Books and books have been written on why the above picture is a really bad idea (having a Christian nation) but I'll just give you one.
If you pick up any reputable book on church history you'll see that union of church and government has been nothing but a centuries long train-wreck.
If you want to consider Christian political engagement, heed the counsel of this essay.
The gospel will move forward through the witness of God's people (the church), not through the power of the state.
14 comments:
Silly Christian. I suppose you'd rather have a muslim nation? Or how about a godless nation? Where does that sign say anything about a "gov't imposed" Christianity?
Let's suppose for a moment that dispensationalism is incorrect, and the gospel prevails through the Zeal of God (see Isa 9:7), what kind of world\nation will\would we have? If a majority of any nation is Christian, by Biblical evangelism, what kind of nation would that be?
true secularism is an impossiblility.
Anonymous,
Don't be. It just make a person look cowardly. I'm sure you don't want that reputation.
The sign implies that we are a Christian nation (or once were). Unless you live under a rock you know that's not the case.
So do I want a Muslim nation or secular nation? I don't really care. The mission doesn't change no matter who is in political power or whatever the dominant cultural expression might be.
Should we fight for laws that restrain evil? Of course! But restraining evil speaks very little to the gospel. That is what I am most most concerned about. The gospel moving forward and it will never happen through gov.
A nation is not a state.
At least in America, where the government is supposed to represent the people.
The American people have always been mostly Christian, and Christianity has shaped our culture and laws more than any other worldview (at least, it used to).
I for one am glad and thankful to live in a country that has many Christians as "alien-citizens" (as our citizenship is in Heaven) presently and throughout our history. I'm thankful that there were many Believers among the Founders and those who wrote the founding documents and fought in the Revolutionary War. I'm thankful that many Christians have served in the governments of the several States and in our Federal government in many capacities.
I think that Anonymous makes a reasonable point that there are some more than semantic differences between a nation and a state. Nevertheless, I must agree with Zach that we are not by definition a Christian nation.
This past Sunday, I turned on the radio to hear a large local church's Easter sunrise service open with the playing of the Star Spangled Banner, the national anthem of the United States of America. I spent many years thinking that there were rightly strong ties between patriotism and correctly held and understood Christian faith. But as I heard the closing notes of that tune to open that service...I couldn't help but think about the "two kingdoms," about how this world and its countries will certainly pass away, and most of all how the Church stands on this Earth, somehow as an embassy of the Kingdom of God. Its members are children of the King, citizens of heaven, strangers and aliens, ambassadors for Christ...and how the national emblems just seemed terribly out of place, even as a matter of "paying respect." (As I went on to hear the preacher refer to Christ as our "designated driver," my surprise at including the SPB in a church service kind of wore off, I must say).
So no, we are not a "Christian nation." We may be, or have been, a nation with Biblically-informed foundations. Indeed, I'm thankful to have that instead of an Islamic theocracy or a Communist state ... but at the same time, look how the Church is growing in those places, and consider the faith of Believers under such regimes. Yet much of America seems to consider nominal Christianity a national birthright. How very sad THAT is.
Oops. SSB, not SPB, for Star Spangled Banner.
VitZ...
(I am the first Anonymous.)
You haven't addressed my questions.
No one, including the sign, said anything about a STATE imposed religion. Get and read this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Against-Christianity-Peter-J-Leithart/dp/1591280060
I have the book and started reading it. It's on the stack!
Identify yourself for real and then we can talk.
z
2nd Anonymous,
Regarding your assertion that "The American people have always been mostly Christian," can you provide solid evidence to back up that claim? I can't see how one could possibly find concrete, substantive evidence for such a broad claim, but if you can, I would sincerely like to see it.
Personally, I think that the idea of "Americans having always been mostly Christian" is terribly confusing to non-Christians, in terms of their trying to understand what Christianity actually *is.*
There is a *huge* difference between a general, societal acceptance of certain Christian *principles* (and even, a vaguely worded verbal profession of "Christian faith") and actual, genuine Christianity, believed and lived out in the lives of a nation of people. By the latter, *Biblical* standard of Christian faith (the "believing" and "living", not the "nation" part), I simply cannot swallow the claim that the majority of Americans have "always been Christians." If you have evidence to the contrary though, I would really like to see it.
>>If you have evidence to the contrary though, I would really like to see it.
82% of Americans self-identify themselves as "Christians" according to a 2002 Pew Research Study.
Perhaps you have evidnece that the 82% are liars. Or perhaps a No True Christian line.
-- 2nd Anonymous
This article should shed some light on the issue:
http://www.evangelicaloutpost.com/archives/2009/04/america-is-not.html
z
2nd Anonymous,
Is someone a Christian simply because he likes to *call* himself a Christian? You mentioned self-identification. Is that what defines a Christian? If it is, then a Hindu can also be a Christian-- because some Hindus *claim* to also be Christians.
A Christian is one who actually believes what the Bible teaches on very basic issues, such as the Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Sprit), the atonement of Christ on the cross for sinners, the exclusivity of Christ for salvation, and Heaven and Hell.
About the 82% that you mentioned, those numbers reduce radically when one looks at surveys which question professing American Christians about actual, specific Christian *doctrines* (such as the above ones that I listed). For example, I read a survey which claimed that only 36% of professing Christians in America believe in moral absolutes.
How in the world can one be a Christian and *not* believe in moral absolutes? The logical, rational answer is, one can't-- which means that 64% of the professing American Christians in that survey are either terribly, terribly confused about the truths of the Christian faith, or they are not Christians at all. If "Christianity" is simply a matter of calling oneself a Christian, then the Bible means nothing-- which means there *is* no such thing as Christianity.
Vitamin Z is giving a baptistic view of the state. I prefer the Westminster Confession (1647): the magistrate has a duty to suppress heresy and promote true religion, yet the magistrate may never intrude into the institutional church (or risk getting leprosy like Uzziah did).
I think part of the question here is: Can and do nations of people generally understand and seek God in a way that is Biblical, rather than according to, say, the Koran, or according to Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist, Marxist or other religions and philosophies?
Acts 17:26ff say, "And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel their way toward him and find him."
Will a nation be wholesale Christian in that as a unity, it believes savingly in the deity, death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ? No. But I believe that God created certain nations that would seek Him MORE according to the knowledge of Christ than some belief in Muhammed as God's prophet, or according to vain philosophies.
I don't mean by this to contradict my previous post. I think we ought to take great care in what we say and mean if we call the US a "Christian Nation," especially in this day and time. There is not consensus on what that means, even among saved people!
Heaven and earth will pass away... and in the end, in Heaven will be people FROM EVERY NATION (Rev 7:9), and regardless of the apparent religious bent of a nation, "God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him" (Acts 10:34b-35a).
Convinced though he was of human sin, Paul was not a pessimistic. He believed that powers can be turned to become instruments of the reign of Jesus. Through the cross, we know that nations are not divine, but through the cross nations can (and have) become Christian. ~ PEter Leithart
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