It’s Who They Are :: By Steve Schmutzer

The Highland Park, Illinois shooting tragedy is just the latest excuse for libs to beat the same drum.

“We need more gun control!”

It’s their standard drivel. The left’s Pavlovian responses are so predictable that it’s plain they don’t properly think through the issues.

First off, Illinois has the eighth strictest gun laws in the nation, according to the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. That didn’t prevent a freakish punk with facial tattoos and criminal intent from fulfilling his warped fantasies.

More gun laws don’t keep the criminals from getting them. They just prevent the good guys from owning them. It’s no different than revoking the licenses of sober drivers because too many drunk drivers are killing them.

Second, studies using data from 1977 to 1992 (Lott and Mustard, 1997) found that states implementing shall-issue laws saw significant decreases in rates of violent crime, murder, rape, and assault. Their “more guns = less crime” findings have been supported by other similar studies.

The bottom line is criminals don’t want to risk getting shot. That’s why most mass shootings take place at gun-free zones like schools.

Third, we need to admit the failure of law enforcement. Bobby Crimo III, the Highland Park perp who dressed as a woman during his attack, was known to law enforcement. His violent videos and intentions, his close ties to Antifa and the Democratic Socialists of America, his infatuation with the occult, and many markings of liberal fascism all marinated his social media.

This was one wacked-out kid who showed every evidence of being a mentally ill foot soldier of the left. And law enforcement did nothing about it – – not until it was too late.

This unfortunate situation recalls the system-wide failures of the Uvalde, TX tragedy. We now know the corrupt Police Chief, Arredondo, had not only donated money to far-left Beto “Hell-yes-we’re-coming-after-your-AR15s” O’Rourke, but he’d also ordered his officers to stand down and not go in after the shooter. The door was unlocked, the officers were armed and trained and ready to do their job, but – – well, there’s that leftie thing. It interferes with good values and common sense.

“We need more gun control!” Yeah – right. Whatever.

What’s abundantly plain is that the gun’s no more at fault for what happened in Highland Park, Illinois, than a pencil is at fault for a failed test.

In their hearts, the Dems already know this. Their problem is the facts interfere with their agenda. And so, they froth and rage. Volume and violence have always been a weak argument’s best friends.

The recent overturning of Roe v. Wade is another situation that showcased the left’s penchant for nonsense and violence. Abortion wasn’t outlawed; it was turned back over to the states to decide. That’s where the issue belonged in the first place.

There is nothing in the Constitution that grants federal abortion rights. Even the late Ruth Bader Ginsberg, a far-left adherent, knew this and noted the problem.

But again, the facts didn’t matter. I hadn’t seen the Democrats that angry since the slaves were freed.

Oh – – – you didn’t know?

Yep, the Democrats were the party of slavery, of the KKK, of Jim Crow, and of segregation. History is very clear about this. The Democrats were the ones to suppress the rights of black Americans over and over. The left has always been about violence against others, which explains why they are the biggest fans of abortion – even right up to the point of birth.

Margaret Sanger was the founder of Planned Parenthood, the seminal entity behind the abortion movement as we know it now. Sanger was a proponent of “negative eugenics,” the goal of which is to remove ‘undesirable hereditary traits’ by social intervention. She wanted to reduce the reproduction of those she considered inferior, and she said her goal was to “assist the race toward the elimination of the unfit.”

Was Sanger racist? Yep. Under Sanger’s direction, Planned Parenthood was marketed to minorities and women of color, and that strategy continues even now. A study by Protecting Black Lives, in 2012, found that 79 percent of Planned Parenthood’s abortion facilities were located within walking distance of minority communities.

The impact of abortions in the black community has been so profound that in 2008, Issues4Life Foundation wrote to the Congressional Black Caucus to denounce Planned Parenthood Federation of America and its “racist and eugenic goals,” calling for the organization to be defunded. But the Dems screamed loudly to promote abortion instead. All their colors showed. The Dems are not pro-choice. They are pro-death.

It’s interesting to note that right after Roe v. Wade got overturned, all the libs became biologists. Suddenly, they all knew what a woman was. Their depraved goals needed a quick change to the narrative.

We hear that the left is “unhinged,” and that is true. This has been particularly so in their reactions to President Trump and his supporters.

Although the right is deeply distraught with the fraudulent election of President Biden and with his “Build Back Bolshevik” policies, they don’t riot in the streets, torch cars, beat up bystanders, threaten to kill electors, shoot cops, form filthy communes in public places, encourage assassinations, promote anarchy, plan hit squads against homes, claw at the doors of the Supreme Court, bankroll mobs, shut down free speech, nor ask for safe rooms, teddy bears, pet therapy, and Play-Doh.

When conservatives disagree with the liberal-socialist agenda, they don’t flood Twitter with murder threats or roundhouse kick peaceful protesters. They don’t menace the left with threats of rape, and they don’t shoot Democrat lawmakers at baseball games.

They don’t talk about blowing up the White House, and they don’t pose with severed heads of the President. Conservatives are not out there shouting at folks in elevators, stabbing opposition candidates, encouraging supporters to harass liberal lawmakers wherever they find them, or burning the left’s campaign headquarters to the ground. The right didn’t start 574 “mostly peaceful protests” that saw hundreds of cops injured, dozens of people killed, and billions of dollars’ worth of property damage.

Conservatives don’t scream publicly for violence in the streets. Conservatives don’t attack and berate Christians for their beliefs and values at the same time as they are protecting and aiding Sharia law. Conservatives don’t call for impeachment just because they don’t like someone, and they don’t protect a two-tiered system of justice at all costs.

They don’t turn venerated proceedings for Supreme Court picks into chaotic protest rallies, and they don’t stonewall cabinet nominees for over a year. The right does not register illegal immigrants in a dishonest effort to create sympathetic voters, and conservatives do not go on national television to protect criminals from that group over the rights of their unfortunate – and legal – victims!

Our nation is being viciously torn apart – but not by those who value freedom, democracy, the rule of law, Constitutional rights, and secure borders. It’s not from those who carry guns responsibly to keep themselves and others safe.

We have a massive and obvious problem. The conduct of the left is now commonly unlawful, frequently depraved, routinely deceptive, persistently violent, habitually self-serving, frankly phony, and – on so many points – outrageously wrong!

It’s not that the left doesn’t understand the virtues of common sense, law, due process, and faith – but rather, they don’t want them! Committed liberals are engaged in a war against all things reasonable, righteous, and respectable. The plain facts make this clear.

Those who most despise God, His gospel, His values, His followers, and His systems of law and order which are based on His eternal Word – are also those who most likely call themselves leftists, socialists, liberals, progressives, or Democrats. It’s all the same.

You need to think about it. The left’s pattern of actions proves they’re agents of hate and violence.

It’s who they are.

 

11 Jul 2022

Arab Seminaries?

Somehow, in those heady days of the 1970s and 80s, when men like Adrian Rogers were in real leadership roles in evangelical circles, we didn’t do a good job of preparing upcoming generations to truly love Israel and the Jewish people. We are seeing the rotten fruit of those mistakes today.

Over time, Christian institutions, including whole denominations, and—critically—Christian media became infected and infested with liberalism. It then took a sharp turn into full-blown leftist ideology. My own personal research shows that this was the product of Soviet infiltration of our culture, especially religious circles.

It was a long time coming.

Until about the year 2000, there was still plenty of sound teaching in the churches. But Rick Warrenism/Bill Hybelism/Andy Stanleyism had taken root and by 2010 the tide had turned. I really believe sound Bible teaching was lost almost totally then. I’m speaking of the so-called Church Visible, of course. There are plenty of small churches doing good stuff. I think of Randy White Ministries, founded by a former SBC megachurch pastor, now happy shepherding a small flock in New Mexico.

In fact, it was Randy White that alerted me to the infiltration of the Southern Baptists by leftists like Russell Moore. Perusing columns on Moore’s website showed me that he is no friend of Israel. He is a Replacement Theology guy, and he took that attitude to the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission before landing at Christianity Today 18 months ago.

I’ve written often about the sad demise of Christianity Today magazine. In the 90s, I could see its leftward drift was fatal. The editorial leadership was proud of its liberalism, all the while intent on fooling readers that it was still evangelical.

Support for evolution, anti-Israel forces, totalitarians and a host of other problems surfaced. As of this moment, CT is no more representative of traditional evangelicalism than the Castro regime in Cuba.

This week I saw an article posted on the CT site touting Arab seminaries in the Middle East, including that mythical place leftists love, “Palestine.” Notice this opening:

“Unlike many American counterparts, evangelical institutions in Egypt, Jordan, and Palestine enjoy an influx of students as they serve beyond their ivory towers.”

If CT thinks seminaries in countries bedeviled by the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas and Islamic Jihad are advancing biblical thought…well, I don’t think they do believe that. Certainly not in “Palestine.”

Spotlighting an Egyptian seminary, CT provides some background:

“Founded in 1863 aboard a felucca, a traditional Egyptian boat, in the Nile River, ETSC’s floating campus served mission stations and fledgling churches associated with the then-American Presbyterian movement. The seminary has steadily supplied synod pulpits ever since.”

And that’s the problem.

Look, even American seminaries has been polluting pulpits for more than a century. The German Higher Critical Movement, which sought to show that the Old Testament was influenced by Sumerian myth, destroyed the faith of many with such outlandish lies. Sadly, too many pastors embraced such blasphemies.

Now, in order to understand why Middle East seminaries are less-than-stellar today, we need to understand history. Michael Oren’s masterful work, Power, Faith & Fantasy, looks at Western influence in the region over time. He spends some time explaining a key concept: “lack of success” (my words) in spreading the actual Gospel left seminaries in Beirut and elsewhere with a dilemma: What are we now doing here? Oren recalls the situation in the 1870s:

“Evangelists had negligible success in their efforts to convert Jews and remained forbidden, at the pain of death, from proselytizing to Muslims. “Mohammedans, Muscovites and Monks furnish their full quota of opposition [to us],” a Presbyterian report of the 1870s complained, but the preachers had little hope of recourse, not even from their own government. Maintaining David Porter’s original policy of avoiding unnecessary friction with the Porte, the State Department reminded missionaries that “no foreigner who objects to Ottoman law need live under it,” and those that do “must also take the peril of their position” into account. The depth of those perils was once again illustrated in 1862, when two American missionaries, one in Adrianople (Edirne) and another in Alexandretta, were murdered.”

Seminary leadership in essence gave up pure evangelism and decided to concentrate on social work in the region. The watered-down efforts as Christian institutions yielded results in terms of education and relief efforts, but they had lost their first love.

Today, they bear no resemblance to the roots of Western Christian education in the Middle East. Oren understands the kind of man sent originally by American churches, particularly a New Englander named Levi Parsons. In Boston’s Old South Church in the fall of 1818, Parsons preached a remarkable sermon:

“His name was Levi Parsons, and the topic of his sermon was not the Gospel, not the Resurrection, but the Jews. ‘They who taught us the way to salvation were Jews,’ Parsons began. They had faithfully preserved the Bible, had worked, suffered, and died defending ‘our’ religion, he attested. ‘Our God was their God. Our heaven is their heaven.’ Most crucially, Parsons recalled, they had provided humanity with its Savior. ‘Yes, brethren, he who now intercedes for you before the throne of God…is a Jew!’ To show their gratitude for the Jews’ munificence, he concluded, Christians must strive to restore that people to sovereignty in its ancestral and biblical home.”

Whoa. That is a long way from where Christian attitudes are today in the Middle East.

In the CT article, they seem to think the following is a good thing:

“Benefiting from generous local and international support, ETSC students pay very little. This has made the growth in enrollment since 2019 ‘an act of faith,’ said Wahba. All students receive an 80 percent scholarship; MDiv students receive 98 percent.

“Similar generosity is received in Palestine, where the $9,000 tuition at Bethlehem Bible College (BBC) is reduced up to 70 percent for the roughly 150 theology and ministry students. An additional 40 students obtain degrees through Nazareth Evangelical College, a sister institution in Israel.”

What even many CT readers are not aware of is, “generous local and international support” is often anti-Israel. They key question is: What is being taught?

My conversation years ago with a key leader at Bethlehem Bible College was disturbing. I asked about support for Jews and Israel, biblically. He answered that, in essence, Palestinians “don’t like” the OT promises to the Jews. So they ignore them or spiritualize them.

In fairness, their pals in American institutions have the same attitude, but it’s still dismaying to hear.

I do not believe there is any redeeming places like Christianity Today, because I believe we are in the era spoken of by the prophets: Apostasy abounds.

In any event, I hope information like this helps you discern when seemingly “evangelical” media like CT offers up their propaganda.

Jim1fletcher@yahoo.com