As our public discourse about Christian Nationalism rolls along, it will be easy to lose sight of how basic the idea is. So here are five foundation stones for Christian Nationalism. These are not the only foundation stones. But they are basic concepts, which if not held, it would be hard to call oneself a Christian Nationalist. Plus, good things come in fives. Five fingers to a hand. Five loaves fed five thousand. Five stones in the hand of the son of Jesse as he walked in the valley of Elah.
One: The only stable nations are those in which the temple of God is built. The goal is not to equate the Christian Church with the Christian nation. The simplest way of distinguishing between the two is to see that the civil magistrates may not lay hold of the keys of the kingdom, the sacraments given to us by Christ. However, it should not surprise us that God appoints and speaks to his Zerubbabels as much as his Joshuas, the former being the governor of Judah in the time of Haggai the prophet, and the latter being the high priest. God had a word for both of them and how could He not? What good would a Jerusalem be without a temple? And what good would the temple be without Jerusalem’s walls? A bit of an easter egg here, Zerubbabel means offspring of Babylon, the nation from which Zerubbabel sprang to rebuild the stable city. If you are tempted to think that the godless nations are the stable ones, remember that God has them spit up rulers to govern nations in which God dwells.
Two: Magistrates rule as delegates of the Triune God. Secular man frets that this will increase the magistrates power, when in truth, it will restrain it. This is one of the key truths employed by Junius Brutus in his Vindiciae Contra Tyrannos. Face it, with a title like that, everything old Brutus said in the work is obviously right. So believe him when he says, “the Holy Scripture does teach that God reigns by his own proper authority and kings by derivation, God from Himself, kings from God, that God hath a jurisdiction proper, kings are His delegates.”[1] Modern and secular democracies, all souped up on the demos, would happily exchange the theos of Brutus for the people. It would go something like this: “the people reign by their own proper authority and kings by derivation, the people from themselves, kings from the people, that the people have a jurisdiction proper, kings are their delegates.” There is a kernel of truth in that bowl of words, namely what Rutherford teaches in his Lex Rex, that God makes the king through the people and not directly apart from the people. But, our current sickness is not that of having civil authorities established direction by God apart from the people. No, the long-term ailment which has left us bedridden is the old vox populi vox dei virus.
Three: Magistrates are to be obeyed when they obey God and not otherwise. This third foundation stone is fairly simply in principle, which is where I intend to leave it for now. There is plenty of work to do on the various applications of the principle. If you ask, “Well, how are we to know if the magistrate indeed is obeying God?” There is a principled answer to this question as well, namely, the revelation of God, both general and special. This is an idea as old as Christendom, be it Augustine or Aquinas. God has revealed His standard to us in a general way and He has done so through the prophets and the apostles. Anyone who takes point number three seriously will be in a pickle to argue that we should neglect on form of God’s revelation when it comes to our civil affairs.
Four: In a Christian Nation, there exists a covenant between God, the magistrate, and the people. We see this very thing with Joash in 2 Kings 11:17, “And Jehoiada made a covenant between the LORD and the king and the people, that they should be the LORD’s people; between the king also and the people.” This is in keeping with the instructions laid down by Moses many years before—”Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, who the LORD thy God shall choose: one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee: thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, which is not thy brother” (Deuteronomy 17:15). Moses proceeds to give stipulations for the king, including the duty of fearing God and observing His law. This covenant idea is not merely an ancient one. It is one deeply rooted in our own tradition as Glenn Moots has noted in his fine work Politics Reformed: The Anglo-American Legacy of Covenant Theology. Moots sees traces of the covenant idea in the constitution, Declaration of Independence, state constitutions, as well as presidential and holiday proclamations. Brutus’ Vidiciae, a copy of which sat in John Locke’s library, not only explains the necessity of this covenant idea but demonstrates its role in warding off tyranny.
Five: The newness of the new covenant does not alter these truths. There are some who will nod in agreement with all that has been said thus far, but then proceed to speak of the discontinuity between the old and new testaments. “Yes, all that you say is true up to the time of Christ coming to His people,” the sentiment goes. Granted, there indeed is a newness to the new covenant. But nothing about that newness requires that any of the foundation stones be hauled off to the dump. Brutus says it well—
“Although the form, both of the church and the Jewish kingdom be changed, for that which was before enclosed within the narrow bounds of Judea is now dilated throughout the whole world, notwithstanding the same things may be said of Christian kings, the gospel having succeeded the law, and Christian princes being in the place of those of Jewry. There is the same covenant, the same conditions, the same punishments . . . as the former were bound to keep the law, so the other are obliged to adhere to the doctrine of the Gospel, for the advancement whereof these kings at their anointing and receiving do promise to employ the utmost of their means.”[2]
[1] Junius Brutus, Vidiciae, 6.
[2] Brutus, Vindiciae, 14.
