Neil Shenvi and Stubborn Demons Only Removed By Prayer and Fasting
In coming days, woke evangelicals will reinvent and regroup. Cast them out anyway.
And he said to them, "This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting." - Jesus (Mark 9:29)
Some disagreement exists on the translation of Mark 9:29. The KJV includes “…and fasting,” but most newer translations only say “prayer,” arguing that the older and most reliable manuscripts don’t include it.
Either way, the message is essentially the same. Some demons flee easily enough, by the power of Jesus’ name. Other demons, however, are particularly resistant to anything but intense spiritual focus on the part of the Christian.
Woke evangelicals are the second variety of demon. It takes significant spiritual work to get them to leave and not come back.
Anyone paying close attention to the horrible fight in conservative evangelical circles (particularly in the SBC) between woke progressives and actual Christians, is familiar with Neil Shenvi. They know his name, although perhaps little else about him, because whenever a woke evangelical leader is caught red-handed spewing the demonic propaganda of Critical Theory or woke ideology, Neil Shenvi suddenly manifests, defending them against accusations of leftism.
Sometimes, it’s quite a ridiculous ploy.
For example, despite JD Greear (Shenvi’s pastor) mainlining the IV drip of CRT directly into his church’s veins via sermons and lectures bought from Docent Group, Shenvi - with a straight face - absolves Greear of all charges. Repeatedly. No matter the evidence.
We’ve seen it occur in social media a thousand times if we’ve seen it once.
The evidence against supposedly “conservative” evangelical leaders (who are declared conservative only by the virtue of their denominational affiliation, and nothing else) who have been taken captive by “vain philosophies and empty lies” (Colossians 2:8) has been so obvious that their jig, essentially, is up.
Nobody in legitimately conservative evangelicalism has any regard for JD Greear, on really any level at all, simply on account of the evidence being presented and verdict coming in that yes, indeed he has taught Critical Theory and did so with gusto. I am willing to concede that Greear did not know - at the time - that he was teaching critical theory, because he admitted to buying sermons from the Democrat-led Docent Research Group. But teach Critical Theory, he certainly did.
But, it’s not just CRT. It was also the #ChurchToo finger-pointing that was used to bludgeon innocent men and foster disunity in the SBC. It was also the “soft (or flacid) complementarianism” promoted in SBC circles, which is egalitarianism by another name. It was the “softening tone” of evangelicals on homosexuality, when Shenvi’s pastor said the Bible only “whispers” about homosexuality, while pleading that evangelicals drop the subject.
Shenvi is a hatchet man, a goon, an apologist for the devil. This is quite literally his full time schtick. And it works like this:
Present yourself as an expert, opposed to these various liberalisms.
Credentialed as an opponent of liberalisms, defend everyone guilty of said liberalisms, on the grounds that you’re an expert.
The concept is called Controlled Opposition, which I’ll write about later today at Protestia.
Did I fail to mention that? I’ve been back for a while.
Anyway, Controlled Opposition is a tactic employed by those in power to mimic a protest movement, but they are, in fact, led by those friendly to the power regime.
The benefit to those in power is immeasurable; their Controlled Opposition will either (1) intentionally appear clownish to onlookers, diminishing the legitimacy of the protest, or (2) allow the movement to ‘take out’ low-level targets to appear genuine, but largely leave those holding power untouched.
One-party states, like the former Soviet Union, perfected Controlled Opposition as a tactic. Even in a one-party state, there will be dissidents. But the Soviet Union figured out quickly that if a small dissident faction was going to exist no matter what, it would find an outlet to protest somehow. But if Communist leaders controlled the opposition, their protests could do no real harm. That’s how it works.
This is so widely known as a tactic, that when Democrats put on their hoods and tried to join a Trump flotilla last month from a boat with racist signage, Republicans ran them over with their own boats. Or, a few years ago, when Feds put on masks and showed up at an anti-government event posing as racists, they were ran off by bikers. That’s Controlled Opposition tactic 1.
An example Controlled Opposition tactic 2 would be Russell Moore - a lifelong Democrat - running the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), waxing poetic about the unborn and imago dei, while systematically undermining the pro-life movement, supporting Democrat politicians, and never using the budget of the ERLC to lift a finger to fight abortion or promote Christian liberty in any measurable way.
At this point, let me transition:
Evangelicals have stopped listening, almost entirely, to those who Neil Shenvi has spent the last several years defending. As we saw, those associated with The Gospel Coalition, the ERLC, or any of the other Democrat PACs masquerading as parachurch ministries, failed in what they attempted. They demonstrated, a week ago today, that they influence precisely 0% of the evangelical vote.
They told us God didn’t care how we voted, and we voted for Trump. They told us Trump had no character, and we voted for Trump. They told us Trump wasn’t pro-life enough, and we voted for Trump. They told us Trump was an insurrectionist, and we voted for Trump. They told us it was okay not to vote at all, and we still managed to wade through a sea of blue-haired fat ladies with nose rings and we voted for Trump.
Their jig is up, more than any jig has been upped before. We upped that jig so hard.
So, with their propaganda failing, they’ll be gone now, right? Wrong. This type of demon is only removed by persistence.
Those who have fought tooth, fang, and claw to warn people about evangelicals who have been hired by (or voluntarily sold out to) leftists to open our churches to the vain philosophies of Karl Marx, Ibram Kendi, and Robin DiAngelou, passed a brick through our collective bowels when we saw PragerU post a video of Neil Shenvi discussing Critical Theory as an expert.
We all face-palmed ourselves so hard that there was a noticeable dip in the conservative evangelical Ibuprofen supply yesterday.
It is indeed a struggle to convey to Prager U why what Shenvi says is wrong in this video is somehow wrong. And that’s because it’s not wrong. It’s all, 100% correct. The problem is, Shenvi uses his ability to understand and convey the ills of wokeness to absolve all the proponents of woke Christianity he possibly can. He can then say, with a straight face, “I am an expert on wokeness. I know woke. And David French isn’t woke.”
Imagine, if you will, someone like Bill Kristol who uses the same tactic. “I know conservativism,” he can say, “now let me tell you why Republicans should vote for Kamala Harris.”
Controlled. Opposition.
Neil Shenvi is The Lincoln Project of evangelicalism. Pretending as though he is on our side, he will predictably take the wrong side 100% of the time.
Prager U needs to understand that all the right people - the type who financiallly support Prager U or have a subscription to Daily Wire+ (raises hand) - despise Shenvi. But all the wrong people who lament so-called extreme, far-right conservatism, love Shenvi.
If you appreciate my work, consider throwing me a bone and getting a paid subscription for less than it takes Russell Moore to get his eyebrows waxed, at only $8 a month or $80 a year. You’ll also get exclusively paid content.
I’ll admit that the typical evangelical can’t comprehend that the politics inside evangelicalism is so dire and disgusting and dark that Controlled Opposition exists within our ranks. And they’re the ones easily taken advantage of by Shenvi. And I’ll also admit that it’s unrealistic to assume that a religious, non-orthodox Jew like Dennis Prager would understand the complexities of the evangelical political climate.
But maybe that’s why Shenvi hitched himself to Prager U. Perhaps, in the devil’s thinking, an organization headed up by a Jewish man would be one of the very few places that wouldn’t understand the systemic undermining of the conservative evangelical cause that Shenvi represents.
David Morrill’s caution is astute. He wrote, “Woke evangelicalism believes that it lost influence over the pews to conservative politics. It will attempt to infiltrate conservative politics to get it back.”
Dang right, that’s what is happening.
I saw something similar in Andrew T. Walker’s sudden appeals to Trump on X, suggesting various policy positions for Trump to take. But I’m sorry, homie, you don’t get to attack POTUS for 8 years through your Democrat PAC masquerading as an evangelical liberty organization and then get to cozy up to Trump after he won (without a single ounce of your support).
Folks, some demons just don’t leave easily. We Christians sometimes have to play whack-a-mole with the devil’s imps. And, if we aren’t diligent, a demon is exorcised only for us to clean the house, and then they come back with seven friends (Matthew 12:45).
The Bible says demons “wander through deserts without water,” looking for a home (Matthew 12:43). Largely, as we saw on Tuesday, the devils afflicting evangelicals and trying to corrupt us in the cause of leftism, were exorcised. And right now, they’re wandering around looking for a new home.
It’s our job, as polemics-minded Christians, to make sure they don’t make a home in conservative politics.
Cast them out.
Amen.