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Jody LaMacchia, Chair of the Oakland County Democrat Party and candidate for State Representative, was "triggered" by a local billboard's simple message:

"The government won't save you but Jesus will. Put down your mask and pick up your Bible!"

LaMacchia took to Facebook to post a rant that plainly expressed the radical left's attitude toward religion and government that it usually takes great pains to conceal:



In the first sentence, Jody LaMacchia levels an all-too-common attack on free speech by accusing the statement of having "put our Oxford neighbors in harm's way." To leftists like Jody LaMacchia, their own opinions are undeniable truth, and everyone else has no agency. This is the mindset necessary for the statement "put down your mask" to be interpreted to mean "put our neighbors in harm's way."

This statement alone illustrates how dangerous someone with this mindset can be but LaMacchia continues: "You're alive because of the very policies [mask mandates] enacted by Democrats."

Again, the contempt for the individual – and for science, which has found no evidence masks have done anything to prevent the spread of the Chinese coronavirus – is breathtaking.

But LaMacchia blunders on, and dares to say "Jesus is cringing." To the left, leftists speak for God.

And as is their habit, LaMacchia mangles a passage in the Bible she does not understand to make her point. Romans 13:1-2, she claims, says "Obey the government, for God is the one who has put it there."

To begin with, this is not even a faithful translation of Romans. "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," is the King James translation. "Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God," reads the New International Version. These translations are clearer. Paul says lawful authorities deserve obedience, not that there is only one lawful institutional authority that must be obeyed.

The Grace Community Church in southern California understands the true meaning of the passage. As they explained in a statement released on July 24, 2020:

Scripture does mandate careful, conscientious obedience to all governing authority, including kings, governors, employers, and their agents (in Peter’s words, “not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable” [1 Peter 2:18]). Insofar as government authorities do not attempt to assert ecclesiastical authority or issue orders that forbid our obedience to God’s law, their authority is to be obeyed whether we agree with their rulings or not. In other words, Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2 still bind the consciences of individual Christians. We are to obey our civil authorities as powers that God Himself has ordained.

However, while civil government is invested with divine authority to rule the state, neither of those texts (nor any other) grants civic rulers jurisdiction over the church. God has established three institutions within human society: the family, the state, and the church. Each institution has a sphere of authority with jurisdictional limits that must be respected. A father’s authority is limited to his own family. Church leaders’ authority (which is delegated to them by Christ) is limited to church matters. And government is specifically tasked with the oversight and protection of civic peace and well-being within the boundaries of a nation or community. God has not granted civic rulers authority over the doctrine, practice, or polity of the church. The biblical framework limits the authority of each institution to its specific jurisdiction. The church does not have the right to meddle in the affairs of individual families and ignore parental authority. Parents do not have authority to manage civil matters while circumventing government officials. And similarly, government officials have no right to interfere in ecclesiastical matters in a way that undermines or disregards the God-given authority of pastors and elders.

When any one of the three institutions exceeds the bounds of its jurisdiction it is the duty of the other institutions to curtail that overreach. Therefore, when any government official issues orders regulating worship (such as bans on singing, caps on attendance, or prohibitions against gatherings and services), he steps outside the legitimate bounds of his God-ordained authority as a civic official and arrogates to himself authority that God expressly grants only to the Lord Jesus Christ as sovereign over His Kingdom, which is the church. His rule is mediated to local churches through those pastors and elders who teach His Word (Matthew 16:18–19; 2 Timothy 3:16–4:2).

Read their full statement here.

Secular leftists happily use any quote from the Bible if the plain text of a statement serves their point. They don't understand the context.

Paul says in Romans that lawful authorities deserve obedience. Paul lived under the pagan tyranny of Nero. The passage is a call for order, not acceptance.

To secular leftists like Jody LaMacchia, the government is God itself.

This is why they so desperately want power over the public. They are moral busybodies.

And if they remain in power, Rome is our future.