"We are deeply
sorry for the hurt this has caused and for anyone who has felt unsafe, unseen
or unvalued," the statement said. "Causing pain was never our hearts'
intention, but it doesn't change the fact that indeed, it did just that. So today,
we speak up and make a change." Lady A.
Just this
morning, I saw a news report that the country music group formerly known as “Lady
Antebellum” is changing its name to “Lady A.” The reason offered by the group
is that they wanted to distance themselves from the supposed association of the
name with the slavery issue that dominated political discussions immediately
preceding the American Civil War. Let me point out, in case anyone reading this
article is unaware of this fact, that antebellum is the Latin word that
means “before the war.” That’s it. Nothing more is implied by the term. It is
what people reading the term infuse into it that make it either benign or problematic.
When
one reads the quote above, taken from a posting on social media, it is
impossible not to be struck by the rationale for the name change. In another part
of the statement, the group claimed that, when they formed the group 14 years
ago, they were unaware of the supposed problematic nature of the term. One has
to wonder how these folks pick a name for their group without knowing what it
means. But it is typical of our current clueless society. Witness the defacing
of numerous monuments, such as the monument dedicated to the 54th Massachusetts,
an all-black northern regiment during the Civil War, and another dedicated to
the memory of early American abolitionist Matthias Baldwin in Philadelphia. Can
anything be dumber than to deface monuments that celebrate black lives or someone
who worked to free black slaves when protesting supposed black subjugation? In
the words of a park employee in Philadelphia in referring to Baldwin, “he was
BLM before there was a slogan.”
Getting
back to the Antebellum report, one of the reporters commenting on the story,
Gayle King, said during the round when the various anchors state their opinions
about the story, that she never looked at the name in the tones that the group
suggested. And I say, good for her! All this “virtue signaling” truly has to
make anyone with an ounce of common sense want to vomit. Gestures such as the
one taken by this group are meaningless. They accomplish exactly zero. No one
is made the better because this group changed its name. All such action does is
sooth the feelings of those who will continue to be eternally aggrieved. If it’s
not this issue, it will be another, but mark my words, something will get their
dander up again, and very soon.
I don’t
know the group; I’ve only heard the name in passing on the internet or the
television. But I dare to bet that they are totally unconcerned for the message
that their singing tells the world. And I should point out the obvious fact
that the group waited 14 years to change their name. Have there been problems
such as the one we are witnessing at the moment in the near past? Yeah,
numerous times. Several unarmed black men have been the victims of police
brutality in the last 14 years. So why, one is forced to asked, did the group
pick this particular event to change their name? I’ll tell you why, because
they know that it sells. They know, just like many other groups and
organizations and politicians, that saying things like “black lives matter”
sells. They may go along raking in millions of dollars without a hint of caring
about anyone. But something like the current situation takes place, and they
fall all over each other telling us how much they care. The hypocrisy is
breathtaking in its scope!!
Of course,
hypocrisy is the hallmark of the unregenerate heart. Take for example a meme I
saw the other day on Facebook. It had the usual “Black Lives Matter” slogan
pasted over what appeared to be some folks protesting and holding up placards
in the background (their shapes and what the placards said were obscured). Nothing
too controversial about such a posting. However, what made it problematic was
not the posting itself, but what organization posted it: Planned Parenthood. Wow.
Here you have the organization that alone is responsible for killing over
300,000 black babies a year telling us that black lives matter. If I didn’t
know any better, I’d think that I’m living in the Twilight Zone!
We look
at all this insanity and irrationality and wonder how people who are, by all
ways of measuring, intelligent and educated can be so amazingly idiotic. How is
it that they can’t see the utter disconnect between one thing and the other? How
can they yell at you that you have to care for black people, which by the way
you’re assumed not to do if you’re white, while at the same time being
responsible for the greatest genocide of black lives in the history of this
country? Well, because their minds are blinded by the evil one (2 Corinthians 4:2-4).
The sin that inhabits their heart is so thick, that they are incapable of seeing
things for what they are. Their concept of truth has nothing to do with
reality. They have constructed an edifice of falsehood which they now see as
the absolute truth, no matter what evidence they may be shown to the contrary.
The answer,
as always, is Christ. Yeah, maybe people get tired of me saying it. But just because
I repeat it so much doesn’t make it any less true. Until the Lord returns,
there will never be any other answer. Anything that man does to try to reform himself
is destined, without exception, to fail. No amount of self-help, of so-called “love,”
and of the claptrap that passes for truth will change the basic nature of the
human heart. Just as with so many other instances, this moment will pass and
the unregenerate man will go his way in his sin, unconcerned and unconverted
until the next crisis when he will once again regale us with whatever nonsense
he is told to spout at the time.
The saddest
part of all this is that many within the church have fallen prey to this kind
of thinking. Did not Paul tell the Galatians that in Christ there is neither
male nor female, neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free? What exactly
did he mean? Simple, in Christ all of those labels disappear. They don’t matter
any longer because they are a construct of the corrupt world from which they come.
Does that mean that those who were Jews stopped being Jews when they became Christians?
No, just like the Greek didn’t suddenly become Armenian. The point is that
whatever you think makes you different from others in so far as your ethnicity
or the color of your skin or your social status means nothing in the kingdom of
God. We don’t treat each other differently depending on where we fall on the
economic ladder, for example. Since we are nothing without Christ, we have
absolutely zero to boast about. All of the things that we often treasure most
will eventually burn up. If we don’t learn that lesson, our lives will be a
mess, powerless and incapable of accomplishing much of any lasting value!
Excellent!
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