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Russell Moore #fundie erlc.com

The article quotes me telling the photographer that he need not investigate the background of every wedding he performs, but they do not quote the next sentence: “But when there is an obvious deviation from the biblical reality, sacrifice the business for the conscience, your own and those of the ones in your orbit who would be confused.”

Here’s why this matters. The photographer has, in most cases, no ability or authority to find out the sorts of things a pastor or church elders would about a marrying couple. Most evangelical Christians, this one included, believe there are circumstances in which it is biblically moral for a divorced person to remarry. And all Christians—regardless of what we think about a church’s responsibility—think that marriages between otherwise qualified unbelieving men and women are good things, grounded in a creation ordinance.

It’s possible, of course, that the man and woman who’ve contracted with a wedding singer are just marrying to get a green card. It’s possible that they don’t plan to be faithful to one another. It’s possible that she’s already married to three other men. It’s possible that their love is just a reality show stunt. Or, to take us back to Corinth, it’s possible the blushing bride is the groom’s ex-stepmother. But unless the photographer has a reason to think this, he needn’t hire a private investigator or ask for birth certificates and court papers to make sure it’s not.

In the case of a same-sex marriage, the marriage is obviously wrong, in every case. There are no circumstances in which a man and a man or a woman and a woman can be morally involved in a sexual union (I have no reason to assume that Powers and Merritt disagree with apostolic Christianity on this point. If so, they should make that clear).

Now, the question at hand was one of pastoral counsel. How should a Christian think about his own decision about whether to use his creative gifts in a way that might, he believes, celebrate something he believes will result in eternal harm to others. I recognize there are some blurry lines at some of these points. But what isn’t blurry is the question of state coercion.

It’s of no harm to anyone else if Kirsten Powers and Jonathan Merritt (both of whom I love) think me to be a hypocrite. It’s fine for the Daily Beast to ridicule the sexual ethic of the historic Christian church, represented confessionally across the divide of Catholicism, Protestantism, and Orthodoxy. It’s quite another thing for the state to coerce persons through fines and penalties and licenses to use their creative gifts to support weddings they believe to be sinful.

That’s broader than just homosexuality. I don’t want wedding singers forced to use their lyrics and voices to tell us how great it is that Herod and Herodias or Henry VIII and fill-in-the-blank wife’s name are soul-mates.

This article maintains that there are no circumstances in which the Bible “calls Christians to deny services to people who are engaging in behavior they believe violates the teachings of Christianity regarding marriage.” Really?

Does that apply only to the morality of marriage? Should a Christian (or Muslim or Orthodox Jewish or feminist New Age) web designer be compelled to develop a site platform for a legal pornography company?

Now, again, we might debate the best ways to see to it that consciences are protected by law and in the courts. But acting as though those concerned about such things are the reincarnation of Jim Crow is unworthy of this discussion. Moreover, the implications for conscience protection are broad and long-lasting. This isn’t just a tit-for-tat Internet discussion. The lives and livelihoods of real people are on the line, all because they won’t render unto Caesar (or to Mammon) that which they believe belongs to God.

Andrew T. Walker #fundie erlc.com

During Saturday night’s debate in New Hampshire, no candidate who was asked about women being required to register for the draft spoke out against such a proposal. My ears could hardly believe what they were hearing: Republican candidates, the party of so-called “traditional values” insisted upon the nobility of the United States drafting women into the military. Whether one “allows” or “requires” women to sign up for the draft misses the bigger point that needs to be said: Women should not be combatants—under any circumstances.

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There is no valor in requiring a woman to be subjected to the brutalities of a wartime foxhole where unimaginable horrors are played out in real life. But more importantly, let me raise this possibility: If a day were to ever arrive where the U.S. military depended on female combatants in order to win a war, the United States has already lost its most important battles. A nation relying on female combatants is a nation that has been brought to its knees by political correctness. A nation relying on female combatants is a nation that has lost all trappings of male and female differentiation. It is a nation that denies creation and reality in favor of anti-creation and anti-reality. A nation requiring female combatants is a nation that has surrendered any remaining relic of chivalry.

Frankly, it is cowardice of the highest order, and one that any self-respecting man ought to shun. The logic and consequence leads down a path that any man with a view to virtue or duty ought to shutter at when imagining. Think, for example, of the moral equivalency of such arguments that make it the duty of wives to respond to midnight intruders, rather than husbands. That’s what those supporting a military draft of women are asking us to accept. This isn’t just a military proposal; it’s about an entire worldview built on the bankrupt ideology of egalitarianism. This form of egalitarianism tries to level all differences in service to ideology. Ideology is so dangerous because it subjects all realities to its claims, regardless of whether such claims are moral or natural. Putting a woman in a man’s place will only increase her likelihood of harm and bring earned dishonor to the man.

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As the book of Romans tell us, disavowing creation is its own form of judgment, and a nation cannot suppress the natural laws of God and expect to prosper in the long-term, much less win a war.

In biblical tradition, man and woman are made beautifully different for purposeful reasons. The broad shoulders of men aren’t ancillary or accidental features, but evidence of the natural strength that males innately possess. The protective instinct that men can harness at a moment’s notice isn’t an evolutionary instinct passed down from marauding cavemen—it issues from the fact that God made men protectors. Military conscription of women makes the thwarting of nature mandatory. Women are nurturers; not warriors. That women are delicate, and possess, on average, a smaller frame than men indicate their aptness for less rugged activities, not hand to hand combat.

That we’re having this conversation reveals that America is less humane and gentlemanly, and that we’ve surrendered to our progressive zeitgeist. It is unacceptable.

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America, this shouldn’t be hard. Nations ought not send their daughters into battle, but God forbid, if wars arise, it ought to be sons that do the nation’s bidding. Anyone with an iota of commonsense and an eye toward reality knows we shouldn’t sacrifice our daughters to battle—and especially not to the spirit of the age.

Russell Moore #fundie erlc.com

Speak directly to these people. To the woman who has had the abortion. To the man who has paid for an abortion. To the health care worker who has profited off of tearing apart the bodies of the young and the consciences of their parents.

Speak clearly of the horror of judgement to come. Confirm what every accusing conscience already knows: clinic privacy laws cannot keep all this from being exposed at the tribunal of Christ. When the Light shines, there’s not enough darkness in which to hide and cringe.

But don’t stop there.

Proclaim just as openly that judgment has fallen on the quivering body of a crucified Jesus—accused by Satan, indicted by the Law, enveloped by the curse.

An abortion culture knows that hell exists, and they know judgment waits (Rom 2:14-16). Agree with them, but point them to the truth that God is not simply willing to forgive them. Show them how in Christ God is both just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus (Rom 3:26).

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The consciences around us don’t believe what they’re telling themselves. They’re scared and accused. Shine the light in the eyes of their consciences. Prophetically. All for justice, legally and culturally, for the unborn. But don’t stop there.

After all, the spirit of murder doesn’t start or end in the abortion clinic (Matt. 5:21, 15:19; Jn. 8:44; Acts 9:1; Rom. 1:29; Jn. 3:15). And the blood of Christ has cleansed the consciences of rebels like all of us.

Russell Moore #fundie erlc.com

Russell Moore, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, commented on the religious liberty victory surrounding Prop. 1, an initiative on the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance that was rejected Tuesday after a nearly 18-month battle.

“Months ago, when Mayor Parker attempted to subpoena the sermons of Houston pastors, I argued then that the preaching of the church of God does not belong to the government and we will not hand it over. Not now. Not ever. Here, the people of Houston have spoken and said the same is true of the conscience. The defeat of this proposition ensures that the consciences of men and women will not be steamrolled, and that unsuspecting citizens will not be put into vulnerable situations.”