Thick as a Brick
The Emotive Language of Frank Viola
“I may make you feel, but I can’t make you think.” Thick as a Brick, Jethro Tull.
“Emotive language is word choice intended to provoke an emotional response in the audience, making them feel a certain way, in order to influence their perspective or create a stronger connection to the topic.”
Unlike the highly educated authors of Answering the Music Man, who base their religious convictions on philosophy and higher thinking, it’s clear that in Viola’s book Insurgence, he isn’t trying to make his readers think. Instead, what he writes, and even the way he writes, is intended to invoke emotions, not thought. Viola’s use of emotive language is dramatic, evocative and, in a sense, somewhat dangerous.
Viola’s exclusive use of emotive language makes me wonder, “why doesn’t he want his audience to think?” Perhaps, it’s because he wants them to feel so deeply that they are willing to make drastic changes in their life that they would never make if they stopped to actually think about the consequences? So, let’s look at portions of his book Insurgence to see if we can determine what he wants his readers to feel, and why he doesn’t want them to think.
What is the insurgence? “During the conference, I did my dead-level best to unleash the titanic, explosive, cataclysmic, earth-shaking, life-altering gospel of the kingdom that was preached by all the apostles in the first century and that turned the world into a mad rage.”
Wow! That’s a lot of emotive language in one sentence. First off, it’s important to note that Viola is not talking about the traditional gospel and its message that salvation is a free gift from God through faith in Jesus. This traditional gospel has been the core of christianity for millennia, but Viola has created a new gospel that he calls the “gospel of the kingdom”. According to him this version of the gospel isn’t just about salvation from eternal judgement, it’s more about (in his words) “the joining together of heaven and earth and establishing God’s kingdom on earth”. Let’s see what he says about his new gospel of the kingdom.
According to that one sentence it’s…
- Titanic – of exceptional strength, size, or power.
- Explosive – able or likely to shatter violently or burst apart, as when a bomb explodes.
- Cataclysmic – a momentous and violent event marked by overwhelming upheaval and demolition.
- Earth-shaking – of great importance.
- Life-altering – having an effect powerful enough to fundamentally change a person’s life, for better or worse.
And it sent people into a…
- Mad rage – extreme, violent, and uncontrolled anger, a state of frenzied wrath that can lead to aggressive actions.
Now, how’s that for emotive language? No thinking required. Didn’t anyone at the conference take the time to ask an obvious question. Did the first century apostles actually turn the world into a mad rage?
Not surprisingly, his emotive language had the effect on his audience that he was hoping for.
“The second night of the conference, something incredible happened. A number of people pulled me aside after the meeting and said things like, “I’ve not been so shaken by the Lord through a message.” Another said, “What took place was electric. Something very special happened in that room that I can’t fully describe.” Others said they were deeply stirred and rocked by what took place.”
Notice that Viola didn’t report that people said he had really made them think. That wasn’t his goal anyway. His goal was to make them feel, and he was successful at that. So much so, that a number of already baptized christians expressed a desire to be re-baptized into Viola’s new gospel.
“We didn’t plan this nor foresee it, but the next morning, a number of people expressed their desire to be baptized. So, I asked a brother and a sister in Christ to baptize anyone who wanted to respond to the gospel of the kingdom. Those who responded were baptized in the hotel pool where the conference was held. Each person being baptized gave a moving testimonial about making their entrance into the glorious kingdom of God. More than half the conference attendees came out to witness the baptisms and rejoice. Many who attended wrote me testimonials of how their lives were turned upside down.”
“Turned upside down – inverted, overturned, capsized, flipped, upended, reversed, topsy-turvy, disordered, chaotic, messed up, confused, and jumbled.”
One of the newly re-baptized followers wrote this,
“By my baptism today, I publicly declare my intentions to… forsake all that gets in the way of me fully coming into the kingdom of God—into the Lord Jesus Himself. I sever my ties to a mixture of lies and half-truth, which resulted in a lack of seeing the power of the pure gospel’s effect in my life.”
It’s funny that I’ve been saying that very same thing for years; “christianity is a mixture of lies and half-truths”. Every blog I’ve ever published has focused on exposing those lies and half-truths.
Like Viola’s rebaptized follower, I also chose to severe my ties to the “mixture of lies and half-truths” of christianity. However, I replaced them with Secularism. Conversely, Viola’s followers, after having discarded the falsehoods of traditional christianity, chose to replace them with Viola’s falsehoods about the “gospel of the kingdom”. Why would they do that?
We’ll come back to that but first let’s examine some more of Viola’s emotive language.
None of his new converts thought to question Viola’s falsehoods.
Recovering a High-Octane Gospel “With rare exception, the gospel that was preached in the first century doesn’t exist today. The gospel that John the Baptist, Jesus, Paul, Peter, and the rest of the apostles unleashed on the world was…
- so titanic,
- so overwhelming,
- so radical, and
- so utterly uncompromising
- that it made the strongest of men quake.”
Did it really make the strongest of men quake? OMG! He’s boarding on downright silliness now. And it continues.
“The early apostles ripped the earth apart by the seams bare-handed, by the power of the gospel they preached and lived. They were firebrands, rare breeds, unlike anything that most of us have ever encountered. They left all to follow Jesus Christ and live for His kingdom. Their devotion was resolute, total, and utter.”
Did the early apostles actually “bear-handedly rip the earth apart by the seams”? Of course not! But it appears that none of his new converts thought to question that fiction. Remember, they weren’t thinking at all. That was not Viola’s objective. But here’s where it gets dangerously cult-like. Viola reminds them that those first century apostles “left all to follow Jesus Christ and live for his kingdom”.
Viola writes,
“The gospel of the kingdom includes a radical call to forsake the present world system – its values, its ways, its philosophy, its language and style of speech, its pleasures – and even one’s own life. And to surrender that life to Jesus of Nazareth, this world’s true Lord. Then to live out this kingdom life with others who have embraced the gospel of the kingdom.”
From where I stand.
After having been “deeply stirred” by his emotive language, these converts to Viola’s new gospel, were then sent home (to the real world) with a conviction to “severe their ties to the world system”. It’s one thing to have an emotional upheaval, and quite another to translate that experience into everyday life without any cognitive tools to deal with what they had just experienced. How exactly would they do that? Perhaps, now we might be able to understand why Viola doesn’t want his converts to think. Look at what he’s asking them to do.
Just because something is “Titanic” doesn’t mean it’s foolproof.
Cataclysmic isn’t always for the good!
Coming next:
As we’ll see in the next blog, Viola doesn’t give his converts much guidance about how to “forsake the present world system”. He was all too eager to turn their lives upside down with his emotive language, but they’ll need more than emotions if they choose to follow his radical “gospel of the kingdom”. Plus, we’ll explore what kind of person might be attracted to the idea of forsaking traditional christianity and embracing Viola’s new gospel of the kingdom.
“I may make you feel, but I can’t make you think.”
From Where I Stand
Nov 16, 2025
Dale Crum