I LEARNED A NEW WORD TODAY

English is rich in words, possessing  over 1,025,109.8 of them as of January 1, 2014. (I don't know what 8/10 of a word is.) New words enter English everyday. 

Thanks to Harvard University, I learned a new word today: microagression. It's so new that your computer will notify you that you've got a misspelled word in your document if you use it. 

Microagression is "some minor everyday statement or action that entrenches discrimination or degrades a person based on their group identity. Harvard University experienced a microagression recently and the Harvard Undergraduate Dining Services sprang into action.

OH, THE SHAME OF IT ALL






It seems that the doer of the deed was the Dining Service itself, so it was logical that it be the one to take the lead. The microagression occurred when  the Dining Service purchased a water machine from a company called "SodaStream," and that was a clear case of microagression because SodaStream is an Israeli company. The presence of such a product from a Jewish company might possibly offend the Harvard undergrads and do them psychological harm.

They had caught the Dining Service with the smoking gun, red-handed. Upon learning of their crime, the supervisor ordered that the Dining Service purchase no more SodaStreams. But that wasn't enough.  Something had to be done immediately about the machines in use. Harvard justice was swift: the order came down that all SodaStream labels be stripped from the machines in order to minimize any potential psychic harm to the students who might read them. (You can't make this stuff up.) In fairness, the Service acted unilaterally without consulting the administration, but act they did.

THE CLOAK

This sounds silly, but there's something sinister behind it and what's going on has been lurking for a long time and is growing: anti-Semitism. We can learn from Dr. Andrew Naorski, a history professor at the University of Oklahoma, who writes: 

"What we are witnessing today in the surge of poisonous anti-Semitism around the world, particularly in Europe, would have delighted Hitler and his Nazi followers.

"Cloaked in the garb of humanitarian concern for the Palestinian people [sin usually cloaks itself in a self-assumed morality], anti-Semitism is gushing with such ferocity that the power to shock diminishes daily. 

"People attend rallies and chant 'Hitler was right!' and 'Death to Jews.' The hateful atmosphere makes it seem almost natural. Last week brought news reports about a Belgian doctor refusing to treat an elderly Jewish woman with a fractured rib, later justifying his behavior by saying he had an 'emotional reaction.' "

IN EDUCATION?

Anti-Semitism in the educational system? Nothing new. In Germany of the 1930's and '40's, "the government 
put much energy into showing the children why it was necessary to be strict with the Jews. Through anti-Semitic literature, the pupils were indoctrinated with delusions of the Jews’ hunger for world dominance, [teaching children] that the Jews were an inferior and criminal race, and that the Jews were a serious danger to the German people. According to an official guideline for teaching about the Jewish Question from 1937, the teaching should result in every single pupil's remaining an enemy of the Jews for the rest of his life and raise his children as [their] enemies." As we would expect, the universities in Germany took the same stance.

That virus is spreading right here, right now.

It is increasing in a number of infected American colleges and universities and in the intellectual elites of the United States:
 

From a news report: "The past three years have been particularly difficult for Jewish students on American campuses.  There has been a sharp rise in the number of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic demonstrations, posters, flyers and speeches from coast to coast. 

 "Numerous ugly incidents are being reported and supporters of Israel feel the growing hostility around them.  A disturbing phenomenon is the appearance of 'Anti-Zionist Week' on many campuses with the support of academic administrations. 
 

"At the University of Chicago, Jewish students formed a coalition which is holding the university responsible for the atmosphere
of intimidation and hate faced by the Jewish students.  They noted that the increase in anti-Semitic incidents kept pace with
the escalation of violence in the Middle East and related that an obviously Jewish student was walking on the campus one
evening when a car drove up beside him its inmates shouting 'Death to the Jews.  Hitler should have finished you off when
he had the chance.' " 

The group wrote:  "These incidents are symptomatic of an increasingly alarming problem for Jewish students.  Jews are being mistreated and intimidated on campus.  In the University of Chicago, anti-Semitism has been made acceptable, even fashionable, by a long process of academic delegitimizing of Israel and Judaism.  Outbursts against other religions and ethnicities, including Islam, are not considered acceptable and they occur much more rarely.  [Responsible for] this delegitimizing are professors, students, administrators, and a host of institutional practices."

On May 7th 2002, a major anti-Semitic incident occurred at the State University of California in San Francisco.  Professor
Laurie Zoloth, Director of its Jewish Studies program attended the Hillel's Peace in the Middle East rally with several
hundred students, faculty and members of the Jewish community who heard speeches supporting Israel and sang Hebrew songs.  Arab supporters advanced on a group of 50 students who stayed behind to clean up.  Professor Zoloth described what ensued:  "As the counter-demonstrators poured into the plaza screaming at the Jews 'get out or we will kill you!' and 'Hitler did not finish the job,'  I turned to the police and to every administrator I could find and asked them to remove the
counter-demonstrators from the plaza, to maintain the separation of 100 feet that we had been promised.  

'The police said that they had been told not to arrest anyone, and that if they did 'it would start a riot.'  

'I told them that it was already a riot. This is not civic discourse, this is not free speech, this is the Weimar Republic with brown shirts it cannot control.'  

She noted that in the e-mail she circulated that the anti-Semitic, anti-Israel and anti-American atmosphere pervading the campus extended far beyond the scope of one protest that spun out of control. 

 She concluded:  "After nearly seven years as  Director of Jewish Studies and nearly two decades of life here as student, faculty member and wife of the Hillel Rabbi, I am saddened to see the San Francisco State University return to its notority as a place that teaches anti-Semitism, hatred for America and hatred .... for the Jewish State of Israel."

The virus of hatred for the Jews is spreading from an increasing number of American colleges and universities to the elites of the United States. What's in the universities of America will one day be in the corridors of power.  Get ready: this will affect American attitudes and actions in the near future.

In a few years, you'll be voting to send these university trained anti-Semites to the Senate, the House of Representatives, and the White House. They will be adjudicating cases in our courts, sitting as bureaucrats on committees you can't control, writing the newspapers and magazines you read, and producing the movies and television programs you watch. These gradates will gladly follow the lead of the Pharaoh in Moses' day in compliance with the old and yet to come evil supernatural conspiracy: to erase all Jews from the face of the earth. (Cf. Rev. 12)

SO?

So: It's easy to critique. The woods are full of  critical Christians who gripe  from their Tempur-Pedic mattresses, while all pillowed in silk. Is there more?

So: Christian parents will need to think long and hard about sending their children into the environment of a secular university in which their kids will get their degrees and break their parent's heart. Christian students will need to think about graduating from a secular university and come out to so live as to break God's heart. Christian graduates need to rethink their donations to such alma maters, even if their school has a powerhouse football team.

So: There is no room, no room whatsoever, for anti-Semitism in a church. Its teachers much teach against it. Its attenders must engage in and support of  Jewish evangelism and the discipleship of the converts. 

So: Instead of "to the Jew last," we must become Pauline and act on his dictum: "to the Jew first." 

So: Anyone for a heavy does of Gen. 12:1-3?

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Dr. Mike Halsey is the chancellor of Grace Biblical Seminary, a Bible teacher at the Hangar Bible Fellowship, and the author of Truthspeak, available on Amazon.com. A copy of his book, Microbes in the Bloodstream of the Church, is also available as an E-book on Amazon.com. If you would like to a receive a copy of his weekly Bible studies and other articles of biblical teaching and application, you can do so by writing sue.bove@gmail.com and requesting, "The Hangar Bible Fellowship Journal."

If you would like to contribute to his ministry according to the principle of II Corinthians 9:7, you may do so by making your check out to Hangar Bible Fellowship and mailing it to 65 Teal Ct., Locust Grove, GA 30248. All donations are tax deductible.

Come visit the Hangar some Sunday at 10 AM at the above address. You'll be glad you did.

Other recommended grace-oriented websites are:

notbyworks.org
literaltruth.org
gracebiblicalseminary.org
duluthbible.org
clarityministries.org

Also:

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