Anyone who has a big family can relate to being lectured on the way to an upcoming extended family gathering. The lecture usually involves a parent reminding the children of such things as not to touch the knickknacks on Grandma’s shelf, or not to wrestle on the living room floor. Parents remind children of certain subjects not to be brought up at the Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner table. We can all relate to issues you simply learn not to mention, lest a sure-fire war commence and the holiday be ruined. The subject matter is usually political or religious in nature, but occasionally it may involve not commenting on uncle Wally’s fake hair, or the mothball odor permeating from Aunt Edna’s purse.
Like your family, the American family also has certain hot button issues that are pushed at times and, when they are pushed, all Hades breaks loose. Issues of race definitely fall under that category. By no means would I excuse the concerns of any side of this issue and claim that they are of little importance, but I want to look at this issue in particular from a spiritual perspective.
When racism comes front and center, it seems that the church falls into a political tailspin and divides between black and white or conservative and progressive. These issues affect the church greatly. Just read the social media spitting contests that take place between Christian leaders in the country every time someone dies in the streets and rioters destroy our cities. These terrible incidents bring sorrow to families, destruction to innocent neighborhoods and, sadly, cripple the church, making her powerless to fulfill the Great Commission. In light of this, what should we do when the church faces this again?
The famous passage in Ephesians 2 written by Paul addresses matters of race and the effect the gospel has on racial divisions. Jesus clearly destroyed the wall of partition that divided people. I find it amazing that there is another verse later in the letter that often goes unrecognized as key in reference to racial tensions. In Ephesians 6:12 Paul writes: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” This verse is placed in the heart of the famous armor of God passage Paul gives the church. Paul highlights the true enemy in this world. The enemy is not physical in nature but spiritual. The racial divide in our nation is without question a demonic divide.
Black, white, Hispanic and peoples of all races in the family of God must fully understand that racism is a spiritual scheme to divide people. Satan’s strategy to divide goes all the way back to Genesis 3 when he sought to divide God and man, and continues throughout Genesis with other well-known separations:  Cain from Abel, Isaac from Ishmael, Jacob from Esau, Joseph from his brothers. In Exodus, the enemy alienated Moses from the Israelites in the wilderness. Satan worked to divide and conquer in the house of David. He successfully divided Israel. He sought to divide the church in Acts through conflict. Satan is in the business of division. As Jesus came to unite us with God and each other, Satan seeks to strategically divide and conquer. This is ongoing, and still today Satan knows that if people are racially divided, they will not have a dialogue about the truth of the gospel. The kingdom of God cannot expand as long as the church is racially divided.
How can we as people of the kingdom counter this strategy? As Paul identifies the battle as spiritual, we must fight in that battle with spiritual weapons. When Satan decides to push the hot race buttons in our country, we first identify it as a spiritual attack on our nation. Second, we put on the whole armor of God to stand in the evil day. Notice that every piece of armor Paul lists in Ephesians 6 counters racial hatred. Truth, righteousness, the gospel of peace, faith, salvation, and the truth of scripture all counter racism.
The truth found in scripture and the gospel of peace show our value in Christ. His death on the cross makes every life matter. Therefore, white lives, black lives, blue lives, all lives matter in the scope of the gospel. This truth must be communicated and is needed most when darkness is falling on a nation. The church must refuse to be sucked into blind hatred and find wise ways to lift up Jesus in the midst of the trial. The truth and the gospel do not matter if God’s people don’t graciously live righteousness and walk by faith. All the elements found in the armor of God, when intentionally put to good use, will be a balm the wounds for some. Proclaim the gospel through face to face conversations, through social media and any means possible, living as Jesus lived, displaying all these armor elements in a world in need of light. I firmly believe that when Satan seeks to demonically divide our society with racial tensions, the church must fight back with the weapons we are given. Be Christ, proclaim the gospel of Christ, and be found faithful. Fight the demonic divide with spiritual unity.

Dr. Josh Phillips

In the world-wide pandemic of COVID 19 every sector of society is clamoring for answers. Politicians, doctors, economists and journalists all seek to sort out how to cope in the new reality. Words like quarantine and isolation are commonplace. News segments about social distancing and the validity of wearing surgical masks remain daily debate.

As a Christian I wonder what affect COVID 19 will have on the state of the Church. Will this weaken the church in America or strengthen her? I recently read some amazing incites about the state of Christianity during COVID from an unlikely source. Those incites did not come from John Macarthur or Franklin Graham but Hulk Hogan. The WWE wrestling legend in a recent article published in the Tampa Bay Times made a series of comments that tapped into the spiritual state of our nation. He did not tell us to say our prayers and eat our vitamins as all devoted “hulkamaniacs” remember from the Hogan golden days but he did preach a profound sermon in a small way about American idolatry.

As quoted in the Tampa Bay Times, Hogan wrote via Instagram “In three short months just like He did with the plagues of Egypt, God has taken away everything we worship,” He later wrote. “God said you want to worship athletes; I will shut down the stadiums. You want to worship musicians; I will shut down Civic Centers. You want to worship actors. I will shut down theaters. You want to worship money; I will shut down the economy and collapse the stock market. You don’t want to go to church and worship Me, I will make it where you can’t go to church.” What an unexpected and profound statement by a man that body slams people for a living. He then quoted from 2 Chronicles 7:14 “If my people which are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”

Whether we agree or disagree with Hogan’s conjectures completely depends on opinion but I think Hogan may be on to something. If we simply put our own views aside for a moment and simply ask the question: What if Hulk Hogan is right? What if God has taken our idols away for this brief time to cause us to repent and turn to God? If Hogan is correct then more questions must be answered. What happens when society gets their gods back? What happens when the American Church gets their other lovers back?

Currently in the midst of the pandemic the numbers are elevated with web and cyber church options available. Churches that have Facebook Live, Live website options and Instagram are seeing a high volume of views. Many churches that desperately needed to upgrade their social media and technological outreach methods have been forced to do so in the midst of the crisis. Therefore, this situation has made the church appreciate the privilege of gathering for worship when before many pastors were struggling to fill their sanctuaries on a weekly basis.

 Sooner or later the light is going to break through and the dark cloud is going to lift. I anticipate a gradual return to church but not an instant flood. Federal and state governments will reopen but some people will be afraid to go back right away. It will be a different site for pastors from their pulpits. They will see congregations spread out and faces covered with medical masks. There will be a wake-up call for many lukewarm Christians and bring back believers to a refreshed state of worship. I am not sure if this will bring Christians back to church in the long term? That is yet to be seen. This could be a positive landmark in Christian history that turned the American Church back to God. However, the cynical side of me says that people’s appreciation for worship corporately will be short lived and as soon as the distractions of money, sports, entertainment and leisure return all of us will go back to our normal lukewarm practices. Unfortunately, many may feel that in the months away from church they survived and can simply watch the services online. They will learn to live without church.

The only way this pandemic will bring about a change in the church is if God brings a true internal miracle in the hearts of the people. If this causes people to look to God and repent of neglecting the worship of God then this change will stick for the long-term. Nevertheless, if people simply draw closer to God to end the pandemic then in a New York minute they will go back to their former distractions. If the church truly wants God and God alone then this will be a spiritual transformation for the American church but if they only want relief from isolation then this will only be a temporary reflection. We will know for sure when society gets their gods back.

Dr. Josh Phillips