Growing up I was taught to value the greatness and splendor that is The United States of America. For a variety of reasons, The United States was the greatest and best country ever in the whole world and anybody who disagrees was suspect of treason (or hellfire and brimstone). Even in church we learned that we are citizens of God’s Kingdom while at the same time were citizens of a really awesome country (even now, we have to admit there are a lot of awesome things about living in the United States). At vacation Bible school we pledged allegiance to the American flag, the Christian flag, and the Bible (none of which are actually in the Bible itself!).
For a long time I reconciled dual allegiance by seeing my Kingdom citizenship as superior to my earthly citizenship. So long as my allegiance to my country didn’t dominate my allegiance to King Jesus, it was okay to pledge allegiance to my country. Unless my country asked me to disown or disobey my True King, I was free to be an active or supportive participant in my country’s agenda.
I can understand the appeal to a “dual citizenship,” and in many aspects there is no conflict of interests to claim citizenship to both. Some country on earth claims us as its citizen. So what? For many, renouncing their citizenship is not an option, and sometimes there are many benefits to citizenship in a particular country (I’m sure many world-traveling Canadians are proud they aren’t Americans!). Even the Apostle Paul leveraged his Roman citizenship when necessary to advance the Kingdom of God.
Allegiance, on the other hand, is a wholly different matter altogether. Allegiance is far more involved than merely acknowledging the claimant of our earthly home. Allegiance is announcing by our acting and living day to day in the real world. According to New Testament scholar and historian of the first-century N.T. Wright, living as Christians in the world is not merely living lives where fewer sins are committed than those who don’t claim Christ as Lord. Rather, living Christianly is walking and proclaiming with all we are that Jesus is Lord—and if we are to take seriously the first century context in which the gospels were written, that means that we are implicitly agreeing that Caesar is not Lord! That is, we do not claim allegiance to Caesar but to Jesus the Anointed One.
The trick to understanding our citizenship on earth and citizenship in the Kingdom of God is to be wary of our allegiances to another king. If Jesus, through his life, death, and especially the resurrection, has announced and demonstrated that God’s new world is breaking through into our world, then our allegiance is to anything and everything that displays that in-breaking of God’s reign. Where God reigns, the kingdoms of this world do not.
Somebody once asked me if I care about the United States remaining a nation. I replied, “I don’t really care what we call it or how big it is or how long it lasts. I simply want people to be free!” As a Christian, there’s certainly more to my desire than for people to be just free. My desire is that everyone will discover their place in God’s movement in the world. But that movement can take form in whatever manner God sees fit, from whomever from whatever country in any place on earth.
(The thoughts above were inspired by my reading of Tim Suttle’s last chapter in Public Jesus. In my next article I’ll wrap up my live blog of each chapter in the book, including a discussion on what it means to be politically-involved followers of Jesus.)
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allegiance,
dual citizenship,
Kingdom of God,
N.T. Wright,
Tim Suttle
(This is part six of a series liveblogging Tim Suttle’s book, Public Jesus. You can read the introduction to the series here, my post on the first chapter here, and a discussion on Suttle’s Introduction here. Each chapter will be liveblogged.)
Have you ever read a novel so captivating that you find yourself lost in another world? Watched a film so enthralling you were literally on the edge of your seat? Heard a sermon or lecture that challenges your way of thinking, not in a confrontational way, but in a way so refreshing you find yourself not caring that it just questioned everything you’ve previously believed? If you’ve tasted of this kind of “languaging”, you will have a sense of the Christian vocation.
Artisans of written word and the craftsmen of stories know intimately the power of language. Language can be a weapon or an instrument of peace. It can tear down or build up. It can unite and divide. It can reject and accept. We are communicators swimming in the ocean of language, yet many of us often fail to recognize how poorly we use our language in ways that honor God.
While we certainly have the power to shape our language, it is also true that language shapes us as well. Without getting too philosophical about it, a simple example will do. Libertarians often stop an argument between a conservative and a progressive by saying, “You both are framing the argument in the wrong way.” The key here is framing. (By the way, I’m not claiming libertarians don’t poorly frame arguments.) In the same way our simple debates are shaped by the words we use, language itself is so deeply rooted that it affects our world view.
As citizens of the Kingdom of God, followers of Christ ought to be willing and able to do what Jesus did: use the power of language to describe a different vision of reality. When we do, Tim Suttle believes that “God just appears and happens in the moment and leaves us forever changed.” Most of us tend to ignore nuance and look at the world in binary: conservative/progressive, rich/poor, black/white, attractive/unattractive, and so on. But think about what Jesus did; he sided with the unclean, the outcasts, earning himself the title “friend of sinners.” Somehow, Jesus was able and eager to say “yes” to those on the “wrong” side. In doing so, he was able to communicate a vision more radical than a mere elimination of “them” (the bad ones). He came into the world to redeem it, to rescue it, to bring it new life.
Suttle’s chapter on “languaging” God could be condensed into this: “The Christian’s most sacred vocation when relating to another human being is to try to become the conduit through which that person comes into contact with the risen Savior. As we relate to one another, God can ‘happen’ to us over and over.” The whole point of the incarnation is that “God can happen to anyone, anytime, anyplace…” When we pay attention, we can be a part of that. But that’s the hard part, this paying attention business. Without being hostile, we often treat those unlike ourselves indifferently, being inattentive in an equally dehumanizing way. The first step to languaging God is to refuse to ignore the world around us.
There are two things we’re supposedly not to talk about in polite company: religion and politics. Why? It’s divisive, almost inherently so. Good dialogue about such topics takes time. Discussing controversial topics thoughtfully is an art, and takes patience. It takes little time to rouse the passions of the opinionated. It takes gracefulness and humility to dialogue meaningfully. This is why how we speak and how we listen is so important.
Instead of using our words to divide, we ought to use them to embrace. Do we frame discussions in such a way that tilts the conversation our way? Or do we use grace and humility to hear out the other person? When we look into helping those in need, are our words and actions showing them pity or love?
When we become artisans of a new way of speaking, we language God to our world in a way that honors God and respects our neighbor. In this way we bring peace while we preach peace, something both libertarians and Christians are passionately committed.
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Kingdom of God,
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peace,
public jesus,
Tim Suttle,
vision
This is part two of a series liveblogging Tim Suttle’s book, Public Jesus. You can read the introduction to the series here, and a discussion on Suttle’s Introduction here. Each chapter will be liveblogged.
Overview
It’s probably safe to assume that many of us have wrestled with the question, “Why did I wake up here in the world?” For thousands of years human beings have reflected upon the origin, nature, and meaning of life. Philosophers often start with the nature of truth. Scientists start with the Big Bang. However appropriate those may be in certain contexts, Christians, in contrast, start with a story*, one that captures the essence of who we are as human beings.
Tim Suttle begins addressing this question by recounting the story from the beginning, in Genesis, with the God who creates us with the purpose to image God to the rest of creation. Image is a verb, connoting action and purpose. It is more than the mere passive nature of a statue (which is what being an “image” meant in most ancient cultures). More than that, God made humans the keepers of the earth, which meant we were “placed here in the midst of God’s world in order to organize our common life together in such a way that we image God to all creation.”
The problem was that human beings couldn’t really get this vocation quite right. Adam failed, Cain failed, even Noah (the one righteous man on earth) failed after the Flood. From time to time we have had small successes, but over the long haul we’ve done a pretty horrible job of imaging God to creation. So God did something we could not do for ourselves: God entered in and started fixing things.
“If we want to understand what it means to be a human, ultimately, we look at Jesus Christ,” Suttle writes. Jesus keeps us engaged with the story connecting us with God’s mission of redemption.
Suttle believes that the “salt and light” passage in the Sermon on the Mount suggests Jesus’ reconstitution of the creation poem: “Let me tell you why you are here.” Suttle concludes, “Jesus came not merely to prepare our hearts for eternity, but to set eternity in our hearts so that we can walk around with it…and work it into every aspect of our culture.”
In the brief video for this chapter, Suttle tells the story of a woman in his church, Wendy, who seemed to always say “Yes” to the Spirit’s nudgings. Wendy finds herself literally talking a woman out of jumping off a bridge. She locked eyes with her and spoke into her life words of hope. This is what we as Christians do with the culture, says Suttle.
In order to lock eyes with the culture, we must be asking ourselves, “How should we order our common life together in such a way that we image God to all creation?” A key point, in Suttle’s telling, is that this common life is not about individuality, but about a community carrying out this vision: “the church is to be the physical manifestation of the spiritual reality that Jesus is the world’s true Lord.”
Reflections
Those who claim that Jesus wasn’t political miss the subversive point of phrases such as “good news” and “Jesus is Lord” (among others). Both of these phrases were inherently political, and Jesus turned them on their heads. The implicit contrast in the phrase, “Jesus is Lord,” was, “…and Caesar is not!” The “good news” of the Pax Romana was subverted by Jesus saying, in essence, “No, this world revolves around me. Let me show you.”
Add to this that the gospel writers were making a strong case for God as King of the world in Jesus (see N.T. Wright’s How God Became King), and you have a very political as well as personal message. Libertarians are rather good at critiquing the state, declaring with fervor, “Don’t tread on me.” (See my article here on why this statement is not merely a selfish demand.) The intuitive feeling that some human beings ought not rule over others is to a degree similar to the claim, “Caesar is not our king!”
If I were to rephrase Suttle’s question in the form of a political application, it might be this: “How can our common life be organized so that allegiance to Caesar is virtually nonexistent?” The empire of the state has become increasingly overbearing and authoritarian. It demands the allegiance of our children in compulsory educational institutions. The major parties compete for power based on the underlying assumption that their own elite few have rightful power over 300+ million people (with the illusion that it comes “from the people”). Citizens who refuse to toe the line of national patriotism are derided as anti-American misfits who hate other people.
The personal application should be obvious, though immensely difficult to abide. If Jesus is our Lord, our King, our rightful authority, what does our life look like, both as individuals and in community? When we gather together with others who share our vision for the world, do we spend the bulk of our time complaining about the state? Or do we take time to pray for the state we (often) view as an enemy? Should we not be energized by the vision of Jesus’ subversive message of living outside the statist quo, ignoring the empire because it has no real authority over us?
Make no mistake: critiquing the empire is important. It is, in a sense, the equivalent of prophesying against the empire. Prophets exist to call a people to repentance, so without them the people may never repent of its collective sin of worshiping the state and accepting its evils. As followers of Jesus Christ, our rightful authority is not King Obama, King Romney, or King Congress, but King Jesus.
If I Had Written This
Suttle is not writing for a libertarian audience, so I wouldn’t expect the applications above to be part of his book. He probably won’t agree with my twist on it. What he might agree with, however, is a critique I made of his previous book, which he acknowledged in his response. Suttle’s energy writing about society and the collective could be inferred that the individual has no value apart from the collective. To be fair, he is broadening the over-individualized message of the gospel to include the social message of God’s Kingdom. Suttle is saying, in brief, “our lives do not have real meaning without community.” While at heart I believe Suttle and I agree, I would have made an effort to include individual importance and value regardless of social participation.
Libertarian benefits of this Chapter
The applications of this chapter mentioned above are clear reasons libertarians should read this book. As libertarians, we often lock eyes with the culture, showing it where it has gone astray from God’s ordering (even if we don’t talk about it in such terms). Libertarians who consider the message of Jesus as for this world will want speak to the world a hope in something greater than empty promises of mere humans engaged in demagoguery with the intent to acquire power.
*Ironically, infamous atheist and inaccurately-named trilogy author Douglas Adams told a story as well. While very funny, it doesn’t quite match the story of Jesus.
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NT Wright,
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Tim Suttle
This is the first in a series posts liveblogging Tim Suttle’s book, Public Jesus.
Most people tend to believe that faith is only a private matter. Christians in America tend to go along with this, believing in a personal space (faith) separate from the public space (politics). Jesus came to save our souls and let us escape to heaven, they say, and politics is just a way of getting along while we’re here awaiting our escape from earth.
I’ve come to believe that this is a myopic way to view life. While the purpose of Jesus’ life, crucifixion, burial, and resurrection can be debated, it is hardly believed by serious devotees of Jesus that the only purpose was to save our souls for a future state of non-earthly bliss. We know intuitively that whatever it is that Jesus came to do, we are to embody that purpose here on earth. Both conservative and liberal strands of Christianity feel passionately about social issues, often based on the teachings of Jesus. Separatists excepted, most followers of Jesus see faith as relevant to at least some aspect of public life.
While Satan may operate and have dominion over certain aspects of this world, there is only one “sphere” in which we live. It is God’s. Tim Suttle introduces us to the premise of Public Jesus by writing, “God belongs in the public square because the public square belongs to God. God is not only the one we pray to in the privacy of our own homes, but God is out and about in cultures and societies, working in every corner of creation to bring about God’s good purposes.” Suttle’s understanding of “the public square” will be explored in the rest of the book, but all should welcome idea that the Christian faith has much to say about engaging the world around us.
In the beginning the Spirit of the Lord hovered over the face of the waters of chaos. God then brings order out of chaos. Echoes of this are throughout the Scriptures and in Jesus’ own ministry. He calms a storm (chaos), not merely proving he was divine, but demonstrating sovereignty over it. Suttle’s application to this biblical theology is to say that “part of our calling as children of God is to attempt to organize our world so that chaos doesn’t reign in public life.”
The way to create order out of chaos, says Suttle, is to embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ. Whatever eschatology we embrace, the future according to the Scriptures is clear: sin, death, and decay will be finished, dead, a thing of the past. What Jesus did in his life and resurrection was live out this future reality in the present. He called his followers to do the same. When we believe eternity has been brought to the present through Jesus, we anticipate the age to come by how we live together right now. We are not simply members of some club, but participants in a new community, a new humanity. Christ shows us how to be truly human.
God also created human beings as caretakers and keepers of God’s creation. As stewards, we are always to be asking, “What would the world be like if God were in charge?” and live in that reality.
It is important to imagine and explore the answer to that question, because even on our best days, imagining a world operating under the rules of the Kingdom of God is rather difficult. Most people can’t even imagine a world where the state doesn’t build the roads! How much more difficult is it to imagine a world of true shalom!?
However the question is answered, Suttle believes it looks like Jesus. That’s what he explores in this book.
Suttle’s introduction begins a process of answering what the world looks like under the Kingdom of God. By starting with creation and ending with knowing what the future holds, he makes it clear that Jesus is where we find meaning in the present. He provides much for Christian libertarians to reflect upon. In calling ourselves “Christian” we are embracing a way of life, a way of order, a way of being human. Libertarians are very good at pointing out what life shouldn’t be like. But that’s the easy part. We ought also to be able to demonstrate what it means to be human in the world. Suttle addresses those issues in the first chapter.
Stay tuned for the next installment of this liveblogging series, and if you want to follow along you can purchase Public Jesus from Amazon and support LCC while you’re at it!
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Jesus,
Kingdom of God,
libertarians,
social gospel,
social order,
Tim Suttle
Author Tim Suttle responded to my review of his book, An Evangelical Social Gospel?, by engaging in the one major critique I addressed in his book. In my review I expressed concern over Suttle’s broad use of the word “individualism” and suggested that perhaps he needed to address atomistic individualism instead. Apparently Suttle agreed my advice is worthy of consideration, and he crafted a response engaging my thoughts.
One thing Suttle and I completely agree on is the moral capacity and worth of the individual. Suttle admits this was neglected in the book, though my guess is that no honest reader would assume Suttle believes otherwise. Any Christian who engages issues of justice in a book obviously attributes moral worth to every individual.
The pushback comes, however, from the voluntaristic element inherent in what I quoted from Norman Horn’s review of Opitz. Suttle writes, “I don’t think our inclination is a factor in terms of what it means to be an individual/person. Our inclination toward being a hermit or social creature is secondary to the fact that we are born vulnerable and dependent creatures.” Further, he writes, “Our essential connected-ness is in our nature… But our involvement in humanity is not voluntaristic.”
There are two concepts here that are at play: “humanity” and “community.” It’s quite possible brevity prevented clarity in my critique. Let’s try it this way: because God created us for community, rejecting it is to deny ourselves participation in the fullness of the human experience. Yet what makes that human experience meaningful depends on the extent to which individuals are free to make commitments to the communities they find valuable. Jesus’ call to follow him implies openness and the possibility of rejection. The hermit is free to be left alone, damned as he might be. But there is no real community by forcing hermits to “belong.”
I find it rewarding that Suttle feels he can find common ground with many types of people from all over the political spectrum. I’ve been hard pressed to find a single social justice advocate who will even entertain the thought that libertarianism and social justice are possible bedfellows. Yet Suttle seems open: “Libertarianism and social justice are not fundamentally opposed to one another.” I hope this conversation can continue!
As a pastor, Suttle asks some really good reflective questions, and in doing so makes some subtle praises for our site, libertarianchristians.com. The outstanding pragmatic question is this one: “Does our society possess the kind of virtues necessary to make self-governing under a more libertarian view work? Is our society too selfish for that?” The short answer is, “No, our society does not. Yes, it is too selfish.” But here’s the follow-up: “If this is indeed the reality, what does this say about the makeup of social justice in our society today?”
Is it truly social and is it truly just when the nature of society itself is governed from the top down by a concentrated set of powers? I’m fairly certain that God is pleased when poor people are merely fed, but my strong hunch is that the command to love the poor has a broader goals: the harmonic relationships of those living in community. It is tremendously difficult to choose to love and serve those who have nothing. It isn’t something we ought to outsource to a single entity forcing us to do it anyway. “Your hearts are far from me” comes to mind as a relevant verse from the Old Testament.
But what lies behind this question is a basic fear, one that I’m likewise a bit nervous to admit. We’re not dealing with software that runs like it’s been programmed. We’re not dealing with sheep who simply follow the one in front of it. We’re dealing with people who have ends with means different from each other which causes conflict. For most people—especially those who raise an eyebrow at the market—it takes a major amount of faith to just “let the market do it’s work.” (Thomas Sowell says he doesn’t have faith in the market, he has evidence. But that’s another article!) The market is full of sinful human beings, some who won’t blink at harming others to achieve those ends. It’s natural to be nervous, but the mechanisms libertarians favor are not “anything goes,” but a method to channel our energy to “get what we want at others’ expense” by requiring us to serve one another. The oft-chided “invisible hand” isn’t just some voodoo result of any and every market, but a shorthand way of saying, “Look at the progress that happens when people are required to trade rather than plunder!”
Suttle includes liberty, justice, and equality as some of the virtues of the Kingdom of God that are compatible with libertarianism. His concern, it seems, are the other virtues that seem to “run counter to the libertarian stream”: mutuality, self-sacrifice, self-emptying, vulnerability, enemy love, refusal of violence, peace, economic justice, social justice.
Perhaps the brand(s) of libertarianism Suttle has been exposed to have been too bold in purpose so as to obscure the breadth of the philosophy of liberty. An applied philosophy of liberty is not one which directly espouses the virtues of self-sacrifice, self-emptying, vulnerability, or enemy love; but neither would it exclude their existence. The presence of liberty is alone insufficient to provide these qualities in individuals. But we would be mistaken to believe that a philosophy of liberty runs counter to them. Those who can truly be sacrificial, self-emptying, and enemy-loving have found true freedom in the will to be more than those who simply refrain from aggression (the bare minimum of liberty).
The refusal of violence (oustide of self-defense) is a common theme for libertarians, with peace being the benchmark of a libertarian social framework. I’m confused that Suttle would include these as candidates of counter-libertarian virtues. If by “peace” we mean the shalom of God, then liberty is the starting point by which people can begin to grasp real social peace. To have inherently divisive social conflict through the political mechanism is no way to begin to establish a true peace in society.
That leaves us with mutuality, economic justice, and social justice. I’ll have to ask Suttle to explain what he means by mutuality and economic justice. As for social justice, I’ll respond simply: without liberty, social justice is but a shadow of genuine social harmony, for it cloaks itself in the language of outcomes without care for the morality of the means. How can justice be considered “social” when conformity is mandatory?
The questions Suttle raises are important for libertarian Christians to consider. Suttle himself seems open enough to making friends with libertarians, especially those who claim the name of Christ. I hope a dialogue will continue between us as we seek mutual understanding of our beliefs and goals.
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book review,
Kingdom of God,
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libertarians,
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statism,
Tim Suttle
Growing up I was taught to value the greatness and splendor that is The United States of America. For a variety of reasons, The United States was the greatest and best country ever in the whole world and anybody who disagrees was suspect of treason (or hellfire and brimstone). Even in church we learned that we are citizens of God’s Kingdom while at the same time were citizens of a really awesome country (even now, we have to admit there are a lot of awesome things about living in the United States). At vacation Bible school we pledged allegiance to the American flag, the Christian flag, and the Bible (none of which are actually in the Bible itself!).
Norman Horn is the creator and primary writer for LCC. Learn a little bit about him in the 