A Christian Resource

Canada isn’t just a post-Christian nation — it’s an anti-Christian nation. And it’s past time we Canadian Christians accepted that.

Earlier this year, Canada fined and imprisoned several Canadians for faithfully pastoring their churches throughout COVID lockdowns and restrictions.

Now, Canada is passing a bill that will fine and imprison Canadians for faithfully preaching what the Bible says about homosexuality and transgenderism.

On Wednesday, Canada’s House of Chambers unanimously passed Bill C-4, a bill that if — or when it passes in the Senate, will make conversion therapy an illegal offense punishable by up to five years in prison.

The bill says:

“Conversion therapy means a practice, treatment or service designed to:
a. change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual;
b.Change a person’s gender identity to cisgender;
c.Change a person’s gender expression so that it conforms to the sex assigned to the person at birth;
d.Repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual behaviour;
e.Repress a person’s non-cisgender gender identity; or
f.Repress or reduce a person’s gender expression that does not conform to the sex assigned to the person at birth.”

Therefore, anyone who influences a person to undergo conversion therapy or provides conversion therapy to that person could be fined or sentenced to up to five years in prison. And anyone who promotes conversion therapy could be fined or sentenced to up to two years in prison.

According to the bill: “conversion therapy causes harm to society because, among other things, it is based on and propagates myths and stereotypes about sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression, including the myth that heterosexuality, cisgender gender identity, and gender expression that conforms to the sex assigned to a person at birth are to be preferred over other sexual orientations, gender identities and gender expressions … in light of those harms, it is important to discourage and denounce the provision of conversion therapy in order to protect the human dignity and equality of all Canadians.”

In other words, the Canadian government believes the Bible is filled with harmful myths about homosexuality and transgenderism — therefore, it is necessary to strip freedom of expression and freedom of religion from Canadian Christians.

Of course, the conversion therapy ban isn’t explicitly directed at Christians. However, LGBTQ activists in Canada have explicitly targeted Christians in their campaigns against conversion therapy.

Though many Canadian churches are either accepting or silent on homosexuality or transgenderism, Canadian Christians are still the most conservative Canadians on LGBTQ issues. Therefore, similar to the COVID lockdowns and restrictions, Bill-C4 primarily threatens the fundamental freedoms of Canadian churches and Christians.

Canada isn’t the first nation to introduce some form of bill against conversion therapy. However, from my research on conversion therapy bans across the world — Canada’s conversion therapy ban would be indisputably the most authoritative and severe ban yet.

Other than Canada (and Australia earlier this year), essentially every conversion therapy ban in other nations is explicitly related to psychotherapy or coercion.

Therefore when Bill C-4 becomes law, anyone who preaches what the Bible says about homosexuality and transgenderism could be sentenced to up to five years in prison.

Earlier this week on social media, I said:

“You’re not homophobic or transphobic if you share Biblical truth with LGBTQ people. You’re homophobic or transphobic if you have a phobia of sharing Biblical truth with LGBTQ people.”

However, when Bill C-4 passes, sharing Biblical truth with LGBTQ people in Canada could make you a criminal.

That includes pastors and Christian counselors who believe what the Bible says about homosexuality and transgenderism.

Pastors and Biblical counselors who teach that homosexuality and transgenderism are unnatural and sinful thoughts and behaviors could be sentenced to prison. Christians who attempt to help homosexual and transgender people repent from their sins so they can have freedom in Christ might lose their freedom and be sentenced to prison.

This is because Canada isn’t a post-Cristian nation — it’s an anti-Christian nation. Meaning, it isn’t a conservative nation either. Canada is also a post-conservative nation.

Canada has a federal party that calls itself the Conservative Party. But we do not have a conservative party — not anymore. They are conservative in name only.

Not only did a Conservative MP make the motion to fast-track Bill C-4 — there wasn’t even one dissenting voice from the 119 Conservative MP’s at the House of Commons.

The motion received unanimous approval from the House of Commons, prompting the entire House to erupt in cheers and hugs — despite their supposed concerns over Omicron. And Canada’s relatively small conservative media is either supportive or silent about this.

Soon I will be engaging in criminal behavior if I write that homosexual and transgender people need to repent of their sins and believe in Jesus Christ. And yet, the Conservative Party is celebrating over that.

That’s the state of conservatism in Canada — that’s the state of Christianity in Canada.

If it’s criminal to convert homosexual and transgender people to Christianity, why isn’t it criminal to convert other kinds of sinners to Christianity as well? But considering what the government says about supposedly harmful myths, perhaps the Canadian government is only a short time away from banning Christians from attempting to convert anyone with the Gospel.

Nevertheless, I am not afraid of what Canada will do to Christians. I’m afraid of what God will do to Canada. Canada isn’t just persecuting Christians, it’s persecuting Christ — and it won’t win.

Please pray for Christians in Canada. Please pray for Canadian pastors and Biblical counselors. And please pray for Canada.

Originally published at Slow to Write. 

Be careful where you allow your mind to wander. If it gets lost, you might never get it back.

God has established boundary lines for our protection, and when we violate these boundaries, we bring harm to ourselves and others.

Progressive theology balks at the idea of biblical absolutes. And this propensity toward relativism prompts progressives to deliberately tamper with the boundary lines on these key biblical doctrines: 

• The supreme authority and truthfulness of Scripture
• Salvation only through repentance and faith in Jesus
• Christ’s atoning sacrifice on the cross for sinners
• The bodily resurrection of Christ
• The virgin birth of Christ
• The reality of Heaven and Hell
• God’s design for gender and sexuality

These biblical boundary lines were established by God and are therefore immovable. If you disregard any of these theological absolutes, you start to slide down a slippery slope. As the dominoes begin to fall, your confidence in the Word of God becomes increasingly weaker. 

You might be interested in two of my recent CP op-eds: “Can Changing Your Mind Change Your True Gender?” And, “Unwanted Same-Sex Attraction and Free Will.”

Pornography, like progressive theology, is a counterfeit. These wicked bedfellows each create their own highly addictive fantasy world. Progressive theology is make-believe biblical revisionism, and pornography enslaves those who reject God’s boundary lines regarding their thought life and viewing habits. 

Wisdom calls out: “My son, give me your heart and let your eyes keep to my ways” (Proverbs 23:26). Job declared, “I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a young woman” (Job 31:1).

Internet pornography is the most readily accessible form of sexual stimulus ever invented. With one click, a bevy of erotic and arousing images instantly display themselves for man’s eyes and mind to feast upon. But it comes at an enormous cost. 

Porn fuels anger and aggression, while dismantling marriages and turning hearts away from Christ. God designed sex for mutual satisfaction in marriage between a man and a woman. Lurid sexual fantasies, on the other hand, greatly diminish one’s ability to experience sexual fulfillment in marriage.

One former porn addict wrote, “I thought because I was more of an occasional user of porn that I didn’t have a problem. Boy was I wrong!” Sexual desire runs amok if your mind is allowed to wander into the danger zone.

Gary Wilson wrote a book titled, “Your Brain on Porn: Internet Pornography and the Emerging Science of Addiction.” He writes, “You have to be OK with the idea that you will never watch porn ever again in your life. If this idea gives you anxiety or makes you cringe, then you don’t have the ‘Porn is NOT an Option’ mindset yet.”

Jesus said, “Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are healthy, your whole body also is full of light. But when they are unhealthy, your body also is full of darkness” (Luke 11:34).

If you fill your heart and mind with sexual lust, it is only a matter of time before you will likely engage in sexual sin with your body as well. Scripture declares, “Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body” (1 Cor. 6:18).

Since sexual sin is the only sin against your own body, the consequences tend to be severe. Scripture provides this warning: “Can a man scoop fire into his lap without his clothes being burned?” (Proverbs 6:27).

A recent headline announced that a tech billionaire “kept a spreadsheet of 5,000 women he had slept with.” It reminds me of two iconic songs: “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction” (The Rolling Stones), and “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” (U2). Money and sexual immorality never satisfy the soul. 

Jesus Christ forgives sins and sets captives free from sexual lust. Heath Lambert said, “Until God is your chief concern — until sinning against Him is what makes your heart break — you will never turn the corner.” He also said, “Jesus’ grace to change you is stronger than pornography’s power to destroy you. Jesus’ grace is stronger than your own desires to watch sex.” 

“For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age” (Titus 2:11,12).

You were created in God’s image as body, soul, and spirit (1 These. 5:23). The Bible is the owner’s manual that explains how your body and soul can operate properly and function smoothly. Viewing porn will scramble your brain, abuse your mind and harden your heart. You could compare it to pouring Coca-Cola into the gas tank of your car. 

Filling your mind with Scripture, on the other hand, is essential if you want to be set free from porn addiction. Christians are called and empowered to “take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Cor. 10:5).

“Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable — if anything is excellent or praiseworthy — think about such things” (Philippians 4:8).

The toxic fantasies associated with porn are a powerful undercurrent in a mighty river. Meditating on God’s Word, while saying “no” to ungodliness and worldly passions, is the only way to avoid drowning in sexual lust. Check out my 2015 CP op-ed, “How Porn Prevents Christians from Being Filled with the Holy Spirit.” 

Progressive theology incites people to doubt God’s Word, which leads to doubts about God’s promise of everlasting life through faith in Christ (John 3:16). Likewise, pornography leads people further and further from the Lord as it defiles the heart and fuels an ever-increasing addiction to sexual lust.

God has established boundary lines for our protection. Those who choose to violate these boundaries do so to their own peril.

The late Evelyn Player, 69, was found dead at Southern Baptist Church in Baltimore, Maryland, on November 16, 2021. | Family handout

A man accused of murdering 69-year-old retiree Evelyn Player inside a bathroom at the Southern Baptist Church in East Baltimore, Maryland, should not be held criminally responsible for her death, his lawyer argued as charging documents revealed how the praying grandmother fought her attacker to stay alive.

Baltimore Police Commissioner Michael S. Harrison told reporters at a press conference last Thursday that Manzie Smith Jr., a 62-year-old ex-convict with a lengthy rap sheet, was arrested and charged with Player’s Nov. 16 murder at Southern Baptist Church.

Smith’s attorney, Warren Brown, told Fox Baltimore Monday that even though his client had not yet been indicted, Smith has no recollection of the day Player was killed. Smith plans to plea not criminally responsible, Maryland’s equivalent to an insanity defense.

“This is not just somebody who just decides to murder someone. I don’t know whether he did it or not, quite frankly. But I do know that if he did do it, it has to be attributed to his mental health,” Brown said.

“He has a lot of baggage, mental health issues, whether it’s schizophrenia, bipolar, delusional thoughts. He’s been in and out of various mental health hospitals.”

An autopsy report on Player cited by CBS Baltimore shows that she suffered multiple stab wounds, including on both of her hands, which suggests she tried to defend herself. Police used DNA evidence to link Smith to the crime.

“It’s not something that you can really say every time there’s a struggle. You’re going to have a lot of DNA there. But if you can, scratching someone is definitely going to get DNA under their fingernails,” Rana Dellarocco, director of the Baltimore Police Department’s Forensic Laboratories, explained to Fox Baltimore.

“If you’re lucky enough to land a good punch and the person bleeds on you, then that’s going to give DNA from that suspect that’s going to get on you.”

Southern Baptist Church pastor, Bishop Donte Hickman, told the news outlet that he was “disgusted” by the argument Smith should not be held criminally responsible.

“I’m disgusted by that characterization of a man who brutally took a woman’s life in our church’s restroom for the disabled,” he said in a statement. “I cannot believe that someone that did this in our church so early in the morning didn’t premeditate this evil attack.”

Brown called the pastor’s statement “an emotional response to what’s going on,” but he could “clearly understand that.”

Player’s murder has made national headlines. Community members, along with city and state officials, agreed that it was the place where she was killed that made it especially shocking.

Just hours after her murder, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott said her death inside the independent multi-campus church her family had attended for four generations was an “unspeakable, cowardly murder.”

He described her as a “dedicated member and staff member” of the church and her killer as “cowardice scum.”

Bishop Hickman also noted in the early aftermath of Player’s death that she had been intensely praying at the church days before her killing. Hickman said she was perhaps at the church early on the day she was killed for similar devotion.

“Typically, Evelyn would not come as early. We have other male sextons that come to the church; she just beat everybody here,” he said. “She had been praying all week, praying and crying, and she may have come to the church early to have some time to pray by herself.”