From The Calvinistic Concept of Culture
The impact of Calvin’s ideas in the political sphere inaugurated a new era, giving a new character and direction to national existence in many lands. The Greek state had been totalitarian, in which religion served as means unto an end, namely, the glorification of the state. In the Middle Ages the roles were reversed so that we find a church-state, with supreme authority vested in the pope, who loaned temporal power to the earthly ruler for the service of the church. Calvin saw the church and state as two interdependent entities each having received its own authority from the sovereign God. In this conception, the state is never secular, nor are state and church separated in the modern sense of the word.
According to Calvin, church and state must live in peace and must cooperate together in subjection to the Word of God. Each is to have its own jurisdiction. The state has authority in purely civil and temporal matters; the church, in spiritual matters.
It’s obvious from the above that American government is modeled more along the lines of the Greek state, with religion being nothing more than “civic” with the only end of serving the needs of the state for orderliness and ultimately its own glorification. Imagine a politician today actually believing that the collective authority he or she exercises is not ultimate, but rather “ordained of God” for His purposes. Modern American politcians certainly never give thought to the notion that there is a Higher Law upon which our Constitution is based. Remove that foundation – which secularists and liberals have been doing now for most of my life – and you have no Constitution left. When Law collapses, “the collective will of the people” prevails, and man becomes sovereign instead of God.
In his ideas about the political order, Calvin’s basic principle of the sovereignty of God is determinative. For he was strongly opposed to every form of state absolutism, autocracy, and absolute monarchy. Kings and presidents ought to have their power limited by legislators and constitutional law. Calvin cites the concrete case from Scripture of Samuel recording the rights of the people in a book for future reference between them and the king. This differs in toto from the social contract idea of Rousseau, in which the collective will of the people is the highest norm. For Calvin the sovereign God is law-giver of the nations today as well as in the days of Samuel, and popular sovereignty is a figment of the deluded imagination of fallen man.
Hi Jeff,
I am new around here, so I don’t have any idea how long you and the others have been trading ideas back and forth, but I have sensed a certain edgy tone to some of the comments by a few of the bloggers (based on my very limited exposure here). Granted, the written word sometimes errantly carries with it inflections in tone that were not meant to be sent. Some “edgyness” is accidental, and some is obviously intentional. I have always found that an idea goes much further with a person when it is delivered in a respectful way – even to someone with which we may disagree. Also, a respectfully delivered statement increases the chances of a respectful response. Having said all of that, sometimes people hesitate to engage in a blog if they think that it will degenerate into a name calling, put-down competition, laced with sarcasm. As respectfully as I can write this, that may be part of the reason you were so surprised in your post (#2) that you did not evoke a response in your post (#1). Honestly, there’s enough tension in this world as it is. Why would anybody volunteer for more? But that’s just me…
However, I will chance a short but sweet response to post #2. In my response I am purposely taking your statement out of the context of Paul’s article. I am treating the quoted sentence on its own, as it stands. You seem to be an intelligent person who enjoys the challenge and mental effort involved in testing many time honored and accepted ideas. Absolutely nothing wrong with that as long as it’s not just for the sport of it. I mean, you kind of have to be really searching for a solution to a perceived problem and not simply enjoying the thrill of the debate. Honestly, I grew up in a family like that and it got old really fast. It also got ugly real fast. Debating, just to debate, is not the way I like to spend my free time. Been there and done that. If someone were to post a simple line like “Thank God for weekends”, they don’t want to be bombarded with responses like, “What EXACTLY do you mean by that? What – no response?? You can’t even define the term ‘weekend’. Don’t you know that the actual calendar is inaccurate by 3.45 days?” I know…silly, but you get my drift. Things can get too combative.
“There seems to be an aversion to thinking outside the box and actually trying to find solutions instead of being used as a divider.”
I don’t have a problem with people thinking outside of the box – as long as that person is not totally biased against what’s inside the box (or the box itself). Oftentimes the answer was inside the box and it was our perception that was the problem all along. This is where the Lord says for us to anoint our eyes with eyesalve so that we may see. I don’t believe that Scripture teaches that “perception is reality”, rather that God’s perception is reality. Many times what we don’t need is a new idea. All of God’s ideas are old – very old. What we do need is some eyesalve so that we can see His ideas more clearly.
You may say that I’m saying the same thing that you are, but in a different way. Kind of, but don’t you think it’s more accurate to say that the solution already exists – we just can’t see it yet? I’m not into samantics, but this mindset tends to keep us humble before God, waiting on Him to reveal a solution to us as we dilligently study Scripture with the aid of the Holy Spirit. It takes the whole “mental superiority” thing (my term – not meant to cast you in a poor light) out of the equation. After all, any real truth that we have ever received has been revealed to us by God. Why would the present time be any different?
Saying all of that to say this: If more Christians approached problems, disagreements, etc., with the attitude that God is the ultimate source of the solution, much friendlier and meaningful discussions could be had between blogger “A” and blogger “B”.
So much for short and sweet…
Oh, and another reason bloggers may not respond is if they feel unqualified or inexperienced in the topic – like me (smiley face).
I don’t know how much I’ll be around these here parts, but good luck to you and I hope this helps.
Tim
Thanks Jeff,
I truly appreciate the compliment. I hope to have more respectful conversations soon!
Arthur, I try to get on this blog and dialog, I try to challenge the conventional thinking, I try to get some of you to maybe think outside the box once in a while. In the process, I am hoping to see if my views are valid or am I wrong in my thinking according to scripture. You are right Arthur, so long as you continue to post this divide and conquer montra you will not get a complement from me. Trust me it has nothing with your views because you and Greg think very much the same, but I have great respect for Greg, why?, while we do not agree, he does thoughtfully reply with humility and respect. I wish I could say the same for you. Anyone else from the right like to dialog about my comments on post #1. I really would like to have a discussion and not an attack session.
Ooh zing, snap, burn!
Pixel, the day I get a compliment from you is a day I would dread.
Arthur,
Your response fully met my expectations. (ppst, don’t take that as a complement either)…..
Believe it or not Jeff, rebutting your rants is not the most important thing most of us have to do on a given day.
All do respect, but I find it amazing that none of you could find the time to challenge me on this; I try to bring up something that, what I would consider, to be a centrist solution to a social issue facing our day and no one comments on it. Most of you come here, pick sides and pat each other on the back for being on the “right” side. There seems to be an aversion to thinking outside the box and actually trying to find solutions instead of being used as a divider. Unbelievable…..
“According to Calvin, church and state must live in peace and must cooperate together in subjection to the Word of God. Each is to have its own jurisdiction. The state has authority in purely civil and temporal matters; the church, in spiritual matters.”
Regarding this: There are many aspects of Calvin that I do not agree with, especially Calvinistic theology but I couldn’t agree with him more on this. Let’s bring this to 21st century America and the debate over gay rights. We are always told that we need to be for or against gay marriage but never told of an alternate solution. Using Calvin’s concept why don’t we stop the churches resposiilty of issuing legal marriage licenses and leave that completely up to the state. Let the state issue civil unions to any couple that desires gay or straight. Then issue the legal mandate that churches should never be told whom they can marry. Marriage would be a spiritual tradition and civil unions would be a legal agreement according to the state. Can anyone from the right on this board argue against it without stating that we are a “christian” nation? Wouldn’t this help solve the issue instead of polorize it further? The issue is not going away and we should be able to come together, left and right to do what is best for all americans, christian, jew, muslim, buddists, gay, straight, whatever, we all have inalienable rights according to the constitution, let’s live like it.
BTW, I can’t take credit for this idea, I heard it from Tony Campolo and Alan Dershowitz, from the evil ACLU.