David Platt is a huge name in the evangelical world, and he is the lead pastor of McLean Bible Church in the suburbs of Washington, D.C.
His handpicked successor is Pastor Mike Kelsey. Kelsey addressed the church after Charlie Kirk's assassination in a Sunday sermon and condemned any celebration of the murder.
However, that's not where he stopped.
I had to sit with my high school daughter to help her process the ungodly and inhumane reactions of other students around her. Nobody should have seen that video and laughed. But I also had to sit with my high school daughter, and help her process some of the things Charlie Kirk said.
What's perhaps more troubling than the idea that this man had to help "process" Charlie Kirk's words for his teenage daughter, is how LOUD the "amens" from the church were.
There was a bigger "amen" to attacking Kirk's character than there was to chastising those who celebrated it?
What are we doing here, McLean?
There's some rhetoric from Charlie Kirk that followers of Jesus should firmly denounce. Listen, he says some things clearly and unapologetically true from a biblical perspective. And I know there was some clips that were taken out of context, I understand what it's like to have that happen to you. It's probably going to happen today after this message.
(I hope Pastor Kelsey is happy that we are giving all the context for this sermon clip.)
I spent hours, hours, watching just long form debates, interviews, speeches. And just to be frank, in a lot of cases the context didn't help at all.
Here's where the turn against Kirk and conservative Christians happens.
In fact, in some cases I was shocked that so many professing Christians were rationalizing things that were so demeaning and un-Christlike. And not just rationalizing things, but idolizing him as the prototype of a new generation of Christians.
As Basham points out in her tweet, Kelsey provides zero examples of this so-called "un-Christlike" speech from Charlie Kirk. There's no recognition that Kirk was murdered because of his unwillingness to compromise on biblical truth.
To paraphrase a Norm MacDonald joke: "You know what they say, speak ill of the dead."
Some reactions:
I'll leave you with this thought as we remember the thousands who returned to church, or went for the first time, because of Charlie Kirk 👇
P.S. Now check out our latest video, featuring Kirk Cameron 👇
