Some friends are talking about an
event/movie by Kirk Cameron called “Revive Us”. One of my friends, who hasn’t
gone to see it but apparently is going, has a friend who had a powerful
spiritual experience at the event/movie (it was originally simulcast but is now
being shown as a movie). This should be frightening – this is strange fire.
Below is my email response to an
invitation to attend. I am not attending. This is exactly why we need to
distinguish between the Cross of Christ and a national flag and agenda and a
whitewashed view of history.
Hi Everyone:
Well here is the thing
about the movie; what looks nice and feels nice may not be nice and as nice as
it might feel it might not be the truth.
Eric Metaxas has
written some books that feel nice but are not well founded, his most recent one
about America is a case in point, and his one about Bonhoeffer is another. He
has also disparaged academic critics of his books rather than provide reasoned
responses to them.
Kirk Cameron has a
pretty naive perspective on US history - a number of people do.
And Ben Carson? He
might be a great surgeon, but his defense of the indefensible words and actions
of one of the presidential candidates is, to me, beyond words. Carson's
words and actions betray the absence of a well-thought-out philosophy - he is
navigating by a weather vane rather than a compass.
Anytime people wrap
the flag, any flag, around the Cross of Christ there is a problem, and when it
is in the context of a highly-charged environment with music and appeals to
revival and patriotism and Jesus - that is dangerous.
So my advice is that if
folks go to go with a critical mindset and then do follow up homework - because
if what Cameron and Carson and Metaxas have to say is based on what they've
already said and already written then much of it isn't going to be true...and
the premise will unlikely be untrue.
Frankly they are using
the Cross and (sadly) Christianity to promote a political agenda - Metaxas and
Carson are strong supporters of Mr. Trump. I don't know about the other folks.
I think this is dangerous - regardless of the candidate.
The very fact that
people are saying they're having a spiritual experience at the movie
underscores my point - if we can't distinguish between the Kingdom of God and a
nation, any nation; if we wrap the flag around the Cross...we are on dangerous
ground.
Here is a professor of
history at Wheaton - if you go to this and search for Cameron and Metaxas
you'll get some hits.
Here is a professor of
history at Messiah.
And here is a post I
did on my blog this past Monday that better expresses my own thinking:
Much, much love,
Bob
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