Tag Archives: fraud

No Right to Complain If You Don’t Engage

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A few years back, maybe six or seven years ago, a member here at Our Savior (or, I should say, former member) approached me to let me know in his passive-aggressive way that my friend Charlie Kirk had been listed in the Southern Poverty Law Center’s “Extremist Files.” In response, I gleefully pointed out that while Charlie himself had not yet received such a badge of honor, his organization, TPUSA, had indeed made SPLC’s “Hate Map” as an “anti-government extremist group.”

That particular conversation, like so many with him before it, did not end well, especially since I implied that being targeted by the SPLC, a group that claims to fight racial hatred, could be a good thing.

But I meant every word.

I wonder what my former friend’s thoughts are now that the SPLC’s guts have been exposed. Although I may be getting a little ahead of myself. Have you even heard the news?

If not, the essentials are that the Department of Justice leveled three charges against the SPLC, namely, wire fraud, making false statements, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. It seems that between 2014 and 2023, the SPLC’s leadership secretly funneled more than $3 million in donor money to racist extremist groups, most notably, the Ku Klux Klan, as well as other neo-Nazi groups. I just read some of Todd Blanche’s comments on the situation. He’s the acting Attorney General. In summary, he put it rather bluntly, saying the SPLC was “manufacturing racism to justify its existence.”

I tried not to laugh when I read his words. Most reasonable people who’ve ever crossed paths with the SPLC already knew that. Charlie certainly did. That’s because it’s an easily discernible M.O. for most of the groups out there claiming to fight racial inequality. In fact, it’s written into the DNA of almost any progressive protest you see on the news. From BLM to “No Kings” to LGBTQ, Inc., the only way these groups have managed to stay in business is to ensure that the “hatred” angle relative to their particular organization’s needs persists. And so, that’s what they do. They foment rage.

I wouldn’t be surprised if we learn that other organizations, like the ones I’ve named, have been doing the same thing the SPLC has been doing. Of course, the SPLC denies the charges. Still, it’s not looking good for them. It’s becoming undeniably plain that the SPLC, which raised money by warning Americans about hate, was shelling out major cash to keep the machinery of hate in motion.

Wow. Shocking.

As I said before, most reasonable people already knew the SPLC to be less a sober civil-rights watchdog and more a moral-licensing agency. It has always acted with an assumed authority to decide who was hateful, who was dangerous, who belonged on the outside of acceptable society, and perhaps worst of all, who needed to be marked for public suspicion, all toward the goal of organic cancellation. Of course, to remain somewhat veritable, the usual suspects, like the KKK, were tagged. In the meantime, the rest of SLPC’s cash was being spent tagging and fighting against Christians, conservatives, and a whole host of ordinary people who held unfashionable views about marriage, gender, education, immigration, or religious liberty.

I suppose that’s what happens when an organization discovers that condemnation can become a business model. The more standards it can create and identify as hate, the more necessary it becomes to fight that hate. The longer its list of enemies grows—the more fear it creates—the more urgently it can ask donors for money.

But again, I say sarcastically, “Wow. Shocking.” That’s because none of this was lost on reasonable people—or at least the people paying attention. And I don’t offer those words lightly, especially to the folks here in Michigan. There’s an angle to this that requires some attention because it lands very close to home.

Jocelyn Benson, Michigan’s current Secretary of State and a candidate for governor, served on the SPLC board during the time period covered by the indictment. She was named to the board of directors in 2014. Her campaign has publicly confirmed that she served for four years. That does not, by itself, prove what she knew or when she knew it. Still, the indictment accuses leadership. That includes the board.

I suppose one thought here is that if someone seeks the governorship of Michigan, then that person’s associations and moral discernment should matter. I’m the Executive Director for an organization. My role exists alongside a board of directors. That board isn’t a ceremonial thing. It exists for governance. It exists for accountability. It exists to understand the organization’s mission, finances, and a whole host of other matters that help ensure the effort is acting faithfully and lawfully.

Now, having said all this, a seemingly random thought must be considered.

Not long after that image of Trump was shared—the one in which he looked an awful lot like Jesus stretching out his hand to heal someone—I read plentiful commentary from fellow Christians on social media saying things like, “This is exactly why Christians need to stay out of politics. The separation of Church and State!”

I get the aversion to the image. Regardless of Trump’s wobbly explanation, it was ridiculous. But it’s precisely because Christians have adopted that kind of retreat that organizations like the SPLC continue to get as far as they do. Yes, there are foolish and cringeworthy things that our elected officials do in the public square. But the answer to these things is never political indifference, or worse, monasticism. It’s never to leave the arena, leaving the gates open, and allowing the lions to feast on whatever they prefer.

It’s true, the government is not the Church. It cannot preach the Gospel, administer the Sacraments, or forgive sins. It cannot make Christians. Only Christ does that through the means He has established. But the government is still Christ’s servant for earthly order (Romans 13:1–4). It is still given to punish evil and protect the neighbor. And when people who hate Christ, hate His design, hate His Word, and hate anyone who confesses His truth, are the only ones willing to enter the public square, willfully disengaged Christians should not complain when the public square becomes hostile to the things of God.

On the contrary, Christians must get in the game and push back. At a minimum, that means Christians cannot shrug at elections. Even more importantly, we cannot simply vote for president while neglecting the midterms, or worse, our local elections. In fact, I’d be willing to say that the folks in charge of the local library or the people elected to your local school board matter more than anyone may realize. Even there, a Christian cannot pretend that a candidate’s beliefs and alliances will have no bearing on our lives. They do, and in the most immediately impactful ways. A school board candidate who sat on the board for an organization that believes 2 plus 2 equals 7 is not someone you want spearheading a community’s educational efforts.

And yet, concerning even greater, more life-altering things, there remain those Christians who sprinkle so foolishly across social media, “Stay out of it! God will handle it!” Those Christians absolutely own the blame when their community’s children cannot do simple math.

Yes, God will handle it. He’ll handle it through your vocation as a citizen, upholding your God-given responsibilities (Jeremiah 29:7 and Matthew 22:21). He’ll bless His world through your faithfulness, which is already something He works in us by the power of the Holy Spirit for faith. We’re already inclined to do what He wants. When we vote, we’ll be inclined to seek candidates who most closely align with Him and His Word.

In this day and age, that pretty much means choosing leaders who protect life, embrace natural law, honor the family, respect religious liberty, and understand the limits of government in light of Two Kingdoms theology.

By the way, Christians engage in the process, recognizing that no candidate will be perfect. No election will usher in the kingdom of God. And anyone who believes these things has lost grip on what the Word of God teaches. For those who hold to God’s Word, they’ll know, by faith, that Christ has already won the victory that no ballot can win (1 Corinthians 15:57 and Colossians 2:15). He lives and reigns now, and His kingdom will have no end (Luke 1:33).

They’ll also know that until He returns, we live here. We serve our neighbors here. We raise our children here. We confess the truth here. And part of that earthly calling is to engage in the public square in ways that not only protect what’s Godly, but also to act with wisdom to preserve it. One of the most powerful ways to do that is in the voting booth.

So, returning somewhat to where I began, I’d encourage you to pay attention. Do some reading. Don’t skim. Read. This is an important way to measure candidates against the Christian Faith, namely, the Word of God. Campaign slogans won’t tell you anything. Not anything of real value, that is. Most would never have learned about Jocelyn Benson’s association with the SPLC had certain folks not dug deeper and written in ways that exposed it.

Read up on it. Also, study the candidates’ voting records. Read their speeches. Look into their associations. Doing even these things, it won’t be hard to figure out who’s who.

Then, as a Christian, take that “who’s who” stuff into the voting booth and flex the muscle of your responsibility. Because if you can, but don’t, as I said before, you have no reason to complain.

Christian Rage?

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I’m going to let you in on a little secret, if only because I feel like writing about it. In short, I’ve had a few interesting conversations about my new novel, Ashes To Ashes, with some folks in Hollywood. But that’s not necessarily the interesting part. What stood out in those conversations is that, after reading the book, they all reached back to me with varying versions of the same conclusion. Essentially, they’ve determined that the novel fits the time. In other words, it fits the national zeitgeist, tapping into something raw and unresolved in the public soul.

What they mean is that people are angry.

By angry, they don’t mean the performative kind of anger that burns hot on social media and then disappears by the next news cycle. They mean the deeper kind—the kind that settles into the chest when dreadful things keep happening over and over again at the highest levels, and yet, no one ever seems to get arrested or brought to justice.

I say this as I consider the obvious examples. For starters, the State of Minnesota is riddled with as much as nine billion dollars in fraud, nearly all of it played out among its Somali community. And lest anyone seem racist or anti-immigrant, no one appears to be getting into much trouble for it—at least, not the actual orchestrators. Or consider the Epstein files. There’ve been years of whispers, sealed documents, but also unsealed documents with redactions that hide 99% of the content—all of this leading to dead ends and a gazillion unanswered questions. Everyone knows something happened. Everyone knows there’s a list somewhere. Dark-intentioned people who use other people always maintain the upper hand. They keep lists. They protect audio and video files. We’ve learned that, especially within the last few years, relative to the release of certain CIA files. However, in this case, nothing has happened. There’s likely some really big names on these lists and in these videos. And yet, no one has paid for their crimes. In the end, transparency and accountability remain entirely elusive.

If you’ve read Ashes to Ashes, then you’ll know that frustration with injustice is an element in the topsoil from which it emerges, which is why the folks out in Hollywood responded as they did. The main character, Reverend Daniel Michaels, finds himself in a dreadful situation, ultimately owning some significant evidence. Unsure of whom to trust, when he scans his immediate horizon, he discovers people and organizations that appear immune to consequences. He also learns the cost of inaction paid by ordinary people—young girls being abused and then traded, or simply moved and slaughtered, like cattle. And while ill-willed insiders so easily use the system to their benefit, he steps into the fray and starts taking names. And it gets messy. Very messy.

Now, please understand, that’s not an endorsement of vigilantism. I’m simply making the connection to the original comments while also acknowledging a reality. I had a conversation in my office this past Monday about the book. Essentially, I said that while we might not want to admit it, when justice feels theoretical, people start fantasizing about other ways of leveling the field. When wrongs are endlessly explained away, when excuse after excuse is given for why justice is so slow, anger begins looking for a body to inhabit.

Again, the Somali fraud in Minnesota and the Epstein files are prime examples of the zeitgeist’s growing conviction. They’re stories that land, not as once-in-a-while scandals, but as recurring symbols throughout America’s immediate history. Even worse, they reinforce a growing suspicion that there are two systems of justice—one for the elite, and one for everyone else. Christopher Wray and James Comey can demonstrably weaponize the justice system and get away with it. Hillary Clinton can have hundreds of thousands of classified documents on a private server, then provably bleach that server, and remain untouched. Someone like Hunter Biden can owe mountains in back taxes, purchase a gun while on drugs, even video-record his behaviors, and leave his proceedings with a relative slap on the wrist. And yet, if I were to make the slightest modification to my home without the proper permits, or make the tiniest mistake on my tax forms, I’d risk massive fines and, in some cases, maybe even time in jail.

It’s these inequities that, when left unchallenged or untreated, curdle into citizen rage. That rage is what Reverend Daniel Michaels embodies for a little less than four hundred pages. And because of this, as the character’s creator, hear me when I say that while he’s not the book’s villain, he’s also not a hero, even though you’re likely to discover yourself rooting for him. He simply isn’t clean. That makes him an anti-hero in the purest sense. In this case, he’s what happens when people stop believing that truth will surface on its own. He’s the product of a world where “wait and see” has turned into a permanent sentence—the only reply to chronic injustice.

And so, America’s current zeitgeist. But here’s the thing.

For Christians, we have a very important filter for discerning these things. For one, God’s Word never denies the reality of injustice. The Bible is brutally honest about corrupt judges, dishonest rulers, and systems that are weaponized against the powerless. But it is equally honest about the limits of human retribution. “Vengeance is mine,” the Lord says (Deuteronomy 32:35 and Romans 12:19)—not because injustice doesn’t deserve an answer, but because we are not created to carry that weight around without being deformed by it. Only God can bear it. In that sense, for an honest reader, Daniel Michaels serves as a mirror, not a model. He shows us what happens when trust collapses, and despair reaches up and out from its goop.

That said, the Christian answer to injustice will never be blind faith in broken systems, which seems to be what far too many in the Church prefer to believe. It’s also not some sort of monastic disengagement from society entirely, which is another preference for far too many in Christendom. Christians need to be in the game and playing it hard. But as we do, we remember what the scriptures reveal—that God is not confused or compromised or unaware. He does not lose files. He does not accept bribes. He does not forget victims. He does not need leaks or whistleblowers to know what’s going on in His world. Nothing He sees has redactions. Every hidden thing is already open and accessible to Him—not symbolically, but actually. Even better, as I like to mention on occasion, the divine lights will eventually come on for all of us, too. I’m not saying we’ll know everything about everything. I’m simply saying what the scriptures say—that the day is coming when all things hidden will be revealed.

In the meantime, what does our Lord require of us? I’ll let the Prophet Micah answer that one: “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). In other words, we are not called to burn the world down in order to set it right. Instead, we are to be others-focused. We are to stand in the breach—telling the truth, protecting the vulnerable, refusing to excuse evil, all the while being humble enough to remember that God is the finisher, not us. We must trust that He will be God.

Of course, that trust does not deny that violence may occur in a fallen world (Ecclesiastes 3:8), nor that, in extreme circumstances, its use may be tragically necessary to restrain greater evil or defend the innocent (Genesis 9:6, Psalm 82:3-4, Romans 13:4). Scripture itself acknowledges this grim reality. But even then, violence is never something to be pursued eagerly or confused with righteousness itself (Matthew 26:52). It remains a last resort in a broken world, and, as best as possible, carried out soberly and with moral clarity, never forgetting a Christians accountability before God (Luke 14:31, Nehemiah 4:14).

In the end, justice will not be done because a character like Reverend Daniel Michaels—real or imagined—goes around taking names with his 1911 Colt. It will be done, ultimately, because Christ already knows the names of both the perpetrators and the victims, and He has promised not to allow injustice to be the last word in any circumstance.

I suppose, as Christians going forward into another relatively early week of a brand new year, perhaps the most countercultural resolution any of us can make is not louder outrage against this world’s evils. It’s not necessarily pointing out how that foolish girl who tried to run over the ICE agent and got shot and killed “had it coming to her.” It’s true, idiocy has consequences. Still, perhaps the better resolution is a sturdier trust behind the outrage—to actually know what we believe and why we might have a reason to get angry in the first place.

By the way, keep in mind that such faithfulness is rarely dramatic. In fact, it looks rather ordinary. It looks like ordinary obedience practiced consistently. It’s built by showing up to church even when we’re tired. It’s sitting beside others in study instead of alone at home on our screens. It’s praying when we’d rather vent on social media. It means giving, serving, confessing, forgiving, and staying rooted in Christ when it would be so much easier to just let oneself drift in the cultural current of “That person has it coming and I’m going to get him for what he’s done.”

None of the things I’ve mentioned are grand gestures, but they are formative. If anything, they’re more than capable of recreating a person’s habitus, which is, by definition, “the way a person perceives and reacts to the world.” It’s what I mean when I talk about seeing the world through the lens of the Gospel. Indeed, a sturdier devotional life—one that trains itself to see through the person and work of Jesus Christ—is one that has little room for the perpetual unrest stoked by vengeful rage. I’m not saying rage won’t be there sometimes. Of course it will. We’re all sinners, and sinners are prone to dreadfulness. But it will be less likely. And that’s a good thing.

And so, again, what better way to continue into a new year than by acknowledging that the stubborn work of Christian faithfulness is an exceptional path. And of course, we pursue that path knowing that in Christ, we always have hope. Only in Him will we find the strength to endure through and into the Day of Days when the divine lights come on, and everything is set right by the One who saw, knew, and was actively working all along.

Who knows. Maybe 2026 is the year the Lord returns. And so, the Church cries out, “Come quickly, Lord Jesus” (Revelation 22:20).