Category: Theology

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You Can Trust Your Bible 2: Ethiopian Boogaloo

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So, wait, someone did as presentation where they had the Ethiopian Bible reproduced on 15-foot-high pages and displayed not-quite-upright for an audience? Or is it just a li’l tiny guy?

It’s been almost six years since I posted an article refuting a breathless, terrified post insisting that the Bible was being corrupted by modern interests. Satanism and the Gay Agenda made their way into the fearmongering. Rupert Murdoch even makes an appearance. It’s a good time.

But what if the conspiracy goes back even further? What if it’s not just Zondervan and HarperCollins and the gay agenda? What if it goes all the way back to 1611 and King James I of England and Ireland? What if it goes back even further, to the Church Fathers of the fifth century themselves?! That’s what a person (?) on Facebook calling himself “Pastor Micah Wells” alleges. This was posted on March 27, 2026.

Every commentary I bought said “meaning uncertain” next to the same verse until I found out the explanation wasn’t missing, it was removed.

How much did you pay for those commentaries? Because Matthew Henry’s commentary (completed by friends of Henry after his death in 1714 and in the public domain now) says enough about this to essentially form the thesis statement for my entire response:

“Of the prophecy of Enoch, (v. 14, 15) we have no mention made in any other part or place of scripture; yet now it is scripture that there was such prophecy. One plain text of scripture is proof enough of any one point that we are required to believe, especially when relating to a matter of fact; but in matters of faith, necessary saving faith, God has not seen fit (blessed be his holy name he has not) to try us so far. There is no fundamental article of the Christian religion, truly so called, which is not inculcated over and over in the New Testament, by which we may know on what the Holy Ghost does, and consequently on what we ought, to lay the greatest stress. Some say that this prophecy of Enoch was preserved by tradition in the Jewish church; others that the apostle Jude was immediately inspired with the notice of it: be this as it may, it is certain that there was such a prophecy of ancient date, of long standing, and universally received in the Old-Testament church; and it is a main point of our New-Testament creed.”

I was in a men’s Bible study group. Tuesday nights. We’d been meeting for three years. Going through the New Testament verse by verse.

We got to Jude. Fourteen verses into this tiny book, someone read verse 14 out loud.|

“Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men: ‘See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones.'”

The guy leading the study paused. Looked up from his Bible.

“Wait. Which book is that from?”

We all flipped to the table of contents. Genesis. Exodus. All the way through Malachi. No Enoch.

I pulled out my phone. Googled it right there at the table.

“The Book of Enoch. It’s not in the Protestant Bible.”

Silence.

I just want to stop at this point and say that I’m not the boy who cried AI, but this whole thing sounds very of-the-moment and formulaic; it seems to be written in that stilted single-paragraph-at-a-time flow that seems so common these days, and feels artificial even if the story is true. Plus, there’s that weird, errant vertical pipe (“|”) at the end of the third paragraph; that’s not a transcription error on my part, it’s in the original post. So I went to find out more about “Pastor Micah Wells.”

His Facebook page is devoid of any actual information about this person, aside from a photo of a man who appears to be in his 40s or 50s wearing a suit and clerical collar, standing in a building with large stained-glass windows; as well as a note that he’s affiliated with the Church of God.

A Church of God pastor doesn’t usually wear a clerical collar, and Church of God buildings tend to be smaller and more understated. If this were an actual pastor in the Church of God, we’d probably be able to find his church’s website, but Google results for his name with “Church of God” return literally nothing except shares of this post and an unrelated obituary.

This is all circumstantial, but it is telling. The smoking gun, though, is the Gemini watermark in the bottom-right of the image. And it’s enough for me to treat the rest of this like it wasn’t actually written by a human.

Then someone said, “Well, if it’s not in the Bible, why is the Bible quoting it?”

Good question.

Not really. There are tons of non-canonical books referenced in the Bible.

Some of them, like the Book of Jasher or the works of the Greek writers Epimenides and Aratus, are books that would’ve been recognized by the original audience as culturally-important at the time; kind of like a pastor in 2026 referencing Project Hail Mary in a sermon. Some of them are letters from New Testament authors to New Testament churches that we just don’t have anymore, like the “last letter” that Paul refers to in 1 Corinthians (call it 0 Corinthians, I guess). Some are ancient Hebrew history books. One in particular, referenced in Esther and Nehemiah, was a log of everything that went on in the throne room of the Persian king. Some are about Zeus, which wouldn’t make much sense to include in a Bible about the Judeo-Christian God. One is just…kind of a joke at the expense of Cretans (and the origin of the Epimenides Paradox: “‘All Cretans are liars,’ said the Cretan”).

Not all of them are worth being in the Bible because not all of them are about God and His story. Not all of them are divinely inspired (though the Biblical inclusion of those words is). Including them would make the Bible huge. They don’t have attributes that Bible books have.

And really, referencing books that were popular and weren’t in the Bible, in my opinion, makes it seem more believable, not less. It means that the people writing it were real, and they interacted with the world and other writing the way we do.

The leader smiled. Moved on. “Let’s not get sidetracked. The point of the passage is about false teachers.”

It’s not impossible for the pastor of a church to be a member (not a leader) of a Bible Study, but it is uncommon. Even more uncommon would be a Bible Study led by someone other than the pastor where the leader feels confident enough to rebuke the pastor for getting sidetracked. Maybe this is a story from before “Micah” was ordained, but that would likely have happened before cell phones, so he wouldn’t have been looking it up at the table. This could be a transcript of someone else’s experience, but it’s not described as such anywhere. I think this is more evidence that the post is AI.

But I couldn’t let it go.

If Jude—an apostle, the brother of James, writing under divine inspiration—quoted this book by name and called it prophecy, how is it not scripture?

Because it doesn’t meet the criteria to be canon: divine qualities, corporate reception, and apostolic origins. Anything else might be helpful, or at least illuminating, but not Scripture.

I went home that night and started digging.

Turns out Jude isn’t the only one. Peter references it. Paul alludes to it. Jesus Himself used language that echoes Enoch when He talked about the “Son of Man.”

This would be hilarious if it wasn’t concerning, coming from someone who calls themselves a pastor. Jesus wasn’t “echoing” Enoch, he was quoting Daniel 7. This is very basic Christology. And I must also point out that the fact that several authors in the Bible reference this “Book of Enoch” doesn’t mean that it suddenly has the qualities required for canonicity. Every bad high school essay starts with “Webster’s Dictionary says…” but that doesn’t mean that Webster’s Dictionary belongs in the canon of bad high school essays.

The early church fathers quoted it constantly. Tertullian called it scripture. Irenaeus referenced it. Clement of Alexandria cited it in his writings.

For the first 400 years of Christianity, the Book of Enoch was considered authoritative.

Questionable. The Jewish Septuagint (finished by the 3rd century BC and a common source of much of the Old Testament citations in the New Testament) and the Tanakh (finished by the 1st Century BC) excluded the Book of Enoch, so the early Jewish Christians likely didn’t consider it canon. Early Church fathers did reference it and even call it canonical, but none of them derived any major theology or doctrine from it. And while Micah here says that it was considered part of canon for 400 years, the furthest estimates for when canon was agreed upon happens more like 330 years after Jesus’ death, and some estimates are closer to 200 years after the Crucifixion, implying that even at that early time, most Christian leaders regarded Enoch as apocryphal.

Further, the Book of Enoch that the Ethiopian church uses today has some pretty wild divergences from orthodox Scriptural positions about the origin of sin, for example. If it had existed in that form in the time of the early Church, it seems unlikely that it would’ve been quoted by even the early Fathers, to say nothing of Paul.

Then it disappeared from Western Bibles. Not because scholars proved it was false. Not because new evidence emerged. It just… stopped being included.

It stopped being included because the Canon was coalescing around the 66 books we know today. The Canon was decided in a way that was much more about weeding out what didn’t belong, rather than intentionally choosing what did. And once that wisdom was handed down, it was affirmed by all major Christian groups, including several who were at odds with one another in other ways.

I found out that the Ethiopian Orthodox Church never removed it. They’ve had the same 88-book Bible for over 1,500 years. Same collection. No edits. No deletions.

While Europe was fighting over which books belonged and which didn’t, Ethiopia just kept reading the Bible they’d always had.

The same Bible that predates the Council of Nicaea. The same Bible that the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8 would have known when Philip baptized him.

“Micah” is playing a little bit fast and loose with history here. First, while it’s true that the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church can trace for itself a very impressive 1,696-year history, the First Council of Nicaea likely predates it by a decade or so. And the Bible they use was officially defined in AD 1240, about a millennium after the Protestant Bible.

Second, the Book of Enoch as the Ethiopian church has it now wasn’t even completed until around or after the Council of Nicaea, so it’s tough to say that they were “reading the Bible they’d always had” if it wasn’t even done yet.

And they didn’t just keep the extra books. They kept God’s true name — Yahweh — on every page. The same name that was stripped out of the King James Bible over 6,800 times and replaced with “Lord.”

This is false. Well, the tetragrammaton (“YHWH,” most often transliterated as “Yahweh”) was translated as “the Lord” in Protestant Bibles. That much is true. But the reason is a bit more complicated than Micah suggests here; it wasn’t just an edict or fiat by King James.

Actually, due to years and years of Jewish believers avoiding using the name, the tetragrammaton’s etymology and even its very vowels became unclear. The Latin Septuagint translation of the Old Testament (300 BC) translates “YHWH” to “Adonai,” which means “Lord;” that was the continuation of a tradition that Jewish believers had been adhering to for millennia by that point. King James’ interpreters simply continued in that vein.

That hit me differently than the Dead Sea Scrolls revelation hit some people.

Because Ethiopia didn’t just preserve Enoch. They preserved Jubilees, which explains the entire Genesis timeline. They preserved the Wisdom of Solomon, which Paul quoted in Romans. They preserved 1 Maccabees, which explains where the Pharisees came from and why the Jewish world looked the way it did when Jesus arrived.

Jubilees was a rewriting of Genesis and Exodus that was written in the 2nd or 3rd century BC, ages after Genesis or Exodus; and around the time when a discussion was heating up within Judaism as to whether they should use a solar calendar or a lunar calendar. In it, God seems to be far more concerned with that calendar than He appears to be throughout the rest of the Bible, leaving some to wonder if the book was written in an attempt to convince Jews to adopt a solar calendar. It also whitewashes the sins of the Patriarchs and even claims that Jacob decided he really loved Leah the most (which kind of wrecks the entire story of Joseph).

The Wisdom of Solomon was likely written in the century right before Jesus was born, and it includes (oddly for something claiming to be a Jewish text) a great deal of Hellenistic Greek philosophy. Some of it has some decidedly gnostic ideas. I can’t find any evidence that it was quoted in Romans, but it seems like some scholars think it might’ve been alluded to in Matthew 27:43 and in Hebrews 1:3. I’ve read the passages in question, and I don’t find them very compelling.

The book of 1 Maccabees seems to be more or less historical, but it exists in an interesting middle ground: too recent to be considered a part of the Old Testament, but not about Jesus (and thus ineligible for the New Testament). The earliest Christians didn’t consider it canon, so during the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther said that protestants shouldn’t either.

None of these books contain any major theological or doctrinal issues, and many of them in fact contradict Scripture in key ways.

These aren’t random religious texts. They’re the books the apostles read. The books Jesus studied. The books that make the gaps in the Old Testament finally make sense.

Apostles? Jesus? Probably not, since few of these were ever added to the Jewish canon.

And when the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947, the oldest biblical manuscripts ever found didn’t match the western Protestant Bible.

They matched Ethiopia’s.

Actually, they matched both. The Dead Sea Scrolls are remarkably close to the modern Western Bible, showing a clear chain of God’s provenance throughout the ages.

For 2,000 years, the world read 66 books while Ethiopia quietly protected all 88. Not because they were heretics. Because they were never conquered. The only Christian nation never colonized by a foreign power. The only nation that claims to guard the Ark of the Covenant to this day.

Ethiopia is really cool. They were briefly invaded by Italy, but it’s true that they were never colonized during Europe’s race to occupy Africa. They’re a symbol of African solidarity to this day as a result. And the Ethiopian church does have a pretty solid case for a very long history of faith, tracing their founding back to a specific person whose conversion was mentioned in the Bible; the Ethiopian Eunuch who was baptized by Philip in Acts 8.

The claim about the Ark of the Covenant is a bit more dubious, though; there’s no evidence at all about the Ark’s current location, and there’s contemporary documentation for everything from its destruction by Nebuchadnezzar all the way down to its preservation in Mount Nebo.

The post goes on from here to talk about the “true name of God” and other such mystical and fantastical ideas that seem to pop up every time something like this makes the rounds; stuff that has no basis or grounding anywhere else in Scripture, and truly reads like “Bible fan-fiction.”

I think you get the picture. “Micah’s” post is very long (more evidence of AI influence, in my opinion), and while it’s full of assertions that “Micah” wasn’t paid, it reads like marketing copy (in fairness, if he’s an AI, I suppose he wasn’t paid). I’m all for decolonizing your faith, but this isn’t how you do it.

In discussions about the canonicity of Scripture, I look to people like Michael Kruger. He’s a scholar of canonicity and the early Church at Reformed Theological Seminary, and speaks really wisely and charitably about the Bible in the ancient Church. I don’t know of anything he’s written about the Book of Enoch in particular or the Ethiopian Bible in general, but I do know that he’s talked about how the Canon of Scripture was settled. For more information, I’d recommend going to him.

The long and short of it is, as I said before, your Bible is remarkably reliable and trustworthy. God has preserved it for generations. And so I say with the Matthew Henry commentary, blessed be God’s holy name that he has not seen fit to test us in matters of saving faith by leaving out anything necessary. “There is no fundamental article of the Christian religion, truly so called, which is not inculcated over and over in the New Testament, by which we may know on what the Holy Ghost does, and consequently on what we ought, to lay the greatest stress.”

Side note: while finishing up this post, I found this at the bottom of the shop page for the book:

“Perfect your toast with this advanced bread toaster.”

Plus, there’s an assertion that they’re the only company that’s authorized to publish this Bible which, if what they’re saying is true, has been in the Public Domain for almost 2,000 years.

And the website was registered in early February (only a month and a half before “Pastor Micah’s” post)—that’s not nearly enough time for 15,000 people to have ordered it, then for Micah to order it, then for him to receive it and read it and recommend it to others, and then for another person to borrow it and read it and order it themselves, and then for a month to pass, and then for Micah to write this post, as he claims in the full version of it.

“Pastor Micah” aside, I would stay far, far, far away from this company.

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The Sojourner

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Here’s a reference sheet, since I find myself in need of it from time to time. I’m using multiple versions for each citation just to show that it’s not one “woke” translation; the message is common and clear across all versions. I’m also only putting the relevant parts of each passage here, but I encourage you to look at the context and see that I’m not cherry-picking or proof-texting.

Exodus 22:21-27, ESV

“You shall not wrong a sojourner or oppress him, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt. 22 You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. 23 If you do mistreat them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry, 24 and my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless.

25 “If you lend money to any of my people with you who is poor, you shall not be like a moneylender to him, and you shall not exact interest from him. 26 If ever you take your neighbor’s cloak in pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down, 27 for that is his only covering, and it is his cloak for his body; in what else shall he sleep? And if he cries to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate.

Exodus 23:6-9, NIV

6 “Do not deny justice to your poor people in their lawsuits. 7 Have nothing to do with a false charge and do not put an innocent or honest person to death, for I will not acquit the guilty.

8 “Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds those who see and twists the words of the innocent.

9 “Do not oppress a foreigner; you yourselves know how it feels to be foreigners, because you were foreigners in Egypt.

(Note: The word translated “foreigner” here in the NIV is the word translated “sojourner” in the ESV above.)

Leviticus 19:10, 33-34, CSB

10 Do not strip your vineyard bare or gather its fallen grapes. Leave them for the poor and the resident alien; I am the Lord your God.

33 “When an alien resides with you in your land, you must not oppress him. 34 You will regard the alien who resides with you as the native-born among you. You are to love him as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.

(Note: verse 10 is more or less repeated again in Leviticus 23:22.)

Leviticus 25:35-38, ESV

35 “If your brother becomes poor and cannot maintain himself with you, you shall support him as though he were a stranger and a sojourner, and he shall live with you. 36 Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God, that your brother may live beside you. 37 You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit. 38 I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan, and to be your God.

Deuteronomy 10:12-19, NIV

12 And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, 13 and to observe the Lord’s commands and decrees that I am giving you today for your own good?

14 To the Lord your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it. 15 Yet the Lord set his affection on your ancestors and loved them, and he chose you, their descendants, above all the nations—as it is today. 16 Circumcise your hearts, therefore, and do not be stiff-necked any longer. 17 For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. 18 He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. 19 And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.

(Note: here God commands that His people serve and depend on Him, and then explains why, and then explains how.)

Jeremiah 22:2-5, NKJV

2 […]”Hear the word of the Lord, O king of Judah, you who sit on the throne of David, you and your servants and your people who enter these gates! 3 Thus says the Lord: ‘Execute judgment and righteousness, and deliver the plundered out of the hand of the oppressor. Do no wrong and do no violence to the stranger, the fatherless, or the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place. 4 For if you indeed do this thing, then shall enter the gates of this house, riding on horses and in chariots, accompanied by servants and people, kings who sit on the throne of David. 5 But if you will not hear these words, I swear by Myself,’ says the Lord, ‘that this house shall become a desolation.'”

Job 31:29, 32, 35-36, NASB

29 “Have I rejoiced at the misfortune of my enemy, Or become excited when evil found him? […] 32 The stranger has not spent the night outside, For I have opened my doors to the traveler. […if I had,] 35 the indictment which my adversary has written, I would certainly carry it on my shoulder, I would tie it to myself like a garland.

(Note: This one is a bit more chopped up, because it’s tough to understand without the overall context. Job is saying that, if he had left the stranger (the ESV again translates this “sojourner”) to fend for himself, he would be worthy of Satan’s accusation against him.)

Psalm 146, ESV

Praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord, O my soul!
2 I will praise the Lord as long as I live;
I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.
3 Put not your trust in princes,
in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.
4 When his breath departs, he returns to the earth;
on that very day his plans perish.
5 Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob,
whose hope is in the Lord his God,
6 who made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that is in them,
who keeps faith forever;
7 who executes justice for the oppressed,
who gives food to the hungry.
The Lord sets the prisoners free;
8 the Lord opens the eyes of the blind.
The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;
the Lord loves the righteous.
9 The Lord watches over the sojourners;
he upholds the widow and the fatherless,
but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.
10 The Lord will reign forever,
your God, O Zion, to all generations.
Praise the Lord!

Isaiah 58:6-10, ESV

6 “Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of wickedness,
to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your bread with the hungry
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover him,
and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
8 Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up speedily;
your righteousness shall go before you;
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
9 Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’
If you take away the yoke from your midst,
the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness,
10 if you pour yourself out for the hungry
and satisfy the desire of the afflicted,
then shall your light rise in the darkness
and your gloom be as the noonday.

(Note: The word that the ESV translates “homeless” in verse 7 is “marud,” meaning “cast out” or “refugee.”)

Malachi 3:5

5 “Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts.

Matthew 25:31-46, CSB

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate them one from another, just as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on the left. 34 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

35 “‘For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you took me in; 36 I was naked and you clothed me; I was sick and you took care of me; I was in prison and you visited me.’

37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and take you in, or without clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick, or in prison, and visit you?’

40 “And the King will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

41 “Then he will also say to those on the left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels! 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink; 43 I was a stranger and you didn’t take me in; I was naked and you didn’t clothe me, sick and in prison and you didn’t take care of me.’

44 “Then they too will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or without clothes, or sick, or in prison, and not help you?’

45 “Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

46 “And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Note: It bugs me that all of the major translations use “stranger” in verses 35, 38, 43, and 44. The Greek word is “xenos,” which is where we get our world “xenophobia.” It literally means foreigner, or even alien.

Hebrews 13:1-3, NIV

1 Keep on loving one another as brothers and sisters. 2 Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. 3 Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.

Note: Did you know that Greek actually has a distinct word for “hospitality for strangers” (as opposed to hospitality for friends)? In English we use the same word whether we’re being hospitable toward friends or strangers, but in ancient Greek, they have “philoxenia,” which is a compound of “philos” (love) and “xenos” (foreigner or alien, as noted above).

3 John 5-6, NASB

5 Beloved, you are acting faithfully in whatever you accomplish for the brothers and sisters, and especially when they are strangers; 6 and they have testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God.

Again, “strangers” here are “xenos.” Further, “send them on their way” is more than just “move them along,” but “give them what they need for their journey.”

Note: I previously had 1 Timothy 5:10 on this list, but I’ve removed it as the explanation I had to give was longer than the verse itself.

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A Theological and Astronomical Fact Check

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A post is going around Facebook that has some people up in arms. It happens to be right in my wheelhouse as a space fan and a theology geek, so let’s take a look. Fair warning: this is a very long one.

The post was, as far as I can tell, originally posted by someone named “Dawn Marie,” whose bio reads “Jesus chaser🕊🤍☁️ Animal lover 🐶 Functional medicine + Self sufficient🌿 Medical freedom 🇺🇸”—which immediately brings up some huge red flags—and it leads with the following images: (click to enlarge)

Striking. Maybe? We’ll see. I’ll be using 📖 to refer to theological assessments and 💫 for astronomical ones, and grading each claim on a scale from ✅ to ⚠️ to 🛑. If I don’t know or can’t find the answer to something, I’ll try to be as honest as I can.

All I will say is: AMERICA..…REPENT!!!!
“Important info!
I’m not claiming to know exactly what all of this means, […]

📖⚠️. Press X to doubt. This is particularly funny because she begins with an assertion of what all of this means (“REPENT!!”) and continues thereafter to make even more assertions about what all of this means, but I’m fact checking her astronomical and theological statements, so let’s keep moving.

[…] but I think it is important enough for all of us to be aware that this is happening and pray for wisdom in this area. On April 8th this year, there will be an eclipse. One singular eclipse is pretty amazing […]

💫✅. All of this is true! I’m very excited about the upcoming eclipse, for which my home will be in the totality. Just nineteen more days!

[…] but this one is actually the last in a 3 part series that has SO much meaning behind it. […]

💫🛑. Not so much. This isn’t the “last,” or even part of a series of three. Due to the orbital dynamics of the Earth/Moon system, there are actually an average of about two eclipses per year; usually a little less than six months apart from one another. The April 8, 2024 eclipse will actually be the 51st of 224 eclipses in the 21st century; hardly an auspicious number. It will be the fourth of ten eclipses to cross the United States in that timeframe, and the second of five total eclipses. It’s actually shocking how much it’s not the third of anything here.

Maybe, if you wanted to play really fast and loose with the dates, you might say it’s the third eclipse to pass over the US in quick succession. But even that is tough to defend; there were eclipses in 2017, 2023, and 2024, which would make the upcoming one the third in twelve years, yes; but the one before 2017 was in 2012, which means that the 2017 eclipse should be a part of the previous series instead, right?

[…] It is important to know that God said that He would use the sun, moon and stars to communicate with us:
Genesis 1:14- “Then God said, ‘Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years…” […]

📖⚠️. Whenever you see an ellipsis in a Bible reference, be wary. (I added an additional one in brackets so that you could see that it was pre-existing.) So what was she trying to cover up in the remainder of that passage? Genesis 1:15 continues the sentence: “…and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.’ And it was so.” Verse 15 makes clear that this isn’t intended as a method of communication, but of timekeeping and illumination; and while the Hebrew word translated “signs” here can also mean “omen” or “warning,” its use in Genesis is exclusively as a marker or a stamp of the covenant (Genesis 4:15, Genesis 9:12-13, Genesis 17:11). I think this is more likely God’s way of signing His work than communicating hidden truths to us; a royal seal of sorts.

Side note, I can’t tell what Bible version Dawn is using. Some of it reads like the ESV, but it’s not exactly right. Maybe she’s transcribing from a paper Bible (she seems like the type of person that might be distrustful of digital Bibles), but it’s odd enough that I’m planning to note whether she’s playing fast and loose with translations here.

[…] Luke 21:25 – “There will be signs in the sun, moon and stars. On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea.” […]

📖⚠️. This one has a little bit more interpretive backing behind it. The predominant use of the Greek word that’s translated as “signs” in Luke 21:25 does indeed carry the connotation of “omen” or “miracle” throughout the New Testament. However, we should see here a warning in trying to interpret things this way: in many cases the people asking for these signs are not believers, but Pharisees—within the account of the Gospels, the villains of the story—trying to get some sort of secret information or to discredit Jesus. So we should be wary of what we’re trying to do here.

Incidentally, she seems to be using the NIV here.

[…] So now that you know that God said that He would use the sun, moon and stars to communicate with us, let’s break down this 3 part eclipse series: […]

Assertions are not proof, Dawn.

[…] 1) With the path of this last eclipse, combined with the first 2 eclipses (one in 2017 and the other in 2023), it will create the Hebrew letter over America that is “Aleph Tav” and in Greek it is the “Alepha and Omega” – both means “The beginning and the end.” God said in Revelation 21:6 that He is the beginning and the end and this Aleph Tav is like His signature. Why would He use an eclipse to put His signature over America? […]

Ooh, we’ve got a double here: bad astronomy AND bad theology!

💫⚠️. Okay, look. Any three intersecting lines will make a triangle, and the Paleo-Hebrew “alep” is basically just a triangle. But look at this map, overlaying all eclipses between 2000 and 2040: there are a lot of triangles. Are we saying that there’s an Aleph Tav over every single one of those? Is God marking Northern Brazil, or three different places in Africa? What about Australia, with its three overlapping Alephs? What did Iceland do to deserve that HUGE Aleph at the top of the map? There’s a little bitty one in Antarctica, is there some outpost of particular sin down there?

📖🛑. There’s a lot here, theologically, and none of it good for Dawn’s point. First, while God uses the Alpha and Omega to refer to Himself in the New Testament, that’s exclusively a Greek New Testament thing. He never referred to Himself as 𐤀𐤕‎ in the Bible; ΑΩ yes, but the Greek term is specifically used because He was identifying Himself as the holder of the sum of all knowledge: beginning and end, inclusive. But that’s not a particularly Hebrew idea; He identified Himself to the Israelites as 𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄, which we transliterate “YHWH” or “Yahweh”—meaning “I Am,” or “He Who Is.” If God chose to use an archaic letter to sign His name on the Earth using the shadow of the moon, wouldn’t the Paleo-Hebrew yod (𐤉) or the Greek alpha (Α) make more sense?

Second, God doesn’t identify Himself using archaic words and terms. Every time He identifies Himself in the Bible, it’s using terms and words familiar to the people listening.

  • He introduced Himself as “the God of Abraham your father” to Isaac, the son of Abraham;
  • as “the God of Bethel” to his son Jacob, referring to the place where Jacob had worshiped Him; and later as “the God of your father;”
  • as “I AM” to the people of Israel, through Moses;
  • as “the Lord” to the people of Israel, when He was promising land to them;

…and that’s just in Genesis and Exodus alone. In a very real way, God is His own story, and He identifies Himself by pointing back to other parts of his story. “I’m the God who did that!”

Obviously this whole thing is heading toward an apocalyptic prediction, but let me just head that off at the pass right here and right now: God calls Himself kyrios theos (κύριος θεός)—”The Lord God”—in the book of Revelation.

[…] Let’s dig deeper:
2) He has used eclipses to warn nations of coming judgement so that the nation can repent of their sinful ways and come back to Him. This happened with the story of Ninevah. God told Jonah to go to the wicked nation of Ninevah and warn them about coming judgement. Jonah ran away from the assignment and while out at sea got swallowed up by a whale and was in the whale for 3 days. Jonah repented of running away so the whale spit him up. He then went to Ninevah and warned the people but there was something that also happened while he was warning the people…an eclipse came over the land. In the 19th century, ancient tablets were discovered that describe an eclipse called the Bur-Sagale eclipse where the totality of the eclipse landed right over Ninevah while Jonah was there preaching of the 40 day warning before the coming destruction. Because of this, the people realized that this was a sign from God that what Jonah was saying was true and they repented and God spared their nation.[…]

💫✅. The Bur-Sagale (or “Assyrian”) eclipse is generally associated with the eclipse on June 15 of 763 BC, which did indeed go over Assyria and its capital, Nineveh.

📖⚠️. While this could explain the Ninevites’ sudden change of heart, this is just speculation. The Book of Jonah is undated, though other sources in the Bible and elsewhere show that the timelines could line up; and the prophet Amos, who spoke around the same time, uses an eclipse to call Judeans to repent. But the book of Jonah doesn’t mention any astronomical event in its explanation of the repentance of Nineveh.

Further, if this was a sign to Nineveh, it wasn’t the only one. In that time, the Neo-Assyrian empire was ruled by Ashur-dan III, who essentially just spent his entire reign putting down revolts. There were also two epidemics of plague sweeping through the kingdom by the time Jonah would’ve arrived. But more importantly than either of those realities, the Assyrian people were already predisposed to see eclipses as portents of doom. God works upon the canvases of the people to whom He speaks; and our current cultural canvas context classifies eclipses as scientific curiosities, not omens.

[…] It is amazing how much American mirrors Ninevah. (If you don’t see it, you may be part of the problem.) […]

This u? “I’m not claiming to know exactly what all of this means…”

Anyway: 📖🛑. Since the point of the book of Jonah is Jonah’s obedience, we actually don’t learn a whole lot about Nineveh. About all we know is that they were “evil.” The book of Nahum also prophesies its destruction; but all that it offers by way of explanation is that innocent blood is shed, lies proliferate, and theft and idolatry abound. This is far from a specific indictment, and could easily be applied to pretty much any group of people over a large enough time. Is that enough to make it “amazing how much American [sic] mirrors Ninevah [sic]”?

[…] To make this even more clear, this last eclipse on April 8th will be going over 7 cities here in America called – yep you guessed it – NINEVAH! I honestly didn’t even know that we had any city here in the U.S. named that but here we are – with this eclipse going over these cities (and there will be an 8th one that it goes over also called Ninevah in Canada.)
Here are the cities:
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐓𝐞𝐱𝐚𝐬
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐌𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐢
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐈𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐚𝐧𝐚 (𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐛𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐝𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐞𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐩𝐬𝐞 𝐌𝐚𝐠 𝟏.𝟎𝟐𝟑, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐥𝐨𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐨𝐜𝐜𝐮𝐫 𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐭 𝟑:𝟎𝟕 𝐏𝐌)
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐎𝐡𝐢𝐨
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐏𝐞𝐧𝐧𝐬𝐲𝐥𝐯𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐚
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐕𝐢𝐫𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐚
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐘𝐨𝐫𝐤
🔺𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐡, 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐚 𝐒𝐜𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐚 (𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐔𝐒) […]

Wouldn’t naming your town “Nineveh” be a little bit…strange? I mean, it’s better than “Gommorrah,” but…

💫🛑. Actually, this is more of a geography debunk:

  • The path of totality does not travel over Nineveh, Texas, missing it by nearly 30 miles. It’s also not an actual town; it’s so small that I can’t even get a Google Street View of it.
  • The path of totality doesn’t come anywhere near Nineveh, Missouri; in fact, it’ll be on the complete opposite side of the state. And it’s not an actual town, either. It looks like it’s exactly one driveway off of a gravel road in a farming community called Connelsville that’s barely on the map. What did that poor farmer do?
  • For the first time, we have an actual eclipse town! The eclipse actually does pass over Nineveh, Indiana…such as it is. I’ve actually been to Nineveh! Well, through it. On my way somewhere else. Nineveh is an “unincorporated census-designated place” with a population of less than 5,000. They filmed part of Hoosiers there. It’s cute.
    Edit: Oh, forgot to add: it is indeed going to be a pretty good eclipse there, and the time is about right, but while I can’t find any data on its actual magnitude over that exact spot, the actual maximum magnitude for this eclipse will be 1.0566, not 1.023. (“Eclipse magnitude” is the ratio between the moon’s apparent size and the sun’s apparent size. A magnitude over 1 is a total eclipse.)
  • Again, the eclipse will pass over Nineveh, Ohio! But, once again, this isn’t really an actual town. We do have a street view this time, though. Cornfields again.
  • Hardly any bigger than the photo above, Nineveh, Pennsylvania is hours outside the path of totality. Its 735 residents are nowhere near the eclipse.
  • Nineveh, Virginia isn’t a town (it’s a wide spot in US-52), and the eclipse doesn’t even touch the state of Virginia.
  • As far as I can tell, Nineveh, New York is just a bridge and a church for the ~50 homes nearby. It’s not a town, and it’s not in the path of totality.
  • Nineveh, Nova Scotia looks like it might actually be the most populous of the bunch, and even it isn’t a town. Oh, and the eclipse barely takes an edge off of Nova Scotia—an edge that’s nowhere near Nineveh.

It’s also worth noting the other Ninevehs that aren’t included, like the ones in California (a neighborhood in Los Angeles with a bigger population than everywhere else on this list combined) and the Solomon Islands (where it will be night during the eclipse in America). The path of totality won’t be anywhere near those Ninevehs.

So, 0/8. But wait—those places where there’s no totality. There’s still a partial eclipse there, right? Yes, but you could say that about the entire hemisphere. It’s definitely not drawing any alephs across that wide a region. Incidentally, the map with this post that charts a route through all of the Ninevehs that seems to suggest the eclipse will be right overhead? That map is extremely a lie.

Side note, what is with her formatting? I associate this pseudo-serifed unicode trickery with spam emails and phishing posts on Facebook. What’s going on here?

[…] Could this be that God is warning us just as He warned Ninevah? There have been many “Jonahs” in the past few years warning the nation that we need to repent and add in this sign above our heads – we can’t turn away from the fact that it is not a coincidence. […]

📖🛑. I mean, if by “the past few years” you mean “all of them”—as in, every year since the founding of this country—then yes, there have been many “Jonahs” warning Americans to repent. So, could this be another warning? Or a sign to confirm one of those warnings?

Well, first we need to clarify: repent of what? The “Jonahs” who have called Americans to repent have called us to repent of many, many things: our presence in the U.N., for instance. Premarital sex. Affirming gay marriage. Not affirming gay marriage. True prophetic calls to repentance need to be clear and unambiguous, but this is anything but. Be clear, Dawn. Don’t just be vague.

[…] But if you need more proof, let’s keep going…
2) The first part of this 3 part eclipse series was in 2017. The path of that eclipse went over 7 cities named Salem, which is short for Jerusalem.
🔺𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦, 𝐎𝐫𝐞𝐠𝐨𝐧
🔺𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦, 𝐈𝐝𝐚𝐡𝐨
🔺𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦, 𝐖𝐲𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐠
🔺𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦, 𝐍𝐞𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐬𝐤𝐚
🔺𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦, 𝐌𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐢
🔺𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦, 𝐊𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐲
🔺𝐒𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐦, 𝐒𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐡 𝐂𝐚𝐫𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐚
The mathmatical “chance” of there being 7 Salem’s with the first eclipse and then 7 Ninevah’s for the 3rd eclipse is unthinkable. But what about the 2nd part of the eclipse? […]

📖🛑. Actually, the Biblical city of Salem is just the home of Melchizedek; it might’ve been Jerusalem, but there’s no direct evidence of that.

💫🛑. I’m not going to go through every Salem here, but while the 2017 eclipse did indeed pass over Salem, Oregon, there’s no evidence of a place named “Salem” in Idaho or Wyoming, the Salems in Nebraska and South Carolina have a population under 200 put together, and with 41 communities named “Salem” in the United States it’s actually a bit surprising mathematically that only seven of them were crossed by the 2017 eclipse. Not to mention that two of the most notable Salems in the United States—Salem, Massachusetts and Winston-Salem, North Carolina—are notably outside the path of totality.

[…] 3) Perhaps the most striking piece of the 2nd eclipse is that the precise center-line of eclipse path exits the USA directly over Corpus Christi. Corpus Christi means the “Body of Christ” and is one of the only towns named that in the world!
But let’s go back to this upcoming eclipse and dig even deeper… […]

💫✅. The centerline of the 2017 eclipse did indeed pass through the center of Corpus Christi.

📖⚠️. While “Corpus Christi” does indeed mean “The Body of Christ,” it’s not named after Jesus’ earthly body, but the Catholic feast day celebrating it (Catholic feast subjects are weird, y’all). If you’re curious, it’s 60 days after Easter.

[…] 4) Jonah was giving a 40 day warning to Ninevah during the eclipse. If you look at our April 8th eclipse and fast forward 40 days then you will get to May 18, 2024 – the day before Pentecost. […]

So it’s 41 days before Pentecost. Don’t play rhetorical games here; God’s signs aren’t “almosts” or “just abouts.” When God speaks, no one paying attention can be confused.

[…] The history of Pentecost is that is the last Spring Feast that the Lord has given us (there are 4 in the Spring and 3 in the Fall). […]

📖🛑. Unlike feasts and festivals that actually were prescribed in the Bible, the celebration of Pentecost was never directly given by God.

📖🛑. Additionally, there are traditionally four or five liturgical feasts in most Western Christian traditions: Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost are usually agreed upon, with Epiphany, Good Friday, and Ascension being wild cards. In either case, none of them are in the fall; Christmas and Epiphany are solidly in the winter, Good Friday, Easter, and Ascension slide back and forth between winter and spring, and Pentecost slides back and forth between spring and summer. Orthodox Christians have twelve feasts, as I understand it, spread more or less evenly throughout the year. But I have no idea where she’s getting this seven number.

[…] This is the day that the Lord sent the Holy Spirit down to all those who have accepted Christ. We are told that the “Restrainer” (many believe this is the Holy Spirit) will be removed before the Tribulation – could it be that this is a warning for that? I’m not sure as that is a worldwide event and this eclipse will be just over North America but it is something definitely to think and pray about for more clarity and wisdom. No matter what, there are too many things lining up for it to not be nothing and so my job is to get the information out to you all so that you can at least be aware of these signs that God is giving us so that you can pray about it. […]

📖🛑. Ok, this is a little wonky, but I think it’s an important distinction: Pentecost was the day that the Lord sent the Holy Spirit down to all those who were gathered. Early Christians had no concept of “accepting” Christ, only of “following” Him, and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit came upon about 120 followers of Jesus who were gathered together in community after His ascension. Whether or not “accepting” Christ is a helpful way to express the event of salvation is something for people smarter than me to discuss, but I don’t think it really is.

📖⚠️. The identification of 1 Thessalonians 2’s “restrainer” as the Holy Spirit is heavily contested (as, to her credit, Dawn acknowledges). Tagging the Holy Spirit with this role is fairly dispensationalist in nature.

💫⚠️. The eclipse’s land coverage is indeed only over North America, but most of its path is actually over the ocean. It begins over the Pacific, nearly at Samoa, and ends over the Atlantic, 2/3 of the way to Europe.

💫🛑. Technically speaking, the “too many things lining up” are as follows:

  1. The Sun
  2. The Moon
  3. The Earth

And I hope, for all our sakes, it’s in that order.

🛑. This is just a normal fact check. Dawn is not a journalist or theologian, she is an influencer. “Her job” is not to get any information out to anyone.

[…] But let’s keep going…
5) From the start of this 3 part eclipse to the end, it will be 7 years. God uses numbers a lot to communicate with us, and 7 has a ton of meaning. A few examples are – He created the world in 7 days, there will be a 7 year tribulation, 7 is used for completion, etc. […]

💫🛑. As noted before, it’s actually kind of surprising how not a 3-part anything this is. But even if we grant her premise, it’s actually only been 6 years, 7 months since the “first” eclipse.

📖⚠️. There’s not really any evidence that God communicates with us using the number seven. At least not before the fact.

📖✅. Seven does indeed come up a lot in Scripture. Its meaning is generally associated with perfection.

📖⚠️. The tribulation described in Revelation (and elsewhere) isn’t explicitly stated to be seven years; that’s a dispensationalist view, and isn’t universally accepted among even the Evangelical community, let alone Christianity as a whole.

[…] 6) Going back to how this correlates with Jonah & Ninevah’s story -at the time of this eclipse, there will be another sign in the sky…it will take place under the constellation, Cetus, which is the whale constellation! […]

💫🛑. Cetus isn’t a whale, it’s a sea monster.

📖🛑. Jonah wasn’t swallowed by a whale.

📖🛑. While constellations and a zodiac existed in ancient Israel, there’s little to no evidence in the Bible of God using them to communicate with His people. Constellations and horoscopes are the domain of astrology, not theology.

💫🛑. Cetus is practically always in the sky in the Northern hemisphere. It’s huge.

[…] And not only will it pass through the 8 cities in North America named Ninevah, it will also pass through Jonah, Texas! Speaking of other towns that it will pass through, these are some of the other city names that it will go right over:
🔺Rapture, Indiana
🔺Williamston, Kentucky – this is where the Ark Encounter is located. The Ark Encounter is a full size replica of Noah’s Ark.
🔺Eagle Pass, Texas – where we are having so many border issues. […]

💫🛑. Oh, are we doing geography again? No, the Eclipse will not go over Williamstown, Kentucky or the Ark Encounter. Rapture, Indiana has a population of one as of 2011. And the southern border of the United States is 1,954 miles; of course the eclipse will be going over it.

[…] 🔺And the point where it crosses the 2017 eclipse to mark the center of the X is an area in southern Illinois called Little Egypt. What is even more fascinating about this is that Little Egypt is sandwiched in between 2 other cities called Alpha, Kentucky and Omega, Illinois – both having the 2017 eclipse come over their cities. […]

💫🛑. Yes, Southern Illinois is called Little Egypt—but all of it is. If the path of totality went over Illinois at all, it would go over Little Egypt. Everything south of St. Louis is “Little Egypt.”

💫🛑. This is laughable: Okay, yes, there is a town in Kentucky named Alpha (another unincorporated community, not a city, though this one is big enough to have a post office). It is not in the path of totality, and it also was not in 2017. And while there is a township in Illinois called Omega, it’s definitely not a city; it will be in the path of totality next month, but it wasn’t in 2017. Interestingly, there’s a town near Omega Township called Salem; I’m surprised Dawn didn’t jump on that.

So how small is this “sandwich?”

Over four hundred miles.

It’s 93 miles from Carbondale to Omega, and 314 miles from Carbondale to Alpha. It’s “sandwiched” the same way Philadelphia is sandwiched between New York and Washington. It’s “sandwiched” the same way you are sandwiched between your nearest artisanal bakery to the east and the bread aisle at your nearest supermarket to the north.

Pretty airy sandwich, if you ask me.

[…] Furthermore, the intersection of the 2017 and 2024 solar eclipses occurs directly over the New Madrid Fault Line, a major seismic zone. An earthquake along this fault line could potentially destroy the U.S., making it one of the most perilous fault lines in the country. I have no idea if this will happen or not, but there are too many things here that are all literally lining up to not share with everyone. […]

💫✅. The New Madrid Fault Line is in fact a major seismic zone, and it is does indeed run through New Madrid, Missouri (which is in the path of totality). But…

💫⚠️. …the Reelfoot Rift actually stretches nearly 150 miles southwest from the southern tip of Illinois into Missouri and then on under Arkansas. Further, there has not been a major geological event in the NMSZ since 1968. In addition…

💫🛑. …there’s no evidence or even suggestion that it could “destroy the U.S.” A team of researchers evaluated the effects of a 7.7-magnitude earthquake caused by a simultaneous rupture of all three segments of the New Madrid fault line and found that it would likely cause the most expensive natural disaster in the United States, heavily damage major US cities in 11 states, potentially destroy St. Louis and Memphis, and displace over seven million people; but as tragic as this would be, it would not “destroy the U.S.”

[…] 7) One more interesting fact is that there are 2,422 days in between the 2017 eclipse and the 2024 eclipse. If you look up 2422 in Strong’s Concordance, an Bible concordance that has every word of the KJV, takes us to Exodus 1:19 which says,
“𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐢𝐝𝐰𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐏𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐨𝐡, “𝐇𝐞𝐛𝐫𝐞𝐰 𝐰𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐧 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐄𝐠𝐲𝐩𝐭𝐢𝐚𝐧 𝐰𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐧; 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐯𝐢𝐠𝐨𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐠𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐡 𝐛𝐞𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐢𝐝𝐰𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐞.”
Why would this be of any significance? […]

Ya got me, Dawn. Why?

📖🛑. We’re deep in the weeds now. This process of calculating days, going to that word number in a specific Bible concordance, and then following the reference to that specific verse is a level of divination that’s right up there with Michael Drosnin’s critically-panned 1997 book The Bible Code. It’s basically Bible roulette. But, to be clear: there is no theological basis for this whatsoever. Dawn may as well be throwing a dart at an open Bible here; just because she wrote a date on that dart doesn’t mean anything.

[…] Well, to me, it reminds me of how Jesus said that His return would be like a woman in labor with the signs of His coming growing stronger and closer together. We are at a point in history where we are seeing all of the signs that He gave us happening before our eyes. In fact, we are even seeing things that will happen during the tribulation get setup now. If we are seeing those things being setup now, that must mean that we are super close to it actually happening. […]

📖⚠️. Christians don’t even all agree that the tribulation is in the future. It may have already happened. Dispensationalist theology was considered fringe until last century, and “all of the signs” are happening before our eyes at roughly the same cadence they have been for the past two thousand years.

[…] Going back to God saying that He uses the sun, moon and stars to show us signs – and then Jesus saying that the signs of His coming will be like a woman in labor, well this information leading us back to Exodus 1:19 explaining that the Hebrew women have labor fast is so interesting to me! Could we be on the brink of the rapture and tribulation!? I don’t know exactly when it will happen […]

Nice save.

[…] but Jesus did tell us that we would know the season and I do believe that we have been in that season for the past few years and are pushing closer and closer to it! […]

📖⚠️. This is probably Dawn’s interpretation of Matthew 24:32-35, wherein Jesus likens the coming of the End Times to the coming of summer. But just a few verses prior, we see Jesus saying, “So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.” (Matthew 24:26-27, NIV) The end times won’t be a secret or a code hidden only to the super-faithful; they’ll be apparent to everyone.

[…] So what do you do with all of this information?
It is no secret that this world has gone mad and everyone knows that there is something happening behind the scenes that feels really uncomfortable. If you have that feeling, you are right! […]

Well, which is it, Dawn? Is it no secret, or is it a feeling that only a few have? This is such a vague claim, I can’t even evaluate whether it’s true or not.

[…] There is a major push for things to happen that were predicted to happen over 2,000 years ago. Most people seek their understanding in the wrong place though. They look to the news and the world to guide them; however, these sources will only bring more questions, not answers. It causes people to live in fear, anxiety and depression. However, Jesus didn’t want us to live that way. He gave us the information so that we would know what is happening when we see these things. […]

Well, which is it, Dawn? Is it your job to give people the news, or will the news just bring more questions, not answers?

📖✅. Jesus did not want His people to live in fear, anxiety, and depression; and He did tell us about the future so that we would not need to. “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

That said…I find this message of hers at odds with the entire rest of the post. The amount of dread washing over every word is palpable.

[…] The first piece of living in His knowledge is accepting that God sent His son, Jesus, to die for our sins and on the 3rd day, Jesus rose from the grave and conquered death. The second piece is to repent to God of your sins and turn away from your sins. […]

📖⚠️. Look, I’m a Reformed guy, so I’m going to see words like “accept” and immediately be triggered. I’ll just leave it at that.

[…] Most churches only teach how God loves you but don’t teach repentance anymore […]

The rest of this is basically an altar call.

[…] and that is a HUGE part of your faith. Jesus said that there will be many who come to Him and say, “Lord, Lord, I knew you.” But because they didn’t repent of their sins and seek Jesus’ ways instead of their own, He will reply, “Get away from me, I never knew you.” We cannot just live however we want without any consequences. Even little children understand this concept, but it has been lost on most adults. This is why Ninevah was going to see destruction – because they were a self-serving, sinful nation – just like America is today. You can’t change the heart of this nation, but you can change your heart and lead your homes to do the same. Third, pray for wisdom in these areas.
I know this has been incredibly deep but just like Proverbs 25:2 says, “It is the glory of God to conceal a thing, but the honor of kings is to search out a matter.” This sign in the sky will be right over your head in just a few weeks – will you have the eyes to see what it really means?” […]

Well, at least she identified an actual sin for Nineveh.

Oh, I guess I can also do one more fact check, and end on a high note:

📖✅. Repentance is, indeed, a huge part of faith.

[…] A huge thanks to these sources:
https://eclipsewitness.com/american-eclipse-judgment
Vincent James

And again my red flags come out. “eclipsewitness.com” reproduces all the problems I’ve outlined above and then some, with a smattering of pro-Trump rhetoric sprinkled over the top. He also seems to have a couple of books to sell, and I would guess he really wants to move those within the next three weeks or so. And Vincent James is a super far right “influencer” on Xwitter; he turns the “nationalist” knob up to 11. Any “information” or “source” he provides should be viewed with skepticism and fact-checked extensively, because it’s likely to be cherry-picked to align with a worldview.

• • •

Side note: I’ve also seen a version of this shared with Matthew 12:38-39 on it, suggesting that the eclipse is the “sign of Jonah” that Jesus mentioned, and that it further foretells judgement on a “crooked generation.”

📖🛑. I implore those people to read literally the very next verse, where Jesus actually explicitly tells you what the Sign of Jonah is—namely, being buried for three days— and then explicitly explains that sign by saying that He’s the one who will be buried for three days.

It’s not a warning of future judgement upon America. It’s a foretelling of his own future crucifixion. That one already came true.

• • •

At the end of the day, God isn’t playing some coy game with Christians in America. He’s not hiding the truth about the Rapture in arcane machinations and revolutions of moon and sun. That’s not the way He has ever operated in the past, and no amount of manufactured “evidence” is going to change that.

Putting aside the fact that dispensationalism—and the rapture with it—is a widely discredited theology that only gained traction in the United States because of racism, any prediction of the end times has only ever been a guarantee that the time predicted probably isn’t when they’re going to begin. Remember Harold Camping? Billboards went up all over the place with his assertion that judgment day would be on May 21, 2011, and a seal that said “The Bible Guarantees It.” We’ll be celebrating the thirteenth anniversary of that day in a couple of months.

Predicting judgment day is a pastime that never goes well. Please pray, if you’re a praying person. And if you’re intrigued by the claims of Jesus, I encourage you to investigate them. But don’t worry about the end times prophecies.

Just put on your eclipse glasses and enjoy the show. Dread not, fear not; it is given to us to enjoy this experience, not run in terror at it. Take heart and have peace: God is a good God, and He will take care of us.

Eclipse Day update

I’m seeing an additional set of…let’s say “a set of sentences” come up a lot recently, so I thought I’d do a last-minute fact-check:

Here’s everything happening on April 8th:

• Rare Solar Eclipse […]

💫🛑. As noted above, there are two solar eclipses every year on average. There’s nothing rare about this one, except that it happens to be going over our heads in a swath of the Midwestern USA.

[…] • Cosmic Explosion […]

💫🛑. I don’t know exactly what they’re calling a “Cosmic Explosion” here, but if it’s the T Coronae Borealis nova, we don’t actually have an exact date on when we’ll see it (could be tonight, more likely it’ll be the middle of the summer), and it actually happened 3,000 years ago.

[…] • Devil Comet […]

💫🛑. Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks has been in the sky since last year. Its closest approach is in June. It probably won’t even be visible today, because it’s very dim.

💫🛑. It’s only called the “Devil Comet” because it briefly had an outburst that looked like horns.

[…] • CERN is being turned on first time since 2022 […]

💫🛑. CERN’s LHC was activated and achieved a stable beam on Friday, April 5.

💫🛑. It was also run in 2023 and 2022.

[…] • Allegedly states are preparing for state of emergency and deploying National Guards […]

⚠️. Some states are preparing for a state of emergency due to huge crowds. Indianapolis, where I live, will have up to a million people showing up over the next couple of hours—nearly doubling the population of the metro area. That’s going to probably cause a lot of cell phone outages, food shortages, and heavy traffic. It’ll be like a major sporting event, but across entire states, and it’ll only last about four minutes.

[…] • NASA Launching 3 Rockets at the eclipse “to study” it. NASA is calling it Project Serpent Deity […]

💫🛑. The NASA sounding rocket experiment is actually called Atmospheric Perturbations around Eclipse Path (APEP). Apep was indeed a serpent deity in Egyptian mythology, but the name has nothing to do with that.

💫🛑. This same experiment was done during the 2023 eclipse. Nothing happened except an eclipse and some information gathering.

[…] • Bible Prophetic signs to repent […]

📖⚠️. As noted above, there have been prophets warning people to repent since approximately the creation of the universe. That’s nothing new. Earthquakes and wars happen all the time. There are no actual new or unusual Biblical signs currently.

[…] • Eclipse will awaken two broods of Locusts(Cicadas) that have not been awake together since 200 years[…]

🛑. Locusts aren’t cicadas.

⚠️. The cicadas aren’t coming out in the midwest until mid-April.

⚠️. Brood XIX was last out 13 years ago, and brood XIII was last out 17 years ago. While it’s true that they haven’t both been out at the same time in about 200 years, periodic infrequent events happen simultaneously all the time. The confluence is nothing to write home about.

• • •

Merry Eclipsemas! Enjoy the show!

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The Steps of the Temple

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On the first step, he stood—

Zerubbabel looked from the temple step, his eyes scraping over the tattered remnants of Jerusalem, but his ears inundated with the sounds of the exiles of Israel all around him. Two years returned, they clashed their cymbals with delight, invoking God’s promise: “The Lord is good; his love endures forever!” Their shouts swelled from the mountain and hope swelled in his heart, for though the temple was still little more than a foundation and an altar, the Lord would live among His people once more.

— — —

On the second step, he climbed—

Joshua, son of Jozadak, strode up to the temple to offer the sacrifices that would finally dedicate it as the place where the Lord would speak. Though its pinnacles were not as high nor its walls as sparkling as its predecessor, and though it had taken them decades to lay the final stone, his heart glowed with peace and resoluteness. Surely this time Israel would retain their fervor, and not be taken into exile again. The walls would still reverberate with the people singing “the Lord is good, His love endures forever!”

— — —

On the third step, he sat—

Malachi slumped, his shoulders rounded and head bowed with the weight of frustration. Barely one lifetime had passed since the last echoes of Israel’s promise of unending devotion had faded across the temple grounds. “The Lord is good, His love endures forever,” but His people forget and turn away so quickly. Crying out the words God whispered to him, Malachi implored Israel to return, but they shut their ears to him. His call to repentance hung in the air, the vanishing echoes of God’s last words for half an age before silence fell.

— — —

On the fourth step, she wept—

Anna, barely twenty and already a widow, carried the sharp-edged pieces of a broken heart; a barren woman climbing barren steps. Her ears and all the ears of Israel ached at the silence in the temple over the past four centuries, but this was still the only place she knew to come with her distress. The promise had long ago been made that “the Lord is good, His love endures forever,” so Anna came in the quiet and began her vigil.

— — —

Down the fifth step, he ran—

Zechariah dashed down the temple steps to his wife with a tangle of joy, fear, awe, and confusion. The Lord had shattered His long silence with a message for the two of them; one of hope and joy, that a son would come to them, to speak for God once more, to prepare the way for the salvation of all of Israel! Their disgrace was over! Zechariah had been silenced, but God renewed the promise through the old man’s shuffled steps that “The Lord is good, His love endures forever.”

— — —
— — —

A young woman and her new husband approach the temple steps with a swaddled baby in her arms:

She steps on the first step with the Temple that will be torn down and raised back up in three days—

She steps on the second step with the Exile that will call all the lost back home—

She steps on the third step with the Sacrifice that will cover all the sins of God’s people—

She steps on the fourth step with the Hope for all those waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem—

She steps on the fifth step with the Word of God, made flesh to dwell among us—

And atop the stairs of the temple, the people of God cry out: “The Lord is good, His love endures forever!”

• • •

My wife and I collaborated on this meditation for a collection of works compiled by our church for the Advent season.

Merry Christmas!

• • •

Scripture references:
Zerubbabel: Ezra 3
Joshua, son of Jozadak: Ezra 6
Malachi: Malachi 3
Anna: Luke 2:36-38
Zechariah: Luke 1:5-25
Mary: Luke 2:22-24

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At this the whole assembly said Amen

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In Nehemiah 5, the people of Israel were fresh out of captivity and barely had two coins to rub together; and on top of that, there was a famine. Nehemiah, the governor of Israel at that time, heard their cries.

Now the men and their wives raised a great outcry against their fellow Jews. Some were saying, “We and our sons and daughters are numerous; in order for us to eat and stay alive, we must get grain.”

Others were saying, “We are mortgaging our fields, our vineyards and our homes to get grain during the famine.”

Still others were saying, “We have had to borrow money to pay the king’s tax on our fields and vineyards.”

I’d like to point out that these are debts entered into voluntarily. They chose to take out a loan, and they were paying it faithfully and still going under. But Nehemiah was not mad at the borrowers. He didn’t tell them “you should’ve thought of how you’d repay it before you borrowed it!” No, he instead spoke angrily to the lenders.

“Give back to them immediately their fields, vineyards, olive groves and houses, and also the interest you are charging them—one percent of the money, grain, new wine and olive oil.”

So, basically, debt forgiveness. The lenders agree to do so. Now, I’m on the record warning that Israel is a church and also a nation; and we run into problems if we try to conflate the two in our modern context. But check this out (v13):

At this the whole assembly said, “Amen,” and praised the Lord. And the people did as they had promised.

Notice that the “whole assembly” praised the Lord. Not just the borrowers, but the people who had already paid off their loans and even the lenders! The people of God rejoiced at the canceling of debt. Israel, as a church, rejoiced at what their governor had done on behalf of Israel, as a nation.

Some of my brothers and sisters need to do more praising and less grumbling. Yes, it’s unfair.

So is grace.

• • •

Scripture quotations from Nehemiah 5, NIV.

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You Can Trust Your Bible

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“Very critical alert!” These really scary images have been going around social media recently. “You can’t trust your Bible!” they implicitly (and in some cases explicitly) shout. “It’s being corrupted by—” well, that’s part of the problem. It’s unclear who’s supposed to have corrupted the Bible, but apparently it’s happened.

In actuality, it’s not actually worrying at all because it’s asking the wrong question. This is a very long post about how you can indeed trust your Bible. But before we deal with the question they should be asking, let’s consider what the NIV and other modern translations are trying to accomplish from omitting these verses, if that were indeed what happened.

The Inscrutable Agenda

  1. If they were trying to advance some gay agenda (as this meme spuriously implies), why wouldn’t they remove, for example, Romans 1:27? What do they gain from trying to throw doubt upon this teaching of Christ that is not only preached elsewhere, but attested to by His very life and death? What do they gain from removing a verse that speaks to His love and grace?
  2. So do these verses represent a core doctrine of the faith? Well, kind of. By which I mean, yes, but not exclusively; it’s also in Luke 19:10 and John 3:17. So if Zondervan was trying to change the Bible and remove some core element of doctrine, why would they leave it intact in two other places? Why just these two verses?
  3. Further, If they were trying to remove these verses from the Bible, why did they include it? That’s right, it’s actually there; in footnotes for this verse in almost every published version of the Bible, the “omitted” words are actually included verbatim.

In short, if they were trying to remove a concept from the Bible, they chose poorly and did a remarkably bad job of it. And they’ve continued to do a remarkably bad job of it for almost 50 years now, apparently, as the NIV has undergone multiple revisions and I can’t find evidence that any further verses have been “removed.”

The Shady Publisher

Now, let’s see about the claim that this is some ploy by a secular publisher. It’s true that the NIV is published by HarperCollins, but it’s untrue that it’s not published by Zondervan; in fact, Zondervan was acquired as a subsidiary of HarperCollins in 1988, and remains a separate but wholly owned entity of the parent company.

This may seem semantic, but Zondervan does appear to enjoy a certain measure of autonomy from its parent company. Further, the change appears to have been made before the acquisition; if you’ll notice the timeline, Zondervan was acquired by HarperCollins four years after the publication of the third revision of the NIV to not include this verse.

Further, it’s disingenuous to suggest that HarperCollins is some liberal outfit trying to destroy good conservative people. HarperCollins is itself owned by News Corp, which was founded by Rupert Murdoch as the publishing arm of the same company that runs Fox News. News Corp has been spun off from its parent company, but is still run by Murdoch, well known as a profoundly conservative man.

Finally, while Zondervan publishes the NIV in the United States, the version has other publishers worldwide. Biblica themselves, the translators, publish the Bible digitally, for instance.

The Right Question

I said above that this meme is insinuating the wrong question. What I meant by that is that we shouldn’t be asking “why were these omitted from the NIV (and ESV, and almost all other modern versions)?” but “Why were they added to the KJV?”

The fact is, in the 17th century when the KJV was being translated, they didn’t have manuscripts as reliable as we have now. The manuscripts which include these verses are hundreds of years older than the manuscripts which don’t, and we’ve only found those manuscripts in the last few hundred years of archaeology. The Textus Receptus, which was a Greek version of the New Testament used by the King James translators for the Authorized Version, was assembled and collated by the scholar Erasmus only about a hundred years before the KJV began translation. The documents from which it was sourced are themselves also not original, dating largely from the fourth and fifth centuries; and Erasmus’ published version was “adjusted” to more closely match the Latin Vulgate version.

In the nearly half-millennium since the translation of the King James version, archaeology has exploded as a field of study. We have more examples of the Word of God available to us than ever, and by and large, they all say the same thing. Further, the New Testament manuscripts and fragments we have access to now are, in some cases, less than a century separated from the life of Christ and, when taken in context as a whole along with the Textus Receptus, can be seen to represent Scripture, preserved by God and handed down throughout the ages.

Kept Pure In All Ages

Most confessions and creeds hold that the Bible is God-breathed and infallible in its original manuscripts; the Westminster Confession, to which my church and I hold, agrees. I would further assert that, just as none of us individually are the people of God, but all of us together are, the whole of Scripture has been preserved as a community of texts through which we see what God originally inspired the authors to write.

But the 1611 KJV was not an original manuscript; it has longevity, and it is valuable, but it is not infallible. It shouldn’t be considered the source or arbiter of textual criticism, and this meme makes a mistake on that point.

Most Christian Biblical scholars also believe that, while God hasn’t inspired any further Scripture, He does protect the Scripture he already wrote. This meme makes a further mistake there, in assuming that the publishers of the Bible are more powerful than the Author of it and can stymie His will.

In the end, it seems we just reckon with a simple choice: did a hyperconservative chief executive order a publishing company he didn’t own to make make a liberal change in a version they didn’t author to two Bible verses which don’t change doctrine in any appreciable way for no apparent or discernable reason, and then maintain that deception until some random person on the internet noticed? Or was it just a mistake in the manuscripts available in 1611 that we discovered in the 350 intervening years between the KJV and the NIV?

The bottom line is, you can trust your Bible in most widely-available modern versions. It’s been independently verified by people smarter than this random guy on the internet, and it’s been protected by the God who wrote it.

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The Reformed Blog Name Generator

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We know. It’s tough to blog when you don’t have a good blog name. Thankfully, you’re reformed! According to most confessions, you have to use an appropriately brainy-sounding name, which helps narrow things down a bit. This little web app will help you find a good one so you can register that WordPress site!

Comment your favorite generated names below.

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Resolved toward Reconciliation

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Historically speaking, the Church has done some pretty crazy and ludicrous stuff.  Last week, one part of it repented of a crazy and ludicrous season in their history.

So, I’m a member of a Church.  That church is a member of a Presbytery.  That presbytery is a member of a Denomination.  And during the 44th General Assembly that was held last week, that denomination – the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) – adopted an overture that has historic ramifications for the people under its care.

Historic Wounds

The PCA has a storied past going back to the beginning of the Civil War.  The Presbyterian Church in the USA denomination split along regional lines when war broke out, with the Southern members forming what was then known as the Presbyterian Church in the Confederate States of America.  With a name and history like that, you can imagine their thoughts on race and reconciliation.  But in 1973, responding to concerns over theological weakness and abandonment of orthodoxy, as well as ordination of women, the PCA split from the denomination in a meeting in Birmingham, Alabama, while their parent denomination (now renamed) joined what would become the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)  The newly-formed PCA affirmed the Westminster Confession, Reformed doctrine, and the Book of Church Order; but they did not distance themselves from the historic actions and attitudes of their parent denominations.

In fact, they issued a letter with their desire to be a “continuing church” as the denomination formed.  “We have called ourselves ‘Continuing’ Presbyterians because we seek to continue the faith of the founding fathers of that Church,” they said.  They truly intended to carry on the tradition of faith that they believed the PC(U.S.A.) was abandoning.

And, unfortunately, that meant taking on themselves the mantle of guilt for a great many racial wrongs.

The Road to Reconciliation

In 2002, the 30th General Assembly addressed one of those things; namely, slavery.  To paraphrase: “The heinous sins attendant with unbiblical forms of servitude stand in opposition to the Gospel, and we confess our involvement in these sins.”

It was a rather monumental step for a historically Southern, formerly confederate denomination to have taken.  But in the view of many, it was not enough.  Because, while slavery may possibly be the blackest mark on the United States’ spotty human rights record, it is not the only one in which Americans are complicit.  The Civil Rights movement, which became the environment from which the PCA was born, sought to address another dark mark upon the history of the United States; but while it made great strides, the massive racial dissent that have broken up in the years and decades since that movement prove that the Civil Rights movement did not in fact complete its work.

The deaths of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, and Eric Garner have brought this incompletion to a boiling point in our nation; and at the 43rd General Assembly, the PCA resolved to study racial reconciliation for the following meeting.  That was last year, and the 44th General Assembly took place in June of 2016.

Repentance to Reconcile

The final document that the Overtures Committee sent to the floor of the General Assembly was approved with stunning unity; 90% of churches in the PCA affirmed the language gladly.  The full text is below, but the bottom line is that the PCA is repenting and seeking forgiveness for their actions; for not only failing to pursue racial unity, but also actively working against it.  It recommends church discipline be exercised against members and churches who have obstructed reconciliation or continue to do so.

It’s a surprising move for a denomination with such deep roots in the “old South.”  And I think it is a Godly move.  But someone who is more closely affected by this overture, Jemar Tisby of the Reformed African American Network, said of the resolution, “For those present on the evening of June 23, 2016, it may have been one of the most refreshing times in the denomination’s history.”

As a black person in an overwhelmingly white branch of the church, I have to constantly evaluate whether I’m truly welcome here or not. A strong statement repenting, not just of racism generally, but the more recent lack of vocal support for racial equality during the Civil Rights Movement, is necessary because silence about the matter tacitly communicates either support or indifference. Now I can confidently say that the PCA is both aware of and remorseful for its historic connections with racism, especially from the mid-20th century to the present.

–Jemar Tisby, raanetwork.org

I’m grateful for that, too; even as a white man, I do not want to be associated with an organization that is indifferent toward – or even supporting of – racial inequality, whether tacitly or openly.  As an organization, it is important that we have a strongly-worded, definitive statement repudiating and repenting of the actions of our organization in the past and present.  It’s a good start, at least.

Resolution Is Not Enough

But Tisby goes on to say that this is not a done deal.  We must continue pursuing repentance and reconciliation in this area as in every area of sin to which we are prone.

[H]aving this overture in the records only helps at first. The actual lived experience of ethnic minorities in churches and presbyteries will prove whether the denomination is truly ready to make room at the table for historically under-represented groups.

–Jemar Tisby, raanetwork.org

The first steps toward that have been taken in Overture 43.  But, beautifully, Overtures 44 and 45 take the next steps; establishing a Unity Fund to financially aid the raising up of minority church leaders in the coming years, as well as a study committee to pursue diversity in the leadership of the PCA.  In my opinion, these aren’t merely lip-service reactions; they’re repentance-motivated steps toward true reconciliation.

Of course, this is not the end of the story.  We must continue pursuing reconciliation as individuals and as churches.

Moving Forward

Sadly, the fatal shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile happened within the short weeks after the vote, and our response to these actions as a church will determine whether we have been moved by the resolution that the PCA adopted on June 23.  This is the time which will decide whether we have been affected by this overture; whether we are truly repentant or simply affirming of a resolution that “makes us look good.”  This is a time to support the black community, to come around them in sadness and support, and to pursue justice alongside our brothers and sisters of other races.  For we are more like other believers of a different race – with whom we will worship God forever in the presence of the angels – than we are even with our family, if they are unbelievers.

I pray that this will be the a time of real reconciliation, and that we will repent without ceasing of our involvement in all injustice; and particularly of racism.

Praise God that He has made us in His image.

—

Recommended Reading:

“Reflections from a Black Presbyterian on the PCA’s Overture on Racial Reconciliation”, by Jemar Tisby

PCA General Assembly #30: Overture 20 (2002)

PCA General Assembly #44: Overture 43 and supporting documentation (2016)

“2016 PCA General Assembly: Moving Forward Together”, by Richard D. Phillips

—

In the coming years, the PCA will be tackling the role of women in ministry, having established a study committee in General Assembly 44.  You can read more about this OTHER historic event on this site.

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PCA General Assembly #44: Overture 43 and supporting documentation (2016)

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Overture 43

from Potomac Presbytery
“Pursuing Racial Reconciliation and the Advance of the Gospel”

Whereas, the 43rd General Assembly considered a personal resolution on racial reconciliation and referred the matter to the 44th General Assembly, so that lower courts could perfect and propose a resolution encouraging “heartfelt repentance”; and

Whereas, in the 1973 “Message to All the Churches,” the founding generation of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) expressly declared our denomination to be the “continuing church” of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS), saying, “We have called ourselves ‘Continuing’ Presbyterians because we seek to continue the faith of the founding fathers of that Church”; and

Whereas, the formation and identity of the PCA was shaped through the honorable and courageous commitment of our founding denominational leaders and churches to be faithful to the Scriptures in doctrine and in practice, and these convictions remain with us to this day; and

Whereas, during the Civil Rights period, there were founding denominational leaders and churches who not only failed to pursue racial reconciliation but also actively worked against it in both church and society through sinful practices, such as the segregation of worshipers by race; the exclusion of persons from Church membership on the basis of race; the exclusion of churches, or elders, from membership in Presbyteries, on the basis of race; the teaching that the Bible sanctions racial segregation and discourages inter-racial marriage; the participation in and defense of white supremacist organizations; and the failure to live out the gospel imperative that “love does no wrong to a neighbor” (Romans 13:10); and

Whereas, the vestiges of these sins continue to affect our denomination to this day and significantly hinder efforts for reconciliation with our African-American and other minority brothers and sisters by: often refusing to lay down our cultural preferences so that these brothers and sisters might feel more welcome in our churches; not sufficiently encouraging minority culture brothers into leadership within our General Assembly Committees and Agencies, presbyteries, and churches, as evidenced by our history; failing to lovingly confront our brothers and sisters concerning racial sins and personal bigotry; and failing to “learn to do good, seek justice and correct oppression” (Isaiah 1:17); and

Whereas, the 30th General Assembly adopted a resolution on racial reconciliation that confessed “heinous sins” connected with unbiblical forms of servitude, but did not deal specifically with the racial sins committed during the much more recent Civil Rights period, which betrayed the visible unity of all believers in Christ (Ephesians 2:11-22), the command to love our neighbor as ourselves (Mark 12:31), and the image of God in all people (Genesis 1:27); and

Whereas, God has once more given the PCA a gracious opportunity to show the beauty, grace, and power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ through confession and through the fruits of repentance: such as, formative and corrective discipline for racial sins; in understanding and appreciation of minority cultures; intentionally establishing interracial friendships and partnerships inside and outside our denomination; renewing our church’s commitment to develop minority leadership at the congregational, presbytery, and denominational levels; and encouraging a denomination-wide vision for and commitment to a more racially and ethnically diverse church in obedience to the Great Commission; and

Therefore be it resolved, that the 44th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America does recognize, confess, and condemn these past and continuing racial sins and failure to love brothers and sisters from minority cultures in accordance with what the Gospel requires; and

Be it further resolved, that this General Assembly praises and recommits itself to the gospel task of racial reconciliation, diligently seeking effective courses of action to further that goal, with humility, sincerity and zeal, for the glory of God and the furtherance of the Gospel; and

Be it finally resolved, that the General Assembly urges the congregations and presbyteries of the Presbyterian Church in America to make this resolution known to their members in order that they may prayerfully confess their own racial sins as led by the Spirit and strive towards racial reconciliation for the advancement of the gospel, the love of Christ, and the glory of God.

Adopted unanimously by Potomac Presbytery at its stated meeting, March 19, 2016
Attested by /s/ RE Charles D. Robinson, stated clerk

Overture 43 Amendment

Therefore be it resolved, that the 44th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America does recognize, confess, condemn and repent of corporate and historical sins, including those committed during the Civil Rights era, and continuing racial sins of ourselves and our fathers such as the segregation of worshipers by race; the exclusion of persons from Church membership on the basis of race; the exclusion of churches, or elders, from membership in the Presbyteries on the basis of race; the teaching that the Bible sanctions racial segregation and discourages inter-racial marriage; the participation in and defense of white supremacist organizations; and the failure to live out the gospel imperative that “love does no wrong to a neighbor” (Romans 13:10); and

Be it further resolved, that this General Assembly does recognize, confess, condemn and repent of past failures to love brothers and sisters from minority cultures in accordance with what the Gospel requires, as well as failures to lovingly confront our brothers and sisters concerning racial sins and personal bigotry, and failing to “learn to do good, seek justice and correct oppression” (Isaiah 1:17); and

Be it further resolved, that this General Assembly praises and recommits itself to the gospel task of racial reconciliation, diligently seeking effective courses of action to further that goal, with humility, sincerity and zeal, for the glory of God and the furtherance of the Gospel; and

Be it further resolved, that the General Assembly urges the congregations and presbyteries of the Presbyterian Church in America to make this resolution known to their members in order that they may prayerfully confess their own racial sins as led by the Spirit and strive towards racial reconciliation for the advancement of the gospel, the love of Christ, and the glory of God; and

Be it further resolved, that the 44th General Assembly call the attention of churches and presbyteries to the pastoral letter contained in Overture 55 as an example of how a presbytery might provide shepherding leadership for its churches toward racial reconciliation; and

Be it finally resolved, that the 44th General Assembly remind the churches and presbyteries of the PCA that BCO 31-2 and 38-1 provide potent and readily available means for dealing with ones who have sinned or continue to sin in these areas.

Pastoral Letter

From the Mississippi Valley Presbytery; available from this site, or mirrored here.

BCO 31-2 and 38-1

From the PCA Book of Church Order

31-2
It is the duty of all church Sessions and Presbyteries to exercise care over those subject to their authority. They shall with due diligence and great discretion demand from such persons satisfactory explanations concerning reports affecting their Christian character. This duty is more imperative when those who deem themselves aggrieved by injurious reports shall ask an investigation.
If such investigation, however originating, should result in raising a strong presumption of the guilt of the party involved, the court shall institute process, and shall appoint a prosecutor to prepare the indictment and to conduct the case. This prosecutor shall be a member of the court, except that in a case before the Session, he may be any communing member of the same congregation with the accused.

38-1
When any person shall come forward and make his offense known to the court, a full statement of the facts shall be recorded and judgment rendered without process. In handling a confession of guilt, it is essential that the person intends to confess and permit the court to render judgment without process. Statements made by him in the presence of the court must not be taken as a basis of a judgment without process except by his consent. In the event a confession is intended, a full statement of the facts should be approved by the accused, and by the court, before the court proceeds to a judgment. The accused has the right of complaint against the judgment.

One Comment

PCA General Assembly #30: Overture 20 (2002)

  By

from Nashville Presbytery
adopted by the PCA, 30th General Assembly, 2002, 30-53, III, Items 14 – 16, pp. 262 – 270.

“Racial Reconciliation”

Whereas, the Scriptures portray a covenantal pattern of both celebration of our rich heritage and repentance for the sins of our fathers; and,

Whereas, our nation has been blessed even as we have repeatedly addressed iniquity, redressed injustice, and assessed restitution for our inconsistent application of the ideals of truth and freedom; and,

Whereas, the heinous sins attendant with unbiblical forms of servitude-including oppression, racism, exploitation, manstealing, and chattel slavery-remain among the defining features of our national history; and,

Whereas, the issues surrounding that part of our history continue to shape our national life, even creating barriers between brothers and sisters of different races and/or economic spheres from enjoying unencumbered Christian fellowship with one another; and,

Whereas, the aftereffects of that part of our history continue to be felt in the economic, cultural, and social affairs of the communities in which we live and minister;

We therefore confess our covenantal involvement in these national sins. As a people, both we and our fathers have failed to keep the commandments, the statutes, and the laws our God has commanded. We therefore publicly repent of our pride, our complacency, and our complicity. Furthermore, we seek the forgiveness of our brothers and sisters for the reticence of our hearts, which has constrained us from acting swiftly in this matter.

As a people, we pledge to work hard, in a manner consistent with the Gospel imperatives, for the encouragement of racial reconciliation, the establishment of urban and minority congregations, and the enhancement of existing ministries of mercy in our cities, among the poor, and across all social, racial, and economic boundaries, to the glory of God. Amen.

  1. That Personal Resolution 6 be answered by reference to the Assembly’s action with regard to Overture 20. [See 30-53, III, 14, p. 261.] Adopted.

Whereas, the Presbyterian Church in America was formed to preach and teach the truth of God’s Word with the desire that its members would practice and live by the truth and as we are a young denomination meeting together for our 30`h Annual General Assembly, we want to thank God for the enabling grace to do this as well as we have done it and confess that when and where we have failed it is our fault and because of our sin; and

Whereas, we acknowledge that corporately as a denomination and individually as members of the Presbyterian Church in America we have sinned, (Romans 3:23), and

Whereas, we acknowledge that along with our many other sins, we may have corporately or individually sinned by slighting or offending a brother in Christ, and we as the people of God are called on in Scripture to repent of our sins as God reveals them to us by His Holy Spirit (Rev. 3:19, Acts 16:19-20, Luke 5:32, & II Cor. 7:10); and

Whereas, we recognize that each one of us must repent for our own sins as God holds each of us accountable for them (Ezekiel 18:20, Romans 14:12, Jeremiah 31:2930, Deuteronomy 24:16), and

Whereas, we also recognize that Scripture establishes precedents for the confession of the past sins of others without assessing personal responsibility for those past sins to the confessing party (Neh. 1:5-7, Neh. 9:13, Daniel 9:4-19), and

Whereas, we recognize the dangers of sins of omission as being grave as those of the sins of commission (James 4:17, Psalm 51:16-17, Proverbs 21:3, Luke 12:47), and

Whereas, God’s Word warns strongly against mistreating or not loving a Christian brother (I Corinthians 6:8, I Thessalonians 4:6, James 4:11-12), and

Whereas, we recognize that some have in the past, by commission and/or by omission, offended and slighted their brothers and sisters in Christ (I John 1:8-10), and

Whereas, we desire that all members of the Presbyterian Church in America conduct themselves first as the people of God – without favoritism, prejudice or partiality (Leviticus 19:15 & I Timothy 5:21), and

Whereas, we desire that all members of the Presbyterian Church in America not only show love for their brothers but that they actually have love for their brothers in their hearts (I John 4:21, Hebrews 13:1, Psalm 133:1 & John 13:34-35), and

Whereas, we desire the blessings of God Almighty upon the work of our churches and of our denomination, and fear His withholding those blessings due to a lack of personal repentance for sins committed against our brothers in the Lord (Proverbs 10:22 & Proverbs 24:23-25), and

Whereas, we want as a denomination and as individuals the blessings of being used of God to see souls saved and the work of His kingdom furthered therefore we strive to be obedient to God; and

Whereas, we recognize the need for the work of the kingdom to progress wherever the descendents of Adam are to be found and desire the work of the kingdom to grow as the lost are saved (Matthew 28:18-20 & Acts 1:8),

Therefore, we–the undersigned do humbly ask this 30th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America to resolve,

That, every member, Teaching Elder, and Ruling Elder in the Presbyterian Church in America be urged to examine themselves in the light of Scripture and by the leading of God’s indwelling Holy Spirit to determine if there be any unrepented of and unconfessed sins of partiality, favoritism, or prejudice (Lam. 3:40 & II Cor 13:5), and

That, if any such sins be discovered, either present or past, that these sins be admitted to and forgiveness sought from God and from those brothers so sinned against (Matt 5:23-24), and

That, the Presbyterian Church in America, at the denominational, local church, and personal levels, be encouraged to continue and/or begin to search out the lost wherever they are and lovingly and powerfully proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ in culturally relevant and meaningful ways as God leads by His Holy Spirit and gives the wisdom to understand (II Tim 4:5 & I Peter 3:15-16), and

That, the Presbyterian Church in America seek to lead the way denominationally in racial reconciliation, regardless of color or ethnic background, for the sake of the Body of Christ and for the glory of God (Col. 3:23-24 & I Cor 10:31-11:1).

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Commentary available on The Aquila Report.

Full text of all overtures available here.