Christianity vs. the Government

Christianity, the Gospel, and the State

Next week with Jeff Durbin, I'm Jeff Durbin, very exciting for everybody today, lots of things going on. We have tonight, well a very special guest, one of my very favorite people in the world and I truly mean that, he's one of my favorite modern theologians and philosophers, he's a good, good friend of mine and it's really a privilege to have him on and an honor to have him on.

Next week with Jeff Durbin tonight, his name is Dr. Joe Boot, I want to encourage you all to get his book, Mission of God, go run and sell your shirt and shoes to buy that book and read it, do what you can to get through that book, it'll bless your life.

He's in charge of the Ezra Institute and he is with us live tonight, welcome Dr. Joe Boot.

Thanks Jeff, great to be with you, thanks for having me again.

Absolutely brother.

Always good to be on the show.

Always a pleasure to have you and we're going to see you actually in July, we're going to talk a bit about the Ezra Institute and the Runner Academy and what's happening up there in Canada. We wanted to have you on Joe because I think it'd be a good opportunity for us, Apologia Church and this ministry and End Abortion Now, all that we're doing, we as a church actually bring the gospel and the biblical worldview into conflict.

We try to every area of life including, and this seems peculiar in our day, it wasn't in history but it seems peculiar in our day, to bring the gospel and the biblical worldview, the word of God and God's demands on culture to even the legislature.

We're doing that with End Abortion Now, I'll just give you sort of a background on this. In November we started a movement across the country where local churches, Christians, pastors are going to their local legislature and they're proclaiming the gospel before.

The legislature.

They're calling the legislature to repent of injustice. They're calling their legislature to uphold justice for the pre-born and that's now happening across the country in so many different states and it really is a powerful thing to witness.

But Joe, many people today in modern evangelical culture will see Christian churches engage in a legislature and they'll say, that's highly inappropriate. We ought to just be having barbecues and leading our neighbors to Jesus.

The church really has no role in proclaiming the gospel and the law of God to the legislature because, and we've adopted this as a mantra, there's a separation of church and state. The church really has no business with the prophetic voice to the legislature.

That's a realm that God isn't really concerned with. In your book, Mission of God, you deal with some of this controversy and this topic. So Dr. Boot, how do we begin to engage that in a modern evangelical culture that feels the way that we do today about those two realms?

The Sacred-Secular Divide and the Church's Public Witness

That's a really good question, Jeff. I think the first thing to do is recognize that the problem is an old one and it goes back really historically to the way we have tried to separate reality. It's a debt really to Greek thought, but to separate reality into two stories, an upper story and a lower story.

And it's really the result of what took place in the attempt to synthesize Greek thought with Christianity as we see it in the Middle Ages and have a sacred and a secular realm. And the sacred realm, spiritual upper story, well, that's the area for the church, area for faith, personal devotions, preaching Christ and your soul going to heaven.

And then the lower story, that's the secular realm, well, that's to be ruled over by reason and natural law and natural theology, and that's not really the primary business of God's people. So that's, I think, the roots of the problem, and it has come through into modern evangelicalism.

And the result is a kind of ecclesiasticizing, I like that word, you have to have your false teeth in to say it, but the ecclesiasticizing of the Bible. It's really saying that the word of God is not a book for the Christian and their total life in the world.

It's not the word of God, the command word of God for the world. It's a church book. And we then imprison the word of the living God in the life of the church. Rather than actually the church being service to the world, the word becomes service to the church.

Well, the church was set in the world to witness to the kingdom of God, not to simply serve itself. So the church is only one aspect of the kingdom of God. It's an important one, but it's one aspect of it.

So God's people are called to bear witness in every sphere of life to the truth of what God has said, and that includes to the state. Now the separation, the jurisdictional issue, well, of course, we accept that the jurisdiction, the separation of church and state is, I think, a biblical principle.

We see it right back in the Older Testament, Saul, King Saul loses his kingdom for trying to act as priest. But the separation of the jurisdiction of church and state as spheres of authority does not mean the separation of the state or the church from the authority of God and His word.

There's no separating religion and the state.

Christ's Kingship, Psalm 2, and the Great Commission

I think that's an important point, Dr. Booth, maybe we can expatiate upon this a bit more. You mentioned even in the biblical worldview, there is a distinction or a separation of church and state of sorts in terms of what you mentioned, God even punishing people who tried to cross over and really step over into a different jurisdiction.

But both those jurisdictions are under the rule and authority of God. God is actually concerned about both. We seem to think in our culture, evangelical culture, that God's concerned with the life of the church and the world of the church and what's happening in the spiritual, but He's not so concerned with what's happening here in our physical reality and the world around us.

So we really, as Christians, are just concerned about really getting people to get to heaven one day. And Jesus isn't really concerned about His rule here on earth. And then we're kind of concerned and we're not so sure whether He's really ruling here and now in the first place.

I mean, all that talk of King of Kings and Lord of Lords, I mean, what does that really.

Mean?

Isn't that just a pithy Christian t-shirt? Does that really mean anything that Jesus is the King of Kings today and Lord of Lords today? I think that we're in a very peculiar place because, Dr. Booth, it's one of the things you point out in your book, Mission of God, that this belief system that you and I would have is historic and the church has held to this in terms of Jesus is ruling and reigning now and everybody and everything is under His rule and reign.

And Psalm chapter two, the father says to the son, ask of me, I'll give you the nations for your inheritance, the very ends of the earth for your possession. And he says to the rulers in the world, he says, obey the son or you're going to perish.

And there are of course, Christians throughout history that held to that perspective as the church with the state. And they actually, you know, had moments even in American history where people were putting their hand on Deuteronomy 28 as they take their oath for presidential office.

And so the separation of church and state is not, it was not, did not mean, does not mean what we really think it means today in terms of the secularization of that term, that the church has no right to speak to the state in terms of the responsibilities and obligations under God.

But it seems so oddly under the secularization of this view, that the view is that the state definitely has the right to tell the church what's law to obey. So let's expatiate upon that.

The Biblical Meaning of Separation of Church and State

Well, you're, you're absolutely right. The original idea of separation of church and state as it appears in the English speaking tradition is to protect the church from the state's interference. As you know, in the United States, there was no established church at the federal level like there was at the national level in England, but there were many states that established their own churches.

So the notion that this was ever had anything to do with separating God or the Christian gospel from influencing political life is a complete misnomer. And in fact, well, if you look at the United Kingdom, the mother of all parliaments back there, the queen in her coronation, which actually harks all the way back to the coronation of King Saul, King Solomon anyway, swore to uphold the law and gospel of Jesus Christ.

And as you've mentioned, the presidential oath of office there on the Bible originally to Deuteronomy 27, 28. So you're, you're absolutely right in pointing this out. This is a serious mistake that Christians make.

The church has a calling as we are, we are a royal priesthood. We occupy the office of prophet, priest, and King in Jesus Christ, who is our prophet, priest, and King. And the prophetic role is to speak the truth to power and to call power, to call earthly power to account.

You mentioned Psalm 2, you could have equally pointed to Revelation 1, verse 5, that speaks of Christ now as the ruler of the kings of the earth. And I think evangelical doctrine often stops at the death and resurrection of Jesus.

It doesn't go on sufficiently to speak of his ascension and then his session, which is his being seated at the right hand of all power and authority. And that's precisely what he told the disciples in the famous Great Commission, as we've come to call it.

Again, we often misquote that as believers. We say it's go into all the world and preach the gospel. But it begins with Jesus saying, all authority in heaven and on earth is mine, therefore go and disciple nations, discipline and teach nations.

So what we're really dealing with here is a creation denying. You mentioned this notion of disappearing as souls into heaven. We could have a discussion about that whole idea, Greek idea of the immortality of the soul and two substances, and that's not a biblical idea either.

But this notion that it's really a creation denying idea. When you think about it, God creates all things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, Colossians 1, and he creates them good. Which means there is no domain of creation that is inherently evil.

There's no aspect, no part of creation that we can say that's evil. What we've tended to do as believers is flee from one area of creation into another, thinking that by escaping that way, we identify one area as evil.

So we say, let's escape to this domain. But that's not salvation. Salvation isn't escape from one part of creation into another. It's about the redeeming, the reconciling of the totality of creation in all its aspects to Jesus Christ.

And he's given us a ministry of reconciliation. Now, if all things have been created good by God, and we ask ourselves, what is the domain of the jurisdiction of the church in creation? Well, obviously it's only a small part of creation.

So the institutional church, yes, we can say that's limited to a particular task and role. But the calling of the believer concerns the kingdom of God, the rule and reign of Christ in every aspect of creation and of our lives as believers.

And that includes church, state, vocation, family, everything.

The Consequences of Ecclesiasticizing the Faith

So Dr. Boo, what are the consequences when we abandon the truly biblical world and life view, and we abandon these concepts of the total authority of Jesus Christ over every single realm, over the leaders of today, when we abandon really the biblical outlook on the future in terms of Christ and his kingdom in this world, expanding that mustard seed to a tree, that leaven in the lump of dough, when we abandon really the biblical perspective of the future in terms of Christ's rule and reign and his victory over the world and this new creation, what are the consequences for the church, for the world around about us?

Like, what sorts of things do we see in culture around about us today that are ultimately in some way consequences of abandoning a biblical life and world view, this consistent perspective of the full authority of Jesus Christ over every area of life?

What are the consequences around us?

Well, that's absolutely critical, because the consequences have to be identified critically. Actually, it's been the Christian church. When we limit the jurisdiction of Jesus Christ to one institution, when we ecclesiasticize the word of God and we practice churchianity, not Christianity, churchism, not the fullness of the gospel, then we actually profane life outside the church.

We abandon the all of life outside of the institutional church to profanation. And so actually, a church that holds this kind of error that we're discussing this evening, in the end, plays a critical role in seeing the decay of the culture around it, because it refuses to assert the lordship of Jesus Christ over it or say that the word of God has any relevance there.

So the secularizing of the world actually is in part a product of the ecclesiasticizing of the faith. And that means that, well, a critical part of that, of course, would be the totalitarian impulse of the modern state.

The modern state begins to see itself as the central and all-encompassing institution. The kingdom of God ceases to be the central reality in creation, and the state starts to deify itself, and then it starts to relate to every other aspect of society in a parts-to-whole fashion, which is to say it starts to see family, church, vocation, education, medicine, all of these things, law, as merely components of the state.

Now, they may be granted by the state a limited amount of autonomy, but really they see them all as merely political animals, essentially. And they're all seen in parts-to-whole relationship. So if you want to know why the state thinks it can redefine marriage, redefine the family, bring the force of law behind redefinitions of human identity, redefine life, promote abortion, promote euthanasia, and so forth, that is the divinized state taking the place of God, where the church has ceased to declare the lordship of Jesus Christ over this area, and the state seeking to swallow all the other spheres of life.

That is wholly destructive, and it's, well, it's idolatry. It's a statism that has become almost normative in Western culture today now, where we have abandoned much of culture to the humanistic state.

Even the way we talk about culture and society, we talk about secular society.

Right.

Well, even if you were to say the state were secular, which we as believers wouldn't want to say that the state is not under Christ, but even if you were to say the state were secular, how can you talk about secular society?

Society is made up of families, of churches, of schools, of guilds, of institutions. So the attempt to radically, when you limit Christ to the church radically, you secularize society as a whole. You abandon it to idolatry.

And the main culprit today of really swallowing these other areas is today the modern state. It's become the power center, and it seeks to relate to every other part of society in a parts to whole fashion, and assert an absolute sovereignty over these different areas of life.

Wow.

Asserting Christ's Lordship in Every Area of Life

Dr. Boot, I don't know how much longer we're going to be allowed to even talk about these things like this. What does it look like? Final question on this point. What's it look like, Dr. Boot? You mentioned those words, and I love those words.

I think they're so vitally important for us to grab hold of and begin to understand and then apply. You mentioned asserting the lordship of Christ to every area of life. I absolutely love that, brother.

Asserting the lordship of Jesus Christ to every area of life, because that, in the context of modern evangelicalism, evangelism in the West, seems like such an odd thing to say. You sound freakish, like not normal to say, assert the lordship of Jesus Christ to every.

Area of life.

We're talking about education, government, every single area of life, the family, the church, everything. What's it look like today in the modern context to assert the lordship of Jesus Christ to the culture around us?

What's that even look like?

Well, of course, it begins by first doing what we've been trying to do this evening, talking about what the lordship or kingship of Jesus Christ actually really means. This sort of radical spiritualization of the kingship of Jesus means it never seems to really land for many people in the real world.

I don't see how, on that basis, we can even pray authentically as Jesus taught us to pray, because he said, pray like this, our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

So if we're taught to pray in those terms, we're obviously being called to work and serve in those terms. So, of course, it begins with declaring rightly, and of course, the church pulpit has a responsibility to declare what the kingship and lordship of Jesus Christ really means.

In any given area of life, if Jesus is not lord, sovereign, and king, some other divinity concept will take his place. It's not that the concept of lordship disappears, it's just transferred somewhere else.

So it may sound strange, as you've said to many Christians today, to talk in this way, but if they analyze it carefully, some other lord is then ruling over these other areas. So we begin with a faithful declaration of what it really means, and then we need to move into these different areas, which means that we begin to say, well, we need to begin institutions, schools, universities, guilds, media production outlets like your own.

We need to actually, as believers, move into all of these areas of cultural life, as we once did. I mean, after all, if you look at the names of the hospitals and the mottos of the great universities, it was Christians that built them, it was Christians that funded them.

If you look at the engravings on our great courts of law, Moses there on the Supreme Court, or the engravings of scripture on the Peace Tower here in Canada in Ottawa, or the Houses of Parliament in England, Oliver Cromwell outside the Houses of Parliament, great big statue of him holding the Bible.

These institutions were profoundly shaped and formed by the Christian world and life.

View.

We need to move. It looks like moving back into all of these areas. You've talked about one tonight, getting pastors to go before the legislature, your work in the area of addressing the issue of abortion here in Canada as well, where we've got euthanasia laws now and assisted suicide, all legalized, addressing the legislature there, but also what are we doing about hospices to care for the elderly?

What are we doing about schools to educate the young? What are we doing about building institutions and universities? How are we engaging with the medical profession? How are we seeking to reform law?

Just have to look at a man like William Wilberforce, a great evangelical, one of the founders of modern evangelicalism, was engaged in all of these areas. It looks like taking the initial steps and then moving out into every area of life in terms of it faithfully.

Yes.

Yes. Speaking of that, final thing here, Dr. Boots, you have the Ezra Institute, the Runner Academy. You are doing something profound, I believe, in Canada. I've been up there, goodness, what's it, Luke, two or three times?

Two or three times we've been up there to Canada where you're at, what's going on there. I think we, brother, we are so impressed and just grateful to God for what he's doing through you, your ministry, your work up there.

So let's talk about that. Ezra Institute, Runner Academy, how can people get connected and what's happening right now in Canada? How are you asserting the Lordship of Jesus Christ in your little realm?

Ezra Institute and Runner Academy in Canada

Fantastic. Well, thank you, Jeff, for mentioning those things. The Institute has had a breakthrough in the last couple of years in that we have been given by God just a beautiful 25 acre facility up on the Niagara Escarpment overlooking Lake Ontario where we now have a study center.

And so what we're seeking to do now is equip young people and emerging leaders, emerging cultural leaders, to have this robust, full-orbed biblical world and life view. And we're bringing in essentially faculty fellows of the Institute from around the world for two critical training opportunities annually.

The first is a worldview leadership camp that's aimed at the high school age for 14 through 18. And there's two opportunities to do that this summer, one in July, one in August. Because we obviously need to engage young people at this point before they hit university and try and give them the tools to face that environment with a critical faculty and with a well-developed scriptural world and life view.

And then what we're really excited about is our flagship offering, really. It's called the H. Evan Runner International Academy for Cultural Leadership. And it is a 12-day residential program in delving into really getting down to the roots of this biblical worldview, cultural apologetics, how do we defend the faith, and cultural Christian philosophy.

How do we really develop a, as Van Til said, a defense of the Christian philosophy of life in its totality applied to medicine, law, politics, media, arts, business, economics, et cetera, et cetera. What does that look like?

So 19 through 40-ish, we've got that program running between July 14th and 27th this year. And that's open to Canadians and Americans, and we've got people, actually some coming in from around the world.

So we'd love to see. You're part of that program, Jeff. You're going to be, as you know, lecturing as part of the program. So we would love to encourage some of our American brothers and sisters to come up here to Canada, come to the Ezra Institute's new study center.

Ten years ago, I planted Westminster Chapel in Toronto, and then Westminster Classical Christian Academy, a school, and the Ezra Institute now is seeking to just equip a whole new generation of emerging Christian leaders to really grasp the fullness of the Lordship of Christ, the fullness of a full-orbed gospel, and apply in detail what that actually means in every area of life.

Yes. Praise God, man. So remind me, Joe, it's, Luke, what is it, it's July 17th and 18th, as I'm teaching

July 14th. Okay. We're July 14th through 27th. I don't have the full program in front of me, but I think you're week two there.

That's right.

Yeah.

So I'll be doing apologetics, I believe, cultural apologetics.

That's right.

So if you guys want to come and join Dr. Buddha, myself, up there, and I think Pastor Luke will be there as well. You guys can meet him. We're going to be up there in Canada assisting with that. And I just wanted to just end with this, and this is really important here, not to our glory in any way, but just in terms of the impact and the outcome of a truly biblical life and worldview.

When you think this way of asserting the Lordship of Jesus Christ over every area of life, I want you to consider what Dr. Booth just said there. Planted a church in Canada, then there was a school, and now he has an institute.

These biblical ideas have consequences, God-glorifying, world-changing consequences. When you think about the ministry of Apologia Church, not to our glory in any way, this is all to the glory of God, but we hold to the perspective of the Gospel that Jesus is truly the King, and He is reigning and ruling now, and He brings His good news into the world of salvation and redemption, but He is reconciling all things to Himself.

And so the duty, the task of the believer is to do that, assert the Lordship of Jesus Christ in every area of life. And so what you can see in these ministries, say Joe's ministry and his work in Canada, or say even Apologia Church, with end abortion now, the hundreds of churches, local churches now going out and bringing the Gospel to their legislature, bringing the Gospel to the local abortion clinics, saving at this point thousands upon thousands of children have been saved from death.

You have all the ministry in the area of the cults and the occult that we've been engaged in, the public debates on atheism, all that God is doing, these nightly shows, all of this is as a result of, it's not an accident, it's not because of very charismatic leaders it's because of a worldview.

It's because of a theological and philosophical perspective on Christ, His Gospel, His Kingdom and the world that actually impacts the world with these sorts of things. Now watch this. Here's two ministries, Dr. Joe Boot and we have Apologia Church.

Imagine if every local church in the West actually had an amazing, miraculous conversion to a truly biblical life and worldview of the full and final authority of the Lord Jesus.

Christ.

What would that mean to have thousands of ministries like this operating in culture? That's our goal. That's what we hope to see by the grace of God that hearts are opened, minds are changed and eyes become opened to the full authority of the Lord Jesus Christ in every area of.

Life.

Dr. Boot, where can people go to get signed up, to get connected, to come meet with us this summer as we minister?

Fantastic. So all they have to do is go to our website www .ezrainstitute .ca. They can find out all the information there. They'll see a box with Runner Academy in it. If they click on that, they can read all about it.

The beautiful setting, the beautiful farmstead here, the fabulous rooms. It's a time of rest, refreshment, learning, encouragement. And it's very close to the U .S. border, as you know, Jeff. It's right there in Niagara.

So they could fly into Buffalo, be with us in less than an hour. So if they just go to the website, all the information is there. Get signed up soon. There's a very limited number of places left. So if they do that soon, they can be with us for this inaugural Runner Academy.

It's going to be a fabulous time together.

Yes, it's a beautiful, beautiful drive and it's an amazing experience. And honestly, oddly, it's easier to get across that border into Canada than it was for us when we flew into Canada and we were stuck for like three and a half hours being harassed, probably because the beards.

Yeah, this is one of the only times you're here, Jeff Durbin. Yeah, this is one of the only times you're here, Jeff Durbin saying, make sure you guys get to Canada, guys. Get to Canada.

All right, Dr. Boo, we love you, brother.

I'm so excited to be with you and just honored to be participating in what God's doing in the world alongside you. You mean so much to us. And it's just a blessing to be a part of this with you, brother.

Thank you so much for joining us today.

Well, we love you, too. We appreciate apologies so much. Keep up with what you're doing, guys, and we'll continue to partner in the work of the gospel.

All right.

Thank you, brother.

All right, guys.

So make sure you guys go check that out. Come and hang out with us this summer. Make sure you guys go to that website. Go get connected. I'm going to especially point young men who are committed to the gospel, committed to actually laying their lives down in their culture to come and get connected with us as we're Institute.

We are strong supporters of Dr. Boot and as we're Institute. So if you want to get shaped, if you want to get prepared for what's happening in the culture around about us with the gospel, I encourage you strongly pick up Mission of God.

Read that book. Make sure you put it on the front of your reading list. Make sure you pick it up as soon as possible. Come meet with us. Get connected to the Ezra Institute. Make sure you guys sign up.

Do everything you can to be there. I'm going to be there. I'll be teaching this summer. You'll get a chance to also hook up with Pastor Luke Pearson and myself. So we'll see you there this summer.

We'll be right back, guys.

Stay with us for an amazing next part of next week with Jeff Durbin. Thank you guys for watching.

The Runner Academy's Vision for Cultural Renewal

What kind of society will we be responsible for building and what kind of people are we sending into the world? Part of our mission in working to redeem culture is to connect with people in various professions to help them to understand their life and calling as a process of culture building.

Our work is best demonstrated at the H. Evan Runner International Academy for Cultural Leadership. The Runner Academy represents a comprehensive instruction in Christian philosophy, worldview, and cultural apologetics.

This two-week course brings students and young professionals on site for a training program like no other. History, politics, law, education, medicine, the arts. There is a biblical vision for all of these spheres to bring them into obedience to Jesus the King and to develop them toward cultural renewal to the glory of God.