It may sound far-fetched to some that persecution of Christians could come in our time in the West, but that’s only because they aren’t paying attention. Just look at the attacks on the First Amendment right of free speech here in the United States. Free speech has never been popular with tyrants. And the past few years have seen the ramp-up of attempts to limit free speech if not overthrow it entirely.
The most aggressive attacks on free speech in the United States have come from Jewish groups such as the ADL in the name of fighting antisemitism. These groups tell us that they are not opposed to free speech but hate speech. But what is “hate speech”? There’s nothing in the Constitution about hate speech, no definition of it. Hate speech, it would seem, is speech the ADL hates.
Or consider the long-running attempts by Democrats to gut the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. The right of citizens to defend themselves with arms has a long history in the English-speaking world and can be traced back to the Bible. The preposterous argument that the Second Amendment applies to the militia and not to individual citizens – note well, the text of the Second Amendment reads, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed” it is the people, not the militia, who have the right to keep and bear arms – advanced by some such as anti-gun activist David Hogg is an enormous lie. Further, it is likely that the large number of privately owned firearms in the United States has helped preserve what limited personal liberties we have left in this nation. If the Second Amendment were not an effective bulwark in preserving personal liberty, why would government tyrants such as Joe Biden work so hard to take them away?
What about criminal justice? That’s another idea promoted by the Reformation. How’s it doing in the Year of Our Lord 2023? Not well at all. We have a weaponized justice system that allows those with regime-supported opinions to get away with murder, while those who disagree with official narratives suffer what amounts to legal persecution. Consider the disparate treatment of the January 6th defendants as compared to the BLM/Antifa “peaceful protesters” in 2020. Or the way nothing has been done about the outrageous amounts of evidence of corruption on the part of Joe Biden, while Donald Trump is subjected to endless phony indictments. A two-tiered justice system is one of the hallmarks of a corrupt regime. And very clearly, we live under a corrupt government that shows little concern about hiding its corruption.
Then there’s the prospect of war. The war in Ukraine has been ongoing now for over a year and a half. This proxy war with a nuclear-powered Russia, started and sustained by the U.S. government, has recently been supplanted in the headlines by the war between Israel and Hamas, and threatens to grow much larger. American politicians, especially those of the Christian Zionist persuasion, can hardly contain their excitement at the prospect of a major war in the Middle East as they fall all over one another to see who can “stand with Israel” the hardest. The notion that America and American Christians have no dog in this fight seems never to be considered by the Zionist militants who drive our foreign policy, many of whom are dispensationalist Christian Zionists.
I could go on, but I think the reader gets the point by now. We live in a collapsing society. And our society is collapsing, because the Biblical ideas that created it in the first place have themselves largely disappeared from the West. This was Gordon Clark’s point in his book A Christian View of Men and Things first published in 1952, a full 71 years ago. It is a credit to Clark that he was able to diagnose the existence of a deadly philosophical disease at a time that many contemporary observers consider a high point in our nation’s history. We were already collapsing when Eisenhower was in the White House. And that collapse has only accelerated in recent years.
I mentioned the Waldenses earlier in this post, how they had to leave mainstream society and form their own institutions to get away from the tyranny of Rome. Will American Christians have to do something similar in the 21st century to escape the growing tyranny in our day? Is the Waldensian option even a possibility in our time? To the first question, my answer is probably yes. I say probably because I don’t claim to know the future. But I do believe that if trends continue as they have, faithful Protestants will find it harder and harder to participate in mainstream society.
To the second question, I would answer that with modern transportation and surveillance systems, it’s harder to fly under the radar than it was in the 10th century. But then we know that God can make a way when it seems there is none. As with the first question, I don’t know and don’t claim to know what God has planned for American Christians in the coming years and decades. Perhaps we will be called upon to “let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also.” Perhaps God has a new Reformation planned. But whatever the case and whatever the circumstances, let us be found faithful to our calling.
Soli Deo Gloria
[1] James Aitken Wylie, History of the Waldenses (London: Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co.), 3, Google Books.
Lux Lucet 
Luther showed no mercy to the Anabaptist German Peasants and saved his venom “Against the Jews and Their Lies”.
In other words, Luther was an imperfect man and a sinner. That doesn’t detract from his teaching that Scripture alone is the Christian’s only authority for faith and practice and that God justifies – pronounces righteous – sinners based on faith (belief) in the gospel of Christ alone.
Luther’s teaching of Scripture alone was another error of Luther. The Scripture teaches against Scripture alone in 2 Thessalonians 2:15.
Wrong, Scott.
Right Steve Matthews. Luther was wrong. He taught heresy. Just like the Pope. Filioque, against Proverbs 30:6 and John 15:26. You can not prove otherwise, Steve Matthews.
Steve Matthews: If you really go by Scripture alone, why would you ever have to read anything wrote or said? That is illogical? If it is really Scripture alone, not Scripture AND Martin Luther.
Wrong, Scott.
Steve Matthews: You saying it is wrong proves nothing. If you presuppose Martin Luther, you must show from Scripture that Luther believed what has been believed “always, everywhere, and by everyone” who is Christian in the Church (Saint Vincent of Lerins, “Commonitories”). Luther is a sectarian, and he promoted a private interpretation of the Scriptures, but the Scripture says that no teaching of Scripture is of any private interpretation. Luther was also a hypocrite, for while claiming to go by Scripture alone, he rejected Scriptures he did not like such as James 2:24, which contradicted his pet doctrine of “faith alone”. He also misread Saint Paul in Romans 3:28, adding the word “Alone” to it, in violation of Scripture in Deuteronomy 4:1-2 and Proverbs 30:5-6, as we learn from Saint Peter 3:15-17; Therefore 2 Thessalonians 3:6 applies to Martin Luther, as does Titus 3:10; “Let no man deceive you by any means” (2 Thess. 2:3); Luther deceived Lutherans by means of his mis-use of the Scriptures, which he twisted to his own destruction, preaching “another gospel” other than the True Gospel preached by the True Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church (Chalcedonian); cf. Galatians 1:6.
You’re ranting again, Scott.
That means nothing. Saying I am ranting is just that you have nothing special to say. God bless you.
If Scripture alone is true because Martin Luther “said so”, where does Scripture tell us to trust Martin Luther as a “guide to the New Testament”? This is an unproven presupposition, not based on Scripture alone.
Okay, Scott.