By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.
How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land? - Psalm 137:1-4
Yes, I voted for The Donald, today. In the final analysis, I considered not voting for President at all, writing in a candidate, or going third party to be roughly equivalent. At this late date nationally, none of them commend themselves to me. Years ago when Joe Sobran was still alive and I had some hope that pastors might start preaching again, the third party option had some credibility. But then we saw a real third party develop in the Tea Party movement and it became apparent third parties provide no solution to the larger problem—which now appears to be permanent.
Our two candidates accurately reflect who our nation is...
They're not flukes, so no third party is going to be qualitatively different than those who gave us The Hillary and The Donald. No viable third party, that is.
Still, sober men and women will admit one of our candidates is much worse than the other. It's a difference worth a vote and I am unapologetic.
It's the mothers who convinced me. We should listen to Christian mothers who give themselves to quietness as they raise their children, today. These are the women who have no voice in the church, and less so in our culture. These godly mothers in Israel are being saved through childbirth, so each of them are a growing repository of divine wisdom the hard brash women shouting at us will never attain.
I heard several men say their wives were going to vote for Trump. Their wives were unhesitant and unashamed in saying so. I knew their wives and had no question they understood the degradation of The Donald, sexually, as well as the meaning of his repulsive treatment of Megyn Kelly. None of these women are deluded about who and what The Donald is, so why no hesitation in their statements that he has their vote?
Their husbands told me it was the children and grandchildren. Their wife was voting for The Donald because her greatest concern is the safety of her children and grandchildren. She, at least, knows the times. She recognizes the sky is darkening and The Hillary poses a much greater threat to the souls and wellbeing of her children and grandchildren than The Donald.
In a word, it's persecution. These godly mothers are voting to put off our loss of religious freedom as long as possible.
It got me to wondering what I have done to protect the young mothers and their eighty-five children three and under in our congregation? This is a lot of godliness being given to God by our mothers, wives, and daughters, so what are we doing to guard them and their little ones?
Currently I'm on the last five pages of a two-millenia history of the English, two-thirds done with Brown's bio of Augustine, almost finished with a century-old summary of the leadership of Colonial pastors in our gaining independence from King George and his Tories' Established Church, and I'm listening to a history of Greece. In its own way each of these works makes it clear that the rich always are accountable to the poor. The elite's wealth and authority comes from those they govern. To assure his throne, Joe Stalin simply starved his kulaks—by the millions. But as a rule, kings, aristocrats, feudal lords, tyrants, and thugs have felt the threat of the masses. They will kill some, but generally they do what's necessary to appease the majority.
I bring this up because the time has come for Christian men to defend our children and their mothers. Previous generations of Christian men of faith did so.
The Apostles left Jerusalem. At the Great Ejection, two-thousand Puritan pastors left their pulpits to guard the religious freedom of godly mothers and their children. The Pilgrims protected their mothers and children by leaving Holland, and they landed on Plymouth Rock. Whether in North Africa during the time of Augustine, Wittenberg in the time of Luther, Geneva in the time of Calvin, Scotland in the time of Knox, London in the time of Owen, or the Colonies in the time of Samuel Davies and Dr. Mayhew, the men set apart to shepherd God's flock have opposed tyrants and rich men who were persecuting the church. And this not because these men wanted to protect themselves, but because they were determined to guard the least of these who belonged to Jesus.
In these United States the past couple of decades, what has changed is that our superiors are intent upon wiping out the people of God by stealing our children. If you ever asked them to their face, they'd deny it, but listen to them and it becomes clear. All Christian preaching in the Apostolic tradition is hate speech. Christian witness in the workplace is hate speech. Our children speaking Biblically in school is hate speech. Our writing on FB is hate speech. The books we publish are hate speech. The Biblical pronouns and nouns we write or speak in the Academy are hate speech. Our bumper stickers are hate speech. Our children's Bible story books are hate speech.
The Bible is hate speech.
Our children and their mothers know very well—better than their fathers—that Tim Cook, Hillary Clinton, and the Supreme Court are determined to employ the force of law to persecute and silence those who belong to Jesus. These thoughts are still in an incipient form, but I am now resolved to stop thinking there's a chance we can pull it out of the fire. The ship hit the iceberg quite a while ago, it's taking on water, the pumps aren't keeping up, and there's no man of God with a vision that our mothers find coherent and believable for the protection of our children.
The two-kingdom men own the Reformed church. The gay Christian men own the Baptists. Wheaton's lesbian and gay alumni own their chaplain's office—and thus Evangelicalism. Which means almost all Protestants in North America have made their peace with "Caesar is Lord."
And if you put your hope in the Theonomists, you're ready to shoot yourself. They're inane. They're misty-eyed dreamers seeking to repristinate the intricate harmonies, cathedrals, Latin, and sacraments of medieval Roman Catholicism. An impartial observer would think them determined to recover the Babylonian captivity of the Church that the Reformers stood against saying "Here I stand. I can no other. God help me."
It's time for God's people to be led to safety. At this point I have no idea where and how, but we owe the mothers of our children some plan for the safety of their children. We can't continue to sit by the rivers of Babylon singing the songs of Zion and assuing our wives and daughters the persecution won't get so very bad during, what, the next seven years?
May God raise up an Augustine, Calvin, Knox, Owen, Wilberforce, Witherspoon, or Bonhoeffer willing to fight for God's honor and truth as well as the protection of our mothers, sisters, daughters, and sons. A man of God who is willing to defend Christ's Bride.
We don't want to be off cloistered and learning four-part harmonies until the battle between ISIS and Tim Cook moves onto our shores and drones start exploding at our weddings.
Tim serves Clearnote Church, Bloomington, Indiana. He and Mary Lee have five children and big lots of grandchildren.
Want to get in touch? Send Tim an email!
