WHEN TO TAKE A STAND

 

 

Here is an account of valor that will make us modern Westerners shudder. It raises the question of how far we should go to defend the truth—our faith. Should we openly oppose a pastor while he is preaching a false Gospel? Phinehas took it a giant step further.

King Balak of Moab had shrewdly led the feared Israel into sin so that their God would curse them, eliminating their threat to Moab. Consequently, Moab enticed Israel into sexual immorality and pagan worship. Consequently, many Israelites mourned and wept but seemingly didn’t take stronger action. Therefore, the Israelite offenses became more blatant:

·       Numbers 25:6 And indeed, one of the children of Israel came and presented to his brethren a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel, who were weeping at the door of the tabernacle of meeting.

It is shocking that Moses hadn’t taken any further action than weeping. Had the sin become so acceptable and widespread that he felt that He could do little to stem the apostasy? However, Phinehas would not merely weep over Israel’s rebellion and the God-sent plague that had already killed 24,000 Israelites:

·       Verses 25:7-9 Now when Phinehas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose from among the congregation and took a javelin in his hand; and he went after the man of Israel into the tent and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel, and the woman through her body. So the plague was stopped among the children of Israel. And those who died in the plague were twenty-four thousand.

After this unauthorized act of violence, God stopped the plague. Clearly, God had been satisfied by Phinehas’ faithfulness:

·       Verses 25:10-12 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: "Phinehas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, has turned back My wrath from the children of Israel, because he was zealous with My zeal among them, so that I did not consume the children of Israel in My zeal. Therefore say, 'Behold, I give to him My covenant of peace, and it shall be to him and his descendants after him a covenant of an everlasting priesthood, because he was zealous for his God, and made atonement for the children of Israel.' "

Had Moses failed to be a Phinehas? Has a plague decimated many churches and Christian institutions today? Do we need another Phinehas, and even many? And what kind of Phinehas must we be?

Clearly a plague of apostasy and rebellion against the Word of God has been ravishing today’s Church. We can cite many instances of this today. For instance, the bowing before the LGBTQ goddess.

Andy Stanley’s LGBT-friendly Drive Conference in 2022 has been taken offline by his North Point church. However, from YouTube snippets and published notes Pastor J.D. Greear had collected some of Stanley’s statements:

·       A gay person who still wants to attend church after the way the church has treated them . . . I’m telling you . . . they have more faith than I do. . . . They still love God.

·       I know the “clobber passages,” alright? We’ve got to figure this out. And if you don’t . . . you can say goodbye to the next generation.

·       Pastors who declare they are affirming or not affirming are taking the church away from someone unnecessarily. https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/downplay-homosexual-sin-generation/

In essence, Stanley demands that we have to reinterpret that Bible’s teachings against homosexuality to make them more gay-friendly. He also claimed that LGBTQs have more faith than the rest of us when they have faithfully endured the Bible’s teachings against homosexuality and have continued to seek God through a Church that has been antagonistic to them and their lifestyle choice.

Sadly, it seems that out of the hundreds of pastors who came to this conference, none spoke up against Stanley, at least at that time. In another of his conferences in 2023, Stanley suggested that faith can be a faith without repentance:

·       The most controversial conference speakers were Justin Lee and Brian Nietzel, whom Stanley described as “two married gay men” who are also “Christ-followers today.” They were invited to speak—and had spoken at previous North Point gatherings—he said, because their stories of growing up in church environments while experiencing same-sex attraction would be “instructive and inspiring.” https://www.christianitytoday.com/2023/10/andy-stanley-unconditional-conference-theology-lgbt/

What can be Biblically inspiring about un-repented sin! Besides, how can this couple be regarded as “Christ-followers today,” since they continue to refuse to repent of their sin! 

·       1 John 1:6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

If Stanley had only been preaching specifically against demonizing LGBTQ rather than loving them and telling them that we are all sinners who need to continually repent, the Church could have no Biblical objections. However, Stanley goes much further. Had there been a Phinehas among them to expose Stanley and to stop the plague? I am not aware of one.