TheonomAnarchic Theory

Pietists Guard the Henhouse (April 16, 2019)

Not because of their affinity for chik-fil-a, the sort of hill on which pietists are always willing to di(n)e, but because I’m using “henhouse” as a metaphor. You see?

I’ve been slow to the party and have missed out on all of the fun regarding MLK50, The Statement on Social Justice, and the Sovereign Nations Conference on Social Justice & The Gospel. The subsequent shots fired put another “ha” in “Brouhaha”. Though, they’ve been off my radar for the past few years, I’m unsurprised TGC and the ERLC are still peddling their do-goodery, and that conservative evangelicals have launched a counter-movement. I am surprised there were few Presbyterian and Reformed signers. Wait. I am? 

The Gospel Coalition has become the click baiting, ticket punching division of the Evangelical Industrial complex. They are a click it and ticket mass production facility. You can see their smoke stacks from the river bank and they keep paying large sums to the EPA who, having run the samples, assure us the levels are stable and the frogs are not gay. But one frog told me he identifies as a prince and supports the Green New Deal. Call your congressmen and buy more plastic water bottles. 

If you haven’t heard of the “Leftist-Pietist Alliance” by now, I would encourage you to consult google attaching the names of your favorite Recons: Gary North, American Vision, Greg Bahnsen, etc. They still get along on this particularly insightful point of theirs. They have aptly demonstrated the tendency for pietism, pessimism, and premillenialism to lend cover to the statists, secularists, and leftists. In this entry, I am assuming this phenomenon to be the case, and not arguing for it. 

The Gospel Coalition has fallen into this pietist error by trademarking and commercializing the word “Gospel”, and restricting its meaning to the mere doctrines pertaining to grace. This has given reformedish evangelicals the false impression that the Gospel is not, as the Heidelberg Catcheism says, “All the things taught in the [The Apostles Creed]”, but rather, merely the doctrines of grace. I understand this is a big claim with plenty of anomalies. I can’t prove this theory, that is tingling about my senses, but you can’t always prove the neighbor is spreading manure before the shit hits your fan — you can smell it, though. Still, The Gospel Coalition did gallantly rise to the occasion when a large faction of American evangelicals rediscovered the doctrines of grace and feasted for the first time. I am very thankful for that. God loves The Gospel Coalition and so do I. 

Today, we need “Together for the Torah”, “The Nomos Coalition”, and probably even “Evangelicals-Who-Publicly-Admit-The-Federal-Income-Tax-is-an-Illegal-and-Domestic-Act-of-Terrorism-Against-Americans” (EWPA/DATAA for short). Evangelicals need to develop, or at least, recover an orthodoxy of civil government. This will eventually require us all to take seriously the works of the reconstructionist movement, historic Christian just war theory, and Austrian economics. If we can’t begin to think theologically about violence, theft, courts, and restitution, as they apply to the state, then we will keep finding ourselves “here at home ‘till closing time” - Merle Haggard. 

The authors and singers of the Social Justice Statement put us on the right track, and though I’ve read Joel McDurmon’s criticism of it, I remain proud of my Baptist brethren. Libertarians and theonomists should be thankful for their stab at an issue that does more than navel gaze about sanctified-woke sensitivity. More to their credit, was the Sovereign Nations conference where Voddie Bachaum quoted Hayek. Yes he did. James White’s program has beaten this resilient horse, ad nausem, when he had much better things to do with his time. Douglas Wilson has been a Revoice watchdog. Phil Johnson triggered Al Mohler- watch for gospel centered safe spaces coming to Southern Seminary. 

Reformed evangelicals must say, “Social Justice is a meaningless term”. I know that God judges nations, I know that God judges generations, I know that God condemns groups who sin. These biblical phenomena are used fallaciously to position the tactic of “social justice”. You cannot apply ethical principles to a collective before they are developed and established, philosophically-theologically, on the basis of the individual. Any true ethic that applies to the individual also applies to the collective but it does not work in the reverse. 

Try this thought experiment: If you were to develop standards and principles of chicken farming you won’t be equipped to know anything about the chickens until you establish a doctrine of the chicken. This is how Paul can rebuke an entire church, while knowing collective sin always breaks down into single units of separate, unique, and individual human action. It is meaningless to say the church sins, if no individual has indeed sinned. When Paul corrects a church, he corrects them for the sins of individuals. You will say to me, utilizing our fowl analogy, “No. The philosophy of chicken farming is a separate enterprise from that of caring for one chicken. Why, you must consider how chickens interact with one other. The flock is a different animal altogether; more complex. First, develop a philosophy of the collective. A doctrine of the chicken can’t control the group.” This is wrong. Logic moves from each composite part to composition. Any true statement about the chicken cannot contradict a statement made of the collective- even in numbers of 50, 100, or 1,000. The farmer can’t establish a doctrine of chicken farming before he establishes a doctrine of the chicken. Chickeness informs Chicken farming because chickeness sets the principium for chickenology. This is how I’ve worked “henhouse” into the title, by the way. 

This is why social justice is a fool notion. Injustice always breaks down to unique, individual human actions which intersect, logically, at the principle level. All injustice can be set right by applying a biblical ethic to each individual case. Ethics begin with one man and one God, then from there, move slowly into many men and one God. The first principles control as the object multiplies. God saves a people. God saves a nation. God saves the World. Then, necessarily, he saves one individual at a time. 

Social Rustice never sleeps. Neil Young. It is behind the curtain of every encroaching tumor of government. It is behind all war and state violence which seeks first the group claiming to guard the interests of the individual. It is behind the destruction of sexual ethics. Our new alphabet contains mathematical notations as in “LGBTQ+” (the “+”, we presume, is the participation trophy). Notice the similar grammatical construction of these two words: “Cis-gender” and “social-justice”. These words, not in need of any qualification, are nonetheless bestowed with a modifier intended to burglarize their meaning. Even our most conservative evangelicals and politicians have given into statist and leftist notions of government because the lie of collectivism yields temporary votes. In this way, they have become conzarvative totalitarians, disinterested in sound theology, nomology, and economics. Three cheers for the Statement on Social Justice. We’ll greet the conzarvative evangelicals with a holy kiss when they get back here. 

Thanks for playing along,
Soli Deo Gloria,
Cameron Witmer