Separation of Church and State

Introduction

Tonight is the last of our baptist distinctives and it may be more important now than it was in the past. The last letter of our acronym is s which stands for the separation of Church and State. There has been a lot of debate about including this principle in our governance here in America because in more recent years it has been taken to mean that politicians can’t allow their faith to impact their thinking. This is a gross misunderstanding because it is impossible for someone who truly has faith to allow that faith to have no impact on the rest of their lives. And yet, the doctrine of the separation of Church and State is a fundamentally Baptist doctrine. Let me explain a little bit about why Baptists have always held this doctrine:

Prior to Constantine, Christianity was alway persecuted; so we were used to living as pilgrims and strangers in this world. But Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman empire and with it, Christianity gained a lot of power. Unfortunately, that power also had a corrupting influence on Christianity. As history progressed, the Roman Empire split and began to lose its power; but the Pope of the Church of Rome held almost universal power until the division of Eastern Orthodoxy. Kings were crowned by the Pope and decisions had to please the Church of Rome. With that came the right to punish anyone who deviated from Rome’s doctrines. When the Protestant reformation came, many of the early reformers were put to death. Until their own nations recognized their authority.

In England, you had the Church of England, in Germany the Lutheran Church, and in Switzerland that Calvinist Presbyterians. One would think that having suffered persecution themselves, they would have been more tolerant of other denominations. In England, those who were not part of the Church of England were called noncomformists. This group included Puritans, Congregationalists, Baptists and Separatists. All of them were very similiar in doctrine at the time, but attendance and licensure from the Church of England was required by law, so if you held services outside of the Church, you could be imprisoned or executed. This is how John Bunyan ended up in prison and writting Pilgrim’s Progress. Even after the Toleration Act of 1689, while granted some religious freedom, their rights were limited. In Germany and Swtizerland, the Anabaptists who rebaptized born again believers and rejected infant baptism were drowned, burned or beheaded. Thousands were killed in a period of 50 years. When the Baptists came to America, they found a system of state-churches in each of the colonies. Most of which were not sympathetic to various denominations. Here the Congregationalists, Puritans and Anglican’s persecuted the Baptists.

In 1651, Obadiah Holmes, John Clarke, and John Crandall (Baptists from Rhode Island) were arrested in Lynn, MA for holding a private services. Clarke and Crandall were fined; Holmes was publicly whipped so severely he could not lie down for days. In Virginia, from 1760s–1770s: Dozens of Baptist preachers were imprisoned, including Lewis Craig, James Ireland, and John Waller. Crowds sometimes beat or dunked Baptists in rivers to mock immersion baptism. So it makes sense, that Baptist’s would opposed State-Churches because they suffered continually under their hands. It wasn’t until Baptist’s lobbied for a bill of rights that religious freedom was enshrined in our constitution which says:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

We face much less persecution today because of the stand of those early baptists, but is the biblical basis for the separation of church and state really defensible? Have all other major denominations been wrong and the baptists right? Let’s begin by taking a look at the biblical basis for the doctrine of the separation of Church and State and then we will look at a modern threat to this doctrine in Christian circles today.

Biblical Basis for the Separation of Church and State

The separation of powers in OT Israel

Even in Israel which began as a theocracy, ruled by God, under the leadership of the judges who did function as both a prophet and a ruler when the nation became formalized and the law was given there was a separation of powers between the Kings and the Priests. The law which came before the establishment of the Kings forsaw this problem. In

Numbers 18:7 “Therefore thou and thy sons with thee shall keep your priest’s office for every thing of the altar, and within the vail; and ye shall serve: I have given your priest’s office unto you as a service of gift: and the stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death.” God specifically restricted the priestly duties to the priests and anyone who tried to do their job was to be put to death.

We have examples of this sin being committed in the stories of Saul in 1 Samuel 13:8–14 “And he tarried seven days, according to the set time that Samuel had appointed: but Samuel came not to Gilgal; and the people were scattered from him. And Saul said, Bring hither a burnt offering to me, and peace offerings. And he offered the burnt offering. And it came to pass, that as soon as he had made an end of offering the burnt offering, behold, Samuel came; and Saul went out to meet him, that he might salute him. And Samuel said, What hast thou done? And Saul said, Because I saw that the people were scattered from me, and that thou camest not within the days appointed, and that the Philistines gathered themselves together at Michmash; Therefore said I, The Philistines will come down now upon me to Gilgal, and I have not made supplication unto the Lord: I forced myself therefore, and offered a burnt offering. And Samuel said to Saul, Thou hast done foolishly: thou hast not kept the commandment of the Lord thy God, which he commanded thee: for now would the Lord have established thy kingdom upon Israel for ever. But now thy kingdom shall not continue: the Lord hath sought him a man after his own heart, and the Lord hath commanded him to be captain over his people, because thou hast not kept that which the Lord commanded thee.”

And in the story of King Uzziah in 2 Chronicles 26:16–23 “But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction: for he transgressed against the Lord his God, and went into the temple of the Lord to burn incense upon the altar of incense. And Azariah the priest went in after him, and with him fourscore priests of the Lord, that were valiant men: And they withstood Uzziah the king, and said unto him, It appertaineth not unto thee, Uzziah, to burn incense unto the Lord, but to the priests the sons of Aaron, that are consecrated to burn incense: go out of the sanctuary; for thou hast trespassed; neither shall it be for thine honour from the Lord God. Then Uzziah was wroth, and had a censer in his hand to burn incense: and while he was wroth with the priests, the leprosy even rose up in his forehead before the priests in the house of the Lord, from beside the incense altar. And Azariah the chief priest, and all the priests, looked upon him, and, behold, he was leprous in his forehead, and they thrust him out from thence; yea, himself hasted also to go out, because the Lord had smitten him. And Uzziah the king was a leper unto the day of his death, and dwelt in a several house, being a leper; for he was cut off from the house of the Lord: and Jotham his son was over the king’s house, judging the people of the land. Now the rest of the acts of Uzziah, first and last, did Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, write. So Uzziah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with his fathers in the field of the burial which belonged to the kings; for they said, He is a leper: and Jotham his son reigned in his stead.”

The rules under the law specifically delineated the powers of each office and kept them separated. This separation is also seen in the fact that those who filled those roles came from different tribes in Israel. Priests were from Levi and Kings were from Judah.

Only the Messiah unites these two roles in One

In the book of Zechariah, God has brought the people back to the land and they are going to be led by a faithful high priest named Joshua and a faithful ruler named Zerubbabel. Both these men were pictures of the coming Messiah, but notice to begin with God ordained two separate men to fulfill two separate roles in Israel. It isn’t until we get to the prophecy about the Branch that both offices are united in one person.

Zechariah 6:12–13 “And speak unto him, saying, Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH; And he shall grow up out of his place, And he shall build the temple of the Lord: Even he shall build the temple of the Lord; And he shall bear the glory, And shall sit and rule upon his throne; And he shall be a priest upon his throne: And the counsel of peace shall be between them both.”

There was one other figure who fulfilled both these roles in the OT: Melchizedek.

Genesis 14:18 “And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God.” This is a type of priest that did not exist in Israel and Jews recognized that the Messiah would be a priest in the same way as Melchizedek. So when we get to Hebrews where it talks about Christ being a priest after the order or Melchizedek; this was not some new made up theology. It is this priest-king role that they were looking for. Christ will ultimately fulfill this role completely during the Millennial reign on earth.

Jesus recognized two kingdoms in this world

In Matthew 22:21 “They say unto him, Caesar’s. Then saith he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.” Jesus was asked a question by some trying to trap him into rebelling against Rome’s authority. Jesus made an statement that allowed him not to step into that trap, but in that statement, he recognized civil authority and spiritual authority as two separate things.

Jesus view reinforced that these were two separate institutions. Later Christian teaching promoted obedience to the rulers except when those laws violated God’s law. The consistent Christian view is that the Church is not part of this world. We are called out.

1 Peter really develops this concept in great detail. Peter presents the Christian as a stranger and a pilgrim in this world in 1 Peter 2:11 “Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;” Our kingdom is not of this world. We are a holy nation called out of darkness into his marvellous light. 1 Peter 2:9 “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:”

So the lines between an unbelieving government and the Church must be drawn. I do not believe that this means a Christian cannot be in government. Daniel was able to accomplish much for his people and for the nation of Babylon because of his involvement in Politics, but the institution of the State must stay out of the Church and the institution of the Church must stay out of the State. When these two things combine together, you just have a recipe for disaster.

The threat to the doctrine of the Separation of Church and State

The issue of the separation of Church and State has become necessary to revisit today. Because of the continual secularization of our country, there has been a counter-revolution among Christians promoting a take over of culture and government by Christianity. Let me make something clear here, I believe Christian values are good for our nation and we should do much to promote them in our country. I also believe that Christians can be in politics and their faith will influence their decisions. But there have been two waves of a theological movement in Christianity since the 70’s that have sought to overtake the government and legal system with Christianity. These movements have taken the names: Christian reconstructionism, dominion theology, and Christian Nationalism. At the root of each of these movements is a belief in some form of doctrine we call theonomy.

Theonomy- the belief that the moral and civil law of OT Israel should shape the governance of modern nations.

Some of it traditional proponents were men like Rousas John Rushdoony and Greg Bahnsen. It has become more popular again through the influences of Jeff Durbin and Doug Wilson. You may have seen the interview with Doug Wilson recently on I believe it was CBS about these issues. Theonomy argues that not only should all civil governments have the bibles moral code, but since the law is perfect, they must also have the laws same judicial codes.

Some hold that the judicial codes should govern every nations judicial codes so that the state should enact the same punishments as laid out in the law. In order for theonomy to work, the separation between Church and State would have to be dissolved, the constitution rewritten etc. Because it is at its core a denial of the doctrine of the separation of Church and State, one can not be a consistent Baptist and hold to these views.

Building off of this premise, many have proposed that America’s culture, identity and laws must become Christian. As much as we would desire America to be Christian and have Christian values, theonomy is not the answer.

The only way for all of America to be a Christian nation is coercion.

The only way to coerce all American’s to be Christian is to blur the line between Church and State.

Historically, this has always led to oppression of true Bible believers. Seeing that most theonomists are presbyterians. When they legislate their own version of Christianity, will they make Baptists sprinkle their babies?

Theologically, it blurs the OT and the NT. As we saw this morning their is a discontinuity between the OT law and the NT Christian.

It seeks to force the Kingdom before Christ comes to establish the Kingdom. Most theonomists are postmillenial. They believe we will ushur in the kingdom by redeeming culture, society and government. After we ushur in the Kingdom Jesus will then come back. So they are literally trying to establish the Kingdom before the king comes.

It promotes Christianity in name only and actually hinders evangelism.

Religious freedom would be eliminated.

Conclusion

These last points are all very practical reasons to resist the philosophy and theology of theonomy, but at the core of it all is a denial of the separation of church and state which Baptists have always held to. So if I could give you an application tonight, it would be to resist the temptation to get sucked into a false theology. As much as we want morality in America, Christian values to prevail; the solution is not a political one. Though theonomy is a theology it’s application is political. The solution to what we desire is found in evangelism and revival in our country. We can stem the tide of evil politically, but unless there is true heart change in our nation; we will continue to go down this road of self-destruction. Don’t settle for a less than best solution to the problem.