I just turned 41, but my records also inform me that I am on my 20th Reformed anniversary. Somewhere in the year 2000, I came into contact with a dangerous cargo filled with contrarian literature. I ate it all so quickly that the only questions I had afterwards were some variation of “What’s for dinner?” and “May I have more, please?” I still keep eating contrarian literature, and I really hope that the end result is not that I become a curmudgeon, but that I find creative ways to inculcate those blessings into my community.
So, while we are at it, let me undo speculations among some two-kingdom scholars. They consistently claim that while Jesus’ has authority over all things, that his authority does not provide or is intended to provide a tangible change in the cultural ethos. I, as a lovable contrarian assert the exact opposite: that the kingdom of Jesus is comprehensive and whatever it touches, it changes. It is not limited to one sphere, nor are things heavenly to be severely differentiated from things earthly. And again, not to repeat the obvious, but the earthly city is not Babylon, nor do we live in this perpetual sense of exile and pilgrimage simply existing seeking a city that shall come. We affirm that the people of God are headed somewhere to take something and claim Someone as Lord over the nations (Rom. 4:13), and that the city has come. Our agenda is to get people to see the ads and RSVP ASAP.
While the Reformers affirm the distinct polities of each sphere and even state without equivocation that there are distinct ends for governmental and ecclesiastical spheres, these ends do not end in wildly strange territories. They serve the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ who has all authority and power in heaven and on earth. Jesus’ earthly authority does not void his heavenly power. They find harmony as one expressive manifestation of Lordship.
So too, you need to notice that when two-kingdom advocates say, “Don’t cause any trouble, let the local officials do their job, because…ya know, Romans 13 and I Peter 4, etc.,” what they are truly implying is that history is static and unmovable. The same texts that state government officials are deacons for righteousness also state that they are under one Ruler who is progressively moving history towards a goal.
Jesus’ overturning the tables was not some act of overt rebellion, it was an act of subversive faithfulness. When the temple does not do what it ought–worship rightly–Jesus has the right to shake things up, and when unfaithfulness endures, he has the right to send armies to tear the whole place down (Lk. 21:24). When Jesus sees a government functioning like a whore, he has the right to tell his people to surround it and sing for seven days and seven nights.
It really is an impious thing for a certain theologian in California (howdy, Scotty) to assert that Christians are pilgrims, and therefore should stop making a mess of things on our way to heaven or that they should stop singing in the public square, or that they should stop opining about unfathomably stupid mask mandates in a city with no COVID death, or that they should stop the pre-planned activities simply because attention from local officials violate the pernicious division between kingdoms. As the kids say, “LOL, ROFL!”
This form of sophistry is the demonstrable failure of an expression of theology that sees the worship of the church solely functional for the sake of the church. How brave it must be to sit quietly in Puritan piety without having to lift a finger in righteous anger towards blunt violations of heaven’s laws first and American laws second, but simply exert Augustinian language as a clear-cut-case for why Christians should not engage the political process as Christians.
Let’s even assume that Calvin’s language of “contrived empire” is applied straightforwardly to us–postmillennial dreamers–to imply that we too quickly make friends of government and church, are we then to simply sit back and wait for defeat as the ideal telos of the church? If the Great Commission does not imply a complete investment in earthly and heavenly things, then our Reformed forefathers failed us in attempting to write letters to pagan kings and to urge them to read fine pieces of theology, and to express their disapproval of government actions.
I submit that the Great Commission speaks directly to all spheres; that government officials should be catechized in the language of Scripture and that once in a while we should use our voices to bring their walls down. If Christendom is merely a catch-phrase for the isolation of the Church from culture, then Jesus should have remained only a great high-priest, but as we know quite well, he is also our great high-king and our great-high prophet. Like that crazy postmil missionary, Hudson Taylor used to say, “Christ is either Lord of all, or is not Lord at all”. I happily join his insanity.
Lord of All or Lord at All?
