Category Archives: Christianity

A Sermon on Christian Unity: The Proto-Kinism of PCA Founder John E. Richards

(The founding of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) was the work of many men, but in any list of those most essential to its founding, along with names like Kenneth Keyes, Paul Settle, Morton Smith, and Jack Williamson, the name of Dr. John Edwards Richards would most certainly be found in a prominent position. Richards helped organize and lead Presbyterian Churchmen United, one of the four bodies that brought the PCA into being. In 1969, Richards and an associate led this group in publishing a Declaration of Commitment to the Word of God in 30 major newspapers, which was signed by over 500 ministers. In 1972, he retired from the pastorate to serve as the administrator for the Steering Committee for a Continuing Presbyterian Church, and spent much of his time traveling to churches to present the issues and debate liberal opponents. He was elected to prepare the docket for the first ever General Assembly, and literally wrote the book on the founding of the PCA, The Historical Birth of the Presbyterian Church in America, from which the following is extracted. At the main campus of Reformed Theological Seminary, the professorial chair for systematic and historical theology is named in his honor (ironically, a position held today by social justice warrior Ligon Duncan). It is difficult to overstate Richards’ contribution to the founding of the PCA. read more

God’s Law is the Rule of Life in All Spheres of Authority

The following was prompted by a discussion with a friend regarding the Westminster Confession of Faith’s treatment of the judicial/civil division of the Law, as well as the 1788 American revisions to WCF 23:3. Despite the digression at the end to focus on these specific issues, I hope it might serve as a general introduction to the continuing and general applicability of God’s Law in the modern world. ~ Mickey Henry

In order for a worldview to be a worldview, it must possess some conception of metaphysics (nature of reality: origins, mind/matter, time, causation, etc.), teleology (purpose/ultimate ends), and epistemology (how we know what we know), as well as a system of ethics; that is, a code of right behavior. The source of a worldview’s code of right behavior, its ethics/morals/law, is the ultimate authority of that worldview (i.e., its “god”). For example, if man or one of man’s institutions determines right behavior, then man is the ultimate authority of that worldview. Within any worldview, there are multiple spheres of authority: individual, family, church, civil government, association, business, etc. The nature of sphere authority, its source, order of precedence, degree of autonomy, and so forth, may be different from one worldview to the next, but these basic categories are inescapable for man (attempts by communists and other egalitarian revolutionaries to annihilate any one of these spheres has always ultimately resulted in failure). In a non-syncretic worldview, that is, one that is self-consistent, homogeneous, and stable, all authority spheres operate within the same ethical framework. While there is variability between authority spheres in emphasis as well as permissible penal sanctions, in a self-consistent worldview there is one law system for all. Since all ethical/legal systems, by nature, distinguish between should and should not, neutrality is a metaphysical impossibility. read more

PCA Prepares to Anathematize the Sin of Noticing at 44th GA

The many social justice warriors in leadership positions with the Presbyterian Church in America are working furiously to prepare new and exciting overtures for the 44th General Assembly, upcoming in June. The PCA is hopeful that these new resolutions will atone for the many sins of the old Southern Presbyterians while helping the burgeoning denomination to win social acceptance and the approval of popularly recognized authority figures. Top on the list of new proposals: a formal anathematization of the sin of noticing. The proposal’s co-author, Dr. Sean Lucas, explained, “While the contemptible baseness of noticing is evident to any Christian with a social conscience, we in the PCA want to be at the forefront of formally denouncing this great evil. Too long, we in the faith community have tolerated noticing when we should have been the first to condemn it. As Dr. Tim Keller taught us in Deconstructing Defeater Beliefs, an integral part of Gospel Neighboring is increasing Gospel Attractiveness by connecting the Gospel with baseline cultural narratives, and thereby diminishing Gospel Exclusiveness. We want to make our cities great places for everyone. Nothing I can think of would more broadly increase the appeal of the Gospel to our postmodern society than condemning the sin of noticing.” read more

Satan’s Conspiratorial War on Man

The foundation for comprehending a conspiratorial view of human events is a proper understanding of Satanology. The greatest trick Satan ever pulled was convincing people he doesn’t exist, and the modern church is complicit in this, having allowed the influence of anti-supernatural rationalism to make demonology and Satanology taboo topics. In the high churches, if mentioned at all, Satan has been abstracted to the level of irrelevance. In the low churches, where some mention does still occur, he has been demoted to a meddlesome provocateur of ordinary human sinfulness, and made a scapegoat thereof. read more

American Vision’s Joel McDurmon Turns His Back on the South

The noisome corpse of institutional theonomy just keeps moldering, but no one seems to care enough to bury it. When I was first introduced to Christian Reconstruction in the early ‘90s, Rushdoony was for the sociologists, Bahnsen the philosophers, North the economists, and American Vision for the neophytes. Today, the heirs of Rushdoony and Bahnsen are in archive mode while North busies himself spawning zany get-rich-quick schemes and writing three and four word sentences extolling the virtues of Walmart to the disciples of anti-Christ Ludwig Von Mises. American Vision is the only organization that is not obviously moribund, though its eternal sophomore president, Gary Demar, continues to disappoint. read more

PCA Repents for Failure to Demand Onesimus’ Freedom

Delegates at the PCA’s 43rd General Assembly

The Tim Keller Cult, commonly known as the Presbyterian Church in America, held its 43rd General Assembly (GA) last week. Several social justice warriors/teaching elders (SJW/TE) presented a resolution that the PCA repent of its role in St. Paul’s failure to demand the immediate manumission of Onesimus in his famous letter to the vile slave owner Philemon.

Onesimus and Philemon

SJW/TE J. Ligon Bonhoeffer explained to his fellow delegates, “It’s been over nineteen centuries, but we are called to repent for the sins of other Christians, no matter how long ago they occurred. Clearly, St. Paul was guilty of the inexcusable sin of racism, wickedly believed in the moral permissibility of slavery, spent much of his ministry microaggressing against women, and heinously insulted LGBTQ persons on more than one occasion. Who knows? If he were alive today, he may have even been guilty of the grievous sin of Holocaust trivialization. He made nasty racist generalizations about the Cretans (Titus 1:12-13), shockingly defined ‘his’ people by race rather than creed (Romans 9:3), and claimed that we have a greater responsibility to our blood relatives than to poor, starving people in Haiti and Nepal (1 Timothy 5:8). I won’t even tell you how long Caitlyn Jenner cried after she read Romans 1. The PCA must disassociate itself from this man’s hurtful words!” He received a standing ovation and many a “Hear, hear!” Numerous delegates quietly relayed to Tribal Theocrat that they’d privately held this conviction for some time, and were greatly encouraged that “the Ligster” was brave enough to publicly come out of the closet against St. Paul’s racism and hate. read more

Christmas Charity (Who needs it?)

The following is a fine piece of writing by my friend Rusty. I’m sharing it here with his permission. ~ Mickey Henry

Last week after leaving work I was in a very good mood and had finally gotten a little bit into the Christmas spirit. The traffic was terrible (at least from a country boy’s point of view) and I was anxious to see the city limit sign that greets me every week day on my way home from work. When I see that sign it means that I’m on a four lane highway and can set my cruise control and move along at a healthy pace to the house. Besides that, this was Friday and I didn’t have to work Saturday. Life was good. read more

A Taxonomy for Comprehending the Occult

Non-Christian thought is a bottomless pit, and one can easily consume himself in its study. Nevertheless, while it is better to comprehend the truth, it is foolhardy to remain ignorant of our enemies. Towards that end, I’ve found the following to be an extremely useful guide when comparing esoteric traditions like Freemasonry, Theosophy, the New Age movement, Kabbalahism, Mormonism, etc. From The Western Esoteric Traditions, by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke:

Taking the Renaissance concordance of Neoplatonism, Hermeticism, and Kabbalah, along with astrology, alchemy, and magic, Faivre deduced six fundamental characteristics of esoteric spirituality. The ﬁrst four of these he described as intrinsic in the sense of all being necessary for a spirituality to be deﬁned as esoteric. To these he added two more characteristics, which although not necessary, are frequently found together with the others in esoteric traditions. read more

Is Segregation Scriptural?

Nathanael Strickland of Faith & Heritage interacts with a 1960 sermon from Bob Jones:

Kinism is often accused of being a new invention by our multiracialist Alienist opponents. Our response is that, while the name may be new, our beliefs are the same as historical Christianity; we are forced to take on a new name for ourselves due to the Marxist hijacking of modern Christianity. While they may sit in control of the denominations and speak for what passes as Christianity at present, it is their views which are the new invention. We are the true heirs of the Christian tradition, and our views are the ones holding continuity with the past. The first part of this proof is offered by the Alienists themselves. That they must so thoroughly condemn and apologize for their forefathers betrays their discontinuity. This alone should be enough, but as further and more concrete proof, I offer the following sermon by Bob Jones Sr. from 1960, entitled “Is Segregation Scriptural?” In 1960, Protestantism was the predominant religion in the South, and Bob Jones Sr. was one of the most prominent figures in the Protestant South. Bob Jones Sr. was the founder and first president of Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina, which, along with Pensacola Christian College in Florida, was and still is one of the most influential fundamentalist Christian institutions in the region and even the country. His disagreements with Billy Graham were a large contributing factor to the split between fundamentalists and evangelicals in 1957. He helped pioneer the practice of giving sermons on the radio, which in fact is how this particular sermon was given. Thus it is reasonable to say that his views in this sermon are definitely representative of the views of white, conservative Christians in the South at the time, and probably even some of the more moderate Southern Christians and white, conservative Christians in the North. read more