"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
