The non-sacral sect model views culture as something that is at best inevitably corrupt (and thus to some degree a thing indifferent), and at worst a subversive danger to the Kingdom. This must be juxtaposed with the sacral-institutional model that views culture as something to be mastered, shaped, and controlled. When I say 'indifferent', this is not to suggest that it can be used expansively or with abandon. On the contrary our interactions with it must be marked by caution and even cynicism - and yet without fear. Such wisdom and occasionalism prove difficult and thus many have (in the spirit of the Pharisees) erected the Legalist Wall as a means of protection - a move that is ultimately corrosive in that in addition to being unbiblical it has the tendency to shut down the spiritual faculties of discernment instead relying on a kind of checklist spirituality wed to a (fundamentally flawed) cultural narrative.
Returning to the question of institution and sacral assumption, where's the evidence from the New Testament? Advocates of this view that seeks to sanctify and transform society struggle to come up with a single verse or instance, and those they provide are either misused and distorted or grossly misinterpreted. To call the lack of evidence overwhelming would be an understatement. In view of the evidence to the contrary the only conclusion is that the sacral-institutional model is an innovation and a monumental error.
As such the Old Testament is deeply mined by these sacralists and yet as data stripped of its redemptive-historical context, as content that is unaffected by the coming of Christ and His New Covenant teachings concerning the Church and Kingdom, it is rendered and applied in an unfaithful manner, often at great odds with New Testament teachings. Contrary to the likes of Rushdoony, we are not sanctified by the Mosaic Law - and neither is society.
But even the Old Testament proves insufficient for their project and so (as already suggested) the endeavour expands and through the vehicle of philosophical theology we see passages like Genesis 1 transformed, the story of creation is used as a platform for a new kind of Creationalism, yet another repackaging of their agenda for cultural transformation. Ignoring the Cainite associations with culture, they fail to take into proper account not only the malignant and fatal effects of the Fall, but the lessons of the Flood and Babel as well. I am continually struck by the fact that the Reformed tradition with its historical emphasis on Total Depravity has progressively lessened the effects of the Fall by means of its cultural theology - at times even flirting with a kind of cultural Pelagianism.
This Old Testament-inspired sacral view is countered by the Two Kingdoms view that emphasizes not just our identity as pilgrims and exiles but the nature-grace duality (or dualism if your prefer) that is at the heart of the conflict, a reality that in many ways places the First and Second Reformation in diametrical opposition.
One is reminded of Richard Kyle's words from almost forty years ago:
"Although John Calvin opposed medieval Catholicism in most areas of his religious thought, in his political theory the first enemy was Anabaptism."
(Direction Spring 1985/ Vol 14 No. 1 - Anabaptist and Reformed Attitudes Toward Civil Government: A Factor in Political Involvement pp. 27-33)
This reality is echoed in the errors of Article 36 of the Belgic Confession and Chapter 23 of the original Westminster document. Though the First Reformation groups (like the Waldenses) were not Anabaptists, and as Biblicists rightly retained paedobaptism and thus child membership in the Church, the legacy of their Kingdom teachings lived on in groups like Anabaptists and to a much lesser extent the Moravians. Again, some of the Restorationists of the 19th century approached these views and revisited them but fell short and were quickly swept away by the tumultuous epoch that brought industrial revolution, new political models, and the world wars. Today the Plymouth Brethren and members of the Stone-Campbell Churches of Christ, and even the Seventh Day Adventists are deeply affected and shaped by the spirit of Evangelicalism and Right-wing politics. For that matter so are the Anabaptists.
And yet the sect model did not entirely disappear with the Magisterial Reformation only to re-emerge with 19th century Restorationism. The tendency reappeared with very mixed results in the Pietist reaction to Protestant Scholasticism, Confessionalism, and state Christianity.
Not a few believers and thinkers in the 17th and 18th centuries refused to embrace the state Church and were viewed as a subversive threat akin to the Anabaptists in the 16th century. Some worked within the state churches on the basis of ecclesiola in ecclesia, while others truly understood the principles at stake and preferred to labour among conventicles, refusing all status and respectability within society and as separatist-sectarians were often persecuted as a result. They were (and are) hated and despised by the Confessionalist communities who claim the mantle of Protestant orthodoxy. Some within the Pietist spectrum are deservedly condemned and yet it would be a mistake to cast the entire movement in monolithic terms. There are some instances of great encouragement and attempts at Biblical fidelity in defiance of Protestant Orthodoxy.
Once again it is the New Testament that drives this thinking - the wilderness imagery, the language of pilgrim and exile, and the Kingdom teachings of Christ all point to a sect-like existence for the Church in the Last Days. This question of pilgrim-exile status must be viewed in the context of a larger debate surrounding the effects of the Fall and basic questions of epistemology, as well as what the New Testament says about the Kingdom, its origin and nature. Described as a dominion not of this world and heavenly, accessible only by means of the Holy Spirit, the very notion of a Christian state or society is rendered moot and meaningless. And if the said Christendom is not the Kingdom - and not the Church, then just what is it? If it's something that genuinely and legitimately emerges from the New Testament but is nowhere described therein, then the Scriptures are not sufficient as we have a massive all-encompassing semi-ecclesial entity with which we must interact and yet have nothing to authoritatively ground it in - apart from tradition and philosophy. If Christendom is conceptually valid, then Sola Scriptura is erroneous. You cannot have it both ways.
If Sola Scriptura (as understood by the Biblicist First Reformation) is valid, then Christendom is an erroneous construct - a counterfeit of the Holy Kingdom, Babel masquerading as Zion.
As I have long argued Romans 13 is misread as it is divorced from its prefatory context in what we call Romans 12. Only by setting aside our Christian calling on Monday morning (as it were) can believers fulfill a role in the state and its bearing of the sword. Kyle elaborates on this:
"In regards to the origin of the government, both the Anabaptist and Reformed traditions affirm that the state is ordained by God. Although the Anabaptist attitude is not totally negative toward the state, it is less positive than that of the Reformed tradition. According to Anabaptist thinking, the origin of the state is directly related to the Flood and thereby to human sin. Because sin would make orderly living impossible, the essence of government is its function of maintaining order. This task of punishing evildoers and protecting the weak requires force and coercion. For this reason the Anabaptists regarded the state sub-Christian. In contrast, it was the church which represented the Kingdom of God. A radical dualism, distinguishing the church from the world, helped to determine the Anabaptist view of the state. The world is essentially evil and diametrically opposed to the Kingdom of Christ. The true Christian, therefore, does not have anything to do with the world except through missionary effort, as required by the Great Commission.
"Such a dualism establishes two distinct realities which are incompatible with each other. While the church belongs to one Kingdom, the state belongs to another. Both the church and state are equally valid within their respective realms and both have their principles and standards, but these two entities remain separate. As a result, the Anabaptists rejected the medieval vision of a single Christian society with its concept of a government-established church." (ibid)
A great deal more could be said about these questions and I would emphasize again that many within the First Reformation orbit (which precedes both the Magisterial Reformation and the consequent Anabaptist epoch) held to these views. While the Reformed theologian Meredith Kline would reject the Anabaptists, his understanding of Redemptive-history made a distinction between Holy Realm and Reign. Christ is King as Creator, Providential Ruler, and Judge. But He is King in a different covenantal context when it comes to His Holy Realm. That is separate from the world and beyond their means of access to or participation in. The various Kingdom passages in the gospels make this abundantly clear. It is invisible, not of this world, and within you. Eschatological and located in Heaven, our access and participation are by means of Union with Christ and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
Also, there is more than simply the Great Commission though it is certainly enough - woe to those who suggest otherwise. The New Testament posits a spiritual-celestial dimension to our activities and the Church's mission on the Earth. We are not privy to a great deal of this apart from its reality. In the Great Commission, we witness in terms of sharing the gospel but we are also martyr-witnesses in terms of the celestial conflict and as citizens of Zion in conflict with the thrones and dominions of this present evil age. Our worship is a kind of warfare in that Christ is present - His Kingdom is manifest in the midst of the nations and their elohim rulers, our Zion congregations are a proclamation of their defeat and pending doom. Our worship and sacraments are effectively a bridge between This Age and the Age to Come as we are in the presence of angels and worship before the Council and Throne of God.
As touched on elsewhere, there is a larger and much more in-depth discussion to be had concerning the relationship and tensions within the nature-grace dynamic. The First Reformation (and Anabaptist) view argues for a pronounced nature-grace dualism - the realm of fallen nature and all the associated questions of things like epistemology and culture are juxtaposed and contrasted with the realm of grace. Nature is fallen and as such natural law and so-called natural theology have little if anything to offer. The 'by what standard' argument of Theonomic Dominionism is a false dilemma and we need not respond with the empty hope of natural law or a return to the Mosaic order. The New Testament view of the world is one of pessimism if not something akin to cynicism and apart from revelation - scepticism. Our bodies are vile tents, the earth is doomed to burn, Satan is the god of this world, we are called to be sheep led to slaughter and to take up the cross.
And it is glorious to behold, a cause for rejoicing as we have a Blessed Hope - and thankfully it has nothing to do with this perishing groaning world or the foolish empty hopes and false wisdom of fallen man.
This view (which some mistakenly view as dark or toxic), is grounded in the holy writings of the New Covenant and is contrasted with modern Reformed and Dominionist views which seek to eliminate any hint of nature-grace dualism - or even in some cases the possibility of duality or tension. This is the holistic 'worldview' teaching (a kind of unified theory) we have all encountered that seeks to eliminate all distinctions between sacred and secular - though even the Old Testament does not embrace this kind of monolithic or monist paradigm. The Sabbath (for example) implies the very distinction they reject - a holy day set apart from the mundane. For the monistic Dominionist, everything is potentially holy and thus (ironically) nothing is holy as the concept only has meaning when there is a distinction to be made. Holy must be contrasted with the common and the profane in order to have any meaning in the context of the Fall and its effects on our thinking and our spiritual sensibilities.
These people in failing to make proper distinctions actually end up losing their unique identity and in time become indistinguishable from the world. History (and numerous contemporary individual examples) testifies to their repeated failures. From the Puritan projects in England and America, to the Netherlands, to South Africa, their glaring failures are on display and condemn them even though few are able to see this. Even post-Enlightenment Germany testifies to the bogus nature of Lutheran Two-Kingdom theology - in reality a crypto-One Kingdom model with the same kind of monist-sacral tendencies that created a weak Church unable to discern between Zion and Babylon, between the Kingdom of Heaven and that of the world - which often takes on Bestial characteristics and sometimes in the most glaring and horrific terms.
Ironically the hybrid nature-grace model of Rome proves better and more hopeful on this point than the Reformed and Lutheran paradigms. Rome created a system that fostered Christendom and all its errors and yet always viewed the worldly path of the baptised sword and coin as a lesser one and the monastic path of celibacy and poverty as a higher calling. The Magisterial Reformation's doctrine of Vocation (another contrivance born of that movement) waged war on this Roman model but it was a case of error combating error. And yet it is Rome's model (on this question) that comes closer to the truth and yet also falls short.
Monasticism always received mixed reviews among the First Reformation. At times monasticism was heartily condemned due to the corruption of the monks and in many cases the monasteries were part of the oppressive feudal system. That said, the First Reformation was inspired by and often connected to not a few monks - many of them renegade. The model of social antithesis, devotion, frugality, work, community, and contemplation is not all bad, but was corrupted by Rome leading to the overreaction on the part of Luther and his progeny. The ancient Celtic Church in some instances represents a kind of nuanced alternative with a different concept of hierarchy. There are reports of Celtic monks that were married and possibly even families living in a kind of monastic commune-like setting. Just as the First Reformation was emerging in light of the Gregorian Reform and in response to it, the uniquely Celtic form of Christianity was being stamped out by Rome's agents and the new Norman regimes in the British Isles.
The First Reformation honoured celibacy - as did the Early Church. The notion of obedience (another monastic requirement) while potentially laudable was hopelessly confused by its associations with the Roman hierarchy and the nature of its authority. And poverty (the final demand) which was also esteemed by the bulk of the Early Church, was a hallmark of the First Reformation and stands in opposition to everything the sacral church stands for. The Magisterial Reformation rode on the coat-tails of mammon and the contemporary and acculturated Evangelical movement is its slave.
Once one understands the larger issues at stake many of the discussions surrounding the institution versus sect debate are revealed as fundamentally flawed and thus of little value. The New Testament model for the Church is incompatible with the sword and coin steeple-status championed by many and thus the debates and their elaborate opinions on this questions are rendered moot.
The re-evangelisation models of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages are likewise flawed as they are all based on tribal conversions, a sort of top-down legislated Christianity. They are of historical interest but when evaluated vis-à-vis the New Testament they are found wanting. The Irish Church is certainly to be praised for its efforts but the narratives (often sacrilegious) by the likes of Cahill ring false. I remember when his book was all the rage and I read it as well. Even then I knew enough history to find it frustrating and flipping through it not long ago in a book store I fought the urge to wing it across the room.
The gospel is not something that can be marketed. It's foolishness in the eyes of the world. Those who think godliness is gain serve only that god that is in their belly. Our calling is to take up the cross and die to the glory of God. Whether that means we die at the stake or in the dungeon or simply die to ourselves and the world, the message and calling is the same. The Church cannot be made attractive to the world. It stands in opposition to the Babel dreams that give lost men hope. Sacralism puts a cross on top of the Tower of Babel and thus creates a counterfeit Church (and Kingdom) - the kind of bride-turned-whore imagery we are being warned about in Revelation. The institutional impulse at the very least flirts with this danger of bestial appropriation and alliance and in some cases constructs an elaborate philosophical-theological system to justify it. The sect model is unattractive and to many debasing - especially to the values of the middle class. But like the message of the cross we don't embrace it because we find it useful. We embrace it because it is true.