Recently, I heard a certain phrase which triggered the neurons in my amateur brain to start bouncing around like a pinball spring-launched into action. Those neurons eventually started to pump electrical signals down to my hands and twitch my fingers to convert the signals through my laptop keyboard into digital format. With some added magic, this manifestation of my neurons, converted multiple times over, is now entering your brain, with the goal of bouncing some neurons around in there as well. The phrase responsible for all this commotion wasn’t complicated or novel per se. It was typical Christian talk. But I’ve been told I have a tendency to over-think things. So here it is.
While addressing the Gospel victory of Christ that we as Christians share in, out of the speaker’s mouth came the following four words, the linchpin that brought about this post: “Our victory is unique.”
No disagreement there. The victory we share in Christ is unique. Christ has overcome Satan, Sin, and Death, and in Him we too are victorious. We are a new creation. We were spiritually dead, and now we’re alive. One day we will rise in body to life everlasting. All that reality is true even if in this life we lose all. To live is Christ. To die is gain. Unique indeed. No other victory like it.
Christians should speak of their victory in Christ as unique, because it definitely is. However, much of the time it seems what is thrown in as a package deal with the unique aspect of the victory of Christ is the notion of it also being narrow. That is the part where my feathers are ruffled a bit.
Christ’s Gospel victory being unique is not the same thing as it being narrow. Actually, its all-inclusive breadth is part of its distinctiveness. How many earthly powers, thrones, and regimes have unsuccessfully attempted to broaden and deepen their reign? Only the Son of Man has achieved such a victory. The dominion of Christ doesn’t include all the pride lands except where the darkness reigns, like that of the Lion King. Mufasa told his son that their kingdom includes “everything the light touches,” but not the shadowy place. “That’s beyond our borders. You must never go there.” the Lion King said. The Father of our Lord commissions His Son differently. He sends the Lion of Judah to charge the land of shadows and bring the light of His glory to bear upon the entire universe. Or, if we don’t like contrasting the Kingdom of Christ with the pagan notions of the Lion King movie, perhaps Abraham Kuyper can help. Kuyper so famously said, “There is not one square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!’”
That’s the basic gist. The distinctiveness of Christ’s Kingdom, apart from other traits, is that it includes our entire existence – spiritual and material. First, He created it: “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth,” (Col. 1:16). And then he reconciled it: “And through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven.” (Col. 1:20). Heaven and earth – created. Earth and heaven – reconciled. There is no partition to distinguish what the domain of Christ includes. It’s all His.
Yes, Jesus told Pilate that His kingdom is not of this world. And so, it is assumed that because Christ’s kingdom is not of this world, it has nothing to do with this world. But as my 2nd grade son is learning, prepositions are important. The Nation of Israel’s takeover of the Canaanite lands was not of Canaan. It was of the power of God and by the faithful obedience of His people. But it had a lot to do with Canaan. Christ’s kingdom being not of this world does not mean it doesn’t include this world.
Yes, Jesus also told his disciples to “seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness” (Matt. 6:33). And, he continued by saying that “all these things will be added to you.” The Kingdom of Christ does not negate the material world. Nay. It includes it.
I think it’s safe for me to assume that so far you, dear reader, have at best simply been reminded of something you already know and have heard before. At worst, you’ve been annoyed at the time spent reading. “My neurons aren’t bouncing!” Well, allow me to help you imagine that so far, the spring coil on the machine has been straining under tension, with the last 700+ words increasing it. In other words, the pinball hasn’t been launched just yet. Sorry, Mr. Lugg.
What I’ve been attacking thus far is what some Kuyperian Christians refer to as Dualism – holding the spiritual world as sacred and the material world as secular. Yes, a worthy enemy to assault. But I think it’s important to not stop our pursuit at Dualism, for in doing so, we will soon be retreating once again.
The Lordship of Christ includes every square inch. So, what’s the application? Spring under tension. The launch: if Jesus is Lord over every square inch, then that means every square inch must acknowledge Him as Lord. The Lordship of Christ is not a passive proposition that begs no response. It is an active premise that demands application. If Jesus is Lord of all, then all ought to, and will, bow their knee.
There are many Evangelicals who agree with the idea that Dualism is bad, and that Christians should be at the table – in art, science, politics, business, all of it. Yes, let your light shine. This is even a twisted reason many Christians appeal to for sending their kids to government schools. Or Christian politicians who claim their faith is important and very personal, while promising to be “objective” in their rulings. But the Lordship of Christ doesn’t claim a chair for the Christian at the Table of Society. It claims the entire table. There are things the Lord approves of, and there are things He disapproves of. As an example, government education would be in the latter group. Simply being involved in the world is not what Christians are called to. We are called to proclaim and live under the Lordship of Christ in every domain. The other word for the approval and disapproval of Christ is a Standard. Some might agree that the application of Christ’s victory is not narrow, but they still live as if the application of His standard is.
Dualism is an enemy that needs to be demolished. But it can become the kind of enemy that is dispatched as a distraction from the real assault. Like General Patton’s Ghost Army with inflatable tanks distracting Hitler from his attention at Normandy, under modernity and post-modernity, the Dualistic notion can be a setup, a distraction, from the more central enemy of Humanism. Christians sitting at the table in defiance of Dualism yet remaining “objective” by secular standards are no threat to the enemies of Christ. They are harmless to the advancement of Humanism. Such Christians are simply ethical secularists, getting set up as the next target. Our battle is not simply about being involved in the world. The battle is about what standard we’re appealing to while there.
The victory of Christ that Christians share in is not narrow in its application. And neither is the standard that His Lordship brings about. The standard of Christ, like his Lordship, applies to every domain.
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