What side are you on in America’s civil insurrection? Southern Baptist Elites issue statement condemning police brutality but are silent as cops are attacked and property looted.

Curse ye Meroz, said the angel of the Lord,
     Curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof;
     Because they came not to the help of the Lord,
     To the help of the Lord against the mighty.[1]
     Judges 5:23

As America’s cities burn in riot and churches remain locked by tyrants, an effete Evangelical Elite preach a doctrine of weakness. When governors ordered churches closed and liquor stores, abortion clinics and Wal-marts open, where were the Evangelical Elites defending liberty?

The Elites were silent. There were none found to boldly declare as Moses, Let my people go! Or, at least, let them meet.

Instead our Elites helped the state fashion shackles. They distorted commands for loving our neighbors and submission to government as justifications for abusive state power.

They were like the people of Meroz—a people who refused to take the Lord’s side.

As one commentary explains, “Meroz represents those Israelites who have taken their stand on the side of the Canaanites.”[2]

And another, “Meroz is central to the repeated theme of blessing on freewill volunteering, battle participation, and personal initiative to defeat the enemy contrasted to cursing on those who do not participate and thus show love for Yahweh. Such a curse in this context reflects a group expected to show loyalty to Yahweh and to one’s own people.”[3]

Evangelical Elites should show loyalty to their own people—the Church.

Instead, too many cater to the whims of secular coastal elites.

While the Pandemic presented difficult choices—there were cases where there was no ambiguity. Cases where local officials targeted churches like in Mississippi and Kentucky. And yet, too many Evangelical Elites were silent.

Now another crisis is upon us. Our nation faces riotous mobs. These are not protestors but the vanguard of a political insurrection.

Lives are at risk. Property is at risk. Social cohesion is at risk.

Cops are attacked. Some with cars. Some with guns.

And what do Evangelical Elites do? They slander and lie about conservative Christians as Ed Stetzer’s vile tweet.

Anarchy and rebellion threaten our land. What do Evangelical Elites do? They release a statement against police brutality and do not condemn the riots threatening our cities.

One thinks of George Whitefield’s comments from A Short Address to Persons of all Denominations, Occasioned by the Alarm of an Intended Invasion, 1756. Whitefield linked threat to civil and religious liberties in his time to those feckless people of Meroz:

“Far be it from me, who profess myself a Disciple and Minister of the Prince of Peace, to sound a Trumpet for War: But when the Trumpet is already sounded by a perfidious Enemy, and our King, our Country, our civil and religious Liberties are all, as it were, lying at Stake, did we not at such a Season lend our Purses, our Tongues, our Arms, as well as our Prayers, in Defence of them, should we not justly incur that Curse which an inspired Deborah, when under the immediate Influence of the Holy Spirit, once uttered, Curse ye Meroz, curse ye bitterly the Inhabitants thereof, because they came not to the Help of the Lord, to the Help of the Lord against the Mighty?—Known unto God, and God alone, are all our Hearts.—Daily and repeated Experience convinceth us, that the greatest Talkers are not always the greatest Doers.—How therefore any of us may behave when put to the Trial, the Trial itself can only prove.”

The present trials show Evangelical Elites are as feckless Meroz.

But, the rest of us—the rank-and-file conservative Christian can do our duty.

We can proclaim truth. We can stand for religious liberty. We can stand for order amid riotous chaos. As Dr. Robert Jeffress said of the mob violence, “God hates lawlessness. 1 John 3:4 says, ‘Sin is lawlessness.’”

We should proclaim this truth—that just as police brutality is wrong, so too is this mob violence.

This is terrorism. We must not give in and we must not be like the people of Meroz.

Do no refuse our duty in the hour of need!

[1] The Holy Bible: King James Version, Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version. (Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 2009), Jdg 5:23.

[2] Daniel Isaac Block, Judges, Ruth, vol. 6, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1999), 239.

[3] Trent C. Butler, Judges, vol. 8, Word Biblical Commentary (Nashville; Dallas; Mexico City; Rio De Janeiro; Beijing: Thomas Nelson, 2009), 154.

One thought on “Evangelical Elites are like feckless Meroz”

  1. Right on the spot. Just as our leaders were silent when gay marriage was forced on us as the new law of the land, so these same people are silent again when the very foundations of our Christian heritage and social order are being undermined. Psalms 11:3 says, “If the foundations are destroyed, What can the righteous do?” BLM is an atheistic, communist front organization and any sympathy with them is siding with them against the gospel of Christ.

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