Words as Weapons
If, in fighting the good fight, we begin to look like the world in our use of words—if we become saltless salt and lightless light—what purpose do we have in the kingdom? We may be fighting for Christ but not have the spirit of Christ.
Words are weapons. They are either weapons used in the service of God and His kingdom—weapons that are brandished in love for God and our neighbor—or they are weapons used in the service of the kingdom of this fallen and sinful world—weapons wielded in love of self and hatred of God and neighbor. This is simply the reality of what words are. In our current context, this reality powerfully confronts us, and we struggle with how to wield our words. We live in the middle of a swirling vortex of political conflict, social unrest, clashing values systems, a culture war, and a global pandemic, and the power of words as weapons through social media has been exponentially increased. Through the means of various forms of social media, words as weapons are used to mobilize, encourage, scare, advocate, anger, inform, judge, punish, reward, lament, and rejoice, and all on a massive scale and with dizzying speed. How do we navigate through this daunting and sometimes overwhelming reality, and how do we ourselves wield a weapon like this that is powerful and so easily and readily available?
The ninth commandment (Ex. 20:16; Deut. 5:20) speaks into this reality and shows us the way forward, and it shows us the gospel for life. It says, “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” This is courtroom language, where one can serve as a witness who brings testimony that is false and brings harm and even death to another person. The commandment is stated negatively (what God calls us not to do) but it can also be stated positively (what God wants us to do). Throughout Scripture, God calls us to protect, build up, restore, and heal others with our words. Read through Proverbs (especially chs.12–14) to see how words are to bring life and not death, to be used by the wise in contrast to their use by the fool. Our words are to be gracious, seasoned with salt (Col. 4:5–6); they are to be truth and they are to build up, as fits the occasion, that they may give grace to those who hear (Eph. 4:25–32).
The way we use our words reveals our hearts, it reveals the kingdom values that govern us, and it reveals the principle of life that animates us and forms and directs our hearts. A saltwater spring or a freshwater spring, a good tree or a bad tree, a heart that is earthly or fleshly—operating according to the principles and practices of fallen Adam—or a heart that is heavenly and spiritual—redeemed in Christ and renewed by the Holy Spirit and operating by the principles and practices of the new life we have in Jesus Christ.
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What Counts as “Religion”?
Treating religious claims as strictly experiential-expressive can help carve out a space for religious free exercise, over against its cultured despisers. But this is a profoundly unstable space. For one thing, it generally abandons the possibility of giving a normative account of the good of religion as such. One can point to the meaningfulness of religion in the lives of its adherents, but it is denied any possibility of relevance to reality itself. And, of course, one forfeits any principled reason to claim that the Satanic Temple is “not a religion”—even though, by any standard definition, it clearly is not.
Last month, a grotesque little display popped up in the Iowa Capitol: a shrine to the horned god Baphomet, erected by the “Satanic Temple.”[1] To be clear, the Satanic Temple doesn’t revere a literal Satan. It’s a secular-progressive organization with a 1980s edgelord aesthetic, swiping at conservative appeals to religious liberty.[2] You say you want religious freedom? Well, that means freedom for us Satanists too. See how you like it now!
The display didn’t last. Ex-fighter pilot Michael Cassidy tore it down (and was later arrested).[3] Since then, much of the conversation surrounding the incident has focused on whether Cassidy did the right thing—and whether any legal rationales for the Temple’s use of the space can justify having a Satanic display set up in the halls of governance.
Those debates are noteworthy. And yet, beneath the surface of these arguments is a much deeper question: what is a “religion,” and who gets to define it?
Most people naturally intuit that to the extent it exists solely to mock other faiths, the Satanic Temple isn’t a bona fide “religion.” Its “fundamental tenets” are nothing more than banal left-liberalism, such as the claim that “[b]eliefs should conform to one’s best scientific understanding of the world. One should take care never to distort scientific facts to fit one’s beliefs.”[4] There is nothing here of divinity at all, and decidedly no affirmation of an actually existing Satan to whom one swears fidelity.
But the category of “religion” becomes slippery whenever such notions are invoked. For instance, insisting on belief in “a Supreme Being” as the sine qua non of religiosity would seem to exclude traditions widely understood to be “religions.” Could such a definition extend to the “emptiness” lying at the core of Theravada Buddhism, or the theologies of immanence that characterize modern neopaganism?[5]
Plenty of academics have thrown up their hands and declared the question simply hopeless. As Jason Ānanda Josephson Storm notes, “most scholars trained in Religious Studies today now consider it naive to presume ‘religion’ as a concept. . . . in many quarters the rejection of ‘religion’ as an analytical object approaches the consensus view.”[6]
Such a rejection, though, is a discipline-specific luxury. The First Amendment flatly declares that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. The category of “religion,” for all its conceptual instability, is firmly embedded in American constitutional law (and echoed in a myriad of statutes). Justices and judges can’t simply make the postmodern move and refuse to answer the question—at least not if they want to keep their jobs. Somehow, “religion” must be defined—and yet, supposedly, it cannot be.
To be clear, this is not a theological-philosophical problem that can be resolved in the space of a single article. What this piece aims to offer is something far more modest: a direction of inquiry that judges and Justices might consider when (inevitably) they are forced to reassess the matter. As appeals to “religious liberty” grow more and more contested, the Satanic Temple, or its imitators, will keep coming, pushing at the boundaries of the concept. The ultimate goal seems to be that scandalized Christians eventually settle for some sort of laïcité and a sterile public square. Christians ought to seek a better world than that.
Begin by clearing away some jurisprudential brush. Some might argue that the question of defining “religion” can be deferred indefinitely through consistent application of originalist methodology—that is, by pointing to historical examples of what counted as “religion” at the time of the Founding, which the First Amendment clearly protects.
The point is well taken. Courts can in practice make this move and avoid the deeper question. The Supreme Court, with its power of discretionary review, need not entertain cases likely to disrupt its existing precedents.[7] (The same is true of many state supreme courts.) From a public-order perspective, there are probably good reasons not to reopen the issue.
But from a theoretical standpoint, this is not especially satisfying. And it leaves questions unanswered that are not clearly resolvable within a narrow historical frame.
It is widely accepted today that the First Amendment’s protections are not limited to Christian (or even Abrahamic) faiths.[8] But there is ample reason to believe that the eighteenth-century drafters of the Constitution, like most other Westerners of the time, would have superimposed Western Christian conceptual frameworks upon religious traditions that in principle diverged sharply from the Jewish-Christian tradition. For example, assuming arguendo that Native American religious practices were originally cognized by the First Amendment, when these traditions speak of a “Great Spirit,” are they referring to a transcendent Creator (e.g., the God of the Abrahamic faiths), or referring to an immanent life-giving power not metaphysically distinct from the world?[9] If the latter, would those Native traditions count as “religions” at all? In the same vein, John Adams’s remarks on Hinduism suggest that he interpreted the tradition through a decidedly Western/Abrahamic lens.[10]
Hence, the deeper question can itself be transposed into an originalist key. To what, exactly, does the First Amendment’s protection for free exercise extend: a religious tradition as such, or the Founders’ inapt understanding of that religion? Is there principled room in the First Amendment for “religion” that does not in fact fit an implicitly Abrahamic paradigm?[11]
In general, the Founders were not what are today called “theologians of religions” or “comparative religionists.” Their use of a familiar theological-philosophical category (that is, religion) was an unanalyzed use (though understandable given the limits of the time). But now, when confronted with more challenging cases and the benefit of deeper knowledge of theological traditions, judges are not exempted from the responsibility to think through this question more systematically.
And that is, in fact, what the Supreme Court has tried to do—for better or worse.
Today, the vast majority of religious liberty cases heard by the modern Supreme Court do not involve fringe groups. The highest-profile court battles usually involve clashes between defenders of traditional Christian commitments and advocates of contemporary views on sex and gender. These cases are selected precisely because they offer clear opportunities for unsettled legal questions to be resolved and (for the most part) avoid getting bogged down in messy procedural issues or questions of disputed fact.[12] In this context, there is simply no reason to reopen questions regarding the nature of religion as such. Nobody seriously contends that Christianity (or Judaism, or Islam) is not a religion for First Amendment purposes.
But in at least two particular contexts, the question becomes much more difficult: cases involving the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), and determinations of conscientious objector status. As relevant here, RLUIPA (enacted in 2000) protects the rights of prisoners to their free exercise of religion while incarcerated. In practice, this often looks like providing special diets or other exceptions to standard prison practice (such as, in the case of a Muslim prisoner, the privilege to grow a short beard).[13] In making such determinations, courts must evaluate whether a prisoner’s supposed religious practice is in fact religious at all.
And the matter becomes even more fraught when questions of the military draft—questions of risk of death—are involved. That’s why, during the Vietnam War, the Supreme Court was required to address directly the sort of belief that properly counts as “religious” for purposes of conscientious-objector status.
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Dangerous Families
I know we like to think that political engagement, social movements, big seeker-sensitive churches, and things like that will win the day. But they won’t! Satan is not attacking families as hard as he is for no reason. Godly, Christ-honoring, fruitful, and multiplying families are dangerous to the kingdom of darkness. If we want to win this battle, then we need to start waging our war accordingly.
INTRODUCTION
I normally avoid disclaimers, but if you understand what I am saying in this article, then you will not only understand almost everything you need to know about spiritual warfare, why this country is the way it is, and how Christians can wage war against it, but you will also come to see how the antidote is dangerous families.
Here is the argument.
THE ARGUMENT FOR DANGEROUS FAMILIES
POINT 1: Satan is the enemy of God. He hates the things God loves. He tries to pervert what God calls good. And he attacks the things God makes.
POINT 2: As a matter of warfare, Satan has focused his attack on the most precious thing God ever designed, that which God has called VERY GOOD (See Genesis 1:26-31)
POINT 3: The thing God called VERY GOOD, is a male and female, human, sexually healthy, covenantally faithful, child producing, monogomas marriage. Or to say that in a different way, a family.
POINT 4: God installed this VERY GOOD family as the basis for, and the most central unit, of all society (see Genesis 1:28)
POINT 5: Knowing this, one can reasonably assume that Satan’s most ferocious attacks, and the heart of all spiritual warfare, will be leveled against the family.
THEREFORE: The way we fight back is by raising up the kind of families that are oriented back toward’s God VERY GOOD vision, that threatens Satan, thwart his plans, resist his temptations, and will eventually topple his kingdom.
But, before we get into that, let us look at how Satan is waging an all-out war on the family. Below, I list a litany (although not an exhaustive list) of examples.
MODERN EXAMPLES OF SATAN’S ATTACK ON FAMILY:
This list could be pages upon pages long. But, here are some obvious examples of how Satan is attempting to destroy the family, which means destroying godliness, men, women, marriage, and children.
Gender confusion, perverted (woke) cartoons, divorce, sodomy, adultery, pornography, lesbianism, fornication, godless schools, cross-dressing, effeminate men, passive husbands, domineering women, pronoun confusion, feminism, transgenderism, hook up culture, woke college campuses, birth control, abortions, sex-ed curriculums, intersectionality, government propagated sexual perversion, subsidizing the murder of babies, etc.
HOW DO FAMILIES FIGHT THESE PERVERSIONS??
The reason we learn about spiritual warfare is not to sit down in victimhood, but to rise up as victors. This is impossible apart from a relationship with Jesus Christ, but for the Christian, spiritual warfare does not end there. Like soldiers, we do not put on the uniform of Christ and think the battle is magically over. There is training, education, fighting, deploying, war-waging, raising up new soldiers, and the eventual triumph after a long and hard-fought campaign.
Below is another non-exhaustive list of activities we can be doing, as soldiers of Christ, to successfully wage war against the serpent. (P.S. it has everything to do with the recovery of the family)
Read the Bible and submit to its truth, pray continually, commit to a local church, get baptized, take communion weekly, love Jesus, and be discipled. Then, while you wait on Jesus to return, guard your virginity, date with purity, protect your eyes and your heart from Satanic perversions, get married to a godly believer, and be faithful to your spouse physically, mentally, and emotionally. Have frequent godly sex so that you are not tempted, make lots of babies, raise them up in the Lord, and refuse to send them to our perverted public schools. Instead, disciple them to grow up and have godly, fruitful, and multiplying families, teach them to worship Jesus fiercely, and to storm the gates of hell advancing Jesus’ Kingdom. If you cannot have children, adopt children, help others raise their children, and be the kind of member of your church that cheers for and supports godly families. If you have kids, do not forget to teach them how to date, how to marry, and how to raise children the same convictions, so that they can make for you an army of grandbabies, that you will assist in preparing for the war.
If you are fortunate enough to live to see your grandchildren marry, then you will get to encourage another generation to take up the blessing of godly, fruitful, and multiplying family life, and you will get to die with an astounding heritage and legacy.
WHY WILL THIS KIND OF FAMILY WARFARE WORK?
Because every Satanic attack listed above is meant to pervert the family. Satan has exhausted all of his energy and effort to pervert boys, soil girls, poison marriages, and stop women from having children. In fact, I believe this is the very reason Satan attacks women as ferociously as he does, since it is the woman who will carry the next generation of serpent crushing Christian children in her womb. If he can cause a society to be confused about what a woman is, then the battle seems nigh to its conclusion.
But, this is exactly the point we have to stand up and fight with dangerous, Satan threatening, families! Because, we will certainly win if we just get in the battle and stop standing on the sidelines in confusion! We will win if we engage as God intended!
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To the Uttermost
No angel, and no mere saint, could work so great a wonder. But Jesus can. He is none other than the Father’s “beloved Son” (Mark 1:11), whom heaven always hears (John 11:42). He is “the righteous” one, “the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 2:1–2), whose wounds and words satisfy every claim of justice. And best of all, he is the advocate of the Father’s own appointing. It was the Father who sent Christ, the Father who raised Christ, the Father who installed Christ as our everlasting advocate. All the intercession of Christ, then, only echoes his own heart-love.
He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. (Hebrews 7:25)
Some phrases carry such strong comfort, such enduring consolation, that they ought to be engraved on the walls of the heart. Airplanes ought to write them daily in our spiritual sky. They ought to be carved on every tree in the forest of the soul. “To the uttermost” is such a phrase.
Jesus is able to save to the uttermost. “That word ‘uttermost’ includes all that can be said,” John Newton once wrote. “Take an estimate of all our sins, all our temptations, all our difficulties, all our fears, and all our backslidings of every kind, still the word ‘uttermost’ goes beyond them all.” The word carries the idea of both fullness and finality: Jesus is able to save completely, and he is able to save forever.
And the reason he is able to save his people so fully, so completely, is because “he always lives to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). In a world of ever-present danger, we have an ever-praying Savior.
Our Praying Savior
For many, a mist surrounds the present ministry of our exalted Lord. We know Jesus as a past Savior who lived, died, and rose for us. We know him as a future Savior who will come again for us. But now, between the two trumpet blasts of his resurrection and return, we can struggle to speak of him in the present tense. What is Jesus doing right now?
He “is interceding for us” (Romans 8:34). Though exalted in glory, the head has not forgotten his body, nor the bridegroom his bride, nor the older brother his little siblings. Our great Moses upon the mountain, our true Aaron within the veil, Christ ever keeps us on his heart. He prays for us.
We may wonder, however, what his intercession really means. Does Jesus literally pray to the Father, vocally asking for our deliverance, forgiveness, protection? Some theologians (like Stephen Charnock, 1628–1680) think so, while others (like John Calvin) argue that he intercedes metaphorically, his glorified scars (representing his death) serving as our eternal plea. Either way, how intercession works matters less than what intercession is: at every moment, the living Jesus applies the power of his past sacrifice for our present help.
Like Israel’s high priest of old, who would enter the temple wearing stones upon his chest and shoulders that represented the people (Exodus 28:15–30), so Jesus carries us and our concerns into the very heart of heaven. As Michael Reeves writes, “God the Son came from his Father, became one of us, died our death — and all to bring us back with him to be before his Father like the jewels on the heart of the high priest” (Delighting in the Trinity, 74). Because he died and rose then, Jesus represents us in heaven now, able and willing to save us to the uttermost.
To get a sense of the height and length and breadth and depth of that word uttermost, consider three promises guaranteed by the present prayers of Jesus for his redeemed people.
1. Your faith will not fail you.
Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. (Luke 22:31–32)
At the dawn of Good Friday, the streets of Jerusalem were stained with the apostle Peter’s tears. The same man who had once leaped from his boat to follow Jesus, and raised his voice to confess Jesus, and walked on the water to meet Jesus somehow, someway found himself denying Jesus. Satan had taken the rock and thrown him like a pebble.
Yet even then, somehow, someway, Peter’s faith did not fail — not completely. Unlike Judas, he would meet Jesus once again by the sea, and once again he would leap from his boat to follow him (John 21:7, 19). And why?
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