John Piper on Critical Race Theory AGAIN!

Okay, okay. So hope you had a good weekend. I know I sure did. It was cold and we lit fires in the fireplace.

It was lovely. Absolutely lovely. Unfortunately, though, my son and my wife not feeling so good, but today they're feeling a little bit better.

So good stuff all around there. God bless you. Let's talk about critical race theory again.

So you know, initially, I wasn't gonna watch part two of this video from john piper about critical race theory part one was just so horrendous.

So I just decided that I wasn't gonna do it. But then I saw a couple of you sent me a tweet from Doug Wilson that called out part two as being amazing.

He said it was really good. He highly recommended it. And all of that. So I decided to give it a watch at least give it a shot.

Right? 24 minutes. I don't know if I'm gonna do another four episodes. We'll see. We'll see how this goes. But I'm very, very suspicious of part two here.

I don't I don't have any expectations. In fact, my expectations could not be lower, given how terrible part one was, if you haven't watched the videos for part one,

I'll try to include them in the link of the description of this video. But here's the thing, guys, like, you know,

I don't often disagree with Doug Wilson. However, I have twice that I can remember.

Very recently on the channel. The first one was his initial reaction to the Coronavirus lockdown orders for churches.

He was wrong about that. His opinion has changed since then. So I had no problem disagreeing with him at that point.

And it turns out I think I was probably right, which is great. I got one. I got that one over on Doug.

But anyway, well, you know, Doug, Doug, sufficiently nuances everything.

So you know, it's hard for him to be wrong. I don't remember how he nuanced that one. But anyway, so that was the first one.

And then I've also disagreed with him on how great what is her name?

Butterfield butter. But Rosario Butterfield. Yeah. I don't think she's terrible.

But I also don't think that she's like the greatest thing since sliced bread when it comes to LGBT stuff as well.

And he seems to really like her contributions in that area. I don't really know that this is the case because I haven't watched

John Piper yet. But Doug, despite his reputation, Doug has a tendency, in my opinion, to just really appreciate and and just accept any level of pushback, even if he doesn't think it goes far enough, or it's just a little bit of pushback.

He really appreciates that in our culture today. And I understand that. In fact, I incorporate that into my own interactions when it comes to critical race theory as much as I can.

In fact, that's part of the reason why I don't give Neil Genvey is as hard of a time as I probably should, is because I appreciate the pushback, even if he's not going far enough, even if he's not naming names,

I'm going to name names, that's fine. He does his thing, I do my thing. I appreciate the pushback. And I think that's what goes on with Doug sometimes with stuff like this.

But we'll see maybe John Piper's video, a second video on critical race theory is excellent. Let's find out right now and start with that winsome music.

We plan to take the week of Thanksgiving off from the podcast to give you some by the way I've done it to 1 .2 speed because John Piper talks way too slow.

Sorry, if it gets too crazy, I'll slow it back down. Listen to the Providence book, audiobook, those excerpts that we published last week.

I hope you will set aside time to do that. It's really important content. I think you'll be blessed by it. But we returned yesterday on Monday with a new episode on the growing debate over critical race theory.

So what exactly is it? Pastor John is about to explain in this follow up episode. On Monday, we looked at the relational dimensions of the debate.

And here now is Pastor John with critical race theory, part two, the root. Yeah, I gotta say it. So he mentioned he wasn't going to start with a definition.

He wanted to talk about the relationships and the feelings first. And he thinks I know he said that that was a good idea because of the

I don't know really why it was supposed to be a good idea. But I thought that was a terrible idea. Because the definitions of course matter when you're talking about interpersonal relationships.

Because interpersonal relationships, how you treat them should change if you're talking about Christians or people that are adhering to another religion.

And so it really kind of the definitions really do matter in this case.

But let's hear him out. Let's see what he says about critical race theory.

So this is our second episode about critical race theory. I focused last time on two biblical relational principles that I so wanted to plead for.

And I postponed a definition of what critical race theory is and the question of why it is so controversial and why it matters.

So that's what we are about now in this session. Good. In my understanding, critical race theory is worth talking about not only because it is causing divisions among Christians at points where I don't think those divisions need to exist, but also because in its mainstream expression, not every use made of it, but in its mainstream expression, it is another manifestation of the age -old enslavement of fallen human hearts to self -deification.

I will be my own god. Self -definition. I will define my own essential identity.

And self -determination. I will decide my own truth and my own morality without deference to any authority outside myself.

So this is amazing. So, you know, it's interesting how much he wants to nuance this up front.

Not every expression of it. What other pagan ideology would somebody do that with? Would anyone ever say white nationalists in its mainstream expression, not every use of it, but in its mainstream expression is sin idolatry.

What other ideology would somebody do that with? We'll see how he defines it. But I just find that particular nuance to be so ridiculous.

It's like, I don't feel the need to be like, you know, everyone who calls themselves a communist, like every expression of communist isn't idolatry.

Well, of course it is at some level. If it's pagan, if it doesn't come from the Bible, at some level, every expression of it is evil.

It's just more or less evil, depending on how far along with it you go. And I would argue that critical race theory is along those lines.

It's always evil, but it depends how far you go, how evil it becomes.

I just don't understand the necessity of that nuance. It's just something that in people's minds that it's just broken.

They just have to bend over backwards to allow room for it in the church. There's no room for critical race theory in the church, even just a little bit of critical race theory.

I'm not saying that. Shenvy does the same thing. I don't see the need for it.

There's no, there's no, you don't give Satan a foothold in your church. Anybody who has gotten help from delving into critical race theory is guilty of those things.

Not at all. Not by a long shot. I'm saying these are the root problems of the mainstream, scholarly, decades -long development of critical race theory, which is why it is being so hotly contested and, in that sense, rightly contested.

So my most fundamental aim here is to encourage us all in the convictions that we are not

God, but Yahweh alone is God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has spoken truthfully in Scripture.

We are not those who can define our own essential identity. God does that by His Word, by His creation, by His blood -bought transformation of His people, and we do not have ultimate self -determination.

God decides what is true, not we. God decides what is right, not we.

And if we are saved from sin and for God, it will be God who saves us and not we ourselves.

Good stuff. I love it. Now, even more specifically, I want to establish us in these convictions over against the core philosophical convictions of critical race theory because I believe with all my heart that these convictions, not those of critical race theory, will serve the cause of racial harmony, racial justice, and the flourishing of a joyful, respectful,

Christ -exalting racial and ethnic diversity in the body of Christ. In other words, critical race theory is not a problem because it raises the challenge of racial justice and racial harmony and racial respect and racial glory.

Instead, it's a problem because it fails us. What in the world is racial glory?

I mean, I like what he's saying, but I don't know what racial glory is.

It fails us as we try to take up these challenges in a hopeful,

Christ -exalting way. So again, I agree with that.

That's good. Critical race theory, the basic assumptions, the foundations of it, they do a disservice to racial unity and racial diversity and racial glory.

I'm wondering why is a little bit of critical race theory okay? Why do you have to continue to nuance this to death?

It's like, no, no, it's evil. It's against what the scripture says at almost every point.

So why do you have to make the room? Every leader in evangelicalism is bending over backwards to be like,

I'm making a little bit of room for it. I just don't get it. It's the same mentality with the voting

Democrat from the last few weeks. It's like, they want to make room for that satanic party.

I don't understand this. In what other sense would we make room for pagan ideology in the church?

Is there room for Muslim ideology in the church? Of course there's not. Because we recognize it as another religion.

Critical race theory is, critical theory is another religion. It's another system of salvation.

And there's no room for it. I just don't understand. I agree with John, but why the need, well, not every person that's in this pagan religion is a pagan.

It's like, no, every person in the pagan religion is a pagan. And every Christian who adopts parts of this pagan religion ought to repent.

They ought to be discipled and disciplined into repenting from the sin of adopting a pagan ideology as a

Christian. Right? So of course there are some Christians that have pagan ideas. Nobody would deny that.

But they should be taught to repent of those pagan ideas. No foothold. No quarter for this.

What is it? And how does it manifest this self -deification and self -definition and self -determination?

As with most philosophical schools of thought. And that is what we are dealing with.

You can define critical race theory generically with regard to its aims, or you can define it more essentially with regard to its core assumptions and conclusions.

If we stay for a moment now at the generic level, critical race theory will not sound controversial because it will overlap with legitimate goals and concerns of many

Christians. For example, the Purdue University website defines critical race theory in this generic way, like this, in terms of its goals.

Quote, CRT—that's short for critical race theory—CRT scholars attempt to understand—so you can hear that's a totally legitimate effort, right?

We all want to understand things, and we ought to. CRT scholars attempt to understand, one, how victims of systemic racism are affected by cultural conceptions of race, and two, how they are able to represent themselves to counter prejudice.

Now, if you don't read— Okay, so this is ridiculous. So, okay, I'm sure that critical race theorists use this kind of a definition, this kind of generic definition that makes it sound very innocuous and all that kind of stuff.

But as truth -loving people, we need to reject that attempt, because that attempt is an attempt to lie through obfuscation.

That's an attempt at lying, because no, that is not what critical race theory is, even in the generic sense.

Because here's the thing, by that definition, I'm a critical race theorist, because I do both of those things.

You're probably a critical race theorist by that definition, because you try to do both of those things.

And so no, that's not how we—we have to reject that as an attempt to try to fool people by confusing terms and confusing issues.

Would any rational person say, well, well, well, hold on a second. Islam, in a generic sense, is an attempt to worship the one true

God in the way that God prescribes. Like, nobody would ever accept that.

No, no, that's not what Islam is. Islam has specifics, and we need to talk about those specifics, because what you've just done doesn't distinguish it from any other monotheistic religion.

We need to look at the distinctions, right? Like, people always say this phrase, and I don't really understand why it's so popular, but it's like, we need to know what you're for, not what you're against.

No, we actually need to know both. We need to know what you're for and what you're against. We need to get specific here.

And so like, I just don't see the value. Maybe John's about to lambast that in just a second.

Hopefully he is. But there's no value in the generic definition of critical theory.

It doesn't distinguish it from anything else. I'm not a those things.

I try to understand what, you know, I don't remember exactly the definition that you just read off, but I didn't have any problem with that.

I do that myself, of course. More than you should into any of those terms, there are many

Christians who would say, rightly, well, those are my big concerns, at least some of them.

So we might talk right past each other if we don't stop to get clarity about the meaning of critical race theory that we have in mind when we speak of it, either sympathetically or critically.

In this and many other issues, we need to take care to get our definitions clear up front in our conversation.

Okay. So then why didn't you do that, John? That's the thing. Like, we could have saved a lot of grief if you just did that, but you specifically didn't do that.

And I want to know why, because it didn't make any sense to me. You said that you would explain why, or at least that I would see why, and I didn't.

You did 25 minutes without explaining what critical race—actually, more, because now we're six minutes in, seven minutes in to part two, and you still haven't given us a definition.

You've just given us a vague sort of generic definition, which is no definition at all. If the definition is too vague, then it's not a definition.

Like, I saw Neil Shenvey say this. Like, if your definition of a cat is a four -legged mammal that's a carnivore, that's not a definition.

That doesn't distinguish it from anything else. Like, that's preposterous. Of course you're confused if that's your definition.

But the problem is, John, that people who would not call themselves critical theorists, and in fact would feel offended if we said, hey, that's critical theory to them, believe specifics of critical theory.

Like the systemic institutional racism that you can never detect, but you know it's there because the power dynamics of white and black and like, like that kind of thing.

And so it's not a pejorative to call someone who believes specifics of critical theory into question.

You know what I mean? So, you know, here we are, we're seven minutes into this video, and I just don't understand what's so valuable about this.

I guess we're about to see. Let's find out. Now, if we go beneath these generic goals of critical race theory to the assumptions and conclusions of its mainstream exponents, things become seriously problematic for Christians with biblical convictions.

That's right. Because this is not a neutral theory. It's laden with assumptions or viewpoints about reality that put it at odds with some biblical thinking.

So let's try to get at this more essential definition. Let's do it, man.

I'm ready. It helps us define. I've been ready for 30 minutes. Critical race theory, if we understand that it is an offshoot of critical theory, and what critical theory tries to do is understand society by viewing it primarily as interconnected groups which are related to each other as powerful or oppressed, advantaged or disadvantaged, privileged or discriminated against.

It studies these groups in order to find and challenge power structures that shape the relationships between groups.

Now, that's where the word critical and theory get their meaning. It's a theory in the sense that it's a way of explaining how society works.

And it's critical in the sense that it assesses and challenges, that is, is critical of, assesses and challenges the way groups exert power or are oppressed by that power.

Still too general, in my opinion. They have started with a concern about the relationships of privilege and oppression between classes like rich and poor, white collar, blue collar, educated, less educated, professional tradesmen, blue bloods versus commoners.

The theory now, as it has come into its fuller expression, has given rise to an array of focuses, theories, disciplines, studies from queer theory to fat studies.

Because as soon as you - The fat studies are my favorite one. You guys ever look into fat studies?

It's good stuff. If you want to laugh, look into fat studies. Focus on groups and power dynamics between them.

You see them everywhere, right? Women, men, heterosexual, homosexual, fixed gender, transgender, old, young,

Western, non -Western. I believe it's called cisgender. Pastor John, please don't be a bigot. American, Canadian, able -bodied, disabled, short, tall, slender, fat.

On every one of these pairs, you can find books and studies more or less shaped by critical theories.

And they're all just as stupid as each other. That's the thing. We have to understand that. The book about fat studies and how it's healthy to be fat and stuff like that, it's actually just as stupid as the critical race theory book.

But somehow we make room. We got to make a little room for that critical theory, critical race theory.

We wouldn't do it with the fat shaming one. Maybe we would. I don't know. A focus on the identity of the group and a challenge of the power or the privilege of one group over another.

So critical race theory. So add the word race to the term critical theory.

Critical race theory then tries to understand and challenge, deal critically with, the power and oppression relationships that have marked racial groups historically and still do today.

And the caveat here is that it's inevitable that they do as well. The other thing is we have to understand, we have to challenge the very foundations of some of this stuff.

I'll give you a perfect example. Today, I saw an article by the Gospel Coalition that said it was about ethnic, multicultural, diverse

Christmas or something. And one of the sentences in the article said, of course,

Christians of European descent should be looking for ways to celebrate Christmas in a more diverse way.

And I know a lot of people would approach this differently, but I just challenge the assumption of that.

Like, of course. Why, of course? Why can't Europeans just be European? Like, if I'm European and I want to celebrate

Christmas in a European way, why can't I just do that? Why can't I live like a European? Why can't

I enjoy European art? Why can't I be a European? Why do I have to do other things, other cultural things?

I'm not saying be against other cultures, but why do I have to celebrate my birthday in a non -European way?

The assumption should be challenged, right? Like, people always say, oh, you should have a diverse local assembly.

Why? What in the Bible would make it a command that you should have an ethnically diverse local assembly?

I'm not saying you shouldn't, I'm just saying, you're telling me I should. It's an imperative. Why? I challenge that at the outset.

And likewise here. I don't believe that privilege is something that's a problem, that you should look at the power dynamics.

Privilege is totally appropriate. Power structures and having different people having different levels of authority, that's totally appropriate.

It's baked into Christianity. It's baked into the way God created the world. So these things, you challenge it at the root.

It's like, no, no, no, no, no, no. We're not going to look at the power dynamics in the family between male and female as if it's something that's on trial, because here's the reality.

God created the world in such a way that certain people have certain authorities. And in the church, males are the ones given charge with that authority.

So we're not going to even put God in the dock at all to figure out if that's appropriate. We already know it's appropriate, because God is the one who did it.

God is the one who did it. God is the one who made the husband the head of the wife. That's God's thing.

So we're not going to put God in the dock there. The challenge, the assumption, what's wrong with privilege? Christ privileges his people.

There's nothing wrong with privilege. So first you have to show me what's wrong with it. And the thing is,

I'm not going to even explore it that much, because I can read my

Bible. I can understand my Bible. And so if you're going to accuse me of a sin, go ahead and accuse me of a sin.

You better have two or more witnesses. But let's make sure we're talking about the right things here. Now, it's true that a focus on groups while minimizing the individual and a focus on power while minimizing other relational dynamics like love and humility and graciousness can skew our understanding and yield unhelpful strategies.

Yes, that's true. Nevertheless, those very focuses, misleading as they might be, can also reveal insights that may be strategically helpful in moving toward greater justice.

So what's the root problem? To dig down to what I think is the root problem of critical race theory in mainstream scholarly expression,

I had to probe behind a few controversial statements which were at first baffling to me and then became revealing.

Let me quote two of these statements and then describe my probing to the root issue.

Let's stop there because the video is long enough, but it sounds like it's about to get juicy, so that's good. Maybe we'll get some clarity in the second half of this.

But I'm still noodling with that last statement. Maybe I misheard him, but he's basically saying that like, yeah, you know,

I know that if you look at groups that might cause problems, but it can also be helpful, right?

It can also be helpful to do if you look at the groups and the power dynamics of the group and stuff like that. And I'm not entirely sure what he's saying there, but it doesn't sound that true to me just on the face of it.

So maybe I'll go back and listen to see what he has to say. But, you know, we're halfway through this.

I'm not impressed. I mean, it's okay. It's definitely not as bad as the first one, that's for sure.

But about halfway through and I just don't really see the appeal. But since we're already halfway through, maybe we'll just finish it because that'll be only two videos instead of last time

I think we did four or five. So anyway, I hope you found this video helpful. God bless.