Revolutionary thought can justify not only violence but crime...because crime (like murder or not paying your taxes) is not crime...but revolution...the refusal to accept the authority of the existing state and seeking to replace it by appealing to a higher law. This is why revolutionaries can argue moral purity while they rob banks. The bank is part of the system they're rejecting and revolting against. Robbing the bank is an act of war...and of course helps them fund their revolution. I'm not saying there are Christians suggesting we start robbing banks, but I am suggesting that in the years to come we are going to hear some pretty extreme rhetoric coming out of Christian mouths. The people at Church who glory in carrying guns and seem to almost consider it a mark of piety....well, is it great leap to suggest they will want to use them when they feel pressed? Will they not put forward Sacralist grounded arguments suggesting we can and perhaps ought to do so?
Suing to
protect and advance the Church, places the Church in the power-struggle. It
takes the Church and transforms it into a political device and institution,
marring and distorting it. The Church abandons the Gospel for the Beast Project
and by entangling itself in the affairs of this life abandons purity and
virginity and becomes a whore.
The
power struggle casts a theological shadow over politics. When society and
government become polarized to the extreme you start hearing
murmurings...questions of legitimacy, first moral and theological, then
political, and ultimately in terms of social action which can
become...Revolution.
It's
happening right now and has been since at least the Clinton years. It quieted
down for 8 years, but in 2008 returned and is growing in tempo.
Maybe
you see where I'm going with this? I'm not saying the Christians suing the
zoning board are going to take up arms against the state, but all these factors
together and the general way of defining these issues will and must lead to
this. Not everyone will go along. If Christians do take up arms, some (probably
people like Mohler) will rightly decry it...even though they unwittingly have
helped to bring it about.
The
present level of Sacralist political activism is weak and largely ineffective.
When the fringe of the movement becomes more mainstream...watch out. The FBI
will be raiding Churches and they'll be crying persecution and condemning those
who don't stand with them.
I hope
the Faithful Remnant will have abandoned these dens of apostasy long before that
point. Come out from her and do not partake of her sins.
How can
we resist? Corporate non-conformity.
Rather
than turn the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA)... if Christians
knew who they were and what they were about...all the lawsuits past and present
would be unnecessary.
If every
homeschooler simply refused to comply, the state would quickly buckle. If they
started arresting people and so forth...non-violence and the power of shame
would win the day. Look at what Gandhi did to the British. Was it easy? Not at
all...but what is it that we want? If something (like homeschooling) is right,
then it's worth suffering for. Suffering is how we fight...not suing.
If it
isn't, or the Church is divided on the issue, then the road will be harder, but
I'm not going to look to Caesar to help the Church fulfill its calling.
At
present (on that issue) we comply with the law and though it can be an
annoyance, it's really no big deal. We wish homeschoolers would have stood more
firm thirty years ago, or that Christians would have understood the issue
centuries ago...but of course the Church was and still is divided on this
issue. Sadly many Christians are heavily invested in the public school system
and many societal thinkers agree with its pragmatics if not necessity and
believe that sphere cannot be abandoned.
Or look
at the whole issue of Churches incorporating under section 501c of the tax
code? I fail to understand why Churches allow the state to dictate structural
and financial policy to them. So they can get a tax break? If they didn't run
their organizations like a business they wouldn't need to worry about taxes.
But that's a whole separate issue for another time. People don't like
it?...then resist. If there's a moral issue at stake, don't play legal
gymnastics, and lawyerly games. Stand for the principle and if you lose your
tax exemption...so be it. Don't sue. Refuse to comply. Even better, don't sign
up for the thing in the first place.
We can
and ought to resist laws that mandate us to sin. But our resistance isn't political.
Show me a single verse in the New Testament that teaches political resistance.
Our resistance is witness based, our weapons are spiritual (Ephesians 6), our
victory very often is reckoned as defeat by those who measure these things in
worldly terms and with worldly wisdom. But we know better. We don't think as
they do.
We are
called to turn the other cheek. Beware of those who teach that we can create
supposedly Christian institutions that are exempt from the commandments of God.
Beware of those who argue we need to strike back in order to defend the
defenseless. To them I say...those who live by the sword will die by it.
The
present course of Sacralism in the Evangelical Church is a road of death and
destruction...there will be blood. Even the leaders probably don't see it coming,
and they will be shocked when it arrives. Others will make the connection and
blame them, but they will be genuinely shocked and offended when the finger is
(rightly) pointed at them.