restoring our biblical and constitutional foundations

The Battered Wife Syndrome of the Religious Right

John M. Leone

Recently, many people have been asking me, “What happened to you?  For years you were a big supporter of the Republican Party and George W. Bush. Why are you now criticizing conservative Republicans?  Why have you abandoned them/us?” After briefly pointing out that the party today is anything but “conservative,” my Reaganish response is usually along the lines of, “I didn’t leave the Republican Party; the Republican Party has left me.” 

The Republican Party of the last decade has sacrificed traditional “conservative” values on the blood altar of political expedience. This party has abandoned its core principles in the pursuit of raw political power. In the effort to “grow” the party, Republicans have embraced a “big tent” philosophy, wherein the goal is to gain as many supporters as possible, even if the methods used to attain these ends destroy the perceived conservative foundation of the party.  Some pundits today state that the party has long since abandoned conservatism, and although I tend to agree with this assessment, my desire here is to point out the accelerating speed of the falling away over the past ten years. 

A dangerous platter of reckless compromise and blatant pandering has been the order of the day for the Republicans as the party slouches inevitably toward the warm embrace of pure socialism and unfettered federal power. As the Democratic Party has moved radically to the left after losing power in the executive and legislative branches of the federal government, and thereby giving up any pretense of occupying the “moderate” position, the Republican Party has also moved left, thereby claiming the dubious “middle ground” that political pundits claim is vitally necessary to win major elections. This major shift left has caused the Republican Party to totally abandon what has traditionally been touted as the basic platform of the party, which is a limited and moral federal government. 

Since taking control of the House of Representatives in the “Republican Revolution” of 1994, a Republican Congress has increased federal spending by 60 percent! The Democrats were actually right for once when they said at the time that the Republicans’ “Contract With America” of 1994 was actually a “Contract On America.” More accurately, I believe that it has been a “Contract on the Contents of American Wallets.” 

In the ten-year period since 1994, conservative citizens in America have been waiting breathlessly for the “conservative” legislative branch to pass laws that would restrict the size and scope of the federal government. After 40 long and hard years of Democratic control, the Congress was finally in the hands of “the good guys.” More recently, as President Bush signed into law one unabashedly liberal big government bill after another, the message was sent out from the White House that Bush was just trying to show the American people how well he worked with the Democrats, and that he would be more “conservative” in his second term. Well, I don’t think my wallet, or the wallets of my children can withstand four more years of Bush in the White House and Republicans in Congress. 

What we have instead witnessed, in these last ten years of our national history, is that the Republican ruse of supporting reform for a return to Constitutionally limited and smaller federal government is just a party line, and not an actual political principle that will ever be embraced or acted upon. Republicans mouth empty platitudes and promises to a willing and eager conservative constituency like a sleazy drunk plying his trademark pick-up lines on a woman in a bar. The lines may sound well intentioned and tickle the desperate ear of the listener, but nothing of real substance underlies these fraudulent declarations. Both the sleaze in the bar and the Republicans in Congress seek self-serving ends in their charade of barren wordplay. 

In addition to the monstrous and irresponsibly wasteful behemoth in Washington becoming ever larger and more powerful, the assault on our 1st Amendment-protected recognition of God in the public square successfully continues (our “conservative born-again Christian” President fully supported the removal of Judge Roy Moore from the bench in Alabama), the assault on our 1st Amendment-protected activity of free political speech is one step closer to completion with the passage of the Campaign Finance Reform bill (otherwise known as the Incumbent Protection Act of 2003), the assault on our 2nd Amendment rights continues, the federal boot continues to be kept firmly on the neck of state sovereignty, the wholesale slaughter of our unborn continues (blessed and funded by the Republican-controlled federal government) with approximately 3,900 God-created innocent and unique human beings murdered each and every day, sodomy-based marriage (and its semantic counterpart “civil unions”) is falsely likened to the great civil rights movements that took place in the 1960’s and is increasingly accepted as normal, our Constitution is flagrantly disregarded and violated on a daily basis by our elected and appointed representatives in every single branch of the federal government, socialized medicine has been passed by “conservative” Republicans in Congress that opposed socialized medicine in the 1990s when a “liberal” Democratic president would have received the credit for such an action, unconstitutional federal funding of public schooling is at an all-time high even though as recently as 1996 the Republican Party platform called for the abolishment of the Department of Education, massive and unconstitutional wealth redistribution schemes continue to be funneled through our labyrinthine tax code system, and our “conservative” President has proposed an amnesty program for illegal immigrants that he says is not really an amnesty program, thereby ushering in a 25- increase in illegal traffic over the Mexican border (does this remind anyone else of Bill Clinton’s “What is ‘is’” debacle?). 

All of the attacks listed above have taken place under the careful eye of a Republican-controlled Congress. 

The terms “liberal” and “conservative” have become extremely relative and are utilized by our elected politicians in an attempt to make us believe that there are actual differences between the parties, when in reality there is little, if any, divergent actions taken on key issues. We may hear wide ranges of rhetoric, but when the rubber meets the road, the differences are indistinguishable. 

What is the one consistent theme that the presidential campaigns of both Bush and Kerry keep hammering home in interviews with the media talking heads?  “We want to make voters understand that there are fundamental differences between the candidates…bla-bla-bla…voters need to understand that there is a real choice involved in this election.”  There is?  Oh, really?  If the differences were so completely obvious, then why would I need Bush’s campaign manager shoving this disinformation down my throat?  Wouldn’t the voters be able to detect a clear difference if, in fact, one actually existed? The only difference I am able to discern between the parties today is that the word “Republican” has ten letters in it, and “Democrat” has eight letters. 

The New American, a publication of the John Birch Society, has just published its latest “Conservative Index.” According to The New American, the Conservative Index “rates congressmen based on their adherence to constitutional principles of limited government, to fiscal responsibility, to national sovereignty, and to a traditional foreign policy of avoiding foreign entanglements.” The results of this index should shock neo-conservatives right out of their boots. 

The Conservative Index for the 108th Congress shows that there is no difference, according to their voting patterns, between the two parties. The Index rates on a scale from 1-100, with a 100 score being a “perfect” conservative score. 174 Republicans in the House (76 -) and 23 Republicans in the Senate (45 -) scored less than 47, which was the score given to Bernie Sanders, who is the only admitted socialist in the House of Representatives. Allow me to reiterate this last point: 197 Republicans in Congress scored lower than an admitted socialist!  The lowest scores in the Senate, a 10, were recorded by two Republicans, John Chafee of Rhode Island and George Voinovich of Ohio.

After learning of this study by The New American, columnist Laurence M. Vance, in his article, “The Myth of Republican Conservatism,” states, “As should be obvious, the Republican Party is not the hope of America. Nothing has changed since George Wallace said that there was not a ‘dime’s worth of difference’ between the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates. It is pro-lifers, grass-roots conservatives, the Christian Right, and the disciples of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity who are wasting their votes by voting Republican – not conservative and libertarian critics of the Republican Party who vote for a third party or not at all.”

The Christian conservative base is now completely taken for granted by the Republican Party and is given mere lip service on the major issues of our time. The Republican Party knows that the vast majority of the Christian conservatives believe that they have nowhere to go and will remain loyal to the party even while it is sprinting away from conservatism at a world record pace. On occasion, the party throws the Christian conservatives some worthless meat disguised as food and expects them to be cheerful and content with this meager fare. 

For example, the President signed into law a bill that outlaws the “partial-birth” abortion procedure. But a careful analysis of this bill reveals the fact that late-term abortions are not affected by the passage of this legislation and actually encourage the abortionists to kill the baby inside the womb instead of outside. New Jersey Constitution Party Chairman Lowell Patterson, founder of the pro-life agency ABBA, states that, “Not one child will be saved by this bill.” 

Instead of courageously leading on the issue of abortion and using his bully pulpit to influence and educate the American public about this national disgrace, President Bush appears content to let the slaughter continue unabated and rule by gauging the pulse of the American electorate (which is eerily similar to Bill Clinton’s style of “leading” by polling in the 1990’s). “I don’t think the culture has changed to the extent that the American people or the Congress would totally ban abortions,” stated Bush when interviewed on the subject. 

President Bush also continues to fund Planned Parenthood, which was responsible for the deaths of 227,375 innocent children in 2003. In the fiscal year ending in June 2003, Planned Parenthood’s annual report showed that they received over $250 million worth of grants and contracts from the federal government.

Pro-life Christian conservatives need to look outside of the Republican Party if they wish to stop the rampant shedding of innocent blood. Our “conservative” Republican President and “conservative” Republican Congress have the blood of millions of children on their hands. Christians should separate themselves from this darkness and evil, in accordance with Scripture.  Casting a vote for people who will do nothing but engage in empty motions over this issue will not save a single child, and only serves to lay a filthy stain on the conscience of a Christian who is “voting for the lesser of two evils.” 

Knowing the Christian conservatives will behave like a battered wife who doesn’t believe she can go anywhere else, the Republican Party has no impetus to make any meaningful change, and the murderous status quo will endure for another generation, with tens of millions more babies savagely butchered at the hands of abortionists. But brethren, let me tell you that we do have a legitimate place of refuge and safe haven in the Constitution Party and their presidential candidate, Michael A. Peroutka.

Christians need to embrace the truth given by the great Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson when he said, “Duty is ours; consequences are God’s.” Christians should be casting their vote for the most moral, upright, righteous, and qualified candidate, regardless of that candidate’s “chances” of winning the election. Do your duty by voting for the candidate who best represents your values and beliefs while leaving the consequences to the Lord.  Leave others to “play the odds,” and wager on “chance,” while you stand righteously by your vote for the best candidate. Christians need not hold their nose while casting a ballot, but should feel good about who they voted for.

Another bone that the Bush administration has thrown the Christian conservatives is his “Faith-Based Initiatives” program, which really amounts to little more than unconstitutional government welfare programs for churches. 

Bush has been very careful to court the Christian vote by saying and doing the right things to be perceived as “Christian,” thereby nailing down a large portion of his conservative base. But his underlying actions (or fruit) urge me to take a closer look at this man’s claim of saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. 

The fact that Bush believes that he worships the same God that Muslims do, the fact that he clapped (to “awake[n] the demon”) and bowed down before a Shinto altar in Japan, the fact that he has made statements claiming that “miracles” can happen to not only believers of the Christian faith, but members of the Jewish, Muslim, and Hindu faiths as well, the fact of his membership in the ungodly and secretive Skull and Bones Society (which he refuses to discuss), the fact that he embraces the concept of “civil unions” (which is different from homosexual marriage in name only), the fact that he sent a letter of congratulations and support to a church that was founded by homosexual activists and performs over 6,000 same-sex “marriages” each year, the fact that Bush has not taken a single decisive action to end abortion, and the fact that Bush recess-appointed Bill Pryor to the federal judiciary after Pryor successfully prosecuted Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore for refusing to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the Alabama Judicial Building may lead a prudent Christian to believe that Bush’s faith is weak at best (judging by the “fruit” of his claimed faith), or that he is simply an unregenerate sinner. 

If Christians are voting for Bush merely because he claims to be a Christian, maybe they ought to consider a candidate like Michael A. Peroutka of the Constitution Party, who would actually walk, and not just talk, like a righteous Christian man. I have met and spoken with Mr. Peroutka and his running mate Pastor Chuck Baldwin, and can assure you that these are great Christian men of the highest integrity that Christians can feel good about voting for.

In his acceptance speech for the Constitution Party Presidential nomination, Michael A. Peroutka addressed the patriotic Christian conservatives who have already turned from tradition and embraced the only real solution to our depraved two-party dilemma. He stated, “They don’t want to waste their vote on the lesser of two evils anymore.  They have seen more than enough evidence of evil and corruption from both major parties to realize that it’s just as wrong to vote for Gomorrah as it is to vote for the slightly more evil Sodom. They know that to keep doing the same thing over and over – and to expect a different result – is the very definition of insanity. The American people are done with this national insanity. They are finished with wasting their vote on democrats and republicans who have demonstrated, indeed promised, their lack of fidelity to the United States Constitution.”

Christian conservatives are to the Republican Party what urban blacks are to the Democratic Party. Both support their party candidates at levels approaching 100 percent, both are completely taken for granted by their elected representatives, and both are given vacuous promises that rarely, if ever, amount to anything of import. What it will take to turn this sad tide of political complacency is a courageous and faithful remnant willing to work at unflagging levels and who are dedicated to preserving and restoring America’s Christian and Constitutional heritage. 

By the Grace and Providence of our Blessed Lord, this counter-revolution will come to fruition and we, or our children, will be able to experience true liberty once again. The steadfast remnant of patriots involved in this arduous battle can find solace and comfort in the immortal words of Samuel Adams who said, “It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people’s minds.”

July 20, 2004

John Leone is a police officer in New Jersey, editor of the Silverback Standard, and a staunch defender of biblical and constitutional government. He may be reached for comment here.

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Creedal Or Deedal Orthodoxy?

 David Alan Black  

“By their fruits you shall know them.” There is hardly any passage in Scripture that demands such self-examination from the Bible-believing Christian as this passage does. As believers in the Lord Jesus Christ we are to be known more by our deeds than by our creeds. It is relatively easy to affirm a creed. It is another thing to work it out in our daily lives. Our Christian life reaches its truest and fullest expression only as we love one another following Christ’s supreme example.

A believer who hates his brother, or looks down upon him, or is quick to criticize and condemn him, has lost all spiritual perspective and sense of direction. Disobedience to Jesus’ love command (John 13:34) reveals a lack of personal knowledge of Christ. A failure to love our brothers and sisters raises serious questions about the genuineness of our faith and the orthodoxy of our religion. Genuine orthodoxy always results in actions – not merely sentimental words or pious pronouncements. We are to love, says John, not in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth (1 John 3:18).

A prime example of this is sharing our material possessions with others, working with our own hands so as not to be a financial burden on others, opening our homes to friends and strangers alike, and giving sacrificially when desperate needs arise in the church. Our love for one another, expressed in tangible ways, proves the reality of the new birth and our relationship with God. It is, in fact, impossible to know God intimately without loving others. Thus, claims to know God and to believe His Word, while failing to truly love others, are false claims. The whole tenor and tone of our personal relationships must be dictated by the awareness that Jesus Christ is a gentle and caring Shepherd.

Paul once referred to Christian fellowship as “the perfect bond of love,” for only love has the adhesive power to hold the whole Body together. True orthodoxy kills self-centeredness; it puts an end to our private desires and ambitions. It makes a person less willing to argue a point of theology as long as there are lost people to be saved and spiritually sick Christians to be healed. In the light of the cross we discover that sharing the love of Jesus with others, whether in the far-distant villages of Ethiopia or in the sun-drenched farms of southern Virginia, is true wealth and satisfaction. You cannot at one and the same time believe in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the gospel of self-fulfillment, marital or otherwise. There is but one possible escape from our dead orthodoxy and our smug fundamentalism, and that is for us to assess everything assiduously in the light of the love that loved us and gave itself for us.

There is, I fear, a kind of Christianity that delights in being harsh and almost brutal. Strength is present, and so is doctrinal purity, but there is no tact or compassion. No one ever lived a holier life than Jesus, yet our Great High Priest is full of sympathy, mercy, and grace. He bears with us without getting irritated or annoyed. His very patience and understanding woo us back to the right path. With Christ we are always safe.

The lesson? For me it is at least threefold. To remember that words are cheap but deeds are costly. To remember that the thousands (or perhaps millions) of words that I have uttered in speeches or published in books are useless – in fact less than useless, a positive impediment – if they are not backed up by simple deeds of courtesy. And finally, to remember that the purpose of the inspired Scripture is always a supremely practical one – that the man of God may be fully equipped for every good work (2 Tim. 3:16-17).

What greater gift can we give to any man than to show him how deedal our creedal orthodoxy is?

May 21, 2007

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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An Open Letter to Dr. Condoleezza Rice

 David Alan Black

Dear Dr. Rice:

Your role as National Security Adviser is a critical one. It has become even more crucial since 9/11. You’ve had a hand in the war effort abroad and the security effort at home. On Iraq, you have been a key advocate of just-war doctrine. As early as August 2002, you told the BBC about a “very powerful moral case for regime change” in Iraq.

And now President Bush has tapped you to defend his administration against charges of failing to act on intelligence data that your critics say could have prevented 9/11. Mr. Richard Clarke, who worked for you, has called you to release the record of your emails in the months up to the attacks to prove his contention that the White House did not take the threat of Al Qaeda seriously.

The 9/11 Commission’s chairman, Thomas Kean, has also called for you to testify in public. Even leading Republicans are criticizing your refusal to appear, saying it looks as if you have something to hide. You will not speak under oath to the American people, yet you can take time out of the middle of the day to address a secretive gathering that included global media mogul Rupert Murdoch and top executives from television networks, newspapers, and other media properties owned by Murdoch’s News Corp.

You say the principle of executive privilege is at stake. The president’s reasoning seems a twisted interpretation of “separation of powers.” It certainly isn’t backed up by recent history. Many presidential advisors have testified before congressional committees. Besides, the 9/11 Commission isn’t even a congressional committee. It is the product of law produced by Congress and agreed to by Bush.

Dr. Rice, your predecessors have gone before Congress in the past. Even President Ford testified about his pardon of Richard Nixon. Executive privilege is a flexible concept. The administration made the same argument in 2002 when it said Tom Ridge, then director of the White House Office of Homeland Security, would not testify under oath before Congress. Under pressure from Congress, the White House backed down, and Ridge testified. Why, then, can’t you go to the president and ask to testify?

After September 11 you claimed that the White House had no prior knowledge that Al Qaeda was planning to hijack planes in a terrorist attack. That assertion now appears to be false. In the months before the Iraq War you repeatedly reassured the public that the U.S. was seeking a peaceful resolution and that war was not a foregone conclusion. However, it now appears that while you were saying this you were telling State Department officials that the decision to go to war had already been made, well before diplomatic efforts even began. It appears, Dr. Rice, that you have either been misleading the public about your role in the decision to go to war, or you have been grossly negligent in not reading the government’s most important intelligence documents.

9/11 Commissioner John Lehman, a Republican, has said “[the administration] has nothing to hide, and yet this is creating the impression for honest Americans all over the country and people all over the world that the White House has something to hide, that Condi Rice has something to hide.” Lehman told ABC’s This Week, “There are no smoking guns. That’s what makes this so absurd. It’s a political blunder of the first order.”

Dr. Rice, with all due respect, I think a lot of people are saying, “If you can appear on 60 Minutes, you can appear before the commission under oath.” We are learning from the commission that you knew a lot more than you’ve admitted. It’s beginning to look like you simply don’t want to be embarrassed. If that’s true, you’re putting your own interests ahead of the national interest.

Your White House ally Richard Perle said, “I think she would be wise to testify.” I agree. It’s not only the wise thing to do; it’s the right thing to do.

March 30, 2004

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com. His latest book, Why I Stopped Listening to Rush: Confessions of a Recovering Neocon, will be released this year.

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A Home for Melesse

 Becky Lynn Black  

The living arrangements of Ethiopians can be divided into rural and urban. Out in the countryside, people live in open areas. Their “yard” is often marked by a row of bushes, but the “fence” is porous. Their homes are square or round, usually only 1-2 rooms that accommodate both animals and humans at night. Their cooking is done over an open fire, either inside their home or outside in the yard. (The smoke from the fire helps to keep away insects and varmints.)

Ethiopians who live in urban areas, however, have a very different arrangement. Here the streets are walled, and behind the walls are compounds. Each compound is a section of land that contains a 2- or 3-roomed house for the land-owner and some individual rooms for a kitchen, a toilet, and a couple of rental rooms.  Finally, in this compound is a small garden and perhaps a stall for a cow or a donkey. If it is luxurious, the compound will have an electric line and a faucet of water in the yard. 

Thievery abounds in most Ethiopian communities. In the rural areas, almost every home has a dog that stays outside at night. In the urban areas, the gate is locked, and sometimes a guard is hired for protection.

God has placed us in the Alaba and Burji sections of Ethiopia. We work directly with the local “mother” church, assisting in the work of spreading the Gospel and strengthening believers. In addition to our help, the church has a number of “evangelists.” In Burji, these are men who have left their homes in the rural areas to travel to distant places to plant churches. They leave their wives and children in the care of extended family, on the family farm, and they travel far and wide to spread the Gospel in places where there is no church.

In Alaba, however, most of the evangelists have not left farms in the countryside; they have left urban businesses. The Alaba mother church sponsors a number of married-with-children evangelists. Almost all of these evangelists purchased their living compounds before they entered the evangelist work; their homes are secure and they have the opportunity for salary supplementation through rental of rooms in their compounds.

However, there are two evangelists in Alaba that have suffered greatly in the 10 years that they have been doing the work of an evangelist. Ironically, both of these men are named Melesse.

Melesse A. has 2 small children; Melesse O. has 7 children. They rent space in compounds belonging to other people. And on our recent trip, we saw more clearly the challenges this arrangement has been to them. There are 3 primary threats. 

1) Communal Stress. As you can see, life within a compound is very close. Kitchen, yard, toilet, and security are shared with all the occupants. Since Alaba is 99 percent Muslim, these evangelist families are living side-by-side with people who often hate them. Also, Alaba has openly-practicing witch doctors who dwell in the compounds. Hence there is no rest, even at home, for the evangelist and his family. They are taunted day and night by those living within their compounds. Their children and wives are threatened because they are professing Christians.  Spiritual stress is compounded as the Evil One blinds hearts to the Truth of the Savior and stirs up hatred.

2) Sudden Eviction. If the landlord is Muslim or Orthodox, he often will quickly evict the evangelist and his family for no other reason than his faith in the Lord Jesus. This form of persecution is seldom reported but it is real. Sometimes the notice is only one day! “Be gone by tonight,” the landlord says. There are no rights for the renter and no legal rental protection like we have in this country. The threat of eviction is a constant one, yielding much insecurity. Even if the landlord is not strongly opposed to the evangelist, if the other occupants of the compound threaten him, then he will evict the evangelist in order to keep peace.

3) Rental Increases. Inflation in Ethiopia is a very real economic burden. The rate peaked in 2008 at 60 percent! They say that this year the rate is “only” 10-.  (Compare that to the usual 2.5-3.00 percent here in the USA.  Remember that the inflation rate is like the Richter scale for earthquakes; it is not a gradation of addition, but of multiplication.) The landlord must operate his compound with economic efficiency. This means increasing the rent frequently to keep up with inflation. Like eviction notices, rental notices are often given on short notice. And accommodating those increases within an evangelist salary is a challenge.

The Alaba evangelist lives in the town, but he usually ministers in the rural areas. Most of his days are spent traveling back and forth. He leaves his family early in the morning and pushes himself physically and spiritually for the work.  When Melesse A. and Melesse O. come home at night, they do not get rest.  Rather, they get stress, threats, and spiritual warfare as they cope with the communal living conditions.

The Alaba Church Leaders have asked us to pray about helping establish secure, safe homes for Melesse A. and Melesse O.  Here is the financial breakdown:

            Purchase of a small plot of land in Alaba Town……………………………..$1450.

            Building (with sticks and mud) a 3- room house, outside kitchen,

                         outside toilet…………………………………………………………………..$2150.

            Building (with sticks and mud) an additional 2 rooms for rentals………..$1450.

            Total cost to help one evangelist family……………  $5,050.

The need is urgent. In the 5 years that we have been working in Alaba, we have watched these men suffer and age. Both men and their families have suffered great tribulation at the hands of Muslim and Orthodox. Both have suffered financial stress with low salaries and continuing rampant inflation.

Both men are focused on the joys of serving the Lord. In our recent trip, Melesse A. had been sick for 7 months with malaria, typhoid, typhus, and gastritis. There is no doubt that part of the reason for delay in his recovery was due to his living condition.

Melesse O. is stronger physically. When we interviewed him, here is what he had to say:

 “Pray that I will preach the Gospel as expected. I have lots of needs for me and my family, but that is secondary. For 18 years I have been sharing the Gospel, telling unbelievers of Jesus. Let the people in America pray for me to share the Gospel as much as possible as God opens doors.”  Then he continued, “I have a message for believers in America. Those who do not give their life to the Lord will die without benefit for their neighbors. But those who give their life to the Lord will die with benefit for the whole world!”

Do such men, serving so sacrificially with their families, “deserve” our help? We think so.

$5,050 per family is very do-able for those of us blessed with wealth and security here in America.  The Scriptures encourage us to share what we have, so that there might be equality (2 Cor. 8:13). 

Can we share $5,050 with these faithful servants?

Below: Melesse A.

Melesse O.

April 17, 2010

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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   restoring our biblical and constitutional foundations

Exactly Which Constitution Are You Following?

David Alan Black 

In his tour de force entitled Our Secret Constitution, Columbia law professor George Fletcher shows how Lincoln’s War replaced the original charter with a second American Constitution, a “secret Constitution.” The Constitution of 1787 stood for a maximum freedom of expression of individual liberty, at least against the federal government. The second Constitution is dedicated to organic nationhood and popular democracy, emphasizing not freedom from government but equality under the law. The state would now have to do more than leave us alone. It would have to ensure equal protection—and do so at the point of a bayonet if necessary.

Professor Fletcher notes that although the original charter of 1787 remains in place, it has been so radically transformed by our secret Constitution that for all intents and purposes the old charter is a dead letter. Because of Lincoln’s war, the Tenth Amendment was effectively abolished, the conquered states were made into puppet governments set up by the Republican Party, and Lincoln succeeded in consolidating governmental power in Washington by military dictatorship.

This means that Americans face a choice as to whether to defend the old Constitution or to follow the new, secret charter—that is, whether to defend the concept of a limited republic with maximum freedom for the people or to acquiesce to the new consolidated concept of power that is prone to dictatorial and imperialistic expressions.

It is probably true to say that most Americans are firmly in the pro-big government camp. They don’t mind sacrificing most of their earnings to unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats and unresponsive elected officials, nor do they mind relying on Washington for a host of taxpayer-funded benefits. And they are agreeable to the notion that personal responsibility and independence should be sacrificed for the “security” offered by politicians. At the other end of the spectrum are people who believe in the old Constitution verbatim and who hold personal liberty and responsibility so dear that they dare to expect others to hold similar views. They abhor all but the most limited and narrowly defined forms of taxation because they believe their money belongs to them and that the federal government only needs enough funding to perform its few, narrowly defined, constitutional duties (that is, under the “old” Constitution). They want smaller government, an end to the welfare state, and an end to government intrusions into their lives and businesses. They want to get the federal government completely out of every area where it has made such a mess: health care, education, law enforcement, foreign aid, corporate welfare, farm subsidies, etc. They want leaders who can read the plain language of the Constitution and who understand that the words “Congress shall make no law” mean Congress shall make no law.

This small but vocal group of Americans is calling for the restoration of a republic founded on the ideals of the old Constitution. Often labeled “paleoconservatives,” they believe that the Founding Fathers designed our system of government in the form of a constitutionally limited republic with minimum government control or interference into our personal lives and business affairs. They further believe that government at all levels—federal, state and local—was originally intended to be controlled by the people, that the Constitution explicitly restricts the power of the federal government, and that the Bill of Rights guarantees that the government may not infringe on our God-given unalienable rights. They are anti-interventionists and despise jingoism and imperialism, especially in the United States.

Paleocons are not isolationists. The word “isolationist” is a pejorative term that is used to describe anyone who does not favor using America’s wealth and power or blood for their particular cause. Paleocons believe that the United States of America is the greatest nation on earth, that it should trade with all nations, that Americans should travel to all nations, that we should have diplomatic contact with all nations, and that we should have regular commerce and cultural exchanges with all nations. They just don’t believe in fighting foreign countries’ wars or paying foreign countries’ bills. That is not isolationism; that is patriotism, and that is Americanism.

Pat Buchanan, in a now famous speech, put it succinctly: “My friends, all the great empires of Europe that began our century so full of swagger and bombast came crashing down to ruin. All are now surrendering their identities and their independence to a super state that pays homage to the god of Mammon. America alone still endures, independent and free. The great questions before us are these: Shall we, too, yield to their temptation, follow their path, and suffer their fate? Is the call to empire irresistible? Is a world government inevitable? Or can America remain forever a light unto the nations, an example to mankind of how a free people should govern themselves, a republic above whose sovereignty stands the sovereignty of God alone.”

The choice is clear. Either the old Constitution or the new, “secret” one. Either a republic or an empire. To acquiesce or not to acquiesce.

As Hamlet would say, that is the question.

April 18, 2003

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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American “Values”

 David Alan Black 

Whenever I consider the question of the missionary calling I always think of the problem posed by patriotism and especially by nationalism, its distorted counterpart. Like most Americans, I love my country. It is part of God’s bounty to me. However, like all of God’s blessings, it is open to distortion.

It would be unnecessary – and foolhardy – to denounce patriotism, the normal pride that men and women have for their country’s national accomplishments. It is when that normal love is distorted into arrogant nationalism that we are on dangerous ground. Indeed, under the pressures of nationalism I have seen people succumb to all sorts of inordinate and unbiblical attitudes.

On the mission field one is particularly aware of the danger of nationalistic feelings. I have seen firsthand the condescendingly humiliating attitude that American missionaries have toward their African counterparts. In some places this paternalistic attitude has even generated hostility.

It would be a grave error, however, to suppose that this attitude is seen only in the English-speaking ghettos we maintain as ex-pats. Far more dangerous are our materialistic attitudes that make foreign nationals aspire to such meaningless forms of temporal aspiration as Western leisure and entertainment. I well remember the shock on the faces of my Ethiopian students when I told them that I never watch television. In modern Ethiopia, owning and viewing a TV set has become a mark of the “good life” to which most Ethiopians aspire. They fail to realize that, by creating the TV, Western man has created out of his affluence nothing but his own boredom.

Americans can be justly proud of their technological achievements that impel men to greater heights of comfort and human dignity. The problem lies in the grave and subtle danger posed by technology. Among other things, our materialistically-oriented society encourages earth-bound aspirations, including the frivolous “escapes” now seen in every foreign capital. Any glimpse of life to come is crowded out as men pursue their creature comforts. This spirit of materialism, in turn, creates a formidable barrier in appealing to the gospel as the solution to man’s helpless plight.

The church needs to become acutely aware that modern Western “values” have largely been shaped by pagan culture. After all, “seeker-sensitive” and “super-church” visions of ecclesiastical life are just as attractive in the Horn of Africa as they are in the Home of the Brave. Materialism is materialism whether it speaks English or Amharic.

When Becky and I go to Africa to make disciples, we go as ambassadors of the kingdom of God – not of America, or freedom, or democracy, or any of the West’s other counterfeit hopes. We are ambassadors of the King of kings.

August 20, 2005

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com. If you would like to know more about becoming a follower of King Jesus, please feel free to write Dave.

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A Christmas Story

 David Alan Black 

In a faraway place lives a ten-year old boy named Azanou. His tiny village is in a land called Ethiopia. Ethiopia is in Africa.

One day, Dr. and Mrs. Black went to the village where Azanou lives. Azanou was one of the first children to greet them. He proudly showed them his Ethiopian “lunch pails.” People in his village had made them by hand, using straw and goat skins!  Azanou led Dr. and Mrs. Black from lunch pail to lunch pail, feeling his way along. You see, Azanou is almost totally blind.

He was such a happy boy (and a good salesman!). Mrs. Black bought a lunch pail from him. Then guess what Azanou did? He gave her another lunch pail for free! What a kind and generous boy he was!  

When their trip to Ethiopia was over, Dr. and Mrs. Black went back to America. But they could not forget Azanou. The Lord Jesus had put a special love in their hearts for Azanou.  But how could they get in touch with him? He lived so far away!

After many emails and phone calls, Mrs. Black was able to arrange for an eye doctor to see Azanou. He is totally blind in his left eye and needs an operation in his right eye. Otherwise he will go completely blind. But where can Azanou have an operation? Ethiopia does not have good hospitals. And who will take care of him after his operation? He has no mother or father!

Dr. and Mrs. Black asked the Lord Jesus what they should do. Then they thought to themselves, “Maybe the Lord wants us to bring Azanou to America for his operation!” They said, “The Lord has blessed America with good hospitals and doctors. Even though Azanou has no parents, he still has his whole lifetime ahead of him!  We should try to help him!”

The Lord Jesus loves Azanou. He gave His life to save Azanou’s soul. He wants Azanou to know Him and to love Him. If coming to America is a blessing that Jesus has planned for Azanou, then He will work out all the details for the trip.

Dr. and Mrs. Black are now planning to go back to Ethiopia and get Azanou. Then he will have his operation in America. His eye will be very tender for six months. During this time he will live with the Black family on their farm in Virginia. Then, when he is healed, Dr. and Mrs. Black will take Azanou back to his little village, back to his friends, and back to his beautiful lunch pails.

Dr. and Mrs. Black pray for Azanou every day. They believe God allowed them to meet Azanou for a very special reason. Will you pray for Azanou, too?  Will you ask our Lord Jesus to make all the arrangements very clear?  And especially ask Him to open the eyes of Azanou’s heart, so that he will see Jesus and love Him.  Because what good is it if we can see with the eyes of our body but we are blind with the eyes of our heart?

Dr. and Mrs. Black love Azanou very much. But someone else loves Azanou even more. Do you know who that is? It is the Lord Jesus. Jesus wants Azanou to know and love Him, just like He wants you to know and love Him. Take time now to talk with Him. Thank Him that you can see with the eyes of your body, and ask Him to open the eyes of your heart to see Him and His love more clearly.

December 24, 2004

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com. He is the author of Why I Stopped Listening to Rush and numerous other books.

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Christian Archy: Its Major Tenets

 David Alan Black  

As I see it, there are three.

1. In the first place, the Gospel is concerned with the kingdom of Christ and only with the kingdom of Christ. This kingdom cannot, therefore, be equated with any human archy, be that archy left wing or right wing, liberal or conservative, revolutionary or anti-revolutionary, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant. The Archy of Christ is intent on reconciling adversaries instead of creating them. Politically, Christian Archy rejects the partisan power contest. At its heart lies the cross and the self-givingness of love. All worldly archys are therefore antithetical to the Archy of Christ, including “good” archys that rely upon an unfounded confidence in the moral competency of humans and that seek to impose their “right” upon people they believe to be “wrong.” Again, I know I am oversimplifying, but these characteristics are precisely found, for example, in the first chapter of Eller’s Christian Anarchy.

2. The second and no less astonishing feature of Christian Archy is the contention that the ultimate victory of Christ’s Archy will take place without any assistance or support from the efforts of human archys of any kind, including those of Christendom, whether of the Christian Right or the Christian Left (see Eller, Christian Anarchy, chapter 2). Eller maintains that human efforts to establish the kingdom of God have absolutely no biblical or theological foundations. Christ’s Archy has nothing whatsoever to do with “holy causes, programs, and ideologies that will effect the social reformation of society” (Christian Anarchy, p. 25). Absolutely nothing! Politics, argues Eller, is one such false messiah, though any movement or ideology that takes the place of the cross belongs under the same rubric and merits the same appraisal. This tendency to supplant the cross of Christ with human solutions (including “holy” ones) and to anoint them with near-divine status is called “arky faith” by Eller. (“Arky” is Eller’s preferred spelling of “archy.”) Arky faith is present whenever one attempts to use piety to force its version of “justice” into place as the solution to “injustice.” Writes Eller (Christian Anarchy, p. 27):

I am convinced that there are many Christians (of both the left and right) who, as individuals, are quite modest, humble, and of realistic self-image – but who, then, proceed to satisfy their lust for power, their delusions of grandeur, and their sense of self-righteousness through the holy arkys with which they identify. Asserting their “just cause” becomes a psychological disguise for asserting themselves; thus they find Christian justification for the sense of power to which all of us are tempted.

This does not mean, continues Eller, that human archys do not exist or are irrelevant. It is simply to insist that Christ’s Archy is not of this world – which means that, as Christians, it is unnecessary to fight the archys, compete with them, or recognize any merit on their part. In fact, Christian Archy is completely indifferent to human archys, whether they be communist, pacifist, liberal, democratic, libertarian, revolutionary, etc. What matters is that the church be the church, refusing to sacralized earthly archys and even itself. God does not need our worldly systems (dogmatics, philosophy, science, politics) or even our “centers for cultural transformation” to bring about societal reformation. Jesus alone suffices.

3. Precisely because the church has abandoned its apolitical message, a third and final dimension to Christian Archy must be mentioned, namely that no worldly archy has any actual power or ultimate significance (see Eller, Christian Anarchy, chapter 3). “Christianity started out as a completely anarchic ekklesia and then drifted into churchly arkydom,” writes Eller (p. 52). By “churchly arkydom” he means any worldly archy that replaces Christian Archy or that vies for our attention, examples being Christian feminism, liberation theology, and social revolution. In Christ’s kingdom, archys based on gender, class, and social standing are completely irrelevant. Christians are called upon to rely exclusively on the Holy Spirit, who “gives hope where all is despair, the strength to endure in the midst of disaster, perspicacity not to fall victim to seduction, the ability to subvert in turn all the powers that are involved” (Ellul, The Subversion of Christianity, p. 190). With reference specifically to churchly archys, Eller notes that an ekklesia “is still a totally anarchic concept; no hint of arkydom is involved” (Christian Anarchy, p. 50). In the church, therefore, there are no human actors who function as special, anointed agents capable either of representing God to men of representing men to God, nor can any single individual speak entirely for God as pater familias (pope, patriarch, priest, bishop, pastor, etc.). Is this perspective anticlerical? Decidedly not, if by this is meant that ecclesiastical leaders should think of themselves self-sufficient and able to disregard their fellow Christians. Decidedly so, if by this is meant the conviction that all the brothers and sisters are able to admonish and teach one another in the Lord, being one Body and one Bread and of one mind.

And so, in Christ, the archys of the world are definitively desacralized, eliminated, and vanquished. This is the essential upshot (as I see it) of Christian Archy, which implies a radical reconstitution of what is truly sacral in God’s eyes.

NEXT: Working Out the Implications of Christian Archy.

Read Part 1:Christian Archy: Introduction.

October 15, 2008

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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Election 2008

 David Alan Black 

Many have been the emails congratulating me on my website and its support of biblical and constitutional reform. If I could summarize the sentiment of these emails it would be: “Yes, our country is being mishandled and it’s time to say: Stop, Enough. Let’s bring America back to the basics of hope and promise, back to a land of energy and hard work, back to a land of strong families and loving communities who acknowledge their dependence on God – and that includes freedom from the proliferating bureaucrats who want to take God out of society and who want to micromanage our lives.”

My goal is simple: to inspire America’s families to have enough spiritual and political backbone so that our beliefs are not trampled on by the self-appointed liberal elites. Only someone with a warped view of reality would call our movement “radical extremism.” The real extremists are the big government, high tax, amoral, social engineering liberals (of both major parties) who control our government. They live in an Alice in Wonderland looking-glass world that uses the establishment clause to beat religion out of our schools and society, that makes abortion – outlawed by every civilized state and illegal for the first 200 years of our history – a “constitutional right,” that forces a woman in California who refused to rent to an unmarried couple because it violated her religious beliefs to put up a sign in her front yard that said “I have discriminated,” that has made our public schools the most dangerous place in America (outside of the mother’s womb, which is now the most dangerous of all) – and the list goes on and on.

Those who call themselves “liberal” are not liberal at all. They want government control of business, of labor, of education, of our families, and, most of all, of the flow of ideas that are disseminated to the people. Of far greater danger, however, is the lukewarmness of “conservative” Americans – a comfortable tepidity, a lethargy that resents being aroused. “Do Not Disturb” signs hang on the doors of resters at ease in Zion. Government schools have turned a whole generation of Americans into socialists who expect the government to practically run their lives and be their provider.

In the midst of this cultural chaos, I want to issue a call for a new rise of faith and freedom that will give every American a renewed vision of hope, a vision that will take us past these troubled days and show us a promise that lies ahead for each of us. So-called biblical “scholars” may tell us that there was no direct act of creation by God, that Jesus never rose from the dead, that there is no afterlife. Say what they will, the Bible clearly teaches these things, and that settles it. Politicians may assert that all Americans have the “right” to free health care, education, retirement benefits, and so forth, but none of these so-called rights is supported by the Constitution, and hence the case is closed.

What’s more, these documents are inseparably linked in our history. The men who wrote our Constitution knew all too well that there was only one source of our liberty:

• Our First President declared: “Reason and experience forbid us to expect public morality in the absence of religious principal.”
• Our Second President, John Adams, said: “We have not government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
• And our Third President, Thomas Jefferson, the author of our Declaration of Independence, gave us this solemn warning: “And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure, when we have removed their only firm basis – a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? And they are not to be violated but with His wrath.”

These men knew that freedom does not come from government; it does not come from social position; it does not come from wealth. Freedom comes from the direct creative act of a Sovereign God – a truth that Thomas Jefferson said was “self-evident.” Despite these warnings, we have allowed an unprecedented assault on our biblical and constitutional freedoms.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I want to challenge you. I believe that God can reverse the tide of secularism. He can bring reformation to America. He can restore the church to her biblical moorings. And He can make the government responsible to the Constitution.

But it’s not going to happen if people like you and me don’t get involved.

Today let me challenge you to move from words to action. Fight for freedom. Resolve to say No to tyranny and Yes to truth. Involvement means that we will live by principle, not expediency. It means that if there is something in my life that is unbiblical (and therefore ungodly) I will repent of it and determine to change. And if I am tolerating in my society something that is unconstitutional, I will repent of that way of thinking, too.

Election 2008 is not as far off as we might think. It will be a year for action. In the meantime, let us work together to bring about a rebirth of biblical values and constitutional liberty in this great country of ours, relying totally upon God’s help.

September 25, 2005

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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