Sadie Robertson Huff is a prominent up and coming quasi female pastor, under the wing of Louie Giglio. While we have not determined her to be a false teacher yet, the trajectory is rather bad, and this controversy between her and her audience over vacationing in Disney World is an example of this.
Heavily implying that she calls the shots in her family, Huff says that they made a decision to go to Disney World for her kid. And then she describes how in one week she angered people for being too Christian and then going woke.
Bad Exegesis
In Mark 2, Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector who then invites Jesus to dine with him and his friends in celebration, in sharp contrast to The Chosen’s depiction of events.
13 Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them. 14 As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.
15 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. 16 When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Mark 2:13-17 NASB1995
Huff applies this passage about Jesus dining with a disciple to herself paying to vacation at Disney World. “I’m holy because of who Christ is in me,” says Huff commenting on her vacation. Yet if a Christian found himself in a strip club this logic could hardly be replicated. The fact is, Sadie Huff fancies herself a Christian leader and cannot see how handing money that she’s earned from Big Eva to Disney as a problem.
Sadie Huff appears to equate vacationing in Disney with going into a hostile mission field when she talks about being light in a dark place. Indeed this is true of the Disney park employee she encountered, but this can hardly be said of vacationers.
Christian Liberty and Wisdom
Sadie Huff and her mother, Korie Robertson, discuss Christian liberty to justify the argument that an expensive vacation at Disney World is not a sin. While it is difficult to compel the conscience that it is a sin to not participate in a Disney Parks boycott, it’s also difficult to argue that this was a wise move.
23 All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify. 24 Let no one seek his own good, but that of his neighbor. 25 Eat anything that is sold in the meat market without asking questions for conscience’ sake; 26 for the earth is the Lord’s, and all it contains. 27 If one of the unbelievers invites you and you want to go, eat anything that is set before you without asking questions for conscience’ sake. 28 But if anyone says to you, “This is meat sacrificed to idols,” do not eat it, for the sake of the one who informed you, and for conscience’ sake; 29 I mean not your own conscience, but the other man’s; for why is my freedom judged by another’s conscience? 30 If I partake with thankfulness, why am I slandered concerning that for which I give thanks?
1 Corinthians 10:23-30 NASB1995
If a Christian is invited to Disney World, expenses paid, by all means go and be a light there. But how is it profitable for a Christian influencer to tout vacationing handing substantial money to a company that openly opposes Christianity. How is it strategic?
This isn’t a gospel issue. This isn’t necessarily a sin issue. But this is a wisdom issue.
Evangelical Dark Web has noted in the past that the most effective way to boycott Disney is to exclusively target the parks. Disney is currently losing money at the box office and has never made money on streaming. As cord cutting continues, ESPN will become more of a vanity project than the cash cow it once was. Yet the parks are how the average person can most hurt Disney, by refusing to go and spend thousands of dollars.
Sadie Huff and Korie Robertson frame the issue as whether or not to retreat from culture which is disingenuous to the debate over supporting Disney Parks with a substantial amount of money, a fact made clear in the Instagram post. Engaging the world rather than retreating from it would be to encourage a public boycott of Disney Parks. This strategic move would cripple a company now bent on preying upon children and furthering the liberal advance in society.
Huff’s braggadocious Instagram post flies in the face of this conventional wisdom and strategic necessity.
Messaging Naivete
Sadie Huff does state that her position is fluid, subject to change upon conditions and needs of her family. She says she will not pay to see Disney movies with bad messaging. Ironically, she follows this up with telling the audience how much her daughters like Frozen, a Disney princess movie about a queen who inflicts a natural disaster on her people, nearly murders her sister, and faces no accountability in the end, because she’s a girl boss, and the world was wrong for forcing her to conceal her emotions.
I cannot help but note the irony. I personally believe, so long as watching is not a passive participation in sin (ie drag shows), watching things with bad messaging and discussing this with children, teens is probably the best path rather than trying to “find the gospel” in Moana, as Huff believes, or avoiding it altogether.
Conclusion
The most popular comments in her video on this disagree with her, although the dislike count is low. It’s not as though people are actually canceling Huff, as she makes it seem. It is, however, further demonstration that she’s not a good influence for young women. She doesn’t handle the text particularly well and is still a quasi female pastor who is the protégé of a false teacher. Sadie Robertson Huff tries to draw a delineation between supporting Disney Parks and supporting Disney’s morals, but patronizing Disney Parks is financially the most direct way to support Disney values.
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