A horribly neglected element of Christ’s glory and honor in modern Christianity is His Lordship and Kingship. Yes, we often sing Jesus is Lord, even Lord of all. But what does this mean to those who sing it? Does it have merely personal application?
Attending a particular church service, though typical in reality, the pastor in his sermon spoke of Jesus as Lord, but we must necessarily wait until His physical return until we see His manifested Lordship.
I asked why? How would Christ imposing an external rule over a millennium be superior to the Kingdom built through His lively stones—the Body of Christ—His church by the power of His Holy Spirit (1 Peter 2:5-6)? After all, weren’t the Jews and even the disciples mistaken about Christ bringing an external political kingdom by force?
The Scripture speaks neither to long delay, nor to any external kingdom! While still on the cross Jesus said, “It is finished.” After His resurrection, Christ further said He had received all power in heaven and earth, and gave a command to go out in His name to make disciples of all nations to the end of the world (Matthew 28:18-20). Jesus, near His end on earth, added:
Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
John 16:7-11
Psalm 110 declares that Christ rules from the Right Hand of the Father, in the midst of His enemies, through His volunteers—His body—until His enemies become His footstool. Yes, this is manifestly a partially established rule, because God Himself patiently conditions it on His volunteers rising to their responsibility, a living sacrifice, their reasonable service (1 Corinthians 15:25-26).
Has the work of the Holy Spirit, the Helper or Comforter—the One Who Comes Alongside to Help—the Parakletos—failed (John 15:26)? Is God the Holy Spirit’s power limited because of the strength of Satan and the weakness of Christ’s body in the world? Is this a Biblical notion? No.
Part of the problem in our age is that we do not seem to embrace the entirety of the Word of God. We cherry pick those parts we find acceptable and comfortable. For example, God is love, yes, but He is also a flaming fire (Hebrews 12:29).
This brings us to our titled subject. Mary, the mother of Jesus, spoke a remarkable prophecy, her Magnificat. While carrying the Christ Child in her womb and speaking of Him, she said:
My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior. For He has regarded the lowly state of His maidservant; for behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed. For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with His arm; He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He has put down the mighty from their thrones, and exalted the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich He has sent away empty. He has helped His servant Israel, In remembrance of His mercy, as He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his seed forever.
Luke 1:45-55, emphasis added.
This sounds terribly political. A dear friend, a pastor, when I noted that he skipped Mary’s declaration of Christ’s overthrow of haughty power in his Christmastime sermon on the Magnificat, shockingly replied, “Over my dead body.” Yes, men, and even Christians tend to make their own salvation through politics, which we ought not do. (See Martin Selbrede’s critiquing essay and listen to his podcast interview on Stephen Wolfe’s The Case for Christian Nationalism.) Nonetheless, and lest we bring guilt on ourselves in cherry-picking Scripture to our own liking, we must teach and live the whole counsel of God. If we fear a corruption of Biblical teaching in the hands of men, we must provide the full Biblical counterpart to humanistic eccentricities and corruption. We must by faith seek the narrow path that leads to life, and avoid the way that seems right to a man, but ends in death. One of the most common condemnations of the prophets against Israel and the nations was the lack of godly, that is Biblical, justice (e.g. Isaiah 1:17, 59:4, and 8:20).
In sending His Spirit to indwell believers, Christ instituted the ability for Christian self-government—the liberty and justice oriented civil order we find as a fledgling expression in early America. The founders expected those following to correct and improve their system. Instead, Christians have merely consumed the heritage we received, leaving a moral and spiritual vacuum, and with the inevitable spiritual, moral and material decline and possible devastation of judgment we face today.
Somewhere between dereliction of responsibility with its neglect of the public sphere, and self-saving politics lies God’s narrow path of Kingdom life with its civil responsibility by faith for all believers.
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