by Charles Gardner —
As the battle for truth heats up, I am hugely encouraged by the story of a black fellow South African whose view on Israel has been turned upside down.
It’s a stirring reminder that when gospel truth was first proclaimed in power and authority, the world of that time was indeed turned on its head.
Back in 2015, desperate to find a toilet after a nine-hour flight from Johannesburg, Klaas Mokgomole asked to be shown to a ‘blacks only’ restroom, convinced by the propaganda sweeping through South African student campuses that Israel practiced apartheid and that Jews “do not even share their toilets with blacks or Arabs”.
Klaas had been an outspoken youth leader of the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. He had even placed a severed pig’s head inside the kosher section of a local supermarket and nearly got expelled from university after storming the stage of an Israeli pianist’s recital.
While his fate there hung in the balance, he decided to visit Israel to witness their supposed racist policies first hand. And that’s when his beliefs began to crumble.
Initially dumbfounded as he watched Jews and Arabs sharing the toilet facilities, he began to see how the BDS mantra amounted to “half-truths and even outright lies”, as he told the Tazpit Press Service during a recent visit to Jerusalem.
He is now a passionate peacemaker and bridge-builder between Israel and the rest of the world and heads up a new organization called Africans for Peace, aiming to heal the ravages of global conflict through honest dialogue.
His ‘conversion’ was costly, provoking much opposition including death threats, but his influence nevertheless spread. One man, who used to publicly profess his love for Hitler, took his advice to visit Israel and, on his return, walked over to the Jewish campus committee to apologize.
I pray that this re-education ‘Klaas’ will continue to spread. The shame is that South Africa is out of step with the rest of the continent both on Israel and on same-sex and other forms of woke Western liberalism.
It boils down to how the government, and leading church institutions, view the authority of God’s word, which pronounces “everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3) for the Jewish people and “a powerful delusion” for those who defy his commandments (2 Thessalonians 2:11f).
The irony in all this is that South Africa, with all her troubles, has a stronger economy and infrastructure, along with wider educational facilities, than other parts of the continent.
But these don’t count with God, who says: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.” (1 Corinthians 1:19, Isaiah 29:14)
Lies and propaganda are the enemy’s stock-in-trade, and intelligence is no match for God’s wisdom.
In Scotland, meanwhile, a young lady called Kate Forbes, a leading contender to succeed Nicola Sturgeon as First Minister, is also challenging the woke ways of our brave new world.
In view of her strong Christian beliefs, a spokesman for the Scottish National Party is quoted as saying that “there will be a massive campaign against her”.
Which simply recognizes the truth of Jesus’ words that his disciples “will be hated by all nations because of me. At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.” (Matthew 24:9-13)
Well-known Christian leader Peter Horrobin writes: “The world hates truth and, while people will patronize Jesus by saying he was a good man with teaching worth hearing and following, they will not tolerate any intrusion of biblical truth into the affairs of a world that has not only lost its moral compass, but in which most people seem to have no desire to find it again.”¹
Bearing in mind the aforementioned accusation against the original apostles for turning the world upside down (see Acts 17:6 King James translation), I pray that Kate and Klaas will do likewise – though in reality they will be turning it the right side up!
1 Quoted by David Soakell of Christian Friends of Israel in his Watching Over Zion newsletter, February 23rd 2023.
