Phil Johnson (PJ) sermonizes,
“The underlying presuppositions of modern Christian nationalism are basically the same ideas that created state-run churches across Europe after the
Protestant Reformation. And on the face of it, reforming government and society to make them more Christian, that may sound like a noble goal, right? I mean, if that were accomplished, it would make us and our lives much more comfortable.”BLMc responds,
1.) PJ complains about state run churches, seemingly assuming that is what Christian Nationalism desires. He once again here makes the mistake of confusing ecclesiocentrism with the Christian Nationalist goal of Christo-centrism. I don’t personally know of anybody who wants the State running the Church or the Church running the state. All Biblical Christian Nationalists understand that the Church holds the keys and is responsible for opening and shutting the Kingdom of God, while the State holds the sword and is responsible for bringing justice in concert with God’s definition of justice found in Scripture. Two distinct, but not divorced, realms working in harmony since they each own a common Lord in bowing to Jesus Christ.
2.) PJ complains about “state-run churches,” but is he so blind as he is not able to see that at this very moment the vast majority of our churches are state-run. Here I am speaking of the Government schools that dot our land like so many cancer cells on a stage V cancer patient. Government schools serve as the current state run church in America. They are everywhere catechizing our children (including most Christian children) into the state religion of postmodern paganism. You can either have state run humanist churches in government schools or you can have the kind of state that leaves the family to be in charge of schooling, which is what a Biblical Christian Nationalism would champion.
PJ,
But I see two significant problems with that.
One, that is not the work Christ has given his church to do. It’s not an idea that you will find anywhere in the teaching of Jesus. It has more in common with the worldview of the zealots of Jesus time. Jesus himself never affirmed or encouraged zealotry. And in fact, at least one of the 12, Simon the Zealot, had to leave zealotry behind in order to follow Jesus. The Zealots were a political party that thought Rome had no business ruling over Israel. And when Jesus was asked about paying taxes to the pagan dominated government of Rome, Jesus response was an explicit denial of the central principle of zealotry. He said, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesars’s and to God the things that are God’s.” But Christian nationalism is basically proposing that the church needs to render to Christ the things that are Caesars.”
BLMc
1.) Here PJ is actually arguing that Caesar has something that uniquely belongs to him and not to Christ. In doing so PJ is carving out a zone for Caesar wherein Caesar can say to God, “this is none of your business. No trespassing.”
Remember, that the whole scenario where Jesus says, ““Render to Caesar the things that are Caesars’s and to God the things that are God’s,” was intended as a trap in order to implicate Jesus. If Jesus says, “pay the tax” He will incur the wrath of the people. If Jesus says, “don’t pay the tax” He will incur the wrath of Rome. So, Jesus says neither and gives a purposefully nebulous answer. He does not answer the question directly. I would say that since I am to render unto God the things that are Gods that means I have to render unto God, Caesar, since Caesar is God’s Caesar. Caesar does not get to claim ownership over any part of God’s world.
2.) I quite agree with PJ that God has not given to the Church the running of the State. However, since Christ is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, Christ is to rule over the State. So, while the Church, as Institution, is not to run the State, Christians who own Christ as King are to rule in the State to the glory of God and so is to bring the teaching of Scripture to bear on the work of the Magistrate.
3.) Also notice here how PJ limits the teaching of Scripture to just the “teachings of Jesus” as if the rest of Scripture doesn’t count.
4.) We really must insist there is idolatry in what PJ is preaching here however well intended the man may be. When PJ argues that there are things that are uniquely Caesars that turns Caesar into an idol who must be obeyed over God in the areas that are uniquely Caesars.
PJ
1.) With his reference to the “dark ages,” PJ reveals that he has been captured by the labeling that is done by the heathens in order to discredit Christianity. Actually, what is called “the dark ages” by enemy historian was a time where Christianity has significant influence. The enemy refers to this time as “the dark ages” precisely because it was so influenced by Christianity.
2.) PJ wants to insist that we shouldn’t pursue Christian Nationalism because Christian Nationalism has always failed. However, we might want to ask PJ which has failed more gloriously, Christian Nationalism or non Christian attempts at organizing social order? Would PJ prefer the failures of the Weimar Republic over the putative failures of Christian Nationalism? Would PJ prefer the failures of Communism over the failures of Christian Nationalism? Would PJ prefer the failures of 21st century American social order over the failures of Christian Nationalism? Would PJ prefer the failures of 19th century Chaka Zulu over the failures of Christian Nationalism. In other words, I will live with the failures of Christian Nationalism over and above living with the failures of all other non-Christian social order arrangements.
3.) PJ then proceeds to give a long list of Christian social order arrangements that have failed as if that proves that because they eventually failed they were never a success and were not superior to the failures that replaced them.
It is unsettling to a maximum degree to think that a Christian, living in the social order morass that we are currently in, would rather live in this social order hell (and it can go from bad to even worse) then have a return to Christian Nationalism. Phil Johnson would seemingly prefer to live with sodomy, trannie-ism, abortion, massive immigration of those who hate Christianity, etc. then to have a ruling class who sought to exalt Christ in all their decision making.
PJ
(After referencing Will & Ariel Durant’s history, Johnson says,)
1.) Will & Ariel Durant were typical liberals who interestingly also said,
“All strong characters and peoples are race conscious, and are instinctively averse to marriage outside their own racial group.”
I wonder if PJ would also salute that sentiment from the Durants?
2.) The Durants were not Christian in any Biblical sense of the word. Should we be surprised that non-Christian Historians would profess that “No one has yet reconciled Christianity with government?”
3.) If Christianity can’t be reconciled with government then that means that government is by definition inherently sinful. If government can’t be Christian all that is left is for government to be wicked. Does PJ really desire to embrace the idea that government is, by definition, wicked? Or, as Christian Nationalists would prefer to say that government is only as good or as bad as the character of men that serve in government. If godly men are magistrates governing by godly principles as defined by Scripture then government can glorify God. It is a wicked thing to suggest that the Christian faith cannot be reconciled with Christian rule.
Will Durant represented the sort of “Old Left” that still had, thanks to God’s general grace, some amount of decency and intellectual honesty left in it – he was not just some vulgarly biased propagandist (but rather a skillful propagandist who did not crudely shove his views into your face).
He was, for example, able to admit that one could not so easily depict Christ as a Leftist teacher:
https://erenow.net/ancient/durantromecaesar/177.php
“Many have interpreted the Kingdom as a communist utopia, and have seen in Christ a social revolutionist.78 The Gospels provide some evidence for this view. Christ obviously scorned the man whose chief purpose in life is to amass money and luxuries.79 He promised hunger and woe to the rich and filled, and comforted the poor with Beatitudes that pledged them the Kingdom. To the rich youth who asked what he should do besides keeping the commandments, Christ answered: “Sell your property, give your money to the poor, and . . . follow me.”80 Apparently the apostles interpreted the Kingdom as a revolutionary inversion of the existing relationships between the rich and the poor; we shall find them and the early Christians forming a communistic band which “had all things in common.”81 The charge on which Jesus was condemned was that he had plotted to make himself “King of the Jews.”
But a conservative can also quote the New Testament to his purpose. Christ made a friend of Matthew, who continued to be an agent of the Roman power; he uttered no criticism of the civil government, took no known part in the Jewish movement for national liberation, and counseled a submissive gentleness hardly smacking of political revolution. He advised the Pharisees to “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.”82 His story of the man who, before going on a journey, “called on his slaves, and put his property in their hands,”83 contains no complaint against interest or slavery, but takes these institutions for granted. Christ apparently approves of the slave who invested the ten minas ($600) that the master had entrusted to him, and made ten more; he disapproves of the slave who, left with one mina, held it in unproductive safekeeping against the master’s return; and he puts into the master’s mouth the hard saying that “to him who has, more will be given, and from him who has nothing, even that which he has will be taken away”84—an excellent summary of market operations, if not of world history. In another parable workers “grumbled at their employer,” who paid as much to one who had labored an hour as to those who had toiled all day; Christ makes the employer answer: “Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with my own?”85 Jesus does not seem to have thought of ending poverty; “the poor ye have always with you.” He takes for granted, like all ancients, that a slave’s duty is to serve his master well; “blessed is the slave whom his master, returning, finds performing his charge.”86 He is not concerned to attack existing economic or political institutions; on the contrary, he condemns those ardent souls who would “take the Kingdom of Heaven by storm.”87 The revolution he sought was a far deeper one, without which reforms could only be superficial and transitory. If he could cleanse the human heart of selfish desire, cruelty, and lust, utopia would come of itself, and all those institutions that rise out of human greed and violence, and the consequent need for law, would disappear. Since this would be the profoundest of all revolutions, beside which all others would be mere coups d’état of class ousting class and exploiting in its turn, Christ was in this spiritual sense the greatest revolutionist in history.”
If we are to take Jesus’ saying in the Phil Johnson’s sense of reserving a space belonging to Caesar, not God, we should also notice that the one thing that is identified in that space is money. Money, therefore, belongs to Caesar and it should not be going to the church. Will Johnson be consistent and stand up on Sunday and say, “Don’t give your money to the church. It is against the command of Jesus.”?
Tim,
Thanks for stopping by.
Yes, if we are to give to Caesar whatever Caesar asks we have made Caesar to be God. When Jesus said, “Give unto Caesar the things that are Caesars,” we should find ourselves asking, “since the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, what could possibly belong to Caesar?”
Clearly, just because Caesar says something is his, does not therefore make it his.