A Christian Resource

By Michael Gryboski, Christian Post Reporter | Monday, December 13, 2021

A federal judge has ruled that Maryland unlawfully discriminated against a Christian school due to its traditional views on marriage and gender identity when the state denied it access to a voucher program.

U.S. District Court Judge Stephanie Gallagher ruled Friday that state officials violated the First Amendment rights of Bethel Christian Academy in Savage when they excluded the school from the Broadening Options and Opportunities for Students Today voucher program.

Gallagher, a Trump appointee, argued that the state failed to put forth evidence that Bethel’s policies have “deterred a single prospective applicant from applying for admission” or that “Bethel has ever denied admission expelled, or disciplined a student on the basis of sexual orientation.”

“Not only was Defendants’ decision to exclude Bethel from BOOST eligibility based on Bethel’s speech, but it was based on the specific viewpoints Bethel chose to express in its admissions policy,” Gallagher wrote in her ruling. “The First Amendment, which is applicable to the states via the Fourteenth Amendment, bars laws that restrict the freedom of speech.”

The judge concluded that “the First Amendment prevents Defendants from attempting to use BOOST funding as leverage to compel recipients to express views that Defendants find more palatable.”

The decision also rejected an effort by state officials to have Bethel return $102,000 of BOOST funding that it received the first two academic years it was eligible for the program.

Ryan Tucker of the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative legal nonprofit representing Bethel, said in a statement that the ruling showed that Maryland “may not discriminate against religious schools simply because it dislikes their religious beliefs.”

“The court was on firm ground to stop the state from targeting and denying children scholarships simply based on the beliefs and policies set out in their school’s parent-student handbook,” stated Tucker.

BOOST was created in 2016 by the state legislature and jointly overseen by the Maryland State Department of Education and a seven-member advisory board.

BOOST funding is given to students to attend nonpublic schools in the state, with 17 students at Bethel receiving the vouchers in the 2016-2017 school year and 18 students receiving the funding for the 2017-2018 school year.   

In June 2019, Bethel filed a lawsuit against Maryland over the private Christian school being removed from BOOST in 2018 due to its traditional views on sexuality and gender.

At issue was the school’s official handbook defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman and requiring students and faculty to use the facilities that correspond with their biological sex rather than any preferred gender identity.

Matthew Gallagher, chairman of an advisory board that oversees the vouchers, informed Bethel that its policies were discriminatory.

“A non-heterosexual student may reasonably view the policy as one that allows denial of admission or discipline or expulsion on the basis of his or her sexual orientation,” Gallagher said, as quoted by The Baltimore Sun.

“Therefore, the Board concluded that this policy, on its face, was in conflict with the nondiscrimination clause contained in the … law.”

In 2020, Gallagher had initially denied Bethel a preliminary injunction against the voucher program ban.

By Jeannie Ortega Law, Christian Post Reporter | Monday, December 13, 2021

Christian minister and recording artist Trip Lee, whose birth name is William Lee Barefield III, revealed that he recently “stepped away” from pastoring due to an incurable illness.

During a recent interview with Faithfully Magazine, the 33-year-old artist disclosed that his 12-year battle with chronic fatigue syndrome has made it too difficult for him to continue serving as a pastor. 

“When I think of calling, I think of desire, gifting, and opportunity, basically. I had the desire to want to do it. When I would preach and serve and help people, I see the Lord using this and the Lord opened doors for me to do it,” Lee explained.

“I think [my] calling has been affected by my own health and things that seemed good and that I feel called to, they don’t work out the way I expect because I have an illness that is the hardest part of every part of my life and things don’t always work out the way that I think they supposed to or I felt they would, but nevertheless, I’m just trying to be faithful in the season,” he added.

The husband and father-of-three released his debut album in 2005 and quickly became a household name in Christian hip-hop. He stepped away from music in 2012 to pursue training as a pastor. 

He went on to preach at several Christian conferences and pastor local congregations. He led Cornerstone Church West End in Atlanta for four years, and in 2019 became a young adult pastor at Concord Church in Dallas, Texas. During that time he authored two books, The Good Life and Rise: Get Up and Live in God’s Great Story, and also released two albums, Rise and The Waiting Room.

Lee said he’s thankful for the opportunities he’s had to serve as a pastor, adding: “I love the Church.”

“For many years, it was me trying to pastor in this season,” he said. “I’m actually not pastoring anymore. I’ve actually stepped away in the past few months because of my health. It’s made it hard, It doesn’t seem like the most faithful way for me to serve the Church in the season. … But yeah, trying to be faithful looks different in different seasons.”

Lee now has a new single titled, “You Got It.” He told Faithfully Magazine he plans to keep creating music. 

At the Gospel Coalition’s 2019 National Conference, the artist preached on Matthew 8:1-13, a passage in which Jesus heals a leper.

“To read passages like these, if I’m honest, can be difficult for a sick person,” he reflected. “Because it just seems so easy. It seems like ‘just believe and you’re healed.’ … It seems like faith just takes care of it. So what can happen — and I know I’m not the only one who has an illness or who has friends and family who have illnesses — the question can be, ‘Why isn’t God willing to heal me?’ It can be confusing, especially when you have false teaching that’ll say, ‘Look, if you’re sick, it’s a lack of faith. Faith always leads to healing.’” 

Nevertheless, the artist affirmed his faith in Christ and His ability to heal.

“If we want to present our brokenness to Jesus … the question is never about God’s ability,” Lee said. “It’s a question of whether or not it’s in His will. That’s how we should bring our brokenness to a Savior as amazing as ours — with an open hand, saying, ‘I know you can. I’m asking if You will.’”

Kidnappers have reportedly killed an evangelical pastor abducted in Nigeria’s Kaduna state last month despite a ransom payment being made.

The Rev. Dauda Bature of the First Evangelical Church Winning All in the Hayin Narayi area, kidnapped on Nov. 8 from his farm in Ungwan Kanti village, was killed last week, Hausa Christians Foundation announced on Facebook on Sunday.

Rev. Joseph Hayab, the chairman of the Kaduna state chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria, told Morning Star News that the pastor was abducted by Fulani radicals who called ECWA church leaders on Thursday to state that Bature was killed because an additional ransom payment was not made. 

The pastor’s wife had reportedly also been taken hostage when she took ransom payment to the herdsmen on Nov. 18. She was released last Monday, days before the captors said they had killed her husband.

A source told The Daily Post that the pastor’s wife was released on Dec. 6 to pressure ransom payment. 

The pastor’s wife told church leaders that her husband preached Christ to his captors and prayed for their repentance, which made them angry and may have contributed to their decision to kill him, Hayab said.

Terrorists and radicals in Nigeria have kidnapped and killed thousands of people in recent years, with Islamic extremist groups displacing millions in the northeast and radicalized herders attacking thousands across farming communities in the Middle Belt. 

Many have raised concerns about what they perceive as the government’s inaction in holding terrorists accountable for the rising number of murders and kidnappings.

In an earlier interview with CP, Emeka Umeagbalai of the Anambra-based International Society for Civil Liberties and the Rule of Law said kidnappings of Christians happen for various reasons.

Some terrorists, like Boko Haram, the Islamic State West Africa Province and radicalized members of the Fulani herding communities are motivated by money, while others are inspired by Islamic radicalism.

Security analysts say kidnapping for ransom has become a lucrative industry in Nigeria as weapons are becoming available to militants in Nigeria thanks to war-torn Libya.

Nigeria is ranked as the No. 9 worst country globally when it comes to Christian persecution on Open Doors USA’s 2021 World Watch List.

Nigeria was placed on the U.S. State Department’s list of “countries of particular concern” in 2020 as human rights advocates sounded alarms about the violence in that country’s Middle Belt that has led to the killings of thousands of people from predominantly Christian farming communities.

But last month, the Biden administration removed Nigeria from the list of “countries of particular concern,” drawing criticism from Christian activists and a former Trump administration official. 

Although some activists have claimed that violence against Nigerian Christians has “genocidal” implications, the Nigerian government has refuted such claims. 

Sam Brownback, who served as the State Department ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom during the Trump administration, told The Christian Post last week that removing Nigeria as a country of particular concern was the “wrong move.”

He argued that it is a sign that “the bureaucracy won” because it does not want the violence in Nigeria “to be seen as associated with religion in any way, shape or form.”

“There is a religious component to it, and we need to call it out,” Brownback said. 

The U.S.-based persecution watchdog International Christian Concern also identified the African country as one of its 2021 “Persecutors of the Year” in a report published last month.

“We are troubled by Nigeria’s omission as a CPC,” said ICC President Jeff King in a statement at the time. “The Nigerian government has done almost nothing to stop the violence against Nigerian Christians, leading to continued violent persecution. In some instances, as with Kaduna’s Governor El-Rufai, the Nigerian government has even furthered the violence.”

“Nigeria is one of the deadliest places on Earth for Christians, as 50,000 to 70,000 have been killed since 2000,” the ICC Persecutor of the Year report states.

By Michael Gryboski, Christian Post Reporter | Sunday, December 12, 2021

Throughout the extensive history of the Church, there have been numerous events of lasting significance.

Each week brings anniversaries of impressive milestones, unforgettable tragedies, amazing triumphs, memorable births, notable deaths and everything in between.

Some of the events drawn from over 2,000 years of history might be familiar, while other happenings might be previously unknown by most people.

This week — Dec. 12 through Dec. 18 — marks the anniversary of the death of a controversial preacher, the censorship of a prominent Catholic theologian and the first classes being held at a prominent evangelical higher education institution. 

As often happens on radio, I unintentionally stir up a hornet’s nest by giving a straightforward, factual answer to a question that, to my knowledge, is not controversial at all. Soon enough, I learn that, in fact, I have slaughtered a sacred cow without even knowing it.

That’s the case with the subject of the Greek word pharamakia in Revelation 18:23. Does it connect in any way to the use of pharmaceuticals today? Is it an indictment on Big Pharma? Does it tie in with the COVID vaccines?

After explaining to a caller last week that the word simply means “sorcery,” I followed up with an article that went more depth.

In short, among New Testament Greek scholars, there is no controversy here, which is quite telling, since they have devoted decades of their lives to studying the language. How is it that people who cannot read a word of Greek know better?

It’s one thing to dispute the meaning of a verse in the Bible. It’s another thing to say that an ancient word means something it does not mean.

For those who claim that the Spirit is opening their eyes to the real understanding of the word, would the Spirit tell you that up means down or black means white or truth means lies? Certainly not. In the same way, the Spirit would not tell you that a Greek word means something very different than what it actually means. He is the Spirit of Truth, after all.

Looking back through history, over 1,700 years ago, when the Aramaic-speaking Christians translated pharamakia in Revelation 18:23 into their language (Syriac), they translated it with “sorcery.” And over 1,500 years ago, when Jerome translated this word into Latin, he translated with “sorcery, magic.”

To this day, almost every English version of the Bible translates pharmakia here with “sorcery” or the like. That includes the KJV (sorceries), the NASB (witchcraft), the ESV (sorcery), the NIV (magic spell) and others.

If there was any connection to “drugs,” it would only be in the sense of producing drug-induced magical spells, not in the sense of pharmaceutical use. That’s why the related word pharmakos, found in Revelation 21:8 describing people who will be cast into the lake of fire, is translated “sorcerer,” not “pharmacist.” Obviously!

At this point, someone will doubtless say, “You’re missing the whole point. It’s what Revelation 18:23 says that got our attention, in context, regardless of what the Greek word means.”

To quote some posts directly, Jonathan wrote, 

“I think you are completely wrong about revelations [sic] 18:23-24 and your antiquated look and view of the Bible is blinding you. Trying to base prophecy off of what a word originally meant is foolish. What other word would they use to try to communicate future scenarios, than the words they had at the present time?

Did you know that the National Institutes of Health (Dr. Fauci’s organization) believes they found the gene that is responsible for faith? Did you know that they also believe that they can use their gene therapy technology to turn off that gene? It kind of makes sense when the scripture says that the lamp went out and all nations were deceived because of a pharmaceutical and they could no longer hear the voice of the bride and the bridegroom. If the gene is shut off, there you go. I know it seems far-fetched, but all the research data is there and available on their website.”

Or, as expressed by Scott, 

“Not only is the world decieved [sic] into taking test drugs (for which the ‘vaxpass’ permissions resemble the mark restrictions and are being instituted by martial law in Austria, Greece, Australia and New Zealand), but it was brought about ALSO by pharmakaiea, being a lab creation funded by Fauci.

“Israel is almost 16 months into a deal with many nations (Dan 9:27) and the WEF is pushing a ‘global restructuring’ using the pandemic as the starting point.

“I think this is definitely the pharmakaiea … and the ‘mighty men’, the merchants of the earth described. I’m looking at Quantum Dot Tattoos as the physical mark.”

The reality is that no one would be equating Revelation 18, which speaks of the destruction of “Babylon the Great,” with Big Pharma if not for the word pharmakia. Yet, the moment you realize it is not related to pharmaceuticals in the New Testament, then the whole connection disappears.

You say, “You still don’t get it. Big Pharma is using sorcery and witchcraft to deceive the whole world!”

In reply, I repeat: if the word pharmakia was not found in Revelation 18:23, no one would have made the connection in the first place. It’s time to give it up, whether you are pro-vax or anti-vax or whatever. If you’re pro-truth, you need to abandon this interpretation.

Still, for those who are genuinely confused (and sadly, there appear to be many), let’s take another minute to set the record straight.

In short, there is no way under the sun that Big Pharma is “Babylon the Great” of Revelation, the one described in Revelation 17:5 as, “BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF PROSTITUTES AND OF THE DETESTABLE THINGS OF THE EARTH.”

That is Big Pharma? Really?

The next verse says that this woman Babylon “was drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the witnesses to Jesus.”

In other words, she was responsible for the persecution and death of righteous followers of Jesus, from the first century, when this was written, until today. Big Pharma? Seriously?

It was Big Pharma who killed Christians in Nero’s day? Big Pharma who killed Christians in the Muslim world in the 13th century? Big Pharma who is killing Christians today in Nigeria and North Korea and Sudan? Please!

According to Revelation 18:2: “She has become a home for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit, a haunt for every unclean bird, and a haunt for every unclean and despicable beast.” Because of that, God’s people are called to flee from Babylon, “so that you will not share in her sins or receive any of her plagues” (18:4).

Does this mean that, if you are a Christian, you must stop using any and all medications, no matter how beneficial they may be? If you’re a Christian doctor, you must never write another drug prescription, even if it will save your patient’s life? If you’re a Christian hospital administrator, you must instruct all your nurses and surgeons and anesthesiologists to cease and desist from using any product manufactured by Big Pharma? Hey, the text says you must flee from Big Pharma and not share in her sins!

This is how utterly nonsensical this whole affair becomes when you actually look at verses in context.

And note again Revelation 18:24: “In her was found the blood of prophets and saints, and of all those slaughtered on the earth.”

To apply this to Big Pharma is not only bad exegesis. It is immoral.

All that being said, do I think that most people will abandon this interpretation once and for all? Sadly, no.

But some will. And so, for their sake, and for the sake of the truth, I’ve written this follow-up article, as plainly and simply as I can. In fact, I’ll give a quick recap of the big picture.

The COVID virus is not a plague from the Book of Revelation.

The vaccine is not the mark of the beast.

And Big Pharma is not Babylon the Great.

A new study from a Vienna-based watchdog organization suggests that anti-Christian hate crimes in Europe have increased by 70% between 2019 and 2020 amid rising concern about declining religious freedom across the continent. 

A new report this month from the Observatory on Intolerance Against Christians in Europe (OIDAC) focuses on how declining religious freedom, freedom of conscience and parental rights have impacted the liberties of European Christians. 

The document identifies “increasing intolerance and discrimination” against Christians from governments through legislation and political discourse. It also identifies intolerance from individuals through “social exclusion and criminal acts.”

OIDAC notes that the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe published its annual hate crimes report in November, stating there were 981 anti-Christian hate crimes in Europe for 2020 compared to 578 in 2019. 

“This meant an increase of 70% in anti-Christian hate crime since last year,” the OIDAC report states. 

“[O]ur numbers speak louder than our words. This is one of the reasons OIDAC was founded over ten years ago, because there was no other organisation reporting and raising awareness on this phenomenon in Europe.”

The study compiled over two years focuses on situations for Christians in five countries — France, Germany, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom — amid rising “secular intolerance” and “Islamic oppression.” 

“These countries were selected because, according to our observations, Christians face the most difficulties in them,” the report explains. “The findings of the report are based on a variety of data we collected. The majority of our data is based on descriptive cases, an extensive questionnaire and in-depth interviews with experts and afflicted Christians.”

While hate crimes have a higher frequency in France and Germany, they tend to be more severe in Spain and France, the organization finds.

“The number of anti-Christian hate crimes in Germany is surprisingly high but not as severe as in other countries in this report,” the report reads.

“The observed cases of violence in Germany are mainly perpetrated against Protestant and Catholic churches and Christian buildings. These include vandalism, looting, graffiti, and damage of property with a high and slightly increasing frequency in the last years. There have also been more severe cases that show a clear bias like physical assaults on priests, arson attacks and decapitated statues. OIDAC has documented 255 violent attacks against Christians or Christian sites between 2019 and 2020.”

In terms of legal prosecution for alleged “hate speech,” the U.K. has the highest number of cases. But the other countries have high rates of self-censorship, says the report.

The right to conscientious objection has been under threat in Sweden, France and Spain.

“The absence of the conscience clause in Sweden is already affecting Christian professionals, and intentions to alter this clause in France and Spain could lead to a complete exclusion of Christians in certain professions,” OIDAC warns.

In the education sector, the organization warns that “Christian university students perceive that they cannot debate certain topics freely or express their opinions without judgment or negative consequences, which leads to the crippling effects of self-censorship.” The document also contends that various new sex and relationship education regulations are violating parental rights.

In France and Spain, most of the attacks were on Catholics. And in Germany and the U.K., both Catholic and non-Catholic Christians have been targeted.

OIDAC recorded 175 incidents against religious freedom in Spain during 2019, and 140 (80%) were targeted at Catholics. In 2020, 51 violent incidents against Christians were recorded compared to 30 cases in 2019.

The watchdog says “secular intolerance” and “Islamic oppression” are two of the primary threatening dynamics impacting the lives of Christians in Europe in four main areas of life: church, education, politics and the workplace.

“We found that the area of church life is the most visibly affected due to an increasing number of hate crimes in most countries, but education, the workplace and politics are following shortly after,” the report states. 

“[W]hile secular intolerance is the driving dynamic in most of the cases and areas of life we observed, Islamic oppression mainly occurs in concentrated hotspot areas, in which Christian converts are the group that is mostly affected along with other residential Christians.”

The report argues that the opposition against conservative Christian moral views leads to secular intolerance.

“This polarization also appears to be promoted by sensationalist and religious-illiterate media that stigmatizes and marginalizes religious voices in the public debate,” the report adds. 

Christian converts with a Muslim background are “very vulnerable,” the group says. “Our data indicates that many of them face intolerance and violence from their social environment, and the danger they face is often ignored by state authorities.”

The report also contends that churches had their religious freedom denied and faced discrimination in Europe due to gathering restrictions related to the COVID-19 Pandemic.

“This happened either by the unjustified and disproportionate use of power by public officials (Spain) or through unproportionate blanket bans on public worship, downgrading it to a non-essential service,” OIDAC details. 

Last July, the watchdog found that there had been about a 285% increase in the number of “anti-Christian incidents” reported in France over the previous decade-plus.

“The French government reported 275, what they call, anti-Christian acts [in 2008],” the group’s Executive Director Ellen Fantini told The Christian Post at the time. “So that is anything from targeting a church in some way with vandalism or a public Christian statue, it could be a Christian cemetery or it could be actual assaults against French Christians with an anti-Christian bias.”