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Chapter 1 to WOKE JESUS: The False Messiah Destroying Christianity by Lucas Miles

Jesus the Luminous

Reimagining the Church

“The timeline of the Holy Spirit is driving our decision to launch the LMX at this moment and we are following her call,” reasoned Reverend Althea Spencer-Miller, a leader in the recently formed Liberation Methodist Connexion.

Spencer-Miller isn’t shy about revealing the new socially and theologically progressive Methodist denomination’s goal which is to “reimage what it means to follow Jesus,”  and has started by reimagining God using female pronouns “she/her.” Other denominational leaders promise “no doctrinal litmus tests”  for those wishing to affiliate with the LMX as they seek to dismantle the “powers, principalities and privileges”  associated with “white normativity” in the Church.

The demolishing of white hetero-normativity, a belief that Church doctrine is controlled by a white Eurocentric male theological hegemony, is a major objective for most theologically progressive denominations. As such, groups like the LMX, claim to be “justice oriented”  as they strive to right the Church’s wrongs. These wrongs include: colonialism, white supremacy, economic injustices, patriarchy, sexism, clericalism, ableism, ageism, transphobia, and heteronormativity.”  

This collective pursuit among the Christian Left has given birth to Woke Christianity. 

Woke Christianity, also known as “Conscious Christianity,” is broad stroke terminology describing Christians intentionally conscious of oppression, racism and injustice. Author and pastor Eric Mason says the term implies “being socially aware of issues that have systemic impact.”  Often compared to the wise virgins in Matthew 25, Woke individuals strive to stay “awake” to issues of social justice while waiting for the Bridegroom to return. Consequently, the term Woke Christians, describes believers who subscribe, whether knowingly or unknowingly, to the alternative gospels of Critical Theory, including Critical Race Theory (CRT) and their pseudo-Christian counterpart, Liberation theology.

Like all heresy, Woke Christianity is rooted in an element of truth, (as in God’s opposition to injustice), but encapsulates this truth with a convincing web of antibiblical ideology and extremism. As such, scripture is either downgraded, stripped of its authority, or frequently ignored, as personal experience, like suffering or oppression and personal enlightenment take center stage in crafting Woke theology. 

For those new to such terminology, Critical Theory has evolved from a highly academic and abstract ideology (developed as early as 1923 in the Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt, Germany) to a mainstream worldview that is shaping sermons, public policy , grade school curriculum and even medical advice .

It is “chiefly concerned with revealing hidden biases,” especially those related to race, gender, and socio-economics. Due to perceived systemic problems inherent within existing social systems, Critical Theorists advocate for dismantling and deconstructing the current systems (such as Capitalism, religion or even America) rather than working within the system to generate improvement. 

Liberation Theology (and its cousin Black Liberation Theology), is a type of religious Critical Theory, which “depends upon the Marxist system”  to dismantle perceived injustices in oppressed people groups even if that requires revolt and revolution. 

Both Critical Theory and Liberation theology, doctrines which few took seriously, are creating a schism and if allowed to grow may arguably rival the doctrinal differences of the Protestant Reformation. In fact, Critical Theory was a major topic of conversation as the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) voted in a new president, Ed Litton, in summer 2021. Litton was viewed by many as a “Woke”  theologian after apologizing for former views on both systemic racism and homosexuality, marking a major step backwards in establishing a top-down biblical orthodoxy within the SBC. Litton joins the ranks of other SBC influencers (Russell Moore, J.D. Greear, and former SBC member Beth Moore)  who have backpedaled on scriptural truths and used their platforms to facilitate Woke doctrines.  

The Evolution of Critical Theory

While many may be acquainted with the dangers of Critical Theory (restriction of free thought, perpetuation of victimhood, indoctrination of young people, a distorted moral fabric, and undue resentment toward the Western world,) few seem to fully grasp the ideological and religious scaffolding that not only shaped, but still guides Critical Theorists, from pedagogs to protestors.

While conservative parents and pundits actively attempt to refute and dismantle the collective dogmas of Wokeism, Critical Theory, Postmodernism and Liberation Theology, their efforts rarely amount to more than, at best, labeling it Marxist and, at worst, declaring it vacuous. Both may be true, at least in principle, but neither approach fully refutes the driving force behind Critical Theory. And this doesn’t even mention that most who have adopted Critical Theory activism don’t know enough about it’s formulation themselves to even be conscious of its connection to Marxism.  Instead, Critical Theorists tend to present complex modern arguments built upon logical fallacies regarding race, gender, socio-economic status and sexuality. By leveraging emotional reactions, social pressure and societal guilt, the ideology of Critical Theory continues to gain ground in almost every facet of Western society - including the Church and Christian institutions.

Within Christendom, this is complicated even further. Woke Christians turn to the scriptures for proof texts to verify certain aspects of Critical Theory and Liberation Theology. They will use references to Jesus being a refugee  to give credence to open borders; Christ overturning the tables in the temple in order to support riots and protests;  and even twist Christ’s intimate friendship with the Apostle John in an attempt to affirm the LBGTQ agenda and saying “Jesus may well have been homosexual.”  This selective use of scripture allows Critical Theorists to pick and choose parts of the canon that assist their cause while easily dismissing verses as outdated, out-of-context or poorly translated that would harm their heretical positions.

From the outset, it should seem odd that Critical Theory and Christianity have become bedfellows. The humanist nature of Critical Theory (depicts the human experience as the central aspect to existence as opposed to the Christ-centric view of Christianity) would seemingly create a conflict between the two. This obvious sharp contradiction though was rounded over time, like a stone slowly shaped by a stream, through the evolutionary development of Critical Theory.

While orthodox-minded Christians may have initially fled from versions of Critical Theory presented by radicals like Marcuse,  more modern kerygmatic Christian figures (Eric Mason,  Tony Campolo, Barry Corey, David Platt, LaCrae and Andy Stanley) have offered a softer, more subtle version of Jesus AND Critical Theory. This version is what has found sympathetic ears among evangelicals. This new faith-based Wokeism didn’t just originate overnight, nor did it leap unmolested from Marx to Mason. Rather it evolved over time and across many different camps, both spiritual and secular, as ideological transmission took place. It migrated from Hegel and Marx to the Frankfurt School, to Black Liberation Theologians like James Cone, to black feminists like Pauli Murray and Angela Davis, to modern Christ-touting Leftists, like Jim Wallis and Michael Wear.  Then it jumped to more surprising sources, like VeggieTales creator Phil Vischer and Beth Moore  before gaining the momentum and social receptivity among Christians that it has today.        

Speaking to the overarching evolution of postmodern ideals that drive current iterations of Critical Theory, authors Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay write:

"Since its revolutionary beginnings, postmodernism has evolved into new forms, which have preserved its original principles and themes, while gaining increasing influence over culture, activism, and scholarship, especially in the humanities and social sciences. Understanding postmodernism is therefore a matter of some urgency precisely because it radically rejects the foundations upon which today’s advanced civilizations are built and consequently has the potential to undermine them."   

The evangelical church, although it rejected early versions of postmodernity, took quite seriously the importance of understanding postmodern culture. So much so that it seemed like nearly every Christian conference of the late 1990’s and early 2000’s featured speakers like Leonard Sweet, Rob Bell and Doug Pagitt who were dedicated to assisting the Church in ministering to a new generation shaped by a postmodern mindset. Interestingly though, many of these individuals, especially Bell, who had a very public departure from evangelicalism , and Pagitt, who proudly labels himself “a leading voice for progressive Christianity” and currently serves as the executive director for Vote Common Good , a left-wing activist group that trains “democratic candidates to connect with Evangelical and Catholic voters”, focused so much on transforming the church to reach postmoderns, that it seems they abandoned the original tenets of Christian faith and became postmodern themselves.

Like the men of Issachar, Bell and others “understood the times,” but they erred. Failing to heed Paul’s advice to the Galatian church: “if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted,” instead of deconstructing culture to better align with the truth, they deconstructed faith in order to better reach the culture. 

Bell, Pagitt and other cultural architects ended up as Woke victims themselves, falling prey to the same philosophy they started out rebuking in the first place. By itself this would be a tragedy, but it’s compounded as leaders have led thousands down similar paths. Like the Pharisees in Matthew 23, these men are “blind guides” and are shaping others, as the church moves further and further away from the truth, into “twice as much a child of hell” as they are. In order to protect the church, we must expose the deception!

The Systematic Theology of Wokeism

Michael Gungor, a formerly popular Christian artist who once boasted about losing 4,000 followers on Twitter after recommending one of Bell’s books,  wrote in a 2021 tweet: “Jesus was Christ. Buddha was Christ. Muhammad was Christ. Christ is a word for the Universe seeing itself. You are Christ. We are the body of Christ.” While absent of any mention of typical Woke language (such as race, gender identity, microaggressions, intersectionality, or sexual orientation) Gungor’s tweet is a perfect illustration of the systematic theology of Critical Theory and the corresponding Gnostic Hegelianism at the bedrock of Woke Christianity.

According to late 18th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, God, or what he interchangeably calls “Spirit,” “Absolute Being” or “the eternal,” is “devoid of self” and “a long way yet from being the Spirit that knows itself as Spirit.” Rather than being defined by orthodox Christian descriptors like holy, perfect, or righteous, Hegel’s god is clothed in imperfection and not yet fully realized or conscious of it’s Spirit-ness – or as Hegel describes it as still in “the process in which Spirit becomes what it is in itself; and it is only as this process of reflecting itself into itself that it is in itself truly Spirit.” 

Within Hegelian thought, the process of the Spirit knowing itself, or seeing the “primal Light” within itself, is realized at the culmination of the end of History, as all of the Spirits (Hegel appears to believe in more than one) unite and are reborn in a “new existence, a new world and a new shape of the Spirit.”  

This eschatological event, according to Hegel, is unable to reach self-actualization, until mankind (whom Hegel calls “the universal divine Man” or “the community”) becomes reconciled to the Spirit.

Finally, this mystic communist utopia happens only when, as Hegel describes, “The world is indeed implicitly reconciled with the divine Being…” 

Hegel believed that the union between the Spirit and man will take place once humanity reaches such a state of perfection that the divine Being is able to recognize itself within the community of man. Once that takes place, man and Spirit shall be reunited and achieve oneness.

For Hegel, as long as there was ideological conflict present in the world, reconciliation with the Divine Being wasn’t possible. Ultimately, Hegel’s mystical pursuit of universal agreement effectuated what we affectionately know as Cancel Culture. Inspired by Hegel, Herbert Marcuse wrote in his chilling 1965 essay, Repressive Tolerance: “Tolerance is extended to policies … which should not be tolerated because they are impeding, if not destroying, the chances of creating an existence without fear and misery.”  For Marcuse, this meant silencing “false words and wrong deeds which demonstrate that they contradict and counteract the possibilities of liberation.”  

What are the false words and wrong deeds according to Marcuse? He leaves no room for confusion:

"Liberating tolerance, then, would mean intolerance against movements from the Right, and toleration of movements from the Left."

Or in other words, true “tolerance” offers no tolerance at all toward differing opinions – especially if said opinions are conservative. While we’ll speak to this more in future chapters, the important aspect to take away for now is understanding that ideological suppression isn’t political, nor arbitrary. Rather, it’s mystical and it’s theological – a reversing of the Tower of Babel, in essence, until we all speak one uniform and harmonizing Leftist language capable of ushering in a Gnostic utopia.      

To bring about this perfected society, Hegel (and later Marx) applied a unique argument known as the “Hegelian Dialectic” which maintains a view of progress, wherein progress is derived from conflict. For Hegel, this conflict exists in the relationship between thesis, antithesis and synthesis, or what Hegel called the “speculative.”  Founder of New Discourses, James Lindsay, brilliantly unpacks Hegel’s modus operandi, which he calls “the operating system of the Left,” in his lecture “Hegel, Wokeness, and the Dialectical Faith of Leftism:”

"So what Hegel actually means by “speculative” is having mystical content. It’s mystical, it’s mysticism . ..so this is going to open the door to a lot of things for Hegel that he already was, like hermeticism, alchemy and in particular also Gnosticism, which is why all of these ideologies like Critical Race Theory can be thought of as “Race Gnosticism,” like people having a particular race because of their structurally determined lived experience, have special insight under a doctrine of standpoint epistemology  that gives them the ability to understand things and have racial knowledges, etc – that gives them special knowledge. That’s Gnosticism, that’s racial or ethnic Gnosticism … because the Hegelian faith is itself gnostic …” 

Hitting the nail on the head, Lindsay rightly exposes not only the Hegelian roots of Wokeism but, more importantly, the Gnostic substructure that shaped its development and continued evolution. Marx, who is most often associated with Critical Theory today, belonged to the Young Hegelian school of thought and while he maintained Hegel’s use of the dialectic, criticized Hegel for his focus on mysticism and more spiritual themes. Marx wrote in 1873: “My dialectic method is not only different from the Hegelian, but is its direct opposite.” 

For Marx, Hegel’s work was rooted too much in idealism for his atheistic worldview and thus insufficient for bringing about the societal transformation he desired. As a result, Marx viewed the Hegelian dialectic as “standing on its head”  and felt it “must be turned right side up again, if you would discover the rational kernel within the mystical shell.”  

Albert Moehler describes Marx’s process of standing Hegel’s work on its head: 

"He saw capitalism as the thesis. He then saw a form of revolution, even a violent revolution, as the antithesis. The synthesis that he promised that would inevitably come out of a communist revolution would be a communist utopia. After the thesis would come the revolutionary antithesis and after the antithesis would come a new era of prosperity and peace under the rule of the people known as the Soviet." 

Between both views, the Hegelian and Marxist, lies the framework for the two major camps of Critical Theorists today – the spiritual and the secular.

Liberal academic theorists, diversity-obsessed sociologists and leftwing educators pushing CRT in schools, tend to lean more toward a neo-Marxist position that replaces socio-economic classes (proletariat vs. bourgeois) with categories of race (black vs. white). But while Critical Theorists within Woke churches share the same race-based categories of secular theorists, they favor a more mystical Hegelian outlook overall, or what Lindsay describes above as “ethnic Gnosticism.”

This is a perfect term for exactly what took place at St. Xavier Catholic Church in New York City during a service in 2020, in which Reverend Kenneth Boller led his church in a question and response, uplifting diversity and denouncing white privilege, with questions like:

• Do you support racial justice, equity and compassion in human relations
• Do you affirm that white privilege is unfair and harmful to those who have it and to those who do not? 
• Do you affirm that white privilege and the culture of white supremacy must be dismantled wherever it is present? 
• Therefore, from this day forward, will you strive to understand more deeply the injustice and suffering white privilege and white supremacy cause? 
• Will you strive to eliminate racial prejudice from your thoughts and actions, so that you can better promote the racial justice efforts of our church? 

Nowhere to be found within Boller’s liturgical questions is any mention of the gospel, of grace, unconditional love, forgiveness, or the saving power of Jesus Christ. Instead what is offered are the basic tenets of a secret Woke dogma that must be adhered to in order to be “saved” and accepted by the Woke Church, or in other words, ethnic Gnosticism.

The Gnostic Roots of Wokeism

At the end of the first century, after surviving both persecution and political pressure, the early Christian church faced a unique threat to the future of orthodoxy: the Gnostics. The term originates from the Greek word for knowledge (gnosis) and was a disparaging label fastened to the heretical group by the early church meaning “those who know.”  This ancient religious movement, often erroneously intermingled with Jewish and Christian ideas, was unapologetically esoteric and imaginative, filled with a vast mythology of multiple heavens, an evil demiurge and a flawed creation. Highlighting the Gnostics general dissatisfaction with the world, theologian and author, Philip J. Lee writes:  

"The ancient gnostic, looking at the world through despairing eyes, saw matter in terms of decay, place in terms of limitation, time in terms of death. In light of this tragic vision, the logical conclusion seemed to be that the cosmos itself - matter, place, time, change, body, and everything seen, heard, touched or smelled - must have been a colossal error."      

Like Critical Theory today, Gnosticism saw the material world as a corrupt fallen system full of conflict. Whereas modern Critical Theorists and Woke Christians see this system as a byproduct of a perceived white hegemony, ancient Gnostics believed this corruption was instigated by the Demiurge, the creative deity they associated with the Hebrew God Yaweh.  

"All the Gnostic texts, though they differ in details, declare that we are strangers, aliens, sparks of Light or Spirit trapped in evil matter. They recount the cosmic process whereby the circles of the world have been created, by ignorant or evil creators and not by the Light, and whereby we have become entrapped in the midmost or deepest dungeon. Finally they impact the knowledge needed to escape back to the one Light whence we have come and which is our real home." 

Within the Gnostic framework above, three key ideas are presented:

1. Alienation
2. Man is trapped by an ignorant or evil creator/system
3. Knowledge or revelation is required to awaken the truth or light within

While each of these ideas originated within Gnosticism, they eventually found a welcomed place within a Hegelian/Marxist framework and continue to find a home in Wokeism. 

DIfferences undoubtedly exist between Gnosticism and the philosophies of Hegel, Marx, modern Critical Theorists and even Woke Christians. But in order to understand how Wokeism has developed within Christianity, it’s important we recognize the evolutionary pathway that Wokeism followed as it developed. To fail to make the connection between Wokeism and Gnosticism, even if one understands the latter influence of Hegel, is to fail to identify fully the heretical nature of Conscious “Woke” Christianity. While the aspects of modern Wokeism may be different today, the building blocks of alienation, systemic oppression and a works-based enlightenment originated within the Gnostic heresy 2,000 years ago.    

Outside of the Church, Wokeism attracts a more Marxist view, with a highly antagonistic belief against God and religion. This requires finding a source to blame for the problems of humanity, including alienation and systemic oppression, other than the Almighty. In traditional Marxism, Marx found the perfect candidate in the bourgeoisie, a perceived villainous middle-class who “owned the means of production.” But secular Woke theorists exchanged and modernized the view of the bourgeoisie for capitalism and a white hegemony, which includes a perceived man-made Eurocentric-view of the Christian faith, which they hold responsible for creating a systematic objection against socialism, sexual liberation, and identity politics. Drawing from each of these systems, Wokeism within the Church presents a noticeably Gnostic theology, complete with emphasis on alienation, systemic oppression, and works-based enlightenment. 

Political philosopher Eric Voegelin felt “Gnostic mass movements,” like what we are witnessing today, were inevitable in a widely Christian society. He explains, “We are confronted with the singular situation that Christian faith is so much the more threatened the further it expands socially, the more it brings men under institutional control and the more clearly its essence is articulated.” 

This trend toward Gnosticism is not due to a weakness in Christianity itself, but rather how it exposes the weakness in others. Describing how Christians drift toward Gnosticism, Voegelin writes: 

"Coincidentally with its greatness, its weakness became apparent: great masses of Christianized men who were not strong enough for the heroic adventure of faith became susceptible to ideas that could give them a greater degree of certainty…" 

While Christians might object to the idea that Voegelin suggests Gnosticism appears more “certain” than faith in Christ, we must remember that “we live by faith, not by sight.”  The Christian Gnostic, in contrast, focuses not on faith, but on knowledge and carnal works, and seeks escape from this world in mystic ritual, rather than spiritual and physical deliverance.

Part of the deception of Gnosticism, percolating all the way down to Woke Christianity, is how easily it is mistaken for orthodoxy by untrained minds. 

Dr. Edward Feser, building upon Eric Voegelin’s definitive work on the subject, refers to the “Hydra’s head of modernist projects” such as “liberalism, socialism, communism, scientism, progressivism, identity politics, globalism, and all the rest”  as “apostate projects” that could only have “arisen in the midst of Christian civilization with the aim of supplanting it.”  

Feser rightly concludes that Gnosticism, as well as Critical Race Theory and other Woke doctrines, were only possible within an existing Christian system because “they are all founded on some idea inherited from Christianity (i.e. the dignity of the individual, human equality, a law-governed universe, a final consummation, etc.) but removed from the theological framework that originally gave it meaning and radically distorted in the process.”  

In this way, Gnosticism, from the first century variety to today’s Critical Race Theory, is a theological parasite becoming drunk on the doctrinal lifeblood of the Christian faith, before hatching its heretical progeny. 

Mani and the Luminous Christ

Born in AD 216 in Babylonia, a decade before the fall of the Parthian Empire rose a young prophet named Mani, whose teachings would posthumously shape followers from China to Rome through widespread missionary efforts. Unfortunately, his teachings would eventually represent “one of the most pernicious forms of Christian heresy” to ever exist. 

Manichaeism, as it would eventually be called, was an elaborate religion amalgamated with adopted teachings from Buddhism and Zoroastrianism, layered upon Mani’s own Gnostic Jewish-Christian upbringing. The result was a somewhat Christian-sounding faith, clouded by a robust dualistic cosmogony detailing the struggle of the spiritual world of light and the material realm of darkness, giving birth to what Mani believed was the perfect religious system. 

According to Mani, God is not omnipotent but rather co-eternal with evil, caught in a cosmic stalemate with the “Prince of Darkness,” a quintipartite demon like creature “which had the head of a lion, the body of a dragon, the wings of a bird, the tail of a great fish and the feet of a beast of burden.”  Additionally, the Manichaeans possessed a complex creation story permeated with vivid battles between multiple deities and forces of darkness and light, the formation of 10 heavens and eight earths from the bodies and skin of slayed demons, as well as an obscure narrative of the creation of man. 

Unlike the Genesis account where “God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being,” the Manichaeans described Adam (and Eve) as being conceived by the copulation of two evil demons. As such, both the heavens and the earth, as well as humanity itself, were formed out of mostly evil materials that had “swallowed”  elements of light. Christ then, was forced to take on the identity of “Jesus the Luminous” where “his primary role was as supreme revealer and guide and it was he who woke Adam from his slumber and revealed to him the divine origins of his soul and its painful captivity by the body and mixture with matter.” 

Likewise, a similar belief exists within modern Woke Christianity: man is trapped within an evil system, dependent upon God to show him that he is oppressed by this physical world and needs to become “woke” in order to find salvation. On the surface, this may sound similar to a salvific message shared by Paul “Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you,”  but as we will see, the Gnostic gospel of Wokeism shares little in common with the biblical message of the Christ crucified.