For years, Eric Metaxas has been an ambassador for faith in public life. His 2009 best-selling memoir on German pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer has long been considered a call to arms for the Christian church to remain passionate about truth and committed to justice.
Now, the author is sounding the alarm once again with his latest book, “Religionless Christianity: God’s Answer to Evil,” which details why the future of freedom in America depends upon Christians who refuse to separate their faith from their politics.
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“The problem today is that most Christians aren’t political enough,” Mr. Metaxas recently told The Washington Times’ Higher Ground. “We’ve been given this gift, because of the blood of patriots, to govern ourselves, to elect people who advocate for God’s purposes. And we say, ‘Well, I’m not going to do that.’ I’m just going to do church. It is wicked. And it’s absolutely diabolical. And many, many Christians are falling for it.”
The author believes a large number of Christians are suffering from a severe case of apathy not unlike the German church of the 1930s, which infamously sat back during the Holocaust and allowed the evil of Nazism to take root and triumph. The problem, Mr. Metaxas says, is that if the church in America doesn’t “wake up” — and soon — our country and our liberties will suffer more than we could ever imagine.
“German Christians were mostly religious without living out their faith. And they basically said, you know, as the trains are going to Auschwitz, we just want to praise God. We just want to have church. Shame on them,” he said. “What you’re doing is serving the devil in a religious way… That’s where we are in America today. People need to wake up to that yesterday. If you’re going to a church that’s going along with this, I beg you by the grace of God, get out of that church because the hour is as late as can be. And I’m not exaggerating.”
And while it may seem easier said than done in a time of cancel culture and growing attacks on religious freedom, Mr. Metaxas says the real fear should be what will happen if the church doesn’t take a stand.
“If you live out your faith, those who don’t like it call you a Christian nationalist. That is just total garbage. Christian nationalism is the devil’s term for actual Christians who live out their faith in all spheres,” Mr. Metaxas explains. “The only one who doesn’t want you to do that is the devil.”
“These people, these Antifa protesters, BLM protesters, they’re Marxists, they don’t believe in God,” he added. “They don’t believe in God’s principles. They believe in power, and many Christians have been fooled by that. Many Christians have been fooled by that through the decades, but we’re seeing it now more clearly than ever.”
Regardless of the severity of the current cultural and political chaos, Mr. Metaxes does not believe it is too late to turn the tide. Indeed, if the church at large can muster the courage to stand up when it counts the most, there are simply no limits to what God can do.
“We serve a God who can do anything. Our job is to do our job. Our job is to fight evil. If we do that unto the Lord, we have no idea what he’s going to do,” he noted. “And the voices that say, ‘It’s over, you can’t win,’ that’s the voice of the devil. That’s the voice of the devil to get Christians to sit on the sidelines… We need to look to the Lord. We need to fight. We need to do the right thing and put the results in God’s hands. That’s why I’m hopeful.”
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Marissa Mayer is a writer and editor with more than 10 years of professional experience. Her work has been featured in Christian Post, The Daily Signal, and Intellectual Takeout. Mayer has a B.A. in English with an emphasis in Creative Writing from Arizona State University.
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