Planted by Water

I am doing some reading at the moment about the Kingdom and how its influence is to be extended in the world, so I got round to reading a book I have been meaning to get round to for a number of years. It was written nearly 20 years ago but many of its themes are still relevant. It is Kingdoms in Conflict, by Charles Colson, the aide to President Nixon, who got caught up in the Watergate scandal of the 70s and was imprisoned. He became a Christian and now is a major Christian leader in the US, having founded Prison Fellowship Ministries, and Breakpoint, which provides a Christian perspective on political and cultural issues in US.

I am wrestling with this whole question of how can we be a force of influence in the world for the Kingdom without falling into the trap of trying to ‘bring in the Kingdom’ through politics and legislation; in other words, to try to Christianise society. To do this, it seems to me, is to make two fundamental mistakes - it fails to see the essentially ’spiritual nature’ of the Kingdom; and it fails to reckon with the incompleteness of the Kingdom’s coming in this age - there is still that which awaits the consummation of the Kingdom; until then the wheat and the weeds grow together. But exactly to what extent will our Kingdom influence affect legislation and social policy, and how? This is a key question that  I am seeking to become clearer on. Any thoughts?

Colson is really clear in some ways on how you cannot use politics to enforce the Kingdom. Although this is based more on the idea of the separation of church and state and their two distinct spheres, rather than a theological position on the nature of the Kingdom, there are many insightful things implied about the Kingdom in what he says.

But because he is defending a Judeo-Christian tradition as a religious tradition, and believes that the US and its constitution are based on the need for a moral and religious character to society, it seems to me that he does end up wanting to ‘Christianise’ in some ways. His views of a state that is ‘rooted in moral absolutes’ are hard to make workable in a pluralistic society.  He is surely better when he emphasises the role of the state simply in restraining evil, preserving order and promoting justice (although what that exactly means in practice is an interesting thought). It is the the job of the church, then, to preach the gospel and to demonstrate the attractiveness of living God’s way.

Given the background that he comes from (an American conservative, Republican), he is very clear-headed about a lot of things and certainly doesn’t just trot out the typical, ‘religious right’ party line - though he is clearly affected by the fear and hatred of Communism, the ‘reds under the beds’ paranoia that affected many Americans during the Cold War. Nevertheless, the extent to which he puts power in the state is worrying. That he perhaps falls into this trap of believing man - and especially the US government -  can do too much of God’s work is shown in the fact that he was one of the evangelical leaders who wrote the so-called ‘Land Letter’ urging President Bush to make a pre-emptive strike on Iraq, and to argue that it would fit the category of a just war. For those of us who feel that the last thing you could say about the Iraq war was that it was just, this gives cause for concern. It is just one illustration of how difficult it can be when determining exactly how the Christian is meant to influence the political world.

Colson is actually at his best when he is writing about the effect of numerous individual Christians - the little platoons - in normal everyday life. This has got to be one of the main means of extending the influence of the Kingdom, but its effects on politics, law, social policy and wider cultural and ethical issues has still to be reckoned with.

Some Quotes

Utopianism always spells disaster because ‘the utopian holds that, if the goal is goodness and perfection, then the use of force is justified’….In contrast, the Christian realisation that perfection eludes us in this life resists the tyranny and bloodshed of the dictator who promises a brave new world.

That this Kingdom is not of this world….and that it is spiritual rather than temporal makes it no less authoritative; that it is a rule not a realm makes it no less an actual Kingdom, nor its laws less binding than those of nations and states, any more than unseen physical laws are less binding than the laws of legislatures.

While it cannot redeem the world or be used as a tool to establish the Kingdom of God, civil government does set the boundaries for human behaviour. The state is not a remedy for sin, but  a means to restrain it.

Thus, the church, while not the kingdom of God, is to live out the values of the Kingdom of God in this world, resisting the ever-present temptation to usher in the Kingdom of God by political means. Yet this is the temptation to which the church,……….. has most commonly succumbed, and certainly this is its greatest temptation today.

In the course of history the church has always assumed a false attitude toward the state when it has forgottem that the present time is already fulfillment, but not yet consummation. 

But while the church must avoid utopianism and diversion from its transcendent mission, it is not to ignore the political scene. To the contrary…..its members, who are also citizens of the world, have a duty, as Carl Henry puts it, "to work through civil authority for the advancement of justice and human good."

The Christian, knowing that the will of the majority cannot determine truth, seeks no preferential favour for his religion from government. His confidence, instead, is that truth is found in Christ alone - and this is so no matter how many people believe it, no matter whether those in power believe it. While this may sound exclusivistic, it is this very assurance that makes….the Christian the most vigorous defender of human liberty. And those who resent the exclusive claims of Christianity are practicing the same intolerance they profess to resent. The essence of pluralism is, after all, that each person respects the other’s right to believe in an exclusive claim to truth.