I have a recollection that Jordan taught me to think of there being a fairly straight-line relationship between the church’s faithfulness in baptizing her babies, and the world’s being taught by that to practice abortion. But as I’ve done some digging, I think this is maybe an implication that Jordan never explicitly drew out.
Jordan’s four essays on dominion are a helpful prelude to this idea. (Peter Leithart treats these ideas at book length in his excellent book, The Kingdom and the Power.) In his essays, Jordan explores a number of ways in which the church disciples the world. He gives some very specific examples such as tithing and church discipline, but concerning abortion he comments only in general about how it is resisted by the church.
I tend to think that if abortion stops in this country it will be less because of Operation Rescue—although I’m not totally opposed to rescues—it will be less because of that than because in a whole lot of little churches around this country that nobody ever saw, people were faithful and just doing their work as Christians, and we’re not ripping off their employers, and we’re pleasing God. And God was pleased, and one day he changed Pharaoh’s heart. And then it stopped.
See, causation in history is not what we think it is. The causes of change in history are invisible, and that’s why we have to believe them by faith. We look at history in our history books, and we see political movements change in history. I think when we get to heaven, we’ll find out what actually caused changes in history were a whole bunch of people that we’ve never heard of who pleased God or who angered God and made God do things. You see what I’m saying and what that means practically speaking is we can do that in worship. In church, in the life of the church, the whole body life of the church, focused on Sunday, gives us power, and I think that that the Christian reconstructionist position—the way it’s usually set out—tends to be a little bit blind to that because too much focus is put on things outside the institutional church.
I’m not sure what year that was. In a 1994 tape series he talks about world transformation. He specifically says that “I’m not going to talk about infant baptism in here, but I am going to talk about a church question a little bit more broadly than that and try to get you to see what I think the Bible says about the centrality of the church in the transformation of the world.” That transformation includes the baptism of the nations:
Jesus said in the Great Commission, “Go, therefore, and disciple all nations, baptizing them.” Baptizing what? Nations. How do you baptize a nation? Well, Israel was baptized in the Red Sea and in the Jordan River, and now what Jesus is saying is all the nations are to be baptized. Israel was made into a theocracy. Okay, please don’t get up and run out of the room because I use that word. They were ruled by God. Some people really freak out at this idea of theocracy. A theocracy is a Christian republic under godly laws, okay? Israel was the first. Jesus now says every nation is to be discipled. Every nation is to be baptized and is to go from being a pagan nation to being a Christian nation. What happens when a nation goes from being a pagan nation to a Christian nation? It changes its laws.
Jordan then comments specifically on abortion:
If we try to reform society directly, we will fall into political activism. And there’s a definite place for political activism. I’ve been involved in it one way or the other for 25 years. I’m not opposed to it, but long term it doesn’t work. And now God is forcing us to see this, and I’ve picketed on abortion for a long time. I don’t say this to boast, I just want you to understand where I’m coming from. I’m not anti-political. The first article I ever had published against abortion was in 1970. That’s three years before Roe v. Wade. Abortion was legal in New York State, and I was already writing against it as a Christian activist. So I know what that is and I believe in it, but my experience tells me and the Bible tells me that’s not good enough. Some of this I’ve learned the hard way. And now the RICO bill is going to be used to arrest anybody who does that kind of thing. So we’re going to be forced back on what will we do.
And I’m going to suggest to you that we could get rid of abortion in this country in 10 years very easily. We could get rid of it in a month. I would say in three days. It would take three days to get rid of abortion in this country. But it wouldn’t come through political action, education, family psychiatry, personal renewal, personal discipleship. . . . Well, this kind of direct action does some good, but it doesn’t bring long-term relief. The truth is, the church has to be reformed before anything else can be. The church must be reformed not perfectly, but adequately.
Now, let me give you some biblical perspectives on this. Some of this you’ve heard many times. I’m just going to try to make it practical because here we are talking about church and society and it’s easy for us to begin to think if we write enough letters, if we vote Republican enough times, if we take over Republican Party precincts, if we do all this stuff, that’ll bring change. No, it’ll just bring short-term relief. It won’t bring change.
Jesus says in Matthew 28, “all power has been given to me in heaven and on earth.” Do you believe that? How many don’t believe that all power has been given to Jesus in heaven and on earth? I think most of you do. What Jesus said.
Are you in union with Christ? Yes. Therefore, all power has been given, in a sense, to you. What power? The power to disciple the nations, baptizing the nations, and teaching the nations to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.
Now, we want the United States to shape up. We want the United States to be a basically Christian nation, tolerant of others, but with clean streets, like it used to be. Jesus says all power has been given to him to disciple the nations, and we’re in union with him, and we have access to that power. And we’re the only people who do have access to that power.
So if America’s in bad shape, guess whose fault it is? It’s not the devil’s fault. It’s not Teddy Kennedy’s fault. It’s not Hillary Clinton’s fault. It’s not any pagan’s fault. It’s your fault. It’s my fault. If we have been given the power, and we have, and the country’s in bad shape, it’s our fault.
I haven’t been able to find any place where Jordan directly links infant baptism and abortion, so I think this must be an application that I made over time. I believe it’s a valid application.
God loves numbers and patterns. You are probably familiar with how the numbers 12 and 70 are significant in Scripture.
But God also delights in dissonance and lopsidedness. The numbers 12 and 70 are quite distant; their least common multiple is 420. A lunar month (29.5 days) does not evenly fit into a year (365 or 365.25 days). A week (7 days) does not evenly fit into either a lunar month or a lunar year. The earth is not perfectly round, nor are orbits perfectly circular.
Solar noon and midnight are pinned to the top and bottom of the clock.
The face of the clock reflects a sweeping 24 hours. The white band indicates what you might call the “date line”—the divide between today and tomorrow. This divide trails the current time so that the clock primarily reflects a view of future hours.
Daylight, nighttime, and the three twilights (civil, nautical, astronomical) are mapped on the clock.
At extreme latitudes, day or night may not be present. The clock attempts to account for this but I have not fully tested it at every extreme. Please let me know if you run into problems.
The major marks on the clock indicate a common understanding of the liturgical hours. The minor marks on the clock indicate a division of individual non-liturgical hours.
I wrote previously about James Jordan’s reflection on God’s covenant name and the merciful cutting off of wickedness. Jordan says,
The statement “visiting iniquity of fathers to the children of the third and fourth generation” means that if you become involved in image worship and your children and grandchildren don’t repent of it, you just move out of history and you move out of the covenant people. You wind up being like the Serbians. Your children are going to suffer from it. They were misapplying that to say, “Well, we suffer nowadays because our fathers sinned.” And the prophets came along and said, “no, if you repent, God will alleviate.”
That’s not what’s going on [in Exodus 34]. Now, the Sinaitic covenant was made with Israel. That covenant’s broken. There isn’t any covenant with Israel anymore. Now what are we going to do?
But I also discovered that I learned this from Gary North as well. North says,
And then Murray says the third thing you’ve got to have is a doctrine of final sanctification, that is, a final judgment in which God looks at what you’ve done and once again, at the end of the process, declares “not guilty.” And that there’s the final resolution and the final evaluation. There’s final judgment. And he said, you’ve got to have a concept of sanctification which includes definitive, progressive, and final.
Now, how do I use that? How should you use that? Because what we’re taught covenantally is that’s not just limited to people. That’s societies, too. That there is not just personal, definitive, progressive, and final sanctification, but there is also corporate and covenantal. And you have that with the bride of Christ. The bride of Christ, the church of Jesus Christ, is perfect in the eyes of God. It’s received all the perfections of Christ, but she’s not dressed in holy robes yet. That takes time. That’s what progressive sanctification is for the church. And at some final point, the church will receive her perfect robes and the marriage supper of the Lamb will take place. And that’s a corporate element of sanctification. It’s not just individual.
Now, what I’m arguing is that if it’s true of the individual and it’s true of the church of Jesus Christ, then I think I can make an application in terms of the development of societies. That certain societies become rebellious and are cut down because judgment takes place also in the midst of time, and you go to the fourth commandment. Visiting the iniquities under the third and fourth generation of them that hate me and showing loving kindness unto thousands of those that love me and keep my commandments. There you’ve got the model of history. That’s what that’s about. Because the thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments, in the Deuteronomic passage: it’s thousands of generations.
So you have the short-term development of evil, and then it ends. It’s cut short in the midst of history, and that inheritance is transferred. And we know that because the wealth of the wicked is laid up for the just. The compounding process takes place over long periods of time for the church of Jesus Christ and the elect.
For this reason I will not be negligent to remind you always of these things, though you know and are established in the present truth. Yes, I think it is right, as long as I am in this tent, to stir you up by reminding you, knowing that shortly I must put off my tent, just as our Lord Jesus Christ showed me. Moreover I will be careful to ensure that you always have a reminder of these things after my exodus.
For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to Him from the Excellent Glory: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” And we heard this voice which came from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain.
And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts; knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1)
This entire passage is a reference to the transfiguration. This is somewhat obscured by variant translation of tent and tabernacle, and of the hiddenness of the word exodus.
From Matthew:
Now after six days Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, led them up on a high mountain by themselves; and He was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became as white as the light. And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with Him. Then Peter answered and said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if You wish, let us make here three tents: one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”
While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them; and suddenly a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him!” And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their faces and were greatly afraid. But Jesus came and touched them and said, “Arise, and do not be afraid.” When they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only.
Now as they came down from the mountain, Jesus commanded them, saying, “Tell the vision to no one until the Son of Man is risen from the dead.”
And His disciples asked Him, saying, “Why then do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?”
Jesus answered and said to them, “Indeed, Elijah is coming first and will restore all things. But I say to you that Elijah has come already, and they did not know him but did to him whatever they wished. Likewise the Son of Man is also about to suffer at their hands.” Then the disciples understood that He spoke to them of John the Baptist. (Matthew 17)
From Luke:
Now it came to pass, about eight days after these sayings, that He took Peter, John, and James and went up on the mountain to pray. As He prayed, the appearance of His face was altered, and His robe became white and glistening. And behold, two men talked with Him, who were Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of His exodus which He was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. But Peter and those with him were heavy with sleep; and when they were fully awake, they saw His glory and the two men who stood with Him. Then it happened, as they were parting from Him, that Peter said to Jesus, “Master, it is good for us to be here; and let us make three tents: one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah”—not knowing what he said.
While he was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were fearful as they entered the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is My beloved Son. Hear Him!” When the voice had ceased, Jesus was found alone. But they kept quiet, and told no one in those days any of the things they had seen. (Luke 9)
Given the strong connections between these passages, I think we should look for what “the Lord Jesus Christ showed me” directly in Matthew and Luke. It seems that Peter is drawing this principle from his experience at the transfiguration: on this side of the resurrection (under the sun, as it were), there is a real experience and perception of light and glory, but this comes at the expense of labor and suffering; we do not have enduring rest. We tabernacle, but we do so in our temporal flesh.
If you had the opportunity to bind your children to Jesus, why wouldn’t you do so?
So they answered Joshua and said, “Because your servants were clearly told that Yahweh your God commanded His servant Moses to give you all the land, and to destroy all the inhabitants of the land from before you; therefore we were very much afraid for our lives because of you, and have done this thing. And now, here we are, in your hands; do with us as it seems good and right to do to us.” So he did to them, and delivered them out of the hand of the children of Israel, so that they did not kill them. And that day Joshua made them woodcutters and water carriers for the congregation and for the altar of Yahweh, in the place which He would choose, even to this day. (Joshua 9)
The same goes for cities:
Then the priests and Levites purified themselves, and purified the people, the gates, and the wall. (Nehemiah 12)
And nations:
Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. Amen. (Matthew 28)
The case in Nehemiah is particularly interesting. Both the civil and religious spheres encircle the city in song and with trumpets:
So I brought the leaders of Judah up on the wall, and appointed two large thanksgiving choirs. One went to the right hand on the wall toward the Refuse Gate. . . . The other thanksgiving choir went the opposite way, and I was behind them with half of the people on the wall, going past the Tower of the Ovens as far as the Broad Wall. . .
Also that day they offered great sacrifices, and rejoiced, for God had made them rejoice with great joy; the women and the children also rejoiced, so that the joy of Jerusalem was heard afar off. (Nehemiah 12)
This reminds us of Jericho. And this underscores that the dedication of a family or city or nation to Jesus is an inescapable concept: you will either be dedicated to him in obedience and service, or in destruction.
Jeroboam famously reinstitutes golden calf worship (1 Kings 12) and names his sons after the sons of Aaron who had offered strange fire (1 Kings 14; Abijah and Nadab). James Jordan hypothesizes that Jeroboam was cleverly inventing a pretext to draw Israel away from worshipping in Jerusalem:
Now, what’s Jeroboam doing? He is returning back to the situation before Moses and Aaron set up the Levites, isn’t he? He says, “No more tabernacle, we’re going to go back to the golden calf. No more Levites, we’re going to go back to the nobility of Israel and make them priests.” What’s he saying? He’s saying basically the kind of thing that Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses say today when they say, “We don’t want this Trinitarian Christianity that was invented in the 4th century at the Council of Chalcedon in Nicaea. We want to go back to the early church before this doctrine of the Trinity was invented because the early church was not Trinitarian.” Of course, that’s wrong, but that’s their myth.
Now, that’s the same kind of thing Jeroboam is doing, I believe. He’s saying, “We want to go back before Moses and Aaron took charge and made themselves dictators and set up this tabernacle stuff and took the priesthood away from the people and gave it to the Levites. And we’re going to go back.” And he says, “Look, you’ve probably heard that Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, were killed by God, but they weren’t. Remember Leviticus says that Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire, and fire came out from God and burned them up. Remember that story?” Now Jeroboam is trying to tell the people, “Well, that’s what your Bible says, but that was written by them Levite priests, and the real historical facts are probably that Moses and Aaron killed them because they wanted to perpetuate the good old true religion of the golden calf.” And so Jeroboam names his sons Nadab and Abihu.
Now what I just said about his theology is something of a guess, but there’s no doubt that he named his sons Nadab and Abihu, and I can’t figure out any other reason why he would. If you look in chapter 14, verse 1, it says, “At that time, Abijah, the son of Jeroboam, became sick.” Now, Abijah is the same as the word Abihu. It’s just a different spelling of the same name. And if you look in verse 20, you’ll find, “And the time that Jeroboam reigned was twenty-two years, and he slept with his fathers, and Nadab his son reigned in his place.” So he names his sons Nadab and Abihu, after the two sons of Aaron that were burned up for blasphemy.
So I think Jeroboam took counsel with people and invented a theology and decided he would go back to supposedly what the true worship had been before it was corrupted by Moses and Aaron. He takes the side of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram who say all the people are holy, not just the Levites. That’s the kind of thing he’s doing. Now, of course, it’s politically expedient to do this. When he rejects the Levites from being priests, it says he appointed other people to be priests. Who do you suppose became the priests? Well, probably not necessarily the firstborn. Let’s say that you were Jeroboam and you were trying to consolidate power. Who would you make as priests? Yeah, your friends, members of the nobility. Because you want to tie them into you, you see. You want to make them vassals, make them indebted to you. You want to centralize authority. Up in this time, you have church and state separate. Levites are over here with their own government. Nobody can be a priest except a Levite, which means they are free from political control. But when you get the golden calf situation, then the Levites and the church officers are all appointed by the king, by the state. And you have one government, centralized authority, centralized control.
One other thing we see here is this feast in the eighth month. It says, like the feast that’s in Judah. What’s the feast that it’s talking about in Judah? Was there a feast in the eighth month in Judah? No. What’s the nearest feast? The feast in the seventh month. Now, what was the feast in the seventh month? It’s the biggie. The biggest of all the feasts. Tabernacles. Tabernacles. That’s where everybody comes and builds a little booth made of palm branches and other branches and lives in Jerusalem and celebrates a festival. And the Feast of Tabernacles became—there’s evidence that indicates this, although it’s never explicitly said—it became a feast that celebrated the kingship of the Lord in Israel. At any rate, Jeroboam puts up a feast that’s just like that, a big eight-day feast, but he does it in the eighth month.
Now, why do you suppose he would do it in the eighth month instead of the seventh? Remember, we’ve got to think like shrewd politicians here. In the first place, you want to have a feast so that your people have an alternative and they’re not attracted to go to Jerusalem. Yeah, you don’t want them to have to choose. And do you want your feast before or after? After. That’s right, so the people come home from Jerusalem and then there’s another feast and what’s left in their mind is the second feast, your feast, the feast of the eighth month.
So that’s all the shrewd kinds of things he’s doing here. He’s counterfeiting the feast of tabernacles, counterfeiting the tabernacle as we’ll see, counterfeiting the cherubim, setting up false gods.
One other thing he does, once the temple was set up, were the people supposed to worship on high places anymore? No, there was only supposed to be one place for festival worship. Now, they had synagogue worship everywhere, in all the towns and cities and everywhere, on Sabbath days and new moons and other occasions. But as far as the festival worship or sacrifices took place, that was only supposed to be one place. Now, Jeroboam, he sets up many places because that’s what the people really wanted. They’d gotten used to having a lot of high places during the hundred years between the tearing down of the tabernacle and the building of the temple. And so he just plays up to them by saying, “Yeah, well, we can. I mean, God is omnipresent, isn’t he? We can worship him anywhere. This is nothing but a priestly innovation made up by Levites that we can only have one place. It’s part of Solomon’s attempt to centralize the nation to have a temple here. Don’t believe them when they tell you that God told them to do this stuff. They just say that. No, in reality, they set up this one temple in order to centralize all the power in themselves.” That’s the way he argued, and of course, he found a lot of people who wanted to believe that. So he sets up two sanctuaries, one in Bethlehem and one in Dan.
Jordan’s take seems compelling to me. What I find especially interesting is that he has Jeroboam resurrecting an old false religion, a sort of zombie religion. This provokes a few thoughts. First, this zombie religion is a new creation, an eclectic smorgasbord rather then a genuine return to an older way. It is an amalgam of high-place worship and firstborn-son priesthood with golden-calf worship and strange fire, as well as a variety of innovations. Second, this zombie religion is brought to life by coming into contact with true worship. If Jeroboam had not needed to draw people away from and to undermine the worship of the living God, he would not have had to invent a false religion. Satan is lazy; he only goes to work when he is at risk of losing ground. Third, this has direct applicability to modern false religions. In reality, they are boutique religions; none of them are old, because none of them have inherent life to perpetuate themselves. The more Christianity spreads, the more false religions draw life from an adversarial and parasitic relationship to Christianity. They must reconstitute themselves every few generations, partly because God judicially tears them down, and partly as a reactive response to the growth and maturation of Christianity. Girard observed, for example, that the more society’s scapegoating mechanisms are exposed, the more society repositions itself as a victim, creating a subtle new form of scapegoating.
Finally, there is no such thing as rewinding the clock, going back. Jeroboam’s false religion does not erase Israel’s obligation to serve the true and living God. The time of the divided kingdom, I think, serves as a prototype for the relation between the nations and the church; you must go up to the new Jerusalem to worship. Decades later, God chastises wicked Ahab for not conducting holy warfare (1 Kings 20:42)! Centuries later, God’s prophets are still dealing with the kings of Israel. And these later prophets often chastise other nations that have also been exposed to faithful worship.
In fact, you never hear of anything like God-fearers anymore after, I guess, maybe the Zoroastrians—who have continued since that time—might be a continuation of God-fearers—assuming that early Zoroastrianists were God-fearers—and that’s what the wise men were. . . .
We still have Jews, but they’ve been starved out as far as their relationship to the Old Covenant is concerned. They don’t follow the Bible. They follow the Mishnah and the Torah. They’re starved out, and the gospel remains. And then, in A.D. 70, they’re ended—and no more temple, no more sacrifice.
Modern Judaism—Judaism since A.D. 70—has been a completely different religion from the one in the Old Testament. There are no sacrifices; not only not any sacrifices in Jerusalem, but they don’t build altars anywhere else, either. Remember that before the tabernacle was set up, the Jews made altars anywhere they wanted, and worshipped—and that was fine. And after the tabernacle was torn down, for a hundred years before the temple was built, they made altars on high places—and that was fine. Then the temple was set up, and they had to go back to worshiping in only one place.
Well, when the temple was destroyed in A.D. 70, why didn’t they go back to just setting up altars anywhere and worshiping on high places? According to the logic of the Old Testament, that would have been perfectly reasonable. But they didn’t do it.
Judaism since A.D. 70 has not been Old Testament religion. It’s been a different religion altogether. It uses the Old Testament. Mormons use the Old Testament, Islam uses the Old Testament, Judaism uses the Old Testament. But it doesn’t have any connection to ancient Judaism any more than Islam or Mormonism do. We are the true continuation of the Old Testament: the churches.
So that’s the order of things—and it happens every time the gospel comes in. And any time there’s a revival, you have some situation like: there’s deadness all over the church, and you have a revival, and then you’re going to have conflict, and you’re going to have a starving out of the old and an establishment of the new, and then you’re going to have some type of killing off of the old: a definitive time when it’s clear that the new has come.
That’ll happen in times of revival, in times of evangelism, and missionary work; just as it happened here. This history is a microcosm or an example of all the big histories later on.
(James Jordan, Revelation in Detail # 84: Mid-course Overview of Revelation)
Jesus is on the horse. He rides forth to conquer. Therefore, the church also conquers. . . .
As far as the whole history of the New Covenant is concerned, [we]’ll therefore make disciples of all nations. Not just a witness in the nations, but every nation is to become a theocracy; every single nation.
Uzbekistan has to become a theocracy, a Christocracy.
Kyrgyzstan has to become a Christocracy.
Bosnia has to become a Christocracy.
Every nation has to become a Christocracy.
And so the conquest is going to continue, and that is what’s going on [here].
(James Jordan, Revelation in Detail # 35: The White and Red Horse Rider: Revelation 6:1-4)
[Girardian sacrifice:] it’s how civilization works. Now, if you’re not allowed to put the blame on somebody else, and you have to put the blame on yourself, then you have to kill yourself, right? That’s what we call mortification. Mortification is killing yourself. Instead of killing somebody else, putting all the blame on him and killing him, and instantly feeling good, you kind of have to wrestle day by day killing yourself: mortification of sin; dying to self.
That’s not something that happens all at once in a big crisis, and you just go out the other side and build your city. That’s something that’s hard to do, and it takes a long time to do; but gradually, the city is built. So, Christianity functions the same way, but because we have to kill ourselves and we have to have discipline in the church, it builds much more slowly. But it’s the same principle. Our city is built on the cornerstone of the death of Jesus Christ, just as the false cities of the world were built on human sacrifices.
Sometimes, quite literally: we read that Jericho was rebuilt by [Hiel of Bethel]. It says he laid the foundation with the death of his firstborn son. He killed his son, put him as a foundation stone; the city was built on him. That’s called a threshold sacrifice. And Cain’s [son’s] death is the foundation of Enoch. Remus’s death is the foundation of Rome. Remember, Romulus killed Remus and built Rome.
Jesus’ death is the foundation of the new Jerusalem.
But, see, we’re not allowed to get into this scapegoating thing. When there’s a crisis of culture, and there are distresses, and pressure is building up, we’re supposed to turn to the Psalms and interact with God. And we’re supposed to lay hold of the true Pentecost, which is the coming of the Holy Spirit. And we’re supposed to go back to the true old ways, which is the Bible and not some culture myth. That way we don’t get involved in fanaticism and crusades.
You know, it’s kind of interesting that people who are Christians find it much harder to get sucked up into movements than other people do. The more mature you are as a Christian, the more stable you are; the more you tend to be just a little bit nervous about big crusade-type things. You go to a Promise Keepers’ meeting, and there’s 10,000 charismatics there and 200 Calvinistic pastors. The charismatics all find it real easy to get into this. The Calvinists were saying, “well, I don’t know.” You know, they kind of get into it, and they’re kind of not sure. Some of the songs they feel like getting into, and some of them they don’t, right?
Because the more mature you are as a Christian, the more the gyroscope inside of you spins faster and faster, and you’re more stable. That’s the analogy I use. We all have gyroscopes inside ourselves, and the more mature we are, the faster the gyroscope spins, and the more stable you are; the less you are tossed about by every wind of doctrine, and the more difficult it is for you to get sucked up into mass movements. The more mortification you practice on the inside, the more you know of the Scripture: the more difficult it is for you to get sucked up into mass movements.
So at this point, we’re different. We don’t go out on a crusade and kill a bunch of people. We’re not supposed to. That’s not the way we relieve pressure on ourselves and on our society. But that’s the way they do, and that’s what’s happening here in Revelation chapter 13. The Jews experienced a big revival of what they think is their traditional religion, the oral law. That’s the problem. We had strayed from it. And a whole bunch of people who had become Christians undergo this experience. And what do we call those Christians who convert back to the oral law tradition? Judaizers. And Paul talks about them. He says, Demas is apostatized. There’s a big apostasy that happens that Paul talks about. It says it’s happening; it’s about to come: the big apostasy. A bunch of people who become Christians, and then all of a sudden they say, you know, “this was a mistake,” and they go back. They’re part of this revival, revival of false religion. And then there will be a persecution of those who don’t go along with it, which is the massacre of the two witnesses or the massacre of the 144,000. But then things don’t turn out the way they expect: because God acts.
One last point. . . . If the scapegoats in this activity turn out to be really innocent, sooner or later their killers feel guilt and become open to the message of the scapegoats. That’s why martyrdom leads to conversion. The Christians refuse to go along with what’s going on, so the Christians are massacred. But a lot of people begin to think, “maybe we shouldn’t have done this; these people were innocent.”
Remember what happens in Revelation chapter 11. Those who dwell on the land rejoice over the massacre of the believers, but: the people from the tribes and tongues and nations and peoples contemplate their dead bodies for three and a half days, don’t allow them to be buried. And then—we read that a lot of them are converted.
Rome had the same revival. When Nero burns Rome, the Romans had a big revival of the old ways, which of course were not old ways at all, but they became, “Rome, Rome is the answer. Rome this, Rome that.” And anybody who wouldn’t go along with it was put to death—which meant the Christians were. And Nero blamed the Christians for burning Rome; he started putting them to death. So, Christians are martyred. But what happens? Romans see Christians dying, they see that they’re innocent. They think about it, and then they’re converted. The blood of the martyrs becomes the seed of the church.
And that’s why, folks, historically it’s only through martyrdom that the church grows. It may be martyrdom in the big sense of being thrown to the lions, or it may be martyrdom in the sense that you practice self-mortification and killing yourself as you mortify sin. But it’s only as Christians mortify sin—and frequently it’s as Christians are actually put to death—that God brings pressure on the world and brings people to himself.
Well, I’m sorry, our time is way up. We’ll probably touch on this again next week, but then we have to move further into other aspects of what’s going on here. Take away from here: this is the way history moves—crisis, big Pentecost, mass movements, scapegoats. That’s what happens, and that’s what happened here.
Let’s pray. Father in heaven, we ask that you would spare us from going through this kind of thing in our day. We can see the pieces of the puzzle.
(James Jordan, Revelation in Detail # 77: A False Pentecost: Rev. 13:13)
I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. (Matthew 3:11 NKJV)
First of all, I am not a language scholar and I hesitate to make much of a preposition.
Second, John’s baptism is not the same thing as Trinitarian baptism, so we should hesitate to make straight-line applications from John to Jesus and his church. In a manner of speaking, John was bringing faithful covenant people back to life after their having come into contact with death. By contrast, Jesus by baptism brings people into his covenant for the first time, bringing them to life once and for all.
Nevertheless, the idea of a baptism being unto or toward repentance is significant. Rather than baptism being, as Robert Stein would have it, a mere synecdoche for a faith-repentance-baptism sequence, this shows that baptism is in fact a performance of repentance. Just as James teaches us that faith must be performed in order to be fully realized, so too repentance must be performed in order to be fully realized.
This by itself is not proof of paedobaptism, though it is highly consistent with paedobaptism and paedofaith. But it is proof against a facile credobaptism: if you require someone to repent before their baptism, you are in a sense requiring the impossible.
I gotta have my orange juice. 