John Edwards and Unattainable Morality

Here is something I don’t understand.

John Edwards has an affair and everybody acts like it is something to be ashamed about?

Whence this leftover Christian conscience about sexuality?

Think about it. The ubiquity of affairs and adultery in our society is legendary. Bill Clinton had several. Bob Livingston who was set to become the Speaker of the House announced during the Clinton – Lewinsky affair that he would not seek to be Speaker of the House due to his own adulterous infidelities. Newt Gingrich had an affair while he was trying to pull down Clinton for his affair and for lying about his affair. Tom Delay was involved in an adulterous affair. John McCain cheated on his wife who stood by him while he was a POW in Hanoi. John Kennedy cheated on the beautiful Jacki and Martin Luther King cheated on Coretta Scott King. Franklin Roosevelt cheated on Eleanor (after looking at pictures of Eleanor one can only have sympathy for Franklin) Warren Harding cheated on Florence King Harding, and on and on it goes. Indeed, it would probably be easier to make a list of high profile politicians who haven’t been sexually immoral.

Indeed, so prevalent is the Washington Whorehouse attitude that in 1998 during the Clinton impeachment hearings House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt said, “We need to stop destroying imperfect people at the altar of an unattainable morality.”

Clearly according to people in high places being faithful to ones spouse is a morality that is unattainable.

So if that is true, and it sure seems like it is for a great host of Americans, both in politics and not in politics, then what I want to know is why the Media believes it necessary to tells us when another high profile politician has fallen short of the unattainable morality?” To fall short of something that is by definition unattainable is hardly newsworthy.

It seems most Americans don’t see any problem in keeping time with somebody who isn’t their spouse, so why is it news when John Edwards is discovered tapping boots with a strange blond and why does anyone care?

Please allow me to answer my own question.

Somewhere in the American psyche there remains the Christian sense of right and wrong and even though many Americans cheat on their spouse they know it is wrong of them to do so and they know it is wrong when a high profile person does the same. On one level it doesn’t make any sense that adultery would disqualify anybody for anything given its prevalence, but on another level people desire their leaders to shape up to outwardly Christian norms… at least in obvious areas.

I figure though, with the passing of another generation, a high profile politician’s adultery will no longer be an item worthy of even the National Inquirer’s scrutiny. Sooner or later we are going to get consistent about this adultery thing. It would be nice if God would send Reformation so that we would be consistent by actually restraining our animal instincts and choosing to be loyal to our spouses.

Knox On Responisbility Of Her Majesty In Civil Realm

” The secound that we requyre, is punishment of horrible vices, such as ar adultery, fornicatioun, open hurdome, blasphemye, contempt of God, of his Word, and Sacramentis; quhilkis in this Realme, for lack of punishement, do evin now so abound, that syne is reputed to be no syne. And thairfoir, as that we see the present signes of God is wrath now manifestlie appear, so do we foirwarne, that he will stryck, or it be long, yf his law without punishement be permitted thus manifestlie to be contempned. Yf any object, that punishementis can nott be commanded to be executed without a parliament; We answer that the eternall God in his Parliament has pronounced death to be the punishment for adulterye and for blasphemye; whose act is yf ye putt not to executioun, (seeing that Kingis ar but his lieutennentis, having no power to geve lyefe, whair he commandis death,) as that he will reputt you, and all otheris that foster vice, patronis of impietie, so will he nott faill to punishe you for neglecting of his judgements.”

John Knox 1514-1572
[A petition ” to the Quenis Majestie, and Hir most Honourable Privey Counsall etc.”].

works of John Knox; collected and Edited by David Laing. vol.2 (Edin.1864) pp.339-340.

Two From Beza On Church And State


“Let this be the conclusion of this argument: those (like R. Scott Clark, Michael Horton, David Van Drunen, and Darryl Hart, etc.)who would bar the Christian magistracy from the care of religion and especially from the punishments of heretics, condemn the plain word of God, reject the authority of the ages, and as a consequence seek the total destruction and extermination of the church.”

Beza, De Hereticis, quoted in Verduin, Stepchildren, p. 57

“But what, then, is the relevance of this long discussion of the duty of kings and magistrates to maintain religion for deciding whether they may be forcibly resisted if they persecute it? I reply that it is one thing to introduce religion in a country, another to preserve it once it is established or to restore it when it has been buried, as it were, under the connivance, ignorance, and wickedness of men. I hold, then, that religion is planted and increased by the Spirit of God alone, through the Word, which is ordained for teaching, encouraging, and exhorting, since this is the special activity of the Holy Spirit, which works by spiritual means. The duty of a prince who would convert his subjects from idolatry or superstition to true religion is to see that they are given good and lively instruction, while the duty of subjects, correspondingly, is to yield to reason and to truth. The prince, finally, should provide and enforce good edicts against those who, from pure stubbornness, would resist establishment of the true religion, as has been done in our time in England, Denmark, Sweden, Scotland, and in a large part of Germany and of Switzerland, against Papists, Anabaptists, and other heretics. And if, instead of believing in the bloodstained whore of Rome, other nations had done likewise, there would be peace not only in religion but in all other public matters, too.”

Beza, Right of Magistrates as found in Constitutionalism and Resistance in the Sixteenth Century Translated and edited by Julian H. Franklin, p. 134

1.)I don’t think Beza would have been sending his son to Escondido for Seminary training. Indeed, given the first quote Beza might seek to bring these gentleman who teach the R2Kt virus up on charges.

2.)Note, that in these United States the rulers do indeed follow Beza’s advice. In an attempt to convert their subjects from what, as Humanists they consider, idolatry or superstition to true humanist religion, the Rulers, through the Government schools, do seek to see to it that the subjects are given good and lively instruction in the humanist religion.

3.)Some will think that the idea of a magistrate charged with the protection of the first table is unreasonable. The unreasonableness of it though comes from having lived generations without that being the case, not from the idea itself. We have so given into a kind of pluralism that was never intended that we think it odd now to pull back from any kind of restrictions on pluralism. As such, the thought that the magistrate should protect the first table seems to be an abomination to most people who think themselves “god fearing people.” It’s as if, having eaten dog biscuits for supper for generations, we are appalled at the notion of eating steaks.

4.) Now surely, there is no way to go from the pluralism that we have to magistrates enforcing the first table overnight. The only way that this is going to happen is by conversion of both those inside and outside the Church. Conversion of those inside to a Biblical understanding that godless pluralism is not acceptable and conversion of those outside to a Biblical understanding that only life can be found in Christ. We will never be able to strong arm a solution. We got into this mess incrementally and we will only get out of this mess as
the Spirit of Christ changes the minds of men inside and outside the Church. Reformation in head and members is the answer not Revolution.

5.) I think a argument could be made that the pursuit of a Christian Theology that embraces pluralism and that evacuates the responsibility of the magistrate to the first table has contributed to a widespread destruction and extermination of the Church. The church in the West is a curio. It is retreating from every assault against it. The Church has been feminized and is largely run by the third sex.

Priest & King, Great Commission & Cultural Mandate

”The total life involvement of the covenant relationship provides the framework for considering the connection between the ‘great commission’ and the ‘cultural mandate.’ Entrance into God’s kingdom may occur only by repentance and faith, which requires the preaching of the Gospel. This ‘gospel,’ however, must not be conceived in the narrowest possible sense. It is the gospel of the ‘Kingdom.’ It involves discipling men to Jesus Christ. Integral to that discipling process is the awakening of an awareness of the obligations of man to the totality of God’s creation. Redeemed man, remade in God’s image, must fulfill – even surpass – the role originally determined for the first man. In such a manner, the mandate to preach the gospel and the mandate to form a culture glorifying to God merge with one another.”

O. Palmer Robertson
The Christ Of The Covenants — pg. 83

In starting we should note that, loosely speaking, the Cultural mandate is most closely associated with Jesus in his Kingly office, while the Great commission is most closely associated with Jesus in His office of High Priest. The Cultural mandate is tied to the imperatives of Scripture, while the great commission is most closely tied to the indicatives of Scripture. The Great commission is a proclamation of what the Lord Christ has done for men, as the great propitiation, while the cultural mandate is the declaration of what the Mediatorial King Jesus requires. While we note these distinctions we insist that our High Priest is King and our King is our High Priest. As our High Priest and King Jesus prays for us in the heavenlies and through His Spirit leads us, in obedience, to extend His already present Kingdom here on earth.

Something that seems to be happening within the Reformed Church is the dividing of the offices of our Liege Lord Christ. There seems to be one faction in Reformedom that so wants to insist on Jesus as High Priest that any mention of Jesus as ruling King is seen as something that doesn’t apply to us now since we are in the interregnum. These people are wrongly divorcing these two offices. At the same time there is another faction in Reformedom that is trying to confuse these two offices so that what God requires in salvation and what God gives in justification are so co-mingled that the doctrine of faith alone becomes a doctrine of faith and works alone.

There is a necessity therefore to try and understand the relationship of the believer to the offices of Jesus as King and Priest, and relationship between the Great Commission and the cultural mandate. First, we would note that even in the gospel Jesus as King commands all men everywhere to repent, while in his office as High Priest He gives what He commands to His elect.

As we consider Robertson quote above I would offer that the Cultural mandate provides the general context wherein the text of evangelism can make sense. Allow me to try and explain. Where Christians take seriously Jesus office as King in an unrestricted sense there a cultural context is created that makes it easier for the gospel to be heard by unbelievers. Think of context and text when reading a book. The context helps the reader to make sense of the text that he is immediately reading. The text itself would be nonsense if it were set in an entirely different context. In the same way when the ‘Gospel’ goes forward in a cultural context that is informed by the unrestricted Kingship of Jesus, there the text of ‘Jesus Christ as the great High Priest’ makes more sense. Where Jesus in His Kingly office is lived out there isn’t such a huge disconnect between the message of Jesus Christ crucified and the reality of a culture that is defying King Jesus at every turn. When we don’t engage in the cultural mandate we make it more difficult for people to hear the strains of the message of the great commission because we are helping to create a social order context that is in opposition to the gospel proclamation. Consequently when we disconnect the Great Commission and the Cultural Mandate what we inevitably end up creating are Christians who view their salvation as unrelated to their cultural endeavors, or who see their cultural endeavors as unrelated to their salvation. The result would be to give us both an anti-nomian Church and an anti-nomian culture.

Likewise the reverse is true. Where the offices of Jesus are confused and collapsed together, with the office of King compromising the office of Priest, we will create a Church that is legalistic and a social order that is rigid. While the previous error wants a text divorced from its context, this error wants a text undistinguished from its context. The former error leads to bifurcationism where the Church as Sacred and the social order as common are isolated from one another, while this error leads to a social order that is undifferentiated as to what is Holy and what is Holy of Holy. Jesus must be proclaimed (prophetic office) in both of His offices (Priest and King) or else we eviscerate the definition of both of those offices.

When we find the proper tension between these offices we discover that people who have been saved and brought into the Kingdom, now seek to bring that salvation wherein they have been saved into every area of life, so that those spheres may experience salvation. In obedience to King Jesus those who have been saved by Jesus as their great High Priest now bring salvation to the gardens they tend, and the children they raise, and the books they write, and the Churches they attend, and the judicial decisions they hand down, and the art they paint, and on and on. So, as individuals are saved by Jesus in His Priestly office, they bring that salvation to their corporate life in obedience to Jesus in His Kingly office, which in turn, as we noted above, provides a general cultural context where it is easier for unsaved individuals to comprehend the Gospel.

Now the objection will be that what I am contending for is a kind of naturalistic program for the Church where I deny the supernaturalistic agency of God for men to be Redeemed and instead am relying on cultural infrastructure to convert lost men.

Of course I would say this is most certainly not true! I am not saying that if we follow three easy steps people will get saved. I am saying that God appoints means to ends. That salvation, while a spiritual reality, happens inside a physical and corporeal context and that it is gnostic to suggest that we can get to the spiritual reality without considering the physical context. Men will never be saved by the proper cultural infrastructure but it is certain that their natural individual resistance to the message of Christ crucified will be accentuated and emboldened by cultural infrastructure that is built in defiance of King Jesus.

God putting the offices of Jesus together they must not be cast asunder.

Beza on the Magistrate and the Church

“The duty of the civil authority in this matter is hedged about by these three regulations: (1) It must strictly confine itself to its own sphere, and not presume to define heresy; that belongs to the church alone. (2) It must not pass judgment with regard to persons, advantages, and circumstances but with pure regard to the honor of God. (3) It must proceed after quiet, regular examination of the heresy and mature consideration of all the circumstances, and inflict such punishment as will best secure the honor due to the divine majesty and the peace and unity of the church.”

Theodore Beza
Beza, De Hereticis, quoted in Schaff, History, p. 798

Here Beza gives us a classical example of normal two Kingdom theology (as opposed to radical two kingdom virus theology). Notice Beza teaches that the civil realm and the church each have their own respective spheres. Second, in number “2” above the counsel is itself based upon the scriptural teaching that legal rulings must be no respecter of persons. Perhaps natural law teaches that we should consult the Scriptures for insights on these matters? Beza is, as such, using the Scriptures to instruct the Magistrate what his role is. Third, the magistrates ruling is in consideration of both God and church. Clearly Beza would be appalled by radical two kingdom virus theology.

All of this is an example of the quote I lifted from Bavinck yesterday. Here we see that “although nature (civil realm) and grace (church realm) are distinct and may not be confused or mingled, God does link the two.