Fred Phelps: I want to party in heaven with you.

I know. It's a strange title.
Some background then before I start.

Fred Phelps was the "pastor" of the highly controversial Westboro Baptist Church. A rabidly bigoted church not affiliated with any actual denomination. Their website is godhatesfags.com and their fame comes from picketing the funerals of children, soldiers and celebrities. In all not a very nice group of people.

You might be thinking from the title of this post and my use of past tense that Fred Phelps (Snr) is deceased. You'd be wrong...possibly...subject to when you're reading this I guess.

Mr Phelps Snr is at the time of writing, seriously ill and in hospital in Kansas where his church is based, is still alive.

But he's apparently been excommunicated from the church he founded.

Some would find the irony amusing, I admit I had a chuckle.

But it says a lot about the man that his legacy is a family that choose to cut ties with an elderly and apparently very ill man who has been their leader for decades and to go as far as to excommunicate him.

The Point?

I don't hate Fred Phelps. I used to. I used to want to drop him and his family down a sinkhole and sell tickets to people to watch the whole lot of them turn on each other as they starved.

But I don't hate him anymore

Say WHAT?!?

It's true, because I realised something. As unlikely as it is, it's possible that Fred's excommunication is a result of hum truly turning to Christ and repenting of the life he has lead.

And even if it's not. I want to see Fred truly come to Christ.

Why?

Several reasons

1. God loves all people. Even those who hate him. The fact is that “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Whether I like someone or not, God thought they were worth dying for. How then can I say that they are anything less that important to God? Should I arrogantly declare my own judgement of a man I confess I have never met to be better than the judgement of God who knew him before he was born?
2. Guess who influenced the majority of the New Testament? A guy named Paul. He wrote a lot of the letters and his contemporary and personal physician, Luke, wrote two of the longest sections of the New Testament. The Books of Luke and Acts.
3. But before he became Paul, he was a Jewish teacher of the law named Saul. Who hated Christians so much that he actually asked for permission to seek out christians and have them killed. If God can save him and use him so powerfully how can we then write off anyone simply because their actions are hateful?
4. I’m just as bad as Fred.Sure I've never picketed a funeral and don't hate homosexuals at all let alone with every fibre of my public figure. But in God’s eyes I am a sinner just like Fred. The only way I can condemn him to hell is to do the same for myself. If God cannot save him then how can I believe he will save me?

Because the fact of the matter is that God is love, and he calls on us to love like Him. And it’s hard but it’s what we are called to do.

So I'm praying for Fred Phelps Senior, I pray that he will recover from his illness, that he will come to a true and saving knowledge of the Gospel and that such a change would take place in his life and heart that he, like Paul would be a powerful tool for God.

I pray that on the last day I will party in heaven with Fred Phelps.