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Voddie Baucham - Ethnic Gnosticism · Voddie Baucham Sermons

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Speaker 1: When I received my assignment for this evening, I was
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Speaker 1: a little perplexed and shocked and a bit nervous as
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Speaker 1: my dearly beloved brother asked me to address in this
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Speaker 1: session essentially a word that I made up. Literally, I
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Speaker 1: coined a word, a phrase, a concept, Ethnic Gnosticism. And
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Speaker 1: then use that phrase during an interview with another dear brother,
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Speaker 1: James White, who has since been using the word. And
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Speaker 1: so tonight what I want to do is just sort
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Speaker 1: of share what I intended by that word and why
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Speaker 1: I think it's helpful in sort of shedding light on
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Speaker 1: At least some of the things that we're dealing with.
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Speaker 1: We know that Gnosticism comes from the Greek word for
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Speaker 1: gnosis or knowledge. The Gnostic heresy was one that was
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Speaker 1: around in the first century. Gnosticism is about a special knowledge.
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Speaker 1: It's about immediate knowledge. And when I say immediate knowledge,
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Speaker 1: I don't mean right now knowledge. I mean knowledge that
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Speaker 1: doesn't have to be mediated through a source. Knowledge that
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Speaker 1: doesn't have to be mediated through the word of God.
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Speaker 1: Immediate knowledge. Intuitive knowledge. A knowledge that separates insiders from outsiders.
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Speaker 1: That is the idea of Gnosticism. And I use that phrase,
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Speaker 1: ethnic Gnosticism, to sort of explain the phenomenon of people
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Speaker 1: believing that somehow because of one's ethnicity, that one is
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Speaker 1: able to know when something is racist. I remember back
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Speaker 1: in the 90s, I think, there was a saying, it's
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Speaker 1: a black thing, you wouldn't understand. And the idea is
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Speaker 1: that if I go to a restaurant and I sit
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Speaker 1: down at the restaurant and somebody looks at me a
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Speaker 1: certain way, or if I'm shopping in a store, and
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Speaker 1: the clerk looks at me a certain way, or if
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Speaker 1: I'm pulled over by a police officer, and the police
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Speaker 1: officer addresses me in a certain way, I know when
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Speaker 1: it's racism. And you can't tell me it's not. And
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Speaker 1: even if you do or say something to me, I
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Speaker 1: know if it's racism, and you can't tell me it's not.
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Speaker 1: And in fact, If you do something or say something
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Speaker 1: to me, and I know that it's racism, and then
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Speaker 1: you come back and say, well, no, that's not what
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Speaker 1: I meant. That's just your privilege speaking. Because according to
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Speaker 1: the concept of white privilege, you don't know what you
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Speaker 1: don't know. How about that? You don't know what you
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Speaker 1: don't know, but I do. That's ethnic Gnosticism. This idea
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Speaker 1: that somehow because of my ethnicity, because of my position
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Speaker 1: as a minority, I know what oppression is and feels
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Speaker 1: like and don't have to necessarily have evidence for it.
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Speaker 1: And because of other people's positions, of not being minorities
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Speaker 1: and not being oppressed, they actually oppress people without thinking
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Speaker 1: about it and without knowing it. They have privilege that
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Speaker 1: they're not even aware of, and literally the phrase is,
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Speaker 1: you don't know what you don't know. So you have
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Speaker 1: to be taught how racist you are, but nobody has
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Speaker 1: to teach me when you're racist. That's ethnic Gnosticism. And
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Speaker 1: it's a problematic idea. It is rooted, I would argue,
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Speaker 1: in cultural Marxism that reduces everything to race, class, sex, gender,
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Speaker 1: that divides people up, not like classical Marxism that divides
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Speaker 1: people up into the bourgeois and the proletariat between the
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Speaker 1: haves and the have-nots, between those who control means of
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Speaker 1: production and those who don't control means of production. But
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Speaker 1: in cultural Marxism, you divide the world between those who
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Speaker 1: establish and benefit from the cultural hegemony and everyone else
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Speaker 1: who is oppressed by it because, for one reason or another,
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Speaker 1: they are not part of that dominant group. This idea
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Speaker 1: is rooted in that. And it's not just a black-white thing.
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Speaker 1: This idea of ethnic Gnosticism goes beyond that. Because if
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Speaker 1: a transgender person, you guys understand the difference between transgender, transsexual,
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Speaker 1: and you got all of this down, right? Transgender just
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Speaker 1: means that my body is one way and my feelings
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Speaker 1: are another way. Transsexual means I go under the knife
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Speaker 1: to do something about it. And so if I am
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Speaker 1: a trans person and I'm in a store and somebody
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Speaker 1: looks at me a certain way, I know when you're
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Speaker 1: judging me for that. If I am a homosexual person,
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Speaker 1: I know when you are judging and oppressing me for that.
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Speaker 1: If I am I know when you are oppressing or
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Speaker 1: judging me for the fact that I am a woman.
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Speaker 1: Because being in these particular groups and going through life
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Speaker 1: and experiencing these things over and over and over again
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Speaker 1: puts one in a situation where you just know. And
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Speaker 1: being in a dominant group where you don't have to
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Speaker 1: worry about such things puts you in a setting and
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Speaker 1: situation where you literally know. don't know what you don't know.
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Speaker 1: You are a racist, bigot, homophobic, transphobic, everything else phobic
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Speaker 1: person that you could possibly be, whether you're aware of
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Speaker 1: it or not. Whether you belong to Christ or you don't,
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Speaker 1: because apparently Christ can transform us and deal with all
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Speaker 1: other sorts of sins, but this one, this one somehow
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Speaker 1: evades the cross. And all people, whether they're Christian or not,
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Speaker 1: are still suffering from this one. Also, this idea is
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Speaker 1: rooted in cultural Marxism because it's based on the concept
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Speaker 1: that my identity is determined by the group to which
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Speaker 1: I belong. That is the major essence of my identity.
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Speaker 1: My My group. It could be my ethnicity. It could
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Speaker 1: be my gender. It could be my, you know, so-called
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Speaker 1: sexual orientation. It could be any of these things, but
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Speaker 1: that is the essence of who I am. And finally,
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Speaker 1: my identity is understood in the context of our struggle.
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Speaker 1: this idea of our shared cultural experience and identity. Media
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Speaker 1: portrayals have a great deal to do with this. And
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Speaker 1: it's interesting because it's kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy. So
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Speaker 1: I am part of a particular group. Say for me,
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Speaker 1: I'm a black person and I'm born into my culture,
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Speaker 1: I'm born into my ethnicity, born into my environment, and
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Speaker 1: my family sort of shapes my understanding of who I
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Speaker 1: am but also when I see images of myself in
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Speaker 1: the media that can also positively or negatively begin to
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Speaker 1: shape who I think I am. And we know that
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Speaker 1: portrayals in the media are always accurate. Stereotypes. Stereotypes. This
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Speaker 1: is another big part of it. And stereotypes are a
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Speaker 1: normal part of life. with our children the other day and,
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Speaker 1: you know, walking with the seven youngest children and somebody,
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Speaker 1: you know, looks at them and seen them before and
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Speaker 1: talking about how big they're getting and, you know, asked, hey,
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Speaker 1: they play in sports? And I said, no, actually, they're
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Speaker 1: all musicians. They're all really concentrating on music right now
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Speaker 1: and not doing anything. Ha! Looks like you ought to
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Speaker 1: have a basketball team. Now, I say that and I
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Speaker 1: see some of you shaking your heads, right? Because you're thinking, stereotype, right?
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Speaker 1: You're thinking, it's racist, right? It was a black family. member.
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Speaker 1: Now let me ask you the next question. Why is
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Speaker 1: it that a black family member can say that to me,
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Speaker 1: and it's not racist, but if a white person said
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Speaker 1: it to me, Do you see what I'm saying? This
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Speaker 1: is the problem that we run into here. And what's
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Speaker 1: the determining factor? The determining factor is me because I
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Speaker 1: know this is the problem with ethnic Gnosticism. I know,
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Speaker 1: not only do I know, but you don't know. And
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Speaker 1: you can say until you're blue in the face that
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Speaker 1: you didn't mean it that way. But if I received
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Speaker 1: it that way, then I get the right to determine
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Speaker 1: that that's what it was. Do you see what this
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Speaker 1: does to us? Because on the one hand, this is
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Speaker 1: about trusting your heart. Jeremiah 17.9 says, The heart is
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Speaker 1: deceitful above all things and desperately sick. Who can understand it?
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Speaker 1: I can understand my own heart, and I'm going to
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Speaker 1: tell you what's in yours? But this is precisely what
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Speaker 1: we're prone to do. Now, as I say this, let
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Speaker 1: me hurry to acknowledge a couple of things. That ethnicity
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Speaker 1: is not a bad thing. Culture, not a bad thing. Nationality,
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Speaker 1: not a bad thing. These are good and natural connections.
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Speaker 1: Ethnic and national identity is both good and important. And
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Speaker 1: I need to hurry to say this because some of
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Speaker 1: my dearest friends and brothers, in fact, some who were probably,
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Speaker 1: some who were signers of the document with us, would
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Speaker 1: want to argue for being colorblind. And I say, that
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Speaker 1: dog won't hunt. Number one, because nobody is. And number two,
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Speaker 1: Because it is an affront to God. God didn't give
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Speaker 1: me all this rich, beautiful melanin so that you could
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Speaker 1: act like I don't have it. Amen, somebody. And it
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Speaker 1: is wrong for me to judge you for not having
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Speaker 1: as much. God did this, people. God did this. And
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Speaker 1: it's a good thing. And natural thing that God has
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Speaker 1: done for us to say that we want to be
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Speaker 1: colorblind is for us to say, I don't care about
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Speaker 1: the variety of color of roses there are. As far
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Speaker 1: as I'm concerned, God just made a rose. Why did
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Speaker 1: he bother to make them all those different colors? If
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Speaker 1: he did, praise him for it. Amen? And I know,
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Speaker 1: I know what we're trying to say when we say that.
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Speaker 1: I know what we're trying to get at when we
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Speaker 1: talk about being colorblind. But if I'm going to say
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Speaker 1: on the one hand, let's be careful about using the
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Speaker 1: terminology of social justice, then I have to also be
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Speaker 1: even-handed and on the other hand say, let's be careful
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Speaker 1: about using terminologies like being colorblind and Because that's not right.
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Speaker 1: It's not possible, number one. And it's not right. And
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Speaker 1: I love it because when people say that, when people say,
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Speaker 1: you know, I'm colorblind and I don't see color, immediately
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Speaker 1: they start giving you evidence. And what's the evidence? The
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Speaker 1: evidence is that I have friends who are this color
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Speaker 1: and I have friends who are that color and I
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Speaker 1: don't have... How do you know that if you don't
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Speaker 1: see it? But what we're trying to say is something different,
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Speaker 1: something good and something important. But let's say that. We'll
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Speaker 1: get to that. What is so good about it? Ethnic
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Speaker 1: and national identity is a conduit for culture and tradition.
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Speaker 1: And that's important. That's good. You know, when we leave
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Speaker 1: and we go on vacation, if you leave and you
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Speaker 1: go on vacation and you travel to another country, When
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Speaker 1: you leave and go on a vacation and travel to
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Speaker 1: another country, you come back with pictures. Usually it's not
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Speaker 1: pictures of the things that are exactly like the culture
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Speaker 1: and tradition at home. Usually you want to show people
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Speaker 1: the beauty of the culture and tradition that you saw
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Speaker 1: over there that is not like your own. Huh? And
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Speaker 1: that's a good thing. Amen? This whole colorblind idea runs
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Speaker 1: us away from that. Ethnic and national identity teaches us
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Speaker 1: dependence and humility. How so? No single group possesses all
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Speaker 1: the good. Amen. I belong to a group that has
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Speaker 1: strengths and I belong to a group that has weaknesses.
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Speaker 1: I look at other groups of people who are strong
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Speaker 1: where I may be weak and who may be weak
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Speaker 1: where I'm strong. And I learn dependency and humility by
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Speaker 1: learning that. No single group possesses all knowledge. Praise God
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Speaker 1: for that. You know, one of the great things about
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Speaker 1: America is that unlike most of the world, and again,
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Speaker 1: this is something that has just come crashing down on
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Speaker 1: me living in Zambia. I live in a very heterogeneous culture.
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Speaker 1: Most of the world is very heterogeneous. In most countries
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Speaker 1: in the world, People are of the same ethnicity and
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Speaker 1: the same background and the same culture. They look alike.
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Speaker 1: In the Olympics, right? When you see the Olympics, you know,
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Speaker 1: the people from this country, they look like that. The
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Speaker 1: people from that country, they look like that. That's most
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Speaker 1: of the world. And then here's America. We got people
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Speaker 1: who look like everybody else's country. And one of the
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Speaker 1: greatnesses of America is how highest class, and best from
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Speaker 1: cultures all around the world come together to make it
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Speaker 1: higher and better. That's good. I don't want to live
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Speaker 1: in a world where we ignore that. It's not right
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Speaker 1: to live in a world where we ignore that. That's good.
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Speaker 1: Ethnic and national identity teaches providence. teaches providence. Every culture,
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Speaker 1: every nationality, every ethnicity has a history that they can trace.
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Speaker 1: My ethnicity teaches me about providence. Knowing who I come from,
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Speaker 1: how we got here, and how by God's grace we survived,
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Speaker 1: that teaches me about the providence of God. I've been
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Speaker 1: living and serving in Africa for the last three and
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Speaker 1: a half years and I've been reminded almost every day
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Speaker 1: it's amazing that my ancestors were torn away from that
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Speaker 1: continent and experienced the horrors of slavery and now I
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Speaker 1: was born in the center of the universe in the
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Speaker 1: greatest nation that has ever existed in the history of
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Speaker 1: the world and The healthiest, wealthiest, most educated, most prosperous
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Speaker 1: black people on planet Earth are in America. Where else
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Speaker 1: on this planet do black people want to go and live?
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Speaker 1: That's better than this. What is that? That's providence, people. Providence.
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Speaker 1: Would anyone have chosen that path? Absolutely not. But you
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Speaker 1: look back on it and see providence. If you ignore
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Speaker 1: culture and ethnicity, you don't see providence. You learn about
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Speaker 1: the consequences of sin. Important lesson to learn about the
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Speaker 1: multi-generational consequences of sin. And by the way, Let me
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Speaker 1: just put a pin here and say this. Because I
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Speaker 1: think this is a lesson that we need to learn.
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Speaker 1: And if we're not careful, again, we talk about the
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Speaker 1: tribalism and the way that we're addressing all of these issues.
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Speaker 1: And everybody who's been up here has acknowledged the fact
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Speaker 1: that there are great issues and ills and evils and
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Speaker 1: all of these other things that need to be addressed.
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Speaker 1: But please don't miss this. One of the reasons... that
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Speaker 1: we are going through what we're going through right now.
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Speaker 1: is because, to quote Malcolm X, yeah, I'm about to
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Speaker 1: quote Malcolm X here at church, America's chickens have come
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Speaker 1: home to roost. There is great sin in our history
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Speaker 1: atrocities that have been committed against people in this country.
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Speaker 1: And you don't get to do that and not have
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Speaker 1: consequences later on down the line. Let's not miss that
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Speaker 1: when we talk about this. Let's not let the only
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Speaker 1: thing that we do when we talk to our children
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Speaker 1: about this is say, yeah, yeah, these people are using,
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Speaker 1: you know, this language, and they're talking about these issues,
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Speaker 1: and they're making this everything, and you know... That may
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Speaker 1: be true, but it's also true that what we're dealing
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Speaker 1: with today is the fruit of horrible sins and atrocities.
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Speaker 1: And you don't have to be a social justice warrior
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Speaker 1: to acknowledge that. Amen? Amen? But ethnic and national identity
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Speaker 1: is not everything. It's important. But it's not everything. So
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Speaker 1: how do we handle this? How do we balance this?
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Speaker 1: I think we have an example. Look with me in
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Speaker 1: Romans chapter 9. And let's look briefly here. And talk
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Speaker 1: about it a better way. Look at what Paul says
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Speaker 1: in Romans chapter 9, beginning verse 1. I'm speaking the
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Speaker 1: truth in Christ. I'm not lying. My conscience bears me
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Speaker 1: witness in the Holy Spirit that I have great sorrow
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Speaker 1: and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish
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Speaker 1: that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ
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Speaker 1: for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to
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Speaker 1: the flesh. I love my people. That's what Paul's saying here.
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Speaker 1: My kinsmen according to the flesh. Paul is not saying
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Speaker 1: I'm colorblind. Ethnicity means nothing to me. I'm a citizen
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Speaker 1: of the kingdom of Christ and I don't even think
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Speaker 1: about those people anymore. That's wrong. That's not biblical. That's wrong.
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Speaker 1: He speaks in the most passionate terms imaginable about the
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Speaker 1: group to which He, by God's grace and by God's providence, belongs.
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Speaker 1: It matters. It's important. It's important. And here's the great irony.
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Speaker 1: The great irony is there are people who don't understand
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Speaker 1: this when they see it in certain minority groups. But
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Speaker 1: then when you ask them about their family, they can
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Speaker 1: tell you what percentage Scottish and what Scottish and what
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Speaker 1: percentage Irish and you know, what boat their ancestors came
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Speaker 1: over on and all of these wonderful things, right? Hold
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Speaker 1: on to that. But don't hold on to that and
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Speaker 1: then tell me to forget my ethnicity. Amen, somebody. Ethnic
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Speaker 1: Gnosticism is broken and sinful. And And I'm here to
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Speaker 1: speak against it. But I don't want you to get
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Speaker 1: confused and think that somehow I'm arguing that one's ethnicity
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Speaker 1: is unimportant. Paul makes this painfully clear. I could wish
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Speaker 1: that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ
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Speaker 1: for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen, according to
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Speaker 1: the flesh. You don't get more passionate than that. And
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Speaker 1: then look at what he says. They are Israelites and
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Speaker 1: to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the
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Speaker 1: giving of the law, the worship and the promises. To
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Speaker 1: them belong the patriarchs and from their race according to
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Speaker 1: the flesh. is Christ, who is God overall, blessed forever.
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Speaker 1: He's specific, not only this group of individuals, but what
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Speaker 1: is he so passionate about with this group of individuals?
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Speaker 1: And he looks at providence. Providence. He's not saying merely
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Speaker 1: our skin color, merely our geographic location, merely our, oh,
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Speaker 1: more than that. But then there are limits to this connection.
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Speaker 1: And I love the fact that it's not an either or.
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Speaker 1: Look with me beginning in verse 6. But it is
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Speaker 1: not as though the word of God has failed. That's
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Speaker 1: just because you might think that, right? That I love
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Speaker 1: these people and my kinsmen and all I want is
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Speaker 1: them and all I God, what have you done? How
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Speaker 1: have you No, it's not as though the word of
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Speaker 1: God has failed. For not all who are descended from
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Speaker 1: Israel belong to Israel. Not all are children of Abraham
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Speaker 1: because they are his offspring. But through Isaac shall your
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Speaker 1: offspring be named. This means that it is not the
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Speaker 1: children of the flesh who are the children of God,
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Speaker 1: but the children of the promise are counted as offspring.
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Speaker 1: Our connection to Christ is more important. Amen. Our connection
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Speaker 1: to Christ is more important. There's a ditch on both
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Speaker 1: sides of the road, folks. There's a ditch on the
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Speaker 1: side of the road that tries to act colorblind and
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Speaker 1: act like ethnicity doesn't matter and act like ethnicity is unimportant.
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Speaker 1: And there's a ditch on the other side of the
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Speaker 1: road that says it's everything. And that we start there
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Speaker 1: and not with the cross. There's a ditch on both
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Speaker 1: sides of the road. And this is the huge problem
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Speaker 1: with ethnic Gnosticism, or at least one of them. So
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Speaker 1: what is the danger? What does this do in the
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Speaker 1: time that we have? What does this do? Number one,
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Speaker 1: I think it compromises genuine relationships. I alluded to this earlier.
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Speaker 1: The fact that there has been a false unity that
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Speaker 1: has been exposed through these controversies. And people who, you know,
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Speaker 1: were brothers from another mother. And now this comes up.
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Speaker 1: And if you say the wrong thing or come down
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Speaker 1: on the wrong side of a particular issue, all of
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Speaker 1: a sudden you are anathema. That's not genuine relationships. And listen,
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Speaker 1: even down on that micro level, if I assume that
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Speaker 1: I can read your heart, And you have to assume
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Speaker 1: you don't know what you don't know. We've created a
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Speaker 1: relationship that is imbalanced, that hinders our intimacy. I mean,
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Speaker 1: think about that. Who wants to have a relationship with
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Speaker 1: someone where you, to the best of your ability, are
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Speaker 1: loving this person? But if the wrong thing slides out
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Speaker 1: of your mouth at the wrong time, that you, in
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Speaker 1: all sincerity... meant to be a blessing, and they determine
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Speaker 1: that regardless of what you think about it, this is
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Speaker 1: what it actually was, and it is an affront to
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Speaker 1: me and a sin against God himself. What kind of
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Speaker 1: relationship is that? And I'm seeing it all over the place.
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Speaker 1: I get emails several times a week from people. pastors,
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Speaker 1: church members, leaders of ministries, who for years, for decades,
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Speaker 1: have been faithful, who are found to hold the wrong
29:24
Speaker 1: position on some case in the media, or who are
29:28
Speaker 1: found to not think highly enough about some particular approach
29:36
Speaker 1: or to a social justice issue and now all of
29:38
Speaker 1: a sudden you're done. You're done. We remove you like
29:49
Speaker 1: a monument in a southern university. We're done. We're not
30:03
Speaker 1: even sure Jonathan Edwards was a Christian anymore. Literally. Literally.
30:21
Speaker 1: This hinders genuine relationships. When we can't be honest with
30:29
Speaker 1: each other. Where we are not free to err That's
30:35
Speaker 1: not a genuine relationship. Ethnic Gnosticism is destroying genuine relationships. Secondly,
30:44
Speaker 1: this idea of guilt and innocence being inherited. This idea
30:57
Speaker 1: that because of who your parents were, you've inherited guilt
31:02
Speaker 1: or you've inherited innocence. That white people can't not be racist.
31:09
Speaker 1: And black people can't be racist. Yeah. Because, you know,
31:15
Speaker 1: the modern definition of racism. Prejudice plus power. What's the power?
31:20
Speaker 1: The power is the cultural hegemony. If you are not
31:24
Speaker 1: part of the cultural hegemony, then you technically can't be
31:27
Speaker 1: a racist. How about that? How about that? So a
31:39
Speaker 1: predominantly white church that doesn't have black members is in sin.
31:42
Speaker 1: But a predominantly black church that doesn't have white members is...
31:50
Speaker 1: It just is. One of those groups needs to repent
31:57
Speaker 1: and sack cloth and ashes. And the other? There's nothing wrong.
32:12
Speaker 1: John McWhorter calls this the religion of racialism. Comes along
32:20
Speaker 1: with what I talked about earlier, this idea of tokenism
32:26
Speaker 1: and suspicion. You have no, like black preachers in reformed
32:38
Speaker 1: evangelical circles right now commodities. And the question is not,
32:47
Speaker 1: this guy is at this conference, is he worth hearing?
32:54
Speaker 1: This guy is at this conference. Ah, why'd they get
32:57
Speaker 1: that guy? Tom alluded earlier to statement that was made
33:10
Speaker 1: by Matt Chandler at MLK 50 where Matt just openly
33:17
Speaker 1: in one of his presentations talked about their desire in
33:21
Speaker 1: their church planting to have black leaders of their church
33:27
Speaker 1: plants and said if I have to choose between a
33:34
Speaker 1: white guy who's an 8 and a black guy who's
33:37
Speaker 1: a 7 I'm going to take the black guy That's tokenism.
33:44
Speaker 1: That's tokenism. And Matt was speaking out of a passionate
33:54
Speaker 1: desire to see reconciliation. Let me use that one example
34:12
Speaker 1: What I'm talking about here. Because, again, one person's social
34:19
Speaker 1: justice is another person's atrocity. I went to school at
34:28
Speaker 1: the University of Oxford in England. Some people think I
34:31
Speaker 1: went to Oxford because I'm pretentious. But I did the
34:36
Speaker 1: last year of my D-Man at Southeastern as the first
34:39
Speaker 1: year of the D-Phil at Oxford. I didn't just want
34:43
Speaker 1: to get a second doctoral degree. I wasn't just not
34:47
Speaker 1: a glutton for whatever. But why Oxford? Do you know
34:51
Speaker 1: one of the main reasons that I did that? It's
34:55
Speaker 1: because if I left the United States and went to
34:59
Speaker 1: a school in the UK, no one could accuse the
35:03
Speaker 1: institution of granting me my degree because of tokenism or
35:10
Speaker 1: affirmative action. I was sick and tired of the assumptions
35:21
Speaker 1: that people make because of this attitude that says, your
35:30
Speaker 1: skin color makes you the weaker brother, and we have
35:33
Speaker 1: to lower the standard for you. And again, Matt would
35:41
Speaker 1: never say that. Matt would never intend that. But to many,
35:57
Speaker 1: that's exactly what he said. And here's the interesting thing.
36:10
Speaker 1: If you are saying that in the midst of your
36:13
Speaker 1: penance over your white privilege, you get a pass. Because
36:22
Speaker 1: of this religion of racialism. Listen to this. from John McWhorter.
36:26
Speaker 1: If you don't know John McWhorter, you need to know
36:28
Speaker 1: John McWhorter. An article that he wrote entitled Atonement as Activism.
36:37
Speaker 1: And it's a bit lengthy, but I think you'll understand
36:42
Speaker 1: why it's worth it. There's several things I want to
36:45
Speaker 1: lift from this. Just listen to what he says. This
36:49
Speaker 1: brand of self-flagellation has become the new form of enlightenment
36:54
Speaker 1: on race issues. It qualifies as a kind of worship.
36:58
Speaker 1: The parallels with Christianity are almost uncannily rich. White privilege
37:03
Speaker 1: is the secular white person's original sin. Present at birth
37:09
Speaker 1: and ultimately ineradicable. One does one's penance by endlessly attesting
37:16
Speaker 1: to this privilege in hope of some kind of forgiveness.
37:21
Speaker 1: This new cult of atonement is less about black people
37:25
Speaker 1: than white people. That's the great irony. 50 years ago,
37:29
Speaker 1: a white person learning about the race problem came away asking,
37:32
Speaker 1: how can I help? Today, the same person too often
37:36
Speaker 1: comes away asking, how can I show that I'm a
37:39
Speaker 1: moral person? Another problem is that I'm not sure that
37:47
Speaker 1: today's educated whites quite understand how unattainable the absolution they
37:53
Speaker 1: are seeking is. You'll never be sorry enough. We have
38:00
Speaker 1: gone from most whites being unaware that racism was a
38:04
Speaker 1: problem for black people at all to whites being chilled
38:08
Speaker 1: to their bones at the possibility of harboring racism in
38:11
Speaker 1: their souls, terrified at the prospect of being singled out
38:15
Speaker 1: as a heretic and forgetting that the indulgences they purchase
38:20
Speaker 1: and the praying they do for their souls has more
38:23
Speaker 1: to do with them than with anyone black. Irony of ironies.
38:37
Speaker 1: We're being driven farther apart by this. This idea that
38:45
Speaker 1: you don't know what you don't know and And don't
38:49
Speaker 1: tell me because I know. Don't try to explain yourself
38:53
Speaker 1: because I know. I talked about it earlier. People who
38:59
Speaker 1: have been for decades serving their communities, loving their brothers
39:04
Speaker 1: and sisters, who all of a sudden run into the
39:09
Speaker 1: religion of racialism, and say, I don't care about that.
39:19
Speaker 1: I don't care about that. I don't care that you
39:24
Speaker 1: have been marching at abortion clinics for two decades because
39:29
Speaker 1: of this. slaughter of black babies. I want to know
39:36
Speaker 1: how sorry you are about the latest issue. And it's
39:50
Speaker 1: never enough. Those aren't genuine relationships. That will never lead
40:01
Speaker 1: to genuine relationships. Because in genuine relationships, I have to
40:10
Speaker 1: be free. I've got to be free to be wrong
40:19
Speaker 1: and have you love me and correct me, and not
40:24
Speaker 1: just dismiss my whole person. I mean, because essentially what's
40:32
Speaker 1: happening in many circles is that there are people who,
40:36
Speaker 1: regardless of what it is that they've done, regardless of
40:39
Speaker 1: who it is that they've been, if they slip up
40:42
Speaker 1: on one of these issues, You quote the wrong person.
40:55
Speaker 1: You come down on the wrong side of an issue
40:57
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden the rest of your life
41:00
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. You just proved that all of that was
41:07
Speaker 1: a lie because you, my friend, are a racist. And
41:12
Speaker 1: racism is the new unpardonable sin. This was on display
41:24
Speaker 1: at MLK 50. Martin Luther King, a serial adulterer who
41:30
Speaker 1: denied essential tenets of the Christian faith. We have people
41:45
Speaker 1: who are now arguing, oh, he was okay. That Edwards, though.
41:57
Speaker 1: That Edwards. Schools unnaming things that were named for Jonathan Edwards. Why?
42:16
Speaker 1: Because he owns slaves. And that is an unpardonable sin.
42:29
Speaker 1: Here's my thing. I have quoted Jonathan Edwards. I have
42:36
Speaker 1: quoted Martin Luther King Jr. Why? Because here's where I'm
42:46
Speaker 1: not willing to go. I won't and I can't live
42:50
Speaker 1: in a world where before I can quote a right
42:56
Speaker 1: and true statement by someone, I have to retrace their
43:00
Speaker 1: life to make sure that I am confident that they
43:05
Speaker 1: went to heaven when they died. Huh? Gandhi said some
43:15
Speaker 1: stuff that's true. Amen? But not today Today where we stand,
43:34
Speaker 1: there is a new unpardonable sin. And those who are
43:41
Speaker 1: presumed guilty of that unpardonable sin must be dismissed, must
43:47
Speaker 1: be castigated, must be torn down, must be done away with.
43:55
Speaker 1: Now you put these two things together. That is the
44:01
Speaker 1: unpardonable sin that undoes everything else that you've done. And
44:07
Speaker 1: by the way, in order to be declared guilty of it,
44:17
Speaker 1: somebody just needs to feel like that's what you meant.
44:36
Speaker 1: Are we there yet? By God's grace, we're not. But
44:42
Speaker 1: it is foreseeable, is it not? There are great ills,
45:02
Speaker 1: great sins, great problems. great wrongs that need to be rectified.
45:11
Speaker 1: All that's true. God has given us a way to
45:17
Speaker 1: deal with those things, to rectify those things. He's given
45:23
Speaker 1: us His all-sufficient Word to deal with those things. Let
45:34
Speaker 1: us Trust the Word of God. Not our feelings. Not
45:39
Speaker 1: our inclinations. Not our own personal assumptions or assertions. But
45:52
Speaker 1: the Word of God. Let us do what the book says.
46:01
Speaker 1: And I'll leave you with this. If I speak with
46:09
Speaker 1: tongues of men and angels but have not love, I'm
46:14
Speaker 1: a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I
46:19
Speaker 1: have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge,
46:23
Speaker 1: and if I have all faith so as to remove
46:26
Speaker 1: mountains but have not love, I am nothing. If I
46:30
Speaker 1: give away all I have and if I deliver up
46:32
Speaker 1: my body to be burned but have not love, I
46:36
Speaker 1: gain nothing. Listen to this. And here's what I want
46:44
Speaker 1: you to do. I want you to listen to this
46:47
Speaker 1: for you. Because this is another great irony of ethnic Gnosticism.
46:51
Speaker 1: Another great irony is that sometimes, and I'm just speaking
46:54
Speaker 1: for myself, sometimes I feel like I'm being robbed of
46:59
Speaker 1: my sanctification. What do I mean by that? What I
47:05
Speaker 1: mean by that is if these issues that we're dealing with,
47:09
Speaker 1: that are now at the forefront, if these issues are
47:13
Speaker 1: only about the hearts of white people that need to
47:16
Speaker 1: be made right, then the stuff in me doesn't get
47:19
Speaker 1: dealt with. And I want you to know that as
47:28
Speaker 1: I'm reading this, I'm reading this for me. And I'm
47:32
Speaker 1: asking myself, what does this mean for you when a
47:37
Speaker 1: white brother says something that is offensive. What do you do?
47:48
Speaker 1: Do you fold your arms and wait for him to
47:50
Speaker 1: be sorry? What do you do? What does a non-black
48:03
Speaker 1: person do if they run into ethnic Gnosticism and feel
48:07
Speaker 1: like it's not fair? What do you do? The answer
48:10
Speaker 1: is here. Love is patient and kind. Love does not
48:15
Speaker 1: envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It
48:18
Speaker 1: does not insist on its own way. It is not
48:23
Speaker 1: irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but
48:27
Speaker 1: rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things,
48:33
Speaker 1: hopes all things, endures all things. That's what my book says.
48:46
Speaker 1: Not if you happen to say something that offends me,
48:56
Speaker 1: I now have the right to not be bound by this. Amen?
49:10
Speaker 1: That's me reading this for me. And I'm saying, you
49:13
Speaker 1: read this for you. Because I'm afraid that what's happened
49:17
Speaker 1: is we sort of faced off on these issues. and
49:22
Speaker 1: have dismissed one another in many ways and in many instances,
49:27
Speaker 1: and we can't do that. Not if we believe this.
49:41
Speaker 1: Not if we believe this. So let us speak to
49:48
Speaker 1: the great ills and evils and sins of our day.
49:53
Speaker 1: Let us proclaim and trust in the gospel of Christ
49:58
Speaker 1: above all else. And let us never ever forget that
50:05
Speaker 1: all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
50:09
Speaker 1: And that we are all in desperate need of His grace.
50:13
Speaker 1: And that none of us is exempt. Let's pray.