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It's Saturday, November 25, 2023.

Today’s edition covers a real estate deal threatening Armenians in Jerusalem, a US immigration rule that deprioritizes religious workers, and much more. Also in this issue: the execution of Achan’s family, and the motive of the First Crusade.

God is the One “who teaches man knowledge” (Psalm 94:10). If you know anything, God taught it to you. Here’s some more of that knowledge for you.

Of Christian Concern

LAND DEAL THREATENS ARMENIAN PRESENCE IN OLD JERUSALEM

A street in the Armenian Quarter, Jerusalem, Israel - photo by Zairon (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The Armenian presence in Old Jerusalem is under threat from a real estate deal signed in 2021. The head of the Armenian Church in Jerusalem says he was misled, and is taking legal action to annul the contract. 

The 99-year lease involves around one fourth of the Armenian Quarter in Old Jerusalem, and forfeits a community hall, a carpark, a garden, a seminary, and five residential homes to an Australian-Israeli businessman’s plans for a luxury hotel development.

Residents were unaware of the deal until earlier this year when surveyors arrived. Demolition of a carpark began last week, resulting in protests that were met by armed Israeli Jewish settlers, causing police to intervene.

Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem issued a statement to express “solidarity with the Armenian Patriarchate and community.” They state that the community is “a member of the Christian family in the Holy land,” and say these recent “provocations…threaten to erase the Armenian presence in the area, weakening and endangering the Christian presence in the Holy land.”

JOSH HAWLEY URGES STATE DEPARTMENT TO REDRESS HARMS TO RELIGIOUS WORKERS CAUSED BY IMMIGRATION RULE CHANGE

Missouri Senator Josh Hawley - photo by Natureofthought (CC BY-SA 4.0)

In a letter to the Bureau of Consular Affairs, Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri raised urgent concerns that a recent change in the US State Department’s immigration rules is adversely affecting foreign-born religious workers.

The type of visa affected is the employment-based, fourth preference category, called EB-4. The State Department, Hawley says, decided “it would no longer prorate EB-4 visa allocation” from three Central American countries: El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala. That means visa requests from these countries would be prioritized over other EB-4 applicants, including religious workers.

“As a direct result of this rule,” Hawley writes, “a missionary employed in my state will be forced to leave her family and wait abroad—for potentially more than a decade—until her visa is processed.”

According to immigration data that Hawley cites, this rule change ushered at least 84,168 people from those three countries, mostly unaccompanied youth, to the front of the queue to receive visas ahead of 866 religious workers.

“Concerningly,” the letter says, “the Biden Administration seems to have pushed Christian missionaries to the back of the visa line—and allowed illegal aliens to cut ahead of them.”

In light of these considerations, Hawley urges the bureau “to redress the harms to religious workers generated by your agency’s rule, including by advancing the priority date for religious workers.”

Also Noteworthy

→ An Arizona church’s outreach director, Hans Schmidt, was shot in the head while street preaching last Wednesday. As of last Friday, he remains in critical condition. His pastor told their congregation on Sunday, “We really need to pray for a quick recovery, believing God for a miracle in that.”

→ Anti-Christian hate crimes in Europe increased by 44% over the last year, according to the Annual Report 2022/23 by the Observatory of Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians In Europe (OIDAC Europe).

→ Americans’ trust in scientists has declined significantly (down 14 percentage points) since the beginning of COVID-19, though a large majority (73%) still claim confidence in scientists, according to a new Pew Research Center study. For an old but related opinion piece by Project 18:15 author Anthony Langer (yours truly), see here.

→ The National Center On Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) is calling for an investigation into Pornhub for additional crimes, following another investigation of Pornhub/Aylo for facilitating sex trafficking in conjunction with one of their websites.

→ Target is selling Christmas-themed LGBTQ products and hired a “Senior LGBTQIA+ Segmentation & Pride Lead,” despite backlash regarding its Pride merchandise earlier this year. The retail store beat third-quarter profit expectations, according to recent reports.

Content Catch-Up

Recent, notable content by Christian creators.*

→ 29 Days In Israel’s War Zone: A Jewish-Arab couple shares their experience of returning to Israel during a time of war, the story of their relationship, and how it relates to the true path to peace. (Video)

→ Women In Ministry: After a year of in-depth study on the topic, popular Bible teacher Mike Winger presents an 11-hour teaching covering “ALL The Debates Over 1 Tim 2:11-15.” (Video)

→ The Fatal Flaw: Apologia Studios calls attention to the major moral failure of the Pro-Life movement in a new half-hour documentary. (Video)

→ Wimpy, Weak, and Woke: John Cooper, vocalist of the popular rock band Skillet, discusses the backlash to the title of his new book, which aims to expose the godless philosophies behind our present “culture wars” and offer an alternative vision. (Podcast)

*Not necessarily an endorsement

The Bible, Briefly

Why Was Achan’s Family Executed?

The Stoning of Achan, Gustav Doré, 1891

In a 2012 talk on “Racism and Corporate Evil,” the late Tim Keller argues that responsibility for sin does not belong to an individual alone. Rather, there’s a corporate responsibility. In part, he makes this case from Joshua 7, which recounts the story of Achan, the ancient Israelite who brought guilt on Israel for taking forbidden plunder from Jericho.

Keller observes that not only Achan himself but also his entire family was stoned to death for his sin, despite their having no direct involvement. Keller concludes from this that there is corporate responsibility within a family.

On its own, the passage may lend itself to this interpretation, but consider the historical context. The divinely-inspired law of Moses had already been given, and that law states: “Fathers shall not be put to death because of their children, nor shall children be put to death because of their fathers. Each one shall be put to death for his own sin” (Deuteronomy 24:16).

This unequivocal statement precludes any possibility that the Lord would command Achan’s children to be put to death on account of Achan's sin. In fact, it expressly prohibits such an execution.

But why, then, was his family put to death? Keller says it’s because, by virtue of being his family, they had participated in helping him become the kind of person who would commit such a sin. However, were that the case, surely Achan's parents would also have been executed, but there’s no evidence they were. Achan’s father Zabdi is mentioned in verses 17-18, but is not included with Achan and his children during the execution in verses 24-25.

Others speculate that Achan’s immediate family members were found to be complicit “due to their common knowledge of the crime.” However, as Dr. Duane Garrett has observed, the right focus for interpreting a passage is only what the passage says, not what it does not say or additional information that is not present.*

In short, the passage does not explicitly say why the family was put to death. So, the reason is ultimately unknown. What is known, however, is that the Lord would not have commanded that Achan's children be executed for their father’s sin.

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*Duane Garrett, "Cain & Abel," 27800: Theology of the Old Testament (class lecture, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, KY, April 23, 2020).

Church History Tidbit

The Motive of the First Crusade

13th century miniature of the siege of Jerusalem during the First Crusade (Public Domain)

The Crusades were a series of religious wars between the 11th and 13th centuries initiated by Western European Christians against Muslims in the Holy Land.

Historians Carl Stephenson and Bryce Lyon attribute the First Crusade (1096) to “a number of developments.”* One of these was the rise of a Muslim military power called the Seljuk Turks. The Turks had dealt a significant blow and become an increasing threat to the Byzantine Empire, whose leaders appealed to the pope in Rome for help.

The papacy had already endorsed a number of “warlike enterprises,” and the new pope Urban II (inaugurated 1088), in the spirit of his predecessor Gregory VII, availed himself of the opportunity. He “dreamed of a magnificent Latin enterprise organized and controlled by the papacy—a great Christian offensive that should absorb and surpass the lesser offensives already begun.”

His primary motive: “to unite all Christendom in a war to recover the Holy Land, thus ending the schism with the Greeks as well as the local conflicts that had so long distracted Europe.” The plan had potential to combine and amplify other ongoing efforts, bring about a general peace “dictated by the church,” and greatly increase “the prestige of the papacy.”

In November of 1095, Urban held the Council of Clermont, during which he rallied the French to the “sacred cause” of taking Jerusalem back from the Turks. In reply, the entire assembly reportedly cried, “God wills it!”

Thousands soon devoted themselves to the campaign, which was launched in the autumn of 1096. It likely helped that crusaders’ families and possessions were promised protection by the pope, and the crusaders themselves were assured of entrance to heaven if they died in battle.

After years of tumult between various factions, a unified “Christian host eventually found itself encamped before Jerusalem” in June 1099. Within six weeks, the Muslim-controlled Jerusalem had fallen.

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*Carl Stephenson, Mediaeval History: Europe From the Second to the Sixteenth Century, Fourth Edition, ed. Bryce Lyon (New York: Harper & Row, 1962), 254-264.

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Why "18:15"? The name Project 18:15 is based on Proverbs 18:15: “An intelligent heart acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge.” The aim is for this weekly email—a Christian news briefing, a Bible study, and a Church history lesson rolled into one—to be one way you keep abreast of current events and acquire knowledge you might not acquire elsewhere.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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