Punish and Break Stuff

All right, let's pray and we will get started. Lord Jesus, as we open up your

Word, we ask that you would send your Spirit, open our hearts and our minds that we may rightly understand what your

Word reveals and what we are to believe, confess, and do for our neighbor.

We ask in Jesus' name, amen. All right, let me start off today, a little bit of a note here.

Last time we met, we talked about, we began to delve into the concept of the division between the kingdom of the right and the kingdom of the left.

It was predicated by a discussion regarding the flags on the altar. If you missed that, please check

Kongsvinger website. And the idea here is we're gonna take a look at the doctrine of the two kingdoms.

And today's lesson is going to be heavy on history and concept, a little bit light on biblical texts.

The heavier biblical texts will start coming next week, but we need to rightly understand what Scripture teaches in regards to the right and the left -hand kingdoms.

And it's kind of vital that we get some clear thinking on this, if you would, because there's a lot of unclear thinking.

And let me explain what I mean by this. Anybody here believe that the

United States is a Christian nation? Today? Right now.

Or 40 years ago? Or 40 years ago? Okay, well, let's go with the 40 years ago.

All right, so 40 years ago, the United States was a Christian nation. That'll be our working thesis. What does it mean?

What does it mean? What does it mean? The majority believe in Jesus.

That makes it a Christian nation. Uh -huh. No, I'm drilling in for clarity.

Drilling in for clarity's sake. I want you to think about this for a second. Now, keep in mind,

Hans and Sonja are visiting from the Netherlands, and so the question, then, of course, is, well, is the

Netherlands a Christian nation? No? Can they answer that?

All right, now, I'm gonna do something a little bit different.

And what I would like to do, to kind of start this off, we're gonna, I'm gonna ask some questions.

And this is a test. But think of it this way. Don't worry if you're getting the answers wrong or right.

That's not what I want you to think about right now. What I want you to think about is, today, I'm gonna answer these questions in this way.

And so we'll just kind of work through this, and I want you to kind of think about this. When we talk about the kingdom of God, when we talk about the government in the

United States and things like that, just think this through for a second. Okay, so these are statements, and you're either going to agree with them or you're going to disagree with them.

There's no middle ground. You can't say, I agree somewhat. And so if you're kind of in the middle, the question is, which, you know, which, if you agree somewhat, you, 51 % of you agrees with it, 49 % of you disagrees with it, you go with the one that's 51%, does that make sense?

Okay, so it's an all or nothing kind of thing. So here's a question. A United Nations peacekeeper who is digging freshwater wells in Africa is doing kingdom work.

Agree or disagree? Did you hear the agree or disagree, huh?

Let's do this this way. Agree? Say yes. Now we're afraid to. And disagree?

Yeah. Disagree, say no. Kingdom work? Yeah, kingdom work. Do you agree or disagree?

United Nations peacekeepers digging a well. Yeah, yeah, for people who need freshwater.

Is that kingdom work? Yeah, that's it, now you're starting to get the note of the problem.

And you notice when I said agree, some of you said yeah, some of you said no. I said yeah. Yeah, some said yeah, some said no.

Well, unless I'm misunderstanding what you're saying. Yeah, see, that is kingdom work.

What is, yeah, what does kingdom mean? Okay, so let me clarify.

The UN peacekeeper is a Muslim and he's digging freshwater wells. Is he doing kingdom work? I wonder what kingdom means.

Uh -huh, yeah, see Janet, you're learning, you're learning, this is good, huh? You didn't say he was

Muslim. Oh, I just said he was a UN peacekeeper. Okay, but the work is the same.

Okay, but the work is the same. Okay, now let's think through this a little bit more. I'm not getting my question answered.

I know, because right now, we're going to just mess everything up. We're gonna tear everything apart first before we rebuild.

You're not playing fair. I know, I know, that's how I play. That's right, ask my wife,

I cheat at Yahtzee. Okay, okay, so here's the next statement.

The kingdom is advanced in the voting booth. Do you agree or disagree? Yes, I disagree.

No one agrees with that, okay? In order to build the kingdom, a pastor must rule the church like Moses or David, and anyone who would challenge his

God -given authority and anointing and vision must be driven out of the church. Agree or disagree?

Disagree. Okay, all right. Proof that the kingdom of God has arrived in a city is that the bars and the strip clubs are forced out of business.

Agree or disagree? Disagree. Okay. The United States of America is a Christian nation.

Disagree. Okay. See, now look at, you guys, you guys are all sitting there going, okay, there's something going on here.

We gotta be very careful how we think about this. We got a pattern here. Okay. A church service focused on rightly preaching

God's word and administering baptism in the Lord's Supper has nothing to do with kingdom work.

Agree or disagree? Disagree. Okay. Disagree. Are these statements helping to clarify?

No? Okay. Just notice how you are agreeing and disagreeing. You're starting to think here.

A pastor who visits his church's shut -ins to preach the word to them and give them the

Lord's Supper is doing vital kingdom work. Agree or disagree? Agree. Okay. Once the world joins together to solve the problems of systemic poverty, human trafficking, and slavery, then the kingdom will be here on earth.

Agree or disagree? Disagree. Do you know there are a lot of people who call themselves Lutherans who would disagree, who would agree with this?

But they're of a particular stripe. Well, you need to read a little deeper. Okay. The church, or the body of Christ, is the kingdom of God.

Agree or disagree? Agree. Now, notice you kind of were not sure. In the other, yes, no.

Yes. And maybe, all right. Oh, a little gunshot.

Well, you weren't on the other one. Okay, this one you were. Yeah, when you're bringing all this other stuff up. When Jesus taught us to pray, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

He was teaching us to pray for the eradication of poverty because there is no poverty in heaven. Agree or disagree?

Disagree. Okay. The sick, the old, and the poor are incapable of doing kingdom work because their lives do not reflect the true power and blessings of the kingdom.

Disagree. By the way, that's a direct statement from a charismatic. Yeah, the sick, the old, and the poor are incapable of doing kingdom work because their lives do not reflect the true power and blessings of the kingdom.

Okay. The kingdom has arrived when Christians fast with Muslims during Ramadan. Okay. Kind of sound like a bunch of conservative people.

All right. A church that doesn't have a soup pantry to feed the poor is not doing true kingdom work.

Disagree. We don't have a soup kitchen. You guys are just saying this because we don't have one. Yeah, but we work on it for work.

Okay. When Jesus taught us to pray, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, he was teaching us to eradicate bars, casinos, homosexuality, because none of these exist in heaven.

Disagree. If the right person... Oh, oh, oh. Why would you think there'd be bars and casinos in heaven?

There isn't. There aren't. So we have to get rid of them here. Okay, so listen to how it's phrased.

When Jesus taught us to pray, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, he was teaching us to eradicate bars, casinos, homosexuality, because none of these exist in heaven.

Okay. If the right person is elected president of the United States, then America will become a

Christian nation. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.

You guys sound so cynical. Okay. Yeah.

Kingdom people hope for the day when Christians will bring the kingdom to earth by creating a moral and just global community.

Okay. The kingdom is advanced through social justice. True kingdom work does not occur apart from preaching repentance and the forgiveness of sins through faith in Jesus Christ.

Okay. Gandhi was a kingdom worker. Gandhi. Yeah, Mahatma Gandhi.

Okay, and you notice you're a little not sure here, because he did something quite amazing in his life. But he's not a

Christian. He was anti -Christian, actually. Yeah, Hindu. Yeah. Mm -hmm.

When Jesus returns, he will establish his visible kingdom on earth. Until then, the kingdom is an article of faith.

An article of faith means you can't see it with your eyes, but you believe it because God's word says it's true. Okay. Kingdom people hope for the day when

Christians will bring the kingdom to earth by conquering the seven mountains. Now, some of you are going, what's that?

What's that? Little bit of a note here. The seven mountains mandate was supposedly a prophecy that Bill Bright received from God.

Bill Bright of Campus Crusade for Christ? And the way the prophecy goes that God had given him a strategy to basically have

Christians take dominion over the whole earth, and so all of society's kind of chopped up into seven different sectors, you know, like the government sector, the business sector, the entertainment sector, and those are called mountains.

And the job of Christians, in order to bring the kingdom of heaven to earth, is to basically strategically figure out a way to conquer all seven of those mountains in the different regions around the world and thereby take dominion over them and that'll bring the kingdom to earth.

The kingdom has nothing to do with evangelism. True or false? Agree or disagree? Disagree?

Okay. When Jesus taught us to pray, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, he was teaching us to operate in miracles, signs, and wonders because heaven is a supernatural kingdom.

Therefore, we must demonstrate the kingdom through the supernatural. Now, note here, every time

I invoked the Lord's prayer, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, the statements that followed were actual statements from people within visible

Christianity, liberals or charismatics or whatever. You're gonna note here, there's kind of a common theme, the way the logic works.

This is how it is in heaven, so we've got to make it this way on earth and that's what it means, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

So, note that. Next, to build the kingdom, a pastor must receive a vision from God, then cast the vision to his or her leadership team so that the people of their faith community can then work to accomplish the vision.

Duane, I'm happy to hear that. That is good news. Baptizing and teaching all that Christ has commanded is the way that the kingdom is expanded.

Yeah, okay. Kingdom work has nothing to do with social justice. Now, be careful on this one.

Okay, you should sit there and say, whoa, wait a second, where do good works fit?

Good works have something to do with the kingdom, they really, truly do. Because remember,

Jesus actually gave money to the poor. Judas was the keeper of the money bag and they were oftentimes giving money away to people.

And Jesus healed people. And these were all signs, if you would, that the kingdom had arrived among them, but his preaching was repent, repent.

So, the idea here is that oftentimes people think of good works kind of separate and divorced from the message of the gospel and they think that that's how the kingdom is advanced purely by doing mercy mission or helping people with their physical needs.

And if you divorce works from the preaching of the gospel and you focus only in on the works, what good have you done for a person if you've dug them a fresh water well but haven't told them about Jesus?

Right? That's where you need law and gospel. Right, you need law and gospel. And then conversely, what good is it if you sit there and say, well, we've got pure doctrine.

Our doctrine's totally pure, man. It's the best doctrine out there ever. Oh, it's all about Christ and him crucified for our sins.

And then those in need around us never hear from us. We don't lift a finger to help them.

You see what I'm saying? What good is your religion then? So, just be careful on that one.

Church coffee bar baristas are doing good kingdom work when they fulfill a customer's drink order.

Well, they're getting caffeine out there. Now, what's the

Kongsvinger equivalent of a church coffee bar barista? I poured coffee this morning. You poured coffee? Yeah, that's right, you poured it for your pastor.

That was very good. Yeah, so, because notice that, you know. So, whoever's volunteering to do the treats on Sunday.

Okay, so, they're doing coffee, they're doing kingdom work when they do that.

We're not charging for it. All right. Sound doctrine and rightly dividing the word of truth are vital to kingdom ministry.

If 51 % of the population of the United States are born again, then the U .S. can have a moral majority and that will make

America into a kingdom nation. No, it's not 51%, it's 54.

It's still got one way to go. Uh -huh, okay. Scripture makes a sharp distinction between the gospel of salvation and the gospel of the kingdom.

No, it doesn't. I'm glad you think that. It does not make a distinction, but there are those in Christianity and the visible church who try to make a sharp distinction between the two.

Kingdom work cannot be done apart from proclaiming Christ crucified for the ungodly. The kingdom has arrived when the government makes the rich share their wealth with the poor.

Okay. The kingdom has advanced through baptizing and making disciples.

A pastor, as God's anointed, must not be distracted away from doing kingdom work by being made to visit the church's shut -ins and preach the word to them and give them the

Lord's supper. Boy. I wish this was not a real quote.

It's actually almost verbatim something I heard. Only those who live a life of outward holiness and reject the ways of the world are part of the kingdom.

Okay. A church focused on feeding the poor and clothing the naked is a kingdom church, while a church that focuses on word and sacrament ministry totally is missing the mark regarding the kingdom work.

Okay. Kingdom people hope for the day when Christians will bring the kingdom to earth by eradicating poverty.

The poor you will always have with you, Christ said. Kingdom people hope for the day when Christ will return in glory to judge the living and the dead and create a new heavens and a new earth.

Yes. All right. So here's the tougher one. And I'll just, a couple volunteers. We won't do this for everybody.

A couple volunteers. In your own words, based on what we just kind of walked through, define the phrase kingdom of God.

Anyone wanna volunteer? You'll notice you kind of have a fuzzy idea of what it is and what it isn't.

Yeah, Janet, sitting there going, I told you I don't get it. What do you mean by kingdom? Scripture says the kingdom of God is near, referring to Jesus.

Uh -huh. Jesus is Jesus. Okay, so you're still kind of, you're musing at the moment, kind of mulling it over.

Just succinctly define the phrase kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is, where Christ is preached.

Okay. Anyone else have an idea? What do you think? Define the kingdom of God. Okay. Notice the silence.

Okay. Now, I'm gonna point something out. The fact that there is silence here is actually a problem.

And it's my job to help solve this problem. Okay. And so here's the idea. There's a lot of confusion, a lot of ambiguity, and a lot of unclarity and uncertainty regarding what is the kingdom of God.

And as a result of this, there are a lot of well -meaning

Christians, and I mean this, well -meaning Christians who are busy doing things that they think are kingdom work that isn't.

And that's a problem. That's a problem. And so we're gonna start to kind of unpack this.

Now, we're gonna begin, like I said, today's a little bit of a history lesson. I want you to think back, if you would, to the first three centuries of Christianity.

Almost three centuries. I don't think I was there. Okay. Dawn was, but. I was, but.

Yes. That's a good definition. Wikipedia. Okay, so Wikipedia.

That great theological. Kingdom of God. The teaching of Jesus.

Yep. In the New Testament. Indeed. The Old Testament refers to, will eventually be judged as essential element of Christian teachings.

So the kingdom of God means, y 'all are gonna stand, you're gonna be judged. Yay. That's good news.

Yeah, I think Wikipedia, this is an open source definition. We might want to, after we're done, see if we can add some clarity.

I was going to say earlier, you know, we're all bad, but some fall away.

Indeed, that's a different topic altogether. Yeah, so the mystery of apostasy is what you're mentioning.

It has a phrase. And then they reference the Nicene Creed, which is pretty close. But you know, that's a lot, because we're born in sin.

And then we are baptized. Yeah, we still have a sinful nature, even though we're regenerate.

You know, then you have the believers and the unbelievers. You're still going to have a separation there. Yep, alright. Alright, alright.

Yeah, see, you haven't added much clarity. You've just added a little more confusion. But that's okay. This is good. This is good.

Get it all out. Get it all out. We sat here. Alright. Now, coming back to the little bit of the history lesson.

First three centuries of Christianity. What do you know from Christian history? What was the

Roman Empire's posture towards the Christian faith? Entertainment.

Entertainment in the sense that Christians were the ones who were providing the entertainment while dying in public arenas like the

Colosseum. Nero used to have nighttime dinner parties, and he would use

Christians as torches to light the party. Not making this up. Kind of disgusting, right?

So nobody in the first three centuries of Christianity within the Roman Empire thought

Rome is a Christian nation. Nope. Not at all.

And so they understood there's a difference between the church and its work and the job of the government and its work.

Now, let me give you a biblical text. We'll review this. We talked about this last time, but I want to review it today.

If you would look at Romans 13, let's talk about the role of governments.

And it's important for us to understand governments are instituted by God. Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.

There is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Who's writing this?

Paul. When is he writing this? Well, middle part of the first century. Which is his governing authority?

The Roman Empire and all of the crazy emperors. That's kind of fascinating.

So a government that's hostile to Christianity, he is telling Christians, and of all places,

Rome, that they need to be subject to the governing authorities. There is no authority except from God.

Those that exist have been instituted by God. Important word here.

Instituted. And in the Greek, that's literally what it's talking about. Something that has been instituted is an institution.

Now, there's two errors, really, classically, within history.

Especially recently, within the past few centuries. And that is a belief that, number one, the church is not an institution, that it's a movement.

And that governments are not institutions. They are movements also. And you're thinking, who did that?

The second one. Answer, the fascists. The fascists were the ones who warred against the idea that the government is an institution.

Hitler, if you do the research on this, hated the idea of government ministers. He considered them to be the people in the way of real progress.

And so the Nazis and the fascists in Italy taught that the government is not an institution.

They didn't want structure and things like this. They believed that their whole movement was a movement.

And when you have a movement, you don't need office holders. You need Führers. Leaders.

But they were also against communism. Yes. Now, this is a different thing altogether, and there's a reason why.

Talk about that real quickly. The fascists hated the communists. The communists hated the fascists. Why? Because they were basically the same, weren't they?

Similar but different. And here's the big distinction. Bolshevik communism is predicated on the idea of the continual fight between the different classes.

The bourgeoisie and the proletariat fighting. So it's always based on class warfare.

So within a communist system, there will always be at least two tiers, no matter how you slice it.

Fascism is a collectivist ideology, but it doesn't make the distinction and have this thing based upon class warfare, but on the idea that individual human beings do not exist.

What exists is the community. And in order for the community to be healthy, there cannot be a constant war between classes within the community.

So that's why they hated each other. Because the communists wanted to take over Europe, but if they had taken over Europe, all of it, then it would have been based upon this constant class warfare motif.

If the fascists had taken over, they would have gotten rid of all individuals at all, and the only thing that would exist would be the collective community itself.

And the Führer. And the Führer. So you're starting to kind of get this.

So the idea of the fascists, then, they got rid of this idea of the government is an institution and has offices and ministers and stuff like that, and they just totally obliterated the whole thing.

You have the Führer at the top, and he supposedly, in some kind of weird, spiritual, mystical sense, was imbued with a really supernatural understanding of the needs of the community, and he was always living out in the future of the community in order to help the community come to where he was.

Bringing them into the future, that's the idea. Now, in the church, there's always this tendency, because of our sinful nature, to not think of the church as an institution and to set up two tiers within Christianity.

And here's what I mean. The two tiers would be something like this. You have the super -spiritual, holy people, and then everybody else.

And so, I'm a pastor, that makes me super -spiritual and holy, and then there's you. Now, notice the snark.

But I want you to think about this for a second. This is a really prevalent way of thinking.

Now, within Roman Catholicism, the way this works out, although Roman Catholicism itself as a whole truly is an institution, the way they set this up, then, is this idea that ordination is a sacrament, and that those who are ordained, they have to be ordained by a fellow who was ordained by a fellow who was ordained by a fellow that goes all the way back to Peter.

And the reason for this is simple, because through that special, mystical, apostolic succession line, what happens is that the person who is ordained undergoes an indelible change within their spirit and character that then makes them worthy to conduct the

Mass, to forgive sins, and things like that. So what is it that makes a priest worthy?

His ordination, which is a sacrament that changes him. And so when that happens to somebody, they're in a different class than the laity.

Totally. Does that make sense? Let me ask you this, and then think about this just for a minute with me, kind of conversely.

We'll switch into the left -hand kingdom for a second. When Donald Trump put his hand on the Bible and took the oath of office, was he changed into something super spiritual and special to be the

President of the United States? You guys seem so cynical. We're sitting there going, if only.

Okay. So, no, he wasn't. But he, at the moment, has ridiculous power and authority.

How does he have that? From God.

From God, but with and what? The institution of the government. The institution of the government is specifically in the office of President.

So, it's the office, not the man. Yes, very good. Okay, see, now we're cooking.

We're cooking here really well. None of you, I already know this for a fact. If I told you I was super -duper special, that I have some special mantling anointing, and that, wow,

I'm so much better than you are, you would all say, time to get a new pastor. Whew, something's wrong.

Whatever you've been feeding him, it's poisoning his mind. Yeah, that's right.

We need to check you into a facility. Hopefully you won't go through with withdrawals. Anyway, so here's the question

I have, then. What is it that gives me the authority, or who is it that gives me authority, and by what mechanism, to preach the

Word, to forgive sins, to preside at the Lord's Supper? Is it because I've been changed?

No, it's the office. So think of it this way. In our lifetimes, I think a few of us have actually experienced a few presidents, we can think of different office holders who've done well in office, and those who've done not so well.

There was room for improvement. In the same way, if you're like me, you've had pastors who, in the pastoral office, have done very well, and others who, well, there could be room for improvement.

But the reality is this, is that they are dispensing their duties. Some do well, some don't do well, but the important thing is the office.

So if I'm crossing the street and I get hit by the proverbial bus, I'm not important.

The office is. So what does Kongsvinger do? They get together, and they choose another fellow to put into the office, and then he continues with Word and Sacrament ministry.

It's just kind of that simple. And that's how things kind of work along. But within many groups within evangelicalism and the charismatic movement today, you ask them, what is it that makes a pastor a pastor?

Answer, they have received a special anointing from God, or they have received a special prophetic mantle from God.

And then you go into some of these churches, and the women are preaching, and you ask them, how is it that she's preaching

God's Word forbids it? Well, she has a special anointing on her life. Now, Joel Osteen has been around for a while.

I remember when he first came onto the scene, everyone was kind of like, what's going on here? Because I don't know if you've noticed this about Joel Osteen's messages.

They are so lukewarm that they can't even melt butter. You'll notice he doesn't preach law.

He doesn't preach repentance. He doesn't teach any messages that are negative.

And so when he first came onto the scene, there was scuttlebutt around the internet and within the

Christian community talking about the fact that this Joel Osteen fellow talks about having your best life now, and he seems to be so sunny and flowery and positive and stuff like that, but we never hear about sin or repenting or anything like this from this fellow.

And so a reporter actually asked Joel Osteen years ago about this.

And Joel Osteen, you know what his answer was? I'm not called to preach a message like that.

I'm specifically called by God to preach a positive message. That's his answer.

And you sit there and go, what? So if I just decided to, you know, do the whole blowing sunshine thing and rainbows and, you know, we decorate

Kong's Vineyard with unicorns and My Little Pony, and if you were the guys that challenged me, I'd say, well, listen, it's not my job to preach anything negative.

I'm called by God to just really help people and encourage them. Marilyn, I heard that, right?

You'll notice something here. What does this presuppose? It presupposes that there isn't an office and that individual pastors can have individual things that God can individually give them to do.

But if there's an office of pastor, then there are qualifications and there are duties and there are responsibilities.

There's authority and there's limits to the authority. And if that's the case, every pastor has the same job.

And no pastor gets to say, no, I got a special thing from God so I can ignore that and do this other thing.

And all of this has to do with wrongly understanding the church, even the government, and how

God has organized these things. The word instituted in this passage is of great importance.

Does that make sense? And here's the funny thing. Regardless of whether or not the country you live in is a representative republic or a monarchy or a dictatorship, over and again,

God refers to the leaders and the heads of all states as kings.

I want you to think about that. All of them.

The kings of the earth. A little bit of data.

All right, so we continue. There is no authority except from God. Those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what

God has appointed. And those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct but to bad.

Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good. You will receive his approval. For he is

God's servant, for you are good. But if you do wrong, be afraid. For he does not bear the sword in vain.

For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.

Therefore, one must be in subjection not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience.

For because of this you also pay your taxes. For the authorities are ministers of God attending to this very thing.

Pay to all what is owed them, taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.

Now, I want you to think about this. According to this text then, what is the purpose of government? What are governments instituted to do?

What? Government. And by that you mean? Rule over. Okay, rule over in what way?

Look at the text. It says it's an open book test. What did you say?

I did. He said keeping the law. Keeping the law. Keeping the law. Right.

So God has instituted governments for the purpose of punishing evildoers. I mean, if you really think about it, at its core, when

Congress and Senate meet, what are they doing? They're writing laws. They're writing laws.

And what do the laws do? They define what is legal and what is illegal, who is bad, who is good.

And then, once those laws are signed, they go over to the executive branch, and the executive branch is tasked with the job of enforcing the law.

So the executive branch says, this is legal, this is illegal, we've got to go find these people who are doing the illegal activity.

And when they find them, what do they do? They put them on trial. They put them on trial.

That's a different story. We'll talk about this in a second. Give them citizenship. Okay. So they put them on trial, and if they're found guilty, where do they go?

Prison. Okay, there's a sense of order. At its basic function, the governments exist for the sole purpose of curbing evil.

This is why it's so important that we elect politicians who recognize

God's law as the way of defining what is evil and what is good.

Because if you get somebody who ideologically is backwards and upside down on this, they're going to think that Christians are evil and that criminals are good.

Isn't that how things always go squirrelly? Just go to Chicago, right? You see what I'm saying?

It's where those who are actually believing and doing according to God's law are punished, while the evildoers who are breaking

God's law are rewarded. That's when the government goes corrupt. When a government does its job well, it identifies evil, writes a law against it, finds the evildoers, punishes them.

And then we pay taxes so that they would do this job. That just sounds so simple.

But it isn't that simple anymore because people... Let's go back to your first question.

Is the United States... I don't see any reason to believe it is.

It can't hurt anyone's feelings anymore, so... Yeah. But what you just got done saying proves that we are not.

Okay, hold on. You're getting way ahead of me here. Now, what you just said at the beginning of this was vital.

What I said sounds so simple. At its core, what the government exists to do and what it's instituted for is actually very simple.

We've made it difficult. Okay? And there's part of a reason why it's become so difficult.

And it has become so difficult is because there are competing ideologies that have different ideas for why the government exists.

And it actually has something to do with confusing the kingdom of the right and the kingdom of the left.

At its core, the U .S. government or any government exists to punish evildoers and to raise an army in order to protect its citizenry.

To punish and to break things is pretty much what the government does the best. And when it does other things, yeah, it's got some problems.

Now, here's where we have to make a distinction. And this is where there is another institution.

The other institution is the church. The church is instituted by Christ.

And the church exists to do what? Make disciples of all nations, baptizing, teaching all that Christ has commanded.

In next week's Gospel text, we will hear Jesus say that we as Christians are to proclaim repentance and the forgiveness of sins.

This is our job. So we make disciples, baptizing, teaching all that Christ has commanded, proclaiming repentance and the forgiveness of sins.

This is our job. So when the government comes along and oversteps its authority, it has authority from God to punish evildoers.

That's what it's instituted to do. When the government or a government official says, you, church, are evil because we don't like what you're saying, and so they begin to persecute

Christians, they're now outside of their institutional authority.

Does that make sense? Isn't that still ordained by God, though? No. That they're put in that position.

That they're in the position is one thing. To overstep their authority is a different thing altogether.

So when a government official says to you Christians, you have to stop preaching that this thing is a sin or that thing is a sin, and you can't tell anybody anymore that God makes people male and female because we believe in non -binary human beings.

And this comes down from a government official. What are we to do? Yeah. We just basically...

Well, actually, it's a little bit more than this. We say to said government official, you do not have that authority, so therefore you need to understand you are in your position because God placed you there and you've overstepped the institution, and you need to repent.

You need to repent of this wickedness, or you will be judged by Christ accordingly.

You see, you keep things in their proper institutions. When you keep them in their proper institutions and understand their offices, you understand that offices have authority.

For instance, as a pastor, I'm ordained. Do I have authority to sign a bill passed by Congress to make it into law?

No. In the same way, no government official has the right to say what the church is to preach because Christ said, teaching them all that I have commanded you, talking to Christ.

You sit there and go, I'm sorry, but the king of kings says to you, king, uh -uh, you've overstepped your bounds.

Starting to see it? All right, now let's do our history lesson real quick here. First three centuries of Christianity, Christianity is illegal.

When does it stop being illegal? Constantine. You're 315.

What's the name of the document that makes Christianity legal? Edict of Milan.

I think I'm off to lunch. Okay, so Christianity is made legal by Constantine.

Constantine ends the official institutional persecution of Christians he himself is baptized on his deathbed.

His mother is a believer and. Constantine does something very interesting shortly after Christianity becomes legal.

He is a participant and present for a church council. The name of the church council was the council of Nicaea.

Purpose of the council of Nicaea was specifically in order to address the issue of the

Aryan heresy. The belief that Jesus is not eternal, but that he is a created creature of God.

He's God -like, but he's not God. And so Constantine is present at the council of Nicaea and thus begins the mixing of church and state.

Does that make sense? This is where it starts to mix. Now, years after Constantine dies, one of his successors, and I forget his name, if it was

Theodosius or some other fellow, but there was an emperor of Rome who believed in the

Aryan heresy, post -Nicaea, by the way. He believed in the Aryan heresy, and you know what he began to do as the emperor of Rome?

Persecute those who believed in the doctrine of the Trinity. And if you know your church history, then you know that one of the great defenders of the doctrine of the

Trinity was a fellow by the name of Athanasius of Alexandria. And Alexandria is in Egypt.

Athanasius of Alexandria was one of these fellows. When the Aryans confronted him and said, give up,

Athanasius, the whole world is against you. Athanasius retorted back, nah, Athanasius contra mundo.

It is Athanasius against the world. I mean, this is a guy who was gutsy in his defense of the doctrine of the

Trinity. But the emperor of Rome, who was an Aryan, decided that it was his responsibility to arrest

Athanasius and punish him for teaching the doctrine of the Trinity. So he sent Roman soldiers to round him up, and he got wind that the soldiers were on the way, and you know what he did?

He skedaddled, which is a very holy thing to do, by the way. He skedaddled.

And as the story goes, it's actually kind of funny. As the story goes, he gets on one of those skiffs with the triangle -shaped sails on the

Nile, and he's in one of those things sailing up the Nile to get away from the Roman soldiers, and they're in the boat just behind him.

And their boat was faster. And so their boat comes up alongside of his boat, and they say, we're looking for Athanasius.

Did you see him? He said, yeah, I did. He's in the boat up ahead of you. And they said, thank you, and then went off after him.

No joke. But now we've got a problem.

You're going to notice this. The Roman emperor sent the Roman soldiers to address a what issue?

A church issue. And so what happens is that Christianity post -Constantine begins to have a mixing of church and state.

And things get so bad that bishoprics, places where bishops were territorially, bishops become political leaders.

And they exercise political authority from within an ecclesiastical office.

At the time of the Reformation, was there any monarch in Europe that can become the monarch without the approval of the pope?

No. This is a mixing of church and state. So the way this is described then is this is called

Constantinian Christianity, a mixing of church and state. Now, Mark.

The church council invited Constantine to participate? He was instrumental in calling it.

Let's assume that the President of the United States is a Christian. Does he have the right to responsibility, or should he tell a

Muslim leader that we should cease among Christians? You can bring it up as a human rights issue.

And you're going to have to use natural law to make the argument. You could make an argument from natural law, but that's not going to fly in a

Muslim nation. And here's the thing. In Islam, is there a distinction between church and state?

There is none. Sorry. Mosque and state. Sharia law is the total meltdown and mixing together and amalgamation of mosque and state.

Yeah. All right. So I don't think that will fly. I don't think. That's a good question.

I don't know. I can't even begin to put myself into the office of President to figure out where the, you know.

I would try to find ways diplomatically to get them to back off of persecuting

Christians, but I don't see any reason why they would believe me or listen to me because I'm just the President of the great evil

Satan America, you know. So, yeah. Being that the U .S. has freedom of religion, can the

U .S. allow Islam without allowing Sharia? Because it seems like it's part of.

Yeah. This poses an interesting problem. And I'll give you an example from recent history.

In Texas, there was a particular city where, no joke, the mayor decided to take a stand against Muslims and the church council, not the church council, but the city council and the mayor basically passed a law saying that they will not allow or recognize any competing law system and that to do so would be treasonous.

And that place, when that happened, the Muslims were there in mass and post -decision, they considered that to be an attack and an affront to Islam.

We've got a problem with Islam because Islam does not see a distinction between mosque and state and as the religion itself grows in the places that it has really taken root, it takes over all of civic.

It does not recognize the rights of Christians at all. Like England. Well, not just England. I would think of like Dearborn, Michigan and places like that.

I mean, in Dearborn, Michigan, the Muslims made it illegal for the churches to ring their church bells. Because we do.

Yes, we do. But in Islam, you don't. Right. So that's why they're here. Yeah.

And they're going to use that almost against us? Yeah. Can I say that? Of course. That's what they're going to do.

They're going to use it against us. Yeah. But that's kind of advanced talk there. Let's stick with the basics for a second.

So coming back to this idea and let's deal with how Christianity has mixed church and state. Right? Can I say one?

Sure. Can I ask one question? Sure. Years ago, whatever country,

Scotland, England, Spain, France, they would get a new king and then say that he was this religion and everyone had to become this religion.

Yeah. So this king would take over and everyone would become this. Is this where this is all going? Yep. This is part of this.

So at the time of the Reformation, Germany itself as a state did not exist. Okay. Where Germany is today, it was part of a place called the

Holy Roman Empire. Yep. And so there was loose little confederations within the

Holy Roman Empire. And as the Reformation spread, because the

Roman Catholic Church excommunicated Luther and those who believed in salvation by grace through faith alone, now you have a problem because in their view, in the monarch's view, if I'm ruling over a people and I've got

Protestants and Catholics in my kingdom, that will undermine the unity of the kingdom necessary for us to protect ourselves and to move our kingdom forward.

And so it became common practice then and religion became kind of like a football. So you have a

Protestant king for a while and he dies. His daughter becomes queen and she's

Catholic. And what does she do? She persecutes Protestants. And then the next fellow is a

Protestant and what does he do? He persecutes the Catholics. And this all leads to what in history is known as the

Thirty Years' War. And nobody comes out of the Thirty Years' War with clean hands. Not Lutherans, not

Calvinists, not Anabaptists, not Catholics. The atrocities committed by all these groups are beyond the pale of sinfulness.

It's just wretched and awful. And so this then becomes kind of the breeding ground of discontent with Constantinianism, although nobody calls it this, the mixing of church and state, so that people are leaving

Europe and coming to North America. Why? So that they can have freedom to practice their religion.

And in the U .S. Constitution, the U .S. government cannot recognize any religion.

And the reason for that is simple. It's because governments in Europe were doing that and it was leading to all kinds of turmoil, chaos, suffering, and death.

So here we are though, the first 200 years of the United States of America. Christians are the majority.

And do you know what they ended up doing? Practicing Constantinianism.

They were practicing Constantinianism. They were enjoying reveling in and taking advantage of the fact that within society they had the majority and they were ruling accordingly.

But over the past 150 years, Christianity has been literally blown out from the inside by liberal theology and crazy heresies.

And as a result of that, Christians haven't been reproducing. They have not been reproducing themselves and making disciples.

So in my lifetime, Christianity, this much of the population, and now we're down to here.

And what's happened as Christianity has become less and less of the population? Increase in evil.

So here we are post -Constantinian Christianity.

And how do we solve this problem? Get rid of the liberals. Okay. Alright, let's throw that on the table and let's discuss it.

So we're going to get rid of the liberals. I would say how? Build a Coliseum again. No. That's Constantinianism.

No. Okay. So how do we solve the problem?

Is it by being politically active and trying to change people's mind and get the majority of people to agree with this particular political party?

Because last time I looked, both of them are a mess right now. You make disciples.

Now think of it this way then. The U .S. Constitution presupposes a

Christian worldview. It does. It can't work without that.

And the reason why things are falling apart is because the church hasn't been doing its job.

This is why we're in the state that we're in. So if everybody is born dead and trespasses and sins.

I know I say this a lot of times. Cows moo because they're cows. Cats meow because they're cats.

Sinners sin because they're sinners. If we're born dead in trespasses and sins, as people continue and grow in their lives as unregenerate unbelievers in God, what are they going to do and want to do more and more?

Sin. And so it's taken on all kinds of varieties of sin. Strange, exotic species we've never even seen before.

Non -binary human beings. What is that? It's nonsense. No, we're not.

We're devolving into slime. They would happily believe that we're evolving, right?

So how do we turn this around? Whose job is it to turn it around?

The church's. The government's job is to punish evildoers. The job of the church is to take the ungodly, bring them to repentance, so that they can be forgiven and bear fruit in keeping with repentance.

Of course not. I would never be sensitive to a sinner who wants to be complacent and comfortable in their sin.

No, I think it's actually tolerant. I talk on it regularly, but here's the idea.

We've got to get these categories right. The government can't fix our problems. It's not designed to.

The government is designed and instituted to punish and break things. It is not instituted to make people

Christians. We are. The church is. So that's kind of step one in all of this.

And again, a little bit of history lesson to kind of frame this all in our minds. But starting next week, this is all, by the way, under the basic umbrella of the fourth commandment.

Honor your father and mother. This has everything to do with the right understanding of the government, also the right understanding of the church.

It really does. So next week we'll delve a little bit deeper into this, and we're going to take a hard look at the kingdom of God itself.