Consider this my after-action report on the recent gay pride event in Bonner Ferry.
Let’s start with a few facts.
Initial reports that 13 churches in town were coming together to host the counter event at the county fairgrounds were untrue. The actual number that I could confirm was more like three or four. Organizers—members of the local Bushnell clan—has reportedly planned for up to 1,000 people to show up. FYI that is almost half the population of the city. In reality, the reports that I received were that attendance was around 300.
Attendance at the gay pride event, per my estimates were as follows: about 20 on Friday night and Saturday, the daytime number was on the order of fifty to sixty. I was not present for the Saturday evening, adults only event.
Saturday was all about the children. They brought in a traveling roadshow of circus freaks from Washington State (Spokane and neighboring areas).
By circus freaks I mean drag queens and such that were grooming children to accept and participate in the deviant lifestyles that these folks embrace. On a Facebook post, I described seeing this as witnessing parents bring their children before Molech and then making them walk through the fire.
The protesters, A.K.A. our guys, were few in number and many were from outside the area. On Friday night, I would say we had eight to ten and Saturday we were able to field twelve to fourteen. Not everybody was there simultaneously.
I would describe our side as fractured in a myriad of ways.
Friday night: I showed up to hand out flyers (Bible tracts), another guy was giving out bottled water to all takers (he also donated food to the gay pride people earlier in the day as he wanted to be immunized of being called “hateful”), about five guys from another town showed up with large signs which looked like Romans on a campaign march, another guy brought a wireless mike so he could “street preach”, and a few others mostly stood around and watched.
Saturday: I was there with my flyers, another group of four was talking amongst themselves and then would read Bible passages out loud, another group of young men were actively talking to a few women attending the event (they later pulled out hymnals and sang a few songs), another guy brought a boom box type PA system to preach, the street preacher from the previous day attended the picnic and then was planning to preach during the evening session, and a few other folks also were of the crowd.
This being north Idaho, anytime conservatives gather, spies attempt to infiltrate groups. One person was pointed out to me by one of the groups in attendance as such a person. I agree that he didn’t fit in; however, whether he was from law enforcement, a plant from the rainbow mafia, or just weird I was not sure. He did his best to interact with each and every one there to protest.
Another divide was whether protesters should be confronting everyone like the preaching folks or just be passive and seek opportunities to strike up a conversation with attendees.
A big divide was obvious in terms of messaging and communication. The big failure by Christians was invoking “Jesus” and “love” in the same paragraph. Many gay folks gleefully were proclaiming that Jesus loved them and thus were perplexed as to why we were there and opposing them. Such talk derailed the gospel “sharing” that was attempted by Christians protesting at the event. When your idea of the gospel is “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life” and the person that you are sharing with agrees, it knocks the wheel off the Campus Crusade method of evangelism. This tactic by the gay folks, knocked Christians off offense and put them on defense with no response.
This brings to mind one of Walter Martin’s early chapters in Kingdom of the Cults where he spends a whole chapter on vocabulary and defining terms. When you don’t take the time to do that, you talk past each other and never communicate the Gospel to others.
The difference of course is that the gay folks claim that God accepts them without any need to repent. It echoes Paul in the book of Romans when he rhetorically asks if we should sin more so grace may abound.
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Romans 6: 1-2
Paul goes on to say you cannot sin and serve God simultaneously. Living to sin (lust) leads to eternal damnation not everlasting life.
Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. (v 12)
But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (v 22-23)
We need some training and planning before attempting this again. Too bad the professional clergy won’t touch this issue. As proven with Covid, they would rather shelter in place. As one group called our town’s clergy, “Hirelings, not shepherds.”
Lastly, what do we do with the folks that sat the whole thing out? Clearly, they are part of the problem too.
Perhaps, when dealing with defining “love” we might want to ask, “Which Jesus are we talking about?”
Somehow agreeing with to Doobie Brother that “Jesus is just alright with me” may be part of the problem.