Tale of Two Kingdoms

by ProfDave, ©2021

(Jun. 30, 2021) — Is your pastor preaching on politics? The Johnson Amendment (to the tax code) has muzzled pulpits for half a century and a Christian legal society tried to recruit clergymen to provoke a constitutional challenge. The IRS has not taken the bait. Trump promised to remove the muzzle but failed to get congressional action.

Five years ago my pastor announced he was doing a series on politics from the book of II Kings. He defined politics as “the way we live together as a community.”  Apart from a remark about electing “a lunatic or a criminal” there was little to get partisans excited. 

Pastor talked about the mantle of Elijah falling on Elisha, and II Kings being written during the Babylonian exile centuries later, when Israel had no king at all.  It was about being the people of God, in a time of transition and in a hostile society.  Today Jesus-followers are citizens of two kingdoms, the kingdom of God and the kingdom of this world.  “The world goes not well, but the kingdom comes” (David Mains).  “The City of Man and the City of God” (Augustine of Hippo).

Our history is written in the kingdom of God, not in the White House.  The kingdoms of this world are unpredictable.  They rise and fall, and their principles change (I resist the temptation to illustrate).  But the kingdom of God is predictable.  Eternal principles never change, no matter who is representing them – even when the kingdoms of this world are directly opposed.  Because the kingdom of God stands on the nature and faithfulness of God.  As citizens of the kingdom of God, how do we live in our neighborhoods?  What do you represent?

“The world goes not well, but the Kingdom comes” (David Mains).  Some say the Visigoths are at the gates of Rome [Washington?] – and the Huns are defending it as in 411 AD (Augustine, The City of God and the City of Man).  Many of us see our Rome under barbarian siege and its principles eroded from within.  No longer are we a city on the hill, no longer does liberty hold aloft a torch for all the world.  The ideals of 1776 are eclipsed by 1619 and we have cast aside the values of our forefathers and magnified their sins (while forgetting our own).  Our cultural icons, the loud and the proud, have rejected God and seemingly expelled Him from the marketplace of ideas.

The world goes not well, but the kingdom comes.  Jesus-followers are citizens of another world.  A realm where the Eternal God rules, whose constitution is His nature – revealed in His Word.  God holds absolute sovereignty over creation, of course, every galaxy and every electron from eternity past to eternity future, but He is also sovereign over the hearts of His people.  “Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” “Jesus is Lord” is our pledge of allegiance. 

Jesus Christ commands the primary loyalty of the Christian.  From Roman times, martyrs faced the lions for refusing to say “Caesar is Lord.”  Sunday-morning Christians melt away into the culture of the day, but real Jesus-followers still refuse to offer incense to the emperor gods of today.  Their consciences are bound to a higher allegiance.  Jesus is not an opinion or a religious preference: He is Lord.  Their Lord.  There may be minor differences among them over what He requires, but they all agree that what He says goes, no matter what the king, the dictator, the party, the president or the court says.  And they are willing to take the consequences. 

We said that Jesus-followers are citizens of another world. Does that make them subversive of civil society? That depends.  The Kingdom seeks the best good of all mankind and all that is good in civil society, including good citizenship.  An earthly regime that is hostile to the Good and jealous of God will consider Jesus-followers subversive and try to stamp them out.  Is our nation under God or in rebellion against Him?

Does my Kingdom citizenship make me a wild-eyed theocratic jihadist?  Not in Christianity.  It has always recognized two realms, sacred and secular, even though both are subject to God.  Jesus commanded that we “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.”  Both emperor (magistrate) and pope (pastors) are subject to the Almighty, and both get into trouble when they usurp His authority.  All authority, the New Testament tells us, comes from the Almighty and we are commanded to treat emperors, presidents, magistrates, and policemen as His agents.  In principle, our own franchise is of the same character.  We represent God when we vote!  So vote prayerfully! 

Pastor Dan challenged us to live as princes and princesses of the Kingdom of God in another “political” sermon from II Kings 3.  Are we asking God to bless our plans and calling on God when our plans go awry and the water runs out?  Been there, done that!  Citizens of this world assume their possessions, their time, their futures are their own as individuals.  But the goal of God is the reconciliation of all things, including people – other people.  Citizens of His kingdom are engaged in His ways, not their own, extending care and compassion to the good and the bad. 

Today, the wrath of God is expressed in the consequences of our wickedness, but it is His purpose – and that of Kingdom people – to redeem even the worst.  Everything can be redeemed.  The wheat grows among the weeds.  But one day, in His time and His way, in the last harvest, He will judge all with holy precision. 

How do Christians get off being citizens of two kingdoms without doing the splits?  Jesus also said that one cannot serve two masters, didn’t he?  Truth be told, a lot of us do it by not paying attention.  Church people cloister themselves in a subculture where all their significant relationships are with others of their own kind and simply wait for the King to return and set everything right.  Others compartmentalize:  Jesus is Lord on Sunday morning and in, perhaps, their personal life, but Caesar is Lord on the job and in public.  They are personally opposed to X, but they vote for it, for example, or they make their living by selling what they believe is wrong.  Now I’ve gone to meddling. 

Jesus-followers live in two kingdoms but have only one Lord.  If we all – if Caesar himself – acknowledged the same Lord things might be easy.  But even in the Middle Ages, that never worked.  Kings and Popes would be corrupted by power and make themselves lords – and we tend to make ourselves lords, too.  That is why freedom of conscience is so important.  We need to be free to obey God rather than man.  In a Christian republic, where the lordship of “God our King” was acknowledged by freedom of conscience, that was not a problem.  That was the glory of America.

“Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.”  Proverbs 14:34. The glory of America was her righteousness combined with religious freedom.  God grant we do not lose it.  “The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous run to it and are safe. … Before destruction the heart of a man is haughty, and before honor is humility (18:10, 12).”  Time for humility?

The late Chuck Colson wrote a book in 1988 entitled, Kingdoms in Conflict. I believe I have it.  Are those kingdoms more in conflict today than then?  Christians belong to an eternal, invisible Kingdom of God that demands their ultimate allegiance.  Yet one of the laws of that Kingdom is that we respect earthly authority, abiding by the laws of the kingdoms of this world.

Even when those kingdoms are hostile to Christianity, we feel morally obligated to be good law-abiding citizens.  Even martyrs do not double park.  Only when directly challenged do Jesus-followers stand up and die.  Unlike Muslims, they do not, even then, hate their enemies.  But, as politely as possible, using every legal recourse, they do not obey the laws of earth that contradict the laws of heaven.  “We must obey God, rather than man.” Some are more polite than others.

What does it mean to live on earth as a citizen of heaven?  Two things come to mind.  First, you don’t sweat the small stuff.  When you think about it, everything on earth is small stuff when put in the framework of heaven.  “This too shall pass.”  As the Assyrian Christian father told his children, “When ISIS asks you if you are Christian and you tell the truth, what they do to you will hurt, but in a few minutes we will all be together in heaven.”  Kinda puts things in perspective, doesn’t it?  Your worst day has the best ending ever!

Second, it depends on how consistent we are.  Can we be the same person at home that we are in church?  At work?  When nobody is looking?  What do we call other people who are not?  Are you?  Did you just lie to me?  The truth: it cannot be done.  It is humanly impossible.  To live as a citizen of heaven on earth requires the Power of Heaven within. 

You see, the Kingdom of Heaven is in us.  The life of eternity enters into us, is born in us, and we become new creations.  It changes us from the inside out.  First, we experience a peace that calls God Daddy.  Then we begin to think differently.  Then we begin to act differently.  We begin to march to the beat of a different drummer.  Transformation spreads outward.  Have you been born again?

How do the Kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this world get along?  This is one of the mysteries of theism.  God is God.  He rules by definition.  The path of every galaxy and every sub-atomic particle is under His direction.  The autonomy of this world’s kingdoms can only exist by His permission.  Their authority is delegated. 

Christianity, following Judaism and contrary to Islam, divides that delegated authority into two realms, church and state.  Both represent God in different ways.  When the state attempts to rule our relationships with God in its own earthly interests or religious leaders misuse the name of God to their own earthly interests the curse of God is upon them.

“You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and by Your will they exist and were created.”  Revelation 4:11. He is worthy. He earned it.  He made it.  It all belongs to Him.  He is the only one who can handle absolute power.  Even a little glory, honor and power corrupts human beings.  It is not ours; it is His!

All religions are not the same.  Allah demands only honor and submission – that is what the religion of peace (salaam = peace by submission) is.  The God of Abraham and of Jesus requires faith and love – “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul and with all thy might.”  Submission can be compelled – whether you believe or love Allah or not.  Faith and love cannot be compelled.  Christianity is a faith religion.  The Kingdom of God is a kingdom of love.  Muslims may also believe in and love Allah and his laws, but submission comes first.  Christians and Jews also submit to the commandments of God – but believing and loving come first.  Those things require freedom.  We do not know how the Almighty does it, but He gives us freedom to believe and to love Him – or not.  And that is why religious freedom and democracy are western, not eastern ideas. 

How do Christians maintain their citizenship in the kingdom of Heaven while living in the kingdoms of Earth?  Not very well, historically.  In the first three centuries, when the “city of man” was hostile to the “city of god” Christian identity was a thing to die for.  It is again in many parts of the world.  But when earthly kingdoms embraced the name of “Christendom” confusion entered in.  Christian kings, sincere or not, had their own agendas – and so did church leaders (today, too).  How much was Jesus and how much was politics, business, and culture?  Are you a Christian just because you were born in Denmark (Kierkegaard)?  Baptized as an infant?  Being American and being Christian were never exactly the same thing.  Which is your primary identity?

According to one survey, the only pastors endorsing candidates are those endorsing Democrats.  The IRS, it seems, does not scare liberals.  But I digress.  The Christian principle of separation of church and state means the government cannot tell the church what to do and the church cannot tell the government what to do, but it assumes that both are listening to God.  Pastors are subjects of the state, but governors are subjects of the Kingdom.  But if all the campaigning is done by enemies of Heaven, what kind of a country is this going to be? Prophets/pastors have a duty to speak out against policies and candidates who are in rebellion against God.  Jesus-followers have a duty of civil disobedience when civil law contradicts the law of God.  Remember the underground railway?

But is it a “Christian” principle to separate our “religious” life from our secular life?  To live and think like a pagan 6 ½ days of the week?  Worshipping the gods of this world, self and mammon?  Voting by party and by class rather than by right and wrong?

Both political correctness and the protest against political correctness partake of the spirit of hell.  Good men and women must participate and vote, but unless God turns the heart of the nation we will get the government we deserve.  May God mix mercy with justice!

“The only thing that is needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”  Don’t know who said that, but it is true.  Hope history will not say that good people did nothing – that we fiddled while America burned.

No kingdom of this world has ever been quite the Kingdom of our God.  Not America, not Great Britain, not Israel, not the Papal States.  It has been tried, but it hasn’t happened yet.  Because human beings are corrupt by nature.  It will take supernatural action.  That’s why we need to pray.

Franklin Graham’s “Decision America Tour” in Hartford in 2016 was as expected.  We stood on the lawn behind the capital and prayed the Nehemiah prayer: repenting of the sins of our nation, ourselves, and our ancestors.  How appropriate.  We have forsaken the Lord our God, defied His law and expelled Him from our schools, our courts, and from public discourse. 

Was “Christian America” an illusion?  Yes and no.  Up through 7^th grade (1956), my teachers led us in the Lord’s Prayer and displayed the Bible prominently on their desks.  Did that make them Christians?  Some were and some were not.  But it was politically correct to pretend to be.  Christianity was open (on the surface).  It, its representatives and its teachings were respected – at least in name.  The Ten Commandments were on the wall.  We knew that Christianity was the foundation of Western Civilization, and the Ten Commandments were the foundation of our laws.  We believed that our forefathers came to America for religious freedom.  There was no state church, but generic Christianity was the civil religion of America.  Atheists and Jews were accepted, in a spirit of Christian tolerance and good will, as the exceptions that proved the rule – they too were part of Christian America.  But was it real?

Was “Christian America” an illusion?  The “civil religion” of the 50’s is pretty much gone.  The Lord’s Prayer, the Bible, the Ten Commandments are gone from the schools and most of public life.  We have decided that “Jesus,” “Christ,” “Our Creator,” or anything that is in the Bible represents the establishment of a church!  And the “wall of separation” between “church” and state became a Berlin wall to keep God out of public life.  His influence, His representatives, His moral law are marginalized – not simply ignored, but stigmatized as alien.  What we once felt obligated to give lip service to now is an embarrassment.  Civil religion has been replaced by political correctness.  The new state church is secularism.  So Obama was right.  This is not a Christian nation.  But was it ever?  Was the “great God [ever] our King?”

The Kingdom of God impacts the kingdoms of this world on at least three levels.  The first impact is the transforming the lives and personalities of Jesus-followers.  The late Roman Empire became salted with a people whose lives and behavior had been transformed.  They began to live with integrity.  In a society at least as sexualized as ours, they glorified chastity.  In a hierarchical culture they treated slaves, women and even children with respect.  While pagans aborted or abandoned unwanted infants, Christians rescued them.  While pagans fled from plagues, Christians stayed to care for the dying.  And they died well.

The second, or secondary, impact of the Kingdom of God came as this community of Jesus-followers, families and fellow travelers was organized into institutional churches.  The visible church, or any particular denomination of it, is not the same as the Kingdom of God or even the “Body of Christ” (Paul), but it does include and organize its citizens.  It turned the Roman Empire upside down (right side up), converted its invaders and turned pagan Europe into Christendom. 

From the Mediterranean to the Arctic, the Atlantic to the Urals, every infant was born into a parish and baptized (or circumcised if Jewish).  That did not mean that they loved the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, mind and strength, nor that they were true Jesus-followers.  Far from it.  But it did make them part of “the Church” (or synagogue).  And the Church was a dominant force in the kingdoms of earth – politically, socially, culturally, educationally, legally and economically.  Even with the reformation and religious freedom – we have denominations and no state church in America – institutional Christianity has been a major force throughout the West, providing moral leadership and consensus.  It invented things like hospitals, universities, orphanages, welfare programs and much more.  It led campaigns to wipe out infanticide, blood sports, prostitution, and slavery.  It inspired reform of factories, prisons, insane asylums and so much more.

In the process, a lot of extraneous (worldly) interests, institutional concerns and mixed motives crept in that were and are an embarrassment to the Kingdom of God, but that is another subject.  After all, the visible church is a human institution.  We have a saying, “If you find the perfect church, for heaven’s sakes don’t join – it wouldn’t be perfect anymore!”

The third level is the cumulative effect that church and individual have in molding Western civilization, to the extent that even the enemies of Jesus are shaped by His influence.  Modern atheism, secularism, scientific naturalism, and Marxism are all Christian heresies – inconceivable outside the West and Christian influence!  Western science, democracy, capitalism and socialism, the separation of church and state, equality and personal autonomy – in a word, the uniqueness of the West – are by-products of Christian institutions, assumptions and modes of thinking.  Western civilization is marked by the imprint of the Kingdom of the Judeo-Christian God!

So, whether you voted in the last election or not, the USA is a Christian nation in the sense that it is still a more-or-less civilized Western nation!  Even our rebellion against God is on Christian terms – the God we are rebelling against is Judeo-Christian.  Allah or Brahma have nothing to do with it, any more than Baal or Zeus or Odin. Is it actually conceivable to rebel against them?

What we are doing, as a nation, is throwing off the restraints of institutional Christianity, its morality and conscious worldview.  It is mostly secondary-level stuff.  Rooting out the legal and intellectual foundations of Western civilization – our foundations.  Expunging and countering that secondary influence of the Kingdom of God.  Attempting to erect a new civilization where the marks of Christ are repressed or perverted, but the fruits are preserved in a free society.  But the roots are deep.  How are we going to get rid of all those transformed lives – salt and light in our pagan darkness?  They embarrass and offend us by their moral standards and good deeds.  How are we going to keep them from joining together to change the world again, as just a handful did centuries ago?  And how are we going to live with the encroaching darkness?

To summarize, the Kingdom of God impacts the kingdoms of this world on at least three levels.  The first impact is the transforming of the lives and personalities of Jesus-followers.  Jesus-followers are better than average citizens (or at least better than they would have been without Him), honest, loyal, generous, loving their neighbors, etc.  They are faithful to their spouses and care for their children.  They try to be moral people, inside and out, and that does bother people who are not.  They are the salt of the earth, the thousand points of light, in the kingdoms of this world.

The second impact of the Kingdom of God is through Christianity as a religion, which has formed and still represents the morality of our part of the world.  To one degree or another, the majority of the West self-identify as Christian and not something else. This is where the argument stands.  It is in this generic sense that it could be claimed that the USA has been a Christian nation and is becoming something else. 

The third impact of the Kingdom of God is the historic formation of Western Civilization – also under attack.  Christianity, for good and for ill, has permeated the West, and with it the whole world in many ways that we do not even recognize – our culture, our institutions, our way of thinking, our way of life.  Can it all survive without Christianity?  Can the flowers still bloom without the roots?