"Governments and the Christian Faith"

I want us to consider the simplicity of the Gospel message, it seems reasonable that the most important things God would want us to know he would state in its simplest form. Paul simply states the Gospel in his letter to the Corinthians, "1Co 15:1 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand;

1Co 15:2 By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.

1Co 15:3 For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures;

1Co 15:4 And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:

1Co 15:5 And that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve:

1Co 15:6 After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep." (KJV) 

So one could expect the idea of government, its form, its purpose, and its working would be laid out in a simple understandable way in His word. So much so that a normal average guy like myself would be able to understand what a government is and its purpose. This article will reflect that very idea, what can I learn from scripture concerning my responsibility to government and what I should expect from the government as a member of society? 

As a basic outline, we might use some of the questions posed in David. W. Hall's book "Calvin in the Public Square". 

They go something like this:

1st, Is the state or are governors sovereign?

2nd, What form should the government take?

3rd, Is democracy an absolute?

4th, Who pays for government, and how or how much?

5th, How much of human life should government cover?

6th, What other valid spheres should the government respect (Family, Church, School)?

7th, May citizens resist their government? Under what limitations or conditions?

We may not cover all of these questions, but they are good to ponder, so we will probably take a wack at some of them. We first must understand why government? The reason government is necessary is found in Genesis Chapter 3, the fall of man. The corrupt nature of man since the fall is of such it must be governed and restrained by some measure. Government is one of the means that God has ordained in this world to curb man's sin and make society somewhat livable. That is the purpose for which government exists, however, today in some governments it has been broadened to a mechanism to try and regulate our well-being, providing basic needs and comforts. Many have become dependent upon some kind of government assistance in the many areas of our lives that it reaches.

It is a commendable purpose to whatever degree it tries to help society, the great problem is its lack of success. All forms of government always fail to provide its stated goals, falling massively short of its own noble ideas. The system may be perfect, but the human element corrupts and erodes until it weakens and falls. The monarchical form of government works very well if the monarch is righteous and just. However, even the best of monarchs have their sin to overcome, at best they only endure for while then it passes to another. It is just a matter of time until the monarchy corrupts and falls. 

Democracies move the power of government from the select few into the hands of the peoples' majority. This is probably the weakest form of government for it magnifies man's corruption many folds. They are usually very short-lived and generally tend toward some form of oppression in the end. 

The American Republic has been more successful in its form because of the safeguards built into it. A Republic is generally safer and provides more freedom than monarchical or democratic governments. Add to the American Republic that the designers' understood and held a biblical view of man and his natural corruption, therefore, the American experience has been strengthened by the many safeguards they implemented in its construction.

They understood man's cravings for power and wealth, they knew he (nor themselves) could not be trusted with himself in a self-governing form without being greatly restrained and having many oversights. Over the decades it has been weakened by the removal of many of these restraints. American exceptionalism is a term that misplaces our success as a people and our enterprises. It has a tendency to puff up our pride feeding our egos in thinking we ourselves have accomplished this great experience. We are an exceptional people in that we have been given much through the Gospel wisdom of our Fathers, outside of the Grace of the Gospel we are lost to ourselves, and that is a miserable sight.

This is best understood in the words of President Lincoln: "Whereas, the Senate of the United States, devoutly recognizing the supreme authority and just government of Almighty God, in all the affairs of men and nations, has, by a resolution, requested the President to designate and set apart a day for National prayer and humiliation;

And whereas, it is the duty of nations, as well as of men, to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon, and to recognize the sublime truths announced in the Holy Scriptures, and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord;

And, inasmuch as we know that, by his divine law, nations, like individuals, are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole people? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God, we have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us! 

It behooves us, then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness." ~ President Abraham Lincoln, April 30th, 1863.

Like nations in the past, such words of warning have for a time turned a people to repentance, only in a short time again to return to the corruption in the succeeding generations. Our hope will be once again to hear the warning and plead for Grace that we might be saved. I know many reject the idea of America's religious heritage and believe humanism, and so-called science are the strengths that will deliver us from our corruptions. However, man is corrupt because of what is in him, science may discover many wonderful things, but it can never deliver him from his corruption. Man's history is the greatest testimony to the truth of Scripture and the hope of the Gospel. Nowhere else is his being laid bare as it is in the Scriptures.

God bless,

David