In the wake of government-mandated lockdowns, an election rife with controversy and an assault on biblical morality and freedom of speech, many Christians are wondering how to respond to injustice righteously while also being peacemakers. 

STAND UP AND SPEAK OUT

In a recent article, Dr. John Diamond answers this question biblically and powerfully. Right now, America is in a moral crisis and Christians are the ones God has anointed to stand up and speak out. It is our duty to do so. If we are confronted with the dilemma of obeying unjust laws or obeying God’s law, it is clear that we must obey God’s laws. We can no longer be passive or stay silent on matters of “politics” any more than we can stay silent on questions of righteousness or justice for the simple fact that the issues of our day are issues of righteousness and justice.

On this subject, Dr. Diamond writes in part as follows:

We live in a very strange and divisive time. No matter the time, as believers in Christ we must respond to the culture of our day with both truth and love (Ephesians 4:15). As we attempt to live up to that Biblical mandate, we must recognize that there are two very powerful voices arising in America in response to the various unlawful acts that have been committed against the American people by their government in the midst of the pandemic.

In the first case, one group desires to appease the current culture. This group believes that by going-along-to-get-along, peace can be found. However, by not standing for individual liberty, this group essentially allows themselves (and their posterity) to become enslaved to a system of power mongers who rule by fiat. On the other hand, another group of people wants to take justice into their own hands by picking up firearms and waging a revolution that they believe will restore our Constitutional republic to what our Founding Fathers intended it to be.

Many Americans are increasingly expressing their desire to bring to justice those in power who are responsible for the great overreach of their authority. These two aforementioned positions (indifference and violence) are both morally and theologically unacceptable for Christians; especially when there is still another lawful and Biblical course of action we can take.

As ministers of the gospel, we are called to be “peacemakers.” Now more than ever, our nation is in dire need of peacemakers. Still, our actions need to be conducted according to a standard of “righteousness and justice” (Psalm 89:14). The clergy can no longer sit idly by while many are calling for secession, revolution, and civil war, without first letting the spiritual voices of wisdom and sanity to be heard throughout the nation (Romans 10:18). Therefore, before we can seek a solution, we must first understand the purpose of a solution. Ultimately, the solution we seek is in response to the injustices we now face.

The express purpose of the US Constitution was to “establish justice, insure domestic tranquility. The two terms “justice” and “tranquility” did not just happen to follow one another in the text. The Founders understood that you could not have one without the other. They knew from all of their experiences that denying “justice” destroys “domestic tranquility.” The antonyms of tranquility are “agitation, disturbance and violence.” When justice is denied to any people group, it ALWAYS results in chaos. . . .

Our Lord grows weary of the isolationist and pacifistic positions of many pastors. The familiar excuse that “Jesus never got involved in the political affairs of the nation” is indefensible. Jesus also never left the nation of Israel to promote the Gospel. Are we going to denounce all missionary efforts for the same reason? The function of any chief executive (king) is to establish the vision for his servants to carry out. Jesus also spent very little time within the four walls of their religious institutions, but did spend most of His time being the “salt and the light” in the community. He continued seeking and saving the lost and creating disciples. Is not the chief command of Christ’s follower to “go” and “make disciples?”

How many modern-day pastors leave the four walls of the church or empower the members of their congregation to fulfill this mandate? As a result, many pastors in America are relegated to mere administers of million-dollar bushels that hide and obscure the light from the community. Is that how we show the world that we are salt and light? . . .

In America, the transfer of sovereign governmental authority was taken from the “king” and given to “We the people” through the American Revolution; this process was then finalized when the last state ratified the US Constitution. Therefore, the scripture passages concerning submission to civil government that some like to quote do not have the same application as when they were written 2,000 years ago. In America, we DO NOT have “leaders” or “rulers,” WE HAVE REPRESENTATIVES AND CIVIL SERVANTS — and they serve at the “consent of the governed.”

What is the function of a servant? It’s to serve their masters, of course. Who are the masters of the American Republic? WE THE PEOPLE! . . . Being elected to a government position in the American system of government IS NOT a promotion to unchecked and unchallenged tyrannical power – it is an act of service. . . .

Any true shepherd, who wants to faithfully preach the Word of God and the righteous mandates towards their government officials, needs to explain that to “obey our rulers” means we must obey God and His law first and foremost. Furthermore, our “rulers” in our system of government are not the same kind of “rulers” in Biblical times. In the American system of government, supreme authority is lodged in the hands of both Almighty God and the U.S. Constitution.

A failure of the clergy to explain our system of government to the church, leads our nation down a road in toward civil unrest. The clergy, who should be the foremost authorities on law and government, often find themselves ignorant of God’s commands on the subject. The American clergy needs to recapture the understanding that God and his moral law are the foremost authority of the restrictions of human civil government.

To read more of Dr. Diamond’s essay, visit Sons of Liberty Media.