What Does the Bible Say About the Civil Magistrate?

 

". . . My thesis is that secularism necessarily implies dictatorship and totalitarian rule.  . . . The result is state control of religion and of all human good, nothing excepted.  . . . "

“The Confession in section i states that it is God who has ordained civil magistrates.  Their authority comes from him;  therefore, they cannot rightfully act as dictators; their just powers are only those which God has assigned them.”  Dr. Gordon H. Clark

 

What Is Christian Nationalism?  What  Does the Bible Say About the Civil Magistrate?

 

Once again I must answer the objections of the libertarians and the radical two kingdoms proponents.  Their contention is that the secular governments must be obeyed no matter what, based on what the apostle Paul says in Romans 13:1-10.  But is this what the Bible really says? 

I am not sure what the term Christian nationalism means, since the definition varies depending on whom you ask.  R. Scott Clark of the Heidelblog defines the term this way:

The West is declining rapidly and in response some American Christians have begun arguing for a return to theocracy and even for a theocratic Caesar figure to replace the secular republican form of government established in the Constitution.  (From: Heidelblog: Resources on Christian Nationalism).

The first assumption which R. S. Clark makes is that “some American Christians are arguing for a return to theocracy.”  Unfortunately, Clark does not define the term theocracy as it is applied in modern times.  The term, as I have always understood it, refers to the biblical theocracy which occurred during the time of the judges and the theocracy under the leadership of Moses, Aaron, and later, Joshua.  But, if this is the biblical definition of theocracy, then I am not aware of any Evangelical Christians of any kind today who advocate for that sort of theocracy or any theocracy whatsoever; that would include the theonomists and the reconstructionists. 

I suppose that might imply the issue of civil religion such as what happened when Billy Sunday was an evangelist in the early part of the twentieth century.  Billy Sunday was a supporter of the war effort during WWI and raised money to support that effort.  As a result of Sunday’s support of the temperance movement and the war effort, it became popular among “fundamentalist” churches to display both the American flag and the Christian flag inside the church.  However, whenever I see someone accused of being a fundamentalist during the first half of the twentieth century, I usually see that as Evangelical.  The fundamentalists of yesterday are the Evangelicals of today.  Unfortunately, the neo-Evangelicals have hijacked the term when in fact they disagree with both the oldline fundamentalists and the conservative Evangelicals of today.

The radical two kingdoms point of view is that churches and pastors should never comment on political issues, while they themselves openly comment on political issues every single time they complain about Christian nationalists.  This sort of double standard is par for the course for Democrats.  Therefore, it makes me suspicious that most of these radical two kingdoms theologians and church historians are actually progressive Democrats in their political views.  The time for pretending that churches and pastors have no solid political commitments is over.  That’s because our democratic republic is quickly devolving into political chaos and open anarchy.

There was a time when the Christian worldview was predominate over the leftist and Marxist worldview in the United States and European countries.  Even the Roman Catholic nations were at one time more politically and morally conservative.  However, now even the Roman Catholic nations are becoming more secular and atheistic in their political orientations.  Even worse, the pope and the Roman Catholic Church is now openly promoting the ideology of the LGBTQIA+ agenda by saying that homosexuality and perversion should not be illegal.  Protestants and Evangelicals who are “woke” are promoting the same sort of nonsense.  First of all, there is nothing immoral about outlawing what God’s moral law outlaws.  To make the point even clearer, the pope and a majority of the Catholic bishops in America and Europe claim to be against abortion and the pro-choice ideology but do not wish to make abortion illegal in their nations.  Neo-Evangelicals are in complete agreement with this approach and so are the radical two kingdoms theologians and churches.

The question therefore is who decides what is right and wrong in the political realm?  The radical two kingdoms people have ceded the argument to the secular humanists, who they say get to determine moral laws in the political realm, while the church should stay in the closet and say nothing when genocide and perversion predominates the larger society and culture.  The trouble with that approach is eventually Christianity itself is made illegal.  An example of that is the current issue of sex change operations performed on minors at almost any age.  The public schools are openly propagandizing and proselytizing young people for the so-called transgender movement and homosexuality.  Some conservative political pundits refer to this as grooming children for future members of the LGBTQIA+ movement.  This is because the Marxist left and the progressives have turned the tables on Evangelicals and conservative Christians.  The Christian church has always catechized the youthful members of the congregation, knowing that the younger a person reads, studies and believes the Bible, the more likely that child is to persevere in the Christian faith.  (Proverbs 22:6).

Some who profess to follow the apologetics of the late Dr. Gordon H. Clark affirm a form of political libertarianism which, for all practical purposes, agrees with the apparent moral relativism of the radical two kingdoms proponents.  However, Jesus said that there can be no neutrality in matters of morality.  I take that to mean more than just personal piety but also in ecclesiastical politics and the civil government.  In fact, Jesus was arrested and crucified by both the religious and political authorities of his day.  But Jesus did not say do not get involved.  What He said was:

“And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose himself, or be cast away? For whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words, of him shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he shall come in his own glory, and in his Father’s, and of the holy angels.” (Luke 9:23–26, KJV)

Does this sound like Jesus wanted Christians to hide from the world and say nothing about morality, the moral law or the Gospel?  I think not.  Of course, we as Christians must show prudence in dealing with employers and employees with whom we work in the secular realm.  But does it mean that Christian churches should take no political positions on moral and ethical issues, that Christian churches should not encourage their members to support political movements which stand for the Bill of Rights and other Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms?  Again, I think they should be involved.  After all, the liberal and progressive churches have no such qualms.  Their moral relativism has become the law of the land.  Evangelical Christians and churches have been attributed with false guilt.  They are called homophobic deplorables, transphobic, white nationalists, white supremacists, racists, and a host of other abusive ad hominems in the name of silencing theological, moral, and political dissent from a biblical perspective and the Christian worldview perspective.

The late Dr. Gordon H. Clark would not have agreed with the political moral relativism of the libertarian variety.  Libertarians have only one moral law:  Do no harm to others.  But this is a vague and vacuous imperative since the proposition does not even appeal to a universal moral standard.  Instead it appeals to an unbiblical standard:

“And the children of Israel departed thence at that time, every man to his tribe and to his family, and they went out from thence every man to his inheritance. In those days there was no king in Israel: every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” (Judges 21:24–25, KJV)

When there is no moral leadership from Evangelical churches in their local cities, counties, and the state or commonwealth in which they reside, there is an aggressive attack on Christianity at large nationally and locally.  Evangelicals need to organize at every level, including nationally.  Otherwise, the United States of America is on the same trajectory as Canada and Europe.  An increasingly tyrannical totalitarianism will continue to push against Christianity until they control even the local churches.  If the fake pandemic is any indication, the progressives have the power to shut down religious freedoms and Evangelicals just go along with it like sheep to the slaughter.  Christian ministers in Canada can be arrested for daring to say that homosexuality is a perversion of the natural order or a sinful rebellion against God. 

I am not advocating the confusion of the law and gospel, nor am I advocating for any so-called Christian nationalism.  What I am advocating for is that Christian churches and pastors stop ignoring their moral duty to stand against immorality, crime and the loss of religious liberties in our nation and our local states and cities.  When Jesus commanded us to evangelize the nations, He was not just advocating the evangelizing of individuals but the evangelizing of entire nations and regions.  The Apostle Paul took this seriously and made at least three missionary journeys.  Was Paul colonizing for the white race?  I do not think so.  Christianity is for all nations, tribes, and peoples.  Every kind and class of human beings is called in the general call of the gospel; rich, poor, kings and paupers and every gender and race are all to be evangelized without compromising the moral law or the gospel whatsoever--that would include evangelizing atheists and homosexuals and transgendered homosexuals.  But Christians should not be duped into buying into the lie that the homosexuals and transgenders are not morally responsible because they are born with a sexual orientation that is essentially biologically and genetically predetermined.  There is no biblical support for imposing a materialistic or behavoristic excuse for immorality upon the Christian churches or Christian individuals.

Dr. Clark repudiated the idea that humans are biological machines, a theory developed by Thomas Hobbes; he also rejected naturalism, behaviorism, and secularism.  The following comment on the Westminster Confession’s chapter on free will is exemplary:

What then does the Confession mean by the natural liberty of the will?  The remainder of the section quoted answers this question as well as two lines can.  Man’s will “is neither forced nor by any absolute necessity of nature determined.”  These words were written to repudiate those philosophies which explain human conduct in terms of physico-chemical law.  Although the Westminster divines did not know twentieth century behaviorism, nor even Spinoza, they very probably knew Thomas Hobbes, and they certainly knew earlier materialistic theories.  That man’s conduct is determined by inanimate forces is what the Confession denies.  Man is not a machine;  his motions cannot be described by mathematical equations as can the motions of the planets.  His hopes, plans, and activities are not controlled by physical conditions.  He is not determined by any absolute necessity of nature.

Dr. Gordon H. Clark.  What Do Presbyterians Believe?  The Westminster Confession Yesterday and Today.  1965.  Second Edition.  (Unicoi:  Trinity Foundation, 2001).  P. 106.

The secularists contend that there are human rights which are independent of any divine moral law or divine imperative.  Instead, they propose a materialistic and a humanistic approach which is supposed to reduce human suffering to the lowest common denominator.  Of course, to accomplish their goals they take a utilitarian approach to attaining their political and moral superiority.  The end justifies the means according to them; and they openly state this when they comment on abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality, sex change mandates, and their contention that they will not allow President Trump to be re-elected—even if the majority of the states’ populations votes for him.  They openly admit that they will use pandemics, their relativizing of the rule of law, and whatever other means, including disinformation and propaganda, to keep our democratic republic from electing a popular president.  According to the secular humanists, evil is merely an existential experience of human suffering, not a violation of divine moral law.  This is why they appeal to climate change, pandemics, lockdowns, open borders, and sexual deviancy to justify their totalitarian tactics.  They also use racial divisions and male and female issues to gain power.

But once again, Dr. Gordon H. Clark’s comments are amazingly applicable even in our contemporary political and moral situation.  Although his remarks are directed particularly at the issue of plenary verbal inspiration and the inerrancy of the Bible, his comments also apply to the political realm:

A second objection to verbal and plenary inspiration can be reproduced by repeating a verse previously quoted. The verse was, “The Scripture which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake.” And the rejection is the great outcry against the theory of mechanical dictation. The liberals regularly accuse orthodox Christians to reducing the prophets to the status of typewriters, or at most, stenographers. This makes them machines and violates their personality. Since it is unthinkable that God would violate anyone’s personality, the doctrine of verbal inspiration must be rejected no matter what the Bible says.

In answer to this objection, I would like to make a minor point and a major point. Actually, it is hard to tell which of these points is major and which is minor. But one is more remote and fundamental, the other is immediate and direct. The more remote and fundamental reply is the denial of the liberal concept of God on which their concept is based. For the liberal, man has certain rights that God cannot violate. Man is in some way independent of God and God is in some way subject to rules of justice that he did not set up. The Bible however presents a sovereign God who out of the same lump of clay create [sic] one man to honor and another to dishonor. No man has the right to complain to God and ask, “why has thou made me thus?”

Obviously, God has created rocks and trees, birds and elephants. And no bird has the right to complain that it is not an elephant. Similarly, God is sovereign in creating men. And if he has created some men to be used as typewriters at times, no one has a right to complain. Hence the first reply to the liberals is to reject their notion of the relation between God and man. God is not man’s valet nor even his cosmic pal and co­pilot. God is the sovereign creator against whom no one has any claim whatever.

Dr. Gordon H. Clark.  “The Inerrancy of the Bible.”  The Gordon H. Clark Foundation.  P. 6.

Whether the libertarians or the radical two kingdoms proponents wish to acknowledge it or not, nations and even the entire global human race, both individually and corporately, are morally accountable to God.  It follows, therefore, that churches and pastors and denominations are morally accountable to God for what they think, say, and do, and for what they omit to do in regards to the moral law.  This is a non-negotiable demand of the moral law, and not even Christians under the covenant of grace are exempt from keeping the moral law, albeit not as a covenant of works.  (See: Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 19:5-7).  “V. The moral law doth forever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof; and that not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator who gave it.”  (Ibid.).  The Bible clearly says that we must obey God rather men.  (Acts 5:29).  This means that when secular governments become tyrannical and threaten Christians and Christian pastors with jail time or loss of their employment for exercising their God given right to the freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, and the freedom of speech, they should instead obey what God plainly says the Holy Scriptures.  Jesus did not merely suggest such opposition but in fact commands it.  (John 15:18-25).

Gordon Clark succinctly opposes both libertarian relativism and secular humanism in these remarks:

. . . My thesis is that secularism necessarily implies dictatorship and totalitarian rule.  . . . The result is state control of religion and of all human good, nothing excepted.  . . . 

The Confession in section i states that it is God who has ordained civil magistrates.  Their authority comes from him; therefore, they cannot rightfully act as dictators; their just powers are only those which God has assigned to them.  What those powers are and what they are not is indicated here and there throughout the Bible; . . .

Clark, What Do Presbyterians Believe?, pp. 207-208.

 

Gordon H. Clark: God's Elect: A Small Remnant in an Apostate Nation

Liberals who loudly assert that the Constitution erects a great wall of separation between church and state when Christians protest against abortion and homosexuality, never see a low fence when it comes to the State's curtailing of the practice of religion.  As one half drunk communist said to me as he was returning from Russia, "you can pray all you want."  Yes, but you can't put your religion into practice. 

. . . . . the IRS and the Supreme Court do not know God.  They want to usurp his place as Father.  From all appearances this liberalism--which is not liberalism at all, but reactionary totalitarianism--will increase.   

--Dr. Gordon H. Clark

This has been one of the most hotly debated and inflammatory presidential election cycles in the history of the United States of America.  The difference is that this time around the media has no monopoly on the news cycle.  The media still has a lot of power to deceive the low information and low education masses with their propaganda.  However, they no longer can monopolize the information available.  The internet, like Gutenberg's printing press, has opened up the potential for social media and blogs to counter the propaganda of the liberal progressives and the inane pseudo-conservative pundits on the radio, satellite and cable television.

Interestingly enough, despite the information superhighway, the vast majority of the populace in our nation does not know how to think critically.  Few if any understand the difference between propositional logic and irrational antinomies.  Politicians can spout off blatantly contradictory statements and the people accept them as just "politics".  Sophistry seems to be acceptable because "everyone does it".  Yet Donald Trump, who lies more than the other politicians, claims to be a truth teller while contradicting himself every other day.

What should a Christian do in such circumstances?  First of all, the sovereign grace Christian knows that all things work for his or her good.  (Romans 8:28-39).  This means that suffering and persecution are not pleasant to go through but they nevertheless work for the good of God's elect.  The rich may prosper in this life but their end is eternal torment in hell unless they obey the Gospel.  (Jeremiah 12:1-3; Job 12:6, 21:7; Psalm 73:3; Luke 12:16-21; 2 Thessalonians 1:8; 1 Peter 4:17).

The late Dr. Gordon H. Clark was a consistent Puritan and did not call for a complete separation between church and state.  He supported the constitutional principle that the state should not establish any Christian church nor interfere in religious matters.  The state has no right to levy taxes against churches as a way of controlling the doctrines of the church.  Unfortunately, secular humanism has been the established religion of the secular state for many decades now.  Dr. Clark's remarks in his commentary on First John were made in 1980.  But his remarks are almost prophetic because the situation today is even worse than it was in 1980:

1 John 3:1

3:1 See what love the Father has given us in order that we may be called children of God.  And we are.  Therefore the world does not know us because it did not know him.

The text:  Why the Textus Receptus omitted the two words "and we are" is a mystery.  The manuscript evidence is very strong; several ancient versions, and some early church fathers as well, have it.

The love of God for his elect is variously described in the New Testament.  Here the purpose, or a purpose, of God in loving us is that we may be his children.  And so we are, for God's purposes never fail and Christ shall see the results of the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied that he accomplished his purpose.  [Isaiah 53:11].

This entails what to some may appear as a disadvantage, namely, the world does not recognize us, does not know us, approve of us.  Of course, in one sense the world knows us very well.  At this writing the Internal Revenue Service has instituted rules to harass and very likely to suppress Christian elementary and high schools.  Christian colleges have for some years suffered harassment.  The courts incline to regard children as wards of the state and to deny parents their rightful authority in the upbringing of their offspring.  Liberals who loudly assert that the Constitution erects a great wall of separation between church and state when Christians protest against abortion and homosexuality, never see a low fence when it comes to the State's curtailing of the practice of religion.  As one half drunk communist said to me as he was returning from Russia, "you can pray all you want."  Yes, but you can't put your religion into practice.

What is the reason for this?  John states it clearly:  the IRS and the Supreme Court do not know God.  They want to usurp his place as Father.  From all appearances this liberalism--which is not liberalism at all, but reactionary totalitarianism--will increase.  Hatred of Christ seemingly will wax worse and worse.  We pray that totalitarianism, terrorism, socialism, and all the antichrists may be overthrown; but we have no indication that God will do so in the near future.  Even the churches, the large liberal churches, contribute huge sums of money to support guerrilla warfare.

Dr. Gordon H. Clark.  First John.  1980.  Second Edition.  (Jefferson: Trinity Foundation, 1992).  P. 90.

What Dr. Clark said 37 years ago is even more pertinent today since the perverse lobby for homosexuality and sex change operations has given the government even more authority to silence Christians and the Bible.   For those who think that Donald Trump is a better choice than the liberal progressive and socialist, Hillary Clinton, I can only say dream on.  Trump is just as much an anti-Christ as Hillary Clinton.

 13 But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.

 14 But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them;
 15 And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
 16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
 17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. (2 Timothy 3:13-17 KJV)

Is There a Universally Recognized Human Right to Homosexual Immorality and Same Sex Marriage?

It is quite frustrating to see Evangelical theologians missing the whole point in their comments about homosexuality, transgenderism, and same sex marriage.  The vast majority of them are trying to find common ground with secular humanists who have invented their own facade which they call "human rights."  [See:  Is Same Sex Marriage a "Human Right"?]  The real question is who decides what these human rights are and how is the deduction made?  Is there an objective standard for determining morality?

This where I am strongly an advocate of the late Dr. Gordon H. Clark's presuppositionalism.  According to Dr. Clark's apologetics, everyone starts with undemonstrable and unprovable axioms or starting points.  This is clearly true of empirical science as well since empiricism is really based on logical positivism of one degree or another.  In fact, Dr. Clark went so far  as to say that empirical science is based on the fallacy of affirming the consequent.  Basically, a theory is a presupposition and the scientist finds every inductive evidence he or she can to affirm the theory.  So why is it that two scientists can examine the same inductive evidence with two different theories and come up with affirming conclusions for two different presupposed theories from the same evidence?  Even scientists are fideists.  [See:  Science and Truth].

The answer, of course, is that they have affirmed the conclusion beforehand.  If it is raining, the streets are wet.  The streets are wet, therefore it is raining.   If A, then B.  B, therefore A.  Of course there could many other factors involved that could cause the streets to be wet.

Logical positivism is self refuting because it says that only what can be learned from the five senses is legimately knowledge.  But the beginning premise is itself not capable of observation since it is an abstract proposition that can only be thought with the mind.  Do animals understand the proposition that 2 + 2 = 4?

To cut the argument short I would ask the question that if everyone--including scientists--begins with presupposed axioms, why would the world at large fault the Christian for beginning with the axiom of Scripture?  All knowledge for the Christian worldview begins with Scripture as the axiom.  Scripture is the God-breathed Word of God.  Every single word is fully inspired by God.  (2 Timothy 3:16; Matthew 4:4; 2 Peter 1:19-21; Psalm 119:89).

I keep repeating this point but it is worth repeating again.  Is the human mind just a product of chemistry in a body, a brain of grey matter?  Or is the human mind really a soul created by God through providence and natural generation?  Philosophers of science have yet to solve the mind/body problem.  Exactly how does the brain produce a thinking and sentient soul in the first place?  Yet we have psychologists and psychiatrists pronouncing yet another fallacy of affirming the consequent.  If there are genetic and biological predetermining factors that could cause homosexuality and transgender dysphoria, then there will be homosexuals and persons with transgender dysphoria.  There are actually homosexuals and transgender confused persons, therefore homosexuality and transgender dysphoria must be caused by genetic and biological predispositions of the human body.  But presupposing this is again affirming the consequent.  If A, then B.  B, therefore A.

The fact that no empirical scientist can demonstrate how a brain can manifest a thinking and sentient soul should raise questions about the logical fallacy of presupposing a confused individual was born with a man's body and a woman's mind or vice versa.  Just because a person has same sex attractions, does that prove that the person was biologically or genetically predetermined to that lifestyle or attraction?  The cause could be psychological disorders rather than genetics or biology.  Presupposing that the streets are wet because it is raining ignores the fact that the street could be wet because a water line broke some other place and flooded the area.   The same is true of presupposing the consequent and finding causes to support the consequent.  There could be any number of other causes underlying homosexuality and transgenderism.

Finally, do we know that there is some set of human rights that everyone universally is entitled to?  According to secular humanism these rights are "universally recognized."  But is that statement itself true?  Obviously not since every culture has different customs.  In ancient Greek and Roman societies sexual promiscuity and homosexuality and even pedophilia were commonly accepted practices.  In Christian societies these are taboos.  In short, presupposing a set of human rights based on popular opinion is a contradiction because there is no universally recognizable authority for developing a set of human rights.  Popular vote does not determine morality per se because morality is maleable and relative to each society.  Unless there is a deontological basis for morality there can be only a totalitarian determination of morality by the state.  For Christianity there is a higher authority than human opinions.  That authority is the Word of God, the Holy Scriptures.  We ought to obey the governing authorities and the civil authority.  (Romans 13:1-14).  But when the government commands Christians to accept homosexual marriage, transgenderism, and the murder of unborn babies, the Christian has a higher obligation to obey God rather than man.  (Acts 4:19, 5:29).  In recent comments President Obama said that Christians must accept the dogma of secular humanism and change the teaching of the Scriptures.  [See:  Christian Churches 'Must be Made to Affirm Homosexuality'].  The dogma of homosexual marriage and transgenderism is soon to be a legally enforced doctrine of the socialist state.  The same thing has been said by Hillary Clinton in regards to abortion.  Christians must accept the dehumanization of human babies or face legal sanctions, according to Clinton.  [See: Hillary Clinton: Force Christians to Change Their Religious Views to Support Abortion].

[Cf. Leviticus 18:22-23; Romans 1:27; 1 Corinthians 6:9-11; Genesis 19:5; Judges 19:22; Deuteronomy 22:5; Leviticus 19:28; 1 Kings 18:28]

I will ask this question again.  Which god is it that gives human beings the right to murder infants and practice perversions like homosexuality and mutilate their bodies to look like the opposite biological sex?  (2 Corinthians 4:3-6).  

Is Donald Trump any better?  No.  Trump is for using tax dollars to fund Planned Parenthood, which exists solely for women's health issues.   Of course, the term "women's health" in liberal jargon means the right to murder an infant in the womb at any stage of development from conception up to just prior to a normal birth at nine months.  Viability is not the determining factor but sheer dehumanization of a human person.  Even Hillary Clinton acknowledged that an unborn child is a person in a rare slip of the tongue:   [Hillary Clinton Admits That Abortion Kills a ‘Person’].   Donald Trump is a relativist in regards to morality as his affirmation of the LGBTQ lobby clearly shows.  Trump is no friend of Evangelical Christianity and to affirm his candidacy is the same as attacking Christianity since he would uphold totalitarian laws restricting religious freedom and theological dissent from the dogmas of the secular humanism state.

For the Christian the final authority in all matters of morality, faith, and practice is not the secularist state or socialism.  Instead the Christian is obligated to obey God when there is a conflict between state dogma and biblical deontological morality.  The Christian cannot in good conscience obey laws that command him or her to recognize a perversion as "marriage" or obey laws that command them to recognize a woman's right to murder her unborn baby at any stage after conception up to and including just prior to a normal birth.  The sixth commandment says, "Thou shalt not murder."   (Exodus 20:13).  The Bible is a book that is logical and propositional in nature and it is perfectly legitimate to logically deduce civil and judicial laws based on the morality revealed in the general principles of the Decalogue and the other moral laws revealed in Holy Scripture.  [See Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 1:6].

 6.      The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man’s salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit or traditions of men. (2 Tim. 3:15–17, Gal. 1:8–9, 2 Thess. 2:2) Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word: (John 6:45, 1 Cor 2:9–12) and that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature, and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed. (1 Cor. 11:13–14, 1 Cor. 14:26, 40).   WCF 1:6.

In short, true Christians are at this time a small minority or remnant in the United States of America and around the world.  Most of the western countries are now openly socialist, materialistic, and hostile to biblical Christianity.  Persecution is just around the corner.  How much longer will the liberal media and the totalitarian state be content with religious freedom?  They are already willing to take away the second amendment right to bear arms.  The freedom of speech and freedom of religion is also on their hit list as relative to the socialist and secular humanist agenda to stamp out the archaic religions of the past and replace them with theological relativism and secular atheism.  Those who are supporting Trump are not offering a legitimate alternate but simply affirming the same result but with a different leader.  Trump is willing to equivocate and dissimulate to win the Evangelical vote.  But in the end Trump's agenda is no different from the agenda of the far left.  His only points of difference with them is on the issue of open borders and free trade or the Transpacific Partnership.  Other than that Trump is still a socially progressive liberal.  But the question is how is it progress when America is regressing to atheism and paganism rather than staying true to the Christian values deduced from the Bible?  It is the rule of law that is deduced logically from the Scriptures that has made our nation great and that has caused western civilization to advance peace around the world.  Instead the secularists want to exalt an intolerant pluralism that does not include the right to believe the Bible literally as it is logically and propositionally revealed from God himself.  The best summary of the system of propositional truth in the Holy Scriptures is the Westminster Confession of Faith.

Humans alone are created in the image of God.  Since God is a spiritual being with no body, it logically follows that the image of God cannot be a material body.   (John 4:24).  It is man's soul which is spiritual and immaterial and it is this spiritual and immaterial soul that is the image of God.  God, being Logic (John 1:1), enlightens every man with the ability to think.  (John 1:9).  Man is not a tabula rasa at birth but is innately endowed with the ability to reason, think logically, keep time, remember the past, and examine contingencies to predict various outcomes for future events.   [See:  The Image of God in Man, by Dr. Gordon H. Clark].  If morality is relative to culture, then morality changes with culture.  The basic premise of secular humanism is that deontological ethics deduced from the archaic Scriptures of Christianity is subject to revision.   Tomorrow it might be perfectly fine to eliminate subhuman homeless persons who have nothing to contribute to society.  Unborn babies are merely a source of human body parts used to enhance the lives of those better able to pay for this service and who have something more significant to contribute to a socialist utopia.  Any political or theological dissent based on an objective standard of morality is intolerable to the secularists.  Although they pretend to be tolerant the one thing they cannot tolerate is legislating morality.  Instead they prefer to legislate immorality and outlaw religious dissent based on the proposition that the Bible is the plenary and verbally inspired words of God and without error in every proposition recorded therein.

Thinking Christians need to stand for the truth and make it known that relativism and progressivism is not an option and that they are willing to suffer persecution if necessary.   Those so-called Evangelical  churches that are more concerned with not losing their tax exempt status--read state licensed or state controlled churches--are not faithful to the Scriptures but to the state.  This distinction will become even more evident as time goes on.

Some so-called Scripturalists are libertarians or libertines.  They believe the axiom that nothing is wrong except what harms another person.  But the Decalogue and the Scriptures disagree.  Leaving out the first table of the Ten Commandments is unconscionable.  Belief in the God of the Bible is the very bedrock of a democratic and constitutional Republic.  Without the Bible the rule of law means nothing.  I end with the question,  "How do you deduce a libertarian political philosophy from the logical and propositional system revealed in the Bible by good and necessary consequence?"

Charlie J. Ray, M.Div.