For Those About to Mock

(We Refute You)

I was in Turkey this week and woke up to the 5am call for prayer. Upon opening my social media feed, I was inundated with stories about the drag queen version of the Last Supper that was featured in the opening of the Paris Olympics. Thomas Jolly, the gay Jewish producer of this spectacle, called it: “ an interpretation of the greek god Dionysus, to make us aware of the absurdity of violence between human beings.” He says: “ In France, people are free to love how they please, are free to love whoever they want, are free to believe or not believe.” Was it a mockery of Da Vinci’s Last Supper with a chubby lesbian woman subbing for Jesus ? The woman, Barbara Butch, seemed to indicate that on a now deleted Instagram post: “ Oh yes! Oh yes! The new gay testament!” And the tableau was called: La Cene sur la scene sur la Seine, which is a play on words which means The Last Supper on the stage on the Seine. Or was it an uber-modern take on The Feast of Dionysus ? Or does it really matter ? Dionysus was the greek god of wine, pleasure, ecstasy, and theatre. He was an “eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die” ( 1 Cor 15:32) kind of god, a far cry from Christ, but very well-suited to the narcissistic-hedonism of the post-christian west, which has adopted drag queens as the nuns in its new cosplay religion. France has fallen. So has most of Europe and half of America. The slide back into paganism has been a long, slow one, but it is real. Moments like this simply reveal the spirit behind the movement. It is an unholy, anti-Christ spirit. It is a Dionysian rather than Christian approach to life.

While Turkish president Tayyip Erdogan slammed the show as “ a disgusting attack on humanity’s sacred values,” OUT Magazine praised “ this huge moment for drag performers breaking through the mainstream and showing their talents to the entire world.” And here I naively thought the olympics was about athletic excellence. The Bible says: “ Whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything praiseworthy, think on these things.” (Phil 4:8) There may have been a time when the Olympics and western culture lined up more with the sentiment of this verse, but it certainly doesn’t now. In fact, it says the exact opposite: whatever is your truth, whatever is objectionable, whatever shows favouritism, whatever is perverse, whatever denies excellence and cynically denigrates praise, fill your mind with these things. Unfortunately people are doing just that in record numbers. The result is that a semi-nude doughy blue man on a giant fruit platter is considered the height of artistic expression. It is actually the height of self-indulgence. Sports is one of the last bastions of commitment and competition, but even here the sway of social marxism can be felt. The Apostle Paul used the games as a metaphor for life: “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize. Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who goes into the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.” ( 1 Cor 9:24-25) Such talk of self-denial and exclusionary rewards is considered passe these days, or so say the men in heals. But why listen to them ? Rather than losing our heads like Marie Antoinette ( to the tune of Ah! Ca Ira played by French metal band Gojira) we should pay more attention to the 6800 athletes who floated down the Seine in 85 boats. They are what the Olympics are truly about: committing to a sport and performing at the highest possible level.

Intentional or not, the deconstructionists who have taken over the arts are involved in what sociologist Phillip Rieff calls deathwork. That term refers to the act of using a sacred symbol from a previous era in order to destroy its original significance and purpose. That is what has happened to the rainbow and will happen to other Christian symbols. ( It is not limited to religious symbols. It is happening to the American flag right now, which is why young people are burning it in the street, something that would have been unthinkable even ten years ago. They do not see freedom in the flag. They see oppression.) Whether this kind of thing is consciously planned by people or covertly orchestrated by dark spiritual forces using human pawns, the ultimate purpose is to mock God and subvert whatever is true, honourable, just, pure, commendable, excellent, or praiseworthy. That is always the agenda. The clarion call is diversity, but that ends up being a code word for perversity, because the spirit driving all this is known in the Bible as “the adversary” (1 Pet 5:8) and “the accuser” (Rev 12:10). Satan cannot defeat God, so his only recourse is to mock God and turn others into mockers. It is a very unwise thing to join his chorus of mockery. “ God cannot be mocked, for whatever a man sows he will also reap.” (Gl 6:7) In the end we will all stand before the judgement seat of Christ. ( 2 Cor 5:10) Dionysus will be nowhere in sight, but if he was, he would sober up fast. We will all look into the eyes of Jesus and give account for our lives, “ so that each one may receive what he is due for what has done in the body, whether good or evil.” No one can deny the suggestive nature of the body movements of the dancers in this scene on the Seine. It was orgiastic with a hint of pedophilia. See Jonathan Pageau’s Symbolism Explained episode on this for a fuller explanation of the bacchanalian. Groucho Marx once said: “ These are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.” He was a consummate mocker, but at least he had the enough sense to mock himself as well. Not so with the current crop of mockstars, who Peter predicted: “ First off, you need to know in the last days mockers are going to have a heyday. Reducing everything to the level of their petty feeling, they’ll mock…” ( 2 Pet 3:3) Of course the mocking is couched in dilettante pop-psychobabble, shallow at its root. Rieff summarized the shift in worldview this way: “ Religious man was born to be saved, psychological man was born to be pleased.”

Anyway, there has now been a backlash to the backlash, a chorus of offence, in response to those who were offended. As one ex-vangelical put it: “Leave it to the evangelicals to misinterpret a feast for the Gods of Olympus as a parody of the last supper. Enjoy your easily triggered outrage.” Yes, those pesky people with a moral compass always ruin the fun! Or maybe they are trying to save you from Satan and yourself. So please allow me to speak as an ex-pagan who is now evangelical. It is not that our faith is so fragile that we panic when it is contradicted. It is not that Christ is so weak that He needs our defending. We believe there is one true God who will “judge the living and the dead,” (2 Tim 4:6) and that all the other gods are imposters. The Apostle Paul says that the “ sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God…” (1 Cor 10:20) When evangelicals see a return to paganism rising in the world we do not see it a a Golden Coral buffet of beliefs where everyone chooses their favorite and all beliefs are equal. We see it as an epic battle between truth and lies, good and evil, God and Satan. Every false belief and image is Satan mocking God. That is why Christian apologists, when we see those about to mock, must refute you. We are following in the tradition of Apollos, who “ refuted his opponents in public debate, proving from the scriptures that Jesus was the Christ.” (Act 18:28) If I am calling anyone out, it is not because I am insecure, it is because I am concerned for their security. I am standing in the road waving my arms in front of their car, not because I am crazy, but because I know the bridge is out and if they keep driving it will not end well. I am simply trying to steer them away from danger and towards discipleship, away from the satan, and towards the savior. The psalmist put it this way: “ Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.” (Ps 1:1)

So you can float downstream on Dionysus’ party boat if you choose, but there is a Niagra of pain the horizon. I prefer to paddle upstream. Others can wave and laugh and raise a glass if they want, but I am convinced I am going the right way. In Jeremiah 21:8 the Lord told the people: “ I setting before you the way of life and the way of death…” Later, in the New Testament, Jesus said: “ I am the way…” (Jn 14:6) In a world where cross-dressing is the norm, the cross may seem weird. Yet Jesus said: “ If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.” (Mt 16:24) That means denying all of our pagan urges. It means dying to our Dionysian self. It means rejecting the food at the feast for the gods of Olympus and sitting down at the Last Supper instead. Choose whatever metaphor you want, but in the end you do have to choose. You can be a blue man or a new man, but you can’t be both. “ The message of the cross is offensive to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (1 Cor 1:18)