The first inside page of the Orlando Sentinel (A2) is devoted to news items about celebrities.  Often it announces upcoming productions or provides status reports on television or movie projects.  On January 23, 2014, for example, it reported that NBC decided not to go forward with its plan to retool Murder, She Wrote.  However, sometimes celebrities are quoted concerning their beliefs, and that same A2 page contained in bold letters what seems to amount to the theology of Katy Perry, born Katheryn Elizabeth Hudson.

Her parents are Keith Hudson and Mary Perry, Evangelical preachers.  They are Pentecostal and have expressed disappointment with their daughter, whose first number one hit was, “I Kissed a Girl.”  Not surprisingly, Perry is pro-homosexual.  And she is one of the hottest stars at the moment, having had five number one songs off one album, a feat not duplicated since Michael Jackson last did it.

Katy’s success is not appreciated by her parents.  In preaching her father has called her a “devil child.”  He added:

I was at a concert of Katy’s where there were 20,000. I’m watching this generation and they were going at it. It almost looked like church. I stood there and wept and kept on weeping and weeping. They’re loving and worshipping the wrong thing.

The way some Pentecostals worship, there might have been some similarities.  But we as parents sympathize with him.  She started off singing “gospel” music in worship and now is adored by fans everywhere who enjoy her immoral songs.  There can be no question that Satan has her—especially as it relates to pride.  How many people are willing to turn down earthly fame?  Satan offered her the world, and she took it.  It is unlikely that she will give it back.

Still, popularity does not qualify her as a theologian. The Sentinel reported her as making the following com-ments:

I do not believe in an old guy sitting on a throne with a long beard. …I don’t believe in heaven and hell as a destination. I see everything through a spiritual lens. I believe in a lot of astrology. I believe in aliens.

Are these comments to be taken seriously?  They sound like she just picked out some bizarre statements and strung them together without any logic or conviction, for that matter.  In the off-chance that she really believes these things and did not just string them together on the spur of the moment because they would be considered provocative by her fans, each one shall be briefly considered.

1. Did her parents teach her that God is an old guy with a long beard, sitting on a throne? Pentecostals don’t get much right, but they haven’t resorted to such portrayals of the Deity, the last anyone heard.  In fact, who is there who believes the Bible that has ever thought of God in such a grotesque manner?  God is eternal.  He never ages; He never runs out of energy.  Someday, when Miss Perry does, God will be just as youthful as He is today.  He does have a throne, however, and Jesus will judge her from it (2 Cor. 5:10).

2. It does not matter what Miss Perry or anyone else thinks. Truth is not decided by a majority vote; it is valid whether anyone recognizes it or whether anyone agrees with it.  Heaven and Hell are quite literal destinations, and everyone will be assigned to one or the other (Rev. 20:11-15).  No one can be surprised that those who violate God’s laws do not want to accept their punishment.  However, God’s will overrides that of mere human beings.
   3. Exactly what “spiritual lens” would that be?  These are the words usually used by those involved in the New Age movement.  They deceive themselves into thinking that they can lie, curse, commit fornication or adultery, or any other immoral act—and yet still be spiritual people.  In other words, they divorce spirituality from morality.  In the Bible, the two are inseparably linked.  Perry’s spiritual lens probably refers to her own views about matters; she gets to define what spiritual is.  “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death” (Pr. 14:12).

    

   4. She believes in a lot of astrology. What does that mean— that she accepts six signs of the zodiac but not the others?  Perhaps she is unaware of it, but astrology is a very old religion—one that is fatal to trust in.  Some 700 years before Jesus was born, some of God’s people had given themselves over to it.  They were trusting in the stars to determine their fate—something only the extremely gullible would do.  Notice what Isaiah said:

    

   Stand now with your enchantments and the multitude of your sorceries, in which you have labored from your youth—perhaps you will be able to profit; perhaps you will prevail. You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels; Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators stand up and save you from these things that shall come upon you (Isa. 47:12-13).

    

   These frivolous substitutes for God might seem attractive in times of prosperity and health, but a devotee soon learns that they have no power to solve life’s real problems.  People dally with them when they are bored, but when they experience actual threats to their lives (disasters, illness, et al.), then they realize they have neglected the true and living God.

    

   5. What is the benefit of believing in aliens? What does it explain?  How does it help resolve anything that pertains to this life?  After spending years listening to transmissions from “outer space” and coming up with nothing, what evidence supports such a fanciful notion?

    

   If someone postulates that aliens are our ancestors and that earth was populated from them, it still does not resolve our origin; we would merely need to figure out where they came from—God or evolution.  We would also need to ask why God created other universes and never told us about them.  Did Jesus go to their worlds to die for their sins, too?

    

   The young pop star has obviously been spending a great deal of time writing songs and not much developing her theology.  She sounds as shallow as a “Valley Girl.”  However, many of her fans probably think she is profound.  By contrast, Psalm 92:5 says: “O Lord, how great are your works! Your thoughts are very deep.”

   THE ISRAELITE CHURCH (AGAIN)

    

   Gary W. Summers

    

   “What color do you think Jesus was?” one of our teens was asked five years ago on his way home from school.  He answered quite appropriately, “What difference does it make?”  Then the leader of the group that had accosted him said, “I suppose you think Jesus died for everyone.”  When he admitted that he did, the group shouted, “Wrong!”  Of course, they are disagreeing with the Bible when they make such a claim.  One would think that John 3:16 was safe from attack, but apparently not.  God so loved the world—that seems to be rather inclusive.  Whoever believes in Him—no restrictions can be seen there.  In 1 John 2:2, the apostle writes of Jesus: “And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.”  Who would dare to disagree with the Bible?

    

   The religious group doing so is “the Israelite Church of God in Jesus Christ, Inc.”  According to Wikipedia:

    

   The Israelite Church of God in Jesus Christ (ICGJC), formerly known as the Israeli Church of Universal Practical Knowledge, is the 2nd largest Black Hebrew Israelite organization in the United States—the 1st being Nation of Yahweh. ICGJC is also a Christian group which accepts the Old and New Testaments as well as the Apocrypha, as inspired Scripture, and which believes that specific people of African and West Indian descent are the lost 12 tribes of Israel and are the true racial and Biblical Jews. They have historically claimed racial superiority to Caucasians, and claim to have divine favor and inspiration. They’ve been branded a hate group by Civil Organizations Centers.

    

        Their own sheet of propaganda says that the tribe of Judah today consists of Negroes; Haitians are from Levi, Puerto Ricans from Ephraim, Cubans from Manasseh, North American Indians from Gad, and Mexicans from Issachar.  Whites and Orientals apparently did not come from Israel, nor are they particularly fond of those from actual Jewish descent.  (They offer no evidence of any kind to establish these claims.)  Since this group was reported on in the March 15, 2009 Spiritual Perspectives, why mention them again?

    

   They recently accosted the same student (who is now in college) over the Christmas break.  The same chart that was provided in the previous article is listed in this one, but the subject matter is different.  In about 20 point type, this flyer asks the question: “How does God feel about Christmas and New Years [sic] according to the Holy Bible?”  How ironic is it that a group that thinks that “The Negroes” are descended from Judah is going to straighten us all out on the holiday of Christmas!  They manage to get only one criticism right.  They ask: “Was Jesus born in the winter on December 25^th?”  They answer, “No,” and provide Scriptural reasons for that answer.  They go too far, however, and affirm that Jesus was born on the Passover.

   “The Christmas Tree Is In The Holy Bible!”

    

   The reader should be quite suspicious of the above statement since having a “Christmas Tree” did not become common until the 16^th century A.D.  Therefore, it would be difficult to find one mentioned in the time of Jeremiah—about 600 years before the birth of Christ.  According to the Israelite Church, however, “Jeremiah condemns the so-called Christmas tree nearly 300 years before the birth of Jesus.”  First of all, their lack of knowledge about Jeremiah is appalling.  He lived prior to, during, and after the Babylonian Captivity, which occurred in 586 B.C.  How do they get 300 years out of that?

    

   Second, what is the subject of Jeremiah 10?  It begins by commanding that God’s people learn not the ways of the Gentiles—or their customs.  One of those was cutting down a tree from the forest and decorating it with silver and gold.  Then they would fasten it with nails and hammers so that it would not topple.  Of particular interest is verse 5: “They are upright, like a palm tree, and they cannot speak; they must be carried, because they cannot go by themselves. Do not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil, nor can they do any good” (Jer. 10:5).

    

   Nothing is said about bringing the tree indoors, doing it during cold weather, December 25^th, or the use of evergreens.  In fact, what was fashioned was something along the lines of a totem pole, which was sculpted, or carved before being carried to a location and made to stand upright.  This piece of wood represented an idol, which explains the reference to its lack of power: it had to be carried, and it could not speak.  Since it was only a manmade object, no one should fear it; it possessed no power to do evil or good.

    

   To try to make this object into a Christmas tree is lunacy.  No one worships the tree they bring into their home during the Christmas season any more than they do pumpkins at Halloween or fireworks on the 4^th of July.  The flyer adds that the tree practice goes back to the ancient Babylonians honoring Nimrod.  Allegedly (and no historical data is provided to substantiate this claim), Nimrod’s spirit would come out of the tree to curse and destroy the Babylonians if citizens did not continue to bring tribute to the rulership of the nation on December 25^th.  Has anyone ever heard of such an origin for the Christmas Tree before?  Whatever practice the ancient Babylonians had is completely irrelevant to what Jeremiah described or to anything done in the 21^st century.  The Israelite Church mishandles the Scriptures from beginning to end.

    

   Happy New Year

    

   Well, actually, the Israelite Church does not believe in this practice, either.  It sounds as if they would be more likely to say, “Boo on you!”  The flyer boldly declares that January 1^st is not the New Year!  They offer by way of proof Exodus 12:1-2, 13:3-4, and Deuteronomy 16:1.

   Of course, this brings up one of their fatal flaws.  They fail to realize that we no longer live under the covenant God gave to Israel.  They praise Jesus and the apostles for keeping the feast days described in the Old Testament, but, as Jews, they were expected to do so.  In fact, God gave these commandments to Israel.  But none of them is currently in effect; they were all nailed to the cross and done away with (Col. 2:14).

    

   The first covenant that God made with Israel was not designed to be permanent.  God always intended to replace it with the New Testament of Jesus Christ (Heb. 8:6-7).  The entire book of Hebrews shows that the Christian system is superior to the previous custom and warns against returning to the old system, whose sacrifices could not take away sins (Heb. 10:3-4).  Only Jesus can remove sins (Heb. 9:12; 10:12), which is what makes the new covenant superior.

    

   The feast days of the old covenant are no longer in effect; Christ is our Passover (1 Cor. 5:7).  Just to dement this point, Paul wrote in Galatians that if any who returned to the Law of Moses as authority to bring over even one practice, you must bring the whole Law of Moses with it. “And I testify again to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law” (Gal. 5:3).  The Judaizing teachers were trying to impose circumcision upon Gentile converts (see also Acts 15:1, 5).  Paul says that no one could bring just one thing over; such an individual would be obligated to keep the whole law, which of course no one can do.

    

   The law demands five different kinds of sacrifices (Lev. 1-5)—not to mention the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16).  Do they keep those days?  Of course not.  They would need to keep the Sabbath day (Saturday) and also observe the dietary laws.  They would be forced to appear at Jerusalem for the Passover.  Are they doing that?  No one has the right to try to bind upon others anything from the old covenant.  We live under the New Testament of Jesus Christ.

    

   In that context, God gave His people a calendar.  The first day of the year corresponded with Israel’s going out of Egypt.  The Israelites kept that calendar for many centuries.  Other countries in which they came to live had other calendars, however, and they ceased to be God’s people (2 Thess. 2:14-16).  Even before that, they lived under the Roman calendar, which persists to this day.  Is January 1^st the first day of the Jewish year?  No.  But Christians are not Jews, and God never gave us our own calendar under the new covenant.  Thus, we use the one that the rest of the world uses, and January 1^st is our New Year’s Day.  No one thinks that God ordained January 1^st; it is a custom.

    

   The Israelite Church says these words underneath a picture of a clergyman: “A Russian icon of the real St. Nicholas, a black Hebrew Israelite Jew! Only one from the 12 tribes of Israel can be called a saint. Read Psa. 50:5.”  The New Testament calls Christians saints—even those who are Gentiles.  The claims of the Israelite Church are both sad and laughable at the same time.