So what do I mean?
Imagine for a moment that you are a Professor. It doesn’t matter what you are a Professor in that is not the point of my discussion. As a Professor you teach on your chosen subject, you write on your chosen subject and you are peer reviewed on what you teach and write. You are considered an expert in your field which draws much criticism from your opponents because you openly state whom you disagree with and why. Lastly you take pride in your honesty and integrity in that when you debate others you debate the issue not the person. Such a Professor might not always be popular with their peers but they are noted for the extent that they strive for honesty and respect in their dialogue with others.
In a world where many of us are social media savvy, finding the tools to download and upload video’s of ourselves and others no longer requires a degree in communications and media studies. Most of us can record and or edit others who speak publicly on a whole range of issues. As such it is easy to take something another person has said and crop it so that what they said sounds nothing like what they really said at all. Television journalists have been doing it for years. News media outlets are masters at manipulating the public through biased and dishonest reporting. Misrepresenting people and publicly humiliating others is the money shot in tabloids it is gold for others to use to tear down and destroy others characters.
As such you would think that Christians might hold themselves to a much higher standard of honesty and integrity than secular news and media does; sadly this isn’t always so. Over the past year or two I have watched Christians that I thought had much higher standards than the world stoop to misrepresenting others. These include so called mature Christian leaders and Church Pastors, some of which I know personally reduce themselves to petty school yard tactics and politics.
I witnessed these so called men of God upload snippets of video of other Christian leaders whose teachings they object to ( or in my view don’t really understand) with bold captions stating how these men were liars, heretics and false teachers who were bringing another gospel. the problem is I took the time to view the videos of the accused, often discovering that they were nothing of the sort. I challenged their opposition to view what the accused had said in context with varying levels of failure and success (mostly failure) only to watch the accusers eyes glaze over and repeat mantra style that the accused were teaching false doctrine.
Saying someone is a liar who spreads falsehood is a serious charge to make against another person especially if that person is an acknowledged expert in their field. Okay so they may be controversial, they may push peoples buttons and they may even sprout some very uncomfortable if not inconvenient truths that hit close to home. They may even be iconoclastic like myself and take pleasure in burning peoples sacred religious, philosophical or social cows The Professor may draw the chagrin of others however that is not license to discredit them dishonestly.
The method of destruction is relatively simple. In fact adults learn well from the cruelty and ignorance of insensitive. self centered children whom they would scold if they displayed the same behavior. In the name of God however and for the furtherance of the Gospel truth maligning, discrediting and character assassinating appears to be fair play. Question the persons credentials, sow doubt about the persons intentions or integrity, don’t confront them personally. Misquote them and by all means allure to the non-fact that they have some nefarious hidden agenda; most likely that they are a satanic operative planted in the church by the Jesuits or Illuminati. Surely they can’t be a true believer…….. and so on it goes.
All I can say to those who lower themselves to such tactics, to those who think that it is okay to misrepresent others, to those who so quickly point the finger but forget what they look like as soon as they walk away from the mirror; shame on you! You do nothing for the cause of Christ and the gospel. You bring the name of Christ into disrepute. I would rebuke you in Jesus name but I fear I would only insult my Lord and Savior.
The Calvinist 