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Posted on 12/26/2025 7:53:07 AM PST by Morgana
The Rev. Joseph G. Crippen is the senior pastor of Mount Olive Lutheran Church, a small Lutheran church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, which is part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. (ELCA)
According to his church bio, he is a “gifted presider, counselor, and preacher who’s passionate about proclaiming God’s love for all people and serving the church as it seeks to faithfully pursue its mission.”
During a recent sermon on the gospel reading in Matthew 3, Crippen puts John the Baptist on blast, condemning him as a hate-filled, violence-encouraging, anti-Jesus bigot, and comparing his rhetoric criticizing the Pharisees and Sadducees to Trump cruelly insulting the Somalis in his state.
Specifically, his crashout seems to be over Matt 3:7-11, which he deems hateful, inflammatory, unloving, and lacking nuance.
“But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”
Crippen declares:
“No more of this,” Jesus cried out. On the night of Jesus’ arrest and trial, Peter slashed someone’s ear off to defend Jesus, and Jesus wanted none of it. “No more of this,” Jesus said, and healed the man’s ear.
I believe Jesus would say the same thing to John the Baptist about these harsh words. John did a lot of good. He pointed to Jesus as Messiah. He suggested very helpful, concrete ways to turn toward God in repentance. But this speech, it’s hate-filled, inflammatory, without nuance, and with all due respect to John, Jesus’ way has nothing to do with it.
He continues:
But you tell me, do you really think we need to hear more public leaders defame whole groups? Haven’t we had enough of that already? With the insults and the defamation? The easy stereotypes, the calls for destruction? A president who calls this week some of his own citizens “worthless, criminals, garbage” because they come from Somalia?
Who sees an immigrant do a bad thing and suddenly is filled with hate-filled rhetoric to ban all immigrants, including friends of this congregation who are dear to us. Aren’t you tired of hate-filled rhetoric that doesn’t see human beings, but publicly insults, offers stereotypes, invites violence?
He concludes:
But you might say, “well, this is John the Baptist, though. He’s preparing the way for Messiah. He’s on the right side.” And you might even say, “these are Pharisees and Sadducees after all. It’s likely they deserved it.”
Are you sure? Are you certain that every Pharisee and every Sadducee of this time deserve to be called “snakes?” Threatened with destruction, with being cut off from Abraham’s family? What about Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea?
Matthew says that these Pharisees and Sadducees came for John’s baptism. He doesn’t say they came to judge or critique. They apparently came for the same reason the others did, for a baptism of repentance. Yet John assumes they’re all wicked? They all have ulterior motives? That just seems wrong.
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“Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.”
Crippen objects to that.
I hope he isn’t related to the astronaut.
And there you have the reason for this diatribe.
And by the way, pastor Joe, it wasn’t John who overturned the tables of the money changers.
What about John 8: 44.
Christ as milksop who accepts everything, even the worst actions with no rebukes but a viewpoint that the Almighty loves diversity and forgives actions even when the actions offend Him enough to provoke Him.
That's what the left wants. It's schizophrenic.
these Pharisees and Sadducees came for John’s baptism. He doesn’t say they came to judge or critique. They apparently came for the same reason the others did, for a baptism of repentance.
And not to mention how judgy John the Baptist was over Herod’s divorce. The fellow got so worked up on that one it’s like he lost his mind.
This so-called pastor should set up shop in Somalia, where his message will be greeted with hugs and kisses. /SSS
No Other Gospel
Galatians 1: 6-10
6I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— 7not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. 8But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. 9As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.
10For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.
Herod lost his mind, and John lost his head.
Ok. Jesus called him the greatest person born of a woman. I’ll go with Jesus’ description.
Exactly.
methinks this ‘pastor’ will hear ‘depart from me I never knew you’ from Jesus
That’s odd: Jesus declared John the Baptist to be the best human ever, at least before His followers.
“Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.”
I’m sick to death of stupid, heretical preachers. Like James and John, I want to send fire down from heaven to destroy them—but I have to remember what Jesus said about that, that we don’t know what spirit we are if we think that way.
I believe the Lutherans use the Holy Bible:
Mathew 7 - “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”
So is his attacking John the Baptist not more of the same he says of the person he attacked?
wy69
Pastor has low ability to sift meaning from text.
God will ultimately separate from those who don’t believe, and obey Him...
I am guessing, but I am guessing 70% or so of the mainstream “Christian” churches have a soft spot in their hearts and brains for this pastors viewpoint. The muslims don’t need to kill the Christians. These types of pastors can do it for them.
I guess Rev. Crippen never got around to reading Jesus’ opinion of John the Baptist.
Truly I tell you, among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet whoever is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.
- Matthew 11:11
I wonder what this charlatan will say when (or if) he comes to this passage.
Matthew 23: 29 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous,
30 And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
31 Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets.
32 Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.
33 Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?
Another religious, crazy fruitcake walking around unmonitored in Minniesomalia.
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