Hello everyone,
My name is David. I am
grateful to reply on the subject of the church and state
relationship. An internet roundtable would be a wonderful thing if
anyone wants to email back to me. And if you want to forward this to anyone,
even better. “In the mouth of 2 or 3 witnesses every word may be
established.” (Matt. 18:16). And “in multitude of counselors, there
is safety.” (Prov. 24:6). Communication is the key to any successful family,
organization, or free society.
I
have been a United States Navy sailor. I am glad to have served my
country. I have been a Christian since I was knee-high to a
grasshopper. I love God and know He loves me. I pray to
the Father and the Son through the Holy Spirit. I teach and lead out
in my local church. I helped construct our little church
building. I hope these credentials qualify me to speak in defense of
the separation of church and state.
I read the speech of the high school
principal, and she misunderstands something. It’s understandable
that she misunderstands. But unfortunate that she does. I
embrace her concern that our society is taking a downturn. It seems
we are hanging ten at the edge of a precipice which has no
bottom. Each generation has lost more capability or interest in
holding up the moral standard.
Materialism has done its evil
work. It’s the same thing that has happened all through the
eons. A people become strong in hardship. They get a
break and push to the top, where they begin to enjoy the luxuries and pleasures
of the good life. Once they have tasted of it, they become ravenous
for more. The world’s wealth pours in, and they use it all for
themselves, rather than being the stewards of it to the world. The
convenience and ease, long having displaced honesty and hardship, give way to
corruption, self-serving, self-indulgence; and the empire is left enervated and
effeminate, ready to fall. And they convince themselves that,
although this condition caused all the previous empires to fall, it won’t
happen to them!
This definition of materialism, labeled
idolatry (or covetousness) in the Bible (Col. 3:5), really pegs us all, inside
the church and outside of it. We have all sinned and fallen short of
the glory of God. None of us, even in the church, can live without
our modern conveniences. It seems we can’t ever go back to the
pioneer days of our colonial fathers and mothers who camped their whole lives.
Modern Jeshurun has grown fat and kicked his Maker. (Deut. 32:15).
Our Constitution was based on
self-government. That is what has made our country
great. This could only happen because our revolutionary forefathers
were the progeny of the Protestant Reformation. Protestantism also
is based on self-government. Everyone stands or falls in judgment because
of himself, not because of a priest or a pope. Along with that
premise, no holy man can: 1) take my place in talking to God; 2) interpret the
Bible for me; or 3) require good behavior from me in order for me to approach
God, for all that God requires and all that I can do is come to Christ just as
I am. Those last three statements summed up the
Reformation. All three tenets can do nothing but develop courage and
integrity, the stuff of self-government, in the privileged people to whom they
are offered and who accept them.
But although the United States
Constitution was born out of the same principles as was the Reformation, this
does not presuppose that we have a Protestant Constitution or a Christian
Constitution. Our Constitution is designed for civil
government. Protestantism is designed for spiritual or moral
government. Our Constitution isn’t even a moral document, but a
civil one. Morality comes from the heart. It is borne out
from our intents, and desires, our love for God. Civil laws have no
way of enforcing morality because they cannot detect an infraction in
spirituality and they have no love to “restore such an one.” (Gal. 6:1).
I would hate to see the mess that would tie up the court system by trying to monitor
and regulate the issues of the heart.
Rather, ours is a civil government; one
in which our forefathers saw wisdom in keeping its hands off the business that
is God’s only. Due to their experience with the Church of England
and the overbearing monarchy, they knew first hand what happens when the church
is in cahoots with the government. All through Europe this cozy
relationship was forcing an impossibly wide chasm between the wealth of the
aristocracy and the impoverished working class, and brought persecution on
anyone who wanted to worship or understand God, or even to think differently
than did the established church. Not many generations previous to
them, people had burned at the stake, were drowned, or other unspeakable
horrors, for their desire to worship God according to the dictates of their
conscience.
So when James Madison drafted the first
amendment of the Bill of Rights, he separated church and
state. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Madison was apparently the
most Christian of any of the forefathers. He had a genuine desire to
protect religion. He also loved his new country for which he had
suffered so much. Knowing the dangers of the current union of
religion and government, he realized that only by keeping religion and
government separate entities would they both stay free from overbearing
persecution. Neither antagonistic nor friendly, they could coexist
peacefully if detached completely.
It’s not the church’s business to enforce
or hamper the laws of any civil government. The church’s kingdom is
not of this world. Similarly, it’s not the business of any civil
government to enforce or hamper the work of the church. In fact, it
has absolutely no power to do that, not for the true church. Because the true
followers of Christ and His cross will obey Him, even against all the armies of
a civil government that trespasses on God’s ground and assumes the authority of
God by legislating for Him.
I applaud our government for keeping its
hands off the business of the church, to the extent that it has. But
lately we’ve seen an insidious move by our government to go back on its hands-off
promise, as built into its Constitution. We’ve seen it fund the
reconstruction of churches and church schools. We’ve seen
“faith-based initiatives” funded by tax dollars. We’ve seen
Congressional, Senatorial, Presidential candidates agree to pander to certain
sectors of the church if they get elected and then when elected, due to the
large religious voting machines, they feel it only right to abide by their
agreements which they unconstitutionally made.
Why shouldn’t good, upstanding citizens
demand laws that will curtail any obvious dissolution of our society? They
should work to curtail anything dangerous to the nation! Alone or in a
large civic group. But when pastors are organizing thousands of
churches to mass-email threats of no-further-votes to an elected official that
they “put in office,” this is completely an altogether different
matter. This is getting dangerously close to a union of church and
state. Yet multitudes of religious leaders see no danger here toward our
government or defilement of the church.
Government politics aren’t the best example
of self-sacrifice and purity. Therefore government politics is not
the place for church pastors. In fact, our great first president George
Washington strongly saw the need for a forceful sovereign government based
solely upon self-interest. And that is the direction he encouraged
and pushed the new American government when he could. Yet
self-interest is 100% contrary to the Gospel. How long will the
church stay pure while it involves itself in politics? Not many weeks
ago, Ralph Reed, famed leader of the religious right, got mixed up in a scandal
with a politician who was playing both sides of an issue while stopping the
passage of an anti-gambling bill. Whether or not Mr. Reed knew he was
accepting laundered money for funding his mass mailing operation, is another
issue. My question is, Why was he there in the first
place? That should be a warning shot over the church’s
bow. Will she learn from this the lesson that government is no place
for the church if she wants to remain pure? Will she back away from
her own bottomless pit? No, she has determined to go her own way.
Now its power that she wants.
Civil government is tasked to keep
peace externally, using external measures. It is the minister of God
to execute vengeance, and it “beareth not the sword in vain.” (Rom.
13:4). Kudos to our government, local, state and
federal. They’ve done a pretty good job keeping us and it
straight. The church is tasked by God to keep peace internally,
using internal measure, “as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.” (Rom.
12:3). How has the church done? Where is the
self-sacrifice seen during the Dark Ages in Europe? What is the
moral condition of her field of labor in the world? What fruit has
she brought forth? She gets a failing grade across the
board. I say this as one of them and party to their
short-comings. It’s State-1, Church-0. When will we be
sorry enough to repent?
But the church cries out, “If it weren’t
for the government getting in our way, we would be better at the task given
us. It’s that Supreme Court… or that Congress…or that White
House. They are the enemy! We could clean up America if
they weren’t such an obstacle. We can’t compete! No
sooner do we clean part of the house, then they dirty it up
again! But we have a plan. Our people will be in the
Supreme Court and Congress and the White House. Prayer will be in
schools, commandments will be in courthouses, people will be in churches on
Sundays.”
It must be asked, Did the church of
apostolic days ever work together with the government to clean up the messy
society? What Would Jesus Do? What did Jesus do? At
every opportunity, He put down any hopes that He would have anything to do with
the Roman government. He didn’t even have dealings with the Sanhedrin,
because their kingdom was of this world, and His was not. Obviously,
the uniting of the kingdom of this world and God’s kingdom has been Satan’s
effort from the beginning; and his often success.
The
pure apostolic church requested no worldly support. She looked to
God and His providences for the advancement of God’s kingdom. Faith
and prayer were her only weapons of war and the gates of hell could not prevail
against her. Why won’t the modern church use the same
weapons? If the churchs need worldly support, what does that say
about their faith? Jesus said, “When the Son of Man cometh, shall He
find faith in the earth?” (Lk. 18:8). “Because iniquity
shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” (Matt. 24:12). It’s
not the government pushing to rape the church, but it’s the church approaching
the government for an illicit affair. How much longer will God keep
Himself from divorcing His bride and putting her away? Unless she
turns away from her efforts to a so-called “moral” union with the state rather
than to the Husband she covenanted with, she will become what the Bible calls,
“the mother of harlots and abominations in the earth.” (Rev. 17:5).
Now, as one Christian to another, please
consider what I’ve said. Please reconsider the attempt to criticize
the government or even the ACLU. I’m not saying this because I am a
member of the ACLU, but because the scriptures say it. “Put them in
mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready
to every good work, to speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle,
shewing all meekness unto all men.” (Titus 3:1,2). “I
exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions,
and giving of thanks, be made for all men: for kings, and for all that are in
authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and
honesty. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our
Savior.” (1Tim. 2:1-3).
Let’s go back to using prayer and
faith. Just a mustard grain amount will turn the world upside down,
in God’s own time. “Shall not God avenge His own elect, which cry
day and night unto Him, though He bear long with them? I tell you
that He will avenge them speedily.” (Lk 18:7, 8).
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