Is Separation of Church And State a Myth?

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The Gospel Message and the Coming Judgment

People are tired of hearing nothing but doom and despair on the radio.

...found in Christ, therefore forfeit any hope of salvation, any hope of heaven.

The issue is that humanity is in sin and the wrath of almighty God is hanging over our head.

They will hear his words, they will not act upon them, and when the floods of divine judgment, when the fires of wrath come, they will be consumed and they will perish.

God wrapped himself in flesh, condescended and became a man, died on the cross for sin, was resurrected on the third day, has ascended to the right hand of the Father, where he sits now to make intercession for us.

Jesus is saying there is a group of people who will hear his words, they will act upon them, and when the floods of divine judgment come in that final day, their house will stand.

July 4th Banter and the Episode Introduction

Welcome to Bible Bash, where we aim to equip the saints for the works of ministry by answering the questions you're not allowed to ask. We're your hosts, Harrison Kerrig and Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we'll seek to answer the age-old question, is separation of church and state a myth?

And before we get into this episode, I thought it was pretty funny, I didn't realize this when we were talking about planning this episode, but we're actually putting this out on July 4th, so I guess subconsciously we're trying to scratch that old patriotic itch and talk about something that relates to all of us talking about the government and how we should view lawmaking on the anniversary of our country's birth.

And so in a way, I guess this is our tribute, if you want to call it that, to the founding fathers and the revolution, but I didn't even really think about that until we were getting ready to record the episode.

But since this episode's coming out, we're not recording it on July 4th, but everyone, you're going to be hearing it on July 4th. And so, Tim, what are some of your plans for July 4th? Are you all shooting fireworks?

Are you breaking out the Abrams tank? What are you all doing?

Well, yeah, like good Americans, we're going to be grilling out hamburgers and hot dogs, and we'll probably sit in the backyard and watch the neighborhood fireworks because they're having some at the clubhouse or whatever, so we'll do that.

But maybe no guns. I think we might go to jail if we try that. But stay away from that. But if we had a tank, we may shoot it.

The guns are out, but the tank, if you had it, that would be on the table.

That would be on point, yep.

Meat and explosions.

That's right.

That's your July 4th. That's the summary of your July 4th. Yeah, ours is going to be something pretty similar. We're going to go eat with a bunch of our family for lunch, and then we might try and go watch some fireworks.

We've had a pretty long weekend of different things that we've been going to, and so our daughter is pretty worn out at this point. I mean, she took a really long nap today, and so I really don't. She's going to be out late tonight too, and so I really don't know if she's going to be able to keep this up tomorrow as well, so we might have to skip it.

The good thing, though, is with the fireworks being loud, if she cries, you won't be able to hear it.

I thought you were going to say something about the fireworks will keep her up, but instead you're talking about you won't have to hear her crying.

Got to think these things through, man.

Yeah, you're right. I'm obviously still a novice when it comes to being a parent, and you are the master. Yeah, so that's what we're looking forward to. We'll see how things go, but it's been a fun weekend.

We got to hang out with a bunch of our church family as well, and so that was really nice. Hopefully, everyone who's listening has been having a pretty good July 4th and been able to celebrate with friends and family.

Remember a lot of the sacrifice that people made and the way they really did risk their lives and their livelihood to be able to found our country. With all that being said, the title question for today is the separation of church and state and whether or not it's a myth.

Is it real? Really, in my mind, the reason that we're talking about this is obviously Roe v. Wade got overturned I guess two weeks ago or I guess a week and a half ago, a week from this last Friday. Weirdly enough, not everyone has been that happy about it.

That's right, man.

Big shock there, but a lot of very vocal and violent people have made it plain that they are not okay with the ruling.

By the Supreme Court.

What's amazing about that too, though, is so many, and this is something that I suspected would happen, but many of your big-name evangelical leaders who you would expect to be celebrating because they've apparently been champions of pro-life causes for their whole life.

It seems like they're eerily, strangely silent with this new revelation, and I'm sure that it puts them in a bit of an awkward situation because now it's like they're in that kind of... It's like a situation where you imagine that the woman's husband went off to war and he went MIA or whatever, and everyone was praying for his safe return, and they give her the news that he's been found, right?

And then all of a sudden she gets quiet and still, doesn't appear to be rejoicing. It's like, I thought this was the rejoicing moment, but apparently you look like you've seen a ghost.

What's going on?

And then you come to find out behind the scenes that they have been pursuing another man, and we're hoping that they're finally rid of the poor sucker or whatever. But this is kind of like that moment for many of the evangelical leaders.

You should make that a scene in a movie. The wife's standing at the door. She opens the door for the guys in the soldier's uniforms coming to give her the news, and she drops down. You don't hear what they say, and you see her just drop down to the floor crying, and then you look at the letter, and it's like, he's alive or something.

It's just like that, man. It's painful to watch. They've been telling us that they're pro-life for years as they undermine the position at every single point, and now is the moment where it's time to celebrate, and they can't even muster up.

Hey, look, they can't anger their platform, man, the people that are supporting them.

Well, it's one of those things where it's like they're in a bit of an awkward situation because maybe we'll talk about this over the course of the episode, but it's one of those things where they've been trying to make this kind of argument that it's okay to be Christian and be Democrat because nothing is ever going to happen with the Roe v. Wade thing anyways, and so now it's just a matter of promoting that kind of things that can actually make a difference, i .e. socialism or whatever.

And so they've been making that kind of case for years now, but now that it's actually overturned, then you're in a bit of a different spot because it's overturned at this point, and you vote Democrat, and they're going to be actively trying to reinstate it.

And so now you're arguing from a different kind of position. It's no longer this impossible white rhino kind of situation where if theoretically it can happen, we all know it's not going to happen, so we can vote for the things we really want.

Now it's like it does bring it into focus and clarity that this is a live issue, and there are literal Nazis that you're trying to support. You're going to try to bring the killing fields back.

Worse than Nazis.

Yeah.

Worse than Nazis.

Right, right. So it's certainly been a spectacle to watch the non-response, or the response, like, don't celebrate the liberation of, I guess, victory in Europe day, and you're not allowed to celebrate because it might offend the Nazis.

It's just like, what in the world?

Right, right.

Come on.

And at the risk of getting off topic this early in the episode.

Who knows what topic it's for.

Yeah.

One of the, I was thinking about this. So I was working, I guess it was Saturday, I was doing some work, and we're doing like a Bible reading plan as a church, and so I was going through Exodus, and it got to the part where Moses and the Israelites, they just got delivered by God.

They walked through the Red Sea, and then the Red Sea, you know, it came back together and swallowed up the Egyptians, right? And I was thinking about that.

They didn't celebrate there, man. They did not celebrate. It was a time of solemn grieving for the Egyptians.

Empathy.

Empathy and compassion and nonjudgmental.

It was very solemn.

Yeah.

No, it wasn't that. I was listening. I mean, I think, I guess it's Exodus 15 or 16, maybe. That might not be right. I can't remember off the top of my head, but whatever chapter it is, it's literally like the whole chapter is just a song of celebration that the Egyptians were destroyed by God, and then you compare that to what you're seeing now, and it's just a total, I mean, you wonder if these guys are even reading their Bibles anymore, you know?

But anyways, back on track, back on track. So the reason we wanted to talk about separation of church and state is because a lot of people have been coming out, and one of the big arguments, one of the big talking points from pro-baby murderers is this idea that—.

I like that way of putting it, Nick.

Pro-baby murderers?

Yeah.

Well, that's what they are. I mean, you can't even argue that at this point. It's a biological fact. You're killing babies. You're killing a human being. So they've been arguing, bringing up, hey, we are not a nation that is supposed to be mixing religion and politics, right?

We have this idea that we were founded on, which is the idea that the church and the state need to remain separate from one another in every single way, right? And so I thought it would be helpful on this July 4th to talk about, number one, is that right?

And then number two, what does God have to say about government and religion? And then focus that in, too, on our specific country, the United States of America, and talk about what were the Founding Fathers' ideas when it came to this subject as well?

Because I think a lot of people just really don't understand. Obviously, they don't understand the Bible. They don't understand what God thinks. But then even just the Founding Fathers and simple history, they don't really understand it.

I mean, you can go online and watch video after video of people getting asked on the street, like, hey, what's the First Amendment? What's it about? And they're just kind of like, uh, uh. My history teacher would be so mad at me right now.

Uh, you know. And I think there's something, too. Like, you get caught in the moment, and maybe you just kind of freeze up. But I doubt there's—I'm sure there's a lot of people out there who if you asked them, they would have no idea.

So with all that being said, Tim, is separation of church and state a myth?

Well, I mean, I think essentially, yes.

That's it. That's the episode.

I mean, it depends on what a person means by that. But what most people mean by that, yes, it's a myth, in the way that most people are thinking about it. But as you think about that expression, there's a ball of separation between church and state.

That is a historical expression that is not actually in the Constitution itself. So that was a letter written by Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist Association. And it is elaborating on the meaning of what you find in the First Amendment.

And, you know, if you properly understand what he's saying, then, I mean, obviously that's his explanation for what the First Amendment actually means. But then in the minds of many, they understand the First Amendment to be saying something very different than what he's intending to communicate.

And so it is what many people now think of when they think of a separation of church and state. I would say, yes, that's a myth. Does that make sense?

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

So that's not what he meant or what the First Amendment meant. So I would say that there's a profound confusion as to what is being actually communicated in the First Amendment itself. But then the First Amendment is pretty straightforward.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or of the right of the people to peaceably assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

So if you want to understand the statement in the Constitution itself, the First Amendment, related to the issue of the relationship between the church and the state, that's essentially it. And what you find there is that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, but then they also make no law prohibiting the free exercise of religion, if that makes sense.

But then that law, they shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. Essentially what people think that is saying is that religion and politics have to be kept separate. But then that really isn't at all what's being communicated, that religion and politics need to be kept separate.

That's not what's being communicated. What's being communicated is that, as you read through Thomas Jefferson's letters to the Danbury, or his letter to the Danbury Baptist Association and their letter to him, what they're making very clear, the Danbury Baptist Association, they're making very clear that their concern is that there's going to be a federal church that's established.

Now, at the time of the producing of the Constitution, most of the states at that time, they had what you might describe as state churches. So they didn't believe in the separation of church and state, meaning that having religion formalized within the government was a bad thing.

What they were afraid of was, the Baptist Association was afraid that the congregational churches would establish a federal congregational church over the entire nation, and that that would influence and control how they were able to participate in their own religion at the state level.

So they were concerned about a federal church. They weren't concerned about the idea of even a state church. Does that make sense?

Right, yeah.

So they were concerned about the idea of a federal church. Now, Thomas Jefferson, in his letter back to him, he says, Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only and not opinions,.

I contemplate with sovereign reverence the act of the whole American people which declare that their legislators shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or the prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state.

So, adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation on behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore man all his natural rights, convinced that he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.

And all that's being communicated there is there's not going to be the establishment of a federal church. But then the idea that religion and politics should be kept absolutely separate is essentially is nonsense.

And it's not something that they even thought about at that point. So, if you think about the Declaration of Independence in itself, the Declaration of Independence communicates that man is endowed with God, certain God-given rights, right?

Namely, the right to life, liberty. And Thomas Jefferson changed Locke's formula, ownership of property to the pursuit of happiness. But these rights were essentially God-given rights. And the issue is you do have to ground your morality somewhere.

Morality doesn't just come from any...

Thin air.

Yeah, it doesn't come from thin air. It doesn't come from an evolutionary framework. You have to have some objective grounding for your morality. And their objective grounding was in the belief in the God of the Bible.

Essentially, they're grounding their morality in that. And so, they didn't think that religion and politics needed to be kept separate in the way that many people understand that today. What they were trying to...

The issue is at the time, the Constitution was essentially advocating a limited form of government. And what they were concerned is that if there was a federal church then that would run roughshod over the sincere religious practices at a state level.

And they wanted things to be kept local. They didn't want it to be run at a federal level, particularly as it relates to religion. So, they were concerned about that as a form of protection for the church.

The concern wasn't to protect the people from the church itself. They were concerned that the government would encroach upon them and force them to do things that were against their conscience. And so, that's why it's an amendment in that way.

But the idea that religion and politics should be kept separate or that that has any basis in the Constitution is just nonsense.

Government, Morality, and the Need for Objective Grounding

Right. Yeah, and it's interesting that so many people in our day and age seem to think that you can't even have politics without a religious worldview of some kind, right? I mean, just like you said. So, politics is basically...

It's informed by our morality, right?

Right.

And our morality is informed by our religious worldview. And so, in a certain sense, you have to have religion of some kind in order to have a government.

Yeah, I mean, you have to have some sort of objective grounding for your morality and apart from the scriptures, you don't have anything that's objective. You can ground it in popular opinion, but it's not going to be objective at that point.

It's just going to change with shifting times. So, if you want some kind of objective moral grounding, you need an objective moral law given by an objective moral law giver at that point. And what's really interesting though is that you think about the founding of our nation and the laws of the colonies, you might think to yourself, what would you do?

And this is something that people are so historically ignorant at this point. But imagine yourself coming over to the New World and you have to form some sort of government, right? You have to figure out what you're going to do.

And as you look at the governments that were actually produced by the American colonies at that point, what's really interesting is that they essentially did the kind of thing that I think any kind of Bible-believing person would probably do at that point.

Meaning, you can imagine that all of us were going on some trip somewhere at our church and we get stranded on a our plane gets shot down or something like that and we all survive somehow and we're lost.

We're on the island or whatever.

We're on the TV show.

But we would have to form some sort of government and then you have to think to yourself, what do you do at that point? Now, if it's all on you and you can't just kind of it's not just about what is, trying to sanctify what is.

If you were to ask yourself, what do I do now? So you put yourself in the deserted island scenario there. What kind of government do you form? And as I've read through the old covenant law repeatedly again and again and again and again, over and over again what you're going to find in the Bible is, particularly in Deuteronomy, that God says of His law that what nation is there that has such rules that are so righteous and just as this and a God so near to them that would give them such a wise law essentially.

And that's phrased over and over again. And what happened with the American colonies is their impulse was to do essentially what my impulse would be to do. If I were in charge, right? You put me in charge and you say, hey, give us a government.

And I would say, well, okay. The only thing I know to do at that point is to go through the old covenant law. This is a law that God actually it has civil elements in it that God actually produced. And at that point, the only thing I would know to do is look at the criminal code that was put in the old covenant, right?

And to think about the things that are death penalty kind of issues under the old covenant. And I would say, well, I guess what we need to do is we need to produce a kind of law that mirrors the morality of the old covenant and trying to distinguish between sins and crimes at that point.

Well, what are the things that have criminal penalties attached to it? And I would think you would need to adopt the penology of the Old Testament, essentially. That's what you do. But then the colonies, that's essentially what they did at a step-by-step level.

If you look into the documents, they did exactly that, okay? And that's why buggery or sodomy was considered a capital offense in the colony. In many of the colonies. It's because they're just reading the old covenant and they're doing what they find there.

That's what they're doing, you know?

They're looking at it and saying, hey, you know, these are pretty good.

Well, I mean, and I don't know how you can improve upon them, right? And so, but then the issue is during the time, there were anti-sodomy laws in America, in most states, up until very, very recently.

And the reason why is because they were there because they read the Old Testament and that's what they did. And so, no one at the time thought that some sort of separation of church and state meant that the Bible and politics must be kept absolutely separate.

In fact, that's totally irrational. You can't even do that. You have to have some objective grounding for your morality. Like, why is murder wrong, right?

Right.

Like, why is stealing wrong? Why should murder and stealing be criminal? And you can't just say because I don't like it, okay?

Right, yeah.

Like, that is not sufficient moral reasoning to say I dislike it, therefore, like, let's make it, like, illegal, right? What you have to do is you have to have some objective moral grounding for the laws that you come up with.

And if you don't appeal to the Bible, what do you appeal to, okay?

Right.

Like, what are you going to appeal to? And so, like, the issue at the time was not that they were saying, like, religion and politics need to be kept separate. In fact, what they said was that, you know, the Constitution was, you know, given for a moral and a religious people, and it was wholly inadequate for any other kind of people.

They understood that, like, morality was intrinsically tied to the Scriptures, and they produced a legal system that was, in large measure, based on the morality of the Bible. And, like, that's what they did.

And so, like, the issue was not keeping religion and politics separate. It had nothing to do with, you know, you can't pray at, you know, a football game or at a school or something like that. Although, I mean, we may want to wade into that topic at some point later.

But, like, it had nothing to do with, you know, taking the Ten Commandments out of the courthouse or anything like that, keeping these things separate. What it had to do was they were preventing the federal government from adopting a state church that would exercise authority over the religious practices of, you know, the entire nation at that point, and they wanted to keep these things at a local level.

And at a local level, they had state churches in almost all of them. So, like, that's the point. So, it had nothing to do with that, essentially.

Atheism, Darwinism, and the Failure of Secular Morality

Petey Yeah, and I think we've talked about this before, but essentially, you know, that's the crux of the issue in a lot of ways is this idea that, you know, that you can have government without some sort of religion at all.

There's a lot of people who really do think that you can have government without religion and then turn around and try and push their specific religion on the government they live under, right? And then, you know, they try and pretend that they're objective with it, but then, you know, the reality is even the atheist is a deeply religious person.

The problem is they have no way to justify their religion, and so what they end up doing is they just steal from the Christian worldview a lot of times in a lot of different ways and pretend that it's, like, some obvious common sense thing that any right-minded person would come to when the reality is there's plenty of people who don't come to, who don't agree with them.

And we as Christians can say, hey, look, you know, when Hitler kills 6 million people, when Stalin kills 20 million people, when Mao kills, like, I don't even remember how many he killed. It was at least 20 million.

I think it was a lot more than that, though. When they do that, we can say, yep, that's evil.

Why?

Because God has told us that killing people is evil. The atheist can't say that. The atheist can say, well, I don't like it. I think it's bad, but then, okay, why? It says who?

But that's even, like, it's contradictory to Darwinism itself, you know?

Right.

In that, like, Darwinism is based on the idea of, like, survival of the fittest and might makes right. And so, like, it's formally contradictory to Darwinism, but not only is it formally contradictory, it's logically contradictory in the same kind of way.

And so, like, you know, it's not whether you're going to have some sort of morality. It's, like, what morality are you going to adopt? But I think for many people, if I could maybe share my own kind of, you know, be a little autobiographical or something at that point, reaction to this kind of discussion, I think for many people there is very much an ignorance about what the Constitution is saying at that point and an ignorance about history.

But then there's also what you might describe as, like, the common kind of, you know, as I've been a Christian and interacted with these discussions over the years, the common kind of way that I think individuals have articulated this kind of thing is something that I, you know, when I was growing up, I was never persuaded was reasonable, but at the same time, I didn't know that I had a way of arguing with it.

But, you know, it's the idea that, like, you, you know, you imagine yourself talking with, you know, an atheist or something like that, and, like, you're trying to get them to, you know, adopt whatever political philosophy that you have, right?

And then, you know, essentially, like, what people are afraid of, and this is what people I knew growing up were afraid of, is they're afraid of, like, the response to the question, you know, so what, right?

So, like, meaning, like, if someone were to say, you know, if I were to say, hey, abortion's wrong, well, why do you think abortion's wrong? Well, because the Bible says that. And then their response to that is, well, I don't believe the Bible, right?

And then there's a lot of Christians at that point who are deeply flummoxed by that response, right? So, like, they don't know what to do with that, right? So, it's just like, you know, I don't believe the Bible, checkmate, you know, therefore, you know, you shouldn't be trying to impose your religion upon me.

So, then, like, the response from many Christians at that point, and I remember that this is, like, I had many friends who, you know, felt like that was just some sort of absolute overpowering objection they had nothing to do with.

And so, because they were going to hear that response, that led them to think, well, the only way to interact with this and to argue with this at that point is just to try to appeal to common ground, essentially, right?

And so, then it's just like, well, I can't use the Bible to argue with someone who doesn't believe the Bible, therefore, the only thing I can do going forward is, the only thing that's left to me is just to try to appeal to common sense or common consensus.

But then the problem, though, is as you watch our culture decay, like, common sense isn't common sense, okay?

Right. It's not very common anymore.

It's not very common anymore. But then there's no settled, agreed upon definition of what common sense is. And, like, that kind of idea, like, pretends, like, that there's some sort of neutral morality out there that everyone can agree upon.

Now, the problem is, like, because our country was founded on a Christian worldview, and you're living in the vestiges of that Christian worldview, yeah, you know what? There's plenty of guys like, you know, James Lindsay, I think, is anti-abortion.

I don't know. I need to probably look that up. But there's plenty of, like, if he's not, at least he's anti-socialism, you know, so there's that. But, like, the idea is, like, you can appeal to, you know, like this idea of property rights because we used to believe in that.

But the problem is that, you know, everything's up in the air at this point. You know, as you check God, you refuse to acknowledge him in our hearts. You know, almost everything's on the table, and there's no shared morality anymore.

And, like, you have women shouting their abortions and, you know, talking about, you know, getting pregnant with, like, Republicans' babies just so that they can slaughter them, right? Like, there's no common ground there, okay?

And, like, the more that you chuck religion, the more, you know, paganism that you're going to see and the less morality that you see. And we don't even, like, we used to think that genital mutilation was a bad thing, and now we're praising it as a virtue.

Like, you know, praising, like, you know, castration of men and, you know, the breast removal surgeries for women. Like, we're at a point now where, like, we are so far gone, and there is no, like, neutral, you know, shared Christian worldview that you can appeal to with the pagans anymore.

We don't even know the difference between a male and a female. And so what that does, though, is it causes you to rethink that basic argument that, like, there's some sort of neutral common ground out there that you can appeal to.

And what you really do have to do is you have to say, thus says the Lord, and do it with conviction. And that's the only thing you can say is that, like, I, like, and that's the very thing that people are humiliated and embarrassed to say, and that's something that, you know, growing up, I just, I didn't quite understand why they seemed to be so embarrassed to just say, God says it, I believe it, that settles it, right?

You know, God is the king above all other kings and authorities, and what he says goes, and he commands everyone everywhere to repent, and it's his world, and it doesn't matter whether or not you submit to him, he makes the rules, and, you know, I have no argument with you other than God says it, and I'm not embarrassed by that.

And there's no reason to be embarrassed by that. Like, God says it, doesn't matter whether or not you like it, you know? And you can make that kind of case when you know that the Holy Spirit has been sent into the world to convict the world of sin and righteousness and judgment.

Like, you, when you, you know, speak what's right, like, like, the issue is you have heaven and earth behind you at that point, and you don't have to fear them, and you don't have to be embarrassed about that, and, like, there's nothing embarrassing about standing on the words of God, so.

Roe v. Wade, State Authority, and Christian Moral Reasoning

Right. Yeah, and, you know, that kind of gets back to what I was saying a few minutes ago. You know, if you are the person who is looking at government and, you know, you look at things like Roe v. Wade being overturned, which, by the way, doesn't even outlaw abortion.

It just turns it back to the, it makes it a decision of the states again, right?

Right.

So, it's not even a full-on outlaw, it's just a, you know, the discussion has moved now from a federal level to a state level.

This is a constitutional, yeah, it's a constitutional right. Now it's, like, no, it never was a constitutional right. It wasn't in the purview of the Constitution.

Right.

Now the states can decide it, you know.

Right, and so, you know, you look at this discussion, and we as Christians, we can look at this and say, hey, it's wrong to kill babies.