Greetings. This is Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church with a moment of truth, where we challenge you to think through an important issue of life and faith. Today, mobs, messiahs, and manipulators, part two. But I want to emphasize today, who are the manipulators behind the scenes? We don't often think about this.

Who are the manipulators behind the scenes, provoking the mobs and financing the messiahs? No mob ever demonstrates or riots for the ends they think they're on the streets for. There are always others with different motives who manipulate the passions of the mob. Edgar Allan Poe said this about mobs. He says, the nose of a mob is its imagination, and by this, at any time, it can be quietly led.

Poe knew mobs. There were plenty of them in the 19th century in America. Leaders, there are a plenty. Manipulators, there are a plenty. It is our purpose today to introduce you to those in the past who have quietly led mobs, and those in the present who are quietly leading the mobs.

We see in the streets today, and we will see in the streets this summer. Make no mistake about this, dear listener. There will be riots. There will be mobs. There will be chaos in the streets.

We can foresee that. You don't have to be a prophet or the son of a prophet to see this coming, both at the Democrat and Republican national conventions and any other incident that may flourish or flare into existence in the course of the summer. Now, last week, we saw how the summer of this election year is going to be one of mobs and messiahs. Will we fall prey to the mentality of the mob, you and I, Christians, even if we never actually become part of a mob in the streets of Cleveland at the Republican national convention or in Philadelphia at the Democrat national convention?

Passions have been so provoked in this election cycle that taking sides with candidates is equivalent to joining a mob in the streets, or even though one never ventures from his cell phone, iPad, or laptop. I have received emails, for example, phone messages that equate Trump with a godless antichrist and Ted Cruz with a saintly messiah figure and a kind of political schizophrenia to others equate Ted Cruz with an unprincipled new world order tool of the Bush family. And Trump is the only true patriot who understands what's at stake in fighting the globalist elite 1% who want to dominate the rest of us. No.

And then, of course, on the Democrat side, you have the passion of the Bernie bots who love Bernie Sanders and see him as a fresh alternative to the corrupt establishment gangster Hillary Klingon, as I like to call her, who only wants to maintain the status quo of the Democrat establishment that is so well served by the Obama administrations. Well, these passions, or factions, as Madison calls them in Federalist Paper No. 10, these passions are the very thing that drives the masses of people into the streets and turns them into mobs. The Apostle James in the Bible asks this pertinent question that we must all answer this summer.

What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? Unquote. Passion, William Penn says, talking about passions and political passions, he says, passion is the mob of the man that commits a riot upon his reason. That's one of my favorites.

Passion is the mob of the man that commits a riot upon his reason. You do not have to leave the peaceful Idaho hills for the streets of a big city to have the mentality of the mob. Passion is the mob of the man, Penn says. What are the passions stirred in us by the contending candidates this election season? We must be ever so careful that the thoughts, feelings, and opinions provoked by the important issues and persons in this election cycle do not drive us to the irrational behavior of the mob.

Author Dan Simmons says, mobs have passions, not brains. Good succinct summary, mobs have passions, not brains. Paul cautions Christians especially about letting passions carry us away into hatred and alienation. Paul says this to Titus, for example, we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. Unquote.

These are the passions, I'm afraid, that are stirred in this election season. And what few people realize is that there are often brains behind mobs, skillful manipulators of human behavior that use the action, energy, and force of the mob for their own ends. This has been true since the days of Jesus when the Sanhedrin gathered, coached, and directed the mob that gathered in the courtyard of the Roman procurator in Judea, Pontius Pilate. Do you remember from your reading of the Bible? The ostensible reason the Sanhedrin wanted the crowd to call for the death of Jesus was for the release of a local hero, Barabbas, who was an insurrectionist.

That is, he was a freedom fighter with the zealots, and he had murdered Roman occupiers. He was a hero to the people. And Matthew tells us, now the chief priests and elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus from Matthew 27. But Matthew also tells the real reason the Sanhedrin wanted Jesus killed. Pilate knew, Matthew says, Pilate knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered him up.

Oh, the Sanhedrin had long ago perceived what was at stake. They said in one meeting, if we let him go on like this, that is, Jesus, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation, unquote. Our place and our nation, they considered Israel, the Sanhedrin did, just like all special interest groups. And here, contemporary-wise, I include the Republican and Democrat establishment. And just like all special interest groups throughout history, the Sanhedrin knew that Jesus threatened their soft, cushy lifestyle.

They were not going to give it up without a fight, and neither will the Republican or Democrat establishment. Well, therefore, the Sanhedrin tell the mob one thing, that is, riot on behalf of a true pastor, Barabbas, while they seek to use the mob for another clandestine purpose, that is, to kill Jesus. In fact, Matthew tells us that the Sanhedrin was successful in their plot.

The Bible says, so when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, that is, in trying to release Jesus, so when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, I am innocent of this man's blood. See to it yourselves, unquote. A riot was beginning amongst the mob. As it was in Jesus' day, so it ever has been when politics merges with mobs. What all men understand intuitively, if not consciously, is that the authority of a mob is the anarchy it brings.

The power of the mob is the irrational wholesale destruction it brings. There is authority to a mob. There is power in a mob. The authority of the mob is the anarchy it brings, and the power of the mob is the irrational wholesale destruction it brings. Now, Saul Alinsky understands this.

He wrote Rules for Radicals, which is the handbook for modern Marxist radicals in these days, for leftist radicals. It was for Barack Obama. In fact, Hillary Clinton wrote her college thesis on Saul Alinsky in his book, Rules for Radicals. Saul Alinsky says this, then, about mobs. He puts it euphemistically, too.

Listen to this. The power of the have-nots rests only with their numbers. That is, the mob. He goes on to say, power has always derived from two main sources, money and people. Lacking money, the have-nots must build their power.

They're perhaps maybe nuts as well, but the have-nots must build power from their own flesh and blood, Alinsky says. He goes on to say, a mass movement expresses itself with mass tactics, euphemistic for riots and mobs. He goes on to say, against the finesse and sophistication of the status quo, the have-nots have always had to club their way, unquote. Implicit violence, explicit violence right there, isn't it? That was Saul Alinsky in his Handbook for Radicals, Handbook for Leftists, then, Rules for Radicals.

A mob is a terrifying thing when once it gets rolling, wreaking anarchy and destruction, all men recoil in horror at anarchy and destruction in the political order. And when they are given the stark choice between the two, they prefer just what Pilate gave them, tyranny and injustice versus anarchy and destruction. The manipulators of mobs and messiahs, they know this, too. Community organizers are exhibit A in this regard.

When Barack Obama burst upon the American political scene in 2008, he was introduced as a community organizer, as if it were some altruistic social worker function, when, in fact, the job description meant that he agitated in neighborhoods for radical social change. This is what Obama did then in Chicago as an organizer, and it is what he is doing now in Washington, D.C., as president, organizer-in-chief, if you will. Once a community organizer, always a community organizer. The community organizer is a disciple, then, of Saul Alinsky, previously mentioned, whose Bible is Rules for Radicals.

Alinsky worked in the poor neighborhoods of Chicago in the early to middle parts of the 20th century, where he brought about social change through controversial tactics that sometimes ended in violence. Well, this originates in Alinsky's view of the necessity of conflict. Listen to this very carefully, listener, because it is a principle of the left, even today. There is a necessity to conflict to achieve one's ends. Alinsky says in his Rules for Radicals, the organizer is immediately confronted with conflict.

The organizer dedicated to changing the life of a particular community must first rub raw the resentments of the people of the community. Does that sound familiar? Fan the latent hostilities, Alinsky says. Fan the latent hostilities of many of the people to the point of overt expression, a euphemism for riots. He must search out, Alinsky says.

The organizer must search out controversy and issues rather than avoid them, for unless there is controversy, people are not concerned enough to act, unquote. Do you see the strategy here? Oh, you conservatives, you Republicans who just want to move on from issues like gay rights or abortion? Oh, conflict is inherent in the left, and unless you learn to deal with it, you're going to capitulate every time, as conservatives and Republicans do all the time. Alinsky's disciples, like Barack Obama, have refined this technique, and they continue to use it today, conflict, as we see in Ferguson, Missouri.

It will be used this summer in Cleveland, Ohio, as the resentments of the people of the community are rubbed raw, and the latent hostilities, as Alinsky calls them, of many people are fanned until they find overt expression, that is, in riots. Alinsky's book, Rules for Radicals, became the handbook for protest and change on the left ever since. It still serves as the handbook for those protesting Donald Trump's rallies, and they will be consulted this summer, too, in Cleveland at the Republican National Convention.

Make no mistake, resentments will be rubbed raw against Trump, and hostilities will be fanned, and will be expressed overtly, that is, in mob behavior and riots. Cynically, Obama and those around him have employed Alinsky's methods the entire eight years of his administration. How naive and gullible we were. So convinced were we, and by we, I mean euphemistically, the low information voter. So convinced were we that merely electing a mixed-race president would solve all of our conflicts, that we refused to submit him to the level of scrutiny required of so important an office.

That would be racist to question his background and past activity. Would most of America have voted for him if they realized that rather than bringing peace and healing to the races, he would deliberately bring conflict and hostility to the races? Would the Nobel Prize Peace Committee have awarded him the Nobel Prize for Peace so hastily if they knew that instead of bringing peace to American race and ethnic and class differences, he would rather deliberately agitate conflict? He's a true son and disciple of Alinsky.

Alinsky says this in his Rules for Radicals About Conflict, once again, as organizer, or I'm sorry, Alinsky says, an organizer must stir up dissatisfaction and discontent, provide a channel into which the people can angrily pour their frustrations. The job then is getting the people to move, to act, to participate, in short, to develop and harness the necessary power to effectively conflict with the prevailing patterns and change them. When those prominent in the status quo turn and label you an agitator, they are completely correct, for that is, in one word, your function. The organizer is to agitate to the point of conflict, unquote.

Saul Alinsky in Rules for Radicals, and how successful Obama has been. If community organizer is synonymous with agitator, then Obama has achieved his goal. Every faction in America imaginable, racial faction, gender faction, ethnic faction, political faction, religious faction, is far more agitated today than when he took office. Peace has not come, issues are not resolved, and America is not united. In fact, a case can be made that we have never been so divided since the Civil War.

So, know, oh listener, that the mobs and violence you see this summer, whether at the political conventions or in the streets of our major cities, owing to some yet unforeseen racial incident, they have, as their manipulators, are very present and the men and women like him. The mobs may think they have their agenda and their purpose, like perhaps reacting to a cop, killing a local person maybe, but the manipulators have their own wider agenda and purpose. Things like expanding their own power and authority, just as the Justice Department did in taking over the Ferguson Police Department.

It is virtually a federal police department now, and others across the country are being federalized as well. Obama and Alinsky are only drawing upon a well-established tradition in the communist Marxist left, too, I would submit to you. Men like Mao Zedong were manipulators of mobs as well, long before Barack Obama saw the light of day. The classic model for the use of mobs and violence for political ends is the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, designed and implemented by Chairman Mao himself. If nothing else, Mao was a cunning genius of terror.

And one biographer of Mao puts it this way. He says, in June of 1966, Mao intensified the terrorization of society. He picked as his first instrument of terror young people in schools and universities. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. He goes on to say, which, of course, is the natural hotbed for activists.

Young people in schools and universities. Does this sound familiar? Intent upon a purge of enemies, both real and imagined. Mao began a propaganda campaign whose theme was Guard the Great Helmsman. The student troops of terror that emerged were labeled famously then the Red Guard guarding Mao.

They would do just as the social justice warriors of today's modern Red Guard on American campuses do. They would scream slogans and epithets in the faces of reactionary bourgeois professors and cultural icons in China. Even those loyal and long-standing members of the party that had helped Mao achieve power. But now Mao was ready to purge. Well, Mao found his tactics even more successful than first expected.

And so Mao had all classes in China's universities suspended in June of 1966 so that they could give their full time then to social justice. Mao said this about that time. He says, now lessons are stopped and young people are given food. They're given food. Wow.

Because food was at that time in short supply because of Mao's policy to ship already short supplies of food abroad as a token of goodwill to spread his doctrine of Marxism, starving his own people. While Mao goes on to say, with food they have energy and they want to riot. What are they expected to do if not to riot? The mobs of brainwashed, propagandized zombie students were unleashed upon society and they did just that. They rioted.

Does this sound familiar, listener? It is the brainwashed students of today's campuses that are doing exactly the same thing at the behest of Maoist community organizers who are following Mao's playbook. To show you how effective these Maoist trainers have been, why? Brown College, for example. Brown College students complained recently to the dean that classes and homework are interfering with their social justice activism.

The college campus newspaper says this, there are people breaking down, dropping out of classes and failing classes because of the activism work they are taking on. How effective then are the Maoists with this technique? Well, let me just remind you here as we're about halfway through our broadcast. I am Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church. We meet for holy worship on Sunday at 10 a.m. at 101 4th Street on the corner of 4th and Boulevard.

Call us for comments, perhaps, or feedback at 523-0196. Or you can check out our website, too, newgenevaopc.org. And we have a new website, too, a brand new website where you will find past messages. Many of you have been asking for copies of these messages. Well, we put them up on a brand new website, which is called omnispotestas.org.

I have to spell that for you, omnispotestas, which means all authority. And it's spelled O-M-N-I-S dash P-O-T-S-T-A-S. dot org then. So that's omnispotestas, O-M-N-I-S dash P-O-T-E-S-T-A-S dot org. Well, to show you what's coming, dear listener, as we today are talking about mobs, messiahs, and manipulators, there is a thing coming down the pike. During the Cultural Revolution begun on college campuses in China, during the Cultural Revolution, millions of Chinese were either killed or committed suicide.

Many of them committed suicide, which was the only honorable way out in Oriental society when humiliated or shamed as the Red Guards made them. Well, millions of idealistic Chinese students were conned into thinking they were helping the Great People's Revolution come about. They were advancing the Great Leap Forward. They were moving their nation into the brighter future, just like today's social justice warriors think they're doing on American campuses. Their manipulators, however, are deliberately aping the tactics of Mao.

These are virtual red brigades of our own in the Cultural Revolution. Perhaps you remember from the Obama White House, former communications director Anita Dunn telling a group of high school students, my two favorite philosophers are Mao Zedong and Mother Teresa, unquote. Everyone, even her defenders, admitted that this was an inexcusable gaffe for supposed communications director to be communicating to the country. But it was revealing this administration is communicating precisely what Mao was communicating to the students on Chinese campuses. What are they expected to do if not to riot, as Mao says?

Well, this brings us to another very important component of the manipulators of mobs and messiahs, that is, those who finance and support the mobs. For example, although the mainstream media tried to report that the Ferguson protests and riots were made up of grassroots Americans who spontaneously rose up to oppose racist police and justice systems, we now know that the community organizers and agitators who led not only the local mobs but also brought in trained protesters bust into Ferguson, they were all financed by radical progressive billionaire George Soros.

All of these people incurred costs of travel and food and lodging, loss of work, nothing of which could be borne in its entirety by the principles. Not to worry, though, a sugar daddy of socialism was there with a slush fund. And according to the Washington Times, in an article written by Kelly Rydell, the Washington Times, no less, they say that Soros has funded the Ferguson protests and riots with at least $33 million since August of 2014 when it all began. And there is more to come for this summer, too, dear listener. So this distinction is important to make.

While the local citizens were furious with their police and court system for perceived racism and injustice, I say perceived because it wasn't so in reality, then the mobs were seeking to redress those grievances. The Times reports that Soros paid community organizers of Marxist groups like Black Lives Matter to rile up the black and extreme left community in order to create as much civil unrest as possible with the ultimate goal of tearing down the heart and soul of America, the article says. That is capitalism and the free market system.

Thus you have, once again, the ostensible goal of the mob in their own minds, but the real hidden goal of those who manipulate the mob. The masses turned into mobs always think they're doing one thing while the manipulators use them for another thing. Today's social justice warriors on American campuses are in reality being used by the left to achieve Marxist ends, not community ends. Soros and men like him, President Obama and former Attorney General Eric Holder included, they are out to tear down the heart and soul of America that is capitalism and the free market system. Listener, this fact cannot be overemphasized.

The masses of the people are transformed into violent mobs by manipulators who use the passions and grievances of the masses to steer them in a direction that they desire. The nose of the mob, as Poe says, the nose of the mob is imagination. And by this, at any time, it can be quietly led. If you are a Christian listening to this message today, know that there are no good mobs in the Bible. No such thing.

It's an oxymoron. What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? The Apostle James asks, is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? This is the heart of the mob. The mob sought to rape the angels in Lot's refuge that is his home in Sodom.

The mob sought to slay Jesus at the behest of the Sanhedrin, crying out, crucify him, crucify him. The mob sought to stone Stephen to death, crying out with a loud voice, stopping their ears, and rushing together at him, stoning him to death. Numerous mobs, as we saw last week, sought to kill the Apostle Paul as he preached the gospel throughout the Gentile world. So, dear listener, dear Christian brother and sister, do not succumb to the siren song of the mob. There is only one crowd, one assembled body that the Bible recognizes as legitimate, and that is the body of Christ.

The heavenly host of believers assembled in the heavenlies. The author of Hebrews says this, you have come to Mount Zion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant. Unquote. Also, we see then the multitudes in heaven, too, in the book of Revelation.

John says this in Revelation 7, I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes, and peoples, and languages, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb. Unquote. This is our community, brothers and sisters. We're in Christ, dear brothers and sisters in Christ. Remember who you are this summer, as the debate rages over who will lead our executive branch as president.

He or she is no Messiah. There is only one Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. The mobs burning, and looting, and destroying are not your people. They're not your community. The multitude that no one can number, from every nation, tribe, and people.

These are your people. The church. The cynical manipulators who wish to steer and use mob action for their own nefarious ends. Men like Soros, and Obama, and Holder. These are not your benefactors.

The Holy Spirit of God directing his church. He's the one who loves you, and intends the best for you. Remember that this summer. This summer, dear Christian, dear fellow listener, give yourself to Christ and his church, not the devil and his mob. This has been Pastor David Bass at New Geneva Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

We meet for holy worship on Sunday at 10 a.m. at 101 4th Street on the corner of 4th and Boulevard. Call us at 523-0196, 523-0196, or check out our website, newgenevaopc.org, and our new website, where you'll find a catalog of past messages for your perusal, and that is omnispotestas.org, O-M-N-I-S-P-O-T-E-S-T-A-S.org, omnispotestas.org.