It is hard not to be cheeful these days. We have been cooking up a poisonous pagan recipie for decades now around these parts. And God has graciously determined for us to start smelling the aroma. If you don’t like the scent, then pour what is in the pot down the garbage disposal and let us be starting again from scratch.
The latest installment of look-at-how-bad-this-is-getting is Joe Biden’s supremely racist and misogynistic nomination of Ketanji Jackson to the Supreme Court. Several people do not see the flaming disrespect for black women evidenced by Biden’s decision. And for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is the salvation of our souls, we really need to. More about the “salvation of our souls” part at the end. But for now, let’s start at the beginning.
Just last month, Joe Biden announced that he had made no decisions except the one to select a black woman as his Supreme Court nominee, “While I’ve been studying candidates’ backgrounds and writings, I’ve made no decisions except one: The person I will nominate will be someone with extraordinary qualifications, character, experience, and integrity, and that person will be the first Black woman ever nominated to the United States Supreme Court. It’s long overdue, in my view. I made that commitment during the campaign for President, and I will keep that commitment.” (Jan. 27, 2022, Joe Biden, White House Announcement)
Now there is enough Christianity left in the American psyche that the majority of our citizens would answer the following question correctly. Question: Who should be nominated as the next Supreme Court Justice? Answer: The best person for the job. So far, we have wide spread agreement. But, Joe Biden thinks so lowly of black women that he has determined to remove all of the non-black women from the race. He thinks that a black woman would not be the best person for the job if non-black women were permitted to apply for the job. His very public statement warrants a straight-forward question, “When did Mr. Biden start thinking so lowly of black women?”
Joe Biden has fallen into what the Bible calls being a respecter of persons. He is being a lifter-of-faces. And God has much to say about such partiality. First, God is not a respecter of persons, but rather a respecter of a person’s work—“And if ye call on the Father, who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man’s work, pass the time of your sojourning here in fear” (1 Peter 1:17). Second, being no respecter of persons is intimately tied to real justice and love to the oppressed, “For the Lord your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty, and a terrible, which regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward: He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment” (Deuteronomy 10:17-18). Here is a word to all of those who want justice in society. You will not get it if you become a lifter of faces. And Critical Race Theory, Intersectionality, and all of the Social Justice Theory which informed Joe Biden’s recent Supreme Court nomination is premised upon such face-lifting. Third, God would have judges who, like Him, show not partiality, “And said to the judges, Take heed what ye do: for ye judge not for man, but for the Lord, who is with you in the judgment. Wherefore now let the fear of the Lord be upon you; take heed and do it: for there is no iniquity with the Lord our God, nor respect of persons, nor taking of gifts” (2 Chronicles 19:6-7).
What we have in Joe Biden’s Supreme Court nomination is a clear picture of two incompatiable worldviews. Christianity says that if you would have the best person for the job, then you cannot be a lifter of faces. Indeed, you must fear God to be the best judge for such fear is a precondition to impartiality. A pagan approach, which refuses to look to any external standard, must lift the face because that is where the standard is. There is no heavenly rule, accordingly to the pagan paradigm, to order earthly rule. Mr. Biden would certainly say that he has aimed at the best person for the job. But his openly stated criteria for being the best person for the job had nothing to do with the face of God and had everything to do with the face of the individual.
As a minister of the gospel I am not merely concerned with who sits on the Supreme Court. That seat is certainly important. But what happends at the great white throne is abundantly more important. Our civil leaders would make you think that the Great Judge will stroke your racial pride like they do. But they tell you a lie. You will get no advantage before the Highest and Heavenly Court for black skin. And white skin won’t help you either. Yellow skin and red skin and purpule skin for that matter will leave you in the same boat as all of the others. You will have nothing to offer on that day for your justification. You will have no victim statuses to claim. You will not find various intersections on the last day. It will be you and a Holy Judge. And the only thing you will have to plead on that day is the wounds of another, the righteousness of another. His name is Jesus Christ. And He is yours by humble faith. So be you a scheming president, an angling justice, a bitter minority or majority, a BLM activist or a white supremicist, come away from your foolish pride to Christ—”Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons: But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him” (Acts 10:34-35).
