Posted on 03/15/2011 5:05:29 AM PDT by scottfactor
Last Friday evening I read a headline that sent lightning bolts of anger shooting through my mind: “Westboro Baptist Church plans to picket funeral for seven dead Perry County siblings.”
The seven siblings were children from the Clouse family, who ranged in age from 11 years down to 9 months old—6 girls and a boy. They were killed in a house fire on a farm in Pennsylvania last Tuesday night. The fire was apparently accidental. The children are survived by their parents and one 3-year-old sister.
You may be familiar with the Westboro so-called “Baptist Church,” though it’s actually just a devilish cult. It is a group consisting mostly of members of the family of Fred Phelps, an 81-year-old self-styled prophet of doom. They have garnered much attention, wrath and trouble since they first burst on the public scene back in 1998 when they protested the funeral of Matthew Shepard.
Matthew Shepard was a homosexual who was murdered by two methamphetamine junkies. Despite the lie repeatedly told by the media that Shepard was murdered because of his homosexuality, Shepard was not killed because he was a homosexual. He was a victim of murder committed during a robbery. The killers themselves admitted they only wanted Shepard’s money to get more drugs, and his homosexuality had nothing to do with it.
Westboro’s protests are based on their belief that all tragic events that occur are God’s taking vengeance on us because of our nation’s embrace of homosexuality. They have protested at homosexual funerals and events like homosexual parades and also at the funerals of various people, including soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. They carry brightly colored signs that say things like, “God hates fags” and “Thank God for dead soldiers.” Aside from the myopic thinking of these people, their theology is not in line with Scripture, as I will address shortly.
On March 2nd, the Westboro gang prevailed at the Supreme Court level on an appeal of a lawsuit filed by the family of a fallen Marine killed in Iraq. The Marine’s funeral was a target of one of the diabolical protests by the Westboro cult. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Westboro. There may be many of us who wished for a ruling against the Westboro family, but as Dakota Voice’s Bob Ellis notes, the Supreme Court’s ruling is a reasonable one, because many of us did not fully understand the facts of that particular case.
In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling, the Westboro gang is emboldened and has decided to target the funeral of the little Clouse children killed in that house fire. Phelps claims in a March 9th news release statement that the fire is God’s punishment on Pennsylvania, because Albert Snyder, the father of the fallen Marine who sued Westboro, is from Pennsylvania.
Phelps claims in the statement that his church is the “apple of God’s eye” and that they are “the only people who truly love you,” and he cites Leviticus 19:17-18 as proof that they truly love people. The verses in Leviticus are the commandments that God gave Moses to give to the Israelites, and those two verses specifically are God saying do not hate your brother in your heart. Do rebuke your neighbor who is sinning. Do not take revenge or hold a grudge, and love your neighbor as yourself.
Is this truly what the Westboro Baptists are doing? I have pondered this and sought the Lord’s help in answering the question. I have written a number of columns on the evils of the radical homosexual movement in our nation. I have denounced our society’s embrace of all things homosexual and the attempted destruction of marriage. I have warned of the dreadful consequences for our country that will result from becoming a modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah, because I do know that the Lord’s judgment is certain to fall on the entire world because of all the sins of mankind—it’s inevitable. It is already foretold in Scripture, so we know it’s coming.
How am I any different than the Westboro gang? It’s partly because my writing is meant as a warning to fight the homosexual program, not as the pronouncement of a certain ticket to Hell for anyone. This is a very tricky distinction, because I know that Jesus plainly said that most people in the world will not choose the path through Him that leads to salvation. In other words, most people will indeed end up in Hell, eternally separated from God. Even many, many people who believe they are heaven-bound are not, as Jesus makes quite clear in Matthew 7:21-23. I also know that anyone who stubbornly clings to his sin and refuses the free gift of salvation offered by Jesus is certainly doomed for eternity.
The difference is we are not called to viciously and deliberately inflict pain on others for the purpose of pronouncing the impending doom of this world. We are called to share the Good News of the kingdom of heaven in the hopes of pointing people to the path of salvation. We are called to do so in love, not in malice. Now, some would argue that calling sinful behavior sinful is not love, but hate. That is a lie. But what the Phelps gang does crosses the line from speaking the truth in love to intentionally hurting others, not to win souls for Jesus, but in my estimation, just to get attention.
In a 2005 interview with then KERN reporter Roland Davis, Phelps’ daughter, Shirley Phelps-Roper (misidentified at the link as “Patty Roper”), reveals some of their perverse theology and thinking. She makes pronouncements about a soldier who was killed in battle and claims he is certainly in hell, because of the fact that he was in the military. She claims that they have success at their protests because they are “delivering a message, period,” and she says, “We’re not winnin’ souls to Christ. We’re telling you that you’re going to Hell, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
That’s about all I need to hear to know these people are not acting in accordance with Scripture. For one thing, she has no way of knowing with certainty that anyone is in hell—that’s not her call, and if she actually understood the Bible, she would know that serving in the military is not the cause of anyone ending up in Hell. She is also flat-out lying when she claims “you’re going to hell, and there’s nothing you can do about it.” Why does she think Jesus came to earth in the form of a man, gave His life on the cross and rose from the dead? If there is, as she claims, nothing we can do to avoid damnation, then she is attempting to render the message of salvation meaningless. Her words are lies from the pit of Hell.
No, these people are not messengers of the Lord; they are tools of Satan. They may one day end up being the ones who do ultimately cost real Christians our freedom of speech here in America. I would not be surprised if eventually a court case to silence them does prevail, and by proxy, the rest of us as well; stranger things have happened in this nutty world.
The funeral for the Clouse children is today (Tuesday). Let’s keep the family in our prayers. It remains to be seen if the Westboro gang will actually show up to protest at the funeral. They have been known to put out statements that they intend to protest and then not do it. But if they do show up, they will be greeted by people who have signed on to create a human wall with soundproofing material between the protesters and the mourners.
The so-called “ministry” of the Westboro cult is not what Christians are called to present to this lost and dying world. The message and ministry should point to the Lord’s kindness, patience and tolerance which lead us to repentance, not the malicious wounding of already grieving hearts.
He will have anal sex with satan for eternity... that is the truth.
LLS
This group is simply a money making machine disguised as a church. They get people to react to their insanity and then sue them.
“it rains on the just and the unjust”
I am a Christian and these idiots are an embarrassment!
They are nothing but a bunch of ignorant hillbillies being led by a manipulative evil man.
(Yes, the mental picture of him being “violated” for all eternity by Satan himself is entertaining)
The members of this phony “church” are beasts, pure and simple, led by a very evil, conniving charlatan.
That would be one jury that I would truly love to get a summons to be on.
Why can’t a motorcycle gang take out the trash?
There are a lot of fields on Kansas.
Just saying...
Worth investigating.
"He'll smoke a turd in hell for that one."
It would be a shame if the entire cult “died in a house fire”.
Good question.
LLS
These people are a bunch of deranged loons. The best thing to do is ignore them. They are attention whores. Stick them 1000 ft down the road and let them protest. They will get tired of it at some point. Hopefully they will not reproduce.
The article misses the truth, which is that this so called church is a bunch of Democrats trying to bring a backlash on real churches.
I did not miss that particular truth. I know they’re Democrats, except they oppose pretty much everyone, including fellow Democrats. You do know they call Obama the anti-Christ, don’t you?
There was plenty I did not include in the column, but I made a brief note that these people could easily end up costing real Christians their freedom of speech. Maybe you missed that part.
But I can understand their saying that, oh say, combat deaths are god's punishment on America for tolerating homosexuality. I'm not agreeing, mind you, I'm just saying that I can see how it makes sense to them
But, even granting their evil logic, where do they get off saying that said soldiers are going to burn in hell? Are they responsible for public policy? Has Westboro made any attempt to determine their individual views on the issue?
Not that I have been made aware of. Somebody is going to burn in hell, no doubt. And I think a number of them will have attended this “church”. Oh, and Dr. Wright's, too.
I believe that's just part of the masquarade. When I mentioned to a liberal friend that Phelps was a hardcore Democrat, he didn't beleive me until he looked it up himself. It made a dent in his trust of the liberal press. Keep up the good work.
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