Christian Social Media Internet Sparring - Comments on Al Mohler and Mask Wearing.

Responding to Comments on Mask Wearing and Government Authority

All right, it's Tuesday. I'm feeling good. I've got about 20 minutes. So let's respond to some YouTube comments. And before we begin, if you haven't already, please consider subscribing to this channel.

Click the little notifications bell and that'll make it easier for you to receive notifications once I upload a new piece of content. Whether it's good or bad, you'll want to know about it, I'm sure. But let's get into it today.

This is the first comment I want to respond to. This is in response to my mask hysteria video. He says, look to scripture first. If it's mandated and not sinful, you do it. First Peter 2, 13 through 17.

You can argue that stop signs are dumb, but you should still stop. Wretched nails this. And I think, unfortunately, that's an oversimplification. It's not that if, you don't have to listen to the government unless they command you to do something sinful.

Like if the government commanded you to wear a clown suit, there would be no moral obligation upon you to wear a clown suit. And, you know, I think that that's pretty obvious when you look to scripture because the scripture gives the government certain things that they can do and certain things that they can't do.

And so you don't ever have to go along with the government, you know, when they overreach their authority. You never have to do that. That's not something that the Bible says that you need to do. Furthermore, in the United States, it's even more complicated because our supreme authority in the United States is a written document that gives the government certain authority and doesn't give it other authority.

And so if we actually did want to be consistent with this suggestion where you have to obey everything the government says unless it's sinful, then we'll actually have to obey the constitution more so than people because that's how it works in this country.

So I understand the idea and I think it would be prudent a lot of the times to obey the government so that you don't get arrested and that you don't cause problems. I think that that's fine, but this is an oversimplification.

I don't think that the scripture tells us to do literally anything that we're told unless it's a sin. Again, the clown suit, obviously you don't have to wear a clown suit if the government says you have to wear a clown suit.

So thanks for the comment, but I think it's an oversimplification. Here's a comment a little longer about my David French video where I said that the Great Commission is about Christian power. Here's what he says.

He says, A .D., I don't believe that the Great Commission is talking about Christian power at all. It is talking about the spread of the gospel to those who belong to Christ. Teach them yes. To rule, no.

We have already have that liberty in Christ. We don't need the physical power in this world to which we are not citizens but sojourners. We are told to submit ourselves to the authorities that he has placed under us for his sake.

He has subjugated our fleshly bodies for his glory, not for our power. And while I will not submit to them in regards to their attempts to supersede our worship, I will be subject to the penalties as a result so that we, like the disciples, can praise him for the honor of being punished for his sake.

In short, the Great Commission is for teaching, which I believe he has gifted you to do, but I'd be wary of putting a Christian in a position where we need to gain power. The word is not about earthly things, but to focus on our minds above where Christ is seated and where we have the assurance of the peace that passes understanding.

Much love to you, brother. Again, this is not an antagonistic comment, but here's what my response to this would be. I think it's very unusual to say that the Great Commission is not about power at all, considering that Christ starts the Great Commission by saying that he has all power.

He has all authority. It's all been given to Christ. So clearly, the Great Commission, there is something about power in it. Now, I see what he's saying here. He's saying we don't need to gain power. That's not the point of the Great Commission, but the point is to teach, which I agree with.

We are to teach, but we are to teach all the nations, which includes people in power. And so if we're going to spread the gospel to kings and to politicians and to presidents, which I think this commenter would agree with, we should do.

We should give the gospel to President Trump. We should give the gospel to the congressmen and stuff like that. If we're going to do that, we also need to teach them how to be a congressman like a Christian ought to be a congressman.

Like we're supposed to teach everything that Christ commands and Christ has commands for politicians and people that are in authority, rulers. And so we also have to teach them and they're going to have to adjust how they rule according to godly Christian principles.

And so clearly that's part of the commission, right? The commission is not, the gospel is not just for people that are in subjection to rulers. It's also for the rulers, like the ruler should become Christians too.

The ruler should repent and believe the gospel too. And so the question is what happens when you're a ruler and you become a Christian? I don't think that the answer to that question is you should give up your rule.

You shouldn't, no, you should rule like a Christian. No matter where you are, no matter what you're doing, like if you're a shoemaker, you should be a shoemaker like a Christian. If you're an artist, you should be an artist like a Christian.

If you are a baker, you should be a baker like a Christian. And if you're a king or a president or a congressman or an alderman or whatever you are, you should do it like a Christian. And I think that's the point.

It's like, yeah, obviously, you know, I'm not saying that every Christian needs to seek power, but if you're in power and you convert to Christ, you should rule like a Christian. So I do think that the Great Commission is about Christian power.

It's about Christ's power. And if we're Christ's body, we need to be exercising Christ's power in our sphere of influence. So I'm not saying you need to become a king in order to be a Christian. I'm not saying you need to pursue political office to become a Christian.

What I am saying though, is that whatever it is that you do, do it for the glory of God and do it according to God's principles. Thanks for the comment. I appreciate it. And thanks for watching. Here's a comment that I think is interesting.

And it's not really a pushback, but I think it's interesting. This is about my Shilin video. This commenter says, I remember as a little kid wishing I was black because of sports heroes. Every race thinks the grass is greener for the other races.

Every race is suspicious and envious and resentful all at once to everyone. This is the human condition. Yeah, I mean, this is the problem with sin, right? This is the problem with sin. We all covet things that we shouldn't covet, right?

This is a problem. Covetousness is a huge problem for people. And so we need to all repent of our covetousness. No matter if you're white or black, you should repent of your covetousness. The problem is that there are certain groups in the United States that their covetousness is actually people hold it up as something that's not covetousness.

See, that's the problem. I always have a lot of sympathy for people whose pet sins are being celebrated by the culture because my pet sins are not celebrated by the culture. Like if I have envy of someone's money, right?

Or financial situation or something like that, the culture doesn't pat me on the back about that kind of thing. You know what I mean? Like that's not something that the culture is really celebrating right now.

But if you're black and you covet your neighbor's wealth or income, you're told that you're actually, it's an injustice that you don't have that. You're celebrated for pursuing your neighbor's stuff. And that's a real problem.

I feel really bad for black people that are pushed in that direction. And even Christians are doing this. This is a real bad situation for them to be in because, and I always think about homosexuals too, especially in the church, right?

Like people that struggle against being gay in the church, they're told so often by the culture that being gay is nothing to be ashamed of. And then even in the church, they're said, well, yeah, you know, you could still cuddle with your boyfriend kind of thing.

And it's like, I feel bad for them, man. I feel bad for them. It's like, if you're glutton, like nobody celebrates your gluttony. But if you're gay or if you're covetous, oftentimes people will celebrate that and tell you that it's okay and tell you that it's an injustice and apologize because of how you've been treated in the past by Christians.

And that's a tough spot to be in. That's a real tough spot to be in. I got a lot of sympathy for people like that. Anyway, here's another comment that's not really critical, but I think it's a good point.

He says, people are so much more upset about masks than they are about the inability of people to make a living by opening their businesses or the ability of people to see their dying loved ones in the hospital or to see their wives giving birth.

Masks are questionable. These other things are very real, very objective harm brought about by public policy. Why don't we shame the bootlickers for supporting destroying lives instead of shaming mask deniers from the pulpit for not being loving Christians?

It's all so backwards. This is a great point, YouTube commenter. I agree. I think that that's way more serious than the masks. Like not being able to make a living, that's an attack on your person. That's an attack on your life to force you to shut down your business because of this coronavirus thing.

That's an attack on your life, your livelihood. That's why it's called the livelihood. Not being able to see your grandparents. This is causing deaths. People are dying because they've lost the will to live because they haven't seen their family in months because they're not allowed to see their family because of the coronavirus.

These are serious things, right? And I think that I agree that the masks are more visible. Because when you see people with the masks on, you know what team they're on, so to speak. And so I think that the reason why people are kind of up in arms about the mask is it's almost like a symbol for the whole program of shutdowns, right?

Like I think it's easy to see the masks and to rail on the masks. The rest of the shutdown programs, it's more ethereal. I don't know if that's the right word. But the masks are a representation of it, a very easy representation of the whole program.

But I completely agree. The masks are small potatoes compared to everything else, but it represents the whole thing in my opinion. And so that's why I don't wanna wear the mask because I don't support the shutdown programs at all.

I think that they're hurting people. I think that in order to love my neighbor, I have chosen that I'm not going to support all of this craziness. I'm not gonna support the shutdown. And I think if I wore the mask, I'd be supporting the shutdown.

I refuse to do it. So I'm gonna love my neighbor the way I understand it, and I'm not gonna wear the mask. People commenting about my Russell Moore video, the evangelical impotence video. These are people that normally like me, but have some critical words.

So here's what they say. Brother I .D., I normally like your content. I think I should point out that you started this video by saying that you don't like to take shots of people after they die. Then you proceeded to open up full blast on these guys for not taking shots at Lewis upon the news of his death.

That's incorrect. I didn't blast these people for not taking shots at Lewis after his death. They could have just said nothing. Or they could have been very specific about what they were praising about him.

And I don't think that that actually is what happened here. Because in the case of Matthew Hall, he's a courageous and loving man. In the case of Russell Moore, they should name a bridge after him. And they shouldn't do these things.

But that's not even really what the video is about either. The video is about the inconsistency displayed by some of these people. They don't actually have this as an option if they were being consistent with their prophetic witness.

But let's continue with the comment as well. He says, I don't know anything about the other two guys, to be honest. I do. But in Al Mohler's case, he says, there's nothing in his statement that isn't strictly true in and of itself.

He limits his honorifics to Lewis's role in civil rights. There's nothing here that leads me to believe that Al Mohler is giving Lewis a pass or somehow supporting him on his abortion stance. I haven't listened to him the last couple of years, but Mohler strikes me as someone who chooses his words very carefully.

It seems right to give him the benefit of the doubt and deal with what he said instead of what he did not say. Perhaps Mohler would attack Lewis's position on abortion, but decided that the news of his death wasn't the right time and place for it.

Unless there's some greater context on this issue that I'm not aware of, your criticism seems uncharitable and hypocritical. I'd love your feedback on this. Okay, great, so I'll give you my feedback. So actually, I actually did point out the fact that he specifically was promoting the good that he did in the civil rights era.

In fact, I gave him partial credit for that because I thought that that was a good thing. My problem with Mohler's tweet is the ridiculous nature of the last sentence. And I agree with you, commenter, that he does pick his words very carefully.

And he said something like, we dare not only honor people with whom we agree with politically. And I think that that is so impotent. That's the whole point of my bringing up Al Mohler's comment. It's impotent to say that we just disagree with him politically.

That downplays the horror of the political implications of what John Lewis stood for. John Lewis is a monster. And I'm not saying you have to call him a monster, but what you can't do is downplay the issues.

Because that's what Al Mohler's tweet does. It downplays the issues. Abortion is not simply a political disagreement. It's not like saying, well, I agree, and I want a 10 tax rate and you want a 20 tax rate.

It's like not the same, even almost. And so no, Al Mohler doesn't get a pass for that last sentence. I agree with you, the first part of his tweet was fine. I have no problem with the first part of his tweet.

The second part of his tweet though is what I was criticizing, which is the absolute insanity of downplaying the issues with John Lewis. And it's not like John Lewis had any redeeming qualities with the rest of his politics either.

Like the rest of his politics were horrible as well. And again, I'm not saying he asked to blast him, but he could have just said nothing or he could have left out the last part of that tweet. Now he didn't have to.

I mean, I'm not saying Al Mohler has to do things the way I would do them, but I reserve the right to rip what I think is rip worthy. And I think that that last sentence, if you go back to the video, that's what I commented on.

The last sentence was in particular the egregious part. I don't think there's any excuse for that. I don't think there's any excuse for that. So Al Mohler might be a pro-life person. I assume that he would call himself pro-life, but the end of the day is he's betraying sort of a lack of care.

If he's reducing the pro-life, pro-choice position to a minor political disagreement that doesn't really have a bearing on somebody's life, I think that that's a real problem. I think that's a real problem.

That's my feedback on it. And I understand what you're saying, but no, I absolutely do not think that Al Mohler is an ally when it comes to how you ought to be treating abortion. Like you ought to be treating abortion way harsher than you treat racism.

And that is just not the case with any of these people. So if you don't like that, I mean, that's okay. I suppose that's fine. You can disagree with me and you can think that racism is worse than abortion, but I think that that's unbiblical.

I think that's an example of impotence. And so Al Mohler, I'll say it again, he's betrayed himself as impotent. He is not a prophetic voice on anything that really matters at this point. You can call yourself pro-life all day long, but if you downplay it as a political disagreement, then you've got a real problem.

You've got a real problem. Anyway, oh, and then somebody else said that I'm foolish to alienate Dr. Mohler. Dr. Mohler alienated himself. Dr. Mohler has alienated himself a long time ago. And there is definitely a history to this.

This is not just me deciding, popping off of the mouth on one tweet that Al Mohler is disingenuous with his words. He has a history of this. He has a history of this. He'll get on his podcast and rail against critical theory, all while he has critical theorist teaching at his seminary.

Like, I'm sorry, but you don't get a pass. You know what I mean? I'm not alienating Al Mohler. Al Mohler alienated himself a long time ago. Anyway, this is a guy who commented a couple times and both were a little bit antagonistic.

Jubilee, Civil Law, and Managing Risk

Let's talk about it. This first one is about Paul Tripp, the Paul Tripp video. He says, quote, if reparations are off the table, then a seven-year jubilee is necessary. I responded, no. And he responded, A .D., so much for being biblical.

Well, unfortunately, commenter, I understand the difference between ceremonial law and civil law and all of these kinds of things. So, no, jubilee year is not necessary. I'm sorry that you don't understand the difference, but there you go.

Here we go. He comments as well. He says, this is on my mask hysteria video. He says, except that you wearing a mask has only positive outcomes. This entire video is you rationalizing to keep from believing and seeing that you are, in fact, selfish.

Well, I've already demonstrated the non-positive outcomes of wearing the mask. In fact, the contributing to mask hysteria, contributing to the lockdown, contributing to the fear factor that is driving millions and millions of people being scared to death, checking the news in terror and anxiety and all this kind of stuff, not visiting their loved ones and their loved ones passing away, suicide, not having the ability to provide for their own families.

All of these are negative outcomes. But I understand, like, he's been programmed, this commenter, to think a certain way, and there's only one side of this issue that makes any sense. That's fine. So I laughed at him.

I said, LOL. He says, AD, your argument is that you're managing risk differently, but mask wearing isn't akin to helicopter parenting. It's akin to keeping your eyes on the road while driving. And I said, right, it is akin to keeping your eyes, let's just say it is akin to keeping your eyes on the road while driving.

That's also a risk management issue because there might be a situation where your eyes leave the road while driving. For example, if you see someone coming, you know, from this side or something like that, your eyes might be off the road for a second, taking a look at what's happening over here, because at the end of the day, something that's happening over here could eventually come to the road.

And so your eyes presumably need to be kind of, you know, scanning the whole range of your vision, right? So that might mean you don't look in front of you directly at all times, but it's a risk management issue.

That's also a risk management issue. So like, I know he's trying to make a point here, but it doesn't work because my eyes being on the road, yeah, of course they should most of the time be on the road if I'm driving, but there are definitely situations when your eyes might not be on the road.

For example, what if there's a, perfect example, perfect example, there's a police officer behind you, turns on the flashing lights, you look in your rear view, your eyes are now off the road and it's a risk management situ, whoop, ah, sorry about that.

It's a risk management issue. Like this is a good example. I don't think it's a perfect analogy, but it's another risk management issue and we all know how to do it. We all do it at all times in all situations.

That's actually what I said in my video. I said everything that you do essentially is managing risk. Anyway, Jacob responds. He says, and those who don't keep their eyes on the road should be prosecuted when they commit manslaughter.

That's insane and stupid, obviously. Anyway, and that's the end of that comment because I didn't respond anymore. All right, let's continue. So this is actually a comment that I think is interesting and I don't entirely disagree with it, but I have a slightly different read on the situation.

This is again about my evangelical impotence video. The commenter says, my understanding is that they are denouncing support of Confederate monuments and flags because what those things honor was sin itself or at least tightly bound to it.

Confederate soldiers fought underneath the Confederate flag largely to uphold the system of race-based chattel slavery. So having statues and flags to honor the Confederacy largely motivated by sin is wrong as I understand it.

This is different than honoring someone for something good despite their sin somewhere else. In other words, there is a difference between honoring someone despite their sin and honoring them for their sin.

This is an interesting point. I think that there's some value to it. However, even this is inconsistent because as I mentioned in the video, we'll get think pieces about how George Whitefield wasn't a Christian because he was a chaplain on a slave ship and stuff like that.

And how we need to cancel George Whitefield and we need to cancel R .L. Dabney because R .L. Dabney said some mean things about black people, which he definitely did. He said some things that I don't believe about black people and stuff like that.

But you see, the thing is like R .L. Dabney is celebrated for his good contributions to theology, not the stuff about black people and yet we still need to cancel R .L. Dabney. And yet we still need to cancel George Whitefield.

And yet we still need to rename this stupid gavel thing from the Southern Baptist Convention and stuff like that. And so while this would be a good way to rationalize it, even this they don't do consistently.

These people are not trying to be consistent. They're not thinking this through. Russell Moore, Al Mohler, Matt Hall, Joe Carter, all they are doing, this is all they're doing. I'm sorry to say this, but this is just how it is.

They're just trying to please the world. They are trying to go with the zeitgeist. They know they've got to praise this guy, so they're gonna praise him. They're gonna do what they gotta do. They're gonna advocate statues.

They're gonna advocate bridges to be named after him. All at the same time while they're currently canceling R .L. Dabney and George Whitefield and stuff like that. And lying about these people too. Because that's the other thing that happens.

Like people say, well, R .L. Dabney, nobody talks about his racism. And the thing is like people have talked about R .L. Dabney's racism for a very long time and debated it and talked about, is it really racism, stuff like that.

People have done this in white seminaries for so long, but we're being made to think by people like, well, let's just say Big Eva, made to think that these people, that this has all been hidden. We were trying to hide this and it's because we're secret Confederates and stuff like that.

This is a great comment. That would be an interesting way to kind of rationalize it, but this is not what they're doing. This is not what they're doing. There's no consistency whatsoever. And that's really what my evangelical impotence video is all about.

The lack of consistency. Because if you want to praise John Lewis, I don't really care. I mean, fine, praise the good things that he did. I have no issue with that. In fact, that's what I do. I praise R .L. Dabney's genius because he was a genius, a theological genius.

It's just a fact. It's just a fact. I do this as well. Because when I say that R .L. Dabney was a genius, I understand that people are going to hear me saying I'm a racist, but I don't have to agree with everything R .L. Dabney said in order to be a genius.

But I'm being told by these same people like Russell Moore and Al Mohler and Matt Hall and all this stuff that I have to go all the way woke, right? So I can't have George Whitefield. I got to question his salvation.

I got to question R .L. Dabney's salvation and stuff like that. So if we're going to be consistent, then we certainly have to question John Lewis's salvation. Right? That would stand to reason, but we don't because there is no consistency.

And so this commenter makes a really good point. A Confederate monument, okay, maybe it's celebrating the sin or it's too close. Fair enough, but that's not what Russell Moore and Al Mohler are doing.

Because if they were, then they would have to change a lot of what they've been doing recently. And that's the whole point. There's no consistency to this whatsoever. None at all. And these are the same people that will get high on their horse, right?

And if I was George Whitefield's pastor, I would beg him to change his mind. And when he didn't, I would church discipline him. Like, no, you wouldn't. You won't even church discipline the dude who's voting Democrat today.

Like fight today's battle. Yeah, you're all big and bad about yesterday's battles, but today we've got an injustice right now. We've got an injustice here. And half of your congregation is voting for these charlatans, these evil monsters, these terrorists.

They're terrorizing the womb, right? And they're terrorizing blacks in the womb at a higher rate than whites. And so if we're gonna go with your nonsense, then you've gotta be a man now. Be a man now and church discipline people that vote Democrat, but you won't do it.

Because you're cowards, you have no consistency, and all you're doing is trying to please the world. You're trying to please the spirit of the age. You're trying to please the zeitgeist. And it's so patently obvious.

This John Lewis stuff makes it so patently obvious that all you're doing is playing footsie with the world. You act big and bad about yesterday's battles, all the races from the past. Oh yeah, I would church discipline him.

No, you wouldn't. You're a liar, you're a coward, and it's obvious to everyone who's thinking about it for a few seconds that big evil is full of these people. Because if you would church discipline George Whitefield, then church discipline John Lewis today for his evil, for his social injustice, for his lack of civil rights.

But you won't do it because that would displease the world and you are desperate for their approval. Anyway, some great comments. Guys, thank you so much for these comments. It's made me think further about what I'm thinking and what I'm saying and what I'm doing.

And I really appreciate the interaction. Anyway, God bless.