“Keeping the peace and enforcing zoning laws is not ungodly, but annoying your neighbors in the name of Christ surely is.”
What specific violations? My guess is what annoys the neighbors is that they dislike how he chooses to worship outside of mainstream large denominational churches.
I don’t know the specifics, and you don’t either. I’m in Texas, you’re apparently in New Jersey.
What we do know is that this guy lives in a state that is friendly to Christians and that he’s been charged with violating 67 city code violations.
That’s way more than “annoying the neighbors.”
Maybe your town allows anybody to build anything for any purpose anywhere. Most don’t. I wouldn’t buy a house next to a church, even though I’m a faithful Christian who attends services several times a week — at a place where such facilities are permitted to build. This man, in violation of his city’s ordinances and over objections of his neighbors, built a church building in his back yard.
Not everyone who calls themselves a “church” is modeling Christian behavior.
This isn’t about freedom of religion but rather about being disrespectful of his neighbors, his neighborhood, and his city’s laws. That’s not Christ-like.