God Gives Them Wicked Rulers

/

One of the subjects I have been fascinated by recently is Italian Elite Theory, which essentially means that society is always shaped and governed by a small minority who hold power.

Therefore, when God wants to have mercy on a society, He does so by raising up a good ruler (a Christian Prince, a Protestant Franco).

But the opposite is true as well: “When God wants to judge a nation, He gives them wicked rulers.” That quote is often attributed to Calvin. According to one man’s research, Calvin didn’t say exactly that. But it is a good, pithy summary of what Calvin did actually say.

What Calvin actually said:

They who rule unjustly and incompetently have been raised up by [the Lord] to punish the wickedness of the people…. a wicked king is the Lord’s wrath upon the earth.

A wicked prince is the Lord’s scourge to punish the sins of the people.

Institutes, 4.20.25 and Commentary on Romans, 13:3

Church & State Intended to Mutually Uphold One Another

/

In our Church Ed. classes we are going through the Westminster Confession. And last Sunday we looked at WCF 20.4, which states, “the powers [church & state] which God hath ordained, and the liberty which Christ hath purchased, are not intended by God to destroy, but mutually to uphold and preserve one another.”

And then this week I was reminded of this quote from a pastor during America’s founding:

The immediate ends of the magistracy and ministry are different, but not opposite: They mutually assist each other, and ultimately centre in the same point. The one has for its object the promotion of religion and the cause of Christ; the other immediately aims at the peace and order of mankind in this world: Without which, there could be no fixed means of religions; nor the church have a continuance on earth, but through the interposition of a miraculous providence, constantly displayed for its preservation. Hence the church of Christ will have no fixed residence, where there is no civil government, until he, whose right it is, shall take to himself his great power, and reign king of nations, even as he is king of saints.”

Elizur Goodrich, quoted in Stephen Wolfe, Case for Christian Nationalism, p. 288 n. 36

Grace Perfects, Restores Human Nature

/

For to the extent that we may be Christians, we do not cease being humans, but we are Christian human beings. So also we must state that therefore we are bound by Christian laws, not that we are consequently released from human ones. For grace perfects nature; grace does not, however, abolish it. And therefore with respect to the laws by which nature itself is sustained and renewed, grace restores those that have been lost, renews those that have been corrupted, and teaches those that are unknown.

Franciscus Junius, The Mosaic Polity, 38 (1593).

Desecularization

/

Alexis de Tocquevill:

Men cannot abandon their religious faith without a kind of aberration of intellect and a sort of violent distortion of their true nature; they are invincibly brought back to more pious sentiments. Unbelief is an accident, and faith is the only permanent state of mankind.