Title: We Do Not Wage War as the World Does

Subtitle: The Identity and Mission of the Church According to the New Testament

Author: Christopher Travis Haun for http://rethinker.net/ekklesia

Categories: Ecclesiology, Missiology, Sanctification

Draft Date: August 2007 (incomplete) ……. This needs to be totally rewritten

From Church Historian Phillip Schaff (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/hcc2.v.ii.html)

The condition and manners of the Christians in this age are most beautifully described by the unknown author of the "Epistola ad Diognetum" in the early part of the second century.

"The Christians are not distinguished from other men by country, by language, nor by civil institutions. For they neither dwell in cities by themselves, nor use a peculiar tongue, nor lead a singular mode of life. They dwell in the Grecian or barbarian cities, as the case may be; they follow the usage of the country in dress, food, and the other affairs of life. Yet they present a wonderful and confessedly paradoxical conduct. They dwell in their own native lands, but as strangers. They take part in all things as citizens; and they suffer all things, as foreigners. Every foreign country is a fatherland to them, and every native land is a foreign. They marry, like all others; they have children; but they do not cast away their offspring. They have the table in common, but not wives. They are in the flesh, but do not live after the flesh. They live upon the earth, but are citizens of heaven. They obey the existing laws, and excel the laws by their lives. They love all, and are persecuted by all. They are unknown, and yet they are condemned. They are killed and are made alive. They are poor and make many rich. They lack all things, and in all things abound. They are reproached, and glory in their reproaches. They are calumniated, and are justified. They are cursed, and they bless. They receive scorn, and they give honor. They do good, and are punished as evil-doers. When punished, they rejoice, as being made alive. By the Jews they are attacked as aliens, and by the Greeks persecuted; and the cause of the enmity their enemies cannot tell. In short, what the soul is in the body, the Christians are in the world. The soul is diffused through all the members of the body, and the Christians are spread through the cities of the world. The soul dwells in the body, but it is not of the body; so the Christians dwell in the world, but are not of the world. The soul, invisible, keeps watch in the visible body; so also the Christians are seen to live in the world, but their piety is invisible. The flesh hates and wars against the soul, suffering no wrong from it, but because it resists fleshly pleasures; and the world hates the Christians with no reason, but that they resist its pleasures. The soul loves the flesh and members, by which it is hated; so the Christians love their haters. The soul is inclosed in the body, but holds the body together; so the Christians are detained in the world as in a prison; but they contain the world. Immortal, the soul dwells in the mortal body; so the Christians dwell in the corruptible, but look for incorruption in heaven. The soul is the better for restriction in food and drink; and the Christians increase, though daily punished. This lot God has assigned to the Christians in the world; and it cannot be taken from them."

On one hand it is clear that for the person who has found peace with God should say, “our citizenship is not of this world” because he or she has joined a kingdom that is “not of this world.” On the other hand, the vast majority of the European strains of the Christian faith-practice stand at least knee-high in the wallow of the emphasis of our citizenship in the earthly Empire or Nation we have found ourselves born into. And while the twenty-seven “New Testament” books make it clear that those who have by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ have been granted citizenship into His kingdom, the same books make it clear that we have obligations to whichever earthly authorities exist in the earthly kingdoms we find ourselves in. Complicating things further, when one factors in the thirty-nine “Old Testament” books and attempts to apply them to his/her own life and society, the theocratic ideal naturally becomes greatly intensified or even necessitated.

This rethink takes as an axiom that those who have invested their faith into Christ for the sake of finding peace with God have what amounts to dual-citizenship—citizenship in a heavenly kingdom and citizenship in one earthly kingdom or another. For those of us who consider ourselves to belong to Christ, this rethink is aimed at making us all rethink several angles on competing citizenships, allegiances, identities and missions. It is the also attempt to rethink the struggle between holiness and worldliness.

Of course the full spectrum of possible positions can be seen in the course of Christian history over the last two millennia. On one extreme pole of the spectrum there have been a few groups who emphasize membership in Christ’s kingdom to the full exclusion of membership in any nation of this world. The Amish communities of Pennsylvania are one example of this extreme pole due to their aloofness to the world around them. Some Monastic orders of the Latin and Greek Churches could be argued to be another example of that extreme for their attempts to not be part of the world. On the other side of the spectrum, the Christian Theocrats (aka Theonomists or Reconstructionists) who seek to take over the government of the United States (to begin with) and bring it under the rule of Christian Law would be a recent example. Another palpable example of this extreme would be the Spanish Conquistadors who attempted something resembling genocide in Central and South America for the sake of extending and strengthening the visible kingdom of God on earth. Between the two extremes, it seems to me that by far most of the evolutionary variants of Christianity in the past 1,600 years fall more toward the side of emphasizing their citizenship in this world. The Christian tradition I inherited from my church and family was far closer to the ‘this-worldly’ pole than that of the unearthly one. Based on the title of this rethink the reader must already be aware that my rethinking has led me toward the other end of the spectrum.

To begin to unfold the concept of “kingdom” I start with a sketch of the history of the nation of Israel. Approximately 3,500 years ago, the uber-God Yahweh used a man named Moses to deliver hundreds of thousands of Jews (descendents of the line of Avraham, Yitzhak, and Yaakov) out of the powerful nation of Egypt. Yahweh made a nation out of the Jews by empowering the Jews to clear out the Canaanite civilization in the middle of the Fertile Crescent. Yahweh made a nation out of these Jews by giving them 613 laws (summarized in the Ten Commandments) which would govern the Jewish life in civil, ceremonial, and moral matters. The Jews didn’t have to raise a single sword to defeat the might of the Egyptian civilization but they were told by Yahweh to practice something resembling genocide against the Canaanite civilization using the sword . . . more blood… Moabites …. Phoenician/Philistine .. . The Davidic Kingdom. Roughly 3,000 years ago the Kingdom of Israel reached a zenith under King David and his son Solomon. It was now a force to be reckoned with. And God promised David that he would establish David’s throne forever. …. Assyria… Babylon… Persia. . . Greece. . . Selucid. . . Roman. They longed for the second Moses to come and deliver them out of the dominion of the Romans. They longed for Messiah to appear to restore the Davidic kingdom to Israel. Not only would Israel be freed from Rome, Messiah would rule all the nations (including Rome and Persia and Egypt) from Jersusalem. They understood kingdom as a very earthly thing that had to be established by God but with the instrument of human yielding of the weapons of the day—iron swords, spears, war bows, chariots, etc. Roman rule was very oppressive and the people were crying out for deliverance much like they had under Egyptian bondage.

Into this Roman-occupied Israel lands a wandering Rabbi. His parents called him Yeshua. We call him Jesus. This rabbi traveled Palestine for about three years of his adult life performing miraculous signs and teaching. At the beginning of the three years the theme was echoed often to Israel that if they would “repent”[i] that he would restore the Kingdom of Israel. Thousands of Jews begin to wonder seriously whether the new Moses and the new David rolled into one had finally arrived. But ultimately the Jews on the popular level accepted him only as a good prophet—not the Prophet. And they didn’t accept him as the King either. And the rulers of Israel rejected Jesus as the King of Israel mainly because “it is better for one man to die than for all to die.” Anyone who has studied Roman history at all can attest to the fact that the way to get the mighty Roman sword unsheathed was to dare to challenge its authority. Israel seems to have rejected Jesus as their King primarily out of fear of Roman retaliation. And they delivered Jesus to the regional representative of Caesar in Caesarea largely on the accusation that Jesus was claiming to be the King of the Jews—something that Rome wouldn’t take kindly to since Caesar had not appointed him. Rome got the message. For when the Romans occupation forces crucified Jesus, they made a point of putting a sign above his head in the three most popular languages of the day saying, “King of the Jews.” But before Pontus Pilate, the regional representative of Caesar, capitulated to the Jewish demand for his crucifixion, he asked Jesus if he himself actually claimed to be a king. Pilate had heard the leaders of Israel say that he was claiming to be a king. But Pilate was giving Jesus a chance to deny the accusation. Do you remember Jesus’ answer?

“My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would rise up and fight.”

John 18 gives us a good firm starting point.

John 18:28-40

Then the Jews led Jesus from Caiaphas to the palace of the Roman governor. By now it was early morning, and to avoid ceremonial uncleanness the Jews did not enter the palace; they wanted to be able to eat the Passover. 29So Pilate came out to them and asked, "What charges are you bringing against this man?"

"If he were not a criminal," they replied, "we would not have handed him over to you."

Pilate said, "Take him yourselves and judge him by your own law."

"But we have no right to execute anyone," the Jews objected.

This happened so that the words Jesus had spoken indicating the kind of death he was going to die would be fulfilled.

Pilate then went back inside the palace, summoned Jesus and asked him, "Are you the king of the Jews?"

"Is that your own idea," Jesus asked, "or did others talk to you about me?"

"Am I a Jew?" Pilate replied. "It was your people and your chief priests who handed you over to me. What is it you have done?"

Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place."

"You are a king, then!" said Pilate.
Jesus answered, "You are right in saying I am a king. In fact, for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world,

to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me."

"What is truth?" Pilate asked. With this he went out again to the Jews and said, "I find no basis for a charge against him.

But it is your custom for me to release to you one prisoner at the time of the Passover.

Do you want me to release 'the king of the Jews'?"

They shouted back, "No, not him! Give us Barabbas!" Now Barabbas had taken part in a rebellion.

When the Rulers of the Israeli religious system ordered the Temple Guards to follow Judas, the traitor disciple, and arrest Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, one of the eleven disciples around Christ unsheathed his sword and started swinging.

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2026:25-55;&version=31;

Matthew 26:25-55

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%2022:25-45;&version=31;

Luke 22:25-45

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%2022:25-55;&version=31;

Luke 22:25-55

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%2018;&version=31;

10Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it and struck the high priest's servant, cutting off his right ear. (The servant's name was Malchus.)

11Jesus commanded Peter, "Put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?"

At the time of Christ’s death, did Christ himself believe his kingdom was worldly or otherworldly? The answer is obviously and unequivocal.

At the time of Christ’s death, should Christ’s twelve closest disciples raise an army of Israeli zealots to start a bloody revolution or a guerilla war against Roman power in their region? Again, NO. They were NOT supposed to fight with earthly weapons (swords, daggers, spears, siege works, etc.) for this heavenly kingdom that doesn’t at this time pertain to this world. The conclusion seems inescapable to me that if you were a disciple of Christ in the time this was said that you should NOT unsheathe your sword against anyone in the name of building the Kingdom of God. This is not an easy thing for us earth bound people to accept in the mind much less the will. Even Peter himself drew his sword on the party of Temple Guards that the Jewish Sanhedrin sent to arrest him. And of course Christ rebuked Peter saying, “Put away your sword,” and even healing the injured man.

About forty days after Jesus had been executed and raised back to life, the first thing his disciples wanted to know was whether he was now going to re-establish the glory of the Davidic Kingdom for Israel.

Acts 1:

In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach ²until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. ³After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. ⁴On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. ⁵For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”

⁶So when they met together, they asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”

⁷He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. ⁸But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

⁹After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.

¹⁰They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. ^{11 “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand
here looking into the sky?} This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”

Soon after our Lord was crucified, buried and raised, he appeared to the twelve closest disciples and began to teach them again. They received serious instruction about “the kingdom of God” over a “period of forty days” from Christ himself. They had already been living with Christ and learning him for two or three years prior to that. So they must at this point be on track finally about what Christ was planning to do about “the kingdom.” I refuse to believe that any man today understands the nuances of God’s plan for the Kingdom better than those twelve men at that time. And I am keenly interested in the question they asked him. I think it not surprising that they didn’t ask him what the kingdom was going to be like—I think they already understood it rather well. They asked him WHEN? They had been eager for the past three years to see this King set up his Kingdom. They had argued who was going to be the greatest in his Kingdom. They had left all they had to enter his kingdom. And they still believed that someday the heavenly kingdom would also become an earthly kingdom.

The eternal kingdom promised to King David was on their minds. It would mean the end of the Roman occupation and domination. It would not mean just a free nation of Israel but the time when the Lord would become king of Israel and all the other nations in a geo-political sense. Here I think we’re not talking about pie-in-the-sky salvation or heavenly salvation or heavenly kingdom. I think these earthly men were asking the natural earthly question. When is Jesus, the Son of David, going to establish his earthly rule, his earthly kingdom, over Jerusalem, Judea, Israel, and all the Gentile nations? This is what they were asking.

And consider Christ’s answer carefully please. What did he NOT say? He didn’t say,

“Are you still so slow to learn? I’ve been teaching you on this subject for years and you’re still getting it all wrong!

Well, get it straight this time: The kingdom is only an invisible kingdom. The kingdom exists only in heaven and in the hearts of

Believing men and women like you. It will never be an earthly kingdom ever.

Israel will never have a kingdom anything like it had during the reign of David and Solomon.

So get used to it. And now get busy extending this kingdom into the hearts of other people.”

Nor did he say,

“I am returning to heaven to send the Spirit to give you the spiritual power you’ll need to create the kingdom of God on earth for me.”

Does it not sound like his answer is ultimately in the positive? To me, it sounds like a positive answer ultimately. Yes, Christ will return to earth some day and establish an earthly geo-political kingdom and fix all the broken things in the middle east and on all continents. But it is none of their business. They aren’t even supposed to know when Christ will do it, much less try to do it for him. “Restoring the kingdom to Israel” is not what he wants his twelve Apostles to be a part of in any way. They can wait in expectant hope for it but he doesn’t even want them to know whether that day will happen soon or whether it will be thousands of years later. To me it sounds like Christ is saying,

“Yes, I will establish the kingdom when the Father tells me to. But you don’t have anything to do with creating that geo-political kingdom.

Instead, let me tell you what your mission is on earth: be my witnesses to every people group on earth. Tell them about me.”

So to me the Apostolic mission is to increase the invisible kingdom but not to establish the geo-political kingdom. Yes, ultimately a necessary component of the salvation of world involves a real, tangible, geo-political kingdom ruled by a perfect ruler—Jesus himself. But I think it important that we not confuse the two kingdoms and not confuse the two missions. We do not build the visible kingdom. We build the invisible kingdom, so to speak.

So as of forty or so days after Jesus told Pontus Pilate that he was a King, but that his Kingdom was not of this world, and therefore his servants would not revolt against Rome, had things changed? Was Jesus starting a new phase of his Kingdom forty days later? The disciples seemed to hope so and asked accordingly. They knew enough to know that the kingdom would become an earthly kingdom someday. And they knew that the kingdom was not yet an earthly one.

Obviously things have changed a lot since then. With few exceptions, the visible, historical European churches have not held this ideal. The churches of Europe in the past 1,600 years or so seems to have been very keen on attempting to establish an earthly kingdom and they usually weren’t shy about using the sword as a main tool. Read any book on Church history and you’ll read about how Church and State either operated with one another and against one another with the weapons of this world in the wars and intrigues of this world. Read any newspaper today and you’re not unlikely to hear how some group of Christians somewhere is advocating some worldly war somewhere or some political party there or some other manifestation of “the sword.” Those who name the name of Christ with their lips and yet also rest the palm of their heel on the hilt of a sword sheathed on their belt need to admit that they have changed.

They might dispute the relevancy of this matter based on timing. They might admit that it true for Jesus and his followers in the first century in Roman occupied Palestine. But they might argue that it is no longer true for the followers of Jesus today. But what changed? Have things changed since then? Rome has disappeared. Rome was Christianized. Greco-Roman civilization became Christian and therefore the Kingdom became earthly?

The burden of the proof is on anyone who says things have changed. And if things have not changed (which I now hold) is it not unreasonable to deduce that if you find yourself fighting with weapons of this world you’re not fighting for the kingdom of Christ? You’re either fighting for your nation, subculture, family or whatever other group you’re identifying with and wrongly confusing it with the kingdom of God on earth. The only way I can think of to logically escape this conclusion is to try to argue that something changed since then. The burden of the proof would be on those who say something has changed. I would argue that things really changed in the mind of the Latin and Byzantine churches with the synthesis of Church and State which Emperor Constantine began. It was at this time that Christians began to feel like Christ’s kingdom really had begun to become of this world. And there was a shift in theological thinking about the kingdom. Whereas the consistent witness of early church thinkers prior to Constantine was that someday Christ would return visibly and establish his own visible geo-political kingdom on earth, the thinking shifted after Constantine (especially with Augustine of Hippo) to the idea that Christ had returned in an invisible fashion and was using them to create an earthly kingdom for Christ.

When will the Lord Jesus Christ “restore the kingdom to Israel?” I think it will be when Jesus comes back to earth in the same way he left the earth—visibly. I think that answer is implicit in the same Acts 1 passage:

So as far as I am able to harmonize these two passages and attempt to read between the lines, Jesus is King of a Kingdom which is “not of this world” for this age but on some future day this King will return to earth in a real, visible, tangible body and establish a real, visible, tangible, geo-political kingdom from which he will rule both Israel and the Nations. Until the day he returns, however, the kingdom we are citizens of remains an heavenly kingdom.

I think also it may not be too unlikely that God the Father may not send the Lord Jesus Christ back to earth in physical form to establish the physical kingdom until the Apostles {Ambassadors} have completed their mission on earth. And what was the mission Christ gave to his “Apostles” (Ambassadors)? The Apostolic witness is in amazing harmony.

Matthew 28

16Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19Therefore go and make disciples of all nations {people groups}, baptizing them in^[^a^] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

Mark 16

14Later Jesus appeared to the Eleven as they were eating; he rebuked them for their lack of faith and their stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen. 15He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. 16Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. 17And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; 18they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well." 19After the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, he was taken up into heaven and he sat at the right hand of God. 20Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it.

Luke 24

. . . they found the Eleven . . . Jesus himself stood among them . . . 44He said to them, "This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms." 45Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. 46He told them, "This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, 47and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 48You are witnesses of these things. 49I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high." 50When he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up his hands and blessed them. 51While he was blessing them, he left them and was taken up into heaven.

John 20:21

19On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you!" 20After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord. 21Again Jesus said, "Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you." 22And with that he breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit. 23If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven."

Acts 1

. . . giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. ^{8 ”}. . . But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Ephesians 6

¹⁹Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, ²⁰for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.

2nd Corinthians 5:

¹¹Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade men. What we are is plain to God, and I hope it is also plain to your conscience. ¹²We are not trying to commend ourselves to you again, but are giving you an opportunity to take pride in us, so that you can answer those who take pride in what is seen rather than in what is in the heart. ¹³If we are out of our mind, it is for the sake of God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. ¹⁴For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. ¹⁵And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. ¹⁶So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. ¹⁷Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! ¹⁸All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. ²¹God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

2 cor 10:2-7

⁵We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

1^st Timothy 2

. . . God our Savior, ⁴who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. ⁵For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, ⁶who gave himself as a ransom for all men—the testimony given in its proper time. ⁷And for this purpose I was appointed a herald and an apostle—I am telling the truth, I am not lying—and a teacher of the true faith to the Gentiles.

The mission given to the Apostles is . . .

==========TO BE CONTINUED===============