Think More, and Harder

There is a distinction that needs to be made when discussing the relationship of religion and politics, but for some reason, very few people seem to recognize it. So here goes (and please pay attention):

There is a difference between a moral principle and the implementation of a moral principle.

In other words, just because a handful of people agree on some point of ethics, that is not to say that they will all agree on what to do next. For example, two people may agree that abortion is wrong (a sentiment I share), but that part's easy. The hard part comes when we get to the "therefore...." Should it be made illegal? If so, by whom, the federal government or the states? What about the economic factors that often contribute to abortion, should we address them, too? What happens when a person thinks that one presidential candidate is against abortion but favors an economic policy that could actually further it, while another candidate is in favor of abortion remaining legal, but promises to address and help eliminate the factors that may lead to abortions?

My point? Simply that it's one thing to have a moral opinion, but the real thinking hasn't started yet.

Take the death penalty. Plenty of Christians believe that capital punishment is biblical, but also feel that it is unjustly administered in the United States. What then? Or what about gay marriage? Is there a legitimate distinction between saying that homosexuality is immoral and saying that the government should enact laws that keep gays from getting married? If not, then are we saying that every immoral practice should be criminalized by the state?

Or what happens when one's pro-life principles force him to choose between voting to outlaw murder in one arena but condone it in another? And even if the murder that happens in one arena (say, abortion) is far more widespread than that which takes place in another (like war), is there still room to weigh the practical chances of eliminating the greater versus eliminating the former, and actually play the odds and vote contrarily to one's preferences?

I don't think there are any easy answers to these questions, and therefore I will not pretend to provide them. All I'm asking for is that, amid our pulpit-pounding and rally cries to one cause or another, we take the time to think a little harder than we are accustomed to doing.

Especially before calling our opponent's faith or character into question.

All the Evangelist's Men

Much has been said in the previous couple threads about the benefits of having a Christian president. Are there benefits to being represented by a believer, and if so, what are they?

On one level the question is irrelevant and impossible to answer. The reason for this is that America has never had an unbelieving president, so given the historical non-existence of the alternative, we just can't know how good we've had it all these years. I mean, if the only version of The Office you've seen in the American one, then you're in no position to judge whether it is better than the original British version (it's not).

Now I know what you're thinking: "Hold on a second! Are you honestly claiming that all of our presidents have been Christians?" Well, not exactly. But I am claiming that they have all made that claim. "But," you say, "don't you think they're just saying that to get elected?" Probably, at least in the case of some. But that's my point: I have no access to the Book of Life, let alone the jurisdiction over the hearts of all people who claim to trust in Jesus, so as far as I am concerned, the question is moot. Now if McCain or Obama wanted to join Exile Presbyterian Church, then I would do some prodding and render a judgment. But even then, it still often boils down to accepting a person's credible profession in the absence of evidence to the contrary.

"Aha!" you exclaim. "So you admit that we can judge the tree by its fruit." Well, yes, but that's not as easy as it sounds, especially for those of us who are not God. The fact of the matter is that both candidates will pursue policies that I, as a Christian, consider wrong. I can conclude from this that neither candidate is a Christian since they pursue what I consider to be non-Christian policies, but then I am elevating my own opinions about very complex matters to the level of "Thus saith the Lord." On the other hand, I can just reduce the whole election to one or two hot-button issues and decide things based on those. I realize that lots of people do this, and I don't want to begrudge anyone their right to be a one-issue voter.

A third option, however, is to admit that there are a host of issues involved in this election, all of which have some moral aspect to them, all of which are filtered through our theological premises, and most of which are not addressed directly in Scripture. Furthermore, the disagreements surrounding the really major issues are often not over morality (on which both sides often agree) but over factual matters. For example, a pro-choicer will rarely murder her two year-old because he costs too much to feed. This is because she thinks it is wrong to kill defenseless human persons. Then why does she think that a mother should have the right to an abortion? Well, for the same reason that you think you should have the right to have your appendix removed. In other words, the disagreement is not between one person who thinks that unjustified homicide is wrong and another who thinks it's right, but between one person who thinks that abortion is unjustified homicide and another who doesn't.

My point is simply that we need to tone down the sanctimony a smidge. This does not mean we should stop fighting against abortion or seeking to persuade others that the fetus is a real human person with a soul. But it does demand that we think more critically than to assume that the will of God will be served by the election of one candidate and thwarted by the election of the other.

The Curse of the Dollar-Shaped Plank

Sometimes I wonder if the reason we interpret "Blessed are the poor in spirit" to mean "Blessed are the people who feel poor on the inside" is because American culture is so oblivious to the sway that money holds over it that we feel we have no other choice but to read this beatitude in such a way that it makes no demands upon our lives. I mean, it's either that or we have to sell one of our Hummers (and that ain't gonna happen).

All cultures have their blind spots, including us. I mean, we have no problem recognizing the faults in other cultures, or in American culture of times past, but diagnosing similar traits in our own is another story. For example, we look at the fact that Muslim females wear those black robes with their faces veiled and lament the way Islam treats its women, while at the same time rarely seeing the demand for Botox, Calogen, and surgical augmentation as glaring testimonies against how we Westerners view our own.

We can wonder with great sanctimony how antebellum Southerners could claim to be disciples of Jesus while simultaneously being owners of slaves, but when a Fortune 500 CEO moves his company's manufacturing to a sweatshop in Malaysia so he can pay the workers $.09 an hour without having to worry about those pesky labor laws to protect them from oppression, we don't call that "slave-owning," we call it "smart business."

We watch those WWII documentaries and wonder how the German population could just sit back passively as Jews were being slaughtered, while feeling no more guilt than the Germans over the 1,000,000 innocent men, women, and children we have killed while liberating Iraq.

My point is simply that if we desire to interpret the Gospels correctly, we need begin by recognizing the dollar-shaped plank that we have firmly lodged in our collective eye.

Blessed Poverty

I just began a series of Sunday morning sermons on the Beatitudes and, after studying and reading in preparation over the past week, I've come to the conclusion that, to quote The Princess Bride, they don't mean what we think they mean.

On the first, "Blessed are the poor in spirit," we almost invariably hear that Jesus is describing the internal state of spiritual bankruptcy that results from our realizing our own sinfulness in the presence of a holy God.

Herman Ridderbos argues, however, that the blessed person described as "poor in spirit" is the one who willingly foregoes earth for heaven. In other words, when we submit to actual poverty (or some other this-worldly affliction) for the sake of Christ and his kingdom, we will be recompensed in eternity with the kind of treasure that cannot pass away.

Consider the fact that in Luke's version of the beatitudes it is the person who weeps now who is contrasted with those who will weep then, and the person who is hungry now with the one who will be lacking then. When Abraham denies the rich man his request for relief from torment in Luke 16, his rationale is that on earth he enjoyed good things while Lazarus the beggar experienced only bad things, and now it's time for the turning of the tables. After the rich young ruler left Jesus sorrowfully because of his many possessions, Jesus told the disciples that if they leave behind houses, lands, or family for his sake they will receive a hundredfold in the new world and will inherit eternal life. And the occasion for James's rebuke of the rich was that they "have lived on the earth in luxury and self-indulgence" and have thereby stored up a treasure-house of curse and condemnation for the last day.

Returning to the beatitudes, then, it is perfectly consistent with the rest of the New Testament to understand "blessed are the poor in spirit" to be describing the person who lays up his treasure in heaven to such a degree that he actually enjoys less of it here.

The Questionable Job Well-Done

As I pointed out in my last post, all legitimate vocations are potentially God-honoring, and further, there is no need to "redeem" or "transform" the work in order for God to be glorified by it. Accounting is accounting, whether it is done for human or divine glory.

Some vocations, however, are by their very nature God-dishonoring. Occupations such as prostitution, drug trafficking, and bank robbery are both illegal and immoral, and no matter how much one may try to convince himself otherwise, God cannot but be grieved with those who practice such things.

But here's where the issue becomes interesting....

Are there jobs that are not only legal but respectable, but which are by their very nature morally questionable? I say "by their very nature" because I am not speaking of the dirty cop on the take, or the embezzling CFO, or the juiced-up designated hitter. These are legitimate jobs done dishonestly. I am speaking of professions that, even though legal and even when performed well, are inherently bad.

I hesitate to provide examples for obvious reasons. So I will let you, the faithful reader, wrestle with this question and come up with examples, if there indeed are any.

Fire away....

The View from the Other End of the Club

It has been pointed out, correctly I think, that the world looks very different depending on whether you have your boot on your enemy's neck, or he has his boot on yours. While power is a sought-after commodity, there is also something to be said for the clarity that comes from being on the receiving end of the club.

Returning to Mitt Romney's appeal to allow the common morality that he shares with all people of faith to trump whatever theological differences there may be between him and evangelicals, it must be pointed out that the appeal for tolerance of minority positions is not uncommon for minorities to make.

After all, does not history demonstrate that the rights of those outside the inner circle are never bequeathed from on high, but must be won through popular struggle? Power, whether political, social, or religious, is often clutched with great jealousy lest it be lost. So if you're a woman, an immigrant, or in Romney's case, a Mormon, the clarion call is for civil liberty and the right to be treated as equals in the public square.

The evangelical church (err, excuse me: movement) has not had the best track record in according said civil liberties to those who are demanding them. You see, as long as we are in power, we will use all the muscle we can muster to win the culture war and defeat the godless, feminist, socialist Ivy-Leaguers who would just as soon surrender the American Dream to those A-rabs in the Middle East.

Sure, we can't define justification by faith if given a hundred tries, but by God we're gonna keep those gays at bay if it kills us.

Let's hope that if our millennial dreams shatter like the tables of the Decalogue and we are unseated from the corridors of power, the new occupants will be kinder and gentler than we were.

But I'm not holding my breath.

Romney, Rodney, and the Plea to "Get Along"

It was humorously pointed out in the previous thread that it apparently takes a Mormon like Mitt Romney to recognize the fact that the minutiae of one's theology has much less bearing upon his public service than the "common morality" that he shares with all people of faith.

I'm not sure if what lay behind Romney's appeal is an example of irony, or the most obvious thing in the world.

Think about it: Experience amply demonstrates that, generally speaking, it is the underdog who pleads for leniency and the outsider who calls for tolerance. In our nation's history it wasn't white people who were marching for civil rights, it wasn't Protestants who were calling for an end to religious bigotry, and it wasn't men demanding equal pay for equal work.

As Andrew Meyer can testify, it's the guy with the taser to his chest who cries, "Don't tase me, bro!"

Part and parcel of (fallen) human nature seems to be that one must find himself against the ropes before he will employ the Rodney King defense. Whether the humans in question are religious or not, once the powerless become the powerful, it is no longer time for "just getting along," but for brandishing the sword and taking the land.

If and/or when the church in America becomes completely marginalized in the public square, our religious leaders will begin to whistle a very different tune than they have heretofore. Instead of the sabre-rattling and rhetoric of dominion, we will begin to hear our evangelical leaders make the "live and let live" appeal that their enemies presently invoke.

The problem, however, is that anyone's appeal to the same civil liberties that he has been instrumental in denying the underdog for centuries cannot but sound hypocritical and hollow.

In a word, when Bellick gets sentenced to Fox River, whatever happens next, it won't be good....

Why Split Doctrinal Hairs?

If you've not yet read D.G. Hart's piece entitled "Jeffersonians All" I would warmly commend it. In it, Darryl draws an interesting parallel between the sentiments expressed by our nation's third President and those of Mitt Romney, the Mormon campaigning for the GOP nomination, in his recent much-discussed speech.

Romney's "Jeffersonian moment," Hart argues, came not when he assured his hearers (as did JFK during his presidential bid) that if elected he would vow to uphold the Constitution of the United States, and not the Book of Mormon or the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Instead, Hart argues:

"The actual Jeffersonian moment came just before his appeal to the separation of church and state. Romney ran through the religious virtues of fellow believers, from the profundity of the Roman Catholic Mass to the prayer life of Muslims. He then said, 'It is important to recognize that while differences in theology exist between the churches in America, we share a common creed of moral convictions.' The 'great moral principles,' he explained, 'urge us on a common course.' Romney... affirmed Jefferson’s view that theology doesn't matter compared to ethics. An American may believe that Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary, that there are three persons in one God, or that men and women have the potential to become gods. But as long as he or she believes in the nation's great moral principles they make darned good neighbors."

The irony of Romney's appeal to ethics over doctrine, Hart argues, is that it is usually only employed by evangelical Protestants, or Roman Catholics like Kennedy, whose churches at least affirm the Trinity and deity of Christ. But when a Mormon plays the deeds-over-creeds card, those Christians who are uncomfortable with the idea of a Latter-Day Saint in the White House all of a sudden become very theologically scrupulous and doctrinaire (I mean, the culture war is at stake here!).

For this turning of the faith-based tables Romney should be commended, for he has articulated what many have been thinking all along: Advocates of religion in public life have never cared about doctrinal precision, so as long as one's religion affirms the correct political ideals, then what's the harm?

After all, if the spiritual kingdom is destined to be the handmaiden of the State anyway, then why split hairs?

The Hermeneutics of Convenience

I find it interesting how arbitrary we Christians can be with respect to what we think is Scripture's clear position on various hot-button issues. What most discussions amount to, at the end of the day, is that the Bible condemns all the things I don't like, while the things I approve of either enjoy the divine stamp of approval, or are at the most unaddressed, or murkily so.

So if you're an American evangelical, then the Bible obviously condemns abortion, while the War on Terror is tantamount to Israel's storming of Jericho. The fact that the former position rests on little direct biblical evidence while the latter rests on bad eschatology seldom comes up, if at all.

If you're a European or British Christian, on the other hand, you are most likely passionately in favor of movements like Make Trade Fair and movies like SiCKO (both of which are considered by Americans as rather liberal).

The same "wink, wink" tactics are employed in the political arena. While Republicans and Democrats disagree over whether the Iraq War is being fought correctly, there is little discussion over whether the U.S. has the right to invade other countries if it sees fit to do so. The two parties may differ on the degree to which the federal government should spend money on social programs for the poor, but there is complete agreement on the glories of the free market.

Regardless of which kingdom we're dealing with, and of what our personal convictions may be with respect to it, it is certainly a healthy thing to lay aside the hermeneutics of convenience every now and then and allow our sacred cows to be challenged. Maybe we'll end up standing our ground, but at least we'll have the benefit of saying that we weren't afraid of a little scrutiny now and again.

The Invisible Hand, the Invisible Foot

In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905), Max Weber drew a line connecting Calvinism and Capitalism, arguing that free-market ideology was much more likely to thrive in Protestant countries than in Roman Catholic ones.

I find it interesting that according to what has been called "The Protestant Work Ethic," the more financially successful a person is, the more we are supposed to believe that God has blessed him. "Look at how well-off Bill is! God must be blessing his business, for he sure seems to be doing something right."

Is it a mere coincidence that the two phenomena that share the metaphor of "The Invisible Hand" are Divine Providence and the Free Market?

Most Christians will acknowledge that God's Providence is outside the bounds of human control. Just as "the Spirit blows where he wishes," so "the Lord will have his way among the inhabitants of earth, and none can stay his hand or ask, 'What doest thou?'"

But is the Market equally "free"? Does it mysteriously bless whom it will, while passing by others with a sovereign aloofness and nonchalance?

I would question my Reformed Libertarian readers whether the giving of massive campaign contributions on the part of huge corporations in return for the ability to influence labor laws, thereby enabling companies to exploit workers, is an example of "free market principles," or whether it is the abuse of power for profit.

Further, I would question why a society that provides aid for the poor is labeled "a nanny state" while a culture that, through tax breaks and economic subsidies, allows its CEOs to make 400 times what their average workers earn is called a "democracy."

Could it be that the real question is not whether there should be welfare, but rather, who should get it?

Could it be that while the wealthy enjoy the invisible hand of the market, the poor feel nothing but its invisible foot?

W2K Part Two: Whose Christian Agenda?

I've made this observation before, but I find it curious that those who advocate the Church's active role in social and political affairs spend so much time arguing for the transformation of culture that they rarely get around to answering an even more important question:

"Transformation into what?"

The reason for this omission, I think, is that we all know what kind of culture we're aiming for (wink wink). This explains the woman's comment (recounted in the Christianity and Liberalism post) that church planting in the Pacific Northwest would be so much easier if there were more right-wing culture warriors up here. This also explains the commenter's question (under the Exclusiveness of Christianity thread) which implied that the two kingdoms doctrine assumes that God is neutral about the sinfulness or uprightness of society.

The answer, of course, is that less sin is always better than more. But let's stop for a moment and ask why American Christians fear sins like fornication and homosexuality (which he listed) but rarely lose sleep over such "white-collar" sins as the exploitation of the poor and the lust for power, whether corporate or imperial.

So next time a well-meaning Christian passionately advocates the Church's role in the redemption of culture, just experiment a bit by responding, "I totally agree with you! So what ideas do you have about putting Nike out of business?"

(Insert blank stare here)

Invention is the Mother of Necessity

I do not doubt that the well-worn slogan "Necessity is the mother of invention" was at one time true. When the cavemen got cold, they had two options: invent fire or freeze to death.

But with the rapid growth and advancement of technology, supply no longer is the result of demand but often the cause of it. In other words, inventing stuff is easy; the challenge is to convince people of their need of it.

Consider the Internet: a technological phenomenon that I, back in the mid-nineties, dismissed as a passing fad that would be as quickly forgotten as the Slinky, has now become so intertwined with our lives that most people could not work, or even socialize, without it (no, the irony here is not lost on me).

But I would maintain that one's true happiness and fulfillment in life actually decreases as his or her level of dependence on technology increases. Whether we're talking about cell phones, laptops, or automobiles, we have allowed a myriad of components into our lives in order to "simplify" our existence, only to find that, soon afterward, we have become slaves to these harsh masters.

Sure, technology solves some problems, but they're often the very problems it helped create. Whether it's a cure for the cancer that we contracted due to the chemicals and radiation we are constantly exposed to or the Blackberry that helps us remember the various business meetings we must attend (to discuss how best to market Blackberrys), the fact is that technology's benefits are questionable at best.

Do we ever consider the adverse effects of our gadgets? For example, no one bothers to remember anyone's phone numbers anymore, since they're programmed into our cell phones (which doesn't help when your battery dies and you need to use someone else's). No one can make actual commitments to be anywhere at a specific time anymore since, after all, "I can just call you when I'm ten minutes out." College-aged kids can barely socialize face-to-face these days, since the bulk of their "personal interaction" is done via Facebook.com (and don't get me started on MySpace's redefinition of what a "friend" is).

We've spent so much energy asking, "Can we?" that we've forgotten to ask a more important question: "Should we?"

From Hierarchy to Mediocrity

"Unit. Corps. God. Country."

So the Marine lieutenant from the film A Few Good Men explained his priorities to Tom Cruise's character in order to justify his assault on a fellow officer (hey, he was following orders). The Christian version of this list usually places the "God" part a bit higher up on the totem pole of importance (like, say, first). After "God" follow "Church," "Family," and "Work" in varying order.

Some would argue, however, that it is illegitimate to place the various callings that God has given into a specific order of importance. If God has called me to be a dad, a husband, a church member, and a lawyer, then who am I to decide which of those legitimate vocations trumps the others?

Obviously, each person must come to his or her own conclusions on this matter. I will say, though, that if one sees his role as a husband and father as being more significant than he does his job (with the latter being a means to excel in the former), then it may be necessary to view with some measure of suspicion the clarion call Christians constantly hear to do all that we do "with excellence." Consider the following two reasons for this.

First, in order to be the best lawyer (or doctor, or WalMart employee) one can be will of necessity entail an excruciating amount of toil, stress, and overtime, which may very well interfere with one's performance in other areas.

Secondly, if Reformed, amillennial theology teaches us anything, it is that God is not glorified by what passes as impressive in the eyes of men. This means that when "excellence" is defined as whatever wows the worldly, it pales in God's estimation to the weakness, foolishness, and lackluster character of the cross.

So a hierarchy that places family above work may include a call for more mediocrity in the latter in order to show some excellence in the former.

The Protestant Rest Ethic

In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905), Max Weber drew a line connecting Calvinism and Capitalism, arguing that free-market ideology was much more likely to thrive in Protestant countries than in Roman Catholic ones.

Consider this illustration: It takes Joe 10 hours to produce 10 barrels of grain a day, earning him 10 dollars, which is the amount needed to sustain his and his family's needs. Now imagine that Joe were given a raise to two dollars per barrel rather than one dollar. The decision facing him would be largely determined, Weber would argue, by the volumes on Joe's bookshelf. If his shelf contains Thomas's Summa Theologica, then he'd earn his 10 dollars by producing only five barrels, and he'd leave work after only five hours' labor. But if his preferred reading were Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion, then he'd still work all ten hours, produce all ten barrels, and earn double the money.

Now Joe can afford to buy a copy of The Wealth of Nations (a nice supplement to all his Reformation literature).

Despite Luther's doctrine of vocation (which gave even the most mundane tasks divine significance), the fact that it is Catholics who enjoy plenty of rest while we Protestants are toiling by the sweat of our brows seems theologically inconsistent. After all, is not Reformed theology the one that emphasizes resting in Christ's work, while those papists are supposedly trying to earn God's favor? And if most Catholics have only purgatory awaiting them rather than a new heavens and earth, then why is it the Protestants who are busily trying to improve their earthly portions?

Possible answers include: 1). Catholics risk displeasing their earthly bosses in order to get back to the business of trying to please their heavenly one; 2). Catholics believe that earning God's favor includes having as much leisure time as possible; or 3). Protestants' preoccupation with earthly rewards is greater than they care to admit.

At the risk of allowing my theology to unduly influence my cultural worldview, I call on all Reformed amilennialists to spend more time socializing with friends and family over food and tastily-brewed beverages, reading more of the Bible and theology than they currently do, and what may be the first step toward all of this: To Work Less.

Close Laptop. Turn Off Cell. Go to Pub.

“Visiting the pub and drinking beer,” writes Tom Hodgkinson, “became a form of protest against the new emerging work ethic.... Pubs once acted as the focus of the community, providing a free front room where people... could discourse freely, drink deeply, and carouse. One gets a real sense that the Industrial Revolution was taking the fun out of life” (How To Be Idle, 166, 167).

When I was living in Europe, my fellow-missionaries and I used to spend much of our winters watching the Lonesome Dove miniseries on video. As we observed the life-long friendship of Augustus McRae and Woodrow F. Call (played by Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones), we all vowed that we would never allow ourselves to become like so many men in our day: working 60 hours a week with no friends with whom we could “quaff foaming pints of nut-brown ale in convivial company.”

The nature of our culture is to isolate us from one another. We sit at our computers or in front of our TVs, we drive alone in our cars from the garage at home to the one at work, we interact through MySpace and email, we converse through cell phones and blue tooths, and even the live events we attend, like weddings or birthday parties, are usually observed through the screen of our camcorders.

We need to get out more (and I’m not talking about those “power lunches” during which we wolf down burgers at a food court so we can get back to work faster). How much political, personal, social, or theological reflection is just waiting to transpire at the local pub, if we would only make the time for it?

Frodo and Sam had the Green Dragon… what about us?

Rise, Shine, and Produce

"Sleep is a powerful seducer," writes Tom Hodgkinson, "hence the terrifying machinery we have developed to fight it. I mean, the alarm clock. Heavens! What evil genius brought together those two enemies of the idle – clocks and alarms – into one unit? ... For all modern society's promises of leisure [and] liberty... most of us are still slaves to a schedule we did not choose" (How to be Idle, 4, 6).

The author's point here is not that everyone should sleep until noon every day (he himself has small children), but that one of the (ill-)effects of our post-industrial world is that we have become what we once called "wage slaves," renting our bodies to tyrannical bosses. "What is truly amazing," Hodgkinson continues, "is that we buy alarm clocks voluntarily. Is it not absurd to spend our own hard-earned cash on a device to make every day start as unpleasantly as possible, and which really just serves the employer to whom we sell our time?"

I trust my point is not quite as idealistic as Hodgkinson's: Do we ever stop to think about the fact that the world wasn't always as hectic and hurried as it is now? That there are countries even today where people are not enslaved to the almighty dollar (what Jesus called "Mammon")?

For my own part, I desire to work as hard at my job as I can, while at the same time refusing to add to the simplicity of my calling a lot of extraneous non-essentials that would have kept me from sitting outside at the local coffee house a couple hours ago and enjoying a book and the sunshine.

Call it "inefficiency" if you must, to which I will respond that I am not a machine. Productivity, after all, may actually increase when we slow down the pace a bit....

On Hobbits, the Shire, and the Kingdom of God's Left Hand

In continuing to consider the believer's dual-citizenship in the kingdoms of Christ and culture, I would like to broach a topic of which the Bible speaks at length and in detail, but which is often ignored from the contemporary American pulpit (either because it has become so ingrained into our psyches that we don't really have the necessary perspective to think critically about it, or simply because we're afraid to ask the kinds of questions we should be asking):

Work, Money, and the proper use of our Time.

To kick the discussion off, I'll quote from the Prologue of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring "Concerning Hobbits" (bet you didn't see that one coming):

"Hobbits are an unobtrusive people; they love peace and quiet and good tilled earth. They do not like machines more complicated than a water-mill or hand-loom. They do not hurry unnecessarily. At no time had Hobbits been warlike, and they had never fought among themselves. They imbibed or inhaled, through pipes of clay or wood, the smoke of the burning leaves of a herb which they call pipe-weed or leaf [and developed a keen interest in the brewing and drinking of ales]."

My reason for this allusion is Tolkien's clear intention to present the lives of Hobbits as an ideal one, and the Shire in which they dwelt as a metaphor for the idyllic kind of life free from the pressures and hectic pace introduced by the industrial revolution.

The overarching question, then, is whether our lives reflect, even in a small way, the enjoyment of the pleasures of the kingdom of God's left hand, or whether we are so bound to our (legitimate) secular vocations that we have become incapable of being the moms and dads, wives and husbands, and even the human beings, that we desire to be?

Is All Power Legitimate?

In seeking to show that power must be justified in order to be legitimately exercised, one illustration that has been used is that of a grandparent who yanks his grandson by the arm, causing a moderate amount of pain to the boy. This is obviously an exercise of force that seems quite harsh, at least until we come to understand that the grandfather was pulling his grandson out of the way of an oncoming vehicle, thereby justifying the use of force. The moral of the story is that power is not always legitimate, but must be justified in order to be seen as such.

What, then, constitutes legitimate power or authority?

If it is wrong, as many argue, to employ armed resistance against a lawful government, even if it is oppressive, then what does that say about the American Revolution? And if we conclude that it was illegitimate for the Founding Fathers to take up the sword against the British crown, what does that say of the authority of our government today, over 200 years later?

Or take another example (one which was used in the comments under the previous thread): If China were to invade the U.S. and occupy this country, at what point, if any, should this new regime cease to be seen as illegitimate aggrressors and become legitimate recipients of our dutiful obedience and respect?

Is there a statute of limitations on rebellion? What if there are rival claims upon our obedience, as during the Civil War (err... excuse me: The "War of Northern Aggression")? Ought we simply fall back upon our own individual consciences to determine our answers to these questions?

And how can we maintain Christian unity amid the varying opinions that exist among believers on these issues?

"Rights": Civil and Spiritual

To be sure, the question of the Christian's obedience to the civil magistrate would be pretty easy if the state were simply totalitarian. In other words, if conformity were commanded with all loopholes abolished, then in the spirit of Romans 13 we would just suck it up and "obey their lawful commands" (WCF XXIII.4).

But when the powers that be confuse the matter by actually inviting challenges to their authority when or if it is abused (such as the insistence of the Declaration of Independence that a government should be "abolished" if it fails to secure the rights of the people who established it), then that changes things dramatically.

Here's where the distinction between the ethics of the civil and spiritual kingdoms is so striking, and, further, what makes appeals for "civil rights" that are peppered with biblical language so troubling. When one quotes Jesus to bolster his demand for the better treatment to which he feels he is entitled, not only is he misconstruing his Christian liberty as civil liberty (contra WCF XX.1, 4), but he is demonstrating a woeful ignorance of the cross. If Jesus did not invoke his unalienable right not to be killed, and if "the servant is not greater than his Master," then who are we to appeal to him to avoid suffering? If the kingdom of God teaches us anything, it is that following Jesus means foregoing our rights for his sake.

But the kingdom of man does afford its subjects certain "unalienable rights" (at least in this country’s expression of it). If, therefore, we feel that those rights are being violated, and further, if we choose to fight for them, then appealing the Scripture while doing so would seem to do more harm than good.

"Carnal weapons for earthly warfare" – sounds about right....

One Market, Under God – Part Three: Blessed are the Poor....

The third portion of Doster’s article in byFaith Magazine (“The Kingdom Work of the Corporate World”) is called “Business is How We Care For the Poor.” Yes, you read that correctly.

Business is, “in an ultimate sense, the only solution to poverty,” Doster writes, since “for-profit work in the secular world is how we care for those in need.” As Christians go into business, the theory goes, new wealth will be created which will create new jobs, thereby fulfilling the cultural mandate and loving our neighbors.

But as I pointed out in my last post, a corporation has only one mandate, and that is to make money for its shareholders. If people are benefited in the process, that is merely a by-product that will exist only as long as the company’s bottom line increases. So if your favorite clothing company can have its products manufactured in a Chinese sweatshop by eight-year-olds making 12 cents a day, that is good news for investors. Or if American businessmen can privatize Bolivia’s rainwater and prohibit the indigenous population from collecting it in buckets to wash themselves for free, a victory is claimed for the free market.

My point is simple: To insist that the second Table of the law can only be fulfilled in a free-market, capitalist society, and that the wealthier a CEO becomes the better off the rest of us will be, is about the most white, privileged, American interpretation of “kingdom work” that I have ever heard.

Or are we only to “contextualize” the kingdom message to those who think that "Rush is Right"?