Southwest Hills Baptist Church: Fill & Download for Free

As an evangelical Christian, I feel compelled to say that what the “Christian right” has accepted in Trump is extremely disturbing, upsetting, and terribly sad. I believe it has done terrible damage to the Body of Christ and to the message of the Gospel.I cut my political eye teeth during the Reagan revolution, proudly cast my very first presidential vote for him. I attended a very conservative Southern Baptist church in the Deep South, and I can vividly recall a very real concern the nascent religious right, among whom were my fellow church members, had with Ronald Reagan and the fact that he was…prepare to be shocked!…divorced and remarried. Many evangelicals actually took Jesus’ words seriously back in those days (if not selectively and at least vis a vis personal morality) and he very clearly stated that “anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.” Matthew 19; and “Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery.” Mark 10. This was a big concern for Christians in 1980, and I know many who did not vote for Reagan because of his divorce and remarriage. Flash forward just a generation and a half to 2016 and…Trump. Thrice married, a known philanderer and adulterer, fraud, thief, bankrupt…morally as well as in business. Just take a look at this one issue that is relatively insignificant to the rest of “the world”, but is huge to the Southern Baptist Convention, home body of such Trump apologists as Jerry Falwell, Jr., Robert Jefress, et. al.:“WHEREAS, Gambling is an immoral effort that creates deliberate risks not inherent in or necessary to the functioning of society; and“WHEREAS, Aggressive actions by the gambling interests in recent months make abundantly clear their intention of seeking to expand legalized gambling throughout the nation and especially in the states of the South and the Southwest; and“WHEREAS, Out-of-state corporations and businesses are investing millions of dollars in a bold effort to change state laws to allow casinos, lotteries, and pari-mutuel gambling; and“WHEREAS, Legislators of many states have shown shameful willingness to give shoddy and inadequate consideration to gambling legislation, to pass legislation out of committees without public hearings, and to schedule votes on gambling legislation in a manner carefully contrived to be beneficial to passage of the gambling legislation.“Be it therefore RESOLVED, That we, the messengers of the Southern Baptist Convention assembled in Kansas City, June 12-14, 1984, encourage Southern Baptists to work diligently with other Christians and other responsible citizens who oppose the spread of legalized gambling; and“Be it further RESOLVED, That we encourage the churches and the state conventions cooperating with the Southern Baptist Convention to engage in vigorous programs of education for adults, teenagers, and children about the moral tragedies wrought by legalized gambling; and“Be it further RESOLVED, That we express our prayerful support and strong encouragement for those who are providing courageous leadership in vigorously opposing the legalization of gambling both in the states where votes are scheduled and at the national level where pressure is building in support of legalized gambling.“Be it finally RESOLVED, That we express our grave concern that gambling interests have unscrupulously twisted the decision of the 1983 Southern Baptist Convention to meet in Las Vegas, Nevada in 1989 to imply that Southern Baptists are compromising their opposition to gambling, and that we declare to gambling interests and to the world that our purpose for meeting in Las Vegas in an expression of our mission to give support to Baptist work and to share Christ with the people of that area; and that we affirm our opposition to gambling regardless of any choice of site for a Convention meeting.” Southern Baptist ConventionFrom this to endorsing a man who bankrolled then bankrupted multiple casinos! The religious right has also chosen to “overlook” Trump’s sexual immorality in exchange for judicial appointments and “national security.” I am not alone in this thinking. Consider conservative Christian writer Rod Dreher, “I don’t agree with Michael Gerson on a lot of things — I believe he is far too accommodationist to the moral values of post-Christianity — but I suspect he has this right about his fellow Evangelicals:Third, without really knowing it, Trump has presented a secular version of evangelical eschatology. When the candidate talked of an America on the brink of destruction, which could only be saved by returning to the certainties of the past, it perfectly fit the evangelical narrative of moral and national decline. Trump speaks the language of decadence and renewal (while exemplifying just one of them).In the Trump era, evangelicals have gotten a conservative Supreme Court justice for their pains – which is significant. And they have gotten a leader who shows contempt for those who hold them in contempt – which is emotionally satisfying.The cost? Evangelicals have become loyal to a leader of shockingly low character. They have associated their faith with exclusion and bias. They have become another Washington interest group, striving for advantage rather than seeking the common good. And a movement that should be known for grace is now known for its seething resentments.“…fair or not, conservative Christianity will be associated with Trump for the next few years, and no doubt beyond. If conservative church leaders aren’t extraordinarily careful in how they manage their public relationship to the Trump phenomenon, anti-Trump blowback will do severe damage to the church’s reputation. Trump’s election solves some problems for the church, but given the man’s character, it creates others. Political power is not a moral disinfectant.“And this brings us to the more subtle but potentially more devastating effects of this unexpected GOP election victory. There is first the temptation to worship power, and to compromise one’s soul to maintain access to it. There are many ways to burn a pinch of incense to Caesar, and some prominent pro-Trump Christians arguably crossed that line during the campaign season. Again, political victory does not vitiate the vice of hypocrisy.”Make no mistake, the “Christian right” owns this president, and they will own the aftermath of his presidency. I predict that this will come back and bite them…no, EAT them alive one day. They made a deal with the Devil, and the Devil will come calling.

Well, I’m going to take a stab at it. The first problem I have with your question is with the term “American Christianity”. There is no such thing, really. As I learned many years ago, “There are really only two religions in the world: Christianity and paganism.” People either worship the Creator or the creation. A true Christian in China has more in common with a true Christian in Des Moines, IA, than the unbeliever who lives next door to that Christian.Second, “American Christianity” is not a monolithic entity. There are very large and highly influential segments of, let’s call it the church, that have had historical differences. Southern Protestantism has, sadly, been historically very hostile to African-American Churches. The Catholic Church is more influential in the Northeast and Southwest than in the South or Midwest.These different “Christianities” have shaped their environments differently. The Black church in America has had a different agenda than most predominantly white churches, emphasizing more social change and civil rights than institutions like the Southern Baptist Convention. To their credit, the SBC has apologized and repented for its historical blindness and antagonism to the rights of black Americans, but the scars are deep.I think most people would agree that the greatest influence of a “Christian” entity on American culture has been that of Protestant evangelical fundamentalism since the early 1980s, when the “religious right” found that it could co-opt the abortion issue as a fundamentally religious and moral “shibboleth” by which “Christians” could forever after determine who God’s anointed leaders were to be. A pro-life politician would get their vote always over a pro-choice candidate. A pro-choice candidate was a murderer; how could anyone vote for a murderer? What this did in effect was shift the burden of morality to a single issue: If the choice came down to a person who was pretty objectively a greedy, lying adulterer and a person who was personally very moral, generous, married to the same person for life, and honest to a fault, the former would have a leg up over the latter if he/she was “pro-life”. The Republican party adopted this strategy with a vengeance, and since so many church-goers became single-issue voters, since it was right on this one issue, the Republican party had to be, by default, right on every other issue. So we have basically ended up with a party that, for example, advocates economic policies that more closely resemble those of a God-hating, objectively evil person (Ayn Rand, and no pun intended) than the Gospels!The “Moral Majority” committed the same error in judgment in 1980 that the Catholic Church did exactly 1600 years before, in 380. That was the year Emperor Theodosius I made Christianity the state religion. I sincerely believe Satan dangled the “Keys to the (Earthly) Kingdom” before the Jerry Falwells of America and they jumped. Jesus clearly said, “My kingdom is not of this world…”, but, like the Serpent in the Garden, Satan whispered, “Did Jesus really say, ‘My kingdom is not of this world…’? You can have it ALL: Heaven when you die, and Dominion now! Why wait?” Satan laughed; God wept; we lost.It was a terrible union of the holy and the profane. It’s like what they say about wrestling pigs: Don’t do it, you’ll just get filthy, and besides, the pig likes it.“Political discourse is the Las Vegas of Christianity—the environment in which our sin is excused. Hate is winked at, fear is perpetuated and strife is applauded. Go wild, Christ-follower. Your words have no consequences here. Jesus doesn’t live in Vegas.“Not only are believers excused for their political indiscretions, but they are often applauded for committing them. Slander is explained away as righteous anger; winning arguments are esteemed higher than truthful ones (whether or not the ‘facts’ align); and those who stir up dissension are given the pulpit. So I balk when pastors tell me the Church should engage in the political process. Why would we do that? The political process is dirty and broken and far from Jesus. Paranoia and vitriol are hardly attractive accessories for the bride of Christ.“When media personalities tell you they are on a moral crusade, they are lying to you. These personalities get rich by instilling fear and paranoia in their listeners. If we give our favorite political ideologues more time than we give Jesus, we are following the wrong master. There are unbiased, logical and accurate news sources out there. But it’s up to you to be a good steward of information—to fact-check for yourself, take ideology with a grain of salt and make decisions based on facts rather than gossip.“Those who argue over politics don’t love their country more than others“They just love to argue more than others. Strife and quarreling are symptoms of weak faith (Proverbs 10:12; 2 Timothy 2:23-25; James 4:1) and are among the things the Lord “detests.” We need to rise above the vitriol and learn to love our neighbors the way God commanded us. We need to love our atheist neighbor who wants to keep creationism out of schools; our Democrat neighbor who wants to keep gay marriage and abortion legal; our Republican neighbor who celebrates death penalty statistics and gun ownership; and yes, even the presidential candidate from the other side.” 7 Things Christians Need to Remember About Politics

I was fortunate to have all four of my grandparents with me until I was 25 years old. Even better, they all lived in Dallas, Texas, where I grew up. It was a blessing to get to know all four of them and to hear the stories of their lives and their ancestors.My paternal grandparents were very sociable people. They occupied the front pew of Wilshire Baptist Church every Sunday. My paternal grandfather owned his own home-building business in Dallas and they lived an affluent lifestyle in the affluent east Dallas neighborhood of Lakewood, near White Rock Lake. They drove Cadillacs and traveled throughout Europe.Yet both of my paternal grandparents came from a hardscrabble existence, picking cotton and growing their own food in East Texas in the midst of the Great Depression.My grandmother told tales of wearing skirts made out of potato sacks, and of the tornado that destroyed her tiny hometown in April of 1929 when she was just nine years old. She was at the two-room schoolhouse when it fell down all around them. The teacher didn’t know to tell them to get underneath the desks, so my grandmother stood in the middle of the room holding her little sister’s hand. The schoolhouse door blew open. A boy went to shut it and it came off its hinges, taking off the top of his skull so my grandmother could see his brain. That was the last thing she remembered before the schoolhouse collapsed around her. Her older sister, who everyone called “Shorty” and was no bigger than my grandmother, came from the high school to carry my grandmother all the way home.My paternal grandfather’s mother was one of thirteen kids who survived childhood. Their surname was Lively, and most of them lived to be in their nineties. My great-grandmother lived to be 100, passing away when I was 16 years old. Right up until she died, her mind was sharp and she enjoyed playing the harmonica and the saw. (Yes, you can play a saw!)My maternal grandparents both grew up in Oklahoma. At the age of five, my maternal great-grandmother emigrated with her parents by covered wagon from Mississippi to Oklahoma as a Sooner. My grandmother was born in a house in a very small town in the beautiful hills of eastern Oklahoma. In a day before TV, my grandmother amused herself by reading and exploring the “mountains” and woods around her house, and had an encyclopedic knowledge of plants and animals (especially birds).Her parents divorced at a time and place when divorce was extremely rare. To make ends meet, her mother took in boarders. She kept cows and chickens in the backyard, and my grandmother tells of how her mother would go out back with a coat hanger to wring a chicken’s neck. Then my grandmother would help pluck and gut and cook the chicken to feed the family and the boarders. Her mother also grew her own fresh vegetables, strawberries, and blackberries.My maternal grandfather was actually born just over the border in Kansas. But his parents soon divorced, and the children were divided up among relatives. My grandfather went to live with his two aunts in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he grew up.He didn’t talk much about his childhood, nor about his experiences in World War II. But he was part of the infantry that swept through north Africa, Sicily, and Italy. There, he broke his back after a bomb threw him into the air. While recuperating in the hospital in Naples, he watched Mt. Vesuvius erupt from his hospital window in 1944.After the war he went to college on the GI bill and became a civil engineer, building dams throughout the midwest with the Army Corps of Engineer. He retired as Chief of the Southwest Division of the Army Corps of Engineers. He was a voracious reader with a particular fascination for military history. He was also a ham radio operator and a gun enthusiast with an impressive collection of Civil War-era rifles.Also rare for the time and place, my maternal grandmother worked for most of her adult life as a legal secretary. By the time my maternal grandparents retired, they had put enough money aside to buy an Airstream trailer and travel to every state in the Union except Hawaii.In terms of how they grandparented, my two sets of grandparents were very different from each other.If you had asked me as a self-centered child, I would have told you that my paternal grandparents were my favorite. They were incredibly warm and loving people, and although my paternal grandmother had very decided opinions about how things should be done, ultimately her love for us was completely unconditional. She was a consummate nurturer who absolutely adored spending time with her grandchildren.Getting to my paternal grandparents’ house was a blast in itself. By my earliest memories, they had moved to what at the time was a distant exurb of Dallas. To get there we had to fly in their white Cadillac over the highest bridge of the mixmaster that joined LBJ Freeway to Interstate 30. I would sit between them on the front-row bench seat of their enormous white Cadillac, and if my grandfather had to make a sudden stop, my grandmother would throw her arm across my chest to protect me. (Yes, this dates me!) Then we would cross the bridge over Lake Ray Hubbard, an enormous reservoir, where my grandparents would make running commentary on the color of the water and the wave activity that particular day.My grandmother’s elegantly-decorated house overlooked a lake and was jam-packed with toys; I was never bored. In the evening we played Chinese checkers and watched Wheel of Fortune. At night, I would take a bath in her huge tub in the bathroom with the quintessentially-seventies green monkey-print wallpaper, with my little bath doll who had red hair like me. Then we would go to bed in the guest bedroom with the two twin beds, her in one bed, me in the other.My grandmother was amazing Southern cook, but every time I visited we’d go to The Circle Grill restaurant. It seemed like a magical place at the time because they had fried chicken and biscuits and French fries with honey, and miniature juke boxes at every table. In retrospect, it was just a typical greasy-spoon diner frequented by truckers in plaid check shirts. Sometimes, for a change of pace, we’d go to Catfish King instead.When it was time to leave my paternal grandparents and go home, I cried because I wanted to stay! But my maternal grandparents were a different story altogether.Although each of my grandparents had grown up poor, The Great Depression hit my maternal grandparents in Oklahoma the hardest. In retrospect I think they might have suffered an element of PTSD from their experiences during that time.They deliberately kept no toys around the house for the grandkids. They justified this to us by explaining that when they were children, they were forced to make do with their imaginations. If it was good enough for them, it was good enough for us.So we entertained ourselves by pulling the pots and pans and utensils out of the kitchen cabinets and pretending to cook. By drawing, and writing stories, and typing on my grandfather’s ancient green typewriter. By going for walks with my grandmother and her Scottish terriers Sanja (named after San Jacinto Day) and Lady Macbeth, and only half-listening to her ramblings about the neighborhood birds and trees. By raking and then jumping in the piles of red oak leaves that fell from her trees in the autumn.My maternal grandparents would go to the PX at Carswell Air Force once per month, where they would stock up on groceries and supplies. My grandmother would buy meat and other groceries on sale in bulk and store them in the deep freezer in their garage.Having spent her life as a working mother, she was not renowned for her cooking skills. It is only in retrospect that I fondly remember her dinners of sloppy joes and white bread with “oleo.” I still have her handwritten sloppy joe recipe to this day.But my maternal grandparents were adamant that I clean my plate. If I did not, they would remind me that when they were kids, they went to bed crying because they were so hungry.It was only as I got older that I began to appreciate my maternal grandparents’ keen intelligence, sharpened by what was largely an impressive self-education. I also better comprehended and empathized with the circumstances in their lives that had shaped them into the adults they were. I began to actually seek out their stories and really listen, for a change.My first grandparent to pass away was my maternal grandfather. He died after a long battle with emphysema and kidney failure on October 14, 2000 — the opening night of my first-ever lead role in a play.It was a very small theater, and there were no understudies. If I didn’t show, the entire show would have to be cancelled, and this small, financially-tenuous theater would have had to refund all the tickets.That day my grandfather was barely hanging on. The hospice nurse expected he wouldn’t last longer than a day.I was a not-entirely-wise twenty-five years old at the time. I anguished over what to do.My aunt and mother pushed me out the door, insisting it’s what my grandfather would have wanted.It would only be a few hours, I told myself. Then I’ll come back and be there when he passes.After the show, my mom met me at the theater to tell me he had passed.My aunt and mother tried to convince me that he had held on until he knew I was gone, so that he wouldn’t keep me from it. But I still feel terrible about it to this day.After my grandfather passed, my maternal grandmother, losing her eyesight to macular degeneration, moved into a retirement community in Dallas. After a while, she reached out to her old high school sweetheart, still living in their small town in Oklahoma. He too was recently widowed. They married in 2003, when they were 84 years old.My paternal grandfather also died from complications of emphysema and kidney failure, in November of 2006. My paternal grandmother, suffering from Parkinson’s Disease, held on another two months before passing away in January of 2007. She and my grandfather had been married for almost 68 years.My maternal grandmother lived the longest. Not long after remarrying to her old high school sweetheart, she started showing signs of Alzheimer’s Disease, eventually requiring placement in a specialized Alzheimer’s facility. She passed away there in August of 2014, at the age of 95.