When Church and State Go Bad

Kopp Disclosure

(John 3:19-21)

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Scratching the Surface

of

Civil/Ecclesiastical Disobedience

(When Disobeying Church/State is Obedient to God)

Prooftexting is popular among immature believers and intentional deceivers; taking texts out of context to pretend proving something inconsistent with the corpus of the Bible.

It’s eisegesis (putting into the text what is not there) over exegesis (taking out of the text what is there); reimagining Biblical texts by substituting human thoughts for divine truth instead of extracting the exact truth of God as explicit in the text.

It happens when theology is reimagined: “So man created God in his image.  In the image of man, man created God.”

It happens when what we think and want and how we feel become more persuasive than God’s prescriptions for holy living in the Bible: “I know that’s what Jesus and the Bible say…but I think.”

Church and state are good at it; prompting their confidence in fooling/misleading/tricking-to-control the Biblically ignorant: “You can fool all of the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time.  Not bad odds!”

Church and state often twist and turn texts out of context to fool/mislead/trick-to-control us; especially when trying to get us to follow them over Him.

They are especially fond of Matthew 22:21 (“Give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and give to God the things that are God’s!”) and Romans 13:1 (“Be subject to the government!’) because, taken out of context, they assist in keeping people in subservience.

Jesus and Paul never meant those words to convince us to follow church and state like mindless drones.

Their contextual assumption is obedience to church and state is required by believers if

church and state are obedient to God as measured by Jesus according to the book.

Examples.

Read Exodus 1.

Read Daniel 6.

Read Matthew 5-7.

Read Acts 5:17ff.

C67 is right on: “Confessions and declarations are subordinate standards in the church, subject to the authority of Jesus Christ, the Word of God, as the Scriptures bear witness to Him.”

Simply, a believer’s highest goal, greatest ambition, and most fervent prayer are to honor God above all others.

It’s the safest way to live here and forever.

I think of obedience to God as akin to a traffic light signal.

When the traffic light is red, we stop.

When it’s green, we go.

When it’s yellow, we proceed cautiously.

That’s how traffic signals keep us safe.

When God’s will in Jesus by the book is clear, we go.

When God’s will in Jesus by the book contradicts our direction, we stop.

When God’s will in Jesus by the book is not completely clear yet, we proceed cautiously; digging deeper into intimacy with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as best explained in Holy Scripture until we are sure it’s safe to go.

It’s like the old gospel song heralds as a promise and warning, “Trust and obey; for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey!”

Jesus by the book is the safest way to live here and forever.

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Blessings and Love!

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