Continuing to Fisk Dr. Andrew Walker’s hit piece on Theonomy posted on “The Godless Coalition.”
AW writes.
The allure of moral, religious, and cultural uniformity cannot come at the expense of religious freedom. A baseline of religious liberty is essential. Unless all religions receive equal recognition under the law, one religious group will set whatever exacting standards it desires as the basis of membership and participation in society.
BLMc responds,
1.) Here we are introduced to Walker’s God. Walker’s God is the humanist notion of religious liberty. Per Walker religious liberty is a higher god than the God of the Bible and His Law-Word. Per Walker, we must serve the god of humanist religious liberty as opposed to serving God.
2.) Note that Walker himself, even if he gets his way on humanist religious liberty has not avoided the moral, religious, and cultural uniformity that he decries. In Walker’s social order there is moral, religious, and cultural uniformity inasmuch as all other gods must bow to the state god who disallows anyone God (including the God of the Bible) from being a God above the state God who demands humanist religious liberty. Per Walker, all the gods must be governed in the uniform moral, religious, and cultural realm by the State God to make sure that none of them replaces the State God thus providing a different uniform moral, religious and cultural social order than offered by Walker’s State God.
3.) We don’t have religious liberty right now. The God of the Bible is not at liberty to be God over all other gods. That is not religious liberty.
4.) Understand that what Walker desires is that Allah, the Jewish Talmud God, Confucius, Buddha be given equal recognition by Christians as the God of the Bible. The God of the Bible per Walker and the Godless Coalition cannot (must not) be lifted higher and seen as superior to the pagan gods. How can a Christian say such a thing without being rightly labeled as a treasonous bastard to the Crown Rights of King Jesus?
5.) Finally, remember we already have the exacting standards of one God lifted above all other gods. We currently have the God-State in the name of humanist “religious liberty” exacting on us his diabolical standards. In the name of religious liberty, abortion is pursued, sodomites can enter into marriage, boys can enter the girl’s locker rooms, and boys can compete against girls in girls’ sports. Talk about an exacting standard.
AW writes,
Whether Catholic versus Protestant or Protestant versus other Protestant, one group is always tempted to exclude based on some religious criteria. As a Protestant, I shudder thinking about many of John Calvin and Martin Luther’s attitudes toward the state’s involvement in religion. Baptists did not fare well as religious minorities under the reign of church-state union, and I have no longing to return.
BLMc responds,
1.) Walker can’t see that all Christians are right now being excluded based on the religious criteria of humanism? Walker can’t see that as the sodomite comes out of the closet the Christian is the one being pushed back into the closet? Christians are being excluded from being able to say “no” to sodomites who want a Wedding cake baked for them, or photos of their God-forsaken weddings taken, or flowers provided for their gross nuptials. Christians are right now on the edge of being told that in their churches they are required to hire sodomites, catamites, and other assorted perverts… all in the name of the humanist god Walker desires to be ensconced as God. Is this man daft that he can’t see all this?
2.) Now you can understand why Baptists were treated the way they were treated. Baptists with their foul humanist religious liberty doctrine are the ones who have opened the door to all the perversion that I have listed above. It is Baptists who have brought us to the place we are by their bone-headed doctrine of humanist religious liberty. Walker would prefer a godless social order than a social order where the God of the Bible is prioritized above all gods. As a Protestant, I shudder at Baptists like Walker continuing to support an idea that has taken Biblical Christians and put them on an equal footing with perverts and anti-Christs. God raises up a Calvin or a Luther or even a Knox to put an end to pestilent thinking like Walkers.
AW writes,
Theonomy is right to criticize our society’s lawlessness. But the alternative it proposes presupposes a Christian society that does not exist and, where it once did, did not contain the theological coherence to perpetuate itself.
BLMc responds,
It is Walker’s presuppositions that are skewed. What else can we propose as God’s people except for a return to God’s Law-Word? Would Walker propose being ruled by some other god and His Law-Word?
1.) Walker seemingly desires some neutral social order. But neutrality and religious liberty are a myth. They don’t exist. There is never a culture that exists that doesn’t descend from and isn’t an expression of some God or god concept. Walker seems to think we can have a culture where all the gods are welcome but fails to see that in that kind of culture there has to be some authority somewhere to make sure none of these gods get out of line. Some authority has to be present to make sure all these gods remain equal. Where ever that authority lies, Walker misses, is the god over the gods. In our setting that is the state.
2.) And of course, with people like Walker, it is not possible to reach theological coherence for a Christian culture. The lack of ability to perpetuate Christian culture lies at the feet of the Anabaptist (paging Roger Williams) and the Anabaptists are the intellectual forbears of Walker’s humanist religious liberty.
Be careful to understand what I am saying here. I am saying that Walker can bleat for humanist religious liberty all he wants but such a beast is not possible. This concept of religious liberty only worked here as long as it did because the country was salted for so long with Biblical Christians. But now that what passes as Christianity is now being trodden underfoot (thanks to people like Walker) the false mask that “religious liberty” always wore is being torn off.
AW writes,
And if Theonomy is right and history is working toward the telos of a Christianized society, why does precisely the opposite seem to be the case? Is Christ’s church less faithful because Western culture is increasingly pagan? What if the Lord uses difficult moments to prune? What results from a reciprocating relationship between church and state, however, is the husk of civil religion and the kernel of saving faith instrumentalized for cultural cohesion.
BLMc responds,
1.) Question #1 – Because God’s people, like Walker, are in rebellion to God’s Law-Word and the implementation thereof. If people won’t champion “No God, But God,” if people won’t champion God’s Law Word for the civil sphere, if people want to champion the presence of every false god as being equal to the God of the Bible for the civil sphere how can we be surprised for a second that a Christianized society is always out of reach?
2.) Question #2 – Christ Church is less faithful where Christ’s Church advocates that all gods be treated equally thus disallowing the God of the Bible to be the God of the 1st commandment.
3.) Question #3 – Invoking the Lord’s pruning to justify our disobedience is odd logic.
4.) We have the civil religion we have now precisely because Biblical religion has not been allowed to flex its muscle thanks to people like Walker. Saving faith that is not expressed in the public square is a saving faith of the most immature variety.
5.) Notice the lack of cultural cohesion that we have now is directly related to the current lack of faith of Biblical Christians who are too fearful to champion God’s Law-Word for the public square.
“Unless all religions receive equal recognition under the law, one religious group will set whatever exacting standards it desires as the basis of membership and participation in society.”
I can’t believe he wrote that! Did he really mean ‘all religions’, and not rather ‘all Christian denominations?’ If so, this was basically the rationale of Imperial Rome and the reason Christians were condemned to death for sedition: i.e. not because they worshiped Jesus, but because they worshiped ONLY Jesus and refused to acknowledge Caesar as the Lord and Arbiter between all competing ‘religious groups’. Either God is God or the State will be God. It’s well-said that there can be no neutrality as regards authority. Never has been–never will be.
“The question is not whether that which is Caesar’s should be rendered to him, for that is to be done to all men; but who is Caesar, and what doth of right belong to him? The proper act of justice is to give to everyone his due; to man that which belongs to man and to God that which is God’s. But as no man can be just or desire to be so, unless he know that justice is good; nor know that it is good, unless he know that original justice and goodness through which all that is just is just, and all that is good is good; ‘tis impossible for any man to perform the part of a good magistrate unless he have the knowledge of God. Those who have no sense of right, reason or religion, have a natural propensity to make use of their strength to the destruction of such as are weaker than they.”
Algernon Sidney, ‘Discourses Concerning Government’