Ex-SBC Pastor Attacks Black Christians who say ‘I’m Christian Before I’m Black.’
Prominent woke Pastor Charlie Dates, who recently left the Southern Baptist Convention on account of their failure to embrace Critical Race Theory, recently preached a message at the EK Bailey preaching conference, where he, as Reformation Charlotte describes, attacked other Black Christians as sell-outs simply because they have not devoted their lives to fighting an artificial boogeyman, white supremacy” and well as “lambasted them for saying things like “I’m Christian before I’m Black.”
Charlie Dates is the pastor of Progressive Baptist Church, ERLC and The Gospel Coalition contributor, and was recently an SBC Executive Committee Panel Member. Our audience may know him from saying that the SBC “Don’t Need Black Faces with White Theology/Voices/Ideas Leading the Convention,” and calling Beth Moore “one of God’s leading women in the world.”
He exclaimed:
“Once and for all delivered, we see that neither justice nor righteousness are well and (gone?) And I got to ask ya’ll ‘where we get that from?’ That ain’t part of our heritage, When did the black preacher become so dichotomized? When did black preaching start to break up?
Well, I got one idea. It’s how and where we’ve been trained. The further in and deeper down black preachers go into white evangelicalism, the more anti-justice and anti-black they become. They start saying stuff like ‘I’m Christian before I’m black.’
What? You are a bearer of the Imago Dei. You are made in the image and likeness of God. Your blackness is designed by God. Chosen by God. Formed by God. Cherished by God. And it doens’t mean that your blackness is superior, but it does mean that the people who told you that lie (Ed.Nt. that you should consider your identity in Christ above your ethnicity) need you to believe that lie, so that they can remain superior through that lie.
h/t to Reformation Charlotte
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I just thought of something. I know they are pushing the marxist CRT, but this is sounding just like Louis Farrahkan and Jeremiah Wright. So sick of these racists.
Another incarnation of the “made that way” (presumably by God) argument that’s deceived so many in evangelicalism. One easy step from here to “you gotta be you, it’s God’s plan (from the foundation of the world!) for you to indulge in being you! That’s what God wants or he wouldn’t have made you that way to begin with. God won’t punish you for being you! He made you! Know that God loves you just the way you are because he himself made you that way?”
The next step-wait for it-is “God is not surprised by any of your sin, your life was all pre-ordained for your good. God wants you to explore and learn, he’s accompanying you on your journey. He loves and believes in you!”
Progressives have had overwhelming success with this. Virtually every American evangelical who dropped out of church after high school, and may occasionally occupy a seat at an average mega church, believes this. And they believe themselves supremely moral for believing this. They believe themselves to be more moral than people who actually have morals. People with actual morals are “Pharisees” and if there’s one thing no church wants, it’s Pharisees. Eeek! Run away from even the whisper of an accusation that you or ANYONE IN YOUR CHURCH could be called a Pharisee! No! That’s not us! No absolute morality will be tolerated In our church! Do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the law around here! We’re just here to accompany you.
Understanding that God made us, loves us, and is “on the journey with us” is the sum total of American evangelical dropout morality. It’s the morality of CCM music, “Christian” movies, social media, Bible studies, and mega churches. They didn’t make it up, they were taught it in church. Woe to the shepherds.