There have been a number of emails from people across the globe asking for the position of Westboro Baptist Church (WBC) regarding the COVID-19 virus and the vaccines that have been developed and introduced. Since there are some places where vaccination has been mandated, the intensity of opposition – often cloaked in religiosity – has also risen. While WBC has been on the streets preaching about this vaccine, the issue of the church’s view on the vaccine and the opposition to it deserves some attention.
***************
“¶ Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; Or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well. For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men: As free, and not using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness, but as the servants of God.” (1 Peter 2:13-16)
The Westboro Baptist Church is not in the business of social engineering. Jesus Christ told that old tyrant Pilate that His “kingdom is not of this world.” (John 18:36) That is the position of every church in the New Testament dispensation. Until Jesus Christ returns in power to take His earthly throne from Antichrist – and sets up His millennial reign as King of kings and Lord of Lords – this earth languishes under the despotic rule of Satan, “the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience” (Ephesians 2:2). The citizens of this nation and world were rebels long before COVID-19 and all its variants came upon the scene … so it is no wonder that every form of rebellion seizes the day in the wake of that pandemic.
We have no part to play in that drama, except to praise God for His amazing judgments in the earth:
- God sends the virus and every variant.
- God sends the vaccines of every nature and strength.
- God sends the arrogance and pride into every human who imagines that he/she/it developed a way to fight the virus.
- God sends the spirit of rebellion into every human who swells up with faux-religious or other fervor to squabble with the governments of the world.
There is no glory in any of it for mankind. Humans pretending that their resistance to the vaccine is grounded in something holy makes no difference. Regardless the source of rebellion … the commandment of God through the Apostle Peter to the New Testament church is clear. This world’s fits against each other are not what we are here to engage in as our religious work. When human authority gives an order – law, statute, regulation, ordinance, etc. – our duty is to see God’s amazing work in providence and submit to the authority.
“¶ Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.” (Romans 13:1-2)
The plagues God imposes upon the earth and her inhabitants will continue to grow. The stupefying ignorance of mankind in thinking they can undo God’s judgments against them will continue to grow. The rebellion of human beings against that authority and against each the other will continue to grow. That is a distinctly described piece of the undoing God’s Word promises to this world as part of the Revelation of Jesus Christ. (Revelation 6:3-4) In that hour, the church and her members are not about disobedience or about trying to fight and argue with each other and the world’s authority. We are about submitting to our God’s Word, His earth judgments, and the ordinance of man as expressions of God’s authority.
“Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.” (Revelation 13:10)