By Mack Rights

In my preparation to review Life at All Costs – An Anthology of Voices from 21st Century Black Prolife Leaders, contributed to and edited by Dr. Alveda King and Dr. La Verne Tolbert, I want to begin by reviewing one particular essay in this fine and important book. Chapter 22 is called “Traditional Values,” and it is written by Elder Levon Yuille. He is the Pastor of The Bible Church in Ypsilanti, MI and a Founder of The National Black Prolife Congress.

For full disclosure, my editor and the President of the Frederick Douglass Foundation of New York, Chaplain Ayesha Kreutz wrote a chapter of this book.

Regarding Elder Yuille’s essay, these are words I’d like to add to my file labeled “Words I Wish I Had Written.” For that reason, I will be quoting it heavily. I feel that this essay astutely captures the goal of this book, for it is not only a book about abortion, abortion-related diseases and the effects of abortion on society as a whole and on blacks in particular. It is also a book about the effects of society’s secularization and social degradation. It strives to describe how alternatives to evil actually can and do work for those in need of advice. It is a Biblical argument on steroids calling all those with awareness to stand up and draw the line in the sand. Not only must we hold that line against the dark forces but also cross that line, fight those forces and push that line back into the territory we’ve already lost.

And along the way, this book is nobly written by honest and frankly-speaking folks who’ve sinned and fallen themselves. But rather than wallowing in sin and resigning themselves to a stoic acceptance of an eternity in hell, they’re attacking the darkness with the words and lessons from the Bible that will lead to forgiveness and ultimately victory over those dark forces that have tempted them with failure. With that said, here are some of the Elder Yuille’s words:

Because someone fails to climb the mountain, this failure does not diminish the beauty or height of the mountain. The climber must simply do what’s necessary to ultimately climb the mountain.

The anti-traditionalist with glee, points to Jimmy Swaggart, Jim Baker and other high profile traditionalists who failed in their climb. And they use these failures as an attempt to diminish the lofty height and beautiful mountain of Traditional Values. They use these fallen climbers as a method to diminish the mountain and to exalt their concepts of relativism, situational ethics and Marxism. (p. 141)

This is a stark reminder that we are all indeed sinners. And just because we occasionally fail to live up to God’s Commandments, this does not mean God is a fool or that trying to hold to these Commandments is folly. The liberals in this country use Satan as a muse, whether they know it or not, and Satan tempts them constantly into violating God’s Commandments. He uses their intellectual pride to convince them that they know better than others do and that they don’t need to hold true to the precepts of the silly traditionalists’ skygod. And with that pride, they become spokesmen for Satan in their active tempting of others into sin by using the government rather than the Bible as the arbiter of what is right and wrong.

With that in mind, Elder Yuille calls for us to buck up and realize this:

We, who believe in traditional values, know that many of us have failed in our climb, but this in no way diminishes the mountain we are trying to climb… It is time for all fallen climbers to rise and take America back up the mountain of Traditional Values. (p. 142)

He calls for us to push the culture back up that slippery slope. It is the path less traveled, and it isn’t the path for an armchair Christian. It is a challenge against passivity in the Culture War. It is a call to leave some of the comforts of life behind in order to serve the Will of God in a Society run over roughshod by the forces of evil. The Elder Yuille continues:

In both of these passages [from Ezekiel] it is noted that the people of God were aiding and abetting individuals who were practicing things contrary to the will of God and these activities were being sorely rebuked by God… It is quite amazing to me how many Christians think their faith has nothing to do with their politics… Matter of fact, it was the Christian faith in the hearts of the Pilgrims and Puritans that brought this nation into being. Along with this, it is interesting to note that there have been, in the past, Supreme Court decisions that said America was indeed a Christian nation (Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States). (p.142-143)

He makes the point, without naming the Democrat Party, that a vote for this party and its agenda is a vote for the reign of evil on earth. Furthermore, he calls out those that want to separate their vote from their values, simply because they’ve been so convinced by the liberal mantra that there is some invisible wall of separation of church and state written into the Constitution. I challenge anyone to read the US Constitution and then try to convince me that it is there. It’s not, unless the words are as invisible as the wall. To make this point even more, the good Elder Yuille writes:

I think many of our founding fathers would be shocked at the idea of a secular America. Especially since the word secular comes from a Latin word which means worldly or pagan. God deliver us from becoming a pagan nation. (p. 141)

If our Founding Fathers were all Christian, and they were successfully able to create a nation that would be obligated to end slavery if it were to live up to its own ideals as written into the Constitution (as Frederick Douglass contends), how is it that we allow our present leading liberal lights to convince so many people that our country is secular and pagan? – Answer: it’s the voice of evil holding out temptation as a justification for the rationalization it takes to become an advocate for this secularization. Pastor Yuille continues:

The Bible also teaches us that Christians should not be in partnership (2 Cor. 7:14) with the works of darkness, such as partial birth abortion, along with such initiatives as the homosexual assimilation movement, which is the effort of the homosexual community to make homosexuality no morally different than heterosexual marriages. Because the Bible has spoken so strongly against these behaviors, for Christians to be in partnership with politicians who promote these causes is distressing because we are strengthening things that are contrary to God’s law.

Some Christians justify voting for causes they don’t believe in because they say they are not a one-issue voter. Regrettably that was the same logic used by the pro-slavery movement advocates… This is most certainly sad because Ezekiel said that means we are betraying God for a handful of barely and pieces of bread. (p. 143)

In other words, he sees the black community’s devotion to the Democrat Party as a consequence of giving into the temptation of benefits doled out by politicians in exchange for votes. However, these votes go to politicians who are actively participating in Margaret Sanger’s Negro Project as it lives on through the choice of placement of abortion mills right smack dab in the middle of the black communities. “Vote for us,” the Satan-inspired liberals say, “We’ll give you barely and pieces of bread, and you can kill your babies here. Oh, and by the way, if you don’t want babies, try homosexuality. It feels good too, it’s socially acceptable, and you won’t have to spend money at the abortion mill simply because those evil Christian Republicans refuse to fund abortion with taxpayer dollars.”

Like I said, Elder Levon Yuille’s words are brilliant, and I’ll end with some of his conlusion:

It is disturbing to note that my community [the black community] which seems to have more churches than any other community in America. It is described as among the most religious, but by their vote the strongest supporters of the most anti-Christian agenda in history of this nation.

This blind devotion is often justified by the numerous government handouts that have come our way, which is simply saying our loyalty to God is secondary to those with corrupt agendas that give us something. In other words, we have betrayed God for a handful of barely and pieces of bread. (p. 144)

Let me take that back. I’ll end with some of my words. This is a review of just 4 pages of this fine book Life At All Costs. Don’t pretend you didn’t find Elder Levon Yuille’s words profound. If you didn’t, it’s because you’re a Satan-worshipping pagan drenched in the blood of the unborn at a Democrat-Coming-Out-Party Abortion Orgy dancing to Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven played backwards while zooted out on a cocktail of ecstasy, cocaine and heroine. But if that’s the case, you’re probably either a serial killer or a Democrat who doesn’t read much, so these words won’t help you.

The rest of this book is just as profound. Get it. It just might change your life. But if you’re already on the correct path, it will help you stay there. These are the heart-felt words of those on the front lines in the battle between good and evil. These Christian warriors are not at all perfectly sinless now- nor were they before they joined this battle- but they are indeed willing to continue to tackle that “mountain of Traditional Values,” even despite their occasional setbacks. It’s during these setbacks that we need these words the most.

This review was written by Mack Rights and featured in The Frederick Douglass Foundation of New York website HERE.