California, LA County both to pay $400,000 settlement to John MacArthur’s church

[TylerR]

Behold this:

The California Court of Appeal today set aside a lower court order that would have allowed indoor services to take place at Grace Community Church in Sun Valley.

The Court of Appeal’s decision temporarily upholds the County’s Health Officer Orders prohibiting indoor worship services in order to protect congregants and the community as a whole from transmission of the highly contagious and potentially fatal COVID-19 virus.

I wrote, before, that this “victory” (which is now no victory at all) was being spun as crack cocaine for the Christian Nationalist base. I also told you it meant nothing. I’ve operated in this world for a long time. JMac’s attorneys know it, too; far better than me.

Hmm…

It is now apparent that John Mac Arthur was on solid legal ground in resisting California Covid restrictions. I believe all thinking Christians should be grateful that Mac Arthur’s church took their stand upon the US Constitution and religious liberty. With the forces of antagonism looming larger by the day, we can be thankful that our Constitution still prevails. However, unless Christians take a principled stand, the enemies of Christ will diminish our freedoms without batting an eye.

Several people scolded Mac Arthur on SI for daring to resist government. I wonder if they still feel that way, or have now become grateful that GCC was willing to take their stand, which benefits every church in California, and no doubt has a positive ripple effect across our nation.

These are difficult issues, and I wrestle with them as much as anyone. We must not confuse American patriotism with Biblical Christianity, but as citizens of the USA, we, like the Apostle Paul of old, must be willing to defend the rights granted to us by our Constitution. If we don’t, we will have nobody to blame but ourselves when these freedoms are taken away.

[G. N. Barkman]

Several people scolded Mac Arthur on SI for daring to resist government. I wonder if they still feel that way, or have now become grateful that GCC was willing to take their stand, which benefits every church in California, and no doubt has a positive ripple effect across our nation.

I do still feel that way. I thought the fines were well deserved, and still feel that MacArthur’s actions are a bad look for Christians. On the positive side, while many fear that religious liberty is on shaky ground, it’s clear that the courts still lean quite far on the side of religious liberty.

[Ken S]

G. N. Barkman wrote:

Several people scolded Mac Arthur on SI for daring to resist government. I wonder if they still feel that way, or have now become grateful that GCC was willing to take their stand, which benefits every church in California, and no doubt has a positive ripple effect across our nation.

I do still feel that way. I thought the fines were well deserved, and still feel that MacArthur’s actions are a bad look for Christians. On the positive side, while many fear that religious liberty is on shaky ground, it’s clear that the courts still lean quite far on the side of religious liberty.

I’ve been pleasantly surprised at just how strong the US’s tradition of liberty has actually performed under the circumstances.

Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, meanwhile, have left me shocked and depressed.

We’ll be thinking through the cultural realities the manifold national responses have revealed for many years, I suspect.

Thankfully that is true, but only as encroachments are resisted and tested in court. If Mac Arthur had been unwilling to do so, we would not have the court ruling in his favor and thus no additional legal benefits for others. In short, those who disapprove of Mac Arhur’s actions are siding with the enemies of religious liberty in this particular incident. Fear of “looking bad” to their Christian friends or before the world may be sufficient reason for some to comply with questionable government encroachments, but if others are not willing to “look bad”, religious liberties defended by the courts would never go to court and would sadly die a gradual death.

[G. N. Barkman]

Thankfully that is true, but only as encroachments are resisted and tested in court. If Mac Arthur had been unwilling to do so, we would not have the court ruling in his favor and thus no additional legal benefits for others. In short, those who disapprove of Mac Arhur’s actions are siding with the enemies of religious liberty in this particular incident. Fear of “looking bad” to their Christian friends or before the world may be sufficient reason for some to comply with questionable government encroachments, but if others are not willing to “look bad”, religious liberties defended by the courts would never go to court and would sadly die a gradual death.

For me, it’s not just that I think it “looks bad” or that I’m siding with the enemies of religious liberty. I’m not afraid of looking bad while doing the right thing if needed. I believe that the way MacArthur handled the entire COVID situation from start to finish was unbecoming of a Christian, let alone a pastor. And I think that will always look bad. I know others view MacArthur’s actions differently and that is fine, but this is how I see it.

[G. N. Barkman]

Thankfully that is true, but only as encroachments are resisted and tested in court. If Mac Arthur had been unwilling to do so, we would not have the court ruling in his favor and thus no additional legal benefits for others.

And there are those of us who are a bit on the fence, since there are a couple of different concepts in play. I’m completely in agreement with MacArthur fighting the restrictions on worship in the courts, and I’m glad he won. On the other side, I still feel he could have handled his version of civil disobedience differently.

Challenging bad laws/decrees and bad implementation of laws or decrees is our right as Americans. I think this could have been done without essentially telling the authorities “we’re not going to submit to you no matter what.”

I understand MacArthur’s frustration with the disparate ways Governor French Laundry discriminated against churches in ways he’d never have discriminated against “The French Laundry” or a casino, but what would be really welcome would be a court slapping governors into next week for sending COVID patients into nursing homes and failing to provide separate facilities for the care of COVID patients. We have thousands of empty big box stores—it would not have been difficult.

Another very welcome thing would have been courts slapping President Biden and Dr. Fauci into next week for failing to raise the roof with governors like Newsom and Cuomo, and also for sending tens of thousands of COVID positive illegal immigrants north with no tracking, and finally for failing to act on clear evidence that the epidemic resulted from a lab leak that we should have foreseen from earlier audits of WIV.

We’re sweating the small stuff and missing several 700 lb gorillas in the room.

Is over his interference in the situation in Canada. We do not have the same laws, nor were churches targeted any differently than any other institutions in our country (most of the time). His interference created divisions among churches here and has had unfortunate consequences in many ways.

Not a fan.

Bert, I agree with you that such rulings would be welcome. However, it misses the point of the Mac Arthur situation because that is a religious liberty issue, and your examples are not.

“Not a fan” is not really on point either. You can be less than a fan of Mac Arthur, and still agree that his stand for religious liberty resulted in a court ruling that benefits religious liberty in America. If government encroachments are allowed to proceed without resistance, religious liberty will eventually amount to little. For favorable court rulings to occur, somebody has to be willing to challenge encroachments in court. Mac Arthur did, and all Christians benefit as a result.

Religious liberty is not “the small stuff.” It is the 700 lb gorilla. I cannot opine on the Canadian situation, as I have too little knowledge in that realm, but in the USA, Mac Arthur’s courageous stand ought to be applauded by Christians everywhere.

[Bert Perry]

Another very welcome thing would have been courts slapping President Biden and Dr. Fauci into next week for failing to raise the roof with governors like Newsom and Cuomo, and also for sending tens of thousands of COVID positive illegal immigrants north with no tracking, and finally for failing to act on clear evidence that the epidemic resulted from a lab leak that we should have foreseen from earlier audits of WIV.

We’re sweating the small stuff and missing several 700 lb gorillas in the room.

There is no evidence that the government is sending tens of thousands of COVID positive illegal immigrants north. First, if they were illegal, the government wouldn’t be involved. Second, Biden is still enforcing Trump’s Title 42 to deport almost 70% of the immigrants back to Mexico. Nothing has changed. Third, numerous sites and studies have debunked that the growth in cases is from immigrants. The greatest indicator of cases is vaccination rates.

There is no evidence that the virus leaked from a lab. Even those scientists who are strong believers that it came from a lab do not say there is sufficient evidence to conclusively say this. There is a lot of anecdotal evidence, but China has restricted access or destroyed information to conclusively say one way or the other. If science is to be accurate than it needs to be conclusive, not just anecdotal. Even if it leaked from a lab it doesn’t change what we are facing today.

David, I’m sorry, but you’re wrong. President Biden took his immigration policies all the way to the Supreme Court, which reimposed the Trump policy. Whereas Trump tended to return illegal immigrants to their country of origin, Biden has been letting them in. They’re being kept in cages (ahem) in detention centers before being released into the country (well, at least until the Supreme Court shut Biden down), and even Snopes admits that nobody’s quite sure who’s getting vaccinated, who’s been tested, etc.. It’s hard to imagine a better scenario for transmitting this disease, really.

And every case brought to the country by an illegal immigrant who could have been turned back is a case that didn’t need to happen, and estimated illegal immigration is over 3000 people per day.

Studies “debunk” this? First of all, I’m having trouble believing that a study was conceived, executed, and through peer review in this time, and second, it’s awfully hard to argue against the fact that disease brought by people who have no right to be here is unnecessary. There’s no statistical test that will override a logical fact.

Regarding “no evidence” that the virus leaked from the lab, false as well. The bats where the virus was found live 1000 miles away in Yunnan, and hence were never sold in the wet market in Wuhan. Early victims of the disease worked at WIV, and the Chinese have restricted access, even to the WHO.

Now do the math; if you have a huge epidemic, and the virology lab in town locks the doors to investigators, where’s the most likely source? Keep in mind that previous audits found serious flaws in procedures at WIV as well, and that gain of function research was being done there.

It’s telling that our political leaders are messing around with face masks and the like when they’ve got huge holes like this in their approach.

Several people scolded Mac Arthur on SI for daring to resist government.

I will not step back from my criticism of MacArthur on this topic, and find it interesting that nobody here has mentioned that MacArthur admitted in court that he lied to his congregation. Despite protestations to the contrary, COVID did tear through the congregation and MacArthur did indeed have COVID during the last months of 2020-early 2021 when he took his mysterious three week break from preaching to “rest”.

https://reformationcharlotte.org/2021/08/30/john-macarthur-reveals-that…

I greatly appreciate John MacArthur and his church standing up for Religious Liberty. I thank God for this decision.

From a previous comment:

“I just signed a law that prohibits any government agency or public official from issuing an order that closes places of worship,” -Governor Greg Abbott, TX

“Churches provide essential spiritual, mental and physical support in a time of crisis,” [Scott] Sanford said about the bill, which passed the Texas House in April. “Closing churches not only eliminated these critical ministries and services, but it violated their religious freedom, guaranteed by our laws and Constitution.”

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/abbott-bans-orders-closing-houses-of-w…

Wish every state had the same attitude, and same law.

David R. Brumbelow

[Jay]

Several people scolded Mac Arthur on SI for daring to resist government.

I will not step back from my criticism of MacArthur on this topic, and find it interesting that nobody here has mentioned that MacArthur admitted in court that he lied to his congregation. Despite protestations to the contrary, COVID did tear through the congregation and MacArthur did indeed have COVID during the last months of 2020-early 2021 when he took his mysterious three week break from preaching to “rest”.

https://reformationcharlotte.org/2021/08/30/john-macarthur-reveals-that-…

Can you provide a link to his admission of lying to his congregation? I had not heard that.