(Adapted from an adult Sunday School lesson in July 2004; written 4Jul04. This material was derived primarily from The Institutes of Biblical Law by Rousas Rushdoony as will be apparent. Those sections making sense are undoubtedly taken from him; the rest are mine.)
There is a division of belief within Christian churches. The belief fault line runs along the separation between faith and works. The apostle James said faith without works is dead so without argument something is required from people of the Christian faith. Part of the problem is determining whether those works involve mundane details concerned with this present world or whether they involve only an explicit evangelistic outreach to the world. Because an explicit evangelistic outreach to the world is a requirement for God’s people the matter for discussion is whether the Christian faith also requires an obligation for ordering our lives as individuals, families, communities, churches and society in general. If in fact there is such an obligation then there should be a unified Christian response to the issues of the day such as, prayer in public settings, homosexual marriage, separation of church and state, the rise of Islam in the West, health care, government run schools. Does the Christian faith have an answer to what we as a Christian community should be working to achieve in the matters? Should there even be “a” Christian answer to such non-evangelistic social or political policies and if there should be then why is there so little understanding within Christ’s church?
This topic immediately causes discord in many churches because it automatically assumes there is a proper response to non-Biblical, secular arguments. It implies there is a Christian answer on how to think about these civil concerns from a Biblical perspective. This very idea is repulsive to many within the church because it smacks of losing sight of our purpose of spreading the gospel while simultaneously establishing doctrines which limit individual freedom under Christ’s grace. Since Jesus made it clear to the Pharisees that neither legalism nor law could save men we do well to consciously avoid any path leading to saving men’s souls by either legalism or law.
We know faith is required which is not something we produce in ourselves but it is given to us by God (Ephesians 2:8-9). Added to that gift are works (actions) that don’t earn salvation but which by their presence give testimony of grace in our lives as a natural response to the gift. Among those works is the essential call to love and to evangelize.
The same Bible which provided those unattainable but permanent moral Ten Commandments also provided rules for God’s people for such mundane matters as where to locate the latrines in their camp and how to go about cleansing a tent for mold. Without exploring the relevance of those rules for today obviously God was interested in how his people were to live in terms we would consider secular. God in his revelation through Scripture didn’t just say don’t murder (moral law), he also commanded obedience to details involving social interaction in the camp, hygiene, architecture, rules for commerce and so forth. It is inconsistent to believe today Go no longer has interest in how we regulate ourselves in the “secular” matters of our day.
Christians who refer to themselves as “reformed” (a term springing from the Reformation initiated by Martin Luther, the German monk in 15xx and not the Baptist preacher of more modern times) hail as one of the hallmarks of reformed theology a “high view of Scripture” which means the Bible is accepted as the Word of a living God who revealed immutable, unchanging truth to us which can’t be explained away as social commentary for a particular age or group of people. It also encompasses the idea that we teach from the whole of Scripture. We don’t separate God into beliefs for certain times or places or pick key verses that address one area while contradicting other areas. The Word of God is a single, unitary Word from a God who does not change.
In the book Millennialism and Social Theory contemporary Christianity was faulted for its lack of vision compared to Islam. After 600 years of relative quietude Islam over the last three decades is once again growing and invading Europe. Islam represents to spiritually dead Europe religious faith which encompasses a total world view for how society and government are to be organized for the purpose of glorifying their false god. Islam in its current resurgence is both calling upon it’s faithful to advance their religion by military domination and also by spreading of the belief in an ultimate truth which gives purpose and structure to all aspects of life. It isn’t the military side of the struggle which is conquering Europe rather it is the call to this spiritual fulfillment giving meaning and structure to life. In the West the success of this invasion results from unashamed visible religious belief directly producing an uncompromising, prejudicial value system. It finds fertile ground in the value-less vacuum of contemporary Western thought because men cannot live without a spiritual dimension while all religious belief will produce some sort of value system
Within the book a riveting statement was made:
“The average age of each convert to Islam is 31; in contrast, the average age of Christian converts is 16.” “….one of the five reasons Westerners choose Islam over Christianity is ‘Islam is practical. It is considered a this-worldly religion in contrast to Christianity, which is perceived as abstract to the extreme…” (A, pg 31)
The intent here is not to prove this statement. It only sets the stage for a discussion about whether Christianity is intended by God to be practical in this present world beyond serving as a means of salvation. A false religion of Islam clearly establishes a meaningful “social theory” even as it points to a path of salvation for its adherents in the after life. For Christianity our study of God’s Word in its entirety should explain why God himself put his people on this earth. Any answer should be seriously debated among God’s people because the outcome of the debate directs how God’s people should act in this present world including actions in daily life outside the church. Furthermore these actions derived from Scripture transcend the quagmire of personal opinions and begin to approach the reality of absolute truth. Not to say we are privy to infallible understanding but rather there is a reality of absolute truth for all men and we are in search of it through study of God’s absolutely true, infallible Word.
So, does Christianity have a practical this-world relevance building a Christian society outside of the church? In order to answer this we must go to the beginning to see what it was God expected of man when he created Adam.
In Genesis 1:26-28 we read, “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” (NKJV)
KJV uses the term dominion. The NASB uses the term rule.
In verse 26 God gave man authority over the creation to rule over all the earth. The world is God’s creation to administer as he desires. He chose to administer it by creating man to be the ruler over the rest of creation. The manner by which man was to exercise his authority is discussed in Genesis 2.
Verses 26-28 establish man’s place in creation as caretaker over what God had made. Verse 27 reveals his very special place as a very likeness of the Creator himself. Man’s purpose, his work, is repeated and expanded in verse 28, and more than that this purpose is blessed. God ordained a place and purpose for man unique from all other elements and creatures. Verse 28 is the dominion mandate from God to man; rule over this earth and all that is in it as you multiply and fill it to subdue it. There is no need for salvation or evangelism at this point in history. The purpose of man at creation in the first book of the Bible is supremely practical; procreate, subdue, rule.
If this were all that was revealed concerning man’s authority in Eden we would conclude Adam was free to exercise his authority in any way he desired. This was not the case even though Adam was at this point in time a perfect, sinless creature. Genesis chapter 2, verses 16 and 17 make clear there is a limit on his authority; “16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in that day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (NKJV)
Verse 17 makes clear mans authority to rule was not limitless. God is the master. Man as servant was to rule over all the earth as he was commanded to do while under the limitations established by God. Man as caretaker was told his source of authority on this earth was God who was the sole determiner of his very life in fact. Verses 29 and 30 also provide a further limit of a practical nature; man and animal were given the vegetation to eat, not each other.
This limitation to man’s authority in Genesis 1:28 accomplishing his mandate clearly establishes the creation was very much under the authority of God. Man was to follow God’s law (law is synonymous with God’s word because every word of God is law to man; God makes no idle comments) in the accomplishment of his task. Keep this commandment and live; break this command and die.
Man fell into sin by violating the limit God gave him in his rule over creation. When he broke the covenant of works he faced certain death. God established a covenant of grace in which he provided salvation to Adam and his descendants through atonement for sin which God also provided on our behalf. Neither Adam nor any man could atone for his sin by any action taken on his own and therefore nothing could remove his guilt which was worthy of death. This is grace; unmerited favor. Adam could tend the garden, subdue the earth and fill it yet nothing he did could erase his guilt. God alone could do this even though there was no human reason why he should. It was grace by God to man, a gift which he gave because it pleased him to do it.
In spite of this absolute truth that man could not attain life through any works there is no command to Adam telling him now that salvation was provided that he could live on earth as he pleases. Just because work is unrelated to salvation did not equate to a status where work wasn’t required. Nor did it equate to a situation where his work was suddenly completely at Adam’s discretion as to how he would accomplish his God given task. The mandate in Genesis 1:28 was not revoked. Adam was to subdue and fill the earth still. Among other things we know from fast forwarding to Genesis xxxxxx after the flood that God only then lifted the ban on eating meat which means the rule of Adam over creation was still subject to God’s rule. Adam was to have dominion over the earth yet still under God’s authority even though he had already failed and would now continue to fail by way of sin which permanently corrupted his character.
When man was given the mandate to subdue the whole earth Adam was working in a sin-less state carrying out a divine task under God’s authority without competition with God. We know he worked in harmony with God because in verse 8 and 9 of chapter 3 we see God came down in the cool of the day to walk with Adam. How different was the situation once he fell into sin?
First we look to determine if man’s fall changed his task. Did God remove the task he had given to Adam to subdue the earth? Not only is their no revocation of the work he had been given we see further in Genesis 9:1-3 that God repeats the mandate to Noah and his sons. The basic responsibility remained unchanged; subdue the earth, rule over it, fill it.
If the task given man did not change because of the fall then did the terms under which Adam (and subsequently Noah) change? Was man now permitted to complete his orders without reference to God’s overarching authority? Again no. Because of the changed condition of Adam due to the total depravity of his nature the task became more complicated as now he was in rebellion to God. Yet God still held sovereignty over all creation, including man, with very precise requirements to man on how we was to conduct himself while living on the earth. Adam had not usurped God’s position nor had he evaded the task he was given. What he did do was complicate the task of dominion over the earth as is seen by the curse, 3: 17 …”Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life.”
The area for additional rebellion increased because everything man did was affected by his desire to disobey. His heart was now evil. God’s relatively simple law before the fall increased due to the new situation in which man found himself thanks to his sin such that law increased due to this new sin nature as we see from the need for sacrifices as is related in the actions of Abel and Cain. But the point remains the fall did not change the status of Adam as a caretaker responsible for obeying God in the details of ruling the earth under God’s authority.
This leaves us with the one obvious change Adam did introduce by his fall and that is the relationship between God and his creation. No longer did God come down to walk with Adam in the cool of the evening. No longer did Adam have the physical presence and communion with his creator which he once had enjoyed. As noted earlier God still maintained fellowship with man but now there was a need for a mediator between fallen, sinful man and holy, sinless God who destroys sin. This mediation was introduced by God himself in the form of the sacrifices which foreshadows the true mediator Jesus. This is seen in Genesis 3:15 with the promise of the one who will crush Satan, by the covering of man in his nakedness by God through providing animal skins (thus requiring the otherwise needless death of innocent animals), and by the system of sacrifices which Genesis 4:4-5 gives a picture in the story of Cain and Abel.
The Genesis 1:26-28 verses are sometimes referred to as the cultural mandate. The question as to whether this mandate still exists in the present age has been debated. Some reject the mandate still applies in a post-Eden world. For instance the Bible Presbyterian Church, Oct 1970, 34th General Synod claimed that this is “a false doctrine….The mandate under which Christians obey their Lord is the Great Commission of Matthew 28:19-20, which requires that we teach and honor all things ‘whatsoever I have commanded you.’” It is not applicable because “the conditions of Genesis 1:28 will never again be available to man until after the Return of Christ and sin is removed.” (B, pp 723-724).
We should reject this interpretation this teaching on the ground it is false doctrine. It fails on several points. In the first place the same mandate is repeated with little variation in Genesis 9:1-3. “1 So God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them: ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. 2 And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be on every beast of the earth, on every bird of the air, on all that move on the earth, and on all the fish of the sea. They are given into your hand. 3 Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs.”
The post-flood mandate to Noah is far beyond the point where man is sinless as he was in Genesis 1. If these verses weren’t enough we see recognition of man’s essential calling stated in Psalm 8:6: “You have made him to have dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet.” Again, this is testament to man’s basic responsibility of duty before God. It doesn’t address how difficult it is for man to accomplish his task. It only makes clear it is his task.
The second reason for rejecting the teaching that Genesis 1:28 no longer applies but has been superseded by Matthew 28 is the fact that God’s people lived from the age of Adam until Jesus came into the world. What then was the direction of God’s people during those 4000 years before Matthew 28 was given? Either men existed without direction until Jesus came or there was a radical change of responsibility when Jesus gave his command in Matthew. This is unacceptable. It isn’t supported by Scripture but it also gives rise to the idea that God’s word has changed. The Bible itself assures us that God does not change; Mal 3:6, “For I am the Lord, I do not change”, Numbers 23:19, “God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has he spoken, and will He not make it good?”, James 1:17, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.”, Romans 11:29, “For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” The burden of proof for claiming the mandate was revoked falls upon those who teach this to find the Scripture showing this to be the case.
Finally, the use of Matthew 28 as a refutation of God’s command to man in Genesis is false. We need to look at what Matthew 28 really says. While there is a difference here there is no radical departure from the earlier rule. Jesus was foreshadowed as early as Genesis 3:15; “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.” Yet the actual details of who he was or what he would do weren’t fully understood until he came. In the same manner the earlier command foreshadows the latter where additional details are given. God doesn’t contradict himself and he didn’t change his requirement for man on the earth. But he has revealed more over time as we can see when we examine Matthew 28:18-20.
Matthew 28: 18-20 “20 And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
In verse 18 Jesus establishes that he has ALL authority including that on earth. That is in contrast to the often implied teaching that somehow Jesus remains only in heaven awaiting his return in order to exercise rule. This section is not the only place where we are reminded that the kingdom of heaven is now, Jesus sits at the right hand of the throne, and he currently rules this world. John tells us that Jesus was the creative force of the Trinity; this is his world. He created it, He died for his people in it, and He rules over it. (Hebrews 1:3, John 1:3, Hebrews 1:13)
In verse 19Jesus issues a charge to his followers, to carry out a task from his authority. He has the authority to command and he delegates this authority to his followers to complete the task he is giving. He sends his followers out to “make disciples of all the nations”, that is causing others to accept and assist in spreading the doctrine of another. [NKJ and NASB say in v 19 make disciples; in the KJ the term is “teach all nations” which is translated as to disciple.] Further, they are to baptize these new disciples in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The term baptizing signifies the baptism of believers, those identified with Christ in his death, burial and resurrection; it signifies close bond to and property of Him in whose name they are baptized. This is the taking of the gospel forth to all nations, bringing them to acceptance and ownership in Christ through his baptism. It is in fact an explicit call to evangelism as a matter of works Christians are to perform.
In verse 20 the commission goes further because Jesus’ followers are to teach these converts “to observe all things that I have commanded you.” Teaching in this sense is translated as meaning to cause to learn, so that this is not so much the providing of information as it is the receipt and understanding of that information. Cause them to learn what? “all the things that I have commanded you” (B: p 729) Note at this point there is now in verse 20 a commandment to works which extends beyond evangelism. By verse 20 these people are already saved.
If you had to put a finger on all the things that Jesus commanded, how would you summarize his teachings? Matt 22:35-40 “35 Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” 37 Jesus said to him, “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
Jesus in his teaching never departed from the law. He directed men away from the false teachings, interpretations, and additions of the Pharisees as they made tradition equal with the law but here in Matthew 22 he centralizes all the teaching of the Old Testament into two succinct principles that embody all the detail. Love God, in a way that is beyond our ability to do; and love the people around you as much as you love yourself. Staying focused for a moment on the idea of loving God, how do you love God? John 14:15, “If you love Me, keep my commandments.” Demonstrate love through obedience to “my commandments.” The scripture teaches us Jesus is God. The Father, Son, Holy Spirit are one and have always been one. The commandments, the law, God’s Word, is Jesus’ Word.
So we come back to the Great Commission in Matt 28. “…teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you,” means causing the nations to learn all the things that Jesus commanded, which can be summed up by loving God with all your heart, mind and soul, and loving your neighbor as yourself. The ability to cause this to happen is found in the second half of verse 20, “and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” Jesus does not merely delegate; he is present throughout the process, throughout time, making this possible.
Rather than seeing the Great Commission of Matt 28 as a contradiction of mandate from Genesis 1, it refines the mandate in two important respects. First, the Great Commission is given to the Church, not to man. Second, “the first Adam faced a naturally good and unfallen world to subdue, the second or last Adam faced rebellious and fallen nations and a fallen world,….more than a garden was now to be subdued; the nations and empires of the world were to be brought under the dominion of Christ.” (B, pp 729-730). The covenant of works still exists yet cannot be a part of our salvation but rather a response to the covenant of grace. The mandate in Genesis 1 still exists yet it has been affected by the Fall and can be completed only through the work of Jesus Christ empowering through His church in the task.
To this point we have established that God gave to man the responsibility of dominion (Gen 1:28, Gen 9:1-3, Ps. 8:6). We have also established this was expanded explicitly by Jesus (Matt 28:18-20) to include dominion of the whole earth of nations by discipling them to observe his commandments. We have also seen in all cases that the authority belongs to and remains with God as man exercises his mandate under that authority.
This leads us to the means by which man accomplishes this under God’s authority, how he is to teach the nations, and what the church is supposed to teach them. As was already mentioned in Genesis 1 we saw man was given the command to rule as caretaker under God while in Genesis 3 we saw him fall into sin as he chose to decide between right and wrong. By so doing he attempted to intrude into God’s authority over all of creation rather than exercising his rule under the law God had given for that rule.
Man is commanded to exercise dominion and he was given the natural desire to do so. In his perfect state he could have done this perfectly but even then he could only do it under God’s authority. In his fallen condition he is still required to complete his task under God’ authority but now it requires the submission of his sinful will to that authority before man can exercise his responsibility properly. Apart from obedience to God man attempts rule on earth in forms that further his sinful behavior. (B, p 448)
The church must recognize the nature of man is divinely created to rule. In our sinful nature we now desire to rule as God not under God. The correct response for the church is not to deny the desire to rule, because it is God-ordained, but rather to harness it under obedient exercise to God.
Properly understood the exercise of dominion under the authority given to us is a means of reflecting upon the glory of the one to whom the sovereignty belongs. Ephesians 1:20 “…which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. 22 And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church,…”
Because God alone is Sovereign in the universe how could it be that God’s people would not see a need to exercise that call to dominion under Him? Did God ordain to cede history to Satan’s rule? According to II Corinthians 10:4-6 4 For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, 6 and being ready to punish all disobediences when your obedience is fulfilled. (B, 725)
We have already seen that in both Genesis and in Matthew God didn’t just give man a responsibility but he exalted us by giving us first his likeness, and then his name, in order to carry out the work he planned for us in this present world, even this present fallen world as is evidenced by Matthew 28.
In practical application of the concept of dominion it should be realized that dominion must be exercised because there is a competing system in place. Where God’s people fail to fulfill their task due to their sin Satan will exercise dominion. His competing world system attempts to exercise the authority, just as in the garden. Man as sinner seeks to usurp God in his authority, and will rule in a sinful manner. Even redeemed man feels the urge to exercise this authority, not under God, but as God. This is in our nature to rule and in our sin nature our desire remains to replace, not glorify, God. The consequence in history of the failure of God’s people to disciple the nations and to teach them to obey all God’s commandments is that there is greater opportunity for sin to flourish and to dominate the lives of men. The consequence of willful disobedience is the recurring promise throughout Scripture of God’s curse upon those who fail to honor him.
If the Church which is made up of God’s people does not obey the task given to them to rule under God’s authority then who will rule? God alone rules, because he alone exercises all authority and is sovereign, but he does allow sin to abound for a time for his own glory even as he allows our sins to manifest themselves to our own punishment. We cannot be indifferent to the fact that sin is an irreversible reality in the present world. It is our task to not only obey but to also disciple others in God’s commandments as a matter of fulfilling the Great Commission.
God’s Word is his law to us. In order to cause the nations to observe all the things Jesus commanded the church must reconcile itself to the truth that what Jesus commanded is his law. The law is immensely important to us in the daily conduct of our lives. It is the only means of exercising dominion or of knowing how to serve God. The problem for the church is the church must recognize that the law is the only way of knowing how we are to rule on this earth. In turn the church must come to grips with how important and practical the law is in establishing the basis for every society, every culture, all government.
We often fail to recognize the seriousness of the Law to God. Observe:
Ps 119: 70b72; 77 70b…But I delight in your law. 71 It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I may learn your statutes. 72 The law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of coins of gold and silver. 77 Let your tender mercies come to me, that I may live; For Your law is my delight
John 3:14-16 14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. 16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
Rom 5:8, 19 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 19 For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man’s obedience many will be made righteous.
We relish the position in which we find ourselves because of the grace extended to us by God’s gift in the sacrifice that Jesus made on our behalf while we were sinners. In realizing this gift, even as we understand we were disobedient and incapable of doing anything to save ourselves, we may fail to draw the correct connection to the law. “If the law was so serious in the sight of God that it would require the death of Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, to make atonement for man’s sin, it seems strange for God then to proceed to abandon the law!” (B, p.4) God was not at war with his own law when he sent Jesus to save us. God demonstrated both the depth of his love for us but also the extent to which he holds his own law to be important. It was important enough that Christ had to die in order for his people to be saved.
At the same time while we must truly recognize the truth that God alone has saved us through nothing we can do on our own we must also recognize that if the law is reduced to a level of irrelevance then we have no direction in which to walk in obedience to Him who saved us. Observe:
Proverbs 6:23 For the commandment is a lamp, and the law a light; Reproofs of instruction are the way of life,
Isaiah 51:7 Listen to Me, you who know righteousness, You people in whose heart is My law;
Rom 3:20 Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.
Not only is God’s law serious but it did not cease to exist because of the act of Christ redeeming us. We will look at that in a moment. We must understand what the Scripture teaches us about the law; it is our lamp to a way of life. To have a more complete understanding of the relevance of the law we have to study the approach of Scripture to the law. In this regard there are 3 basic characteristics. (B:pp. 10-14)
First, Scripture contains “broad …. Principles” or “declarations of basic law”. “The Ten Commandments are not therefore laws among laws, but are the basic laws, of which the various laws are specific examples.” For example in Deuteronomy 5:19, the eighth Commandment, “You shall not steal”. The commandment prohibits theft. But when you look at the basic principles contained in this law it is evident that 1) the concept of private property is established since this command was given with the threat of punishment for violation; “it punishes offenses against property.” 2) the principle of protection of property, or private property, is established not because it makes good sense economically, personally, societally, or for social order; the basis of private property rests on “the sovereign and omnipotent God.” 3) When someone breaks this law, because it didn’t originate in the authority of a compact of man or with the power of the state, that person has sinned against none other than God himself. “Law breaking is entirely against God.”
Second, the “major portion of the law is case law.” “The illustration of the basic principle in terms of specific cases”. Deuteronomy 5:19 was the basic law; Deuteronomy 25:4 contains an example, or case law: You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain. In I Corinthians 9:9-13 refers to this same verse from Deut 25 in his discussion about ministers of the gospel, in verse 14 Even so the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should live from the gospel. He applies the case law. Taking the basic principle, citing the case law, and showing its application, it is clear that the intent of the basic law is not intended to reduce to the specific application. “Without case law, God’s law would soon be reduced to an extremely limited area of meaning.”
Finally, the law serves to restores God’s order. God proclaims his law; those who break it receive punishment; God’s punishment, his curse is meant to bring about the obedience that God requires in the first place. In the case of the 8th commandment, in Luke 19:2-9, the story of Zaccheus, 8 The Zaccheus stood and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord, I give half of my goods to the poor; and if I have taken anything from anyone by false accusation, I restore fourfold.” 9 And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham;”
The law is more than a simple listing of 10 thoughts. It is an entire system of thought pointing to the law-order of a sovereign king which declares the manner in which he desires to be served by his subjects. (B, 10-14)
Without the law there is no Christian government, there is no Christ-centered society, there is no Christian civilization. There is only the law system of the competing power for dominion on earth which is the godless rule of Satan. What is often unrecognized at a fundamental level ALL law is moral and religious. All law stems from some authoritative basis. To deny that the only sovereign is the source of the authority for human law is to invite anarchy. Anarchy in turn is only an interim state because it represents a vacuum of order which will immediately be filled. When God’s people step away from their responsibility, the competing world view, the dominion of Satan as exercised by sinful men, fills that void.
We saw this at the Tower of Babel as man first organized together to form a government based on his own authority in defiance of God. Gen 11: 4 And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.” They of course had been told to spread throughout the whole earth so they were defying God’s law in a government and society in opposition to Him. And the pattern of centralized tyrannical authority has persisted to this very day. (A: 324-325)
To understand law we must first understand grace and its relationship to the law. To understand this we must know the significance of Paul’s discussion of the law in Romans 7. Let us examine it: Rom 7:1-6 “1 Or do you not know, brethren (for I speak to those who know the law), that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives? 2 For the woman who has a husband is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of her husband. 3 So then if, while her husband lives, she marries another man, she will be called an adulteress, but if her husband dies, she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though she has married another man. 4 Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another — to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. 5 For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. 6 But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.”
As Rushdoony has stated, “The point in this illustration is not that the law is dead, but that we in Christ are dead, i.e., the death sentence of the law is fulfilled against us…..if a husband dies, it is not the institution of marriage which dies but a particular man who is dead to marriage. The law was a death sentence to us; it declared that, for our apostasy, our covenant-breaking with God, we deserved to die. The death sentence being fulfilled against us in the person of Jesus Christ, we are now judicially dead in the eyes of the law….we can never again be sentenced to death by the law. … being raised from the dead, i.e., the death of sin, by the work of Christ, we are now married to another…….our union is no longer with sin but with Christ. Being alive in Christ, we are now alive to the law, not as a death sentence against us, but as that which represents our new life, the ‘newness of spirit’ (vs. 6), our life in Christ, whereby the law is now our happy way of life.” (B, 736)
Again in Romans 7: 7-12, “7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. 9 I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. 10 And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death. 11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me. 12 Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.” It is fairly clear then that Paul did not preach against the law. It is and remains vital to life.
Israel was called to obedience to be a special people:
Exodus 19:5-6 “5 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people; for all the earth is Mine. 6 And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel.”
1 Pet 2:9-10 9 But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; 10 who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.
Obedience of God’s people is a means of proclaiming God’s message of the gospel to the world. The purpose for that proclamation is to let men know of their sinful deeds and of the redemption God made available to them. It is part of our task in God’s plan of grace.
1Pet 2:11-12 11 Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul, 12 having your conduct honorable among the Gentiles, that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they observe, glorify God in the day of visitation.
According to the Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 16: “Good works are only those works identified as good by God and commanded by Him in his holy word. (Micah 6.8)…..These good works, done in obedience to God’s commandments, are the fruit and evidence of a true and living faith.” (James 2.18, 22)
In summary the call to dominion by God’s people on this earth is a God-given command. It is part of the works required by God’s people not because it leads to salvation but because God commanded us to do these works. How we know what works to perform in establishing dominion is determined by obeying God’s law because there is no other way to know how we are to react. The understanding of God’s law is incomplete if we believe the law is in conflict with grace. The law points us to our total dependence or grace as it completely demonstrates our hopelessness without grace but it doesn’t diminish the value and validity of law. Our understanding of the law is also severely misconceived if we don’t learn that a law system undergirds every aspect of a society whether it is Christian or pagan. As Christians with a call to disciple the nations with the power Christ promised to us we cannot fail to see our need to work to establish both church and society based upon God’s law. Doing this is not only obedient but it glorifies God and becomes the means by which godless men are constrained from limitless sin as well as made fully aware of their need for God’s grace.
Dominion is our responsibility. The way to its exercise is through God’s Word which is his law to us. Law under girds all aspects of a society. The conclusion then is the church should be diligently studying God’s Word to find the correct Christian proposition to every issue because we are to take the lead in ruling this earth under Jesus the King. Our works are important and required. If the church does not see how it should be setting the tone for secular matters then it doesn’t understand the calling in Genesis 1 and Matthew 28. Islam is a practical, this-world oriented religion. Ironically according to Scripture so is Christianity.
A. Millennialism and Social Theory, Institute for Christian Economics, Tyler, Texas, 1990 by Gary North
B. The Institutes of Biblical Law, The Craig Press, 1973, by Rousas John Rushdoony
C. Westminster Confession of Faith, Summertown Texts, Signal Mountain, TN, 1991, by Douglas F. Kelly, Hugh W. McClure III, and Philip Rollinson
D. Westminster Confession of Faith for Study Classes, Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, Philadelphia, PA, 1964, by G.I. Williamson
