Dr Greg Bahnsen - Political Ethics: Secret Directive Theory... Cautious Approach (Part 6)

Church was well aware of the political implications of being a Christian. They could hardly avoid them. To be a Christian. And I use here now the word Christian as a formal title. To be a Christian, that is to say, a disciple or follower of Christ, According to Acts 11:26, meant to confess Jesus Christ as Savior, Messiah and Lord. I think you might be interested to note the implications of those three titles in the New Testament. Savior, Messiah, and Lord. Christians declared that Jesus was their only Savior, the Greek word for Savior being soter. We see this, for instance, in Acts 5:31 and 1 John 4:14. We have beheld and bear witness that the Father has sent the Son to be Savior of the world. Despite the fact that Roman coins of the day often depicted the emperor's face with the inscription of Soter and in some cases only Savior. The earliest Christians declared the name of Jesus to be the one and name given among men, whereby we must be saved. Acts 4:12 and so here the Roman world saying, here's the emperor, only Savior or Savior. And Christians say, no, Jesus is the Savior and the only Savior. It was also essential for a Christian to believe that Jesus Christ, that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, as it says in 1st John 5:1, because Jesus admitted openly that he was the Christ. You'll notice that the Sanhedrin brought him before Pilate for trial, where Pilate also inquired and found out that Jesus considered himself a king. Luke 22:67 and following through the third verse of chapter 23. But if Jesus deemed himself to be a king, then according to the crowds, he was speaking out against caesar himself. John 19:12. So if Christians say Jesus is soter, Savior, then they contradict the claims of the Roman coin that the Caesar is the soter, the Savior. When Jesus said he was the Messiah, the Christian, and that he was a king, the crowd said, then you speak against Caesar. And finally, the New Testament shows us that it's characteristic of all Christians that they confess with their mouths that Jesus is Lord. Romans 10:9 and 1 Corinthians 12:3, meaning that their allegiance in all things belongs to him as Lord of Lords and king of kings. First Timothy 6:15, Revelation 17:14, Even as he, the King of kings, battles against the political power of the beast and the kings of the earth. So then, whether we like it or not, the earliest Christians comprehended that being a Christian had political ramifications. To say that Jesus was Savior, to say that he was Christ, and to say that he was King, Lord of Lords, meant that you were taking up a position against the Caesars. And the kings of the earth Paul and the Christians at Thessalonica were charged with political crimes because of their confession of Christ. In Acts 17:7 we see that it was alleged these all act conflicts contrary to the decrees of Caesar saying that there is another king, one Jesus. Now we know that one day King Jesus will require all kings of the earth to give an account of their rule to him as their sovereign ruler and judge. All thrones were created for him who is to have preeminence in all things. Colossians 1:16 18 Kings who have been so unwise as not to serve the Lord with fear and kiss the Son, will experience his wrath perishing in the way. Psalm 2:1012 and therefore we can see how important and how legitimate it is for Christians Bible believing Christians who want to submit the Scripture from beginning to end to maintain God glorifying attitudes and beliefs about politics and social ethics. If we must glorify God even in our eating and drinking, then surely we must glorify him in the way that we vote, in the way we encourage statesmen to rule our society. Indeed, we must seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness according to Matthew 6:33, so that his will will be done on earth. Matthew 6:10 but what is God's will for political ethics? That's the political question. Yet it's a question that modern Christian writers in politics and social morality find so difficult, if not impossible, to answer clearly and specifically with the renewed interest we are seeing in our day, for Christians to rush into the political arena with a complete world and life view which touches on everything of human interest, with the flood of books and articles which are now being published on the Christian approach to politics. What would happen, one must wonder, what would happen if the world were all of a sudden to stop short and simply say, all right, we see how humanism has failed so desperately. What do you Christians say we should do in matters of political ethics? Once again, the opportunity to speak out with the Christian perspective. If we were given that opportunity, would evangelical and Reformed writers have anything to say beyond generalizations and ambiguous platitudes? I think there's real reason to doubt that they would, and the explanation of that failure is not really too hard to find. The reason why Christians who want to write or take a stand on issues of political ethics have usually failed to produce distinctive and helpful answers which are clear and specific. Is is to be found in their reluctance to endorse and to publicize the law of God precisely where the Lord has revealed definite answers to the sociopolitical problems of men and their civilizations. What kind of good news, what kind of gospel does the kingdom of Jesus Christ bring according to many Christian groups? What kind of gospel do we find? Going to detail a few concepts of the gospel here. I'm going to go back and then redo the whole question with a different summary as well. But first let's just look at the gospel that we find being promoted by different groups. You might notice on the one hand, the social gospel, the social gospel that is dominated by modernists and liberals, as most any Bible believing Christian knows today. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the higher critical movement in scholarship challenged much of the biblical teaching and understanding and undermined a good deal of the most basic theology of the Christian church. And thus the work and the message of Christ were reduced so that he performed no priestly work by his death and resurrection secured no eternal salvation for men. The modernistic approach to man became evolutionary and naturalistic, further denying the Christian message about man's unique dignity as God's image and a special creation by his hand. As a result, modernism turned away from the verities of biblical Christianity and concentrated almost exclusively on on moralistic themes and interest, especially matters touching on the brotherhood of all men as it came to expression in social relations. So liberal theologians felt no hesitation to propagate humanistic solutions to political questions all in the name of Christianity. We must remember however, that the fault with the social gospel was not that it was social, but that it was modernistic and Bible denying. On the other hand, in reaction to liberalism, fundamentalism in the 20th century preached an individualistic gospel. By extreme contrast, the emphasis fell upon saving men's souls from eternal damnation and changing men's hearts for church oriented living waiting for the imminent return of Christ to this hopelessly degenerating world. Ironically, for all the effort to distance itself from liberalism's errors, the commendable insistence on certain key fundamental doctrines of the Bible and fundamentalism tended to create a short sightedness to the full implications of Christianity. And once again the work and message of Christ were reduced for the full salvation which Christ accomplished was narrowed to to the spiritual aspects of man and the present kingdom and rule of Christ were postponed to a later date when sociopolitical matters would again appear on the agenda. Redemption was not seen as applying as far as sin's curse is found and godliness was narrowly defined by abstinence from worldly abuses like drinking, smoking, movies, dancing. The conservatism of fundamentalism was sorely needed in theology of course, but the social effects were less than beneficial. Jesus said that if the salt has lost its savor, it is good for nothing but to be cast out and trodden under the feet of men. And to the extent that this happened to fundamentalism, it was because it did not proclaim the whole counsel of God. Even for sociopolitical morality, Paul's ethic was not exclusively focused on the future life in heaven or the individualistic behavior of the present. He said in 1 Timothy 4:8 Godliness is profitable for all things, having promise for the life which now is and of that which is to come. Now, side by side with the social gospel of Modernism and the individualistic gospel of fundamentalism, we can place the dichotomistic gospel of Romanism or Lutheranism, the social gospel individualistic gospel now thirdly, the dichotomistic gospel of Romanism and Lutheranism. The Lutheran Church, to be sure, stands firmly opposed to the theological errors of the Roman Catholic Church. We will recall that Luther inaugurated the Protestant Reformation of the church by insisting on the doctrine of justification by faith over against the Romanist notions of righteousness through works of the law. Yet, strangely enough, the Lutheran outlook on sociopolitical matters has developed into a parallel perspective to that of Rome. The Roman Catholic Church reduces the work of Christ Christ, leaving the completion of salvation to priests and to human efforts, while the Lutheran Church tends to reduce the message of Christ, drawing a strong opposition between law and laying near exclusive stress between law and gospel, and laying near exclusive stress on the gospel. The Roman Catholic outlook over the years has been that there is a distinction to be drawn between the realms of nature and of grace. Some matters of life pertain to one while others pertain to the other. Political questions are natural to man in his social existence, and thus the perspective of grace, the perspective of special revelation is not directly pertinent to these in that case, man's self sufficient, man's natural reason becomes the arbitrator in issues of political ethics now in parallel fashion. Strangely enough, classic Lutheran doctrine teaches that there is a kingdom of the right hand and a kingdom of the left hand, one pertaining to salvation in the church, while the other pertains to creation and society. As a result, when believers enter into political reasoning, they do so on a common platform, with unbelievers as part of the kingdom, if you will, of nature creation. Now neither Romanism nor Lutheranism have a direct and specific word from God on political matters, but only on matters concerned with grace and salvation, the kingdom of the right hand, and as a result they both promote A neutral attitude toward politics which cannot offer distinctive guidance from Scripture for society. The dichotomies which are central to these theological perspectives turn out to screen out a fully biblical orientation to political ethics. Now rocking to yet another extreme, we can look at neo orthodoxy and subsequent radical theologies which have proclaimed the unsure gospel, which addressed special problems in society and politics, but with no clear and specific word from God. You have the social gospel, the individualistic gospel, you have the dichotomistic gospel, and now we have the unsure gospel that wants to say something to society and politics, but has no specific and has no clear word from God. Karl Barth, for instance, was confident that the commands of the Bible were not universal truths applicable to every age and every culture, but they were merely time bound witnesses to the will of God. Emil Bruner went further to say that the Bible could not, in the nature of the case, provide us with pre established norms of kind conduct for our obligations, he thought, could only be determined by the situation in which we find ourselves opening the door wide to the development of Joseph Fletcher's situational morality, where moral duty is relativistic. Neo orthodoxy promoted nothing more than what I call cheap grace, which does not require men to be converted, does not require repentance from specific sins, does not require that we be sanctified according to an unchanging pattern of holiness. Neo Orthodoxy could not offer anything but a nebulous gospel to men, for according to it, God did not communicate infallible verbal propositions. So it was only to be expected that the neo orthodox approach to social and political problems was ambiguous, was unclear and had to be unauthoritative. It had no sure word from God by which to judge and to guide the social affairs of men. So we see the inadequacy of the social gospel. We see the inadequacy of the individualistic gospel, the inadequacy of the dichotomistic gospel and the inadequacy of the unsure gospel. What can we offer by way of antidote to all of these? What can we offer to bring help and solution to men? Obviously over against the social gospel, individualistic gospel, dichotomistic gospel or gospel, we can find the blessed and I think, refreshing comprehensive gospel of reformed theology, which is the heritage of biblical Christianity. The good news of Christ's kingdom is that Jesus Christ graciously and powerfully saves man in the fullness of his created and sinful existence. Jesus is a prophet declaring God's will for ignorant men. He is a poor priest interceding to God on behalf of polluted sinners. And he is a king ruling over all men in all areas of life. The coming of the kingdom therefore brings the progressive rule of Christ over the world, over the flesh, and over the devil. First Corinthians 15:25. The Reformed churches have always stood for the proclamation of sola scriptur and tota scriptura. Only Scripture, but all of Scripture. Solely Scripture and totally Scripture. Scripture alone must be the standard of our theology and ethic. We must preach all of Scripture in its total relevance to the life of men. Only Scripture, but totally Scripture. That's our motto. Consequently, we observe that the the preaching of the New Testament is not apolitical. The New Testament does not shy away from matters of the material world, the temporal world, the social world, the world outside of man's heart and the church. The New Testament is not apolitical in its preaching. We see that Jesus rebuked Herod as a vixen. Jesus. When Herod sent messengers to Jesus to warn him about his preaching and activities, Jesus said, you return to him and you say to that vixen. Well, now, that was clearly a critical remark about Herod. First of all, it was critical because he was being likened to a fox rather than to a lion. He was among the despicable animals of the animal kingdom and not showing, you see, noble qualities as a ruler, but. But even more, he was a female fox. He was a vixen because he was being dominated by his ungodly wife. That's political preaching. And John the Baptist called the behavior of Herod unlawful behavior. And for that John lost his head. Paul warns us against a political ruler that he calls the man of lawlessness. The man of lawlessness clearly being critical of this man of lawlessness for failing to observe the law of God. And John the apostle in the book of Revelation calls that political ruler the beast, which is hardly flattery. That's preaching, which is political in orientation. Over against these evil rulers. Christians are said to stand for the law of God, Revelation 12:17 and Revelation 14:12. And the reason Christians stand for the law of God over against the beast, the vixen, the man of lawlessness, and all such ungodly rulers is because in Romans 13:4, Paul taught that the civil magistrate was obligated to be a minister of God, one who avenges his wrath against evil. Those who are evildoers are defined in Paul's theology as violators of the law of God. So since the New Testament is not apolitical, neither should be the preaching, the comprehensive preaching of the reformed churches I think it's sad that in recent years, then, in light of the need for comprehensive gospel preaching, over against social preaching, over against individualistic preaching, over against dichotomistic preaching, and over against unsure preaching, that our comprehensive preaching has been crippled by people who are refusing to find God's will specifically taught in the Bible and particularly resistant to the idea that we can find God's will for politics in the Old Testament law of God. Well, this is one way of introducing the question, where is God's will to be found? We've seen the different kinds of gospels that are promoted today in the various Christian groups. I want to ask the question, how do we discern God's will for the state? Where is it that Christ is politically working? Where is it that Christ is politically working? The first answer that is posed, the first one that comes to mind, says that in the New Testament it's not really easy to discern the workings of God through a specific nation. Even though God continues providentially to rule over political entities through His Son. There's the attitude that says, well, we can't really discern the workings of God through any specific nation. Israel is no longer the chosen people of God. However, we confess that God providentially is ruling over political entities by means of His Son today. In fact, it is indeed a mark of piety not to be able to know how God explicitly works today, because that matter is consigned completely to the secret decretive will of God. It's a mark of piety not to know how God explicitly works. For this is a matter having to do with his secret will. For instance, although God judges them in his mysterious ways, the actually existing powers in this world are condoned by Christ and Paul. So we may not pry into providence and ask about legitimate and illegitimate governments. We must simply accept the governments that we find. This is, if you will, a view that says the will of God is found in his providence. That if this is what is happening in politics, this is what ought to be happening in politics. And although what is happening in politics may eventually come under the judgment of God, it's not our job to pry into God's providence. We must simply submit to the powers that be. There's a difficulty with this, however, and that's that the Bible certainly gives us examples and seems to offer us guidance for civil disorder, disobedience. And the Bible is not a continuous, unbroken story of submission to the powers that be. You look at the story of Daniel and you consider the experience of Paul, and you won't find unequivocal civil obedience being rendered. The Bible gives us that example. And the Bible seems to offer us guidelines for civil disobedience. Christians who long for the kingdom of God must aggressively critique the status quo, must be looking at the way things are taking place in the world, about them, and ask whether it's the way God wants them to be, must criticize things, must be willing to preach against injustice and try to bring about changes in the world. And if that's true, then we can't be satisfied to find God's will for politics and just what is providentially happening. There's a real difference between power and justice, between might and right. The Roman Empire of old and the Holy Roman Empire following it, as well as the Chinese Middle Kingdom, were all characterized by strong centralized organizing powers which forcibly precluded a multicultured world. Here we have submission to power and having power to find justice in centralized governments in the Roman Empire, the Holy Roman Empire and the Chinese Middle Kingdom. And these organized powers, political power in such a way that all cultural diversity was squashed. Now, in the case of Machiavelli and following Machiavelli and his train, the state is seen in essence as a power. You think of Hobbes, how he says the state is the Leviathan, the great monsters, just a matter of power. And there are no unjust laws, Hobbes said, because law defines justice. The law of the Leviathan, of the power, is what justice will be. But we want to say as Christians that politics is certainly more than power. Politics must include as well a goal to achieve and the means by which we will be guided to achieve it. We come up from the Roman Empire in Machiavelli to the era of nationalism in Western history. We see that 400 years ago, the new nationalities that emerged aimed to advance the needs and the wants of particular people, particular people, the needs of Frenchmen or the needs of Spaniards or what have you. In the Roman period, it was centralized power. In the period of Machiavelli, power was the essence of the state. In the area of nationalism, its particular people, decentralized power becomes important. And then we come to the French Revolution. The meaning and the aim of power is seen as egalitarianism, a leveling of distinctions, a leveling of particular. And then finally we come to the Russian Revolution, which is aimed to use power in order to put away all power itself. So you see how destructive the idea of power for the sake of power is. We have power, centralized power. In the Roman Empire, this becomes the essence of the state in Machiavelli, and then it's broken up for particular groups. In the era of nationalism, it becomes leveled out power egalitarianism in the French Revolution, and then it becomes power for the sake of ridding the world of power, using the state for the sake of getting rid of the state in the Russian Revolution. So historically, if we just do that quick survey of the use of power, we see that you cannot avoid the question of how power is to be used. It's not enough to say the state is power. You have to say the state is power. For what ends. You have to raise the question of justice. What is it that makes the use of power legitimate? What are the norms for the state's coercion by means of the sword? We as Christians cannot be satisfied then to say that Christ is politically working. And we find that just in terms of his providential will, whatever is happening ought to happen. We call that the naturalistic fallacy, reasoning from what is the case to what ought to be the case. And it leads to a status quoism. It leads to silence. Instead of a prophetic ministry that reforms the society around us, well, we can move to a different option for how to discern God's will, to ask where Christ is politically working today. Instead of saying that God's will for society, for politics, is found in his secret, decretive will, we have those who make an unqualified identification of God's will with specifics in secular movements, an unqualified identification of God's will with. With the specifics of secular movements. This second view strongly denies the first view, the one we've just been looking at, strongly denying that view. They would. Those who hold the second view would boldly, without reluctance or qualification, identify secular movements with the political work of Christ. And I think a very good example of this is found in current liberation theology. And it's also found, I think, explicitly stated in the 1976 Boston Affirmations, which I'd like to read in part to you. The Boston Affirmations arose from a number of Protestant theologians coming together and making a declaration about the Church's witness in society. And the affirmations begin with these words. The living God is active in current struggles to bring a reign of justice, righteousness, love and peace. The Judeo Christian traditions are pertinent to the dilemmas and of our world. All believers are called to preach the good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight. Historically, if we just do that quick survey of the use of power. We see that you cannot avoid the question of how power is to be used. It's not enough to say the state is power. You have to say the state is power. For what ends? You have to raise the question of justice. What is it that makes the use of power legitimate? What are the norms for the state's coercion by means of the sword? We as Christians cannot be satisfied then to say that Christ is politically working and we find that just in terms of his providential will, whatever is happening ought to happen. We call that the naturalistic fallacy, reasoning from what is the case to what ought to be the case. And it leads to a status quoism. It leads to silence. Instead of a prophetic ministry that reforms the society around us, well, we can move to a different option for how to discern God's will, to ask where Christ is politically working today. Instead of saying that God's will for society, for politics, is found in his secret, decretive will, we have those who make an unqualified identification of God's will with specifics in secular movements, an unqualified identification of God's will with the specifics of secular movements. This second view strongly denies the first view, the one we've just been looking at, strongly denying that view. Those who hold the second view would boldly, without reluctance or qualification, identify secular movements with the political work of Christ. And I think a very good example of this is found in current liberation theology. And it's also found, I think, explicitly stated in the 1976 Boston Affirmations, which I'd like to read in part to you. The Boston Affirmations arose from a number of Protestant theologians coming together and making a declaration about the Church's witness in society and it. The affirmations begin with these words. The living God is active in current struggles to bring a reign of justice, righteousness, love and peace. The Judeo Christian traditions are pertinent to the dilemmas of our world. All believers are called to preach the good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, and to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. And now I'm going to be skipping around, but I'll continue reading. To sustain such participation, we have searched the past and the present to find the signs of God's future and of ours now. With respect to prophecy, the Boston Affirmation says, those who authentically represent God have interpreted and will interpret the activity of God, and in social history, they announce the presence of God in the midst of political and economic life. They foretell the judgment and hope that are implicit in the loyalties and practices of the common life. And they set forth the vision of covenantal renewal. For instance, racism, genocide, imperialism, sexism, are thus contrary to God's purposes and impoverish us all with respect to the new covenant. The declaration the source and end of life is disclosed in the suffering love, which breaks the power of sin and death, which renders hope in the action of God to reconcile and transform the world, which shatters the barriers of ethnic, class, familial, national and caste restrictions. Meaning and divine activity are incarnate in history and human particularity. It speaks of various movements in the history of the church and then says, wherever the heirs of these movements are authentic, they confess their sins, worship the power that sustains them, form a company of the committed and struggle for justice and love against the powers and principalities of evil with respect to their present witness. The transforming reality of God's reign is found today in the struggles of the poor, in the transforming drive for ethnic dignity, in the endeavor by women to overcome sexist subordination, in the attempts within families to overcome prideful domination, in the efforts by many groups to develop multiple modern humanity and a love for its cities, in the demands of the sick and the elderly for inexpensive, accessible health care, in the voices of citizens and political leaders who demand honesty and openness, who challenge the misplaced trust of the nation in might, in the research of science, when it warns of dangers to humanity and quest for those forms of technology which can sustain human well being and preserve ecological sources in the humanities and social sciences, when the depth of human meaning are open to inquiry, in the arts, where beauty and meaning are explored in the halls of justice, when righteousness is touched with mercy, and especially in those branches and divisions of the Church where the truth is spoken, in love, where transforming social commitments are nurtured. It was quite a stirring declaration. But what it is saying is we can find Christ politically working wherever the action is. This is unqualified identification of all these social movements as being movements within the kingdom of God. But the question is, how can they say this? By what yardstick do they measure? What criterion do they use? It seems to be wherever God is shattering barriers, well, that seems to be susceptible to a whole lot of counterexamples. One of the barriers on my life right now is the barrier of economic scarcity. So it seems to me that the kingdom of God is coming where I am able to oppress the poor and drain from them everything they have so that the barrier against my economic wants is going to be removed? Well, nobody's going to accept that as being just and fair. That isn't where Christ is working politically. But now how do you know that the one is right and the other is wrong? Why should the state become a welfare state to help the poor, but I not be allowed to oppress the poor in my rentals or whatever? I mean, there has to be some criterion by which we judge these matters. Moreover, mustn't the signers of the Boston affirmations, mustn't they admit that they could be wrong? Couldn't they be wrong in identifying the working of God's kingdom in women's liberation? I mean, is it at least not possible that they are wrong? Isn't there some ambivalence to reckon with? Isn't there the possibility that the women's movement is in fact an egoistic thing, or that at least it has egoistic strains in it? Do we unqualifiedly identify the kingdom of God marching through the women's liberation movement? Isn't there ambivalence to reckon with? Isn't there a measure of tentativeness needed to counterbalance the kind of what we might call low here ism of this attitude? Remember how Jesus said, be careful of those who say lo here the kingdom, lo there the kingdom. And here we have the lo hereist right, the people who say, lo, the kingdom's right there in the racial struggle. Lo here it's in the woman's struggle, low here it's in the struggle against poverty or against the war or against nuclear power plants. Isn't there any room for tentativeness and ambiguity, caution? Don't some standards have to be brought to bear? We have some questions about this, and so I move to the third option. The third option for identifying where Christ is politically working might be described as a cautious perception of Christ working in the movements of our day. But without identifying God's kingdom with any of our own conceptions, as we must be cautious not to identify the kingdom of God with my thinking about the kingdom of God. This third option wishes to counteract the attitude of low hereism and say that we must be concerned to discern God's political movements and to seek the full dimensions of Christ's redemptive work and in the ongoing activity and events of our society. But we must do so with humility, caution, and tentativeness. There must be a humility about it. We must not have pride to think that we can identify our thinking and perceptions with gods. We must be cautious, we must be tentative. We may make mistakes. There's ambiguity out there in the world to reckon with. This is reflected in the 1975 Hartford appeal that was something of an answer to the Boston Affirmations. Certain other theologians, Protestant, Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox theologians, got together and issued this statement of theological affirmation, the Hartford Appeal over against the uncritical acceptance within the ranks of theology of the norms and emphases of secular thought. I'd like to read for you now just some portions of the Hartford appeal. Hartford Appeal says the renewal of Christian witness and mission requires examination of the assumptions shaping the Church's life today. An apparent loss of a sense of the transcendent is undermining the Church's ability to address with clarity and courage the urgent task to which God calls it in the world. This loss is manifest in a number of pervasive themes. And then they lay out 13 different themes that have this insidious effect. The first is modern thought. The idea is here is a theme that is promoted by these secular theologians. But this theme is subject to question upon reflection. And it's these themes which are undermining the Church's ability to address with clarity and courage the task that God has called it to in the world. So the first theme that they stand against is the theme which says modern thought is superior to all past forms of understanding reality and is therefore normative for Christian faith and life. In repudiating this theme, we are protesting the captivity to the prevailing thought structures not only of the 20th century, but of any historical period. We affirm the need for Christian thought to confront and to be confronted by other worldviews, all of which are necessarily provisional. Every worldview is necessarily provisional. Now notice that while this is going to be a good corrective to the low hereism of the Boston affirmations, what you get is nobody knows for sure. Everything is necessarily provisional. So we're going to the other extreme. Another theme that they write against, to declare against, is that Jesus can only be understood in terms of contemporary models of humanity. They argue this theme suggests a reversal of the imitation of Christ. That is, the image of Jesus is made to reflect cultural and countercultural notions of human excellence. We do not deny that all aspects of humanity are illumined by Jesus. Indeed, it is necessary to the universality of the Christ that he be perceived in relation to the peculiarities, particularity, excuse me, of the believer's world. We do repudiate it. The captivity to such metaphors which are necessarily inadequate, relative, transitory, and frequently idolatrous. So they don't like the idea of the Christ of culture, to use Niebuhr's classification from our previous lectures. Another theme that they stand against since what is human is good, evil, evil can adequately be understood as failure to realize human potential. And they argue this theme invites false understanding of the ambivalence of human existence and underestimates the pervasiveness of sin. Another theme that is problematic says institutions and historical traditions are oppressive and inimical to our being truly human. Liberation from them is required for authentic existence and authentic religion. So says the secular theologian. These others want to say institutions and traditions are often oppressive. For this reason, they must be subjected to relentless criticism. But human community inescapably requires institutions and traditions. Without them, life would be degenerate into chaos and new forms of bondage. The modern pursuit of liberation from all social and historical restraints is finally dehumanizing. A further theme that is dealt with. The world must set the agenda for the church. Social, political and economic programs to improve the quality of life are ultimately normative for the church's mission in the world. And the argument against this is that this theme cuts across the political and ideological spectrum. Its form remains the same no matter whether the content is defined as upholding the values of the American way of life, promoting socialism, or raising human consciousness. The church must denounce oppressors, help liberate the oppressed, and seek to heal human misery. Sometimes the church's mission coincides with the world's programs, but the norms for the church's activity derive from its own perception of God's will for the world, so that the world doesn't define the agenda for the church. Then, one final example. The theme is the struggle for a better humanity will bring about the kingdom of God. And the Hartford appeal says the struggle for a better humanity is essential to Christian faith and can be informed and inspired by the biblical promise of the kingdom of God. But imperfect human beings cannot create a perfect society. The kingdom of God surpasses any conceivable utopia. God has his own designs which confront ours, surprising us with judgment and redemption. And so the third school of thought that's in Christian politics says that Christ is politically working today in the world. But we mustn't engage in a kind of low hereism where God's will is unequivocally, without hesitation, identified with whatever is happening. Rather, we must, with humility, caution, and tentativeness identify these movements. Now, it's interesting to me that although this is a modern outlook, the one that I'm dealing with here, that we can find God's will in the world as long as we are kind of dialectical and cautious about it. Say yes but no, yes but no about everything. It's interesting that the Belgian Confession of Faith, Article 4 37, in dealing with the Last Judgment, had this to the faithful and elect shall be crowned with glory and honor. And the Son of God will confess their names before God His Father and his elect angels. All tears shall be wiped away from their eyes. And their cause, which is now condemned by many judges and magistrates as heretical and immortal impious, will then be known to be the cause of the Son of God. Now, the belgic confession, when it was written, was obviously dealing with the persecution of Protestants and with the Reformed who were being condemned by judges and magistrates. And what it was assuring us is that on the Day of Judgment it would be made clear that those things which are not popular in the eyes of the state in the world were in fact the cause of the Son of God. And this kind of thinking gives encouragement to some people within their foreign world to support the Hartford appeal, that in fact there are movements, although despised by the world, that will turn out to be the cause of the Son of God on the last day. We'll recognize that. But against this third option, we must point out that the standard of judgment on the Day of judgment is going to be God's prescriptive. His prescriptive will that is revealed in His Word. The standard of judgment will not be the course of the world or where it's happening or where it's at. Just the matter of Christians being involved in the social activities of the day. But the. The standard on the Day of Judgment will be what Jesus Christ has revealed through the Scriptures. Let's review what we've done now, today. And in this course so far. We have pointed out that there is a transformational need for Christian political stance. And we have posed some of the major questions in our present day for Christian political theory. The questions about the proper function of the state and the place of the state and God's ordering of things. And we have been dealing now with the question of where Christ is politically working today. There are those who say, well, it's a secret because it's all part of God's decretive will. So we just submit to our states. On the other hand, there are those who say unqualifiedly, we would say that God's will can be identified with secular movements. And then kind of rocking from that extreme, you have another option that says, well, God is working in secular movements, but we must be cautious in identifying his kingdom with any of our conceptions. Now, as we move into the last two options on your outline, you will notice that these last two options turn from the question of what is happening, from the situation, God's providence, if you will, secular movements. And a cautious discernment of secular movements turns now to God's revealed will or God's written word as a way of discerning where God is working in the world. There's something of a natural division between the first three options and the last two. The last two maintain that we find out we discern where God is working by looking at the prophetic will of God in the Bible. We look at the prophetic will of God in the Bible, for instance. There are those who hold that there are themes and ideological conceptions in the Bible that show us, that guide us in our perception and evaluation of what's happening. Many in the Sojourners movement are with William Stringfeld, Ethic for Christians and Other Aliens in a Strange Land says, we have the eschatological themes of Babylon and so forth that help us by way of these themes to evaluate the world in which we live. But then we have those who hold to a specific chronology of events, and this specific chronology helps us to evaluate God's will in the world. And there would be be the example of dispensationalism with its charts and so forth, telling us what we should say about politics and international events. However, others who want to look to the revealed will of God for direction in politics don't look at his prophetic will, but want to look rather at his prescriptive will. Want to look at God's will with respect to do's and don'ts and attitudes, more, if you will, the normative or ethical side of Scripture rather than the prophetic side. And among those you can see radical Christianity, the Sojourners movement, stressing one kind of ethic, the common life, the simple life, the help of the poor, and so forth. We find neo conservatism, the utter patriotic approach that says Christianity and the state go hand in hand, the American state. And then we find a transformationalist approach to God's prescriptive will. Those who want to use God's word to change things in their society. But there is a methodological difference as well as a difference in aim between various forms of transformation that we're going to be talking about and Then finally, as concluding group in our survey, we would have to mention the eclectic young evangelicals that seem to want to take a little bit from all of these groups and put it together. They don't so much constitute one unified school of thought, but they need to be mentioned for the sake of completeness. We come back tomorrow, then we'll look at these groups that try to use the written word of God as a guide to discerning where God is working, where Christ is working in politics today.