CAP –
Study 6 – Kingdom of God – Confidence and Leadership
This segment
concludes the chapter on the Kingdom of God, as authored by Gary North in his
book “Unconditional Surrender.” It clearly calls into question some of the
present teachings of the church and the resultant ineffectiveness not only of
the church, but leadership at all levels in the whole world.
·
Why
is the church so pessimistic about its role - in time and on earth? Who wants
to be a commander in a losing cause?
·
When
Moses selected Joshua to lead ancient Israel, what happened to the rest of his
generation which resisted and mistrusted God? Are we the modern version of them
by resisting God’s dominion assignment?
·
How
do we justify our inaction?
·
What
are we in effect doing when we continually pray for miracles without laboring
for victory under God’s revealed law-order?
·
When
will we decide to leave the wilderness of doubt, pessimism and confusion?
The biblical
reasoning and logic of this subject was detailed in the previous studies.
Please review as you need to do so. Also, I would strongly advise that you
re-read the recent Notes and Asides #4 – “Understanding What We Believe.” The
following is from “Unconditional Surrender.”
For a
successful program of delegated responsibility to persevere, the church must
become convinced that such delegated authority can produce long-term benefits. The church must become confident
in its own earthly future. The church must become convinced that it
is an honor to bear new responsibilities, in time and on earth, in every area
of life. The church - and I mean the multitude of Christians acting as dominion men - must become
convinced that we aren't God's cannon fodder, that we aren't destined to defend
the last outpost. Who wants to take responsibility for commanding despondent
troops who won't take responsibility themselves? Who wants to lead an army of
incompetents whose own Supreme Commander has supposedly told them that the army
is destined for temporal defeat? Who wants to be a commander in a losing cause? Who wants to command
troops when it isn't safe to delegate authority to any of your subordinates a
lesson which you learned from your Supreme Commander, who made this mistake at
the very beginning of the war? Nobody sensible would do it. I submit that this is a major
factor in explaining why Christians have nobody sensible leading them in
this century - or at least very, very few sensible people.
What should be our first step in
locating a generation of competent leaders? Moses selected Joshua to lead Israel into the land
because Joshua was one of only two spies who had returned to Israel, 40 years
before, to recommend that they march in right then and take the land that had
been promised to them (Numbers 14:6-10). Caleb, the only other spy to agree
with Joshua, also entered the land, as God had said he would (Numbers 14:24).
Only two men were optimistic. Not an auspicious beginning for Israel in the
wilderness. But God has all the time necessary to achieve His
goals. He simply waited for all of the older ones to die off, except Caleb and
Joshua. Then they marched across the Jordan River and began the
conquest.
The younger generation took God's word
more seriously than their parents had.
They entered Canaan believing that God would give all the nations of Canaan
into their hands. They didn't remain true to this faith; they were unsuccessful
in dislodging several of the tribes (Judges 1). They were, however, far more
confident than the generation of the exodus had been, and far more successful.
Therefore, the first step in locating reliable leaders is to reverse
the paralyzing pessimism of contemporary Christianity. We must take God
seriously. When
God gave man his dominion assignment, God meant business. He was serious. He
built the dominion impulse into man, and only a progressive demonization of men
can begin to thwart that impulse. In hell and in the lake of fire, the dominion
impulse cannot find expression. Part of hell's horrors is the eternal thwarting
of that impulse. For regenerated
men, the adopted sons of God, there can be no question concerning the
continuing nature of the dominion assignment. Since it was built into
man's very being the task which defined man's purpose from the beginning - the progressive ethical
untwisting of the presently distorted image of God in man will bring the
dominion impulse into the forefront of the life of man. The kingdom
of God is an ethical imperative, but since man bears God's image, and
his built-in purpose is to exercise dominion over God's creation, the kingdom
of God is also an ontological imperative an inescapable aspect of the
being of regenerated mankind.
Israel
was defined in terms of God's
promise to Abraham (Genesis 15:13-16). God would give the seed of Abraham
the land. This was an unconditional
promise, for Abraham had surrendered to God unconditionally. God had
dragged Abraham to Himself. He had dragged Abraham out of Ur of the Chaldees
and Haran. He told Abraham what He would do for Abraham's heirs, and He would
fulfill His promise (Galatians 3:16-19). Israel would enter Canaan. Israel was destined to enter Canaan. Yet Israel was also commanded
to enter Canaan, and the older generation refused to obey. Their
punishment: to die in the wilderness. But Israel did enter the land
eventually.
Redeemed mankind must subdue the earth. It is God's dominion assignment.
We cannot evade its implications without suffering punishment. Our generation may try to evade
its responsibilities in this regard. Our generation may continue to deceive
itself, arguing that the Bible's promises of victory, in time and on earth, are
to be interpreted as spiritual victories only, the internal victory over sin,
but with endless defeat in the external world of culture, until Christ finally
returns to deliver us from destruction. Men may try to justify their failure in
the external world by pointing to their own hypothetical victory over sin in
their spiritual lives. Christians who do this will view the institutional
church as a haven of refuge, God's port in the storm, and they will turn
inward, concerning themselves with endless bureaucratic ecclesiastical
squabbles, signifying practically nothing.
Christians
may take another approach, and try to postpone the establishment of God's visible
kingdom until after Christ returns physically to give us total direction,
placing us in various bureaucratic positions where we will be allowed to follow
detailed orders from the cosmic Command Post. General Headquarters will issue
comprehensive orders, and we will obey them to the letter. We won't ever again
have to make responsible decisions, fit ting the letter of the law to external
circumstances without deviating from the spirit of the law a difficult, though
responsible, process. The future external, visible kingdom will therefore not
be our responsibility to build, but Christ's.
By using
either of these two approaches, today's Christians seek to justify
their own cultural impotence, their own lack of dominion. They internalize the kingdom, pointing
to supposed victories inside their souls victories that never result in
cultural influence. Or else they point to a coming discontinuous event, which will bring
power to them only in terms of the creation of a massive supernatural bureaucracy. In the
meantime, both views preach pessimism concerning this age. Both views prophesy the defeat of
the church externally in this age. Both views create a desire to
escape from the responsibilities of this world the comprehensive
responsibilities of cultural dominion. Both views reinforce our rebellious tendencies to defy God, deny the
dominion assignment, and retreat into a closed, isolated society to sing
our hymns, pray our prayers for deliverance, and eat our mess of pottage.
We have tried to sell our birthright to the devil. Let him exercise
dominion! Let him bear the responsibilities! Let him rule in time
and on earth, if only he will give us a little more time to pray and sing.
Maybe if we grant him his right to rule temporarily, he’ll be nice and let us
alone. Let Satan rule,
if Satan lets us alone: this is the "battle cry" of contemporary Christianity.
We need to revive our hope in God. We need to revive our hope in
His good judgment. We need to revive our hope in ourselves, as redeemed men, so
that we can face the dominion assignment with confidence. We need to regain our
confidence in the power of God's revealed law as a tool of dominion. We need an eschatology of
victory, in time and on earth an optimism concerning our ability to extend
dominion and subdue the earth, making manifest the comprehensive kingdom
of God, in time and on earth, before Christ finally comes in victory to remove
His people from a world whose potential has been used up because God's people
have fulfilled the terms of God's dominion assignment.
This requires unconditional surrender. We must surrender to God's
absolute sovereignty. We mustn't mouth the words, "the sovereignty of
God," if we really mean, "The sovereignty of God, with a little
sovereignty to man." We have to read Job 38-41, Romans 9, and Ephesians 1
again and again, until we recognize God's total sovereignty. Then, once we see who
is really sovereign, we can have faith in ourselves, as redeemed and
progressively restored ambassadors of God on earth. Then, and only then,
will we bring God's peace treaty before the citizens of Satan's shrinking and
defensive kingdom, calling them to sign the treaty now, to submit unconditionally
to its terms of surrender, and to make a covenant with the God of the invading
kingdom. Those who are meek
before God shall inherit the earth.
The
kingdom of Satan is very much like Jericho in Joshua's early days. The church
of God has its marching orders. It is to conquer the land, driving out the
inhabitants. This time, we are not to use force, as the Israelites did, but we are to use the sword of the Lord, the preaching of the gospel. We
are ambassadors, not spies, this time. We announce the coming of the
kingdom. We warn the residents of today's cities of the coming
judgment. In Deuteronomy 20:10-15, God gave us the command not to destroy a
distant city without offering it the opportunity to sign a peace treaty and to
become tributaries. This is the same treaty God sends to the nations today.
Their time is running short. God's kingdom is coming. They must capitulate now,
or else spend eternity as fiery sacrifices to God. It is to their advantage to
become members of God's kingdom.
God gave the people of Canaan time to
think about His arrival, in the person of His people. They knew what was coming a
generation in advance, and they trembled (Joshua 2:9-11). Perhaps they grew
temporarily confident when the Israelites of Moses' day grew fearful, and
decided to remain in the wilderness, culturally impotent, fed by God's
miraculous manna (Exodus 16:15,31-35). God graciously spoon-fed these
pathetic former slaves until they died. The Canaanites were
given an extra generation to fill up their cup of iniquity (Genesis 15:16). But
the day God parted the waters of the Jordan River, the manna ceased forever
(Joshua 5:12). God would spoon-feed these people no longer. The miraculous manna
would never again appear on their land. The land was now permanent land; they
would have to subdue it under God's law. That spelled the end of the road for
most of the Canaanites, and had Israel been more faithful, it would have been
the end for all of them.
This leads us to a crucially important principle: when
God's people seek continual miracles from God, rather than victory by means of
labor under God's revealed law-order, they are admitting defeat. When God's people prefer to be
spoon-fed rather than to exercise responsible dominion, the kingdom of Satan is
given another stay of execution. It is this continual
praying for miracles, for discontinuities in history rather than the continuity
of victory under law, which has paralyzed the expansion of God's kingdom. Pessimism
concerning the church's ability to extend God's comprehensive kingdom,
coupled with the slave's hope in miraculous, discontinuous deliverance, have
kept the church wandering in the wilderness for several generations. Should we be surprised
at the second-rate officers we have today, given the state of mind of the
troops? Should a generation of slaves, who wait trembling for their master to
tell them exactly what to do next, expect anything better than third-rate
bureaucrats to lead them? When men flee from the burdens of responsible self-government
as men of both kingdoms are doing all over the world today, should we expect to
see Christians demand God's freedom under God's law?
Let us flee the wilderness. Let us abandon hope in our
daily manna, our daily miracles. Let us abandon the need to be spoon-fed by
God. Let us begin to act like shepherds. Let us begin to accept the bur dens of
responsible self-government under the guidelines provided by God's law. Since
the law is no longer a threat to us eternally, because we are delivered by
Christ from the curse of the law, let us approach God's law as a
master craftsman approaches a tool that he understands and respects, and
not as apprentices who are afraid of the tool and the responsibilities of using
that tool in their labor.
When Christian leaders see that they are called to lead
confident troops who understand the responsibilities of self-government, and
who are willing to bear these responsibilities because they understand the law
of God, their tool of dominion, we will find better quality leaders accepting
their positions of responsibility, not just in the institutional church, but in
every institution, in every walk of life.
