Category: R2K Virus (Radical Two Kingdom Theology)

I picked at part of this quote in the previous entry but I just have to come back for another bite at the proverbial apple.

D. G. Hart writes,

“So if you are a legislator or president or judge and you hold office by virtue of being elected by Americans, not just the Christian ones, then don’t you have an obligation to execute your office in a way that is in the best interests of the people you serve (Americans and American-Christians)?”

1.) As a Christian public office holder, why would one posit, that acting in a non-Christian manner, in pursuing the best interest of non-Christian constituents would be a Christian thing to do?

2.) As a Christian public office holder, why would one not think, that acting in Christian manner, in pursuing the best interest of non-Christian constituents, would always be in the best interest of non-Christian constituents?

3.) By what standard are we defining “best interest?”

Darryl asks,

“But if you think that you are always going to have to act as a Christian in public office, then should you be allowed to hold power in a government that shows no religious preferences?”

1.) I guess every thought captive to the obedience of Christ is understood to have the addition “except in the public/common kingdom.”

2.) So much for “whatever is not done in faith is sin.”

3.) This quote suggests that if someone is voted in by all the Americans then there are times when it would be wrong to act in the best interest of Christians vis a vis the Christian constituents.

3.) Are we being told by a Dr. of the Church that it is wrong, at times, (by what Standard?) to act as a Christian when in a public capacity?

4.) If one is not acting as a Christian then how is one acting? Perhaps it is the case for Hart that it is Christian to not act as a Christian when you are a public official representing all the people?

You can’t make this stuff up.

Hart continues,

I get it. Politicians face ethical dilemmas but those are not the same as a personal preference or conviction on the one hand and what is best for everyone on the other. A Major League Baseball umpire may have grown up as a Phillies’ fan, but if he is behind the plate for a Phils-Pirates game, he’s supposed to call the same strike zone for both pitchers.

So doesn’t the same apply to Christian legislators who would seek public office in the greatest nation on God’s green earth? Don’t they have to act in the best interests of citizens who are both God-deniers and God-fearers?

1.) Only a Christian Umpire, or a Umpire influenced by a Christian worldview would think it important to call balls and strikes as “balls and strikes” in a Phillies vs. Pirates game. A non-Christian Umpire would call that outside pitch a third strike on Andrew McCutchen every time and be glad he was able to do so.

2.) Acting in the best interests of citizens who are both God-deniers and God-fearers would be to always act as a Christian.

Recently, public officials of the California State University locations, ruled to “de-recognize” the Christian campus ministry called “Inter-Varsity.” See story linked,

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/09/intervarsity-sanctioned-california-state-university_n_5791906.html

Now according to R2K Chieftain Dr. D. G. Hart, this was a understandable move since,

” … if you think that you are always going to have to act as a Christian in public office, then should you be allowed to hold power in a government that shows no religious preferences?”

Now, it is at least possible that the public officials of the California State University system were Christian and it is possible, that since the California State University system was not to show any religious preference, therefore those Christian public officials of the California State University did the right thing.

However, even if the all the California State University officials who made this decision were pagans, it still is the right decision, according to Hart, since the University system was not to show any religious preferences. I mean, after all, who does Inter-Varsity think they are requiring leaders to adhere to Christian beliefs? The University, per Hart, was correct to shut this travesty of unprincipled pluralism down.

However, Hart’s colleague, Dr. R. Scott Clark thinks that the California State University was wrong to de-recognize Intervarsity. Clark offers this morsel,

“One area that ought to be a matter of growing concern for Christians (and other religious folk) is the attempt by some in our society to use administrative and bureaucratic positions to silence views with which they disagree. Such impulses are fundamentally un-American and unjust.”

Scott, sees de-recognizing Inter-varsity as something bad. But, we might ask, “bad,” by what standard? By a Biblical Standard? 1000 times no. Scott’s standard for faulting the California State University system’s decision as bad bad bad is that it is “fundamentally un-American and unjust.”

But applying Darrell’s principle it most certainly is American and just. After all, the California State University system is to show no religious preferences and allowing Intervarsity to only have leadership that is Christian is the very apex of religious preference.

Pursuing a brief rabbit trail one wonders why Dr. R. Scott Clark appeals to the Confessions in order to gain traction for policy in the Common realm? Certainly, if Scripture is not to be our guide in the common realm, per R2K, then the confessions would be out of bounds also right? Why should Christians care what the Confessions have to say concerning common realm activity? Well … they might care what those Confessions say about the common realm when they are in the Church realm but the minute they leave the Church realm they would have to forget that they cared what the Confessions said when they were in the Church realm.

Scott also complains about the California State University system trying to impose ideological conformity from above but if the University system would do what Scott wants by allowing Inter-varsity to operate untrammeled wouldn’t that also be a case where the University is imposing a top down ideological conformity? The University can either impose a ideological top down conformity that says, “No expressions of faith will be silenced,” or they can impose a ideological top down conformity that says, “No expressions of faith will be silenced except Christianity.” Either way, the University system is imposing a top down ideological construct. No neutrality Scott … remember? It is never a question of “whether or not top down ideological construct,” it is only ever a question of which top down ideological construct.

Scott complains about the unfairness of it all, but what is fair outside a Biblical standard?

Scott asks the question,

“From what mountain did the administers descend, what revelation did they receive that gives them the authority to banish historic Christian orthodoxy from campus?

I hate to be bearer of bad tidings but the answer to this question is they descended from Mt. positivistic law or they received the Revelation from St. Natural law. The further bad news for Scott is that the only thing that can combat each and both of them is Biblical Christianity in the common realm.

“When we come to the Republication Paradigm, merit is being defined and used differently than in the Westminster Standards.”

Elam, Van Kooten, Bergquist
Moses and Merit; A Critique of the Klinean Doctrine of Republication

1.) The reason that merit is being defined and used differently than in the Westminster standards is because the whole idea of “merit,” as handled by the Klinean Republication lads, is resting in a different worldview from those who wrote the Westminster standards. Words are worldview dependent and the worldview of the Escondido Theology is a different worldview than the Westminster divines and so their definition of merit is as different as the worldview that they own.

2.) Concretely speaking, merit is different in the Escondido Theology because, following Kline, the Escondido theology no longer is taking into consideration the ontological divide between man as creature and God as Creator. Because the Westminster West lads view merit only covenantally there is little understanding in their position to see the inability whereby Adam could gain, even in the prelapsarian covenant, a strict merit. Adam could never have earned a strict merit due to the ontological distance between the Creator and the creature.

Adam gained merit in the prelapsarian covenant only due to God’s condescension. God’s condescension allowed Adam to accrue “covenant merit.” However, covenant merit could never be strict merit because of the ontological divide between God and Adam. The only one who could ever gain strict merit was the Lord Christ; and that only because there was not ontological divide between the Father and Son. The Escondido theology severely minimizes this ontological distance between God and man and so does not render justice to the idea of God condescending to man.

The sum of it all is that the changes made in the Escondido Republication Theology goes a long way towards giving a facelift to the Reformed faith so that it no longer is what it once was. You simply cannot rearrange and redefine central concepts of the Reformed faith without sending ripple effects through the whole theological structure.