We Will Not Be Silenced Interview Part 4

Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.

The enemy is at the gate. Radical Islam, Antifa, and other violent groups intend to tear this country apart. Only the Church stands against the swelling tide. Erwin Lutzer's new book, We Will Not Be Silenced, gives us a road map for the dark days ahead.

Stay with us. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Now, along with Pastor Larry McCarthy, here is Pastor Lutzer. Well, once again, this is Pastor Lutzer, and today we have our last session discussing my new book. And with me here in the studio is Larry McCarthy.

He's on the pastoral staff here at the Moody Church, the pastor of Compassion and Local Outreach. So, Larry, today we have a huge agenda that we're going to get into. We do indeed, but I want to remind the listeners of the title of the book, We Will Not Be Silenced, Responding Courageously to Our Culture's Assault on Christianity.

Now, today, boy, you're coming right out the starting blocks. Radical Islam on a Mission to Destroy America? That's a bold statement. You're right, Pastor Larry, and that happens to be chapter 8 in the book, where I talk about the left. And when I speak about the left, I'm not talking politically, necessarily.

That has to do with a cultural stream in America. There are those who would like to see America destroyed and rebuilt. And because in this chapter I talk about Muslims and Islam, I want to point out that, of course, the majority of Muslims in America have no intention of destroying America. They accept American values and the American way of life, but the problem is there are some radicals who exercise a great deal of authority who would like to see America destroyed. So what I do in this chapter is to try to help people to understand that we're living in an era where Islam oftentimes is being praised by people.

It is being praised. Christianity is spoken against, and the hope is that eventually Islam will become a part of a movement that will help destroy America. Peter Robinson Pastor, how would you respond to those that would say that, well, isn't Sharia law compatible with our Constitution? It certainly is not. People have no idea what Sharia law is if they say that.

It's an American version that seems to be compatible, but if you look at Islam carefully, you understand that it is not compatible with our Constitution at all. But let me mention why I bring this up here in this book. The reason is because what you find among the left, they oftentimes defend Islam, and that happened even after 9-11.

You know, the idea was, look, we got what we deserved. People fly planes into buildings because they are oppressed, and America is the great oppressor. And so what we need to do is to exonerate Islam, even in the face of this kind of violence and terror.

Now let's fast forward. What happened after 9-11, which is kind of scary, is the fact that Islam was being taught in schools. I mean, I'm talking about the five pillars were being taught.

Children were asked to try to understand Islam and were being taught Islamic doctrine. And I give examples where the ACLU was defending Islam. Now where was the ACLU? Could you imagine Christianity being taught in the schools and the ACLU coming out in favor of it and defending it?

No, I can't. Here's my confusion. This isn't accidental, but the people who would support this and push it, Islam attempts to nullify everything that we allege to hold dear in America, the freedoms that we have, so to speak. They would nullify all of that.

Why would they stand up and want this to be part of the American culture, to replace America, when it would nullify everything that we stand for? Larry, if I understand your question correctly, I want to say this. The reason that the left, which has such different values, is willing to team up with Islam, which as I emphasize already has very different values, is that they see one another as allies just for now, to accomplish the same purpose, namely the destruction of Christianity and the destruction of capitalism. So on that, they are agreed. So what you have is in the military, what does the expression say?

He who is an enemy of my enemy is my friend, so they team up together to accomplish that. What we must recognize is that this is happening, where the ACLU will actually defend the teaching of Islam in our schools, and when parents objected and brought a lawsuit, they were vilified on social media. You're intolerant. You're racist.

You're whatever, and by the way, that social media is totally 100 percent out of control. There's one other thing I want to mention, and then we have to get to this subject of the next chapter, and that is this, that according to the American Textbook Council, Islam now basically has veto power over our textbooks. And I encourage parents out there, you're listening to this. Would you look at your children's textbooks that are being used in the public school on history?

Read them. Don't assume that they are going to teach about the greatness of America or put Christianity in positive light. I know examples of a textbook that gives 60 pages to how wonderful Islam is, 14 pages to Christianity. Christianity is based on imperialism.

It has denigrated women and the whole bit, and many parents don't even know that this is what their children are being taught in school. Oh, my goodness. That's a good word, Pastor. You know what I like about what you just said?

It's so practical. That gives parents something they can do, and for a lot of parents who went to sleep during their time in high school, now is a chance you can read those books again. And you can get the education you're supposed to get way back there, right. So parents, as I emphasized in a previous program, God is going to hold you personally accountable for the way in which your children are being taught, and you need to seek wisdom to make sure that they are being shielded from the issues of sexuality that we talked about in the last broadcast, but also the idea of history. So we must take note of that. And as Christians, how do we respond? Well, first of all, what we discover is we have to be kind to Muslims.

We can befriend them in our neighborhoods and so forth. Most are very interested in our religion. But at the back of our minds, we also need to understand that there are the radicals out there that are trying to promote an agenda that is totally contrary to American values.

The name of the book, We Will Not Be Silenced, Responding Courageously to Our Culture's Consult on Christianity, chapter 9, vilify, vilify, vilify. If there's one word that would describe the sentiment in America today, it would be simply anger. Why are people so angry?

You know, that's a very good question. Of course, politically, we notice that we are so divided where there is so much rancor on both sides of the aisle and you have all that. That undoubtedly fuels anger. The other thing I think, Larry, is social media because people can now go online and they can just vent and they can just say whatever they like and use whatever words they want to use and they're outraged about this and they're outraged about that. But the point of this chapter is where I emphasize that even those who go along with the leftist agenda are being vilified today.

I give an example, for example, of an angry mob in Canada. There's a woman speaking in a library and she belongs to feminist current. She's pro-abortion. She's pro-gay rights. But she has the nerve to disagree with the transgender movement. So here you get this angry mob shouting, shame, shame, shame.

Think of how liberal she is in these views and it still isn't enough. In other words, you come over to our point of view completely or we will cancel you. We will demonize you. We will shout at you and threaten you because there's no such thing as civility, discussion, talking like we used to think America was all about.

All that is gone and we live in a culture in which the person who shouts the loudest seems to be the winner and that's why it is so difficult. In the book, you talk about extreme tactics. Do you want to address that just briefly?

Yeah, Larry. And you know, I've been using the expression the left and of course I hope that people understand that I mean the radical left. I don't mean it politically.

What I'm talking about is a form of secularism that all of us need to be standing against. But since you're talking about real radicals, I want to say a word about Antifa. Now what we have is, let's go back to the time of Hitler, you know, when his brown shirts were really the ones that were roaming around making sure that justice was being served in various ways. Antifa doesn't have brown shirts.

It does have black masks. But here's what I want to say regarding everything that has happened in America all in the year 2020. It's very interesting that Kristallnacht, which took place in Germany, that was the night when Kristall was broken.

That's the idea. When you have all of these gangs roaming around destroying Jewish businesses. And there was a pretext for that.

Whenever you have a revolution, you always need a pretext. There was a man by the name of Ernst von Raat. He was a German diplomat who was put to death in Paris. He was shot by a Jewish student. So what happened is, Hitler and Goebbels got together and they said, you know, we have to respond to this.

And so they, in effect, told the police and the fire departments, don't intervene. Let's just let the mobs rule. Well, the point that I make in the book is you can almost think of them as they were destroying Jewish businesses saying, we want justice for Ernst.

We want justice for Ernst. It's to your point. Yeah, you see the point. All of us know that the death of George Floyd certainly seems to be just murder, right? Yes. All of us want justice in those situations.

Yes. But that doesn't give permission to people to burn things down, to loot buildings and all the rest. That's right. And what you have with Antifa especially, and I need to emphasize something that's somewhat obvious, I hope, to people, that of course I can understand the anger. I can understand the peaceful protests and all that. But that does not justify the radicals taking advantage of it, hitchhiking it, and looting, destroying, arson, and all the rest.

That's right. And this is so critical. People need to understand that when you have an organization that says we're standing against hate, sometimes those people are the most hateful of all. And what it comes down to again is human nature. The fact is that all of us are sinners.

And as I mentioned to you earlier in a previous program, we do not have a skin problem. We have a sin problem. Amen.

And so what we need to do is to recognize that all of these movements are more destructive than they are helpful. Wow, that's a good word. The name of the book, We Will Not Be Silenced, Responding Courageously to Our Culture's Assault on Christianity. In chapter 9, you also give this illustration of this church that is just lit up for teaching, Genesis 1.27.

And of course it's a true story. The church is the crossing in Columbia, Missouri. And there are reasons why I know this church so well. So one of the pastors is preaching on Genesis 1.27. God created them male and female.

He was so loving and so concerned that he not step on toes that I wondered whether or not he was going to land the plane. But at the end, he came down on the biblical side, but there are two genders. Suddenly the next day, the newspapers pick up the story. People begin to write in. A thousand people sign a petition that the church should no longer have a relationship with other organizations in the community. It becomes front page news. Students at the university say I don't know if I can feel safe in a culture and in a city that would have a church like this. And on and on the vilification went. The pastor was compared to antichrist and all of these other outrageous things. Now what you need to understand is this, Larry, and boy we have to hurry on here. I used to always say, you know, churches should be known for what they are for, not what they are against.

But here's the point. Even though this church did wonderful works in the community, the fact is this, that they stood against something that they had to stand against and all that was forgotten and they were vilified and that is coming to a church near you. So we have to hurry because the last chapter of my book is the words of Jesus to the church in Sardis, Strengthen What Remains. Are you ready there, Larry?

Larry, I'm ready. So what concerns did Jesus have for the church? Rebecca and I visited Sardis many years ago. We were part of a tour that visited the seven churches of Revelation. When you're at Sardis, there is a church there, a number of them actually that are right up against a pagan temple. So you look at this and you say now wait a moment, how should we interpret this? They said we want to be where it is the darkest, where the need is the greatest and we're going to represent Christ right here.

That's the positive way. There's another way to interpret it, that the church felt quite comfortable right next to the pagan temple and the pagan temple by the way was an immoral temple and I wonder, you know, were there people who came out of the temple or I should say and then went to church or came out of the church and went directly to the temple, took about five steps and they were there? I don't know. But here's the interesting thing. Jesus writes this letter to the church of Sardis and he says you have a reputation that you are alive but you are dead.

Yes. Boy, we have to ponder that because the church was the place to be, the church was alive. What does that say to today's church? And then Jesus says strengthen what remains. Now what's interesting is that Jesus does not expressly tell us what it is that he had against the church but clearly when you read the whole letter, I think that we can put two and two together very quickly and we will understand. He says but I still have some people who have not defiled their garments and they shall walk with me in light.

That's what he says. I think what Jesus is saying is you forgot that the world is your enemy and you have allowed the world into the church and people's garments are spoiled. So I ask the question in this chapter, what might Jesus say to the American church?

Yes. And I try to boil it down in three points and there are those who might disagree, who might say he will say something else. Number one, it has to do with the gospel. We have social justice theories today oftentimes being taught and we know that social justice can be defined biblically.

We're involved in culture, making it better but it can also be defined as we talked about earlier under critical race theory. Churches are being invaded by this kind of teaching. I'm talking now about evangelical churches and they are losing the gospel. They are talking about justice but they are not talking about judgment.

Yes sir. They are not preaching the whole counsel of God and a clear gospel message. The second thing that I highlight that I think Jesus would obviously talk to us about is our concessions to the world's theories of sexuality and I know that churches struggle. We talked about this earlier because we want to be loving but we also have to be truthful and to be able to separate those two and to say, if I might quote the words of Martin Luther, here we stand, we can do no other so help us God.

So we need to be able to do that kind of thing and to do it with a great deal of confidence. And then the third area has to do with the whole topic of the world in the church. Earlier we talked about technology and it's very easy for us to forget indeed that the world is not our friend. I'm talking about the world now, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. So the question is, what does the church do? We need to wake up, we need to respond to the culture. In my book I end with a quote which I thought I had before me here but I don't from Martin Niemoller.

I think I can capture it if I simply paraphrase it. He's speaking at a time in Germany when he knows he is going to be persecuted, he eventually of course was taken to a concentration camp because of his commitment to the independence of the church from Hitler's regime. And what he says Larry is that Satan has been allowed by God to sift us and Satan is sifting us that God might know whether or not we are chaff or whether or not we are wheat. And I look at the church today in America and I say that indeed God is sifting us. The question is are we going to be faithful? As I mentioned in the first program together I didn't write this book to reclaim the culture, I wrote it to reclaim the church and to say to the church are we willing to engage the culture but at the same time stand against the culture and all the headwinds that we are facing. My heart is with the people of God and I don't feel brave.

It's easy to be intimidated but we have to be willing to say we're going to be faithful and then we live with the consequences. And I want to thank the many people who support the ministry of running to win. This is my last session with you Larry. Thank you so much for being a part of this. Larry At the end of casual Christianity we got to get into the game, so to speak. The book, We Will Not Be Silenced, responding courageously to our culture's assault on Christianity.

Thanks for having me. Thank you so much Larry and God bless. Pastor Lutzer's new book, We Will Not Be Silenced, will be sent as our gift to you as you support Running to Win at this crucial time with your gift of any amount. Just call us at 1-888-218-9337. That's 1-888-218-9337. Or write to us at Running to Win, 1635 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 60614. Online, reach us at rtwoffer.com.

That's rtwoffer.com. Running to Win is all about helping you find God's roadmap for your race of life. Next time we begin a series on God and the nations. We'll see that God is moving the nations into position for the climax of this present age. Thanks for listening. This is Dave McAllister. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.