RANCHO PALOS VERDES, Calif. — Pastor John Amanchukwu urged pastors and other Christians to speak boldly against the increasingly blatant evil in American culture, especially when others tell them to stay quiet.
“I have been told by prominent people on the Left and the Right that I need to tone it down,” Amanchukwu said during an impassioned message Wednesday evening at Turning Point USA’s Faith Forward Pastors Summit. “I’ve been told this by lying liberals and by ratchet RINOs. I’ve been told to just tone it down a little bit and take the edge off.”
Amanchukwu, a preacher from North Carolina who wrote the 2022 book Eraced: Uncovering the Lies of Critical Race Theory and Abortion, has been an outspoken critic of abortion, pornographic books in schools and cultural Marxism in its various forms, such as critical race theory and queer theory.
Amanchukwu has repeatedly gone viral on social media for confronting public school boards about the inappropriate reading material they provide to children, though he noted during his speech at the packed TPUSA event that some have dangled the possibility of a much bigger following if he backs off “the rainbow mafia.”
“Every time I’m told these things, it goes in one ear and out the other,” he said before going on to prompt the entire audience to cheer with him: “I will not shut up!”
“They want to take our voice and they want to take our message. And sadly, too many today have surrendered the truth of God’s Word just to fit in with the crowd,” he said.
Amanchukwu buttressed his point by citing the Gospel story in Mark 10 regarding Bartimaeus, the blind beggar whom Jesus healed after he cried out loudly despite those around him telling him to stop.
Noting he has been rebuked by fellow Christians who urge him to be less “inflammatory” when calling out cultural wickedness, Amanchukwu likened such discouragement to that which Bartimaeus faced.
“They were telling him, ‘Hey, beggar, be quiet. We’ve heard from you enough. Shut up. Tone it down. Don’t speak up. Don’t say anything. This is not your time to speak,'” Amanchukwu said. “And as a result of that, the Bible says, ‘But he cried the more a great deal.’ In other words, when they told him to tone it down, he got a little bit louder.”
Amanchukwu said the same attitude that animated Bartimaeus should drive American Christians as their prevailing culture increasingly descends into what he likened to Sodom and Gomorrah. He suggested that far too many pastors are more concerned about protecting themselves than fighting in the spiritual war manifesting in the culture.
“Too many Christians today want to be nice rather than being faithful,” he said. “Nice Christians see perversion, and they say, ‘I’m not going to judge it,’ but faithful Christians call a spade a spade,” he said.
Amanchukwu went on to quote Romans 13:12, which says, “The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.”
Given the relatively short window during which every Christian has to be faithful in their own generation, Amanchukwu urged his audience to make the most of it.
“In other words, we don’t have much time left,” he noted, later adding, “Now is not the time for the Church to tone it down. Now is not the time for us to shut up. Now is not the time for us to be quiet.”
Jon Brown is a reporter for The Christian Post. Send news tips to jon.brown@christianpost.com
