RSSCrunchy Con and Franky Schaeffer
W.H. Chellis
An interesting warning from Rod Dreher’s always interesting blog. I fear that a lot of this kind of thing can be found in our circles. The temptation to be religious ideologues is immense.
stevez
June 22nd, 2007 at 1:08 pm
“In my view, the state should willingly submit itself to the spiritual authority and order society to protect the Church & facilitate her salvific mission.â€
SZ: So what do you do with the reality that it doesn’t? There are a lot of things that “should happen†but never seem to. I hear this all the time from transformers and wonder how they find any ease with this constant tension between what they think ought to be and what is. But to even back up to the claim that this should even happen in the first place, let’s take the Jesus and Peter encounter in which Peter stands in front of Jesus to keep Him from facing crucifixion. You know the rest. Was Jesus wrong to be as audacious as to call such a devoted disciple ‘Satan’ and demand he get out of His way? (This demand to get out of the way seems ironic in light of your call to get out of the way.) And then with Pilate: instead of silence, where is the charge to protect Jesus and make it all go away with further charges to protect the disciples and heed both Him and His followers? It seems to me that were the transformationist set of assumptions to come to pass we actually end up with Peter (and to up the stakes, Satan) getting his way and stopping the purchase of sinners and thereby eradicating the very program of God—which is why I find transformationism to be not a little antithetical to the Christian religion.
“The Church’s witness announces the Lordship of Christ to every man in whatever station, including ruling authorities. Paul was sent not only to the Gentiles, but their kings as well (Acts 9:15). All are responsible to submit to Christ’s authority and order their affairs in light of his coming judgment. Since the Father has committed all authority to the Son for the purpose of salvation (John 17:2; Cf. Matt. 28:18, Lk. 10:22, Jn. 3:35, 5:26-27), Christ’s office is a royal-redemptive unity. His single office is that of sacerdotal kingship, or, royal priesthood (Heb. 8:1-2).â€
SZ: Again, we may agree on certain assertions but have different meanings behind them I agree, of course, that “Paul’s mission was to not only the Gentiles but to their kings.†The Gospel is held out to all men, no matter their station. And we see this mirrored also in Jesus. But are we really to interpret the dimension of the Gospel being held to earthly offices of power to mean that the Gospel comes to change them in the here and now? When we see Jesus come to Pilate He actually stands silent before him. Wouldn’t we expect Him to open His mouth and with one hand’s finger point to the Torah in the other, telling Pilate “if you can’t lend a hand then get out of the way, because we are here to make this a better place� Why the silence? Why a life of obscurity and sorrows, only to be crushed and hanged high? And why the same fate for all the Apostles, and why the rejoicing at the same such treatment? Wouldn’t those who truly expect that “the state should willingly submit itself to the spiritual authority and order society to protect the Church & facilitate her salvific mission†be more embittered by persecution than to actually rejoice over it? I find all these NT narratives painful and counter-intuitive to these notions that the Church exists to shape things up. And what about the Church’s own history as it runs concurrently with the world? Why have things never really been changed; why is the world no better off than it ever was even in the light of this blessed thing called the Church in its midst?
“Because it is impossible to separate the law from the Lawgiver, it is improper—to say the least—for Christians to teach that God is indifferent on whether corporate society acknowledges Christ’s redemptive reign as long as it follows some moral precepts derived from natural law.â€
SZ: The charge of indifference is as befuddling as that of neutrality (I know you dismiss the assertion that you do the latter, but I only used your literal words that said as much). I agree that God is not so indifferent. God is not indifferent when natural man naturally labors under the natural CoW. Natural man does this in order to claim his own justification—he was made for as much. Natural law is not arbitrary or just a way to keep man in line for a temporal spell. It serves that purpose, to restrain evil and promote that which is good. But as grounds for justification or probationary graduation is to man’s demise. He can’t stand on that ground and expect reward but only punishment. That is what natural man does: he points to his own execution of the CoW and mistakenly believes he’s captured it. And God howls. Howling is not the language of indifference. The only ground to stand on is the CoG. And so what would you suggest here, that man be forced somehow to bend the knee in some sort of Spanish Inquisition (Monty Python, anyone?)?
steve