Rather than ping-ponging
between the theocracies of the the Christian Left and Right, we should
recognize that we live as Calvin wrote, in a “twofold kingdom”
(duplex regimen). Surely we understand what that means differently from
the way he did but it is a good and helpful distinction. It means that we have
duties to both the civil magistrate and to the church. As members of the civil
polity, which is best understood as a covenant of works, we ought to advocate
policies that are for the welfare of all citizens. Those policies are best
grounded in natural revelation, accessible to all who will use their senses and
rational faculties. As members of
the spiritual polity (represented by the visible church), which is a covenant
of grace, Christians have a duty to show love and grace to those the civil
magistrate admits to the protections of the republic. The United States is not
a new incarnation of national Israel nor is it the church. It is a civil
polity. As such it does things that the church cannot and should not do (e.g.,
bear the sword). The church is the Israel of God, in Christ. The church does
what the state cannot do, namely show grace to the undeserving and to administer
the keys of the eternal, spiritual kingdom.
It is not easy to know how to relate our duties to both realms
simultaneously and faithful Christians will disagree but we have liberty to do
so. One may think that it is good civil policy to admit Syrian refugees (e.g.,
to help defuse anti-Western sentiment in the Middle East) and another may think
it foolish to admit thousands of refugees when it seems clear that doing that
helped facilitate the recent attacks in Paris. Now we are having the sort of
discussion we should: the proper application of wisdom and natural law to civil
policy rather than a debate about who is or is not a faithful Christian using
the machinery of the state to enforce their eschatology upon citizens who may
or may not agree with them.
Read
more at: Refugees
And The Twofold Kingdom | The Heidelblog
