NXR Podcast - QUESTIONS - Should Christians Judge Outsiders?
Aired: 2022-11-05
Duration: 18:42


=== God's Agency in Judgment (14:52) ===

[00:00:00]  Hey guys, real quick before we get started, I have a small request.
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[00:00:17]  Thanks.
[00:00:21]  Here we go.
[00:00:22]  This is from Kevin Wendt.
[00:00:24]  How would you answer someone that brings up 1 Corinthians 5, verse 12 and 13 in opposition to the church and Christians getting involved in the political sphere?
[00:00:33]  Even the abortion mill ministries, etc.
[00:00:36]  I believe that theonomy is good, and in the post millennial hope, I am just wondering the best way to answer this.
[00:00:43]  Thank you.
[00:00:45]  All right, let me find it.
[00:00:46]  1 Corinthians chapter 5.
[00:00:48]  I know exactly what you're talking about, but I want to be able to read the text.
[00:00:53]  1 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 12 and 13 says this For what do I have to do with judging outsiders?
[00:01:03]  Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?
[00:01:06]  God judges those outside.
[00:01:08]  Purge the evil person from among you.
[00:01:11]  Oh my goodness, if I had a dollar every single time a well meaning but very foolish Christian quoted that in order to say that we shouldn't care about politics, I would be a very, very rich man.
[00:01:24]  Let me read it one more time.
[00:01:25]  For what have I to do with judging outsiders?
[00:01:28]  Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?
[00:01:32]  God judges those outside.
[00:01:34]  Purge the evil person from among you.
[00:01:36]  All right, first, for what have I?
[00:01:39]  Who's I?
[00:01:40]  The Apostle Paul.
[00:01:41]  What is the Apostle Paul?
[00:01:43]  He's an apostle.
[00:01:45]  An apostle of the world, an apostle of the civil magistrate, an apostle of medicine, and no, an apostle in the church.
[00:01:55]  He has a position of ecclesiastical authority commissioned by Christ in his church.
[00:02:02]  So Paul is saying, I, as a churchman, as a clergy member of sorts, the highest to be sure, but as a clergyman, what Business do I have with judging people outside of the church?
[00:02:15]  I am a leader in the church.
[00:02:17]  That's my domain.
[00:02:19]  Then he goes further and he says, Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?
[00:02:23]  All right, who's the you?
[00:02:24]  So the I is the Apostle Paul.
[00:02:25]  What is the Apostle Paul?
[00:02:27]  A clergyman in the church.
[00:02:29]  All right, who's the you?
[00:02:30]  The you is the entire city of Corinth.
[00:02:33]  No, it's the church at Corinth, it's the saints, it's members in the church.
[00:02:38]  So he's saying, Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?
[00:02:43]  Are to judge.
[00:02:44]  This is who you're supposed to judge.
[00:02:45]  Then, verse 13, he says, God judges those outside.
[00:02:50]  Purge the evil person from among you.
[00:02:52]  And what he's saying in that case is he's talking about the man who had sexual relations with his stepmother, a kind of sexual perversion not even heard of among the Gentiles.
[00:03:03]  And he's saying he needs to be excommunicated, handed over to Satan.
[00:03:06]  He needs to be removed from the roster of the church.
[00:03:10]  Treat him as a tax collector or a Gentile, no longer regarding him as a brother.
[00:03:14]  For the saving of his soul, the destruction of his flesh, but the saving of his soul, which is in fact what happened because when Paul writes back to the Corinthian church in 2 Corinthians chapter 2, he tells them to welcome that same man.
[00:03:26]  I believe it's the same man back in.
[00:03:28]  All right.
[00:03:28]  So Paul is basically what he's saying is look, we're not judging outsiders here, but we are judging those in the church.
[00:03:33]  And we got a guy in the church right now who needs to be purged.
[00:03:36]  That's what Paul's saying.
[00:03:36]  So I, as an authority in the church, I deal with the church.
[00:03:42]  And you, as members of the church, Make judgments also.
[00:03:47]  You have a role in this judgment, not just me top down, but the church itself needs to corporately and in a unified sense, needs to purge this evil person from among the church.
[00:03:58]  Now, all that being said, verse 13, he says, God judges those outside the church.
[00:04:03]  Now, here's the deal.
[00:04:04]  Let's look at that real quick.
[00:04:07]  You guys are going to love this, right?
[00:04:10]  The favorite text of everybody to quote over the last two and a half years, Romans 13.
[00:04:17]  What?
[00:04:17]  Romans 13.
[00:04:18]  Here we go.
[00:04:26]  Romans 13.
[00:04:27]  Let every person be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God.
[00:04:33]  God sovereignly appoints human civil magistrates, and those that exist have been instituted by God.
[00:04:40]  Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.
[00:04:47]  Go back, 1 Corinthians 5, verse 13.
[00:04:49]  God judges those outside.
[00:04:52]  But how?
[00:04:54]  By what means?
[00:04:55]  Through what agency?
[00:04:58]  There is a human agency that God uses to judge those outside of the church.
[00:05:04]  What is it?
[00:05:05]  It's a civil magistrate.
[00:05:06]  Those who resist the authorities resist what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.
[00:05:13]  For rulers are not a terror to those who do good, but to bad.
[00:05:17]  Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority?
[00:05:19]  Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval.
[00:05:21]  For he is God's servant for your good.
[00:05:24]  But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain.
[00:05:29]  He is the servant of God, an avenger.
[00:05:32]  Who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer?
[00:05:36]  So, 1 Corinthians 5, verse 13, God judges those outside.
[00:05:40]  How?
[00:05:42]  By the avenger that God instituted, by the servant of God, by God's deacon, the civil magistrate.
[00:05:49]  He's the one who carries out God's wrath on the outsider, right?
[00:05:54]  So, you have not two kingdoms.
[00:05:57]  Get that garbage out of here.
[00:05:59]  You have three spheres the home, the church, and the state.
[00:06:04]  The home, the church, and the state.
[00:06:06]  There are leaders, fathers, I would say.
[00:06:09]  This is the father's world.
[00:06:10]  He works through fathers.
[00:06:12]  This is patriarchy.
[00:06:13]  There are fathers in each of these three spheres that are in authority, that rule, and are called to rule righteously according to the scripture.
[00:06:20]  There are familial fathers in the home.
[00:06:22]  The father is the head of his children.
[00:06:23]  He's certainly the head of his wife.
[00:06:25]  The scripture teaches this.
[00:06:26]  There are ecclesiastical fathers in the church.
[00:06:28]  There's a reason why elders, leaders in the church, are to be men.
[00:06:33]  And there are fathers in the civil magistrate.
[00:06:35]  Now, I understand that we have a bunch of women in positions.
[00:06:38]  Of high up civil authority, but that's God's judgment.
[00:06:41]  That's not something to boast about.
[00:06:43]  It should be men, right?
[00:06:44]  Because the civil magistrate bears the sword and the sword belongs to men, not women.
[00:06:49]  Despite what female elf wields the sword in the rings of power, in God's world, according to God's word, men are the ones who wield the sword and the sword belongs to the civil magistrate.
[00:07:01]  It should be men.
[00:07:02]  They're the ones who are called to rule.
[00:07:03]  So, all that being said, you have three different spheres, and certainly in terms of the people, there are overlap.
[00:07:10]  Right?
[00:07:10]  People who belong to the church also belong to families and they also belong to a sovereign nation.
[00:07:16]  They are citizens in a nation.
[00:07:17]  So there are multiple different identities and belongings that each of these people have.
[00:07:22]  But what Paul is saying when he says, hey, it's not my business to judge outsiders, great, because he's an apostle.
[00:07:28]  And you, and in what sense is he speaking to the Corinthians in that instance?
[00:07:33]  He's talking about you, insofar as it regards your status as church members, are not to judge those outside, but to judge those in.
[00:07:41]  Inside, and right now you need to judge this particular person by rendering a righteous judgment, excommunicating him, handing him over to Satan, in line with the teachings of Christ in Matthew chapter 18, church discipline.
[00:07:53]  Okay, that's what he's saying, but he's not saying that no one judges outsiders.
[00:07:57]  Yes, he says God judges outsiders, but we know that this is also Paul, Romans chapter 13.
[00:08:02]  How does God judge outsiders?
[00:08:03]  Through people.
[00:08:05]  Through people.
[00:08:06]  But it's another sphere.
[00:08:07]  So he uses the leaders in that sphere.
[00:08:09]  But those leaders are supposed to be God's servants, right?
[00:08:13]  Caesar is not God.
[00:08:14]  Caesar submits to God, Caesar is a servant of God.
[00:08:19]  Yes, separation of church and state as two sovereign spheres.
[00:08:22]  Yes and amen.
[00:08:23]  Separation of Christ and state.
[00:08:26]  No.
[00:08:27]  We do not want an ecclesiocracy.
[00:08:29]  A church run state or a state run church, which is what we've had for several decades now.
[00:08:34]  We don't have a church run state, but we do have a state run church.
[00:08:37]  We don't want either.
[00:08:38]  We want a separation of church and state, but we don't want a separation of Christ and state.
[00:08:43]  That means we reject ecclesiocracies, but we would adhere to a theocracy.
[00:08:49]  We do adhere to that.
[00:08:50]  We believe that Christ is king.
[00:08:52]  Here's the deal Christ is king of kings.
[00:08:55]  Ever heard that line before?
[00:08:56]  Christ is king of kings?
[00:08:58]  Okay, which kings is he king of?
[00:09:00]  Earthly kings.
[00:09:03]  Christ is king over the kings of this earth, over the civil magistrate, over Caesar.
[00:09:09]  These guys are, now, certainly, we have plenty of tyrants.
[00:09:12]  We have plenty of people in the realm of the civil magistrate that have rejected the lordship, the kingship of Christ.
[00:09:18]  But that's not how it has to be.
[00:09:20]  That's not how it's supposed to be.
[00:09:21]  And that's not how it ultimately will be as the Great Commission advances and the gospel goes forth and we make disciples of all nations.
[00:09:30]  Here's the deal.
[00:09:32]  Just think about this logically for a second.
[00:09:34]  This is what you ultimately have to theologically affirm.
[00:09:37]  In order to get rid of theonomy, what you would have to say is that a Christian cannot, in a moral righteous sense, serve in any position in the state.
[00:09:49]  Christians cannot be service members in the Navy or the Air Force or the Army or the Marines.
[00:09:57]  Christians cannot be police officers.
[00:09:59]  They cannot run for local office.
[00:10:01]  They can't be council members.
[00:10:02]  They can't be governors.
[00:10:04]  They can't be judges.
[00:10:06]  They can't be president.
[00:10:07]  They can't.
[00:10:08]  None of that.
[00:10:09]  That is thoroughly unbiblical and sin.
[00:10:11]  It's a sin for Christians to be in the civil magistrate.
[00:10:15]  That's the position you would have to hold.
[00:10:17]  Because the only alternative position is that God calls people.
[00:10:21]  And we see this in 1 Corinthians 7.
[00:10:23]  Now, I understand it's primarily talking about marriage as the case study, but the principle, I believe, applies to other realms and other examples as well.
[00:10:31]  God calls people, God saves people, and they should remain in the station of life in which they were in when God called them.
[00:10:39]  Now, not in every instance, right?
[00:10:41]  So, like, if you're a criminal and you get saved, well, you exit that career, you go ahead and retire from your career of being a criminal.
[00:10:52]  But what if you're a Philippian jailer?
[00:10:55]  What if you're a centurion?
[00:10:58]  What if you're Felix, a governor?
[00:11:01]  What if, you know what I mean?
[00:11:02]  Like, what happens when you're in the civil magistrate?
[00:11:05]  And here's the deal Jesus addressed these things.
[00:11:07]  There were Roman soldiers who asked Jesus, What does it look like for us now as Christians?
[00:11:13]  To live a Christian life, to be your disciples.
[00:11:17]  And Jesus says, well, you must exit that realm.
[00:11:21]  You must quit your job.
[00:11:22]  Nope.
[00:11:23]  Jesus does not say that.
[00:11:25]  Jesus says, you must do your job Christianly.
[00:11:30]  Jesus does not say it is Christian to get out of that job in the civil magistrate.
[00:11:34]  No, he says a Christian civil magistrate just needs to do his civil magistrate job in a Christian way, in an ethical way, not exploiting, not oppressing.
[00:11:46]  But in an ethical way, according to whose standards?
[00:11:48]  Caesar's.
[00:11:48]  No?
[00:11:50]  No, Caesar doesn't get to decide what belongs to Caesar.
[00:11:52]  Yes, we are called to render unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar.
[00:11:56]  The question is, who decides what belongs to Caesar?
[00:11:59]  Well, it's the king above all kings, Jesus.
[00:12:03]  Jesus.
[00:12:04]  So, all this being said, what business do we have judging outsiders?
[00:12:08]  Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?
[00:12:11]  Great.
[00:12:11]  Yes, that's speaking about our role as church members.
[00:12:16]  Paul speaking as a church clergyman in his role as an apostle in the church to other.
[00:12:23]  People, Christians in Corinth, who regarding their position, their status, their responsibilities in their vocation as church members.
[00:12:30]  Paul is not saying that no Christian, that none of those church members in Corinth could hold, in terms of their vocation, a job in the civil magistrate, and that if they did hold said job, that there's no transcendent standard from the word of God that they should abide by.
[00:12:49]  Paul's not saying that.
[00:12:50]  That is eisegesis of the highest order.
[00:12:53]  So when Paul says we don't have business.
[00:12:55]  Judging people outside of the church.
[00:12:56]  That's right.
[00:12:57]  Christians, when we're wearing our churchman hat, as it pertains to the realm, the sovereign sphere of the church, the ecclesiastical realm, as we are wearing our church hat, we don't judge outsiders.
[00:13:10]  But guess what?
[00:13:12]  As human beings, we hold, we wear more than one hat, right?
[00:13:16]  You're a member of a local church.
[00:13:18]  Great, praise God.
[00:13:20]  You're also a dad in the realm of the family, a husband, or a mother, and a wife.
[00:13:26]  A brother, a sister, and you also have a job.
[00:13:29]  You're a businessman.
[00:13:31]  You're a farmer.
[00:13:32]  Or you're a police officer.
[00:13:34]  Or a council member.
[00:13:35]  Or a governor.
[00:13:37]  Or a mayor.
[00:13:38]  And in all those things, unless we're going to make an argument, and this is what the radical two kingdom guys basically have to do, they won't, but this is the logical implication of their view.
[00:13:47]  They basically have to say it is a sin for Christians to serve in the civil magistrate.
[00:13:53]  But it's not.
[00:13:55]  Clearly, from the Bible, it's not.
[00:13:56]  So then the question is for those Christians who do serve, In the realm of the state, they're members in the church, they're fathers in the home, husbands in the home, but then they're also a police officer or a governor or a council member in the state.
[00:14:10]  So, as it pertains to the home, what standard do they use?
[00:14:14]  The Bible.
[00:14:15]  They love their wives according to God's law, they love their children according to God's law.
[00:14:20]  In the church, how do they function?
[00:14:23]  According to God's law, according to the scripture.
[00:14:26]  And in their position, their vocation in the civil magistrate, how do they function?
[00:14:30]  Well, as a neutral.
[00:14:33]  Entity, according to the principles of classic liberalism, as a libertarian.
[00:14:39]  No, as a Christian, in this particular case, a Christian nationalist, a Christian civil magistrate, a Caesar submitted to Christ as king over the king, right?

=== Law for All People (02:48) ===

[00:14:52]  The law is king.
[00:14:53]  Whose law?
[00:14:55]  God's law.
[00:14:56]  God's law is king.
[00:14:58]  And so, then what do those civil magistrates do?
[00:15:00]  Those Christian civil magistrates do?
[00:15:02]  Well, according to Romans 13, what they do is they judge outsiders.
[00:15:06]  That's the point.
[00:15:08]  They judge outsiders.
[00:15:09]  So we do judge outsiders.
[00:15:11]  We just don't do it in the sovereign sphere of the church.
[00:15:14]  We need to have clear categories.
[00:15:16]  That's all we're doing.
[00:15:16]  We just need to have clear categories.
[00:15:18]  That doesn't mean Christians don't ever judge those outside of the church.
[00:15:21]  No, Christians judge as they're wearing their church hat, as members of a local church.
[00:15:26]  They judge those in the church.
[00:15:27]  But then those very same Christians, especially with the post millennial hope, as the leaven works through the whole batch of dough, as the nations are Christianized, as the mustard seed grows into a tree, as a stone cut by no human hands.
[00:15:39]  Grows into a mountain that fills the earth.
[00:15:41]  As more and more Christians come, some of those Christians are going to be civil magistrates.
[00:15:45]  And what do they do?
[00:15:46]  They act like Christian civil magistrates, which means they judge outsiders.
[00:15:50]  And that is God judging outsiders, but through the agency that He instituted, which is Caesar, which is the civil magistrate.
[00:15:59]  They are God's deacon, God's servant, God's avengers.
[00:16:03]  And so we do judge.
[00:16:05]  And the church doesn't carry it out.
[00:16:07]  The church doesn't round up criminals that aren't members in the church and put them to death.
[00:16:12]  The church doesn't do that.
[00:16:13]  But the state should, depending on the crime and what the Bible says is the just punishment for it, the state puts them to death.
[00:16:21]  And some of those members of the civil magistrate will be Christians, and all of them, even if they're not Christians, they should be informed and counseled on what is just and what is right and what is Christian by the church.
[00:16:34]  One of my roles as a local pastor is that I preach, first and foremost, I preach to the sheep in my church on the Lord's day.
[00:16:41]  I nourish them with the bread of life, who is Christ.
[00:16:45]  But I also, as a local pastor, I cry out to those in the civil magistrate who are outside of my church.
[00:16:52]  I don't render or execute the judgment.
[00:16:54]  But I tell them what God's judgment is and what they, as God's servants, should be doing.
[00:17:00]  I say, as John the Baptist said to Herod, it is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife.
[00:17:06]  Why?
[00:17:06]  Because Herod was a member in John the Baptist's church.
[00:17:08]  Nope.
[00:17:10]  No, Herod wasn't a Christian.
[00:17:12]  Herod wasn't a part of the church.
[00:17:16]  Did that stop John the Baptist?
[00:17:18]  No.
[00:17:19]  John the Baptist said, You're a human being created in the image of God.
[00:17:22]  You live in God's world.
[00:17:23]  God has a transcendent law.
[00:17:24]  It's not just a law for church people, it's a law for all people.
[00:17:28]  Stop sinning.
[00:17:29]  And John the Baptist speaks to him with authority.
[00:17:32]  He doesn't carry out or execute a judgment, but he makes a judgment.
[00:17:36]  And there is a difference.
[00:17:37]  And Christians are called to do precisely that.

=== John the Baptist Confronts Herod (01:00) ===

[00:17:41]  Oh, hi.
[00:17:41]  I didn't see you there.
[00:17:42]  Thanks for sticking around.
[00:17:43]  I've got an important announcement to make.
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[00:18:41]  God bless.