Sermon Review Time! Marks of a Shifting Culture from NAR Dominionist...

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So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven. - Matthew 10:32-33 (ESV)

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If you have never heard of the Church of the Highlands, you are not alone. In Alabama however they appear to be a very popular mega, multi-site church. They actually have 26 sites across Alabama. Their lead pastor is someone named Chris Hodges, who I do not believe I have covered before. In doing daily research I came across his name and the above link to a sermon he had done called the Marks of a Shifting Culture. Immediately the NAR dominionist radar warnings went off, so I decided to do a sermon review. Please realize this is what is being taught to people instead of the word of God. Instead of the uncompromised gospel. Now I will admit that Hodges appears saner than most NAR dominionist preachers, but the core concern remains a pitting of the church against the world. This is the enemy's scheme to get the people who claim the mantle of Christ to hate the very people who need the gospel the most.

The premise behind this sermon is that the culture in the world has shifted somehow, away from God. It is the fundamental false argument underpinning dominionism. The reality is at no time in history did this country follow God. It remains the best societal experiment in secular history but that does not make it ancient Israel. Replacement theology is a false theology. We are grafted in. We do not get to choose to enter covenant relationships with God - He chooses and He chose Israel, not America. America was founded on economic rebellion, in violation of scripture I might add and was built on the backs of slavery and child labor until the 1900s. Now, America has done plenty of "good" in the secular world but the dominionist argument that it somehow was cuddling with Jesus for hundreds of years and has been now led astray by the wicked Democrats is asinine and ignorant of both history and the bible. I used to teach both, so I know this very well. America is also responsible for the most heresy being exported to foreign countries. Five of the wealthiest pastors are now in Africa, which has been corrupted by American apostate teachings. That said, Hodges starts out by bragging that he has been just exegeting the Book of Daniel verse by verse. This is a plan that should be commended that most churches should follow - just not the way that Hodges does. You see, verse by verse exegesis does not matter if you are still looking to leverage the text for pre-biased matters. He admits the topic of cultural shifting was chosen because of the claim that his sheep asked for it, not because he happened upon Daniel Chapter One. While we are discussing it, if your sheep are asking about the world and not matters of God, perhaps that is an indication you should examine the subject matter you keep teaching them.

Now, some of his arguments early on are tortured attempts to drag the NAR cultural wedge issues into scripture but the efforts are clumsy at best. The fact that King Nebuchadnezzar wanted to teach the exiles Babylonian language and literature has nothing to do with "something happening in our schools today." The first complaint Hodges levies in his argument is that culture will always confuse our identity. For his proof he offers up Daniel and the three Hebrew boys as proof because their names were changed. Now, it is true that if we are taken into captivity by an ancient king, he may insist that we not called ourselves by the names that represent our God because he has a whole different set of false gods. I get that. To try and correlate this however to identity issues in the world today falls on its face. No one is demanding that Christians change their names. To further deepen his theological problem however, Hodges essentially lies about the name changes. His assertions are:

Daniel to Belteshazzar - Daniel meant "God is my judge," which is true. Hodges claims however that Belteshazzar was a name for a girl and meant, "Lady protect the king." I am unsure where Hodges got such a wildly inaccurate translation, but I am willing to guess it came from an NAR source. I did some research, and all reputable sources agree that Belteshazzar meant - "Bel protects his life." Who was Bel? Just the national God of Babylonia. So, it is true that they wanted to get rid of the name that referred to the Hebrew God in favor of the Babylonian god, but this nonsense about female names is simply wrong. he makes the point of course to further disparage the gender confusion issues in the world today but he has to lie to get there. He actually claimed that gender confusion was first seen in the Book of Daniel. Cringe. It did not stop there:

He claimed Hananiah, which meant Yahweh has been gracious was changed to Shadrach which meant I am fearful of God. The point he tried to make was that the world wants us fearful and depressed! He claimed this was a spiritual redefining and that it was happening today! Scary until you understand that the meaning of Shadrach simply meant "Illuminated by Rak," who was the Babylonian sun god. His next butchering was the change of Mishael, which meant "who is what God is" to Meshach which meant "I am depressed, contemptible and humiliated." The application point he tried to make here was the mean old world wants Christians sad and feeling like they are worthless. How horrible! Then you realize that Meshach simply meant "who is like Shak, the Babylonian god Venus. Are you sensing a theme here? Well, we have one more. Hodges claimed that Azariah, which meant Yahweh has helped was changed to Abednego, which meant "servant of Nebo." His claim here was that Nebo meant one who speaks or prophesies so that culture will want to change what we hear or something vague like that. I will not speak to that because Nego, not Nebo, was the Babylonian god of fire. The website "Got Questions summed it up this way - "The boys' names were changed as a way of encouraging them to forget the God and traditions of their homeland and become conformed to the ways and gods of Babylon." This is what happens when you proof text the bible. When you have decided that it speaks against the modern-day culture, which it does not, you seek confirmation. It is called confirmation bias. Then you seek out preachers who align with your thinking and get lazy. You do not bother to check if they are bat-poop crazy or what the truth is. Chris Hodges LIED about all four translated names just to try and force his narrative into the text. The truly sad thing is he probably didn't have to. He could have just made the point of false gods versus the one true God and that would have been powerful and biblically/historically accurate. Instead, he sacrifices all of his credibility on the altar of NAR dominionism and is exposed as such in the very first point of his sermon. He then makes four points about culture:

* When culture shifts you must know who you are

* Culture will always try and make you compromise your standards

* Culture will always test our faith

* When culture shifts, we have to learn how to stand

So, let's deal with these one at a time. The first argument seems very reminiscent of the Andy Stanley complaint that the kids he sent off to college from his church were coming back atheists. Stanley blamed the church's insistence that the bible was inerrant, which is stupid. The problem of course is that Stanley does not preach the actual gospel and thus no one was probably saved. They went into the world and without the indwelt Holy Spirit to lead them into all truth, they fell for convincing arguments. The point Hodges misses of course is that we always should "know who we are" and that is not a point of antagonizing the world. Even if you allow the point that the culture has shifted, that does not mean we need to shift. We need to be the shining city on a hill not the legislation pending before Congress. The NAR wants to change the behavior of the lost and even if they succeeded, they will still be the lost. The second point is phrased, as all of these, to continue to perpetuate the victim mentality in the church. The mean old world is trying to make me change my standards! Please. First of all, the world believes what they believe, and the bible says they think the things we believe are utter foolishness. So, stop acting hurt or surprised when they act accordingly. We see this mentality playing out in actual court cases all the time now that the NAR has infiltrated the majority of churches in this country. The church rose up and applauded a baker who refused to bake a cake for a gay wedding. As if Jesus is going to say "attaboy" over this garbage. You chose to be a baker, so bake. It is not courageous to stick your thumb in the eye of the lost and say its for Jesus because it isn't. It's for you. Even from a strictly secular angle, we fail to see the non-discrimination laws are for our protection as well. If a Muslim owned bakery decided to stop serving Christians, I am sure the culture warriors would scream persecution! Now, there is a real struggle between accepting the standards of the world and the standards of the bible but that aint what Hodges is selling. He is selling victimhood and portraying the lost as the enemy. Sure, our faith will be tested by a lost and dying world but that should only reinforce the need for the preached gospel, which is the only thing that has the power of God's salvation. That brings us to the final point listed, which is when culture shifts, we have to learn how to stand for God and herein lies the red meat of NAR dominionism. Hodges lists three subpoints:

* Stand in prayer

* Stand for the work of the Lord

* Stand for God

Now, no problem with the first. Pray before action? Absolutely. The second point is mostly presented from the angle of the Purpose Driven Church and Life, which is this notion that God has this wonderful plan for your life that apparently includes your purpose of serving in the Parking Lot Ministry at Church of the Highlands after five courses, a SHAPE profile and a cloud of dust. The far more disturbing point however was the final point, summarized by Hodges as such:

"We know that God is for us. But have you ever had the thought that we should be for Him too? Like have you ever thought he needs us to stand and defend His honor and His name? How much would he love it if He had some of His kids out there saying, "Don't talk about my daddy that way!" God says, I wish you would stand for me." - Chris Hodges

Wow. This is so breathtakingly bad. It is however, right out of the NAR dominionist playbook. Beloved, God does not NEED anything from us. The god that Hodges portrays here is a hurt wounded God up in heaven wondering why no one will defend Him. How insultingly absurd! How blasphemous! Yet that is how dominionism is pimped to the church. They portray God as a victim too! If only God would have some culture warriors out there to defend His armor and slap the world across the face with a white glove! And please stop with the humanizing the Creator of the entire universe. He is not "daddy." He is our Lord, or He is nothing! There are a whole bunch of churched folks who defend the alleged honor of God every single day and they will all stand before Christ on the last day muttering, "Lord Lord." How tiny and impotent is your God that He needs YOU to defend Him! Stop it please!

Not content with that heresy nugget, Hodges triple downs now by retelling a story of when he was golfing with someone who did not know he was a pastor. Every hole the guy was screaming "God da**" until Hodges says that "something rose up inside of me to defend the honor of god." Yeah, that something was called pride. It was called ego. It was called grievance. So, to this unsaved man, Hodges claims he said:

"If you're gonna keep saying that, at least get it right, because God doesn't damn. The devil does. So use his name, please. He doesn't damn anything. He's a blesser. Every good and perfect gift comes from God. You have"you are misrepresenting my heavenly Father, and I just don't think"if you're gonna say it, you use the right name." - Chris Hodges

What??? How does Hodges not realize the very story he preached from was set up by God condemning Israel! He promised them in Deuteronomy that the Babylonian exile would happen if they were not obedient, and they never were! They were constantly worshipping other gods so one day, Babylonia overran Jerusalem and carried off who they did not kill! That is how Daniel and the three Hebrew boys found themselves in this situation! If you want to go beyond that and pretend, he was only talking about eternal damnation is Chris Hodges really saying that the devil decides who is eternally damned? That God is not sovereign over those eternal decisions? God absolutely damns people, and the vast majority will end up that way according to scripture. The devil has no such power or control. If he did, we would all be damned! God is only a blesser? Tell that to Ananias and Sapphira. Tell that to Uzzah. Tell that to the entire generation killed off in the wilderness. This is not only horrible theology, but it is dangerous because these people will go through times when they do not feel blessed and now they might blame God because their pastor fed them this drivel. He then had the nerve to try and drive home the point by citing the key verses today, listed above, from Matthew, while saying:

"But if you disown me, don't let anyone know you are a Christian, afraid to pray in a restaurant - like I am not ashamed to be a Christian. I am not obnoxious about it but I am not ashamed." - Chris Hodges

This is so bad. He is literally preaching a works salvation here. The idea that God would disown us, meaning we would end up in hell, because we did not want to pray in our local Applebees is RIDICULOUS! The bible says to not pray to be seen by men! You should not have to let anyone know you are a Christian. Your life should show it! I find the majority of people who insist on letting everyone know are obnoxious about it and end up not representing Christ at all. I might add that not broadcasting your faith doesn't mean not acknowledging. To add what he thinks is proof, Hodges offers up the blasphemous Message paraphrase:

"Stand up for me against world opinion and I'll stand up for you before my Father in heaven. If you turn tail and run, do you think I'll cover for you? - The Message

Dear Lord - this is NOT what God was saying in this scripture. He is not saying stand up for me against the world, that is ludicrous. Refusing to hate the world is not akin tucking tail and running. They portray a vindictive petty god who will damn you for not defending him. Ironic, considering he just claimed god never damns, right? Beloved, there were 26 sites filled with people who listened to this garbage collectively and hooted and hollered amen because they are like sheep without a shepherd. Chris Hodges seems nice enough and very folksy. I am sure he was just taught poorly himself but that is no excuse. He worships an idol, a false Christ. One that is weak and feckless and needs us to stick up for him. He butchered scripture after scripture and flat out lied about every single name change example he started the sermon with. He presented his false god as never damning anyone yet damned you out of the corner of his mouth if you do not say a prayer at the Cheesecake Factory before eating your BLT. This NAR dominionism is corrupting so many and leading them so far astray of the real Christ. The One who doesn't need us to defend Him. The One who implores us to turn the other cheek, obey our earthly authorities and leave room for His judgment and wrath. The One who said His kingdom is not of this earth. The One who is not monitoring our voting records or whether we say grace out loud before eating. The One who died for the very people the apostate dominionist church wants us to hate. Resist beloved. Mark and avoid Chris Hodges and anyone who preaches so horrifically and wants you to worship their feeble idols constructed so that they can be the creator instead of the created.

Reverend Anthony Wade - August 4, 2023

Authors Bio:
Credentialed Minister of the Gospel for the Assemblies of God. Owner and founder of 828 ministries. Vice President for Goodwill Industries. Always remember that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.