‘The church is the people. So get out on the beach’
You can’t cancel Jesus! But we are seeing the beginning of China-style religious persecution and it’s well underway in California. It may be the start of the underground church in America.
As California continues to intensify, and extend indefinitely, prohibitions on religious services, several thousand people have taken to the beaches in California to worship God and peacefully resist the government’s unconstitutional rules.
On July 30th’s show, David Knight reports, “This is the perfect example of how to protest this. In California the beaches are open but churches are closed. As someone present at the event told the local news, ‘It’s such a double standard, right? You have protesters who can go out, do gatherings like this, and nothing is spoken about; if anything, it’s praised. But then we’re not allowed to gather in church on Sunday.”
Knight continued, “Just forget the building, there’s nothing magical about a building. The church is the people. So get out on the beach, as a matter of fact, that’s where the people are.”
These gatherings are being organized by Saturate OC, which is run by Parker and Jessi Green. On the Vision section of their website, they wrote, “In 2016, my husband Parker and I moved across the country from New York to California and gave up everything we had because of a profound vision God had shown us. We came to California on a vacation and as we prayed we saw a picture of thousands of people being baptized along Huntington Beach Pier”
“We’ve taken the last year to prepare for this event,” said Jessi Green. “We had no idea we would do it in the middle of a pandemic when most churches are closed. But that’s just the way it turned out.”
Saturate OC held their first service on July 3rd. On July 13 a new round of lockdown restrictions from Governor Newsom closed churches, restaurants, wineries, and other businesses for 80% of California. Napa County, where Newsom’s own winery is located, wasn’t included in his arbitrary order and remains open for wine tastings. Even though the new restrictions do still permit outdoor church services, Saturate OC was ordered to cancel their service due to too many attendees not following physical distancing and mask “guidelines”.
The city government of Huntington Beach released a statement on July 24th titled, “SATURATE OC EVENT NOT PERMITTED BY THE CITY, AND IS VIOLATING STATE AND COUNTY PUBLIC HEALTH ORDERS” In which they complain about not all attendees wearing masks and Saturate OC not having a permit. “Therefore, the city has informed Saturate OC that their event is not allowed to occur.”
City officials put up signs on highways leading to the beach stating that the event had been canceled. despite that, thousands still came to the beach on July 25th for worship. A singer in attendance tweeted that city officials estimated the crowd to be about 5,000 people, a local news station reported that lifeguards said the crowd was “over 1,250 people”. Regardless of many people were there, it’s certainly up from the estimated 300 people that attended their first event on July 3rd, regardless of the city government’s best efforts to stop it. The Orange County Register reports “While there was a strong police presence during the meeting and officers attempted to make an announcement, their voices were drowned out by participants who sang loudly and defiantly.”
In a press conference, San Diego Public Health Officer, Wilma Wooten said about the gathering, “Obviously we are very saddened by the violations that were witnessed on Sunday… We will continue to address this egregious violation as we have others brought to our attention.”
Saturate OC is planning more gatherings Friday nights at 6 pm, though they’ve stated that the next service won’t be held at the same part of Huntington Beach. They haven’t announced the location of the next service but you can register at saturateoc.com for updates.
“You have all these churches trying to get people to come to them,” said Parker Green, an organizer of the event. “We are going to where the people are. We really want to see believers activated, not just passively listening to a sermon in church.”
As Mordecai told Esther at a time of great peril for the Jews in captivity, “If you keep quiet at a time like this, deliverance and relief will arise for the Jews from some other place, but you and your relatives will die. Who knows if perhaps you were made queen for just such a time as this?”
If the brick and mortar pastors and the 501c churches keep silent, God will raise others for deliverance and relief. As Jessi Green puts it “You can’t cancel Jesus.”
This article first appeared at RoundTableReport.com.
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