On November 14, 2019, I published a post that was originally titled “I Don’t Know What To Say.” I eventually changed it to “How Soulless Bureaucrats Make Owning an Online Business a Nightmare.” I recently shared it in a group in reference to what we’ve observed with online businesses being deplatformed and demonetized at an ever-increasing and alarming rate by YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Instagram, and the like.
In the year and a half since I wrote that post, many people have told me it was the thing that finally opened their eyes to all that was going on behind the scenes online. For those who read it at that time, the changes in the online world over the past six to twelve months have been less of a shock. They were forewarned and knew the signs to look for.
My writing output on this site took a real dive in the intervening months. Partially I have been trying to determine how to best position myself moving forward to avoid the cancel culture fallout as much as possible. I’ve mentioned in posts that I stopped making videos and set aside the idea of creating courses because it was becoming a challenge to find any place to park them where they wouldn’t be deleted. I did not want to keep duplicating my efforts as I tried to race around and stay one step ahead of the woke police. So this has involved many behind the scenes changes including moving my website hosting to something safe. The website hosting I am on now will allow me to host and stream my videos directly from my own site. No more needing to upload them to other places I can’t count on. Paying for it myself is more expensive, but it is worth the tradeoff to know that whatever I take the time to create won’t be censored or deleted for no reason.
But that wasn’t the only reason my writing has dropped off here.
It was also because I spent a lot of time thinking about ministry, what it means to be an “older woman” in the body of Christ, and what I am called to grow here for the future. Events of the past two years have shown me afresh that only what’s done for Christ will last. I’ve always known that, but I’ve spent a fair amount of time mulling over how to apply that truth. The Lord has led me through such a wide variety of life circumstances over the past many decades. He’s given me insights and knowledge over the years. How should I be a good steward of that? How do I share Christ with as many people as possible? What have I been doing here that distracts from that or even, God forbid, contradicts it?
While I’ve been thinking about my own responsibilities as a Christian woman, I’ve watched as ministries imploded. I’ve watched prominent and vocal women who claimed to be Christians embrace the most abhorrent views that can in no way be defended from Scripture. I’ve watched prominent so-called evangelical Christian pastors discuss the need to disconnect Jesus and the Christian faith from the Old Testament because the Old Testament is “problematic” for people today. (Any time someone uses the word “problematic” you can safely assume whatever they are saying is at best a half-truth.) I’ve watched the Southern Baptist Convention slowly imploding as leaders embraced critical race theory. I’ve watched Ravi Zacharias’ life work go up in flames. I’ve watched as over and over again prominent Christians repeat lies that can easily be verified as false and yet they have no interest in correcting the lies they are telling.
And on and on and on. It’s made my head swim at times. I’m sure you’ve also watched many of the same things with dismay. How can people be so deceived?
If 2020 was anything, it was the year people and ministries were exposed for who and what they truly are. We know why which I wrote about extensively in The Life Lessons of Warren Wiersbe, Rachel Held Evans, and Those Falling Away by Deconstructing Their Faith and spoke about in Negative World – High Profile Christians Bend the Knee & Embrace the False Woke Gospel {Sallie Video}. That’s some of the only significant content I’ve put out in some time, but I believe they are important.
At the same time, I’ve been incredibly encouraged by other Christians including some I only “met” online last year. There are men and women who are boldly and accurately speaking truth of Christ and the Bible without compromise. Their videos and writing encourage me each day and I’m thankful for them. I’ve been introducing you to some of them by sharing a few links in the Forum and via book recommendations in different posts. I’ll continue to share them with you.
One of the people who has blessed and encouraged me a great deal the past few months is Andrew Torba, the founder of Gab. The man is fearless in calling out evil and speaking of Christ the King. For that, the platform is constantly under attack both figuratively and literally. Likewise, there are many others on Gab, in particular, who have blessed me with their straightforward and unashamed defense of the Gospel and the historic Christian faith. The ability to see people speak freely and without being censored or needing to self-censor for fear of deplatforming is amazingly encouraging. Do I agree with all of them on everything? Of course not. But I am thankful for those speaking boldly for Christ.
While I’ve done a lot to get to this point today where I am ready to write about it publicly, there are still choices I have to make. I’ve had discussions with David, my mastermind group members, and others about how to live as a faithful Christian without compromise in the midst of an increasingly depraved online culture. I had already left Facebook and Twitter a few years ago and never liked the fakeness of Instagram so those were not issues for me. I’m using Gab and Telegram and greatly appreciate both of them for sourcing information and staying up-to-date on what is going on. But I do have my own set of issues.
In thinking about these topics, I’ve been reflecting on this Scripture passage in particular.
2 Corinthians 6:14-18
Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness?
And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever?
And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said:
“I will dwell in them
And walk among them.
I will be their God,
And they shall be My people.Therefore
“Come out from among them
And be separate, says the Lord.
Do not touch what is unclean,
And I will receive you.”“I will be a Father to you,
And you shall be My sons and daughters,
Says the Lord Almighty.”
I’ve written before that I lean heavily toward the view that Christians are the called out ones and we are to be separate from the world while still living in it. While some Christians claim it is okay to live as much like the world as possible without crossing a vague proverbial line, I’m quite the opposite. When it comes to issues such as these, I tend to stay far away from the fence and don’t push against it. I certainly don’t know what that should look like in everyone else’s life, but that is how I tend to think about it in my own life.
I’ve watched the folly of the past three decades as the church in the United States has sought to look as much like the world as possible. What has it gotten us? In my opinion, it’s left us with millions of people who have a form of Christian religion but know nothing of Christ and the Scriptures.
What does 1 Peter 2:9-12 tell us?
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;
who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.
Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul,
having your conduct honorable among the Gentiles, that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they observe, glorify God in the day of visitation.
What does it look like to be set apart online? What does it mean to conduct business online and not be unequally yoked with unbelievers? The most common response is that Christians can’t avoid doing business with unbelievers because we can’t live in our own little world. To a certain extent that is true.
However.
Why do we continue to choose to give our money to people who hate us? Why do we send customers to businesses who despise our faith? Why do we partner with people who would gladly see us silenced and destroyed?
These are not rhetorical questions. I’m asking you and me for an actual answer.
Where is the line crossed?
When censorship starts? When censorship reaches a critical mass? When I’m forced to renounce my whiteness? (If you don’t understand why I put this particular one here, you are badly out of touch with what is developing in our culture.) When I’m forced to wear a badge online or on my person that says I’ve been deemed sufficiently acceptable by woke or anti-racist experts?
When I’m forced to renounce Christ?
Where is the line?
The line is coming for you if you follow Christ. The line is coming for me. Short of a massive true revival in this country (which we should all be pleading for daily in prayer), we will all be faced with a line where we have to choose.
I’ve already cancelled my Amazon Prime account and eliminated almost all shopping on Amazon over a number of issues including their censorship and direct assault on free speech. But do I take days of my already limited time to remove every Amazon affiliate link from my website and also lose the small amount of income it brings me? There are probably thousands of affiliate links on here. It will take me days to go through and find them all and then fix the posts that will be impacted. What do I do?
How will you choose to live as a called-out pilgrim in an increasingly anti-Christian environment?
Where will you draw the line?
In Our Cozy Home This Week – No. 59 – Church Doctrine, New Website Hosting To Avoid Cancel Culture
This is so hard Sallie! Your decisions about the affiliate program and TPT sound like a lot to chew on! I can see both sides of the coin for your concerns. So many of these types of quandaries seem to fall in that gray area of Christian liberty. The section in Romans 14 comes to mind about the different types of Christians – some who eat meat, some who only eat vegetables; some who honor one day above others, some who see every day the same; and the key section for me in this arena:
12 So then each of us shall give account of himself to God.
I don’t see your affiliate links as a sin. I don’t think selling your content on TPT is a sin. However, if you feel a conviction that you should pull away from those things, then it would be a sin for you to continue. What about leaving affiliate links that are already in place and just not adding any others to Amazon products from here on out? Or maybe link to another affiliate instead of Amazon for future posts? Perhaps leave your product on TPT and continue to sell there, but if they target your materials and want you to change them, refuse and remove the products in question. As for people changing your content, there will always be people who intend to cheat others of their work and change / take credit for it, or are even ignorant that changing something might be against the author’s wishes. It would be distressing, but I think that you should just put out what you believe, do whatever you can to protect it, then pray for peace.
We do not / can not rewrite our history, and so we can only do what we can with the information we have at the time. When we get more information later, we do better later.
I cancelled my Facebook account about a month ago. I now have a family member in crisis and the way I used to connect with distant family members was through FB. I could really use these other members’ assistance and prayer through this crisis, but they would not switch to other platforms and are not really interested in communicating other ways. I also feel really out of touch with my small town and my women’s ministry at church. Our local newspaper was bought out and no longer has local news and happenings, so FB is the only way to learn about events and issues around town. I asked at church about switching to an email group instead of a FB group and was told that they did not get as much response and engagement with email and would not duplicate efforts, so I am out of luck if I want to participate and do things like sign up to help out with mercy meals and other last minute ministry opportunities. It is bothering me enough that I am considering making another account and only using it for those things. BUT I have worked so hard so far on getting rid of trackers and such, that I feel like I would just be heading back into the muck.
We are called to be pilgrims and are trying to make progress, but sometimes the “Hill of Difficulty” stalls us before we can get to the “House of the Palace Beautiful” where we can rest and put on the Armor of God. 🙂
Keep learning and teaching and following the small voice of conviction! I will be praying for you sweet friend!
Hi Amanda,
Thank you for the thoughtful comment. I always appreciate them.
I don’t think anything I am doing at this point is a sin, per se. It would be a sin if I believed God led me to do something about it and I didn’t. I’m still trying to determine what being a faithful Christian looks like in these circumstances. I think this is a question every Christian should be asking herself or himself these days.
How long do Christians continue to support organizations and companies that are clearly and without hesitation practicing censorship of biblical values and ideas? When will people stop supporting Amazon? When they ban Christian books? When they ban Bibles?
Re: people changing materials. In my mind there is a difference between people doing something they shouldn’t be doing and promoting it as a business model. The people doing it illegally are doing so and there is nothing I can do about it. However, TPT has decided that since people are already (illegally) altering documents they might as well offer a convenient way to do it right on their website. In addition, they can make money by selling this service to people. That’s wrong. I don’t care how they spin it, it’s wrong. I’ve had many disagreements with choices made at TPT over the years, but they were always difference of opinion regarding how things should be done. With the clamp down on free speech and this new business model, it has moved into something else. These aren’t simply matters of holding different opinions on a topic. These are core, fundamental issues of free speech and providing a tool for people to ignore the intellectual property rights of copyright owners.
This is one of the things I have appreciated about Andrew Torba at Gab. He is pushing people to think about how their money and daily choices build and enrich the very entities that seek to destroy Christians and the key tenets of Western Civilization.
Why are we actively funding our own destruction?
Sallie
This is something Christians should consider when they give so much money to Amazon.
https://thefederalist.com/2021/03/04/i-havent-used-amazon-for-almost-3-months-and-i-dont-miss-it-one-bit/
Very well said, Sallie! I have been praying for you every time you come to mind, which is often. No doubt that the road is extremely difficult for Christians now, both on and offline. You’re right, though, as Christians we have to make a stand, or get swept away by the current of godlessness.
I have a theory as to why so many believers are being led astray now. It’s pretty simple: they don’t know God’s Word, they don’t read it, and they would rather have their ears tickled by false, feel good teaching. Maybe that’s harsh, but it’s what what I see in the small circles I travel in.
Anyway, it was good to see a post from you again. My husband has been out of work since late last year, so I can’t afford any extras right now.
God Bless,
Cheryl
Hi, Sallie!
Searching on TPT for Easel-enabled resources, it looks to me like these are dominated almost completely by just two sellers. I see a short-term opportunity for a seller with a broad base of existing resources to jump in there and clean up as well.
Also, through reading the Student Privacy Policy, I was surprised to learn that teachers may give “parental consent” regarding students’ private information going online, as the COPPA law is currently (not) being enforced by the FTC.
That is an enormous can of worms that must be ready to blow up. Lots of parents are concerned about their children’s online privacy, and to have schools and teachers requiring children to use digital services left and right, where information from and about the children can be and is collected, is not going to fly well once the mainstream becomes aware of the potential for the misuse of the information.
Also, people have tolerated distance learning for a season, but many will be insisting on either in-person schooling or homeschooling for next school year.
Children likewise must be getting somewhat tired of digital activities.
I see these factors as limiting the overall viability of Easel in its current form. They also point to further bifurcation of education: the families who have “voted with their feet” on the one hand, and the families who have not on the other. You can and probably should write content for both segments, but they won’t consume it in the same way.
I’ve been struggling with Amazon as well, but haven’t come to a complete decision on that issue yet.
Your concerns about TpT last time you posted them were the reason I decided not to pursue it for my materials. I wonder if CBD has a way to upload materials to sell?