By ChristianView Network
Mid-day today, 13 September 2016, the Minister of Home Affairs, Malusi Gigaba announced the banning of American Hate Preacher Steve Anderson from entering South Africa.
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South African Christian groups strongly opposed to homosexuality, including the Evangelical Alliance of South Africa, the Baptist Union of South Africa (Anderson claims to be Baptist) and ChristianView Network http://goo.gl/mRWpXg had already disassociated with Anderson, owing to his previous self-confessed hatred of homosexual people.
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The biblical Christian position is to oppose homosexuality, but to lovingly seek to convert such people to Christian faith (1 Corinthians 6:9-11) http://goo.gl/jc64F1.
Anderson, like Donald Trump and Julius Malema, is part of a new generation of attention loving actors who play a reality-TV style game to manipulate the media and internet to grab attention. Unlike Trump and Malema, he actually doesn’t have any real constituency beyond his tiny cult-church. Anderson doesn’t represent the Christian faith any more than Donald Duck — and so doesn’t deserve to be quoted in the news.
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Why then is Anderson making headlines? Answer: Because an LGBT activist network is campaigning against him –launched a petition and are phoning up various South African organisations trying to get each to take a public position on the issue.
The LGBT lobby claim to have collected 60 000 signatures to have him banned. Nevertheless, probably only a tiny fraction of these are South Africans. Almost all the signatures came from an international LGBT petition web site with two million https://allout.org/en/members, where the same people sign one petition after another in different countries around the world http://goo.gl/XvpxDB.
Why then has this LGBT activist network wasted so much time campaigning against an irrelevant person with no support, giving him the media profile that he desperately wants? Answer: Because the real agenda of the LGBT activists is to outlaw preaching that homosexuality is a sin. That has been their publicly stated intention since the ‘Gay Rights Charter’ was published in 1992 http://goo.gl/4vAbkp (.pdf copy available on request).
Anderson and the LGBT activists appear to be opposed, but actually, they help each other achieve their objectives. He is a narcissist who wants publicity. They help him get what he wants. They want to destroy religious free speech. He helps them stir up hate towards religious groups opposing homosexuality. So the two sides of the hate agenda help each other — and risk destroying real debate.
Part of that same agenda has been the current lawsuit against Jon Qwelane http://goo.gl/druL5z, their attacks on UCT Student leader Zizipho Pae and evangelist Angus Buchan http://goo.gl/Vfto8J. No credible religious group wants to associate with Steve Anderson, so they start with a case that is not difficult to win. But we can be certain, that the same LGBT groups will continue their attacks against Qwelane and they will be back soon attacking someone else — next time someone engaging in legitimate religious free speech.
Anderson is actually irrelevant without the help of LGBT groups. The real threat is that these LGBT groups want to destroy religious freedom of speech. The government, the media, the Human Rights Commission, church denominations must be careful not to be manipulated into the agenda of these two groups. We have to firmly oppose both sexual sin and hatred against people because of their sin. So, as Jesus predicted in Matthew 24 we face the double threat of false prophets and persecution http://goo.gl/1vV2Oc.
Seems like everybody has a hidden agenda these days, particularly the news media, but could well include the person preaching at our churches on Sunday. You just can’t be sure anymore.
The only ‘good’ thing that I can say about Anderson and the militant LGBTQ groups, is that they are honest about their agendas, as repulsive as both of these opposite points of view are. Yes, the militant LGBTQ groups are not hiding their agenda as you suggest, so I really don’t know where you got that from.
I’ve been a Christian for nearly 40 years, and a ‘pew-warmer’ for another 25 years, and it’s interesting how this ‘war’ between the church and homosexuality started in our generation, and how it’s gone full circle. Seems like the militant LGBTQ groups learnt a lot about hostility from us, going back to the sixties and seventies. .Just a thought, since you (whoever wrote this) appear to desire a “real debate” between the militant LGBTQ groups and the church. How about if we stopped shouting out so loud about how much we hate their sin, and started raising our voices a little more than the faint whisper about how much we love the sinner? That’s very Biblical, because my version of the Bible does say that mercy triumphs over judgement. Don’t shoot me for this, it’s only a suggestion, just in case we are really, really interested in a debate without any hidden agenda.
Hi Barry,
The LGBTQ groups are perhaps not hiding their agenda, but what they are hiding is the fact that they are backed by millions of corporate dollars to do what they are doing. Very few “man in the street” Christians are aware of the ramifications of their influence and behind the scenes activities…
I largely agree with Barry’s comment, & I was also around in 60’s and 70’s! Fundamentalists (of all kinds) love to hate and hate to love.
Gateway News believes that it’s okay to preach a doc train about killing people? This is what I gather and that is pretty disturbing to me. To add such a dangerous message together with the pulpit the combination is lethal. People will kill with a spiritual stamp of approval from the pulpit. What evil are you supporting?
Hi there. I don’t know how you came to such a conclusion. But Gateway News certainly does not support preaching a doctrine of killing people. Our God is a God of Love. This story, which was written by ChristianView Network, was in fact published by a number of South African newspapers this week because the writer makes an interesting observation — that in a strange way the disgraceful US preacher Steve Anderson and LGBTI activists are allies because they use each other to get media attention. According to the writer, Anderson wants attention because he is an egoist, and the activists because they want to destroy religious free speech. – Editor
fully agree well said. Anderson is an embarassment to our faith that is the truth. regardless of one’s views on the LGBTI reality we have today , it’s a disgrace you even posted an article and you yourselves are also giving this “unknown” a platform and his fair share of publicity. shame! where is the love?
Pat, yes, you raise a valid question: should we be adding to the publicity? I believe the article provides insight into the LGBTI activists’ strategy for attempting to get speech that opposes their views outlawed. If we look at events in the world and our country it is clear that activists who know how to manipulate lawmakers and media do pose a threat to everybody’s religious freedom and free speech. Love defends freedom. Love does not look away. We need to be aware of what is going on. And as informed followers of Jesus we need Holy Spirit inspired ways of engaging effectively for the good of all. – Editor
It perhaps often seems that mutual respect in a free speech and religious freedom society is entirely ignored by all involved. Why are Bible believing Christians and preachers not afforded the same leeway and “grace” demanded by so many without a standard from which they function? The LGBT community may rant, rave, shout, scream and demand but Pastor Steve Anderson may not express his personal interpretations of a fixed value set, i.e. the Bible? What makes the LGBT community right and Pastor Anderson wrong?
Hi Abraham. I am with you on defending free speech. But Steve Anderson crosses a line by calling for the killing gay people. He also called the murder of 50 people at a gay bar in Florida ‘good news’. – Editor.
Thank you for this informative article Andre. It gives the whole thing a new perspective to know that the LGBT are benefitting from all of this, never thought of it this way.