Left dormant for too long, left to the buffeting effects of wind and rain, waiting out the scorching summers and unattended winters, my faith begins to stink. I had foolishly thought that time would be the vehicle of sanctification, that being an older Christian would automatically make me a more Christ-like Christian. But it hasn’t. The veneer on my faith looked uncomfortably like the veneer on our shack.

The excitement ebbed away with my first breath. Now, to be honest, I’m not an overly excitable guy; I’m fairly reserved in my displays of emotion, but I had been undeniably excited, that much was clear. But not any more.
A week or two earlier, my wife and I had purchased on old van, circa late 70’s, that had been permanently parked on a slab of concrete, wrapped in old corrugated iron, and had numerous little extensions tacked onto it over the last 30 years or so. Our intention was to make some small renovations, tidy it up, and use it as a beach house retreat for family holidays, and as a place for others in need of some Sabbath rest to have an inexpensive break away. The location is stunning. Nestled among the Australian bush landscape, overlooking a quiet stretch of water that winds its way out into the Pacific Ocean, sits our little shack. In my mind, the primary vision was wrapped in all the potential, the finished product, the place where I and others could rest. Of course, somewhere in the back of my consciousness was the annoying voice of the realist the dwells within, “You got a fair bit of work here, mate. It’s not going to be easy.”
I’d say that my sense of expectation was most akin to the hopes and dreams of my youth—full of visions for how thing will be, without giving much thought for the journey required to get there. I recall the zeal of my early 20’s, the vision I’d constructed of my victorious Christian life, the ministries I’d have transformed, and maybe even built. I remember thinking about how much easier my Christian life would be when I was older, when I’d conquered youthful lusts, had overcame the temptations that assailed me, and looked more like Jesus than I did then. I guess I must have thought that with enough time, things would get better, as though the passing of years would, in and of themselves, achieve something that I longed for.
But now, here I am looking at my Beach House—the passing of time had not been kind. Of course, there was a kind of rustic charm, a weathered patina that told a story of the years that etched themselves into it—yet there was no mistaking it, more time was not the cure for what ails my crumbling little shack.
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The “You’re a racist either way” charge (called a “Kafka trap”) is just one current example of the kind of nonsense used by our own culture’s thought police to cloud our minds and confuse us. Racism exists, of course, but claiming all whites are racist because they’re white simply trivializes genuine racial bigotry.

The secular world clearly controls the language game. Be careful you’re not taken in by it. Let me show you what I mean.
Since critical race theory is the latest worldview counterfeit (see July’s Solid Ground), consider this example of linguistic arm-twisting. Someone says, “If you say you’re not a racist, that just proves you are a racist.” How would you answer?
I suspect you already see the verbal sleight of hand—the ham-handed attempt at rhetorical manipulation. If you admit you’re a racist, you’re a racist. If you deny you’re a racist, you’re a racist. Racist if you do; racist if you don’t.
Even though the nonsense is obvious, the charge still catches good people off guard. What now? I have a tactical response to this challenge that I’ll share with you in a moment, but first let me show you what’s going on.
Nearly 75 years ago, George Orwell wrote 1984, a dystopian novel about a totalitarian world of mass surveillance and iron-fisted political/cultural suppression. The despotism was abetted in part by “Newspeak,” a clever manipulation of language that Big Brother employed to obscure truth and make it almost impossible to think clearly about any issue opposing the Party.
Orwell’s work was prophetic, though the world he warned of didn’t begin to materialize in liberal democracies like ours until decades later than he predicted. The practice of manipulating language to confuse or even silence opposition, used so effectively in Orwell’s time by Stalinist Russia and Nazi Germany, is now standard fare.
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It is important to remember that three months before his departure, a Southern Baptist task force determined that Moore’s organization was “a source of significant distraction from the Great Commission work of Southern Baptists.” The report cited things like participating in the partially Soros-funded Evangelical Immigration Table, filing an amicus brief to support a mosque, failing to support the religious liberty of California churches during Covid-19, and a general tone of condescension and unresponsiveness. Moore’s opposition to President Trump was only factor in determining mission drift. [2] This lack of self-awareness on Moore’s part can almost be considered the theme of his book.

Russell Moore, the Editor in Chief of Christianity Today, recently authored a critique of the current state of evangelicalism called Losing Our Religion: An Alter Call for Evangelical America. In decades past, rank and file evangelicals might take someone with Moore’s credentials seriously. Moore served as the President of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention for eight years. Before that he taught theology at the largest Protestant seminary in the country. Yet in 2023, this pedigree can actually serve to decrease one’s credibility in the minds of many conservative evangelicals.
Some of Moore’s own former supporters now see his brand of evangelicalism as controversial. The obvious question is, “What happened?” How did someone who climbed their way to the top of conservative Christianity find themselves on the fringes? The question stretches beyond Russell Moore. Other evangelical elites like Beth Moore, David Platt, and Matt Chandler could ask the same question as they have watched their audience divide and shrink for the past few years. Moore’s answer can be summed up with the reverse of a common breakup line: “It’s not me, it’s you.”
As the title of the book suggests, evangelicals are in the process of losing their religion to a false political gospel and need to come back to the faith. Unlike them, Russell Moore and those who agree with him “never changed.” He writes, after undergoing lengthy “heresy trials” during his time working for the Southern Baptists, “I hadn’t changed my theology, or my behavior, at all. What I had done, as the president of my denomination’s public policy agency, was refuse to endorse Donald Trump.” In Moore’s mind, he “paid the price” for the sharp political divide President Trump exposed. [1]
It is important to remember that three months before his departure, a Southern Baptist task force determined that Moore’s organization was “a source of significant distraction from the Great Commission work of Southern Baptists.” The report cited things like participating in the partially Soros-funded Evangelical Immigration Table, filing an amicus brief to support a mosque, failing to support the religious liberty of California churches during Covid-19, and a general tone of condescension and unresponsiveness. Moore’s opposition to President Trump was only factor in determining mission drift. [2] This lack of self-awareness on Moore’s part can almost be considered the theme of his book.
If Moore were to apply many of his critiques against politically conservative evangelicals to himself he would be found guilty. For example, Moore accuses Trump-supporting evangelicals of relativism when they justify their endorsement using the lesser-of-two-evils approach. He thinks these conservatives believe “immorality is necessary to combat even worse immorality.” That is certainly not the rationale most Christians who voted for Trump used. Yet, Moore himself employed a similar approach to shame evangelicals for failing to sacrifice popularity in order to “preach the gospel” like Martin Luther King Jr. In this case, Moore preferred a man with heretical theology and major character deficiencies over his own evangelical siblings who did not publicly support the Civil Right’s Movement. [3]
Moore also critiques “ends justifies the means” thinking, yet supports things like attending gay wedding receptions in order to be a witness. He attacks what he calls “conflict entrepreneurs” who seek to gain an audience based on controversy. Yet, this could be an apt description of what Moore did to rise to the level he now holds. Moore believes people in the church are normalizing “crazed and irrational conspiracy theories” yet he aggressively promoted the Covid vaccine and thinks white supremacy is a pervasive threat. One might ask Moore: “And if I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out?” [4]
Of course, Moore does not see himself as engaged in the very thing to which he objects. Instead, he is one of the heroes of the story courageously accepting the position of underdog for the purpose of telling the truth. He draws a parallel between his situation and the situation of Outlaw Country artists like Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings. They were exiled from Music Row, free to write more authentic songs “that seemed real to them.” They breathed new life into a failing genre by breaking established rules and embracing something pure. In the same way, Moore says “American conservative Protestantism [is also] seeking revival.” [5] In order to get there, evil and corruption must be opposed.
In accomplishing this, Moore awkwardly promotes “winsomeness” while simultaneously describing his political enemies in terms severe enough to make the most boisterous Fundamentalist blush.
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