By johninnc
One of the more revealing vestiges of the covid era was the extent to which churches and their leaders hewed to, and even vociferously advanced, the fickle government narrative.
Many of the same pastors, who routinely and thunderously spew forth on every perceived social ill, assault on “christian values” and “religious freedom,” registered no meaningful complaints when it came to the tyrannical lies, censorship, and coercion of local, state, federal (and emerging world) governments under the guise of “protecting us” from covid.
One of the ways that the US government gained “buy in” from churches was to provide them with money to help them through the crisis.
In early 2001, we ran a post that touched on the billions of dollars of “covid relief funds” paid to US churches. See below:
I want to preface the next section of this post by saying that a church taking, or not taking covid relief funds is not a reliable indicator of the truth or falsity of its gospel message(s). But, I believe that churches that accepted covid relief funds cannot be trusted with the wellbeing of their congregants, irrespective of their doctrine.
Following are excerpts from an article entitled the Downside of the New Normal:
The world has changed, and overall, it is not for the better. We have changed. Our government has changed. Our values have changed. Covid-19 has given us an unjust legacy of new ways of thinking, new values, and new expectations. It is overall, an unjust system…
What are some of the negative characteristics of the New Normal?…
There are much closer ties between church and state that will have unforeseen consequences. In Australia and America, the churches laughed all the way to the bank in Covid Hysteria. Many received millions in subsidies, payouts, and other financial benefits, perhaps carrots to smooth over the closure of the churches and their silence. Usually, churches are always saying something in the public sphere, but during Covid Hysteria, they were very quiet.
I found an interesting online resource that can be used to track “Payroll Protection Program (PPP)” federal “loans” (most of the “loans” have been forgiven) in the US. Please see link to the search tool, below:
I did a quick search for prominent churches in Charlotte, NC that received PPP loans. Here were some of the larger cash recipients:
Forest Hill Church – $4,104,900
Roman Catholic Diocese of Charlotte – $1,584,953
First Baptist Church – $713,195
Friendship Missionary Church – $580,500
Providence Baptist Church – $572,700
Northside Baptist Church – $500,000
First Presbyterian Church – $407,120
In addition to the churches who took covid funds, many who did not take covid funds also stood on the sidelines and failed to speak out against one of the greatest evils of our generation. In so doing, they both missed a great opportunity, and made other societal issues that they might raise appear trivial by contrast.
Some of the sounds I heard from Christian leaders regarding the government covid actions were:
Cheerleading
Parroting
Promoting
Govsplaining
Gaslighting
Virtue signaling
Condemning
Whining
But most of all, the silence was deafening.
I have seen all sorts of tortured reasoning for why churches taking covid money from the federal government is OK. One of the more creative came from a friend who is not a professing Christian: that a church accepting covid funds is no different than a church accepting aid from a public fire department if the building were on fire. I think that is a silly, trifling argument, similar to suggesting that congregants using public roads to get to a church is no different than a church accepting covid relief funds. Anyhow, I didn’t necessarily expect him to understand.
One of the interesting things to watch – the unforeseen consequences of the closer ties developed between church and state during the covid era – will be the nature and extent to which churches will be coopted by government into supporting other exigent matters, such as changing our diets, restricting the sizes of our families, monitoring and reducing our “carbon footprints,” censoring speech, prosecuting unjust wars, and so on.
Notes From A Retired Preacher 
I could not have said it better, holly
Susan, there are so many voices out there that are in error. They tried to say the vax was the mark. Some of this forcing of masking and vaxes in order to go into doctor’s offices and restaurants or grocery stores were just a form of conditioning to get people to do what they say. Taking the mark would be obvious, a person would know they were taking it to worship the beast.
If you have believed that gospel for yourself, remember 1 John 5:13, you can KNOW you have eternal life. So stay in the Word. Re-read verses like Eph 2:8-9; Rom 4:2-5; Rom 11:6; Titus 3:4-7; John 5:24; John 10:28-29; John 3:14-18,36; John 6:28-29, 40,47. Reread the book of John several times and just rest in Him, in the fact He is not a man that He should lie. He cannot lie. He says when we believe on Him we have eternal life. And we’re sealed with His Spirit until the day of redemption the moment that happens (Eph 1:13-14; 4:30). Stay in His Word, best way to answer the accuser of the brethren.
Thank you so much!! This helps so much!!
No
Susan, anyone who has believed in Jesus as Savior has eternal life that can never be lost or forfeited. Eternal life begins the moment one believes in Jesus as Savior. You seem to understand the Gospel message, and that Jesus saves us, apart from any works on our part. It is not the quality of our faith, but the object of our faith that is the central issue. And, since eternal life is by definition eternal, no Christian will take the mark.
…and could wearing the mask, standing 6 feet apart, etc., be worship of the beast?
Dear John,
I have tried to believe the Gospel the best I can. In my understanding, it would be something like this:
By trusting in the sinless Son of God’s finished work on the cross, which is:
His death, where He paid for my sins, past, present and future, with His blood;
His burial; and His resurrection;
ALONE
to save me from my sins, I am saved forever.
i do believe this, but my brain gets tired. I worry I haven’t meant it enough.
Also, can a Christian who has believed the Gospel go to hell for taking the mark, or by worshipping the beast or the image of the beast?
Thank you, in advance, for your kind attention to all who write and read here.
May our Lord richly bless you and your family.
Susan
Holly, I’ll be on the lookout…
John lol. Well, first they’ll start with suggesting, a ‘really, truly, spiritual person, would think nothing of it. That John the Baptist ate bugs, so what could their possible objection be? Then they’ll probably bring up the permissible bugs, the locusts, the beetle, grasshopper etc. from Leviticus. Then they’ll get some money from the gov’t for their ads and never will a bug touch their lying lips 🙂
(Now if we hear that argument somewhere, I want to see an article on it here lol).
Holly, I am waiting to see how they will package the importance of eating bugs. Lol.
I was thinking abou the ‘Daniel Diet’ with Dr. Oz and Rick Warren. And I think someo of the more liberal churches are already on the abortion trail, keep families small or non existent, some are Green, and I think on CRT, many churches the pastors tried that. In a way, that is censorship as well. But anytime churches are worldly, they will be loving the things of this world.
Holly, much of the focus in professing christendom these days is on anything and everything except the gospel. Anything that blurs, or distracts from the gospel message will invite ecumenism.
Johninnc, I think we can see some of the love thy neighbor ideas in installing women as pastors and the Alphabet scene as well. Another thing I’m seeing with this crossless gospel is an ecumenism that will create a great apostasy. Just wait until they’re all saying, Jesus is over here, over there, in this inner chamber. Just believing in Jesus for eternal life means that many other religions that add works would be ok to hang out with.
If they were right, it’s a shame the apostles weren’t told they didn’t need to witness of His resurrection.
Holly, it is astounding that someone you knew would wish you dead so she wouldn’t have to see your posts any more. It will be interesting to see what other “love they neighbor” causes into which the “churches” will be co-opted.
Johninnc, what you said below about the mask/V/Covid time period, I have noticed quite frequently:
“There was a lack of discernment, a lack of courage, and a lack of leadership.”
This is something I saw with a lot of believers. Fear. And sadly a sheep mentality to believe what they were told carte blanche. But the worst part was some believers who felt it was right people be forced and right for believers to acquiesce if they ‘loved their neighbors’. As Pastor Cucuzza mentioned in one sermon, it is conditioning for what is to come. I was unfriended and blocked for my stance regarding the forcing (and even identifying the ingredients) and one ‘Christ follower’ that I knew from my Christian High School told me she hoped I would get covid and die, so she wouldn’t have to see my posts any longer. My daughter commented to her that it might be wiser to simply unfriend/unfollow me if she didn’t want to see my posts vs. wishing another dead.
We know who gives the spirit of fear and so it will work well in the end. I pray for those who were afraid and took it, or didn’t want to lose their jobs and took it. I have seen it take lives and also eyesight, paralyzed one, two with encephalitis of the brain, heart attacks and strokes (of just people I know).
But not expecting these things to change, just knowing that we have the Lord through this, and His Word for discernment (Heb 5:12-14) gives me so much thankfulness.
I used to love listening to Matt Walsh. Well, when I’m being fleshly and worldly anyway. He appears very smug, self righteous, and judgmental.
Quick to condemn the person, but slow to share the solution. Truth be told though, seeing as he’s a Catholic, I would rather him not talk to anyone about Christ.
It’s crazy how weird the world is becoming. The story you mentioned about human trafficking was odd, John. I don’t even try to understand things anymore
Jason, it is my opinion that whenever the world starts to coalesce on an issue, particularly if it seems like its kind of sudden, there is reason to give pause and think about what may be happening.
I worked for a very large US bank for most of my career. A few years ago, during one of our departmental management meetings, our HR representative said the bank was concerned about human trafficking, and was going to start working to prevent/fight it. Shortly thereafter, I was having lunch with a co-worker from another department, and he was telling me that his church (a very large church) had a guest speaker telling them about the horrors of human trafficking. The timing seemed to me to be suspiciously more than merely coincidental. After all, this same bank never met a “woke” issue they didn’t like, and seemed to have no problem with unfettered immigration, which is one of the enablers of human trafficking. When I read reports of other banks and prominent individuals being implicated in the Jeffry Epstein scandal, it doesn’t surprise me that some leaders and corporations would try to take positions to preemptively deflect any suspicion that they may have enabled or tolerated human trafficking.
Matt Walsh is said to be a practicing Catholic, according to Wikipedia. If that is accurate, then it would not surprise me if his regular exposure to false Roman Catholic doctrine has a major influence on his views. Assurance of eternal life should never be derided as “complacency.” God wants believers to have assurance, which is why His word points them away from their works and toward the sufficiency of Jesus Christ as the sole basis of assurance.
Similarly, Roman Catholic influence is prevalent in “faith-based” movies and certain conservative press. A Christian’s eternal life is never in “jeopardy.”
It would be hard to find anyone who would publicly admit being “for” human trafficking, so it is uncontroversial to be against it.
Conversely, the whole world fell for the covid tyranny, hook, line, and sinker (including most churches and “Christian leaders”). Voices of opposition were roundly dismissed as “conspiracy theorists” and cranks. It was hard to find anyone who took a stand against covid tyranny, including the churches, most of which stood down.
It is very interesting to watch the world and the churches coalesce on so many things.
I was appalled to see Matt Walsh, author of “What is a Woman”, comment that a Christian must not be complacent about salvation.
Matt Walsh says: “Ask the average American Christian to tell you how his life would be different if he didn’t believe in Christ, and he will struggle to provide a single example. And this fact will not trouble him. He is supremely confident in his own spiritual complacency. He laughs at the very notion that God might send him to Hell. He has no problem believing that some people are damned—a lot of people, even—but not him. He lives in a fog of cowardly and comfortable delusion, and it grows thicker by the day”
The very notion that God should send a believer to hell is utterly laughable in the face of grace and deserves the utmost derision. I mince no words: believers should be complacent about their salvation.
Sadly, Matt does not know what a believer is, because maybe he is not a soteriologist.
I was also appalled at the comment of Tim Ballard, the protagonist of “Sound of Freedom”: his wife “wouldn’t let him jeopardize his salvation” by not being involved in saving the children. There is no such thing as jeopardizing salvation. Lordship has all the essence of pedophilia: its sheer perversion. LS trafficked our souls.
Steve, for me, this article is meant as kind of an epilogue to the covid trauma. I would like to see some kind of public reckoning, but I think that is unrealistic.
Medical interventions should be based only on informed consent, and should never involve coercion. The way that would-be covid preventatives and treatments (isolation, masks, inoculations, and sometimes even other therapeutics) were pushed went way beyond that.
In the US, the rule of law became the law of rules. Most US states, and our federal government, quickly bypassed constitutional and legal norms and devolved into quasi-dictatorships.
Many of our friends and family were conscripted into the “war on covid,” and got caught up in viewing those of us who took a more skeptical view as the enemy. This was very hurtful, and most who made us into enemies will never know the extent of it.
Things started for me during the voluntary phase of the mask mandates, with some family members suggesting that my wife and I were not as considerate as they were because we didn’t wear masks. One family member suggested that people who wouldn’t wear masks were political dupes, as if we had delegated our decision-making to politicians.
Of course, we were excluded from most stores/restaurants/gyms for months on end, due to our mask refusal, and subjected to harassment in some of the few places that would receive us. And, travel using any public transportation was off-limits for a couple of years.
I believe that most politicians of both parties were on the same side. Any entreaties that we made to republican office-holders were either met with silence, or with “get your shots.” Note that both former Republican Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, and Democrat House majority leader, Nancy Pelosi, were staunch vaccine and mask advocates. I believe that President Biden should have been removed from office for his vaccine mandate, because it was such an overreach of his authority.
As for Trump, his presence in the White House at the outset of the pandemic set the table for lockdowns and the total abdication of decision-making to “the experts.” I can’t say whether having a Republican president in office when covid started contributed to the evangelical community standing down, or not. But it would seem likely.
Many of us had hoped that the “15 days to flatten the curve” was just a time to catch our breath and assess the situation, when, in reality, it was the start of boots on our necks. In looking at the times that some of the PPP “loans” were approved, it appears that some folks had more foresight into the likely duration of lockdowns than I did. For example, 15 days to flatten the curve was announced on March 16, 2020. Forest Hill church received approval for the first of its 2 PPP “loans” – a whopping $1,739,700 – just 35 days later.
I don’t begrudge anyone their choice as to whether or not to get covid shots. But, anyone who was OK with coercive covid measures was not a friend. Emergency powers, properly used, are for things like temporarily making all highway lanes head away from the coast during a hurricane evacuation, for a period of a day or two. It is unconscionable that they would be used to confine people or to close businesses, churches, etc. for months or years on end.
I absolutely detested hearing anyone who derided my objections to tyrannical policies as “muh freedumbs.” My father participated in the Normandy invasion in WWII to defend “muh freedumbs.”
Anyone with any modicum of common sense and/or basic high school biology education should have smelled a rat. Our betters used “science experts” and fear to convince almost everyone to repudiate basic biology during covid (inoculation is better than natural immunity, closing down civilization would stop the spread of a virus, etc.). Most people accepted that nonsense hook, line, and sinker. It was an attack on basic biology, truth, and common sense. I find it impossible to believe that so many “scientific experts” really fell for it. There has to be some other explanation.
The professing Christian community really stood down during covid. There was a lack of discernment, a lack of courage, and a lack of leadership. The churches that failed to take a clear stand against the tyranny have no more credibility than our “public health” and medical establishments, whose reputations are in tatters.
There are not many like you! Even pastors that I thought I trusted shut down their churches, and the ones that did not masked up. I am not surprised at the money they took from the government at all. The congregants started pointing fingers at each other and fighting, telling them to mask up and get the vax, husbands and wives became enemies because one would get the vax the other would not. Even my husband and I almost came to blows when I told him don’t do it! Everyone was on the bandwagon, believers and non-believers alike. The ones that continued to meet for Bible study like me and my friend were far and few between. We refused to mask up, we refused to get the vax. I am an employer, and I learned a long time ago, over 25 years ago, as a woman don’t take money from the government, they will own you. I was approached to take loans for a woman (minority) owning a small business and you would not believe the contracts! I never took a loan from anybody except a truck loan. I know many Christians so called and I can’t have fellowship with them because they are out of fellowship with Jesus. They have no discernment, they actually walk around very happy, post sugary ‘Jesus Loves you’ notes on Facebook or whatever, they did not trust Him when they took the poison in their veins, but don’t correct them, they will hate you! I am a pharisee, or a jezebel, an unrighteous judge, or a very dumb Christian they say, I have even been called a Mormon, an evil Biden supporter. Our lives will never go back to normal. Our hospitals are ruined, our churches are ruined, our schools are ruined, the cult of covid has affected the soul of America. The church believes their savior is Donald Trump, and they are ignoring all the signs that are everywhere! NNG