Before posting Study 5, I would like to further explain some of the fundamental structure of the whole series of CAP and the basic premise behind it.
Over the last 15- 20 years, I have read many books and watched some DVD series on Christian history and American politics. I have also tried to keep up with social, cultural, scientific and economic developments. As Christians, we should have a solid grounding in most of these areas.
So far, I have brought into play in this CAP series - two books and one DVD. I periodically draw from each, as I see the topic developing. If I had to select just one resource which encapsulates most of what I’ve learned and best expresses it in a readable style, it would be Gary North’s “Unconditional Surrender” book. In fact, he wrote it because he couldn’t find one which he could recommend to others.
This book has become the basic track on which our CAP series will run, in the short term at least. It is so well organized that we don’t have to read the whole book from beginning to end chronologically. Each topic has been helpful to me as an entity unto itself, with an excellent summary and conclusion. Some of you might want to order it yourself and I would certainly recommend it. The best price I have found is at American Vision. A free download is also available.
The basic premise behind this book is that we are now living in this phase of the Kingdom of God, which Jesus began upon His first advent. This is fundamentally in opposition to what a large percentage of Christians believe. That is why I have decided to post Mr. North’s Preface to his book.
(The following is from “Unconditional Surrender”.)
PREFACE
This
book was born of necessity. In 1980, I was publishing a bi weekly economic
newsletter, Remnant Review, which was sent to people who are interested
in ways of preserving and increasing their capital. In my June 6, 1980 issue, I
wrote about the "Four G’s” in investing: gold, groceries, guns, and God. I
had plenty of recommendations on the first three, but when I came to the
fourth, I got stuck. I wanted
to recommend a good introductory book on the significance of Christianity
for the modern world, and I couldn't think of one. There are books of many
kinds, all dealing with one aspect or another of Christian faith and
worship, but I couldn't think of one that was general, theologically
accurate, comprehensive, and readable.
This began
to bother me. At the time I was publishing seven newsletters - and writing four
of them - so my time was extremely scarce. Furthermore, I ran the Institute for
Christian Economics, and one of my continuing projects was writing a complete
economic commentary on the Bible. Then as now, I spent a minimum of ten hours a
week, fifty weeks per year, on this project. So I knew I didn't have much time
to write a book. At the same time, I became convinced that an introductory book
was needed.
To get
the job done without ruining my schedule, I decided to write this book, but
with a time limit. That limit was two weeks. I began on July 2, 1980, and I
finished the first draft on July 14. In fact, I even had half a day to spare,
since I finished in the afternoon.
This was
the last book I ever wrote on a typewriter:
an IBM Selectric III. By the end
of the year, I had switched to a word processing program called SSI, which a
year later became WordPerfect. I used
the SSI program that another ministry owned.
I plugged into its minicomputer by means of a wire strung across the
street. In those days, SSI sold for
$7,500, which in today’s money is $20,000.
It ran on a $25,000 used minicomputer, which in today’s money is
$66,000. ICE bought it for me to
use. Mistake! Within a year, it was possible to buy
WordPerfect for $495, and an IBM PC for under $2,000. I had bought too soon! But in just one week, I doubled my
output. No other tool ever accomplished
that in my lifetime.
I had
James Jordan read the manuscript, and he made some important suggestions. I
have included most of them in the final version. Still, the book is basically
the product of two weeks of writing. The entire project took one month: from
start to final draft.
I
wanted it to be readable.
Complexity makes books unreadable, so I wrote it rapidly: no notes, no outline,
and with only the chapter headings in mind. But I had been studying the Bible
for over twenty years before I began this project. (I used the King James
Version for citations, since most readers own this translation.) With Jordan’s
help, I made major revisions in the chapter on “Man”, in the section dealing
with salvation. I am least happy with this section, since it's more complex
than I had hoped, but I have been unable to figure out a way to make it shorter
or easier. I wanted it to be accurate.
I simply
didn't have time to be more thorough. I hope that my approach has at least made
the book readable. Anyone who wants to pursue some of these topics in
greater detail can follow through by reading further. No single handbook can
serve as a final source on the meaning and implications of Christianity.
I
decided originally to call the book Christianity: What Difference Does It Make? Some
of my associates wanted me to call it Sheer Christianity, a title
reminiscent of C. S. Lewis's Mere Christianity. But I stuck with Unconditional
Surrender, since I think it comes closer to the major themes of this book.
I wanted
to produce a handbook that
could serve as an introduction to the basics of Christianity, as well as a
study guide for people who are already Christians, but who have never spent much time considering
the social, political, and economic implications of Christianity. It might be thought of as a fat tract. It might be
thought of as a Christian manifesto. My hope is that it will at least be
thought of.
The book
is divided into three sections. The first section, "Foundations," covers the
fundamentals of orthodox Christianity. These are the religious principles that
set Christianity apart from all other religions. The second section, "Institutions,"
covers the implications of Christianity for the major institutions of human
life. We should expect to find a very different approach in each major
institution from what we would expect to find in non-Christian cultures.
Finally, there is the third section on "Expectations." What should we expect in the future?
How will we implement the principles we found in section one? Do we have time
to develop the institutional base of section two? What is the proper plan of
action? What are we required by God to do?
In the
third edition, published in 1987, I added the chapter on “Time”, and in this edition,
I have added another chapter, “Judgment”. I did this because I recognized that the book
should be structured in terms of the five points of the biblical covenant
model. This five-point structure was the
basis of Ray Sutton’s book, That You May
Prosper: Dominion By Covenant, which the ICE published in 1987. The first three chapters of this book matched
the first three chapters of his.
I knew in 1980 that
this book will inevitably offend everybody. It breaks with most of what we know
as "establishment Christianity." There are many establishment
Christians who think they aren't part of a religious establishment, but they
are. When they read this book, and if they think about what they are reading,
they will either have to reject much of what I conclude in this book or else
they will have to begin to labor long and hard to rethink the religious
principles they have been taught for many years.
Any time a reader
doesn't like what he's reading, he should check his premises. Then he should
check out the documentation I provide. Errors
in any human book are inevitable, but it's a question of reducing errors to a
minimum. This
book breaks with many of the current slogans of Christian churches, yet it
was written in terms of this presupposition: the Bible is the inspired Word
of God. It was perfect in the original manuscripts (autographs). It is because
I believe the Bible is inspired with respect to both its historical data and
its theological judgments, that I decided to write this book. I am convinced
that much of what passes for conservative Christianity in the early
twenty-first century is neither conservative nor Christian.
What I recommend to the
reader is simple to state but difficult to achieve: respect for what the Bible says. Something isn't
Christian because I say it is, but because the Bible says it is. At the same
time, something isn't Christian just because some pastor or some familiar book
says it is. Just because you haven't heard anything like the message this book
presents doesn't mean it isn't an accurate message. You have to make up your
own mind. Tradition is no substitute for personal responsibility. Slogans you
learned in Sunday school may not be what the Bible really teaches. Just because
you may have an outline at the foot of each page in your Bible doesn't
guarantee that the text of the Bible teaches what's in those footnotes. You have
to decide, not in terms of what men say, but what the Bible says.
-July,
2010
