Aug 12
25
Yes, there can be a Christian nation today?
We came across an article written by OPC Pastor Larry Wilson in a publication which reprinted it this summer. The context for the article was to challenge the dangerous practice of proof-texting from the Bible to make an argument. The topic Pastor Wilson chose was whether or not the United States was a Christian nation. The Scripture passage he referenced was 2 Chronicles 7:14. Though the purpose for the article was proof-texting, the question discussed of whether or not America is a Christian nation, provided another excellent opportunity for rebuttal. I offer a rebuttal below, raising questions about the credibility of Pastor Wilson’s arguments, and offering a more compelling Christian position. Click here to read Pastor Wilson’s article: ‘Patriotic’ pretexting – Larry Wilson – August 2012. Let us provide the introductory paragraphs, so that you have some idea of where he was going even if you don’t take a moment to look at his entire article.
“Patriotic” Pretexting
It’s an American disease but the rest of the world isn’t immune
By Larry Wilson
I’ve come to think that perhaps the Scripture text that I’ve most often heard taken out of context and rendered into a pretext may be 2 Chronicles 7:14: “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
How often have I heard this verse quoted as if it applied directly to American Christians, directly to the United States of America? Is not America a “Christian nation”?
A better question might be, Is there even such a thing as a Christian nation in the new covenant era? According to God’s Word, the answer is yes. So what is it? Is it a geographical area, or a specific form of civil government, or a certain group of citizens? No, the only Christian nation that exists in the new covenant era is the “one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.” To her alone does God say, “You are … a holy nation” (I Peter 2:9). …
Because this is so, it is wrong to apply 2 Chronicles 7:14 directly in our era to any particular earthly country – including the United States. …
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Response to “Patriotic” Pretexting
In the July/August issue of Reformed Perspective, Larry Wilson discussed – “‘Patriotic’ pretexting” – the question of whether or not there is such an entity as a Christian nation in the new covenant era. He concluded that the Church itself is the only Christian nation to exist in this period (I Peter 2:9).
Within Reformed circles, the primary traditions or schools of thought which advance the notion of Christian nationhood also existing in relation to countries are theonomy and Christian establishment. For a Reformed publication and readership, I wish that Pastor Wilson had addressed the perspective and arguments of these schools of thought rather than the notions of Christian nationhood that one is more likely to find in baptistic, evangelical, dispensationalist circles. For example, at one point he writes: “Accordingly, rather than inviting the nations to come to the Holy Land in order to become part of the holy nation, …” That notion of a Christian nation sounds more like something wedded to dispensationalist views of Israel. In my 15-20 years in theonomist circles and as a member of the RPCNA (Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America), which traces its roots back to the Scottish Covenanters with their strong Christian establishment convictions, I have never heard such sentiments articulated.
Pastor Wilson articulates some foundational theological convictions, but I am left with the impression that he is wedding them to criticism of some particular sentiments he has heard voiced in the context of “Christian nationhood” language. I may well concur with his criticism of such sentiments, but they don’t represent every vision for Christian nationhood. He does not seem to have Christian establishment or theonomic notions in mind with some of the comments he makes.
For example, he writes that “it is unbiblical to say that any nation, including the United States – as a nation – enjoys special favor form God over and above the other nations of the earth.” But then he says, “If the United States has enjoyed God’s favor, it has done so for the sake of his church.” OK, but which is it? Is it wrong to say nations can enjoy God’s special favour or is it correct to say they can enjoy special favour if one links that favour with church’s faithfulness? It can’t be both. I would venture to say that Pastor Wilson’s first statement, rejecting the idea of special favour, assumes a certain package of unbiblical ideas that many non-reformed Christians attach to the notion of special favour. He does not explain this, so he comes across sounding contradictory. But his second statement reflects the theonomic thinking I hold. God does bless and curse entire nations, doing so by way of His Church in that nation (cf. the blessings and curses of Deut. 28 and 29), and its faithfulness and vitality.
Earlier in his article, Pastor Wilson references the Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20. That passage is a call to baptize nations, not to baptize people out of or out from nations, but to baptize nations. There is a corporate and national nature to Gospel application and Kingdom advancement.
The Church is the true Christian nation, as Pastor Wilson notes (I Peter 2:9), but this does not negate the notion of Christian nations from a national perspective. Distinct nations are a Biblically sanctioned method of distinguishing people (as Prof. Cornelis Van Dam has noted in his recent book, God and Government). We also know, as Abraham Kuyper has noted, that there is no square inch of reality over which God does not say this is mine. In other words, there is no such thing as neutrality. This goes for national allegiance as well. It’s hard to argue that there is no such thing as heathen nations. We see the outworking of Islamic nationhood, atheistic (communist) nationhood and Hindu nationhood, etc. all around us. Well, it’s impossible for the negation of something to exist if that which is being negated does not first exist. Evil couldn’t exist if good didn’t first exist. So if you can have heathen nations, then you must necessarily also be able to have Christian nations.
Pastor Wilson writes, “Our Lord Jesus made it clear that … the church would take a very different form in the new covenant. It would become international, rather than national; its power would be spiritual, rather than temporal; it would be spread by gospel witnesses, rather than soldiers (Acts 1:6-8). In an article written for the explicit purpose of countering other views, a statement like this must be assumed as countering what the author understands to be the thinking of the people he is countering. The theonomists and Christian establishmentarians whom I know also believe the Church is international and spiritual, and is spread through gospel witness rather than soldiers. But the kingdom of God has always been spiritual (which, correctly understood, includes the material), and God’s redemptive truth has never been advanced through “soldiers.” I don’t know what Old Testament scripture Pastor Wilson would use to argue otherwise. Israel’s military movements were never authorized as part of gospel work.
Additionally, it should be noted in response to this particular comment by Pastor Wilson, that the idea of Christian nations reflects thinking about the advancement of the Kingdom of God. I don’t know if he distinguishes between Church and Kingdom. He should. But in his statement in question, he is talking about the nature of the Church – as international, spiritual and advanced through gospel witness. As noted, theonomists and Christian establishmentarians don’t take issue with that. But that’s a separate issue, or at least a different point. We don’t equate nations with the Church. But when they are discipled and baptized and swear allegiance to Christ as King, then they can be brought into the visible Kingdom of God as Christian nations.
The idea of the Church being a nation is a concept of a different order, so that notion does not necessarily negate the possibility of physical, geopolitical nations also being Christian nations when their representatives swear allegiance to the God of the Bible and Jesus Christ as Lord, as Britain did centuries ago under the Presbyterian influence by way of the National Covenant and the Solemn League and Covenant. There is no neutrality.
We see in Scripture that God works through people groups, through ethnic groups. Leaders of covenantal bodies have a representative role and their decisions bind those under their authority. Elders do this for churches. Parents, particularly fathers, do this for their families. If the civil magistracy is a God-ordained institution (Reformers say it is; Anabaptists, not so much), then the civil magistrates lawfully in God’s eyes make decisions that bind the whole nation over which they govern. This should be that much more clear to those of us who live within nations that have intentionally built representative governmental bodies to govern us. With a situation like the signing of these British covenants, in which civil magistrates AND church leaders AND heads of homes signed the documents to bind themselves and those over whom they exercised lawful authority in allegiance to Christ as King, and therefore, necessarily, to His Law-Word, the Bible, as His special revelation to mankind, how else would one want to define that other than the establishment of a Christian nation?
We also note that God did not only hold Israel accountable to obey His law. In the old covenant era God also held heathen nations accountable to His law. Although Prof. Van Dam rejects theonomy, he notes in his recent book that Nebuchadnezzar was judged by God for disobeying his law. The obligation to God’s law, then, has never been exclusive to Israel, as Pastor Wilson seems to intimate. Israel was not necessarily called to exercise force to see these nations by way of their civil magistrates bow their knee to God and swear allegiance to him. Nor do theonomists or Christian establishmentarians take such a position. As Prof. Van Dam notes in God and Government, theonomists hold an anti-revolutionary position.
Most theonomists are postmillennial. At this point, my understanding is that historically Presbyterianism has also leaned that way. Biblical postmillennialism is a very patient perspective, not the kind of spirit conjured up in the minds of people who equate it with a vision for “ushering in the Kingdom of God on earth.” It’s very consistent with this anti-revolutionary posture that Prof. Van Dam notes as being one of our characteristics. Keeping this in mind, the passage Pastor Wilson cites from Jeremiah as characteristic of his vision rejecting Christian nationhood, is in fact a wonderful passage for articulating the spirit of theonomy and Christian establishment. It is Jeremiah 29:4-7:
“Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all who were carried away captive, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and dwell in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit. Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters – that you may be increased there, and not diminished. And seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive, and pray to the Lord for it; for in its peace you will have peace.”
Pastor Wilson says it is OK to be patriotic and to love our land, then says “the overwhelming reason why we are to do so, however, is not because it is a Christian nation, but rather for the sake of our even higher allegiance to the kingdom of heaven and its King.” I’m afraid it escapes me why he assumes a dichotomy between these two thoughts. Again, perhaps he has a certain package of ideas in mind that he has heard other people associate with the notion of loving their “Christian nation.” In terms of what he actually put on paper, though, I can’t see why these two thoughts need to be pitted against each other.
Pastor Wilson also writes that our higher allegiance should lead us to pray “for kings and all who are in high positions, … (I Tim. 2:2). It should also lead us to respect and submit to civil authority …” That’s fine. I can’t see theonomists and Christian establishmentarians objecting to these points, so I’m not sure why they were raised. I would argue our vision for lawful Biblical political and cultural activity is much wider than that, but it does include those obligations.
What is very disappointing, though, is that Pastor Wilson, in his comments about our obligations, seems to assume that none of his readers are politicians or would-be civil magistrates. Let me say that I am surprised that any Christian businessmen bother to attend church. Ninety-eight percent of teaching and prayers I hear on economic matters address the needs and concerns of employees. I never hear the needs of entrepreneurs and business owners and employers represented – perhaps with the exception of farmers. The same goes for politics. Almost everything addresses the responsibilities of citizens, subjects, voters. But when one starts to discuss the obligations of Christians in civil government, I think it becomes much, much more difficult to avoid the antithesis; the fact that there is no neutrality. All the decisions a politician makes are ethical in nature. Almost all decisions relate to allegiances of one form or another. If there’s no neutrality, and your ethical decisions are not Biblical or Christian, then what are they? If there’s no neutrality, and you are making decisions that don’t reflect allegiance to Christ as Lord in your public as well as private life, then with whom are you making allegiances? And if you are making Christian decisions, and if Christian decisions are increasingly being made by civil magistrates over the course of a period of time, then, if they are not moving the country in the direction of becoming a Christian nation, then what exactly do you call the potential outcome of their actions?
This response to Pastor Wilson’s article is not a systematic handling of the issue before us, but it does raise key aspects of the doctrine and spirit that can be found in Biblical theonomy and Christian establishment in response to points made by Pastor Wilson.