Piper Off the Rails
For some time I’ve been wanting to respond to John Piper’s article: “A Reason to Be Vaccinated: Freedom”. I’ve put it off over and over because I find it a very difficult piece to write. Not because it’s a challenge; no, to the contrary. It’s as though you took your kid to an Easter egg hunt and wound up in a factory chicken farm with 100,000 hens, each laying an egg every 16 hours. Where do you start, and what’s the fun in it?
You likely have strong opinions on the entire “Covid” scenario, and it’s futile to try to sway them one way or another in this short article. So this is not a re-hash of “Covid” arguments, or “vaccination” arguments, rather, a critique of Piper’s totally backward, totally illogical pseudo-scriptural treatment of the subject that can shed only confusion in the minds of his readers. Let’s see if we can wade through that neck-deep pool of muck so skillfully packaged in such a short space.
Piper goes off the rails fairly early in his article…the title: “A Reason to Be Vaccinated: Freedom”. In actuality, there are numerous reasons stated in the article to get vaccinated. Most of them are at the very best marginally debatable and will prove in time to be wrong. But the title pretty much says that just because you are free to get vaccinated, go ahead and do it, and there is nothing in the article that clarifies this dumb assertion. You’re also free to live on three Happy Meals per day…but it’s probably not a good idea.
Before addressing the next point where Piper goes off track…the first sentence of the article…we need to examine Piper’s frame of reference. Piper bases his case on “statistics”. “Before I get to the biblical argument for radical freedom, consider a few statistics that fuel the fire over which this article was cooked.” Statistics are cited from mainstream media, who are regurgitating statistics from the establishment/corporate/government/pharmaceutical agencies…the same people who think, insist, and report that human gender is a matter of choice. I get it, if you are going to use statistics, you have to use someone’s statistics. But to uncritically repeat such information, with no recognition of the godless biases behind them, or consideration mentioned for moderating them, is stupid at best and evil at worst.
So, on to the second mistake Piper makes…in the first sentence of the article. Piper says: “My aim in this article is to encourage Christians to be vaccinated, if they can do so with a good conscience and judicious medical warrant.” This is humorously reminiscent of the scene often repeated in westerns, where it is said of the hastily rounded-up villains: “give them a fair trial and hang them”. It assumes a conclusion yet to be reached. To be fair, it could be argued that there are some instances where all the evidence could be weighed and a shaky conclusion could be in favor of “vaccination”. I’m thinking, in an attempt to be fair (perhaps beyond reason) of frail elderly who are possibly more prone to danger than others. But Piper gives no indication that he is not speaking of Christians, and the population as a whole, in general. And the assumption is that all the advice given by the corporate/establishment/government cabal is good and Godly advice. One has to be an unthinking and unquestioning devotee of the zeitgeist to think this way.
In the third paragraph, Piper elaborates on the “give them a fair trial then hang them” fallacy: “If the shoe fits, put it on, check your conscience, consult your doctor, and go get vaccinated.” See, Piper knows that your doctor will tell you to get the shot, and that your doctor will be right in telling you so. Because Piper’s faith, apparently, is in the same people who can’t decide which rest room to use. Somehow, though, I can just hear Piper’s knee-jerk question to anyone challenging the statistics put out by those who he so trusts: “are you a medical doctor”? No Mr. Piper…are you?
Piper: “When people respond to this increasingly clear reality by pointing to untrustworthy and disreputable government and medical leaders, I respond, “That’s a non sequitur.” The team called “vaccination” just made a first down, even if monkeys are holding the chains.” We’ll see, John, we’ll see.
Next is Piper’s “biblical case”, which is a maze of truisms mixed with Piper-esque pietism and Bible verses that apply to the case only once you approach it from Piper’s twisted worldview. The conclusion that he seems to want us to draw…and which he fails to make…is that if you don’t support vaccination, you just aren’t spiritual.
The crown jewel: “My point is this: Don’t be enslaved by fear of man. Don’t be enslaved by the fear of breaking ranks with ideological allies. The old name for this is peer pressure. You are free.” Apparently in Piperland, the Christians who need to be encouraged, and whose freedom is at stake, are not those who have been thrown out of their jobs, or cannot visit their loved one dying in the hospital, or are wondering if they will be allowed to grocery shop (or be allowed out of their houses) two months from now because of the decrees of the godless Communists who have seized the reins of power. No, Piper needs to encourage the majority to be courageous enough to stand with the majority, do what they are told, exactly as they are told, along with Piper himself and everyone else who will maintain favor with the godless spirit of the age and its handlers. Maybe Mr. Piper and his courageous followers will see fit to use their tremendous courage to send the rest of us a few cans of Campbell’s soup after we’re banned from the grocery stores.
Shame on you, John Piper, for turning against those brothers and sisters who most need encouragement in this exceedingly and increasingly wicked age. But frankly, where encouragement is needed, we will be looking elsewhere.
-Jim Mogel