It started over immigration, but its really about much bigger issues. Here's a link to the post on their site.....Random Thoughts on Illegal Immigration.
I wrote a response below.....I got a response....and I wrote again. Here's the exchange, which is also on the IronInk site. I hope I can post a part#2 of this discussion.........
Even if you don't agree, you can learn from the different ways in which we're arguing and how we get to where we are at.......
Exchanges with Iron Ink
Me:
I'm glad that you pointed out America is not Israel and therefore the laws pertinent to the strangers would not be applicable.
That's a good argument. I wish Theonomists would go ahead and apply that Covenant-nature of the Law to their entire thesis and then they would realize that just as it would be a profanation of the Law to apply the immigration code to America, so would it be for all the Mosaic Law.
The Messiah has come. We don't need the types and shadows and we certainly understand that to divide the law and retain the typology of Christ as Judge while removing the typology of Christ as Saviour would destroy the integrity of the Law itself.
I appreciate your point on immigration. It just furthers the argument and exposes the inconsistency and a-Covenantal nature of Theonomic thought.
John A.
Jetbrane@IronInk:
John,
You missed the point.
The immigration laws Are applicable. However, they are only applicable when all of them are applied. It is not a profanation of the Law to apply the immigration code to America. It is a profanation of the Law to apply the immigration code to America when the Biblical immigration law is only applied selectively.
Westminster confession of faith makes it clear that the general equity of the law still applies which is all theonomists argue for. Those who contend against theonomists continue to show their public square antinomian colors.
The Messiah has come and is ascended. Because the Messiah is ascended He rules according to His never negated moral and case Law-Word.
What I see you types doing John is that you divide the offices of Christ. You desire a Christ who is Priest without a Christ who is King who rules according to His Law-Word which shall never pass away.
You may appreciate my point on immigration but since you are operating autonomously on this matter and a host of others it is just coincidence, given your ongoing inconsistency, that you appreciate what I am saying on this point.
P
Me:
The Westminster 3 fold division is nowhere taught in the Scriptures. The Mosaic Covenant was a Unity...it all stands or falls together. It's all in the book of Hebrews.
Edom and Moab were never under the Mosaic Law...because it is Covenantal. To be under it, they would have needed to become Jews.
Taking Covenantal typological law and applying only one part of the picture..Christ as Judge, and failing to understand the whole picture of Christ as Judge/Christ as Redeemer is in the end to profane the law. It is to strip it of its covenantal holy status and reduce it to a common grace ordering mechanism. God has already given us that in nature.
To suppose the unregenerate who cannot see the Kingdom...and cannot obey God's holy laws due to their fallen state...is to reject Paul's argument in Romans and to assume a Pelagian view of fallen man. He can the pagan please God by keeping His laws? This is indeed a profanation of the law.
The Kingdom is not of this world. He rules by the power of the Holy Spirit. The Judaized version of the kingdom you're advocating was the hope of the Pharisees and utterly rejected by Christ and the Apostles. The Holy Society has always been the pagan ideal. Israel as a true Theocracy represented a Pilgrim kingdom in a composite geo-political order. And today, the Church is the Pilgrim kingdom in composite societies.
You didn't understand about the immigration point. I was being sarcastic...your argument defeats your central thesis and shows the arbitrariness of your system. When it is convenient you appeal to a mistaken a-covenantal universality of the law, but when it is inconvenient you appeal to the covenantal nature of God's people.
By going beyond the scope of Scripture and employing a philosophical construct that does not allow Common Grace to function, and using the false theonomy/autonomy dilemma, you set out to construct sphere-blueprints which go beyond the scope of the Scriptures and their purpose as a revelation of Jesus Christ. This is the very autonomous thought you would hope to avoid. The common grace realm allows the pagan world to function. Their thought is autonomous and thus in the end sinful, but governed by Providence is entirely sufficient to create a matrix for the Kingdom to operate. God can pull back that restraining hand, and often He does. It's not our job to try and turn the City of Man into the City of God. It can never be. Christ will destroy it by fire. It's temporary.
Sorry, but Theonomic Reconstructionism has misread the Bible on a massive scale.
The Monistic construction of a Sacralized Society is exactly what the New Testament warns us against.
I'm not trying to be mean. I'm hoping to make you think, because you're focused on building the wrong kingdom and you're fighting the wrong battles.
Think about it.
Peace,
John A.