Author: jetbrane

I am a Pastor of a small Church in Mid-Michigan who delights in my family, my congregation and my calling. I am postmillennial in my eschatology. Paedo-Calvinist Covenantal in my Christianity Reformed in my Soteriology Presuppositional in my apologetics Familialist in my family theology Agrarian in my regional community social order belief Christianity creates culture and so Christendom in my national social order belief Mythic-Poetic / Grammatical Historical in my Hermeneutic Pre-modern, Medieval, & Feudal before Enlightenment, modernity, & postmodern Reconstructionist / Theonomic in my Worldview One part paleo-conservative / one part micro Libertarian in my politics Systematic and Biblical theology need one another but Systematics has pride of place Some of my favorite authors, Augustine, Turretin, Calvin, Tolkien, Chesterton, Nock, Tozer, Dabney, Bavinck, Wodehouse, Rushdoony, Bahnsen, Schaeffer, C. Van Til, H. Van Til, G. H. Clark, C. Dawson, H. Berman, R. Nash, C. G. Singer, R. Kipling, G. North, J. Edwards, S. Foote, F. Hayek, O. Guiness, J. Witte, M. Rothbard, Clyde Wilson, Mencken, Lasch, Postman, Gatto, T. Boston, Thomas Brooks, Terry Brooks, C. Hodge, J. Calhoun, Llyod-Jones, T. Sowell, A. McClaren, M. Muggeridge, C. F. H. Henry, F. Swarz, M. Henry, G. Marten, P. Schaff, T. S. Elliott, K. Van Hoozer, K. Gentry, etc. My passion is to write in such a way that the Lord Christ might be pleased. It is my hope that people will be challenged to reconsider what are considered the givens of the current culture. Your biggest help to me dear reader will be to often remind me that God is Sovereign and that all that is, is because it pleases him.

Two Kingdom Theory & The Reichskanzler

In an effort to stifle the opposition, Hitler invited 40 prominent church leaders to meet with him on January 25th. He said, “You leave the care of the Third Reich to me and you look after the church.” That sounded good, but Hitler still planned to control the church through Reich Bishop Müller.

The story of the confessing Church in Germany is somewhat known among Christians in America. One reason that I explicitly and vehemently reject radical Two Kingdom Theory is because of some deep and heavy research while an undergraduate in the relationship between Church and State from 1933-1945 in National Socialist Germany. In this culture the Church had been co-opted by the State to the point that only a very small percentage of German Christians were willing to stand against the patriotic and nationalistic fervor that swept over Germany. Luther’s Two Kingdom Theology had been preached throughout the German Lutheran Church and it was this theology that made it easier for the National Socialist regime to compromise any resistance that might have arisen in the Church.

While Luther’s Two Kingdom Theology is not exactly the same as that being pushed by Radical two Kingdomists today (it had more of a flavor of State over the Church), I still am concerned about the radical two Kingdom theology that is being advocated today by the faculty at Westminster West since it is not difficult to see similar conditions being created within the Church in These United States as existed in the Church of National Socialist Germany from 1933-1945. After all, according to the Radical Two Kingdomists the Church as the Church is not to speak to the civil realm since the civil realm is to be spoken to by individual Christians citing not God’s revealed word (Scripture) but rather using God’s creation word (Natural law) as authority. Could a Church saturated in radical two Kingdom theology (R2kt) find it within themselves enough of a spine to stand athwart the wicked intentions of Machiavellian Statist magistrates? Could a Church saturated in R2kt find it within themselves the ability to protest the actions of the magistrate in any action except an attempt to control the Church? (And the question begs being asked as to why any Magistrate living in the same culture as a R2kt Church would bother to worry about the Church since it could be no threat whatsoever to his {or Her — HRC} designs.)

Now the account cited above has an encouraging ending.

As the clergymen were leaving, Martin Niemöller addressed Hitler: “Herr Reichskanzler, you said just now, `I will take care of the German people.’ But we too as Christians and churchmen have a responsibility toward the German people. That responsibility was entrusted to us by God, and neither you nor anyone in this world has the power to take it from us.”

Niemoller is an interesting case. First, theologically speaking he was hopeless, embracing the tradition of Karl Barth (as Dietrich Bonhoffer did as well). Second, Niemoller initially supported Hitler only later realizing the danger of Hitler’s movement. Third, even well into the conflict, Niemoller sought to oppose the policies of National Socialism while taking great pains to communicate that he wasn’t opposing Hitler. Still, to his credit Niemoller spoke more directly on this occasion to Hitler than he was accustomed to being spoken to. Finally, to his credit Niemoller was eventually arrested.

Given R2kt it is difficult to see how any minister would ever be arrested for speaking Biblically revealed truth to authority.

One final word that is somewhat ancillary to all this. American Christians should heed the lessons of the vapid, empty, and unwarranted patriotic and nationalistic fervor that swept over German Christians from 1933-1945. American Christians should realize that all because something is wrapped in the flag of one’s national origin that does not make that policy, law, or view sacrosanct. While we should all love our country, there are times when love for country means we are against our countrymen because we are for our countrymen.

Natural Law And Cultural Engagement

But apologetic confrontation with unbelieving thought is not the only kind of interaction that Christians have with unbelievers. Christians are called not only to break down every pretension that sets itself up against Christ (2 Cor. 10:5) but also to live lives in common with unbelievers in a range of cultural activities. Christians may and even should make music, build bridges, do medical research, and play baseball with unbelievers. Believers are called to live in peace with all men as far as it lies with them (Rom. 12:18), to pray for the peace of the (mostly pagan) city in which they live (Jer. 29:7; 1 Tim. 2:1-2), and to interact in the world with people whom they would not admit to membership in the church (1 Cor. 5:9-11). There is a place for a believing musician to explain to an unbelieving musician that music is meaningless unless the triune God exists, but when they are rehearsing together in the community orchestra such a Van Tillian apologetic confrontation would be highly inappropriate—the task at that time is cooperation at a common cultural task. The same thing is true in regard to working on a construction site with non-Christians or grilling burgers with an unbelieving friend at a neighborhood cook-out or thousands of other ordinary endeavors. To try to put it briefly, we have different sorts of encounters with unbelievers at different times. Sometimes we have opportunity to engage in apologetic discussions, in which our modus operandi is confrontation and exposure of the futility of unbelief (though always in love). Other times (and probably most of the time for the ordinary Christian who is not a professional apologist) we have common tasks in which to engage alongside unbelievers, in which our modus operandi is trying to find agreement and consensus so that shared cultural tasks can be accomplished as well as possible in a sinful world.

Dr. David VanDrunen

Here VD offers as an appeal to Natural law the fact that it provides a means by which Christians and non-Christians can live their lives together. I’m not sure I understand how this serves as an argument for Natural law given that Christians who believe that Biblical law is to be the standard still manage to successfully engage in the kind of activities that VD mentions without embracing Natural law. Biblical law Christians understand that there is a time and a place for playing one’s flute in the local symphonic band and for invoking the law of anti-thesis when discussing how music has genuine meaning only if one presupposes the God of the Bible. I am not sure how believing in Natural law helps one to co-operate in common cultural task over and above believing that Biblical law helps one to co-operate in the common cultural task. Christians need to be salt and light and they cannot be salt and light unless they are positioned in places that are putrid and dark.

There is something else though that we need to mention here. The agenda of Westminster West teaches that the Scriptures do not speak to Musicology, Bridge building, Medical research, or playing baseball. According to the radical two Kingdomists the anti-thesis doesn’t exist in these areas and as such it is not possible to take captive thoughts in these areas to make them obedient to Christ because Christ doesn’t give biblically revealed thoughts on these disciplines. I am not sure that according to radical two Kingdomists that it is true that music doesn’t make sense apart the reality of the Triune God since the Scriptures are not about music.

As to VD’s statement that, ‘Christian modus operandi (must) try to find agreement and consensus so that shared cultural tasks can be accomplished as well as possible in a sinful world,’ we must emphasize that the agreement and consensus that we can find is only where the non-Christian is being inconsistent with their otherwise God hating Worldview. In other words, the fact that we can play beautiful music together with non-Christians in a local symphonic band is because the non-Christians, being gifted with common grace, have not yet worked out their God hating convictions to their inevitable conclusions. It is at least an open question if it would be biblically right, before God, to play in a symphonic band that was committed to preforming pieces and concerts that were dedicated in communicating that music was meaningless, just as it would be disobedience before God to support an art gallery that was committed to anti-art or stocked with works like Andrew Serrano’s Piss Christ.

Still Working on Natural Law

“Natural law is the moral revelation that God gives in creation itself. Romans 1:18-32 speaks of things that may be known of God from creation, including a great deal of moral knowledge. Romans 2:14-15 speaks of the law of God being written on people’s hearts, such that even those without access to the law revealed in Scripture are held accountable to God through their consciences. Many prominent Christian theologians have identified natural law as the standard for civil law and government, including not only medieval theologians such as Thomas Aquinas but also reformers such as John Calvin. Thus, acknowledging the importance of natural law is neither unbiblical nor foreign to historic Christian theology.”

Dr. David VanDrunen

We’ve already dealt with the faults within Natural law in relation to the Romans 1 passage that VD cites above. Simply put the fault in appealing to that passage as a source of legitimacy for Natural law theory is that it ignores the context which teaches that men, because of their depravity, suppress the truth they definitely receive from what is revealed. Because this is true, it is naive to think that Natural law theory can be appealed to in order to provide the legal foundation by which to govern cultures that are post-Christian.

Cornelius Van Til underscores this point,

The doctrine of total depravity of man makes it plain that the moral consciousness of man as he is today cannot the source of information about what is ideal good or about what is the standard of the good…. It is this point particularly that makes it necessary for the Christian to maintain without any apology and without any concession that it is Scripture alone, in the light of which all moral questions must be answered. Scripture as an external revelation became necessary because of the sin of man. No man living can even put the moral problem as he ought to put it, or ask the moral questions as he ought to ask them, unless he does so in light of Scripture. Man cannot of himself face the moral question, let alone answer it.”

Second, VD appeals to Romans 2:14-15 as another base of support for Natural law theory. Let us consider that passage.

14For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.

On this passage we must immediately note that the context is the Apostles indictment against Gentiles for their suppressing what they can not avoid knowing. The consequences of their suppression of this known truth is that they exchange the truth of God for a lie and worship things that are not worthy of worship. God having predestined them for such an end thus gives them over to the lusts that they freely desire. This results in a final proclamation from the Apostle in Romans 1:29-32 that they ‘know the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, (yet) not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.’ Romans 2:1-15 finds the Apostle continuing to build the case that the Gentiles are guilty before God even though unlike the Jews they didn’t have God’s written law. St. Paul argues that what proves that they have a knowledge of the moral law of God is seen in that the Gentiles ‘do by nature the things contained in the law,’ and that they have a conscience that judges their conduct consistent with the law. However what we find in Chapter two can’t be made to contradict what we find in Chapter 1 where the Gentiles are characterized as suppressing the truth in unrighteousness. When in the passage quoted above the Apostle says what he does he is not teaching that there are Gentiles who receive the moral law through Natural law mechanisms and who keep the Natural law and so are saved by their righteousness. Such a reading would be contrary to what the Apostle explicitly teaches in 3:19-20, 23. What the Apostle is (again) arguing is that there is a universal sense of obligation — a obligation that is suppressed but still exists. What the Apostle teaches throughout Romans 1-3 is that Gentiles (and all men) are conscious of the moral law to a degree that makes them both guilty before and accountable to God. Romans 2:14-15 thus is anything but a recommendation for a Natural law theory that makes room for the ability of fallen men to not suppress the truth in unrighteousness. In point of fact Romans 1-3 is a round condemnation of any idea of Natural law theory. How can gentlemen like VD appeal to Romans 2:14-15 to support a theory that teaches that men can be governed by their reception and embrace of Natural law when when the immediate context teaches that the Gentiles suppress natural revelation(Romans 1:18-20), worship nature (Romans 1:23-25), act against nature (Romans 1:26-27), and deny their natural affection (Romans 1:31)? If anything the context implicitly suggests that any theory of Natural law that is arrived at by fallen man is a theory that will use Natural law as a means to justify and rationalize their perversions and anti-Christ agenda.

Finally, by way of support for Natural law VD appeals to a long line of Natural law theorists within the Reformed camp. It is undoubtedly true that this long pedigree exists. I would submit however that Natural law theory makes far more sense in the context of Christendom (the context that all these men lived in) then it does in post-Christian culture. Natural law in the context of Christendom has the advantage of making sense if only because there is such a large natural constituency available to buy into what a Christian community would advocate that Natural law teaches. Remember it has been consistently said in these posts on Natural law that God does indeed make His moral order known in natural revelation. The problem is not with the sender but with the receiver(s). In the context of Christendom it would not be a surprise to find that the receivers would be more naturally inclined to correspond with that message which is being sent. Another way to get at what I am saying here is that in a culture embracing a Biblical Worldview Natural law could make perfect sense but in that context one would find that Natural law was nothing but a reflection of Biblical law. So on one hand Natural law could work in a culture shaped by a Biblical Worldview but on the other hand that culture wouldn’t need Natural law since it was looking to God’s Word for guidance. All of this is to say that the long pedigree of Reformed Natural law thinkers that can be pointed to makes sense in light of the fact that they all were living in the context of Christendom where there existed common ground. Natural law in a post-christian context can’t make that kind of sense.

So, the three reasons that VD give for giving Natural law a hearing have been weighed and found wanting.

Natural Law

Natural law — A law or body of laws that derives from nature and is believed to be binding upon human actions apart from or in conjunction with laws established by human authority.

Natural law theory suggests that in the order of the Universe there is a certain objective communication of basic truths that should govern mankind and that these objectively communicated truths can be known by all mankind because these truths naturally resonate with mankind given that they are part of the objective order which communicates these basic truths.

Put in Christian hands, Natural law, as noted in the previous post, should become the authoritative source for the governance of cultures in every realm save the Church realm. In the Church realm God’s revealed Word is to be the source of authority. Natural law is to govern in this way because according to some it is ‘the only available basis of morality for non-Christians, people who do not live within the covenant community and do not share its history and memories.’1

The contrary position to Christian Natural law theory is that God’s revealed law-Word should govern in every area of life. This position does not create the kind of dualism that Radical Two Kingdom Theorists advocate, insisting instead that God’s word speaks to every area of life and not just to the redemptive realm. The contrary position to the implied autonomy of man in Christian natural law theory is called ‘theonomy,’ which is the position advocated in Isaiah 8:20 where we are instructed to repair to ‘the law and to the testimony’ as opposed to other modes of revelation in order to gain insight into God’s mind.

Now as we examine Natural law theory we must first say that we agree with Natural law theory that the moral order of the universe is so constructed that man does look out upon the universe and knows and understands that there is a proper moral ordering that should be followed. Christians would say that this is so for several reasons. First man knows and understands that there is a proper moral order because man, like all of creation around him, is part of God’s general revelation that pronounces that basic moral order. Man is not only a receiver of general revelation that pronounces God’s basic moral order but he is also a sender of that message in as much as he is a part of the creation in which God and His order is revealed. Because this is true when man denies God’s moral order he at the same time denies himself since he himself is a living declarative embodiment of God’s moral order. Second man knows and understands that there is a proper moral order because man is created in God’s image and being created in that image he can not avoid seeing what God shows by way of a proper moral order. Third man knows and understands that there is a proper moral order because God has written His law upon man’s heart.

All of this is true, and we gladly go this far with Natural law theorists. However at this point there is an immediate dividing of ways because while Biblical Christians admit to all this they include another element that Natural law theorists don’t seem to take as seriously as they should. That other element is the noetic effects of sin. Man does know all that we have admitted that he knows but Scripture teaches that man suppresses that truth in unrighteousness. Man does know that message that the moral order is sending but because he will not have God rule over him he holds down that knowledge insisting that he doesn’t know what he does indeed know. It is this truth over which Christian natural law theorists stumble. Man does know at his deepest level that (as one example) abortion is murder and yet man buries that knowledge in concrete all the while insisting that what he knows is that murder is not murder, nor is it wrong when he wants to murder.

Now often at this point Christian Natural law theorists will insist that people who posit the noetic effects of sin to be as extensive as they say it is are exaggerating the noetic effects of sin. “Certainly,” they say, ‘man is not so fallen that he can’t rightly interpret the unchanging laws that exist in nature that define for man what is right just and good by the use of right reason.” They further insist that while man may be dead to spiritual realities that it is an over-reading of the Scriptures to suggest that because of sin man is unable to read non-spiritual truths aright. First, we would note that this is the same kind of objection that Arminians raise concerning man’s will. Arminians object that dead in sin can’t mean dead to the point that man’s will can’t respond. Natural law theorists are arguing that dead in sin can’t mean dead to the point that man’s intellect no longer completely suppresses the truth in unrighteousness. Second Reformed Natural law theorists are forgetting their Van Til. Van Til insisted that fallen man’s mind remained sharp like a saw blade but the problem was that, because of sin, the saw blade always cut at the wrong angle. Man’s mind does indeed remain sharp but he always reads God’s moral order in a way that serves his God hating agenda. Now that fallen man sometimes exhibits felicitous inconsistency by getting some things right is not testimony that he is interpreting Natural law aright but rather is testimony that since this is God’s world it is impossible, short of insanity or death, to get everything perfectly wrong. We would say it is an odd thing for Reformed people to argue that dead in sin means enough life to read Natural law aright and to embrace what they read.

More later on the problems of Natural law theory.

More on VD and Natural Law

As observed above, nearly everyone, at some level, believes that life is valuable and therefore that lethal violence against others should be prohibited by law. Most people would also agree that this applies, perhaps especially, to those who are weak and unable to defend themselves. Based upon such convictions, people today overwhelmingly condemn infanticide as a terrible crime. Beginning from this widespread acknowledgement of natural law truth, we could attempt to show how these proper moral sentiments are inconsistent with a pro-choice abortion position.

Dr. David VanDrunen
Reformed Natural Law Theorist

We admit that, at some level, all people believe that life is valuable. However at the level that counts for public policy it is clear that people insist that they do not believe that life is valuable. 50 million aborted children since 1973 could be brought in as witnesses to that truth. We are happy to concede that people who think that infanticide is ‘a terrible crime’ but who support abortion are inconsistent but it is obvious that they have resolved that contradiction in the direction of allowing abortion and we would further suggest that over 30 years of pointing to Natural law theory has not convinced them to change public policy. Further it would be naive to think that vast number of people who support abortion haven’t already been confronted with the contradiction that is involved with them being against infanticide. Natural law can’t convert people.

Indeed one could even insist that it is Natural law theory that has given us the public policy of abortion. To be sure it is not Natural Law theory coming from the hands of godly men like Dr. VanDrunen but could it not be Natural law theory coming from the hands of people from different faith commitments? Could they not use Natural law theory to argue that Nature teaches that since people are responsible for their own bodies they are free to choose what does or doesn’t happen in and to their bodies? Now naturally Dr. VanDrunen (and all good Christians) would vehemently disagree that such a reading would be a proper reading of Natural law. Here we find the problem with Natural law and that it is subjective to the max. The nature of Natural law is always in the hands of the one doing natural law. If Natural law is done by somebody in the Muslim faith with Muslim presuppositions, they are going to discover that Natural law teaches basically what the Sharia teaches. If Natural law is done by somebody who has as their beginning point feministic Humanism they are going to use Natural law to show that nature declares that abortion is proper and fitting.

Now, everyone agrees that in a Redeemed culture that is looking at truth objectively Natural law is going to teach what it genuinely does teach — God’s moral order. But the problem for Dr. VanDrunen and others who want to rebuild Natural Law theory is that they don’t sufficiently take into account the noetic affects of sin. All men know God’s moral order but they suppress that truth in unrighteousness and so come up with Natural law theories that are driven by their a-priori faith commitments whatever those faith commitments are. Now to be sure nobody is able to scrub their godless Natural law theories clean of any Christian influence. All unbelieving Natural law theorists must climb up into God’s lap in order to slap Him in the face. The fact remains that whatever overlap there is in Natural law theories that fall from the hand of pagan Natural law theorists with law consistent with what Christian Natural Law theorists would come up with is a case of the pagans not being able to totally get out of God’s world. It seems passing strange for Christians to suggest, that because an overlap exists in all cultures between what pagans believe and what Christians believe, that therefore proves the viability of Natural Law theory. Such a belief fails to see that overlap results not from pagans no longer suppressing the truth in unrighteousness and accordingly reading Nature aright, but rather results because it is literally impossible to get a culture off the ground that is not supported by some remnants of God’s reality. Reformed natural law theorists miss the contradiction that pagans are doing all they can to get away from the reality that since this is God’s World it should be governed in accord with Christian interpretations of Natural law theory, while Christians are doing all they can to move toward the reality that since this is God’s world they should be governed by God’s law. How can any Natural law theory be universally accepted by all men in order to bridge that yawning chasm?