Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the throne, Yet that scaffold sways the future, and, behind the dim unknown, Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above his own.
For your reading or listening pleasure.
The above is from a new Theological Webzine, “American Mantle.”
Also, while featuring not one of my more flattering photos, “The American Free Press” printed an interview between James Edwards (He of “The Political Cesspool” fame) and myself in their publication.
Doug Wilson – “What is happening with a lot on what I call on the ‘Dank Right’ these days is – which is an over-reaction to the egalitarianism and the globalization / homogenization of all ethnicity on the one hand, people have reacted the other way but what they’re doing is talking about ethnicity all the time like this is the only thing. But the Bible is much more wise than that. Jesus says you can’t be His disciple unless you hate Father, Mother, Wife, Brother, Sister. You’ve got to hate them. Now Matthew says ‘love more than me,’ so that tells you what’s going on there.”
Joe Boot – “There’s also the incident where Jesus is teaching and He’s barely had time to eat and – I love it, I think it’s there in Luke or is it Mark 4, somewhere in there, where they think Jesus has lost His mind and they’re final solution is ‘tell His Mom.’ finally His Mom and Brothers show up and they (the crowd) says ‘Your Mother and Brothers are calling you,’ and He says ‘my Mother, my Sister, my Brother are those who do the will of God.’ That whole idea of the only totalizing concept that the Bible recognizes is that relativizes all other loves is the Kingdom of God.”
Doug Wilson – “And you see , for example, hate Father, Mother, but if you surrender and die – basically if you mortify your earthly loves that way the resurrected, such that a man can love his wife as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for it or Jesus who said ‘Who is my Mother,’ is very solicitous for her from the cross … so it is not like we hate earthly loves. I am very grateful for my earthly loves but the Bible is very clear that only God’s requirements are total and if your beloved tries to entice you to idolatry in the OT, you have not pity. You have to say absolutely not.”
Joe Boot interviews Doug Wilson
Reformcon
“Ordo Amoris & the Gospel’s Answer to Ethnic Animosity.”
Bret responds,
1.) First, let us note that making an idol of your family, tribe, clan, nation or race is possible. Familioltry is a thing. However, can we honestly look at the current incarnation of the West and conclude that famililoltry is a problem? I mean, sure, I am confident that there may be some people out there among the pagan right who are making idols of their family, but let’s be honest and admit that we do not have a widespread problem in the Church today of people making an idol out of their family. On the other hand, to those like Doug Wilson and Joe Boot who seem to be brain dead that there is a very real agenda to snuff out the white man (replacement theory) there is instead the problem of not dealing effectively with the problem of egalitarianism. Like the Israel leadership of old Doug and Joe want to treat the problem of egalitarianism too lightly. The West is clearly in a house that is burning down around us in the flames of egalitarianism and the Boomer-cons want to go on a diatribe about the dangers of familoltry? Do these chaps know what time it is? Do they realize that total percentage of white people to non-white people has dropped precipitously in the past 50 years? Do they realize that globalism and the migration habits of the third world into Western countries is not an accident? Do they understand that by the definition of “genocide” as stated by the UN that white people are currently being genocided? These two Boomers complaining about the presence of familoltry in our current climate is like someone pointing out that a teenager has a zit all the while missing the fact that his leg has been shorn off.
2.) Doug, as a proponent of the effeminate soft left, argues that we on the “Dank Right” have overreacted. Well, that does tend to happen when genocide for white people is on the menu “effeminate Doug.” Sure, some people have probably over-reacted but, again, I would strenuously contend that people like Wilson and Boot (and White and Sandlin and Durbin etc.) are massively under-reacting. They are sleeping while Rome burns. One only has to know somewhat of the history of Rhodesia and South Africa to see where all this is headed across the West. Yet, here we find Joe and Doug screaming … “All is well; Don’t over-react.” Honestly, this lack of urgency by Joe and Doug looks all the world like C. S. Lewis’ Green Witch, in the novel “The Silver Chair” doing all they can to put the awakening Prince back to sleep so he won’t fight against his danger. Who died and left you King, Doug, to decide when complaining about wickedness becomes too much complaining?
3.) Doug then complains that people are talking too much about globalization, and homogenization. This is like complaining that a prisoner on the torture rack is complaining too much about the pain of the torture. Of course we are complaining a great deal Doug. After all, torture doesn’t feel good.
Also, on this score who says when complaining about being vanquished becomes too much complaining? Let’s keep in mind that the egalitarian New World Order is in the saddle and holds the whip hand. Wouldn’t you expect the ones who are being whipped to be complaining a great deal? If we want to throw off the New World Order we have to spend time complaining about the fact that is Satanic and against God’s social order.
4.) I’m sure that the Bible is much wiser than all of us … including you Doug. That’s kind of a Captain Obvious statement.
5.) Keep in mind Doug that when Jesus says that we have to hate our family in comparison to loving the Lord Jesus Christ that kind of language doesn’t work unless there was (is) the expectation that we would indeed love our family. Jesus takes the idea that would be most central in people’s minds (the naturalness of loving one’s family) and says “Love for the Lord Christ must be even above that.” So, Jesus, takes the most central love in creation and puts it in its place; second to love for the Lord Christ. We might say, in light of this teaching, that Jesus is saying Love God first and then love your family. No one on my side of the fence disagrees with this Doug. Nobody on my side of the fence is arguing that we must love our family above God. What we are arguing is that we must love our family above loving the Stranger and the Alien. This is the 5th commandment. This is I Timothy 5:8.
6.) Turning to Boot’s brilliance, we once again offer that we quite agree that love for God relativizes all other loves. However, that does not mean that love for God eliminates the Ordo Amoris. There will be times when love for those who are not family who do the will of God will trump love for family who does not do the will of God. Nobody denies that on my side of the fence. We are merely arguing that normatively we have a responsibility to our Mothers before other women not our Mothers… just as Jesus demonstrated on the Cross.
7.) When you compare the first paragraph from Doug with the last paragraph from Doug it is clear this chap is involved in classic “Double-speak.” He, as he so often does, wants it both ways. He is, once again, fence straddling. Clearly, when any of my family is trying to entice me to idolatry I am going to tell them to “hit the road.” Really, this looks a great deal like a straw-man argument on Wilson’s part.
Now, look, Doug Wilson complains about how much his opponents are talking about race but I could fill a small library with how much this man keeps returning to the race issue in order to gate-keep against the non-egalitarians. In point of fact, I would say that he and his groupies are the ones who can’t shut up about the subject in their attempt to foist a kinder and gentler egalitarianism on us.
All religions are law systems and all law systems are the servants of some religion. This explains why theocracy is an inescapable concept. All governments must enact laws and when they do enact laws they do so on the basis of religion since law is a statement of morality and morality a reflection of religion. This, obviously, means that all governments are the reflection of some religion. No form of government is religion free. All forms of government are as equally intensely religious. This is true when the government says it eschews all religion, or, to the contrary when it insists, that it accepts all religion. When any government says that it is religious free it only means that it is basing all its legislative and governmental work on its own authority, which tells us that it is based on the religion of humanism where man dictates the morality upon which all legislation is based. Religion has not gone away. When any government insists that it accepts all religion, once again we have a testimony of humanism since in the accepting of all religion it is the government which will determine which religion will be the religion that dictates the morality upon which legislation will be based.
The above is true for any institution in any jurisdiction wherein laws are made for the institution. Because, families, for example, have laws that govern the family, families are downstream of some religion, since the laws for the family are based on a morality and the morality in turn is based on some religion and God concept. Because this is so families will be “Christian families,” or “Humanist families” or “Jewish families,” or “Muslim families,” etc. However no family will ever be a non-religiously defined family. The same is true for law courts, for educational institutions, for workplaces, for political parties, etc. Religion is an inescapable concept and never goes away, though often it is insisted that this or that is “irreligious.”
All this explains, in part, why R2K is so disastrous. R2K insists that these different realms (family, arts, juridical, education, politics, government etc.) all should be, by definition, areligious. R2K, bone-headedly, insists that the adjective “Christian” should never define these different realms. Indeed, R2K goes so far as to say that it is sinful before God to insist that the adjective “Christian” should be supplied as a descriptor for any of these areas. In doing so, R2K turns over all these areas to non-Christian religions. This is so because once R2K has successfully convinced Christians that they should not pursue “Christian Education,” “Christian Politics,” “Christian Jurisprudence,” “Christian Art,” then all that is left as an adjective to define these jurisdictional disciplines is some non-Christian religion. This explains, in part, why R2K is idolatry and an abandoning of the Christian faith.
Doug Wilson is one of those guys who will say anything that comes into his mind that sounds good at the moment. Here is a recent example. Now, I want to say at the outset that I don’t disagree with Dabney here – especially given the condition of the Black race in the South at the time – but I’m pretty sure that Doug would be insisting upon all kinds of disclaimers her regarding Dabney. The issuing of those disclaimers would prove that Doug often says things that are convenient for the moment.
“I think R. L. Dabney was a godly Christian man — a little irascible at places but nothing I think I need to put a disclaimer on.”
Doug Wilson
“[W]as it nothing, that this (Black) race, morally inferior, should be brought into close relations to a nobler race (White), so that the propensity to imitation should be stimulated by constant and intimate observation, by domestic affection, by the powerful sentiment of allegiance and dependence?”
R. L. Dabney
In A Defence of Virginia & The South – p. 282
LOL… I’m pretty sure Doug would be ruined if he didn’t put a disclaimer on that. Let the disclaimers be forthcoming.
33 Pilate therefore entered again into the [q]Praetorium, and called Jesus, and said unto him, Art thou the King of the Jews? 34 Jesus answered, Sayest thou this of thyself, or did others tell it thee concerning me? 35 Pilate answered, Am I a Jew? Thine own nation and the chief priests delivered thee unto me: what hast thou done? 36 Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my [r]servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence. 37 Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, [s]Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end have I been born, and to this end am I come into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice. 38 Pilate saith unto him, What is truth?
And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, I find no crime in him. 39 But ye have a custom, that I should release unto you one at the passover: will ye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews? 40 They cried out therefore again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber.
__________
On the Church Calendar, this Sunday is designated as “Christ the King” Sunday. The recognition of this day has an eschatological dimension and so points to the end of time when the kingdom of Jesus will be established in all its fullness to the ends of the earth. As such “Christ the King” Sunday naturally leads into the Advent season, when the Church commemorates the first Advent of Christ.
As the modern Church only gives lip service to Christ’s office as King I find it incumbent to speak on this subject with every chance available. It is a place where the contemporary Church is falling down. It is a subject upon which it is good for all of us to be reminded.
In this passage in John Christ asserts His Kingship. This morning we want to examine how it is that Christ comes to this Kingship and what some of the implications are for Christ being King.
Here Jesus Christ confesses to Pilate that He is a King,
37 Pilate, therefore, said unto him, Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, [s]Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end have I been born, and to this end am I come into the world,
I.) Christ is the King by Divine Right
Since the Father is Sovereign… the Son is Sovereign
The idea that Jehovah is King is everywhere posited in the Old Testament.
Here are just a few examples,
But of the Son He says, “YOUR THRONE, O GOD, IS FOREVER AND EVER, AND THE RIGHTEOUS SCEPTER IS THE SCEPTER OF HIS KINGDOM.
And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, “KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.
So based on this unity of the Trinitarian Divine being, as God is sovereign every member of the Trinity shares in that sovereignty.
According to one of the Important ECF, Cyril of Alexandria,
“Christ, has dominion over all creatures, a dominion not seized by violence nor usurped, but his by essence and by nature.”
As Jesus Christ is very God of very God, He shares in Sovereignty with the Father and the Spirit. As such Christ, by way of His divinity, is King over all creation. As we have seen this is what Scripture teaches. Christ is King over all men and over all Creation.
II.) Christ is the King by Acquired Right
I Cor. 6:20 you were bought at a price. Therefore glorify God with your body
For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life you inherited from your forefathers,
I. Cor. 7:23You were bought at a price; do not become slaves of men.
‘ We are no longer our own property, for Christ has purchased us as Peter teaches, “with a great price” and so our very bodies are the “members of Christ.”
The heart of our Catechism presupposes Christ’s Kingship,
Here the emphasis is that Christ has paid the Ransom-price which grants Him the Divine Right of Kingship.
III.) Christ is the King by Divine Inheritance
A third ground of sovereignty is that God bestowed upon Christ the nations of the world as His special possession and dominion.
In the Great Commission Christ, Himself testifies to this,
“All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” (Matthew 28:18)
John 3:34For the One whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God gives the Spirit without limit. 35TheFather loves the Son and has placed all things in His hands.
John 5:22 Furthermore, the Father judges no one, but has assigned all judgment to the Son, 23so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him.…
So what are the Implications of Christ being the King of Kings and Lord of Lords? Thus far, I think one could get most of the Church on board with what has been said. But it is the implications of the Kingship of Christ which begins to stir the proverbial pot and so it is on the tangible impact of the Kingship of Christ wherein Christians begin to fall out with one another.
Implication #1 — Caesar must bow to Christ’s Kingship
If Christ is King over all then all must bow to the authority of Christ.
According to McGoldrick, in his book on Reformed giant Abraham Kuyper,
Kuyper believed that, “Christians must served God within the world, and not flee into seclusion as Monks and some Anabaptists have done. When Christians obtain positions of civil authority, they must operate in obedience to God, since the Lord has ordained their authority (Rom. 13:1-7). This, Kuyper argued, means that the civil government must “restrain blasphemy, where it directly assumes the character of an affront to the Divine Majesty.” The constitution of the state should acknowledge God as supreme ruler, and governments should set aside its regular activities on a Sunday and protect it as a day of worship. Magistrates… should regard themselves as responsible to God in the discharge of their duties. They should punish public attacks upon God as crime against civil law, which acknowledges God as the source of the state’s authority.”
Contrast, this Christian conviction with something just written recently by Baptist Minister John Piper,
So how do we express a passion for God”s supremacy in a pluralistic world where most people do not recognize God as an important part of their lives, let alone an important part of government or education or business or industry or art or recreation or entertainment?
Answer: We express a passion for the supremacy of God…
5) by making clear that God himself is the foundation for our commitment to a pluralistic democratic order-not because pluralism is his ultimate ideal, but because in a fallen world, legal coercion will not produce the kingdom of God. Christians agree to make room for non-Christian faiths (including naturalistic, materialistic faiths), not because commitment to God”s supremacy is unimportant, but because it must be voluntary, or it is worthless. We have a God-centered ground for making room for atheism. “If my kingship were of this world, my servants would fight” (John 18:36). The fact that God establishes his kingdom through the supernatural miracle of faith, not firearms, means that Christians in this age will not endorse coercive governments-Christian or secular.
So, we are considering the implications of the Kingship of Jesus Christ and already we have come to a huge fork in the road between those claiming Christ. One expression holds that the implication of Christ’s Kingship is the Christians should rule as Christians. The other holds that the implication of Christ’s Kingship is that Christians should rule in such a way to make room for Atheism. Both would affirm the Kingship of Jesus Christ. Each is defining Kingship very differently.
The upshot of this is that while Christians each may affirm statements that are linguistically the same, they may very well being affirming very different things.
Implication #2 — Our Law Order must reflect the Law Order of the King
Christians and non-Christians alike fail to understand how much of the fabric of the Law Order that created Western Civilization was Christian in its beginnings.
Harold J. Berman’s Massive two Volume Set “Law and Revolution,” notes this repeatedly.
“The Church … would work for… the reformation of the world through law, in the direction of justice and peace…. Law came to be seen as the very essence of faith. ‘God is himself law, and therefore law is dear to him, ‘ wrote the author of Sachsenspiegel, the first German law book, about 1220…. Law was seen as a way of fulfilling the mission of Western Christendom to begin to achieve the Kingdom of God on earth.”
Elsewhere Berman notes,
“The Law of King Alfred, for example, start with the ten Commandments and a restatement of the Law of Moses, a summary of the Acts of the Apostles and references to the monastic penitentials…. Christianity broke the fiction of the immutability of folk law.”
And again in Vol. II Berman notes,
“The English Puritans… shared the belief that human history is wholly within the providence of God, that it is primarily a spiritual story of the unfolding of God’s own purposes…. They believed, further, that God willed and commanded what they called the ‘reformation of the world,’ and they emphasized the role of law as a means of such Reformation.”
Time does not permit to mine all the rich quotes from Berman’s two volumes that demonstrate that our Father’s understood that one of the implications of the Kingship of Jesus Christ was that social orders were to be governed by His Law Order. In the words of G. K. Chesterton, we are discovering anew that if ‘man will not be ruled by the Ten Commandments he will be ruled by ten thousand commandments.”
This denial of this implication of the Kingship of Jesus Christ is all very recent comparatively speaking. We have grown up in this rebellion so we tend to see the rebellion as the norm but up until about 100 years ago men understood the connection between God’s law and the law that guided the civil order in the West.
Harold O. J. Brown notes,
If there are no laws made in heaven, by what standards should human society organize itself? We do need laws by which to organize and structure our lives, but if God has not given them, where shall they come from? There is only one answer: We must make them ourselves. Of course, if we make our own laws they will have no more authority or force than what we ourselves possess and can assert by means of the power at our disposal. In other words, law comes to represent not the will of the Creator but the will of the strongest creatures. This became the widespread view, sometimes unexpressed but frequently explicit, of most Western societies in the first part of the twentieth century. America’s great legal statesman, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., thought no differently in this respect from the great dictator, Adolf Hitler. Both of them believed that laws simply represent the will of the dominant majority. Holmes was a courteous, urbane, sophisticated gentleman, but his idea of law would have offered no opposition to the enactments of Hitler, who for a time reflected the will of Germany’s dominant majority.
Harold O. J. Brown, The Sensate Culture: Western Civilization Between Chaos and Transformation (Dallas, TX: Word, 1996), 88.
Implication #3 — We will be considered intolerant because we are intolerant
Illustration — To make this concrete let’s consider that the same can be said of the relationship in physical organisms. Your body can’t develop a tolerance to a deadly parasite in your body. That parasite is trying to take over your whole body and kill you, while your body’s autoimmune system are doing their flat level best to kill the parasite. The two are at war. To tolerate an alien law system into your social order is to court death.
We are the King’s men. As the King’s men we cannot abide the King’s law and character being set aside and so we will oppose all that which opposes the King. Concretely, this means, as we have taken Christ as King, we live in a time as the loyal opposition. In this epoch, so set against Christ the King as it is, we must practice the virtue of intolerance. We must practice a confrontational disposition out of love for Christ the King and for other people.
There can be no tolerance in a law-system for another religion. Toleration is a device used to introduce a new law system as a prelude to a new intolerance… Every law-system must maintain its existence by hostility to every other law system and to alien religious foundations or else it commits suicide.
R.J. Rushdoony