Pro-gay Bible teacher, Tony Campolo, hopes to convert evangelicals to social activism through his “Red Letter Revival.” Ironically, evangelical leaders in once-conservative camps like the Southern Baptist Convention and The Gospel Coalition have already beat him to it. Following on the heels of their MLK50 conference, which served to venerate Dr. King and invigorate the evangelical base to embrace social justice, this has become a rare historical moment where prominent leftists like Campolo are actually behind the curve in the advance of blatant progressivism.
According to Baptist News Global…
A group of Christians often labeled as “progressive evangelicals” will hold a revival — in Lynchburg, Va., a center of conservative Christianity — designed to reconnect that old-time religion with concern and activism for social justice.
Friday and Saturday, the Red Letter Christians movement hosts its first “Red Letter Revival: A Revival of Jesus & Justice” at the E.C. Glass Civic Auditorium.
Tony Campolo, leader of the “Red Letter Christian” Movement, made the news most notoriously in the Fall of 2016 for simultaneously supporting Hillary Clinton’s presidential candidacy and coming out in support for sodomy-based relationships.
The purpose of holding the Red Letter Revival social justice event in Lynchburg, Virginia – according to Campolo – is to send a statement to Liberty University, which is seen as the bastion of political Christian conservatism.
When asked by Baptist News Global if the social justice event was really a “revival” and if people would be asked to make a decision of some sort, Campolo responded by saying, “Exactly. That is so important. We are going to have a decision time when we will call people forward to kneel and pray to send Jesus and to send the Holy spirit [sic] to transform them from within. … But we also want to work hard to overcome the divorce between social justice and old-time evangelicalism. And that’s why we call it a revival.
Campolo continued, “We see ourselves as heirs to Charles Finney … who was the Billy Graham of the 19th century and who called people down the aisle to accept Christ. … But those who were converted at his meetings were called to be involved in the anti-slavery and women’s suffrage movements. These preachers came to be known as fire brands and they were very instrumental in stirring religious fervor against slavery. … We’re saying when you commit yourself to Christ you commit yourself to what Christ through the Holy Spirit is doing in society today. … We want the values of Jesus to be propagated in the church today.”
Campolo’s event will likely attract hundreds of progressive Christians who will be encouraged to take up the mantle of social justice in the name of the Gospel. At the MLK50 event hosted by the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) and The Gospel Coalition, nearly four thousand ostensibly conservative evangelicals gathered to commit themselves fully to social justice. It’s a strange world we live in.
[Editor’s Note: HT Baptist News Global]
