JD Vance and the Ordo Amoris

there is actually a priority of love. And we would say that I would say that I love her more than I love you.

And if you can't get that, then you're a knucklehead.

Vice president JD Vance. Old school. And I think it's a very Christian concept by the way, that you love your family and then you love your neighbor and then you love your community and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country.

And then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world. A lot of the far left has completely inverted that.

They seem to hate the citizens of their own country and care more about people outside their own borders. That is no way to run a society.

Okay. So Vance said that. And immediately people started to lose their mind and said, nope, that's not

Christian. It's not Christian to say, to love your family first. It's not Christian to say, to love your community first.

It's not Christian to put categories like that. And, and, and so I was on X and I saw this man who

I do not know. Um, and he, well, there was actually two posts.

I'm going to put them both on the screen. The first post was a guy who said, wait, in Christian thought, if your child is in one hand and a stranger's in the other, what are you supposed to do?

Meaning which one do you prioritize? And this man named Joe Ash Thomas, who described himself as having attended the, or one of the premier conservative evangelical schools or evangelical seminaries in the

United States. Like he really built up his own stock. Uh, Joe Ash Thomas said in a Christian, in a

Christianity that looks like Jesus of Nazareth, you would love the stranger first that you would love the stranger before your own child.

And then he goes on to say, if you don't like that, that's okay. Just be honest that you're not ready to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow

Jesus. Okay. Joe Ash Thomas. I want to, I want to explain something to you. There's a Greek word for what you've just said.

Baloney because that's what it is. What you just said is absolute bupkis. It's baloney. It's garbage. It's, it's, it's, it's liberal slop.

The idea that I don't, I'm not able to prioritize my own love. God prioritizes his own love.

He says of Israel in the old Testament. And I always point this, this verse out to people in Amos chapter three.

It says, when God is speaking to Israel, he says, you have, I known of all the nations of the earth. Meaning the word no, there means to love.

It means to prioritize in regard to how he loves the nations.

He says, I have put Israel first. God does have a priority. He prioritizes his people.

He tells us that it's very clear. So when JD Vance is saying this, he's saying, yes, there is actually a priority.

And there's a phrase that's gone out today. I know Doug Wilson said it, maybe you saw it.

Um, uh, but the phrase is ordo amoris, uh, from the word amor, amoris, meaning love, the order of love or the, uh, and, and you think about like the order salutis is the order of salvation.

Order amoris is the idea that there is actually a priority of love.

And we would say that I would say. That I love her more than I love you.

And if you can't get that, then you're a knucklehead.

I mean, really, you know, you can't get the fact that I love my wife more than I love you. Even if we're, even if you're a

Christian, I love my wife more than I love you. There's a, there's an order to that. There's a, there's, there's actually a, um, a priority in this.

And, um, now there's another side to this where someone would say, and I, and I would, I, I know there's the argument.

Well, um, I I'm, I'm in a, I'm in a different relationship with Christians and I am with non -Christians and I have non -Christians in my family and I have

Christians that are not in my family. And I've said this to my church. Like I've said to my church, yes. There's a sense in which

I have a stronger bond with my Christian brothers and my church than I do with like my family.

That's not in Christ, my extended family. We have a blood relationship with them, but we have a blood in Christ relationship with, with those in the church.

So there are distinctions that are to be made, but there's still an order of priority. And, and my primary priority is the priority of my family.

And I think that's what JD Vance was, was trying to say. Now one could argue, you know, that, uh, that can be pushed too far where we absolutely ignore people outside of our family, but that's not what he was saying and that's not what

I'm saying. In fact, I made this post and some people saw it. Some people agreed, some people disagreed, but this was the post that I put in regard to this whole subject.

I said, a man making the members of his home a priority is in the very qualifications for an elder.

If he doesn't care for his home, how can he care for the members of his church? That's what the scripture says.

This proves there's a priority for a godly man that begins in the home. What is it? What is the, what is the qualification for an elder?

He must manage his home well, because if he doesn't manage his home well, he can't manage the church. There's a priority for the man of God that he actually prioritizes his family first before he can go and prioritize the church.

So, um, again, I wanted to throw these thoughts out there because it was, it was a big deal on X the last few days.

And I don't go around just commenting on everything, but on this particular subject, I think we can to say, well, what

JD Vance said is unchristian. No. What JD Vance said is simply talking in the categories of priority.

And my priority is number one. And my kids know that too, by the way. How many times have I told our kids,

I love you, but your mom comes first. And by the way, if your kids come first in your marriage and your, and your spouse comes second, then your marriage is out of order because I tell them the same thing, that's right.

She's first for me. I'm first for her. The kids are valuable and lovable and we love them.

But one day my boys are going to leave their father and mother. They're going to cleave under their wife and they're going to become one flesh with their wife and they're going to create this and I want to model for them what that's supposed to look like.

And that means she's my priority. And if that doesn't make sense to people, I don't understand why not.

That's the very thing God told me to do. He said to love her like Christ loves the church and that she is to respect me as the church submits to Christ, Jesus submitted to me, that mutual relationship of love and respect is supposed to be the picture of the gospel, the, the husband representing

Christ, laying his life down for his wife, giving himself up for her, washing her with the water of the word, sanctifying her and all those things and the wife submitting to the husband as the church submits into Christ.

This is all a picture of the gospel. And so the idea of, well, you know,

I'm supposed to love a stranger more than I love my children. No, that's, that's, that that's kooky talk and, uh, we need to recognize it for what it is.