Trump Has Broken His Promise of Defunding the American Abortion Holocaust

If some years ago Republicans could not defund Planned Parenthood (the largest network of abortion and family planning clinics in the U.S.) because socialist Democrats had a majority in the House, in the Senate and had the White House, now the upper hand belongs to Republicans. If formerly Democrats could fund abortion, now Republicans can defund it… if they want.

Yet, it seems that they do not want, even though they have been elected by their conservative constituents just for standing against abortion.

Last week, the GOP-controlled Congress passed an Omnibus Spending Bill (Omnibus Bill) valued at $1.3 trillion in order to keep the U.S. government from shutting down.

Yet, was it worthwhile not to shut it down?

Actually, Trump’s signature did much more than just hindering the U.S. government from shutting down. It hindered the abortion industry from shutting down too.

The Omnibus Bill preserves Medicaid “reimbursements” and Title X funding for “family planning.” This is to say, it maintains America’s $500 million annual contribution to Planned Parenthood, America’s largest abortion mill.

Basically, when Trump approved the Omnibus Bill, he applied capital punishment on all his promises of defunding abortion.

Does a government funding abortion deserve not to shut down?

Trump’s approval of the Omnibus Bill is especially tragic because last January he delivered a historic pro-life speech.

The big victors have been pro-abortion activists.

Abortion was not the only tragedy in the bill Trump signed.

The Omnibus Bill funds abortions and does not fund the building a Border Wall, which is essential for the U.S. security.

It funds war on babies on American soil and wars on foreign soil, by increasing military expenses. Even though the main responsibility of a military force is to guard the borders of its own nation, U.S. expenses support the U.S. Global Police, including 800 U.S. military bases around the world. It is hard to imagine a more ridiculous and hypocritical case than a nation that can guard its military ambitions around the world but is unable to guard its own backyard!

The big victors have been neocons.

Conservative columnist and author Ann Coulter late Tuesday accused President Trump of being an “ignoramus” who is “not giving us what he promised” during a speech at Columbia University.

“I knew he was a shallow, lazy ignoramus, and I didn’t care,” Coulter told the audience, which was largely comprised of College Republicans.

“It kind of breaks my heart,” she added. “He’s not giving us what he promised at every single campaign stop.”

Still, Coulter contended that Trump’s campaign was vastly preferable to those of his competitors, whom she likened to escaped mental patients.

“We had 16 lunatics being chased by men with nets running for president—and Trump,” Coulter explained. “So of course I had to be pedal-to-the-metal for Donald Trump. I’d been waiting 30 years for someone to say all these things,” probably referring to his promise to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and also his promise to stop neocons’ military meddling in other nations.

In 2016, Coulter published the e-book “In Trump We Trust: E Pluribus Awesome!” to challenge America to vote in Trump.

The book praises Trump’s promises of

1. Building a Wall. Coulter said, “Trump announced he was running for president in a speech talking about Mexican rapists, pledging to deport illegal aliens and build a wall.” After over one year in office, Trump has not built yet even an inch of the wall.
2. Not meddling in Syria. Coulter said, “Trump was the only Republican—other than Rand Paul—who did not propose starting a slew of new wars in the Middle East.” Yet, last year she had to criticize him for breaking his promise on Syria.
3. Not arming Ukraine against Russia. In her book Coulter pointed that all candidates, except for Trump, had promised to arm Ukraine. She remarked, “How many Americans wake up every night in a cold sweat in anguish about Ukraine? Even people afraid of global warming aren’t worried about that. Ukraine was part of Russia for most of its history. It would be as if Putin sent fighter jets to force America to give Texas back to Mexico. Most Americans not only don’t care if Putin takes Crimea and the Ukraine.” Yet, Trump broke his promise.
4. Getting along with Putin. Coulter added, “Most Republicans seek to prove their conservative bona fides by having an itchy trigger finger—particularly toward Russia. These days, there’s no one to oppose them. The American left used to be totally fine with the Soviet Union—the gulags, the invading Eastern Europe, the show trials. Until the anti-gay stuff. Now the Russkies are walking on the fighting side of liberals!” Even Trump has embarked the anti-Putin train.

Coulter is right. Trump is not giving America what he promised at every single campaign stop — at least, not on foreign policy, where Trump used to disgust neocons, but now he pleases them on every at every single point.

The vital mission of the military is to protect its own backyard. The U.S. military is failing horribly in this mission, because they are too busy in neocons’ military adventures in other nations.

Before Trump approving the Omnibus Bill, pro-life leaders pleaded with him to veto it.

“Mr. President, Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion business in the U.S., making them one of the largest abusers of human beings in the world,” said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue and one of the founding members of the Center for Medical Progress. “It is currently under investigation by your Department of Justice for engaging in the illegal sale of aborted baby remains for profit, as revealed in a series of authenticated undercover videos that shook the nation in 2015.”

“During your 2016 Presidential Campaign, you promised to defund Planned Parenthood,” he reminded Trump. “I urge you now to keep your promise and veto the Omnibus bill until it no longer provides any of our tax money to Planned Parenthood.”

Yet, Trump broke his promise. He did not veto the Omnibus Bill.

If a foreign force were slaughtering over 500,000 innocent American babies a year, the U.S. military would work to defeat the perpetrator. Such high numbers of innocent lives are actually being destroyed on American soil, and the perpetrator is not China and not even America’s favorite bogeyman: Russia. The perpetrators are abortion mills, especially Planned Parenthood. Abortion is today the leading cause of murder in the United States.

The U.S. military is doing nothing to destroy this enemy.

President Trump, who for so many times has promised to defund Planned Parenthood and its abortion holocaust, signed the Omnibus Bill. In the past, the U.S. Abortion Holocaust had the assistance of socialist Democrats to keep killing. Now the U.S. Abortion Holocaust needed Trump’s assistance, and it received.

No government deserves to continue operating by delivering its innocent babies on the medical altar of slaughter.

No government deserves to continue operating by abandoning the protection of its borders to invest in the military meddling of other nations’ borders, just to satisfy neocons.

It just sad that conservatives vote for politicians to save America from abortion, and then politicians need to keep funding abortion to save the government from shutting down.

What is the point for conservative constituents to elect “conservative” politicians if they eventually approve funding for abortion?

“I say to Congress, I will never sign another bill like this again,” Trump said earlier this month. An insightful cartoon portrays Trump about to jump from a plank from a skyscraper and promising to his advisers “Ok, but I’m never doing this again.” There will no second chance.

For the sake of innocent babies condemned to medical and government slaughter, could American conservatives just shut down the U.S. government? Or will they wait for God to do it?

Copyright © 2018 Last Days Watchman-All rights reserved

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wfN_DtNtyo?rel=0]

Do minority groups fare better when they have significant political representation? Between 1970 and 2012, the number of black elected officials rose from fewer than 1,500 to more than 10,000. Conventional wisdom would suggest that all these political gains would lead to economic gains. But that has not proven to be the case. In this week’s video, Jason Riley of The Manhattan Institute explains why blacks in power don’t empower blacks.

Copyright © 2018 Prager University-All rights reserved

Passover was the first of the three feast seasons in Jewish culture.The Passover was to be a memorial to the Hebrews’ deliverance from Egypt. This deliverance happened during the month of Nisan and represented God’s first encounter with His covenant people. (Exod. 12:1-14; 43-48.)

You recall that God chose Moses as His instrument to lead the Hebrews out of bondage. Working through Moses, God sent ten terrible plagues against Egypt. This was God’s way of convincing Pharaoh to let the Hebrews go. But each time God sent a new plague, Pharaoh’s heart hardened (Exod. 3-10).

God gave Pharaoh every chance to let the Hebrews go, but Pharaoh would not yield. God then declared a tenth and final plague, which was the death of the firstborn of every family (Exod. 11). But along with this decree of death, God gave specific instructions on how to be saved from this death.

Every Hebrew man was to select for his household a lamb without spot or blemish. On the fifth day, he was to bring the lamb to his doorstep and kill him. As he killed the lamb, he would catch the blood in the basin at the foot of the doorstep. Then he would sprinkle the blood on both sides of the doorpost and above the doorpost. Thus, the entire entrance into the house was covered by the blood of the lamb.

That night, God allowed the angel of death to pass through the land. As he passed from door to door, he sought to enter every household. If the entrance was covered by blood, the angel of death could not enter but had to pass over that house. If the entrance was not covered by blood, judgment would come upon that household as the firstborn would die.

This was the Lord’s Passover. We see that He used the blood of the lamb to save His people from death. The blood of the lamb was their covering and protection.

The Hebrew word for Passover is Pesach. This word means to come under the protection of a deity by crossing over, jumping over, stepping over, or leaping over something, in this case, the threshold. Humankind’s earliest primitive altar to the one true God, as well as false gods, was the threshold or entrance into the home. The threshold altar was the place where people made their sacrifice to their gods. The purpose was to request protection from the family deity as well as inviting the deity into their house.

When people dedicated their house to their god, they did so by making a sacrifice at the threshold. So it was the common practice to kill an animal at the threshold of the house as the way of welcoming the family deity. They would then cross over the threshold and enter the house.

Since the people were making a sacred blood covenant with their god, they were careful to cross over, step over, leap over, or jump over the blood. To trample under foot the blood was to show contempt and rejection of the covenant. They would then invite the deity into their house to be their protector and provider. In their way of thinking, because they dedicated the house to their god at the blood- stained threshold, their god stood in the doorway protecting them from harm.

The common understanding of Passover that has come down to us over the centuries is that God somehow passed by the dwellings where the blood was applied. But the biblical understanding is much more powerful. When the people applied the blood to the threshold and doorway, they were inviting God to pass over or cross over the threshold into their house as their protector from the angel of death.

God, in a sense, stood in the doorway protecting the people from death. He entered into a threshold-blood covenant with the people as He crossed over the blood-stained threshold while His executioner entered the houses of those who did not have the blood. This Pass-over was actually a Crossing Over or threshold Covenant.

Fast-forward 1,500 years later to Jesus’ day: for centuries, the Jewish people had been celebrating the Feast of Passover by killing a lamb and offering it as a sacrifice to God. They knew about lambs. But the blood of an animal could only cover their sins; it could not take them away. In view of this, God sent prophets to explain to the people that, one day in the future, a human lamb would come who would deal with the problem of sin and death once and for all.

As the time came for this human lamb to be sacrificed, God sent one last prophet to help the people recognize Him. This prophet was John the Baptist, the forerunner of Jesus. John introduced Jesus with these words: “Behold the Lamb of God!” (John 1:36).

John identified Jesus as the human lamb Isaiah spoke of who would give His life for the sins of the world. Jesus was God Himself, born as a human, specifically for this purpose (Acts 2:22-23). Because of their religious sacrifices, the Jewish people immediately understood the significance of John’s statements concerning Jesus.

As the time approached for Jesus to die, Jesus deliberately arranged His itinerary and personal activities around the events associated with the selection, testing, and death of the Passover Lamb. In this way, the Jewish people would be able to understand who He was and what He was doing. They had acted out the drama of redemption through the Passover picture.

The blood of the Passover lamb was a visual aid and dress rehearsal directing the Jews into the future when Jesus would come and establish the spiritual reality that the lambs could only symbolize. The blood of Jesus saves us from death and gives us the promise of resurrection.

What personal application does the passover feast have for us today? The Bible says and the human condition proves that all of us have sinned and that the judgment for our sin is death (Rom. 3:23; 6:23). As with the Hebrews back in Egypt, the angel of death comes knocking at our door. Death is the one subject we don’t like to think of or talk about.

Not only are we afraid of death, but we are also afraid of God. We are afraid of God because deep down inside we know we are sinners and that our sins have separated us from God. We know that God would be perfectly just in punishing us. So we run from Him. We try to hide behind the walls of religion, business, power, money, fame, glamour, success, etc. We keep ourselves busy and numb our minds in order not to think about Him. The prophet Isaiah observed this and wrote, “‘there is no peace for the wicked,’ says the Lord” (Isa. 48:22).

Even though we deserve death, God has made a way for us to be saved. That way is through the blood of Jesus, which cleanses us from all sin (see 1 John 1:7). When we apply His blood to the doorpost of our heart, death cannot hold us. We no longer need to fear death because the resurrection of Jesus has taken away its sting (1 Cor. 15:51-57).

The same is true of our fear of God. We no longer have to run from God when we accept Jesus as the Lamb of God who died for our sins. God accepts Jesus’ death in our place. He is our innocent substitutionary sacrifice. We are reconciled to God when we acknowledge Jesus as the one who died on our behalf.

Paul wrote, “But now in Christ Jesus [Messiah Yeshua] you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ [Messiah]” (Eph. 2:13). This means there is no condemnation for those who come to Jesus and receive Him as Messiah, Lord, and Savior (see Romans 8:1). We shall not come into condemnation, for we have passed from death to life (John 5:24).

The result of our coming to Jesus as our Passover sacrifice is peace with God. We read these words in Romans, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ [Yeshua the Messiah]…But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ [Messiah] died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him” (Rom. 5:1,8-9).

Our Father in Heaven has offered the blood of His own Son as the Passover-threshold covenant sacrifice. By embracing Jesus as our Passover Lamb, God has entered our house—that is, our life. He has become our protector and provider. We have crossed over from being natural people to covenant people, from darkness to light, from sin to righteousness, from bondage to liberty, from defeat to victory, from fear to faith, from sickness to health, from poverty to plenty, and from death to life. Therefore, let us not trample under our feet the sacred threshold-blood covenant God has made for us through Jesus and treat it as a common thing. But let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for our God is a faithful, covenant-keeping God. (Heb. 10.)

Accepting Jesus as our Messiah, Lord, and Savior is the first major encounter we have with God. This is how we find peace with God. This is what the Feast of Passover symbolizes. It is the picture of the Prince of Peace, the Lord Jesus.

Copyright © 2018-Destiny Image Richard Booker, author of Celebrating Jesus in the Biblical Feasts

Children Need a Crisis of Faith: Seven Lessons from Parenting Through Doubt

My wife and I have five children. Our oldest two have exited childhood and are adventuring into the uncharted territory of their young adulthood. Our younger three are navigating the tricky waters of adolescence. As parents, we have the sacred, marvelous, daunting, and sometimes painful privilege of sharing in all these unique life-journeys.

As a rule, I am slow to offer parenting advice. We are still too much in the thick of it to be qualified experts. Most of the time we’re looking to receive, not dispense, counsel.

And one wonderful new source of counsel we’ve discovered is our (now) adult children. Their experiences of childhood and adolescence, and the good and not-so-good ways we parented them, are still fresh. But there’s sufficient distance for them to maturely reflect on their experiences and enough trust between us (thank you, God!) for them to share with us honestly. It’s precious and humbling when your child matures into your counselor.

Where It All Begins for Children

Recently, my wife was sharing with one of our adult children some of the spiritual wrestlings and questions of their younger siblings. Our adult child replied, “That’s where it all begins.”

This was the wise reply of one whose wisdom was hard won. They spoke from experience, having endured difficult and sometimes dark seasons of profound spiritual struggles during their own adolescence. And they discovered in these seasons what nearly all saints discover sooner or later: the Light of the world shines brightest in the darkness — in our own darkness (John 1:5). Coming to really see, savor, treasure, and trust Jesus Christ almost always begins in a crisis.

And this has unnerving implications for Christian parents: if our children are going to see the Light, they very likely must endure darkness. Which means we will endure it with them, and experience a powerlessness over the outcome we find hard to bear.

As parents, we spend a lot of time and energy trying to protect our children from the forces of evil and sin in the world, which we should. And we try hard to point them to the gospel so they escape the horrible slavery of their own sin, which we should. We comfort, reassure, and counsel; we admonish, reprove, and rebuke, which we should.

But all the efforts we pour into protecting and teaching our children can make us susceptible to the deception, even if we know better, that if we do our job right, our children will sail from young childhood into adulthood on untroubled seas, arriving with a robust faith in Christ. We forget that this wasn’t even Christ’s own experience in “parenting” his disciples. It was on the troubled sea, not on tranquil waters, where the disciples began to grasp what faith really means (Luke 8:22–25).

Our children may have to ride on a violent sea, one we fear will swallow them, before they really learn to fear and trust Christ. As parents, then, we must prayerfully prepare for when those sea billows roll, because it will be a scary ride for us too.

Faithfully Parenting

While I’m reluctant to give parenting advice, my wife and I have ridden enough waves with our children to share some lessons, not as an expert on parenting through a child’s faith crisis, but as a fellow sojourner sharing from my experience — my own faith crises, as well as my children’s.

1. Expect your child to experience a faith crisis.

Actually, do more than expect it; pray for it. By “faith crisis,” I don’t mean the loss of faith — a period of apostasy — though for some that may be what a crisis looks like. What I mean is whatever event(s) God knows is needed to call forth real faith in our child — a season or set of circumstances when they are faced with a crisis that forces them to exercise their own faith and experience for themselves that God exists and is the rewarder of those who seek him (Hebrews 11:6). Praying for our child’s faith crisis sounds strange, I know. But if we want our child’s deepest joy, we will pray for the testing of their faith (James 1:2–4).

2. Expect your child’s crisis will be different from yours.

God has taught you to walk by faith, and not by sight, in particular ways. But it’s likely that he will deal differently with your child. They may struggle in ways and over issues and questions you haven’t. The unfamiliar may seem frightening. But it’s not unfamiliar to God.

3. Expect to feel somewhat helpless.

There comes a point when God decides to use means quite apart from us to teach our children to trust him. He doesn’t typically inform us in advance when he begins. We just rather suddenly find ourselves on the periphery of our child’s struggles, not allowed the same access or influence we used to have (or thought we had). We’re unsure where this car is going, and it’s not in our power to steer it. We must resist panicking or the urge to try to seize the wheel, both of which only tend to make things worse. Such a moment often becomes a faith crisis for us too, where we must learn to trust God with our children in whole new ways.

4. Seek to be a safe place in a crisis.

During one point of crisis, one of my children confided that they didn’t feel safe discussing with me certain theological questions they were wrestling through. Their dad was a ministry co-founder and bi-vocational pastor at our church. It felt like there was only one acceptable place to land.

Since then, I have tried to share with all my children more of my own faith journey, crises and all, that brought me to where I now am. And I’m seeking to be more explicit with my children that, while I hold my theological convictions sincerely, I do not expect them to uncritically adopt them from me, or necessarily arrive quickly in adolescence where it’s taken me years, and plenty of testing, to reach.

We can’t always control whether we are perceived as a safe place to our children, but as much as possible, we must seek to be a safe place for them to discuss hard questions and to be in process without judgment. It’s not easy for an invested parent. But we must strive to be (especially) quick to hear and slow to speak.

5. Do not mistake a chapter for the story.

We must try to keep our child’s faith crisis in perspective — no matter how long. We are not God. We do not have foreknowledge. We must not assume we know how the story will end. Most biblical characters had life chapters that looked like their train was going off the rails at some point.

6. Aim for faithfulness.

We are not the authors of our children’s story. Neither are they. God is the Author. God does not call us to determine the outcome of our children’s faith. He calls us to “dwell in the land [of parenting] and befriend faithfulness” (Psalm 37:3). Our aim is to follow Jesus faithfully, speak what he gives us to say faithfully, and to love the children God gives us as well as we can, come what may.

7. Pray without ceasing.

Part of faithfulness is not to cease praying for our children to be “born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3) and filled with the knowledge of God’s will with all spiritual wisdom and insight (Colossians 1:9).

8. Trust God.

This is the beginning and the end of parenting our children, whether on stormy waves or still waters. We want our children to reach maturity in Christ. “For this [we] toil, struggling with all [God’s] energy that he powerfully works within [us]” (Colossians 1:29). But we do not trust ultimately in our toil; we trust ultimately in God’s power. And when our children endure various crises of faith, we “wait for the Lord” (Psalm 27:14).

Where It All Begins

So much more can and should be said. I’m very aware that our children’s faith crises, and what has precipitated them, and how long they last, are as varied as people and experiences vary. I know as parents these can be frightening moments because, for some, a crisis results in the rejection rather than the realization of faith. But even then, it’s not the end of the story.

Parenting is not for the faint of heart. It’s for the heart of faith, the one for whom God is the strength of their heart (Psalm 73:26). He is the author and perfecter of our faith — and our children’s faith (Hebrews 12:2). As the great cloud of biblical and historical witnesses remind us (Hebrews 12:1), often, when a crisis hits, that’s where it all begins.

Copyright © 2018 Originally published by Jon Bloom Desiring God.org where the featured image was sourced-All rights reserved

In response to Kathy Gyngell: Radicalisation and child rape – the no-go areas in liberal elite’s community agenda, Ken wrote:

Police get a tip about systematic rape of white girls; do nothing. Government gets a tip about how unrestricted immigration is allowing in unsavoury types who end up committing acts of violence and murder against the population; does nothing. The pattern is familiar to historians as late-stage decadence. Citizens soon ask, ‘Why do we need a government?’

Copyright © 2018 Reader’s Comment, The Conservative Woman-All rights reserved

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZRHSrc0dUU?rel=0]

Chuck Missler’s message from the Rocky Mountain International Prophecy Conference.

Copyright © Prophecy Watchers.com–All rights reserved

The East African Revival is over; however reading Bowe’s analysis in our previous post is very sobering. On almost every issue that Bowen raises, we have to ask ourselves if we are repeating the same mistakes.

The pattern of acquiescence with evil has continued as the clergy support many evil actions of the Kagame regime. Cantrell Phillip in his article, “We Were a Chosen People”: The East African Revival and Its Return to Post-Genocide Rwanda writes:

The leadership of the Anglican Church is largely comprised of Tutsi returnees. Its leaders accept and endorse a misleading portrayal of Rwanda’s history, a history endorsed by the ruling party which serves to mask ethnic divisions in the past and social tensions in the present. The church, at times, even builds upon some of the traditions of the Tutsi monarchy.

Rwandan Author and International Development Professor, David Himbara argued that the real reason why Kagame is closing 700 Rwandan Pentecostal churches is not hygiene but fear of words and thoughts:

Kagame tightly controls the media, political parties, and civil society at large. The churches constituted the last open space. Kagame knows this. The localized community of churches offered a slight space for daring to imagine and talk about change. What mattered most was that these churches were willing to open their doors to the hurting and to the broken within their communities. The churchgoers sang and praised God who they believe will set things rights.

In Uganda, the situation is similar to that in Rwanda, if not worse. Most of the Church has become an extension of the rich, and powerful. Certain Pentecostal churches whose pastors participate in Inter-religious forums are close to the President or are generally sympathetic to the NRM government have gained much in prestige and contributions by their parishioners, but the gospel being preached has been greatly watered down because of this hypocrisy. This creates divisions and hatred from the general public.

The British Curse?

When Uganda began independent self-rule, one author said that the British left behind a curse that Ugandans would never make it without them. If that is true, then it’s not a coincidence that traditional rituals in the church led to the appearance and power of communists, and the subsequent tragedies that have engulfed that beautiful nation. Today it’s among the most corrupt and poorest nations on earth.

The spiritual condition of the church determines the economic, political, and social condition in the nation in which that church exists. So why would it seem strange if a country has all these problems yet leaders many of whom call themselves Christians, also believe in African traditional witchcraft? Is this the reason why the Church doesn’t transform the nation?

For example, President Museveni’s wife and daughter are Born Again Christians.. Is the daughter who is a pastor condoning her father’s actions? Well, I don’t know; salvation is a personal experience. It is a matter of the heart, not of the head and it is a love relationship that spills over into everything you say and do. Jesus says, “You will fully know or recognize people them by their fruits” (see Matthew 7:16-20). He also says,

I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and how greatly and sorely I am urged on (impelled, constrained) until it is accomplished! Do you suppose that I have come to give peace upon earth? No, I say to you, but rather division; For from now on in one house there will be five divided [among themselves], three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law (Luke 12:50-53 AMP).

The Consequences of Idolatry

In churches everywhere, there are large numbers of people in pain. Several of us have suffered unspeakable abuse in childhood, others were betrayed and rejected and others rendered powerless and unable to establish themselves in their world.  It is inevitable that the gospel will be modified. The people will then be affirmed in their assumptions and left unchallenged. The structures which they have set up to protect themselves from inner conflict and pain will remain, and so the option for healing will be consciously or unconsciously rejected. The consequences of this idolatry are to be seen all around, particularly in the lack of impact that the church has on society.

If this idolatry is going to be removed from the church this will have to be addressed. There is, of course, a fear of rocking the boat, a fear of persecution. How can one move out when one is desperately trying to ease the pain inside? How can one take risks of upsetting people when so many of us are already hurting and when we are also so insecure in ourselves? For the traditionalists like it was in Uganda and Rwanda, the fight was to retain what is familiar, to feel comfortable in the surroundings, and in the form of worship that never changes.

When we turn to the national scene, we see that the idolatry of the church has had devastating consequences throughout the centuries and allowed the spread of evil held in check to erupt when the conditions are right. John Dawson in his book Taking Our Cities for God has this to say:

In human history, it is easy to see the enemy coming in like flood and the Lord raising up a standard against him. In a global sense, each generation faces Satan in the form of the spirit of antichrist or communism. This is the spirit of those puppets who have the ambition to rule the world. A praying church should face this spirit and drive it off long before we find ourselves in a world at war. Physical violence, whether in families or nations represents an encroachment of spiritual violence into the material realm. The spirit of world domination can emerge only when the saints have lost their vigilance or when the international church has become severely divided over some issue.

If one looks at the history of the East African Revival Fellowship in Uganda or Rwanda prior to 1970 and 1990 respectively, one can see how it had fallen into idolatry and “lost its vigilance” as Dawson eloquently put it.

Uganda and Rwanda’s clergymen are treading a very dangerous political path by closing their eyes to the injustice in exchange for the right to live. When the German professor William Hermanns asked Albert Einstein whether “it isn’t only human to move along the line of least resistance” during the dark period of the Holocaust, Einstein responded:

Yes….It is indeed human….Since when can one make a pact with Christ and the devil at the same time? The moment I hear the word “religion”, my hair stands on end. The Church has always sold itself to those in power, and agreed to any bargain in return for immunity. It would have been fine if the spirit of religion had guided the Church; instead, the Church determined the spirit of religion. Churchmen throughout the ages have fought political and institutional corruption very little, so long as their own sanctity and church property were preserved.

Final Thoughts

The aim of every Communist state is to replace God and to conquer the whole world. For this, no one and nothing will be spared. In each country they will try to get a selected part of the population on their side, making all kinds of promises. It is a tactic that was propagated by the then Chinese premier, Chou En-lai, many years ago. He said,

If you want to destroy someone but you are unable to get near him, then you must befriend him. Once you are his friend, you can embrace him and stick a knife in his back.

That method is still being practiced today. A friendship is formed with a certain number of people, not because they particularly love them or want to help them but to use them for their own purposes. As soon as the Communists have the power in hand, they turn against their former allies. Overnight their friends become enemies. There is only one way of breaking the Communist power: “And this is the victory that overcomes the world, our faith” (1 John 5:4).

Our faith in Jesus Christ, as the Redeemer of the world, and our dedication to Him must be greater than the dedication of the Communists to their ideology. We must regain that living, vibrant faith if we are to endure the battle against an enemy that seeks to destroy us.

Before we rush to embrace the East African Revival, it is wise to ask what its legacy is in the world outside of church meetings, in the practical day-to-day of political life and society.

The human race is both selfish and stupid, and every time a clock ticks somebody dies to prove it! If that makes us angry, so it should. God is angry too. The proper prayer response is to be penitent for our own part in the world’s injustice and to ask God to help us discover what we can do to help those who suffer.

The voice of God to nations today comes through the whole body of the church. The church’s existence, way of life, and principles of service should be a constant challenge to the ways of the nations. When a church ceases to bring God’s redemptive vision to a nation, calamity is near, which is why the church must be prophetic.

In Africa, this has been a period of enthusiastic church building-a response to local needs and concerns. As we’ve examined, neither has the Church been immune from the general social disintegration. Corruption, idolatry, witchcraft, personal rivalries, ethnic conflicts have all been present in the Church as well.

Many of the weaknesses which the East African Revival Fellowship first encountered in the 1930s still persist within the Church. The Church has been susceptible to the erosion of moral standards and integrity as has the rest of society. In this situation, there is surely a need again for a revival of the Church and a great awakening in society.

The difference between revival and a great awakening is that the former affects only the Church, reviving and empowering it; a great awakening is more than revival-it impacts culture, politics, secular institutions, the world, government, and society outside the Church.

We must pray for revival, yes; but what is needed at the present time, is something that will affect the entire world, especially the African nations.  I am afraid that no movement of the Holy Spirit has done that for a long time.

We are told that the Lord is a jealous God. Just as it would be appropriate for a man to be jealous if another man took his wife, it is right that God should be jealous for his people when they follow other gods. Once a person has entered the kingdom of God and has wholeheartedly accepted the lordship of Christ, no other culture or tradition may legitimately lay claim to our lives, but most believers during the East African Revival combined their traditions with the Word of God.

When we become Born Again, it causes great conflict to combine our traditions and culture with the Kingdom of God. They will always be in conflict with one another. As Brian Stanley’s book on Christian Missions and Enlightenment says:

A theological tradition whose constant goal was holiness and victorious Christian living proved enormously attractive to African Christians who knew that beneath much of the appearance of so called conversion lay an undiminished commitment to traditional beliefs and practices. Doctrinal teaching which came close to advocating the necessity of a ‘second blessing’ seemed to offer the answer to those dissatisfied with the results of conversion. But once they had been revived, the emphasis on a second blessing was in practice obliterated by the new distinction between those in the revival fellowship-the ‘balokole’ or ‘saved ones’-and those outside. To be revived and to be saved became virtually synonymous.

Writing in 1937, Joe Church posed the question:

As one looks at these two or three hundred changed lives in Rwanda and Uganda what is one to say? Were they saved before, and were now just revived; or were they never really born again? Almost every one of them would answer you himself that the latter was his experience. All seem to state unmistakably that they only had a nominal Christianity before.

Then why couldn’t they change? They had been exposed to the gospel but still turned to their pagan practices instead of continuing their relationship with God through the Holy Spirit. And they were humiliated. No greater humiliation can come upon a people than to have their power, prestige, possessions, privileges, and beauty taken from them.

Instead of repenting of the idolatry and witchcraft practices connected to their traditional practices, they desperately wanted to restore their kingdom to its original prominence. From that time the Baganda have paid a heavy price for their pride. The refusal to repent from idolatry and witchcraft, which is the core challenge of the man of colour, underpins the reason why God allowed the Baganda to be a prey for the Western Uganda ruling class to dominate them to this very day.

Their great pride in one of the richest areas in the country with great quality of land for agriculture and other resources have been used to consolidate the regime’s power. The remaining resources in the form of land, has been sold and sacrificed to the god of instant gratification and self-indulgences. It is a clear principle of Scripture that idolatry leads to immorality and loss of respect for God, which in turn leads to loss of respect for people.

The people whom the Lord had first entrusted with the Revival and those who had great potential with skill and ability are now mainly consumers rather than producers. Worse still, the immigration to Western nations has fractured the Baganda family image. Those in Diaspora still want to maintain their pride by organising communities, but instead they are caught between their previous culture and that of the West.  The Baganda were truly confounded, and since the restoration of the kingdom in 1993, there have been relational, social, ethical and economic problems, particularly in Buganda.

Anglican Church in Rwanda

Regrettably, just like in Uganda, through division and dissipation, the Anglican Church in Rwanda contributed to ethnic divisions in the past. And, it is doing so again in the post-genocide state. In Rwanda, the people shared a common language and citizenship but it wasn’t enough for the warring tribes—the Tutsi and Hutu—to live peacefully together.

In the course of responding to questions of what happened during the East African Revival, Kevin Ward takes a historical look at the Revival and the role of the Anglican Church of Rwanda in the genocide of 1994. Ward writes:

By 1990, the Anglican church was deeply involved in internal wrangling and divisions. They were focused on jealousies and bitterness between Adoniya Sebununguri, bishop of Kigali, and John Ndandali, bishop of the second diocese of Butare, created in 1978. The conflict was focused on who would become the first Archbishop of the new Anglican province of Rwanda created in 1992. Although personal factors were paramount in this conflict, it did strangely parallel political divisions between the ‘north,’ where the deeply unpopular president came from, and a ‘south,’ which felt excluded.

A series of other conflicts among the leadership of the churches began to disfigure the Anglican Church: based on personal and family rivalries, regional differences, political disputes (as a multi-party system was introduced). Hutu-Tutsi divisions were only one of many factors fueling and sustaining these disputes. Often the rhetoric of the Revival was introduced into the disputes. At high-profile meetings of reconciliation, church leaders confessed and sang Tukutendereza in the old spirit of the Revival fellowship, but these occasions did not seem to have the power to transform the faction-riven nature of the church. The form of Revival had replaced its genuine spirit.

Division From Colonialists

The Hutu were mainly agricultural people while the Tutsi were predominantly cattle herders. In fact, by 1900 much ethnic blending occurred and the two tribes became quite similar—speaking the same language, living in the same areas, and following the same traditions.

However, when the Belgian colonists arrived in 1916 they immediately showed favor to the Tutsi, who were taller and thinner than the Hutu and thus looked more “European.” The ruling colonists made a formal division between the two tribes and began classifying them according to their ethnicity. As a result, the Tutsi enjoyed better jobs and educational opportunities, and they also held the most powerful government positions, creating a tremendous amount of animosity between the two tribes. In 1969 Rwanda gained independence from European rule, but the damage had already been done.

The rift created between the two tribes was irreversible. The growing resentment and hostility turned to violence several times in the 1960s and the 1970s leading up to the tragedy just 25 years ago. From April 7 to July 15 1994, Hutu extremists systematically killed nearly 85 percent of the Tutsi population. In total, the genocide claimed the lives of more than one million people.

Complicity of The Churches

Roger W. Bowen in his book, Genocide in Rwanda: Complicity of the Churches points out that the pre-genocide Anglican Church did not speak up for the Tutsi exile from the early 60’s who were never allowed to return to Rwanda. He says,

The Church in Rwanda failed to plead their cause, perhaps because, in the Anglican Church at least, the leadership was exclusively Hutu….Within the Anglican Church it was hard for Tutsis to advance in leadership while the hierarchy remained solidly Hutu.  The issue, which in the past in times of revival had been addressed so powerfully, was allowed to remain unresolved. The challenge to find a deeper, more fundamental identity “in Christ” where there is no Jew nor Greek, Hutu nor Tutsi, seems to have been forgotten by many.  

There were glorious exceptions to this where Christians who were also Hutu helped to protect their Tutsi neighbours from the interahamwe militias. By and large, however, the Church had allowed these ethnic tensions to continue unresolved, often below the surface, until conditions occurred where the issue exploded beyond their control in horrific violence. 

What happened in Rwanda is a salutary reminder that the fear and pain of preventing the Church from addressing a painful tension within itself needs to be overcome if one is to avoid the far more horrific consequences of not facing it. 

Bowen says that the Rwandan Anglicans used a canon within a canon based on the revival template:

In some cases, all Scripture in interpreted to give the same message, often interpreted through the lens of the revival experience, rather than letting the diversity within the Bible be heard. Inadequate exposure to the whole counsel of God has meant that Church leaders were often left without the theological tools to engage with the complexities of relating to newly independent African states, to issues of economics, development, justice, human rights, and ethnicity.

Acccording to Bowen, “the practice of sharing testimonies from the East African Revival led to a lack of Biblical input and instruction, with the danger that personal experience became more important than the Word of God.”

He also points to a culture of obedience that went too far, violating the Apostles’ injunction in Acts 5.29 to obey God rather than man. He says:

In Rwanda, people killed because they were told to do so by the government, local burgomasters and the radio. Obedience to authority is inculcated within African culture and we need to ask whether the Churches have adopted the same approach. Within the Catholic tradition, there has been an unquestioning submission to Papal authority. Within the Protestant tradition in Rwanda, you are wise to obey your Bishop because your livelihood depends on his goodwill.

One of many interesting takeaways from Bowe’s analysis is that reconciliation narrative was actually in place prior to the genocide of 94, and was in fact an artifact of the East African Revival Fellowship. The revival before the genocide did nothing to stop a nation of 85% Christians to slaughter one another. The church did nothing to avert the genocide or change the behaviour of those who wielded the machetes in this highly Christianized nation that had experienced a Revival prior to the Genocide.

Christian survivors of the genocide who participated in these evangelical meetings tell stories of church members and testifying Christians who, having attended the same meetings, were later seen in the uniforms and activities of Interahamwe (militia). During the killings, many were also seen at roadblocks with machetes. It is hard to believe, but it was reported by trustworthy individuals.

The killers were not faceless or nameless. They were the Tutsi’s very own neighbours. They had worked side by side with them, attended the same schools and churches, and lived right next door. There were a few remnants among the revivalists in fact who stood against the genocide and some of them were killed and others testified. So that’s a contradiction and a challenge we have to bear for not only revival but even for the church itself.

As Bowen noted, in the Rwandan context, the East African Revival produced an apolitical Church that did not confront the evils being committed by the State, with the result being that they were silent prior to the genocide. Roger Bowen wrote:

The more conservative attitude to Scripture, and the associated controversy, led to an emphasis on evangelism rather than any engagement with the public life of the nation or critique of the socio-political context. Indeed, the missionaries were dependent on the goodwill of the colonial administration and sought to be apolitical.

Bowen also turns the blame on himself and on the Churches of the West who wanted to avoid offending their African partners:

Partnership in mission is the dominant theme in Anglican relationships. But one may ask in the context of Rwanda, as perhaps elsewhere in Africa, whether the mission agencies at least have so leaned over backwards to avoid the charge of colonialism that they have failed to challenge their partner Churches? Within both Uganda and the Rwandan Church, we were aware of many of these issues and yet, as their partners, we largely failed to challenge them as equal partners and to “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15). In Ezekiel 33 the prophet is challenged to be a watchman for the House of Israel to warn the people of God of impending danger. Both the national Church of Rwanda and its partners overseas had largely failed in this role of watchmen.

The Danger of Idolatry

Wherever we set up false beliefs and traditions for our own convenience and credit them with God’s authority, we move towards idolatry. The security is then seen in a belief structure, not in the risen Lord. The results of this process have brought untold suffering for millions in our generation.

The failure of both churches in Uganda and Rwanda up to 1970 and 1990, to be Christ-centred, resulted in both nations falling into idolatry, with deadly consequences. This in turn allowed full play to the demonic powers, with suffering, chaos and death of which we are only too aware. This is of course, the basic pattern in the Old Testament. God is adapted to meet the needs of His people but we have to guard ourselves from anything and everything that would occupy the place in our hearts due to God.

We are all on a journey that forces us to re-examine our hearts in our daily walk with the Lord. However, that should not stop us from learning some hard lessons from the past and repenting of what led to these great tragedies of history. Unfortunately, we might be repeating the same mistakes as we shall finally examine in Part 7.

Africa is a place where Christian missionaries invested more than a century of effort, labouring in obscurity and laying the foundations of faith among many Africans. They sacrificed their lives to scatter the gospel seed to many regions of Africa long before the invention of tools modern evangelists use to harvest massive crowds today.

However, the mystery to me is how the life-giving message of Jesus can become dead and a fresh move of God can grow stale. How does it happen? Evangelist Reinhard Bonnke who began his missionary work in Africa has this to say:

The first step, I think, is when methods that worked in the past are enshrined, and new wind of the Spirit is resisted. Old ways are repeated without inspiration by many who labour as professionals. Perhaps they do it for money. They become what Jesus called a hireling for the Lord. If one comes who dares to break the accepted patterns, he is persecuted. They have forgotten that the Lord seeks a living and growing relationship. He resists being entombed in a method, or a building, or an organization-no matter how successful it might once have been.

During the East African Revival Fellowship, the Ugandan clergy were a formidable group opposed to the young enthusiasts for revival. One of the consistent themes of these early revivalists was their opposition to what they called “obukulu” in the Church. Bakulu is Luganda for elders, those in authority. As indicated in the previous post, this hierarchical system of authority had come to represent authoritarianism in Church life, a wholly negative critique of the clergy, who clung to the trappings of prestige, respect and power which their status gave them. These elders resented the attacks from revivalists on many aspects of traditional Kiganda culture.

Incidentally, this issue of the relationship between Christianity and traditional culture was receiving particular prominence in 1941 due to the re-marriage, against all precedent, of the Namasole (the Queen Mother) to a young school master who had been training at Mukono, and who was subsequently to become a strong believer of Jesus Christ. The Bishop and the leaders of the Church of Uganda were unpopular for sanctioning the marriage, and this only served to increase the hostility against the East African Revival Fellowship on the part of many Baganda.

The Traditional Anglican Church

The Anglican Church in Buganda was already established with its own traditions, with a vigorous indigenous clergy jealous of its status and rights, and an articulate laity. Many Baganda resented the revivalists because they challenged their icons, images and other monuments, and attacked their deeply held Kiganda traditions and practices.

The revivalists upset the informal accommodation between Kiganda culture and Christianity which had gradually grown up.  They denounced the continuance of traditional religious practices by Christians and they accused the Church of turning a blind eye to this.

They refused to have anything to do with such rituals as those connected with the birth of twins, or with the last funeral rites (Okwabya Olumbe), both of which the revivalists felt involved immoral practices. As a result there has a tended to be a suspicion of Born Again Christians on the part of ordinary Baganda Christians, and a resistance to their ideals becoming normative in the Church.

Although the revivalists had always resisted taking on a bureaucratic organizational structure, priding themselves on their openness to the Spirit, nevertheless, they had developed a quite tightly-knit informal structure of authority based on senior brethren (ab’oluganda), who often received the honorary title of Taata (Father).

Each district had a number of such senior brethren, and the mobility of brethren in travelling around to attend weekly or monthly fellowship meetings or larger scale conventions meant that the senior brethren had many opportunities for meeting each other and discussing the development of the movement. Thus an informal network of authority established itself, and this enabled the leadership to exert a fairly tight control-sometimes even to the extent of causing feelings of excessive authoritarianism, friction and schism within the Revival.

The Revival existed with a certain amount of tension between the desire for cohesion, solidarity and resentment, especially from strong personalities of an undue exercise of authority by even more dominant senior brethren.

Educational Differences

To make matters worse, if the elders of the church, the clergy, were deeply suspicious of the revivalists, the elders in society at large, the chiefs were equally hostile. Here again generational and educational differences between the old elite and the rising generation of well-educated revival leaders may have exacerbated tensions between the two groups.

The creation of an elite class made Western education became the heart of an internal challenge in Uganda resulting in the divide between those who have and those who don’t. Schools were not evenly spread throughout, so the tribes who received education first had an advantage.

As David Abernethy observed, “the uneven spread of mission schools by creating objective differences between various ethnic groups stimulated rivalry between them.” That imbalance was not corrected and therefore made Western education to be one of the reasons for conflicts in the revival.

The fear that these educated revivalists were a potentially subversive force was shared by the colonial government. In this case they were worried by the threat to social order which an incipient mass-movement like the Revival posed.

Quarrels, Divisions and Opposition From CMS

The Revival also divided the missionary community. Most of the CMS missionaries in Uganda, while longing for some kind of revival in the church of Uganda were opposed to the particular manifestation of revival among the believers.

They resented the anti-clericalism of Dr. Church and the Ruanda Mission, regarding their criticisms of CMS and the Ugandan Church as arrogant and insensitive. The actual experience of revival was proving controversial. The radical egalitarianism and unconfined freedom of the revivalists were difficult for many to accept.

Salvation comes only through being washed in the blood of Christ shed on Calvary. Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin (Hebrews 9:22). You were not redeemed with corruptible things…but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot (1 Peter 1:18-19).

The centrality of the atonement was a classical feature of revival; but the European Evangelicals thought the revivalists gave it an “objective reality or conception” almost distinct from the Lord Himself, which they found disturbing. They even asked Joe Church to refrain from using the chorus “What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.”

The Rise of The Reawakened

In the 1940s and 50s, the Born Again believers gradually became a more respectable group and a more integrated into the life of the church. But this brought a feeling among some of the brethren that worldliness was creeping in, a falling away from the fire and enthusiasm and commitment of the earlier period.

It has been pointed out that the revival did have some weaknesses.  Offensive confessions of adultery, where people’s names were mentioned in the audience of children caused many problems. These secret sins should have been kept under the blood.

In the 1960’s a new search for a reawakening and holiness came to be expressed in conflicts over dress and fashion, about whether brethren should take out loans and become burdened with debt in order to improve their material standard of living.

There was also a growing up a generation of educated believers who wanted to integrate the Revival more into modern life. Many were from Western Uganda. Festo Kivengere from Kigezi had emerged as a prominent leader. He and Janani Luwum were perhaps the two most outstanding Born Again churchmen. Luwum became Archibishop in 1974 and was murdered in 1977 as a Christian martyr and champion of human rights during Amin’s tyranny.

Festo had spent many years as a teacher and evangelist in Dodoma (Tanganyika) but had returned in 1959.  Kivengere had a remarkable career as international evangelist, founder of Africa Evangelistic Enterprise, Bishop of Kigezi and a man at the centre of Ugandan national life, working for lasting solutions to the intractable problems which Uganda has faced.

He above all transcended the limitations of Balokole piety and practice, and encouraged the Balokole tradition as a whole to be dynamic, creative and responsive to the profound changes in culture and society.

With one Archbishop’s approval Festo decided to seek ordination and to attend a theological college in the United States. As this was decided without the approval of the brethren in Kampala, it was considered a betrayal of group solidarity.

Festo was becoming increasingly critical of the narrowness of many of the Baganda brethren, and from America wrote to Joe Church, by then living in retirement in Kampala: “When the spirit of freedom gives place to the spirit of fear among the brethren, that to me is the saddest day for Revival … Revival is bound to die when Christ is replaced by any of these treasured traditions-of plainness of dress, hair fashions–plus-plus!”

Joe Church was equally saddened by the disputes within the Revival, but wrote back to Kivengere: “Buganda has changed since the burning of the Lubiri. They are sad still and very sensitive, we have to come and sit with them, where they are, like Ezekiel did.

The prophet Ezekiel showed the heart of a pastor when he visited the exiles at Te-abib. Overcome by what he saw, he said very little; in his own words, he just ‘sat and remained there among them for seven days, overwhelmed with astonishment and silent (Ezekiel 3:15). It is a basic principle of pastoral care that to help people in trouble, you have to put yourself in the place where they are and allow them to be themselves and to express what is in them.

This reference to the flight of the Kabaka in 1966 and the subsequent abolition of the kingdom of Buganda put the increasing isolationism of many of the brethren in the context of the tragic history of Buganda in the 1960s, a tragedy which was to engulf the whole nation with the coming to power of Amin in 1971. That year was when the disputes among revivalists came to a decisive break.

The believers became divided and no longer shared fellowship with the brethren at the Namirembe weekly meetings but began to meet separately. Nsibambi, who had in many ways sympathized with Mondo’s stand, now came off the fence and denounced the awakened as extremists. They responded by denouncing the moderate believers as those who were asleep. “Where has a revival like this one been seen, full of cows and money?”

It Was a Mystery

In spite of all these weaknesses that surfaced during the revival, the East African Revival conformed in all essential respects to an European religious model. It was the means of Africans expressing their dissatisfaction with a missionary religion which left them stranded half-way between the pagan and Christian society.

They expressed their dissatisfaction by seizing the initiative in a movement which fundamentally challenged missionary superiority. Both sides of the paradox could be true at once only because of the remarkable agreement between the characteristic features of the European model and the spiritual needs of the East African Church at that point in its history.

Yet as Gordon Hewitt rightly comments, “The immensely rapid response of Uganda to the proclamation of the Christian gospel remains a mystery.” God is in His providence and immense love found the souls of those poor Africans worth dying for!

To the Christian mind the congruency is providential rather than accidental. Without the Revival, the Church in East Africa could scarcely have had the strength to survive internal conflicts like the Mau-Mau in Kenya, standing up to President Idi Amin in Uganda, and subsequently the Rwandan Genocide 50 years later.

The church in Rwanda experienced some of the same problems as the church of Uganda during the East African Revival Fellowship. In Part 6 we shall examine the Revival and its impact and relationship to the 1994 Rwandan Genocide.