A Warning for Conspiracy Theorists with Some Outrageously Good news for Pedophiles Satanists

Over the past few months I have been increasingly concerned about the number of conspiracy theories being shared by professing Christians on social media. An opinion piece in the New York Times this week suggests that I am not the only Christian to feel this way. It focused on an anonymous individual who posts far-right conspiracies under the pen-name ‘QAnon’. His theories, draw on populist end-times narratives to appeal to conservative-minded American evangelicals. He claims that the left-wing Democratic political establishment is controlled by a pedophile satanist cult, hell-bent on destroying the hero in a Republican white hat, President Donald Trump.

A few thoughts from the Bible:

• In the ninth commandment God specifically outlaws giving false witness. Whatever evils other people may have committed, it is sin in you that moves you to blame them for sins that they have not committed. It is sin in you that moves you to accuse them of sins without witness or evidence. It is sin in you that twists the facts in order to build a case when there is no case. False accusation is not Christ-like. It is devilish - Satan himself has been doing it since the garden of Eden (Genesis 3:1-4).

• In the sixth commandment God specifically outlaws murder. Jesus’ exposition of this law emphasises the principle behind it - that hatred is murder in embryo. This applies to malicious character assassination as well as actual physical assassination.

• God is no respecter of persons. He will not overlook an individual’s sexual promiscuity or financial corruptions or any other transgressions just because they have the ‘correct’ political affiliations. By God’s command, the sun and the rain fall on the wicked and the godly. Suffering impacts the righteous and the unrighteousness. Jesus warned us not to make inferences about condemnation from things people suffer; rather, He would have us take the tragedies and disasters we observe to heart as a reminder that we all live only once “and then judgement”. If you show favouritism: 

“...you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it. For he who said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not murder." If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law” (James 2:9-11).

• The God of absolute justice has appointed civil authorities to judge and punish crime and has claimed the right of final judgment for Himself (Deuteronomy 32:35; Romans 12:17-19 & 13:1-7). To pass final judgment on anybody is a blasphemous usurping of Jesus Christ’s prerogative as Judge of all the world (Acts 10:42).

• The Christian message is an offer of mercy to the worst of sinners. He has not appointed Christians to be mini-judges in the world but witnesses to His saving power and ambassadors of His Peace Treaty. The Holy Spirit convicts of sin with the purpose of leading sinners to Christ who delights to forgive sin and save sinners. The highest authority in spiritual discipline given to the corporate church is always to be exercised with our eyes on restoration not condemnation (Matt. 18:15-20, 2 Corinthians 2:5-11). All Christian witness has an element of “exposing the works of darkness” (Ephesians 5:1-17). However, the Holy Spirit does this primarily through the anointed preaching of Scripture, keeping the preacher - and everyone else - in the dark about the sordid details of other people’s lives (1 Corinthians 14:24-25). Even as saved sinners, we are vulnerable to temptation and can find an inordinate delight in things that are evil. We should not take pleasure in highlighting gross evil (especially, if that gross evil is unproven):

“It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret” (Ephesians. 5:16).

Rather, we should absolutely delight in presenting Christ, even to the most evil people imaginable:

“This is why it is said: “Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you” (Ephesians 5:14).

That is, for me, the biggest issue. To denounce and condemn the sins of liberals, abortionists, communists, pedophiles, gays, nazis, and yes, even satanists, without also denouncing the sins of the self-righteous, racists, women-abusers, pornography distributers, heterosexual adulterers, and bigoted religious pew-warmers is utter unrighteousness. 

To denounce and condemn all these without denouncing and condemning my own sins as equally deserving of eternal punishment in hell is utter hypocrisy.

But to denounce and condemn any sin, without immediately presenting Jesus as the only One who is willing and able to save sinners is utterly anti-Christ-ian.

I don’t know who might read this but whoever you are I want to tell you something. If you see yourself as good and righteous and respectable, God begs to differ: you need a saviour just as much as the members of members of a pedophile satanist cult. And if you are a member of a pedophile satanist cult you are not beyond hope: the blood which Jesus shed on the Cross of Calvary is enough to pay your enormous sin debt, wash you clean of your utter filth, and deliver you from the powerful grip of the tyrant Satan, a mere created angel who has deceived you into worshipping him as a god. This is not to offer an easy way out for those who have committed morally reprehensible crimes; Jesus will not take away the legal consequences of your sins and crimes in this life and the civil authorities will rightly require you to submit to the demands of the law. However, if you truly trust in Jesus as your Lord and Saviour, He will instantly make you righteous and pure in God’s eyes (justification), and continue to work in and change you (sanctification), so that you will be ready to enter heaven when you die - whether that occurs at the end of a long prison sentence or the sharp point of an executioners needle.

Outrageous? Yes. Biblical? Yes.

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1)

Whoever you are and whatever your sin, if we meet in hell, it is because we both deserve it. But whoever you are and whatever your sin, I hope that one day we will meet in heaven. If we do, it will not be because I am better than you. It will be because Jesus is infinitely better than both of us and I have entered on the same terms of you: turning from my sin to Jesus by simple faith.