David French: presumed expert says a couple worthwhile things

“Author David French urges Christian voters to ‘act justly, love kindness, and walk humbly.'”  – The Christian Chronicle, November 2023

I was not swiftly drawn in by that lead to find magnificently conceived philosophies and groundbreaking advice.  Who hasn’t heard that Micah quotation before, and why use it as a subtitle for a supposedly provocative, insightful interview?  Oh, well.

I was interested in what this person had authored.  Try as I might, though, I could not find anywhere in the two-page interview/article the title of any book French had written.  As an author myself, I wish I’d been interviewed; enviously speaking, I think I could have said equally insightful, and even more incisive things.  (But that is not very nice of me, so I should delete that.  [But that would be disingenuous of me, so I’ll leave it in.])

Before I get to the good stuff, I’ll register my objection that a former military man, a political columnist for the NY Times (a “former newspaper,” as Andrew Klavan says), and a figure compared to Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition, is appealed to for any thoughts on the relationship of the Christian to human government.  Those factors insert huge question marks into consideration of whatever Mr. French has to say.  He does, however, have impressive credentials:

David French joined The New York Times as an Opinion columnist in January 2023.  Before that, he was a senior editor at The Dispatch, which he helped start, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic.

He spent most of his career as a practicing lawyer, working in both commercial and constitutional litigation. In his late 30s, he joined the United States Army Reserve as a judge advocate general.  He deployed to Iraq in 2007 and served in Diyala Province, where he was awarded a Bronze Star.  During his legal career, he litigated in federal courts from coast to coast and served as a lecturer at Cornell Law School. He is a former president of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression.  – NY Times

French has said some worthy things in the Chronicle’s interview, but I don’t know that many of them are all that quotable.  I found that the title of his most recent book is Divided We Fall:  America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation.  I am immediately disinterested in the book, because the title’s focus is nationalistic although the book is written by a professing Christian.  Had I first known him as someone who wrote about biblical texts or God or worship or discipleship or even theological history, perhaps I’d be more interested in his ideas on American restoration.  I also acknowledge an over-sensitivity to the presupposition that political and military experience qualifies one to comment on the intersection of Christianity and civil government.  Indeed:  such experience might just be the scale-tipping factor that keeps one from having anything worthwhile to say in this area.  Not that someone with military experience has no insight; far from it.  But we tend to presume that being military or retired military equals having a soapbox labeled “Respectable Man.”  Despite the apparent presumption that makes my hair stand on end, I read on. . . .

French compares his wartime experience with Sunni/Shia disputes to today’s Republican/Democrat climate.  That sounds on target to me.  I’m even more interested, however, in his mention of the “upside-down kingdom of God.”  That is one apt characterization of God’s rule and reign, in my estimation.  French rightly points out that Jesus wasn’t about overthrowing Rome.  “That does not mean we should allow injustice.  But what it does show is that there is a different kind of call on the people of God.”  Yes, I agree (no matter how we conceive of “calling”).  I find the subsequent appeal to Micah 6:8 hackneyed, and the suggestion that Paul’s admonition to Timothy about the “spirit of power” has something to do with not attributing power to Biden or Harris or Clinton is barely dubious.

The next topic reveals an insight:  that someone born and raised in a “small denomination” (i.e., smaller than mainline denominations, I presume) will likely not grow up with the presumption that “we” have the “power” to “run things.”  Roman Catholics and Presbyterians and even Baptists, for instance, might tend to think they can affect national politics by coercion, although they probably wouldn’t call it that.  French appears to affirm that power should not provide the primary impetus for Christian living and action.  He also seems to translate this (rightly) negative view of power into a focus on justice.  That doesn’t seem to be a bad thing, but in today’s lingo, “justice” may well be read as “social justice,” which again has associations that are neither pure nor precise.  Painting with a broad brush, I would agree with French that justice is to be upheld over power (or the pursuit of power), but the devil is in the details.

Finally, the interviewer gets to that age-old, annoying question:  what about Christians and voting?  And again, French points to justice, with a wispy suggestion that one doesn’t have to vote in every election if his polar star is justice.  Unfortunately, he doesn’t take the bait of the interviewer’s appeal to David Lipscomb.  He passes right by Lipscomb’s philosophy, despite the fact that he has recently been named a Distinguished Visiting Professor of Public Policy at David Lipscomb University.  Perhaps some connective thoughts were edited out of the interview:  he does suggest that actual Christian living (time, energy, effort, community) is what it’s all about, whereas the vote is not.  I would add that the vote is not only the exercise of the “voice,” as we have long been taught in our democratic republic; it is also an indication that we want, and believe we have, political power.

Pursue justice rather than power

 

 

Of Israel, Israelis, and antisemitism: some rejectable notions

Foreword:  My first post on the tragic Israel situation (and this one should probably be the last) was more than two weeks ago.  Coincidentally, that post referred to another article by the same author referred to below.

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I skimmed an article by former diplomat and historian Michael Oren, an Israeli-American, about the violence in Israel and Gaza.  The subtitle and some of the later content surprised me, and a few lines even disturbed me.  The article’s publisher, The Free Press, has a vested interest in that its founder and her spouse are Jewish; although they are wholly justified in spotlighting this situation with its global implications, the possibility of bias exists, even with these particular journalists.

As if the world could do with any more negative stimuli, the pro-Israel and pro-Hamas rhetoric are both hot already.  It seems historically on track to note that most Christians, most Republicans, and a good number of moderate Democrats have taken a pro-Israel stance, while those in many prestigious universities and large cities these days are reportedly leaning heavily toward the Palestinian side.  I find this whole ball of wax quite complicated in terms of nationalism/ethnology/culture,¹ and I would at least suggest to today’s Israelis that God once directed the Hebrews to “colonize” the “promised land,” driving out others who had been living there.  Then, at some point, others took over this or that part of the land, and Muslims were part of subsequent “colonizations.”  The word “colonize” is apparently a lightning rod, but I think it is fair to apply it to both sides.

Do Israelis today have a right to the land because God gave it to them?  I don’t know whether many of them would have appealed, even subconsciously, to Moses and Joshua after the most recent attack.  The developing theocracy of that time notwithstanding, it is incumbent on Israelis to realize that those Hebrews they call ancestors were once themselves the marauders who overtook the land.  History involves one horrible war after another; I don’t know why one set of wars is more determinative than another.  All wars I can call to mind have people embroiled in horrific struggles for sovereignty; this observation holds true in Ukraine, Israel, and much more.  I suspect that Jews must sense a kind of historical-theological imperative beyond what might be termed “international law” in this century, and, from a secular point of view—and make no mistake that war is secular—international law and the understood rules of war trump any history and theology, whether real or imagined.

I’ll paste in a few quotations from Oren’s article, with comment.  Here is the lead:

“Hatred of Israel cannot be distinguished from hatred of the Jewish people.  Incontestably now, anti-Zionism is antisemitism.”

Oren and I would presumably both presuppose that Palestinians and most other Muslims do hate the nation-state of Israel as a geopolitical entity.  Yet hating a nation-state simply isn’t the same thing as hating the people who live there.  I’m not sure how one ascertains that someone hates a country as such.  Yes, there is a kind of sinister metonymy that can occur, in that if one says often enough that he hates Israel, he could come to substitute unconsciously the word “Israel” for the people.  Still, if the phrase “the Jewish people” means the same thing to the author as “the nation of Israel,” well, it shouldn’t.  (I hate many things that are going on in my own country, and some days, if pressed enough, I might even carelessly say I hate the whole thing, but that does not by any stretch mean that I hate the people.)

I also offer a demurrer to the second assertion above.  “Anti-Zionism is antisemitism,” wrote Dr. Oren.  I think “anti-Zionism” can imply different things, or at least entail different scopes.  However one defines anti-Zionism,² that term does not necessarily require that the person who holds that view also be against the Jewish people.

“Antisemitism” is broadly understood as anything that opposes Jewish people, although technically it would include other descendants of Shem—for instance, some Arabs, Ethiopians, and others.  Differing understandings and opinions may coexist, yet it’s difficult for them to do so when people groups and war are involved.  I remain convinced that a proper view of God’s reign does not assign significant roles to the world’s potentates or to land holdings, and that is the overarching raison d’etre for this Subjects of the Kingdom blog.  Contra the import of the antisemitism-related subtitle quoted above, I believe that the distinguishing of geopolitics, theology, and faith in God itself remains important.  Taking a position against—or for—a nation does not necessitate a set of relational or theological implications.

These notions, then, are rejectable:  (1) being against a nation equals hating people, and (2) not supporting “Zionism” equals being anti-Jewish.

For many centuries, the term “innocent Jew” was an oxymoron.  Jews were guilty by birth, by belief, and by ancestry.  There is a religious tenet of Judaism, reenacted each year at Passover, that all Jews were present at the exodus from Egypt and when God gave the laws to Moses at Sinai.  Twisting this is a Christian belief that all Jews were present at, and responsible for, the crucifixion.  More than Pilate, more than Judas—a name not chosen randomly—the Jews were damned for deicide.

But killing God is only one of the sins for which Israelis—read: Jews—are being demonized in this war.  Behind the reports of the deliberate Israeli bombing of Palestinian neighborhoods—reports that meticulously stress the number of children killed—lies the 144,000 children mythically massacred by the Judean King Herod.

– Excerpts from “Michael Oren: A War Against the Jews,” The Free Press, 10/26/23

I’m ignorant about many things, and apparently the use of the phrase “innocent Jew” is one of them.  I don’t remember ever having heard that term; I therefore have no association with it at all.  “Giant shrimp” and “old news” are oxymoronic, but “innocent Jew” can only be an oxymoron if it’s recognizable, and I don’t think it is.  I don’t know where this author has been digging or hiding; in the mind of this Caucasian Christian, Jews are not innately guilty of anything because of their ethnicity.

The idea (first paragraph, third sentence) that Christians believe all Jews were present and responsible at Jesus’ crucifixion is laughable.  I mean, I suppose it’s possible that some 19th- or 20th-century Germans were so historically ignorant that they could have thought that was possible, and again, I myself am ignorant of many things.  I can only say authoritatively that I myself have never heard such an idea until this very point in my life.  Therefore, because this thought is utterly new to me, and I am neither illiterate nor an ostrich, I think find it almost ludicrously offensive to suggest that it is “a Christian belief.”

Next:  the author asserts that “Jews were damned for deicide,” i.e., killing God.  Although I am currently persuaded that anyone who expressly and intentionally rejects Jesus and never turns from that stance will be eternally apart from God, that is different from saying that “the Jews were damned.”  Speaking only for myself (and not for Eusebius or Augustine or Hildegard or Luther or Calvin or any other historical theologian), I’d offer this:  I don’t believe King David was damned for murder, so why would I, as a Christian, believe a Jew of the first century would be damned for contributing, in some indirect sense, to the crucifixion of the God-man Jesus?  That act would have been wrong, and guilt would be part of the equation, but repentance would have been possible, so ultimate condemnation based on the crucifixion scenario is out of the picture.  Recall with me, too, that Saul gave assent to the murder of Stephen (and the story of Stephen in Acts 7 bears certain resemblances to Luke’s account of Jesus’ crucifixion), yet Saul was not damned.

Why did Oren introduce King Herod in the second paragraph above?  I’ve not heard the 144,000 number in this context before, either.  The use of term “mythical” with reference to the killing of children (noted in Matthew 2) elicits a defensive response in Jesus-believers; that word, too, weakens Oren’s article, and I feel no need to go further.

The Free Press may certainly give due attention to the awful and gruesome things going on in Israel and Gaza, but all journalists should take care.  Palestinians have done horrific things, and so have Israelis.  The Israel-state is not above criticism, and the notion that it has a place whereas Arabs do not is a rejectable one. 

It does no good to say so, but I still condemn all war and all violence . . . all the while recognizing that, as long as this world-system exists, there will be wars.

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¹ I doubt that even the Samaritans of Jesus’ day were a monolith.  Is it any wonder that the Jew/Israel/Arab situation is impossible to resolve?  Intermarrying does occur.  Both Arabs and Jews live in many countries, and the lineage is messy, to say the least.

Jump out of the Middle East for a moment to ponder the proposition of tracking an African line of descent backward from 1920s North Carolina.  One might come to know, with some certainty, the names of the mothers for three or four generations back, but the identity of the fathers is probably a different story.  Alex Haley’s compelling Roots investigations aside, could most black Americans today even begin to know which African region their great-great-great-great-great-great grandfathers lived in, prior to being shipped in chains to our continent?  Even one side of my mostly literate, European ancestry has only been traced back to the early 1600s, and that with some doubt.  Does a Gaza-dwelling Arab know for certain that he has no Jewish blood?  Does a kibbutz-dwelling Jew know she has no Muslim blood from the Middle Ages?

² https://subjectsofthekingdomblog.wordpress.com/2017/04/27/on-israel-my-present-stance/

Not the same thing: thoughts around the atrocities in Israel

As I begin writing this, it is October 9, two days after news broke about the Hamas/Palestinian attack on Israel.  I suppose I fall around the 60th percentile in terms of knowledge about the Middle East, so I consider myself largely ignorant, but I have a few ruminations.

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Foreword:  It’s not the same thing

Long ago, on a plane toward Israel for sightseeing, I mentioned to the guy sitting next to me my plans to see the “Land of Palestine.”  Goodness.  I was so young and had no idea . . . and I was cautioned by that older person that I should probably take care when using the word “Palestine.”  In my memory, this man was well-spoken and a little dark-skinned.  He could have been a Jew from Tel Aviv or an Arab from Jerusalem or Gaza.  All I knew at the time was that Palestine was on my Bible maps.  But that “Palestine” and the current use of “Palestinian” are not the same thing.

At least a portion of the BLM posse has expressed sentiment in favor of the Palestinians.  They apparently find common ground.  It’s not the same thing, though.  The respective courses of action are both despicable, and their causes, both suspect, but I tend to believe the Palestinian cause has more reality behind it.

Images and reports have surfaced of deplorable violence inflicted on women, children, and other civilians.  This all “began” with atrocities by Hamas-led forces from Gaza, and it has continued with an onslaught by Israel that also inflicted harm on civilians.  Based on what I know now, one week in:  the Israeli violence, although also devastating to civilians, is categorically not the same thing as Gaza Arabs’ rape of women and beheading of children.

~ ~ ~

On the one hand, I condemn any violence, including Hamas’s “initial” attack.  On the other hand, I am no more convinced of Israel’s rights than of the Palestinians’ rights.  It’s complicated.

On the one hand, an “invasion” or “terrorist attack” (labeled as such) seems initiatory and therefore deserving of condemnation.  On the other hand, no attack occurs in a vacuum.  There is a historical context, and such contexts are always complex.

On the one hand, I grieve for deep human suffering, period.  On the other hand, it would seem that both sides are at fault in almost any war.

On the one hand, there is a deep historical connection to the land of Israel for Jews and  Christians.  On the other hand, physical borders are no longer significant in God’s Kingdom, and I do not believe the Gaza Strip is any more significant than the Crimean Peninsula or West Africa or Myanmar or anywhere else.

~ ~ ~

“Israel is the Jewish state . . . and so we will be judged.”  – Michael Oren, American-born Israeli historian, author, politician, former ambassador to the United States, former member of the Knesset, and a former Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office (“Honestly” podcast, interview with Bari Weiss)

In a real but unfortunate sense, Oren is right.  There is such history that pertains to all iterations of Israel and all types of Jewishness that the current nation-state will naturally be a lightning rod for judgmental opinion.  I would add that there will be judgment on all sides of all questions.

On the other hand, regardless of ancient Israel’s theocratic history, regardless of the Nazi Holocaust of the 1930s-40s, and regardless of compassionate, continuing, modern-day sympathies for the suffering of an ethnic group, the state of Israel has no special status anymore.¹  Presently, it is one country among ~193.  It bears little connection to the Israel of King David or Hezekiah or any of the others.

Obviously, the country garners a lot of attention.  Journalistic attention and the political magnetism of the land are tied to Jewish history, certainly including the Nazis’ genocidic crimes.  The Arab oil industry is also involved, and much more.  Still, Oren’s words (above) and others like them should not be translated into a unique, transfigured status for Israel.  Ancient Hebrew theology and practice don’t pertain all that much to current-day Israel.  Jewish history has involved multiple forks in roads, and the word “Judaism” seems to apply most directly to religious practices that developed hundreds, and even thousands, of years after Abraham, Moses, and King David.  In any event, Jewishness is no longer a diamond-studded touchstone for humanity.

Any outcome of the present conflict with a “victor,” which seems unlikely, will not equate to God’s approval of the military victory.  A victorious nation-state is not the same thing as approval in God’s eyes.  God doesn’t work that way anymore.

All war is deplorable.  All attacks on innocent human life should cease.  But they never will.

Our Lord, come.

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¹ Nor do I believe there is any special status conferred on Americans by virtue of their being U.S. citizens.  Our citizens deserve no more attention, protection, or rescue than all the others in the Middle East.

War Resisters League

Sometime earlier this year, I learned of the WRL, whose 100th anniversary is a week away, on October 19th.  With a name like “War Resisters League,” it is obvious that it would be a pacifist organization.  It is also a secular organization, having no apparent ties to a religion, much less to a denomination or subdivision.

I considered supporting the group and possibly becoming a member.  I became reluctant, though, when I noted the breadth of the group’s “about” statement.  They support causes that I don’t know enough about, including ending tactical use of tear gas by police.  I also question a statement I saw about immigrants.  It seems that one could resist violence and war, effectively looking for alternate solutions to conflict, without weighing in on such a thorny and overwhelming issue as immigration—which of course includes illegal immigration that is causing a great deal of strain on society.

A cousin organization, headquartered in London, is the War Resisters’ International.  (I don’t get the apostrophe, but I’m going with it.)  This group seems to have a more pure version of pacifism at its root.

Organizational affiliations or not, it is important that a Christian affirm nonviolence, at least to some extent.

A “kingdom university”?

An August article in the Christian Chronicle spotlighted Ken Jones, new president of Oklahoma Christian University.  The program he launched as he took the helm of the university seems, on the surface, much the same as what was undertaken by (sister school) Harding University’s new president Mike Williams.  Despite the hardship placed on people and programs by tough decisions, in order to keep a business such as a university afloat, I take no exception to either president’s business practices.

I note, however, that Jones intentionally repeated the phrase “kingdom university,” with no working definition given in the interview.  He seemed at one point simply to contrast being a “Church of Christ” institution with a “kingdom” one.  In other words, for Jones, it appears, based on the published interview, that “kingdom” means being willing to accept Christians of different denominations at the university.  If that is his meaning, I assert that it is grossly insufficient—and significantly misleading to anyone who wants to think seriously about the meaning and implications of the kingship of God and of His Christ.

“And that’s all I have to say about that.”  – F. Gump

Faith in a nationalistic perspective

“President Trump is a believer, and so am I.  We understand the role of faith in the life of this nation.”  – Mike Pence (ca. 2020)

I do take one of the above-named politicians to be a believer, while the other doesn’t give any evidence of being one.  Both of them might have a level of understanding beyond my own around the “role of faith” in the U.S.A.  If you define faith as “affiliation with any more or less Christian or Jewish group and/or system of thought,” then it may be readily acknowledged that “faith” has had a great deal of effect on this country for centuries.

On the other hand, I would seriously question that Mr. Trump or Mr. Pence (or most anyone else!) understands the role of the nation in the present-day faith-system called “Christianity.”  It seems to me that the influence runs strong in that direction.

Pence’s statement does raise the question of what faith is, and there are at multiple, valid answers, depending on whether one is speaking (1) broadly and nationalistically, (2) within the confines of a relatively close-knit faith group or church, or (3) strictly scripturally.  In any event, politicians who tout their faith in the context of seeking, grabbing, or maintaining political clout give little evidence of understanding the non-geopolitical, non-bordered, upside-down Kingship of God.

Consider these words from Lee C. Camp:

The fundamental identity of American Christians, if Christianity means anything, is in being Christian, not in being American.  And the fundamental role of the Christian community, to use the apostle’s language, is to serve as as ministers of reconciliation to God and thereby to one another.  To the degree that we fall prey to hysterics of partisanship, to that same degree we have lost our way as a Christian community.
…
But in these days in which the partisanship of too many Christians takes on an increasingly militant nationalism, such partisanship is all the more devastating to Christian witness.

To be wildly partisan about presidential elections in the midst of the late days of empire; to be ideologically hostile regarding small government versus big government; to be blindly belligerent regarding capitalism versus socialism, without keeping all these questions in their place of relative importance over against larger concerns; to cast aside all other concerns and favor of a government mandated pro-life policy on the one hand versus a calisthenic of pro-choice on the other—all of this represents the failure of Christianity in America.  – Lee C. Camp, Scandalous Witness, 100-101

And I would add that the question is not whether Christianity fails in America, for that emphasis spotlights a single country.  Clearly Dr. Camp is not exclusivistic, either; I feel safe in saying that he too believes the reign of God transcends national borders.  No, what happens in America is not central.  The question is whether Christianity has failed, period—and what happens in the mind of God based on that situation.

Is it possible that soteriology, justice, and eschatology could merge?  In other words, could the saving work of God, human justice, and last things come together in some cataclysmic way, by God’s hand?  I might have even the question all wrong, but the possibilities intrigue me.

One thing I know; on this I stand:  God’s kingdom, which will not ultimately fail, is not tied to the U.S.A. or to any other national entity.

Excerpts from a conversation

Here are some excerpts from a long-past e-conversation, slightly edited for clarity where context is now missing.  I’ve saved this for years, trimming it down here and there.  I think, for better or worse, that this contains a lot of important concepts.

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In large measure, my convictions are founded on ideals related to the Kingdom (rule and reign) of God as I see them revealed in scripture.  I personally have no interest in passivity, but neither do I have goals related to political aspects of this world’s systems.  I have yet to find a convincing scripture- or Jesus-based argument that bolsters participation in government and war.  (The more valid pro-participation arguments are based on things other than Jesus or scripture.)

To believe that a Christian is better off not participating in the government machine is to be in harmony with important aspects of biblical Kingdom theology and with many esteemed voices throughout Christian history—including large swaths of

• the gospel of Matthew (for just one scriptural instance)
• the earliest Christian witnesses (nearly universal consensus)
• mid-millennium Anabaptists (ditto; see Hughes quotation below)
• important 19th-century reformers

“For [the Anabaptists] it was far more important to have a living, pure church than to have a viable state.  They deplored the immoralities than ran rampant in the church of their time and longed for commitment and dedication, for a church that would embody purity of life and singleness of purpose….  [T]hey knew where their commitment lay.” ‑ Richard T. Hughes (1988, “Restoring an Apostolic Lifestyle: Anabaptists,” 127)

In holding such positions, I probably should not feel uncomfortable around other Christians, yet I often do.

Each individual conscience, as well as it can, must harmonize personal decisions with scriptural principle and whatever is known of Jesus and his kingdom.  A pilgrim disciple’s efforts to engage with the world ought always to be subsumed under Kingdom goals.

. . .

It is a radical worldview that sees the reign of the King as determinative both now and forevermore—really, as the only kingdom that ultimately matters.  No earthly kingdom may receive the believer’s ultimate loyalty.

. . .

I can certainly affirm and support some governmental measures taken—for instance, steps to relieve hunger or to cripple those who traffic in human lives.  When a disciple follows the Messiah with one eye on the eternal Kingdom and the other on treating people kindly and justly . . . , the people will be the focus.  Non-political emphases will be the rule, not the exception.

The assumption that we (Christians) should use political power is but an assumption.  Jesus did not use such means to achieve his ends.  I find no New Testament evidence that what Jesus wanted was policy change (He never went to Rome), but he did want his followers to do Kingdom work.  That work involves treating people justly, and there may be somewhat public aspects to that.  While many very sincere Christians will seek involvement on political levels, I deny that the “struggle for justice” necessarily includes politics.

. . .

I do not believe abortion is inherently wrong in all cases, but I am troubled as I see the related, societal ill encroaching.  I am not sure at all that outlawing abortion is the “just” thing to do in secular society.  Society is, and will continue to be, secular.

How can moral coercion of non-Christian persons be justified when we find no unwilling New Testament disciples?  It is not Christians’ business to get non-Christians to change their behaviors.  That is not the first order of business, anyway. . . .

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I do not believe God’s people “abandon” or “abdicate” with regard to political roles and power.  Quite to the contrary:  the burden of proof is on those Christians who take as a given that they should be politically active. I believe there are

• good people in politics
• more good people considering political roles
• precious few who are actually doing Kingdom work through their offices
• even fewer who can truly harmonize 1) being one of God’s people and 2) being a politician or government office-holder, without compromising either role.

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Many Christian teachers these days take as their jumping-off point the idea that Christians should redeem government, and I think that viewpoint emanates from a faulty emphasis—a temporal, earth-bound one.  God redeems those of us who want to be under His rule, and He has the prerogative to set human rulers in place, but that doesn’t mean they operate under His will, or that it’s conceivable that they could.  He is not in the business of redeeming or purifying human government.  God’s purposes transcend the currently known world, and our reflective purpose should not be to attempt to transform the inherently flawed, God-opposing human governments.

I will not align myself with any nation-state, pledging any sort of allegiance to it, but I will submit to the laws of the one in which I live—insofar as there is no conflict with allegiance to God—and will appreciate various genres of blessings while I live here.

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Someone asks, “How can we afford to allow this to happen again?” as though it is a given for me and other believers to connect personal morality and beliefs with political activities.  I ask this instead:  “How can Christians afford to place their faith in political events and personalities when eternity is at stake?”

. . .

There are many things the world doesn’t need, and one of them is the Christian Right, because it harms God’s causes in at least two ways: (1) it makes the secular world annoyed, thus hindering evangelism, and (2) it takes Christians’ eyes off the Master and the goal.

I start not with any particular temporal concerns or with a philosophical position on political power/influence but with a faith-position that arises out of the scripture and history of the early Christians.  What I read and understand about Jewish and Christian history, culminating in a new manifestation of God’s rule in Christ, is bedrock for me.  As I understand the nature and purposes of the Kingdom of God (announced with vigor and purposefulness by John and exemplified by Jesus), its concerns dictate that I remain in a pilgrim-sojourner status in this world while seeking to be a disciple of the one Master.

I do think the allegiance issues are unavoidable for many/most/perhaps all believers.  Struggles will continue throughout this life, in varying degrees in different situations.  I will not pledge allegiance to a country, but I sometimes struggle with other allegiance concerns (to spiritual causes, maybe to a person, etc.).

I cannot let my worries about a country’s direction outshine my primary allegiance.  Will I be afraid?  Of course.  I’m human.  But with His grace, I will continue to affirm and confess my allegiance to the King of kings, not to the empire or nation-state.

Representing

Sometime in my 20s or 30s, I came to feel that the so-called “great commission” (at the end of Matthew 28) was not universally applicable and yet had taken on a life of its own.  Many a pulpiteer has parroted, “‘Go ye’ means go me!”  And no one seemed to question that, at least openly.  The “limited commission” (at Matt 10:1, Mark 6:7, and Luke 9:1) and also in Mark and Luke) and is also important, but even that notion seems to lead over-bearing, extroverted preachers to lay a burden improperly on every single pew-packer.  Not everyone was chosen for that task by Jesus in that time; why would I think everyone is so designated now?

Later in my scripture-study-life, I became more conscientiously and academically comfortable with limiting the “great commission.”  Leaving myself out of its explicit details, I instead moved toward the notion of being an ambassador, a representative.  Those designations seemed, and still seem, more broadly applicable.

But how to be one of those?  Have I just substituted one kind of deferral or absolution for another?

I used to wear a Christian t-shirt or three, but those are gone now.  I must ask myself how I represent Jesus the Christ today.  Representing Him must be primary, but I’m at a loss these days.  I do have license plate frames that point to Jesus as κυριός | kurios, and to non-franchise Christianity.  No one has ever asked me about these messages, so I assume they are not very effective.

Having been raised in a deep storehouse of hymnody and other Christian songs and material, I think of expressions now long passed by, but still resident in my heart.  The likes of “I’m Not Ashamed To Own My Lord” and “Who Will Follow Jesus?” come to mind.  Expressions such as these are still meaningful and captivating:

defending his cause

maintaining His honor

“I am on the Lord’s side.  Master, here am I.”

I didn’t come into contact with “Living for Jesus” until my 20s, but it, too, expresses the desire to represent the Lord in life.  The wordings of Mark 8:38 (“whoever is ashamed of Me . . .” and Romans 1:6 (“I am not ashamed of the gospel”) are etched deeply in my head, too, providing both a polar star and a cause for guilt feelings.  I fear I am not truly representing very much of anything.

If I were to buy a pop-culture t-shirt today, it would be the one shown here.  In the arena of sensible, evidence-based medicine, government, and society, I support watchful waiting, doing no medical harm, and loving, tenacious, even ferocious care.  Also, I want to draw attention to de-transitioners and their struggles, so I would represent their interests and not those of unapologetically radical ideologists who make dupes of politicians, educators, and formerly respectable medical professionals.

But when I extend the thinking to the health and God-orienting of souls, the mere “do no harm” idea seems so limited.  Impoverished, even.  What is most important for me to represent?  This snapshot of a church’s slide presents a noteworthy angle on representation.

Now, that’s hardly the most succinct or quotable thing I’ve read on Christian living, but it does begin with the notion of representing the King.  Remembering that He is in charge—and we are not—is a good place to start, or re-start.  Maybe, just maybe, I can remind myself of His place in the cosmos, and purportedly in my life, by being allegiant in small ways.   Not getting distracted when little things hamstring me or seem to render me powerless could just be a good way to represent.

Lee C Camp, proposition 6

In Lee C. Camp’s book Scandalous Witness, his Proposition #6 is this:  the United States was not, is not, and will not be a Christian nation.

I will share here some of the strongest, most to-the-point verbiage from that chapter.

America cannot possibly be a Christian nation because no nation-state can be a Christian nation state.  This is not a biased judgment about America.  It is a simple matter of understanding what a nation state is and what Christianity is.  These two cannot be conjoined.

The following are some particulars:

• Nation-states are bounded geographically by borders.  But the Christian church is transnational and is bounded by no artificial geographical boundaries.  Nation-states are bounded procedurally by laws regarding citizenship.  By and large, nation-states comprise those who are citizens according to arbitrary historical accident. . . . I am . . . a citizen . . . due to the two contingent facts of my birthplace and the time of my birth.  The church, however, comprises those who are members following their own voluntary intentional commitment. . . .
  
• Nation-states build walls, literally or procedurally.  The church of Christ welcomes all, literally and procedurally.
• Nation-states maintain their existence through military might and standing armies, precisely because they are geographically bounded.  The church, on the other hand, is an entity that lives by, lives according to,  and bears witness to suffering love.  The church does not depend on self-preservation. . . .
• Nation-states seek their own partisan agenda.  This often takes the shape of developing alliances with other relatively like-minded nation-states. . . .

The country of my birth and political citizenship is not a Christian nation.  It could never be one, because such cannot exist.  A few minutes before a national, one-party debate–a showcase for bullying and pulpiteering, I imagine—I wanted to share these important truths, so that leftists and rightists and centrists alike might realize that our hope is not in this nation.

The most comprehensive topic

I’ve been taking baby jaunts through a festschrift titled Continuity and Discontinuity.  Some of the chapters (various authors) aren’t very artfully or compellingly written, and the material pertains more to surveying theologian-type literature than to theology itself (which would be OK with me here) or to scripture (which would be far better).  I did come to a noteworthy statement in chapter 6:

I gladly accept the label “covenant theology” and have long considered myself a covenant theologian.  Today, however, I prefer to think of reformed theology as “kingdom theology” since the kingdom of God is the most comprehensive and all-inclusive biblical category.  As this chapter will indicate, I understand God’s covenants as well as the New Testament church as instruments or agencies of God’s kingdom.”  – Fred H. Klooster, “The Biblical Method of Salvation:  A Case for Continuity,” in Continuity and Discontinuity: Perspectives on the Relationship Between the Old and New Testaments, John S. Feinberg, editor

While this quotation is essentially a jumping-off point for Mr. Klooster’s perspective on the mode/manner/way of salvation, I think it’s substantial, and I’ll let it stand here on its own.