exalt

By Elizabeth Prata

Societal, cultural, financial, economic, political collapse. Some say all this collapse is near. It may be, or not. But either way, things seem in disarray.

A prophecy from Peter: “They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” (2 Peter 3:4).

They say such things because they believe them. Satan has blinded the lost to the things of Christ. It has always been so. The Israelites taunted Jeremiah with the same:

“Behold, they say unto me, Where is the word of the LORD? let it come now.” (Jeremiah 17:15)

And why are people willing to believe the Zombie/Mayan/Cayce/Nostradamus apocalypse and not the Christian Revelation of the promised Apocalypse? Because the aforementioned are from satan. Satan, they’ll believe.

Technically, the world has been ending since Genesis 3, but the feeling of chaotic flying apart has increased dramatically in the last few years.

I’m enjoying the Spirit’s sweet presence every day. I enjoy my walk with Jesus in increasing amounts of awe and joy. I am encouraged by knowledge of the sovereignty of the Father. Far from being depressed personally, I am more joyous all the time. Seeing these world events and understanding where we are on the timetable of God’s prophetic clock, (that every day we are one day closer to the culmination of all things) I’m wonderstruck at the vastness of His intelligence and the scope of human history- and grateful that I am a part of His kingdom.

Yes, the days are difficult, and I mourn for people who are lost in sin and for my own sins. But the events we read about here and elsewhere far from saddening me, make me think of Exodus 15:11.

“Who among the gods is like you, LORD? Who is like you—majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?”

In the current phase of Christianity, many have lost that sense of awe. I think it is because many popular teachers and preachers have taught and preached man, not Jesus. “It’s all about you” too many sermons, talks, books, and conferences emphasize. The excessive focus on our prosperity, our self-esteem, our pits, our problems, combined emphasis of His love to us, His friendship with us, His Bridal “romance” of us, has resulted in a lowered God.

The ‘Buddy Jesus’ from the blasphemous movie ‘Dogma’

Too often Western Christianity looks to Him as a friend, (which He is) but in looking at Him only as friend, through that one facet, and not so much as Sovereign King, Judge, and Holy God. This looking exclusively at Jesus through one facet has allowed many to devolve His status in their minds from friend to ‘old buddy, pal o’ mine.’

Realizing that the lower society sinks the higher we can see Him is a balm to the soul. It is as if He is stripping away the layers and revealing us to be the depraved sinners we are and by contrast, we can’t help but see Him as August Holy One. At least, I hope you see it that way.

Quite simply, western Christianity does not have a transcendent view of God anymore, and thus a sense of awe is lost. This particularly applies to prophecy. Only a Sovereign God expressing His will upon the world knows the end from the beginning. Only He at His will and pleasure states what will happen in a thousand years, or six thousand years, and it comes to pass exactly as He said!

We are living in the times of Romans 1. Our nation is being judged, Romans 1 IS the judgment as He gives them over to their depraved minds. This is an awe inspiring thing- to see the Bible pages ripped from its bindings and come to life on earth in the news. It makes me fear Him and it makes me love Him.

That He stays His hand of execution despite seeing the perversity in the world makes me love Him even more.

So when I write of judgments to come, rather than be completely sad, I also focus on how compassionate He has already been. “It is of the LORD’S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.” (Lamentations 3:22).

He has been giving the Spirit time to grow seeds, waiting for us to repent, bringing many sons to come to Glory! (Hebrews 2:10). His wrath is tinged with patience, and I am in awe of this God who loves us despite the perversity and rebellion we see in the world today!! THAT is how I stay positive. I hope you do too.

Habakkuk finally got it, saying in chapter three:

“Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us” and then he said,

“Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places.”

No matter how low the world gets, the Lord makes me tread on high places. My Holy awe of Him is a reverence mixed with fear: “Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our ’God is a consuming fire.’” (Hebrews 12:28-29).

I love The Onion. When I was a newspaper publisher and editor I loved reading the headlines and laughing at how closely the writers of that satirical newspaper came to making their fake headlines seem almost real. It takes skill and nuance to consistently produce satire, and often there are just as many misses as there are hits with less talented writers and humorists.

When the Babylon Bee, a satirical Christian digital newspaper, came out, I loved it. The writers are hilarious and consistently produce nearly true or could be true headlines almost every day. I’ve quoted the Bee a few times, always admiringly. I mean, who doesn’t laugh at these satire news headlines?

Sermon On Tithing Moves Congregation To Commit 10% Of Their Attention…
Megachurch Apologizes After Statement Of Faith Found On Its Website
Local Man Waiting For Second Person To Gather So Jesus Can Show Up
New Journaling Bible To Eliminate Scriptural Text Entirely

All those are hilarious takes on the foibles and issues facing Christians today. The Bee takes on Christian Living, Church Life, Theology, Megachurches, Politics…no sphere is sacred and all have been lampooned. Most, devastatingly so.

However, I’ve had a growing sense of dismay over the Bee’s existence these last few months. Recently I posted this on The End Time Facebook Page:

“The Babylon Bee (BB) is an American Christian satirical news media outlet. African News Updates (ANU) is an African news AND satire outlet. All of the BB is satire. Some of the ANU site presents real news and some of it is satire, but they’re labeled. The top story is from the Babylon Bee, posted July 19, and is satire. The bottom story is from African News Updates, posted July 14 and is NOT satire. It’s real news and it’s horrible.” The two stories are not related…except for the fact that visible Christianity is getting so ridiculous it’s hard to tell when it’s fake and when it’s real. I say “visible Christianity” because the true church is always beautiful in God’s eyes.”

And that is the issue. The world of Christianity is so wayward today that many of the satires on the Babylon Bee could actually be happening. And so, many people post and re-post them as actual. I was thinking about this issue a great deal but was unsure how to approach my thoughts which had not yet coalesced.

Then today I came across the Wretched Daily Clip from Todd Friel, which mentioned this exact issue before moving on to explain the theology. Friel said,

Several people also sent me an article, and I have to confess to you that it’s tragic that they did…not that they themselves are the tragedy, but because we are living in a world right now where this could be possible…the headline is about a megachurch that debuts a water slide baptismal.

I thought it was sad that people had sent in the article as a truthful article with the statements of, ‘shucks, what is the world coming to, Todd?’ More and more people believe the Babylon Bee articles are real, because as Friel said, it is possible. Outlandish is no longer outlandish. The ridiculous is the new normal. An entire generation of youth have grown up with the kind of Christianity the Bee lampoons, who don’t know it’s wrong.

My concern in writing a blog has always been to produce clarity, provoke thought, and of course, exalt God. My fear has always been that I would instead be adding to the general confusion. My grief would be to write something that leads someone astray.

So today my question is, do we need a Babylon Bee? Does the Babylon Bee exalt God? Provoke thought? Promote clarity? Or does it add to the general confusion? I submit that it does the latter.

Not that clarity, thought, and exaltation are the only ‘good’ in Christianity. Humor and laughter are fine. I’m not a fuddy duddy. However, my own opinion is that we are so far gone that the sting of a Bee is lost on a crowd that believes its stories to be real. In 1950, I could envision that a media outlet such as the Babylon Bee would immediately be seen as satire. Pastors wore suits and ties, preached from the Bible and not from anecdotes, didn’t arrive on a zipline, didn’t have a smoke machine, and were intentional about their call for their congregation to pursue holiness. Nowadays, not so much.

The sad thing is that the point is made by the end of Friel’s 2 minute clip. The satirical waterslide baptism? It turns out that one of his staff members informed Friel that there actually is a church that baptizes their kids in a pool with a fire truck and confetti shoots out of a cannon when the child comes up out of the water.

So…do we need a Babylon Bee?

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Sources:

Wretched Daily Clip

Babylon Bee