One of the major talking points of Dominionism is the success of the Great Commission. Their argument goes that since Christ has triumphed over His enemies and we know that all the promises are fulfilled in Christ, the Great Commission must be successful. The statement itself is absolutely true but the question must be asked - how is success defined? Answering that question is key because success itself is a vague term. Take a simple example of a corporation. Its leadership might determine that success is increasing its revenues by 10% over the year. Now that the leadership has set a clear target, at the end of the year one can gauge their success. If they increased their revenue by 9%, they have failed and if they increased it by 10.5% or 12% or 100% they have succeeded. The point being that the clear metric set by the leadership on what success is, defines it. In the same way when we speak of fulfilment of Biblical prophecies and therefore the success of the Great Commission, we ought to consider them through the lens of Christ and the apostles. We’ve already considered some of their hermeneutics earlier in this work. How does that apply to the Great Commission?
Tag: Dominionism
Understanding the Great Commission
We read about the Great Commission in Matt 28:18-20, where Christ says - “18 And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. 19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: 20 Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.” The Dominionist reading of the Text goes like this - Since Christ has been given all authority, Satan has been divested all his authority. Therefore, it is the duty of the church to invade his kingdom and establish itself over the earth. Christ’s statement that His kingdom is not of the earth refers to its origins in heaven and not to its purpose in this age. Since the Great Commission calls for the Church to teach all nations to observe all of God’s commandments, one of the ends of the proclamation of the Gospel is the transformation of societies and establishment of righteous laws. On the surface this sounds like a coherent understanding of the passage. Yet, this departs from the themes and motifs that have already been revealed in the Old Testament and are further revealed in the New Testament.
Redemptive Kingdom Structure in the New Covenant: Part 3 – King and Holy War
In the Old Covenant, the Israelites waged holy war against the Caananites within the boundaries of the promised land. Likewise the Christian is also engaged in holy war. In the New Covenant, there are two categories in which this war is waged and these categories are not mutually exclusive. Since the Christian himself is the domain of God’s Kingdom, we wage an internal holy war to cleanse ourselves. Then we also wage an external holy war against the forces of darkness. Since the Kingdom of God is not a physical kingdom, this war is not a physical one but spiritual in nature.
Eden and the Fall of the Material Order
A high level overview of the creation of the material and celestial order provides a foundation to understand the garden of Eden, man’s role in it, the covenant God established with him, his failure to keep that covenant, his fall, the curse that entered the material order as a consequence of that fall and ultimately God’s promised redemption of His people from that fall. Understanding the themes drawn out in the garden of Eden is critical to understand the narrative of redemption and the Kingdom of God. It also establishes a foundation of God’s dealings with mankind, through covenants. These covenants are a framework through which God reveals and accomplishes the redemption of His people.
The Material Order: It’s Original Purpose
Every good book has an introduction that draws the reader into the narrative presented in the book. Genesis provides this introduction in the Word of God. While the Bible is a collection of sixty-six different Books, written by a variety of different authors over millennia. However, it presents to us one single narrative of the work of God in history, from creation to the ultimate end of the created order in the fires of the Lord’s coming. Therefore, to understand the Bible we need to understand where the narrative begins and how it progresses from Genesis to our place in the New Testament.
Daniel, Nationalism and Lessons for New Covenant Pilgrims
Christian Nationalism is an ideology that is gaining significant traction in Dominionist circles. The ideology seeks a return to the "glory" days of what is called Christendom, wherein "Christian" thought flourished in the West and where laws reflected what is perceived as Biblical influence. This ideology has come to play a seductive role in broad Evangelicalism and is the stepping stone to a return to the days of an apostate society. For indeed a society that claims to be a Christian and yet most of its citizens are unregenerate, is indeed a society of apostates and that does far more damage to the Kingdom of God than any heathen kingdom can. It is in light of this that it would be pertinent to study the life of Daniel, a member of the Old Covenant who lived in exile in Babylon, a situation that is the certain calling for every Christian in the New Covenant era. The study of the life of Daniel and his context as a Jewish exile in Babylon will provide helpful guidance for the Covenant people of today to navigate the world and understand the nature of the covenant peoples' interaction with the world and its systems and the nature of the whole conception of nationalism, a notion that becomes moot when considering the eternal order.
Worldliness and Dominionism in Christian Homeschooling Movements
There's a popular quote by Voddie Baucham that circulates in Reformed homeschooling circles - "We cannot continue to send our children to Caesar for their education and be surprised when they come home as Romans." Taken in and of itself, the quote is spot on and rightly calls out the folly of sending off children to state sponsored schools where they are indoctrinated to become "good" citizens according to the requirement of each nation. However, a general observation of homeschooled children shows that they are just as worldly and likely to apostatize when they leave the nest. There must be something beyond what meets the eye that explains this phenomenon. Ideally, homeschooled children should show a marked difference from their State schooled peers, however, this seldom is the case.
Natural Revelation and the Sufficiency of Scripture
Recently there's been a surge of interest in Reformed circles on topics pertaining to Natural Law and Natural Revelation. Western Cultures in the 21st Century have seen a rapid erosion of traditional values leading to the formation of several reactionary political movements, like the Alt-Right and several other ethnically conscious movements that claim that the salvation of the West lies in returning to traditional European mores and practices. Reformed tradition is not exempt from the influence of these movements - both progressive and reactionary. Since the Magisterial Reformation didn't abandon the Dominionism of the Middle Ages, this tradition has continued in some form or the other within Protestantism leading to a long history of seeking power, influence and engaging in social activism. While all of these misguided attempts have consistently failed, from Geneva to Apartheid South Africa, the fascination with the notion of taking Dominion for Christ hasn't died.
The Dominion Mandate Examined Through the Lens of Scripture and Church History
The problem with the Dominionist view of the Cultural Mandate is that the natural reading of the Text doesn't allow for the added assumptions, either that of Kuyper or of the later Reconstructionists. This verse is specifically dealing with the means of sustenance in a primordial agrarian system established at Eden and has nothing to do with the notions of utilizing the full "God-given" human potential through the subduing of nature and an emphasis on civilization building, politics and arts. These are assumptions being added to the Text. Its a textbook example of eisegesis. The Dominionist is reading his preconceived notions into the Text to make way for something that the Text doesn't allow for. The natural reading utilizes an action "have" or "take" dominion and an object(s) "fish of the sea, fowl of the air, every living thing". The Dominionist expands this set of objects to include civilization, politics and culture.
Charlemagne and the Problem of Fake Zions
Thus is the end of the cause to establish “Christian” realms, an engagement in futility for of it we have no command, being required by Christ and the Apostles to live as pilgrims and martyrs, bearing witness for Christ in a world that will soon be burned with fire. Charlemagne’s dream was to build Zion on Earth, and many a revisionist seeks to read that into the annals of history. However every attempt to establish a Zion, only leads to the formation of a counterfeit, a distraction from the true Zion we Christians are part of and told to build. Charlemagne’s Kingdom wasn’t a kingdom based on righteousness, but one of corruption, wickedness, murder and lust.
Deo Vicit Mundum 