusively by the entrenched side.

Whatever you call it, we are at war.  We know 1776.  We know 1861.  It is clear now that we are in the middle of a third one.  Just as in the first several years of the earlier two, it is too early to tell which side will win. 

The first real trigger was likely the regime’s reaction to the 2008 financial crisis.  By far, popular support was against any bailout of financial institutions – let the chips fall where they may.  I still remember the time TARP first came up for a vote: from memory, something like 90% plus of contacts from the public to congress expressed the desire to vote no – which happened the first time the vote came up.

Maria Bartiromo, on CNBC at the time, scream into the camera, “COME ON, PEOPLE!”  apparently, you have to be dumb to not want to give billionaires more billions.  Well, congress kept voting until they got it “right.”  The Tea Party was born from this and from Ron Paul’s run for president that same year.  Both the Tea Party and Ron Paul’s run were hijacked.

Then came the Obama years – relatively quiet domestically, but clearly steps were put in place to transform America even further to the left.  However, anytime someone spoke up about it, they were labeled racist, etc. 

So, instead of speaking, they voted in Trump.  Out of twenty or so republican candidates for president in 2016, he survived.  He survived because he was the only one who fundamentally spoke against the regime and for the people (Rand Paul a little, but he couldn’t match Trump’s personality).

The deplorables voted Trump into office.  While he spoke in revolutionary terms, he was nowhere near prepared enough to act on his words.  We all remember; we kept asking ourselves: is he playing four-D chess?  What’s going on?  When will he turn over the winning card?  It never happened.

In fact, he gave us Operation Warp Speed.

Meanwhile, the other side planned and schemed.  Biden was voted in, the most popular president ever.  More votes than ever.  Magical midnight reversals, truckloads of ballots, etc.  Thousands went to prison because they thought something was fishy about the outcome and they wanted to make their concerns known.

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Trump won the election in 2024.  Admit it, you thought that this would never happen.  I thought it would never happen.  They tried suing him, convicting him, putting him in prison, killing him.  None of it worked.  The opponents didn’t even try to steal the election – or, if they did, they were unable to do so.

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Something was different this time.  There was little talk coming out of the Trump team between election night and his inauguration.  Sure, we heard the words: DOGE, end the wars (but not the slaughter in Gaza), nominees including RFK, Jr., Gabbard, Hegseth, Patel.  No, not saints, but a sea change from what I have seen in my lifetime.

Are We Winning?

 

Trump’s first week.  A flurry of actions, many of which I applaud.  Or, to put it more appropriately in the language of many of my friends: as long as the dictator – through executive orders – is doing stuff I like, everything is cool.

I won’t list everything Trump has done here – others have written very good summaries, much better than I could do.  And, of course, you all know what I consider the not good stuff.  Like I said regarding Trumps actions: many of which, not all of which, I applaud.

I have written before, a month before Trump’s election eight years ago:

For those who fear that some form of extreme fascism is coming to the United States, they need not fear Trump; the fear is in who (or what) comes next – win or lose for Trump.

So, Trump won in 2016.  But he lost (yeah, I know) in 2020.  What if 2024 is the “who (or what) comes next” part”?  He is acting like he is just that – very efficiently and quickly cranking out dozens of executive orders, halting certain expenditures, etc.  Again, much of which I applaud.

What’s not to like?

Angelo Codevilla wrote, in anticipation of the 2016 election:

We have stepped over the threshold of a revolution. It is difficult to imagine how we might step back, and futile to speculate where it will end. Our ruling class’s malfeasance, combined with insult, brought it about. Donald Trump did not cause it and is by no means its ultimate manifestation.

What if the 2024 Trump is something closer to, but not yet, its “ultimate manifestation”?  He is acting like it, and many on the right are cheering: we are winning!

The next year or so will be critical: does Trump change the fundamental direction on at least a couple of the dozen issues that threaten us.  For example, the budget deficit, or the pharma-industrial complex, or whatever.  I say “great.”

But someone will come after Trump.  On the one hand, the revolution won’t be complete.  Will JD Vance, or someone along those lines, be as effective as Trump.

Or, alternatively, what happens when the left gets a Trump of their own – one who has a flurry of executive orders, one who has all his or her ducks lined up to hit the ground running on day one.

Conclusion

Are we winning?  Or, to put it another way: have some things, at least, moved in a better direction?  I say, yes.  But it all comes down to the “how.”

We will get either an even more dictatorial president soon enough – whether on the right or on the left.  I will not consider that we are winning, either way.

But, given that I have no say in the matter, I know which evil is lessor. 

Epilogue

If you were Roman Catholic in Spain during the Spanish Civil War, you welcomed Franco.  No, you weren’t thrilled, but he was the lessor of two evils…and you had a chance to live, unlike if the communists and anarchists won.

Bible Believing Church

 

I used to cringe at this statement.  Let me explain, before coming to why I write “used to.”  It is a statement used by some Protestant churches, and, to my knowledge, only Protestant churches.  I would cringe because I took it as a slight against those churches that also embrace tradition (as if even the lowest of low protestant churches don’t hold to some tradition).  In other words: we believe the Bible, and only the Bible.  Sola Scriptura.

I didn’t like it.  Even the churches that embrace tradition (Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, etc.) are “Bible believing.”  They are just Bible believing plus some other things.  But this was my frame of reference: the self-proclaimed Bible believing churches aren’t like those Catholic and Orthodox churches.

Now, what I am about to write – and that this is revelatory to me – is truly…stunning.  It turns out that a better way to understand the phrase – whether it is meant by all who use it or not – is not in the frame of contrasting against “Bible believing plus.”  Instead, to contrast against “Bible believing minus.”

The big “minus,” which is the obvious point for my being stunned, is on all points regarding embracing every woke concept.  We believe the Bible except what is says about a man and a woman, about marriage, about sexual relations, etc.  We believe the Bible except for the idea that God was purposeful in Creation.

Now, that many Protestant churches believe in the Bible “minus” has been obvious to me.  Yet I didn’t see this phrase “Bible believing” as an indictment of these.

Why now?  Why am I writing this now?  Here again, I have known for quite some time that not everyone who uses the words “Christian” or “God” or “sin” or “saved” mean the same thing as others or mean what it is the Bible teaches on these subjects.  For much of my life, I was just such a “Christian” – a Christian as long as Bible believing minus was acceptable.

This is what hit me like a two-by-four across the skull: being faced with this reality personally, intimately, and directly by people who use such words yet mean something else entirely…well, now I understand what “Bible believing” means in its best sense.

It is in contrast to such Christians: The Bible “minus” Christians.  Subtracting what God says from the definition of “Christian,” “God,” “sin,” and “saved.” 

It is a god, and a Christianity made in their own image.

Conclusion

Matthew 7: 21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven

Lloyd-Jones described these words as “…in many ways the most solemn and solemnizing words ever uttered in this world… How often, I wonder, have we considered them, or heard a sermon on them?”

As I noted at the time: The warning is one of avoiding self-deception and self-delusion.  It isn’t a warning simply of and for our teachers, but for ourselves.  It is emphasizing that nothing avails but true righteousness and true holiness.

This true righteousness and true holiness doesn’t come by picking and choosing what we want from the Bible.  God doesn’t change; His commandments do not change either.