Stolen

Charlie Rodriguez

In 1941, a portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer was stolen by the Nazis from Austrian banker Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer and displayed at the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere in Vienna. After a long international court battle, the painting was finally returned to Maria Altmann, Bloch-Bauer’s niece, in 2006.

In 2016, Smithsonian Magazine featured an article about the oldest-known carving of the moral code, or Ten Commandments, shared by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam alike. Although this archaeological treasure has not yet been stolen, its contents, God’s Moral Law, has been.

Government, academia, business and even the Church regularly steal concepts (doctrine) from God in order to redefine them for their own selfish purposes. This is called Intellectual Property (IP) Theft because the Bible is God's intellectual property. He breathed it out (2 Timothy 3:16-17), therefore it belongs to Him.

Could  this form of IP Theft of God's property happen in the Presbyterian Church in America? Yes. "Side B Christianity"--which is now being debated in the PCA--is a secular, made-up term attempting to make biblical that which is not biblical. Even the debating of Side B Christianity is a form of IP Theft because it gives life to something unbiblical. It is another Gospel.

Last summer I invited Dr. Rosaria Butterfield to be part of a panel discussion during our Biblical Way Forward seminar in Birmingham. What I found interesting, and a blessing, is how warmly and enthusiastically Rosaria was received because of her clearly biblical understanding of Side B Christianity given below:

Side B Christianity—Revoice—is tribal, not truthful. Instead of offering fundamental liberty in Christ, including redemption and change, Revoice theology denies the power of Christ’s blood to sanctify His people such that they no longer are homosexual. Revoice theology is tribal in its use of Freudian anthropology over biblical personhood, recording homosexuality as a morally neutral sexual orientation. But the Bible records both feelings and practices as sinful acts if directed against God’s commands (Matthew 5:27-28). Revoice theology is political in its embrace of LGBTQ+ language and ideology.[9] Revoice theology believes that homosexual orientation cannot be repented of, thereby withholding the power of repentance and sanctification to transform lives. In contrast, Scripture teaches us to “repent…and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out” (Acts 3:19).

Because I choose Truth over tribe, I reject the false teaching of Revoice/Side B Theology. Read full articlehere.

Rosaria's understanding of human sexuality and identity as a new Christian--though not fully developed then--were nevertheless obvious to her and according to nature. She also believed that she was "without excuse" for not believing them. What happened in the PCA that some could be so easily misled with Side B? 

Consider this: Also stolen is the conscience of man through subterfuge by elitists and progressives in government, media, tech industries, academia, and even Christian organizations. These entities have taken what is holy and made it profane. They have tricked men and women into believing lies, rather than the truth. They have done this even within the context of the church.

God’s Moral Law is best summarized in the Ten Commandments and fulfilled by loving your neighbor as yourself (Rom. 13:9), and governments can and should use these laws in governing, but their origin is with a Holy God who alone defines them. Redefining God’s Moral Law (e.g., when governments say abortion is not murder, that there are more than two genders, that you may change your gender, that marriage can be anything you want it to, and when the PCA continues to be de facto Side B Christianity is, in essence, stealing from God. In a court of law, it would be deemed plagiarism, and restitution would be in order.

Restitution is defined by American Jurisprudence as the “return or restoration of a specific thing or condition.” If the Church and Government began to think in legal terms-- such as restoring God’s Moral Law to its original meaning-- perhaps the conscience of both will be pricked. It is a method that Nathan used with David (“You are the man!”) and one approved by God.


Charlie Rodriguez, PCA TE, Author, Publisher