25. Christian Nationalism (Witherow's 6th Principle)

Not as much Christian Nationalism in this episode as you’d expect. Joshua Walker joins us to discuss Witherow’s final principle of the Apostolic church.

Joshua is the pastor of Church of the Resurrection PCA in Flagstaff, AZ.

Transcript

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Welcome

SPEAKER_01 0:15

Oh no, I'm just um Hello and welcome to Polity Matters. My name's Ben Ratliff, and I'm joined by Jared Nelson and Scott Edberg. We have just been talking about MySpace, and I don't know why. Uh this is episode seven in our series before the book. Uh you've been following along, maybe, maybe not. I don't know. We're basically a book club now. Uh we're here to discuss material that we've been reading and that has bearing on church polity and church government. And at the moment, we're in the middle of a book by Thomas Witherow called The Apostolic Church. Uh, we've um we've been inviting different friends on to uh to talk with us, to discuss with us, to really just add some dynamic to our conversations about uh Witherow. And today we are happy to welcome our friend Joshua Walker. Uh, why don't you uh tell us a little bit about yourself, brother? Uh you I mean, one big thing that I will say, just in case you won't, is that you are the moderator of the Arizona Presbytery. And uh we want everybody to know it.

SPEAKER_03 1:14

Yeah, thanks for having me on. Thank you. Thank you. Glad to be here. Thanks for inviting me to talk about such an um interesting and fun topic. As you mentioned, I'm in Arizona. I'm up in northern Arizona in Flagstaff. When you think of Arizona, don't think of um the same type of thing in Flagstaff. We're up in the mountains. I've got about four inches of snow on the ground right now outside my office window as I'm looking out. Um, pastor here at Church of the Resurrection, Presbyterian Church, married um to my high school sweetheart, Crystal. We have a lovely little boy, Calvin, and are um happy to be here and looking forward to this.

SPEAKER_01 1:50

I think we all have different ties to Joshua, but mine is um that we overlapped at RTS Jackson. His his senior year was my first year at RTS Jackson, and we got uh somehow roped into watching the last season of the TV series Lost with you and some of y'all's friends, which was the worst season of television ever by the time we finished it. And I cannot believe what happened. What a waste of time. Yes, yeah. I agree. Um scarred for it.

SPEAKER_02 2:17

Don't spoil that for me. I'm watching that right now. I just know that I'm gonna be disappointed now. Well, that's good parts.

SPEAKER_01 2:24

You know, it just it just all feels like a dream. It was so long ago. Um,

Introduction

SPEAKER_01 2:28

as you recall, uh, listeners, we are reading through Thomas Witherow's The Apostolic Church, which is it? In the first chapter, the question was posed which of the three forms of church government prevalent throughout the world is it the duty of a Christian to select and to support? And if you're wondering what those three forms of church government are, I'll just refer you back to a previous episode where we talked about it and you can start uh at the beginning. Uh, in order to answer this question, though, Witherow observes the Apostolic Church in the pages of Scripture. Just as the moral law of God is laid out in principles for us, so also the polity of the church is given not in detailed instructions, but in principles to be applied. And so we've been looking at these principles, and we're on the last of six total. We've looked at five already. The office bearers in the apostolic church are chosen by the people. Uh, the offices of bishop and elder are identical. In each church, there ought to be a plurality of elders. Ordination is the act of the presbytery, a plurality of elders, and fifthly, the privilege of appeal to the assembly of elders and the right of government exercised by them in their corporate character. And today, Witherow presents principle number six: Christ alone is head of the church. And he starts, um, he starts this chapter. It's it's it's chapter two, if you're reading along with us, it's the very end of it. Principle number six, he he begins by sort of talking about uh who isn't the head of the church.

Who is NOT the Head of the Church

SPEAKER_01 3:50

Uh, maybe you guys want to walk us through a few of these ideas. You know, where does he where does he point us to show us uh what isn't the answer to the question related to the spiritual head of the church?

SPEAKER_02 4:00

Okay, here we go. Scott gets the answer, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Didn't you say you were on some kind of uh medicine or something? We're not feeling well.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Yeah, yeah. So yeah, so I'm gonna know where we're headed. We're talking about Christian nationalism on this podcast episode. Uh just that's that's the title. Um what we can learn from Witherow as he begins his uh discussion is the idea of um a temporal king or prince that would um be the head of the church therein. Uh, I'm sure on his mind he's thinking of the Church of England, perhaps, as the the king or queen sits on the throne over the church and over its bishops. Um, Witherow begins by saying, No, no temporary human king fills uh that position as head of the church. And he he begins to go back all the way to the early church, thinking through the apostolic era, where there was no civil society that ordained um, that ordained a king that would sit as the head of the church. Uh he he gives all sorts of examples of if God, if our God wanted a prince or a Christian king in the civil realm, he would have changed Nero. He would have changed Pontius Pilate or Agrippa or someone else of the nature. But instead, in establishing his church, Christ alone is the head of the church, not these local civil magistrates that might have much power, but are not ecclesiastical heads of the church therein.

SPEAKER_00 5:30

Yeah, in addition to no um really civil government uh type officer, there's uh he also lists that there's no church officer that has supreme power uh over the church. And there you might be thinking in apostolic times of some apostle that would be the supreme apostle, or then after that, with uh some sort of bishop that has uh preeminence or is uh the first or the last word on things. Um so he he lumps that in there too and um makes his case uh as he has been before that you know no apostle that we see um could just tell another one this is how it goes because I'm an apostle and I'm I'm Peter or I'm Paul and therefore um I'm I'm head of the church and what I say goes.

SPEAKER_03 6:14

Yeah, interestingly, he cites 2 Corinthians 1 24 when he says this, even the apostles did not claim to have dominion over people's faith, but only to be helpers of their joy. So not even not even the apostles put themselves over top of others in this regard as head of the church kind of way, but they were there to help and to um come alongside of them. So even during the early church, the apostles didn't supplant Christ as the head of the church.

SPEAKER_01 6:45

Yeah, and Witherow deals with this next idea earlier in the chapter, but I'm gonna use it to transition us to the the right answer to the question. He starts off uh this might actually be the first couple of sentences of the whole section. He says, it is a distinctive feature of the apostolic government that church rulers did not render spiritual obedience to any temporal potentate or to any ecclesiastical chief. Paul seldom commences any of his epistles without reminding his readers that he held his apostleship by the will of God, not by the will of man. And and Withrow points us to Galatians 1, where Paul says, Paul an apostle, not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised him from the dead. Um

The True Source of Spiritual Power

SPEAKER_01 7:27

there's there's no uh there's no temporal governing authority over the church uh in terms of supreme power and authority. And so he points us instead to the the true source of all spiritual power. And um we're let's let's just maybe we should work through these texts that he first gives us because before he makes this point, he just gives us Ephesians chapter one, Ephesians chapter five, Colossians chapter one. Uh Josh, maybe you want to tell us what you went and looked up because I thought that was really interesting about Westminster.

SPEAKER_03 7:58

Yeah, so as I was looking this up, um, you know, he said, great, come ready with some Bible verses. So I thought, okay, let's see what the confession says here. So I looked up the chapter on the church and looked at the section where it said that Christ is alone the head of the church, and I dropped my eyes down to the footnote and it lists three passages Ephesians 1, Ephesians 5, and Colossians 1, the exact same three that were cited in our text. So I thought that that was interesting. So I had to do a bit more digging to find some other places to go, which I was able to do. But that was interesting. Um, that that um I'm wondering if he maybe got them straight from that, perhaps. You know, who knows where they got these from?

SPEAKER_01 8:35

We'll save some of those texts. We'll circle back around uh after we work finish working through his thoughts and see what we might want to add to it. But um I mean Scott or Jared, do either of one of y'all feel like walking through these three texts that he points out and just kind of draw out the main thoughts that he has there.

SPEAKER_00 8:49

Yeah, they're all pretty similar. I I mean the Ephesians um just has the line that he gave him that is Christ as head over all things to the church. So that gives you the the scope of his dominion, all things in the church. Um Ephesians 5.23 um just has the the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church. And then Colossians 1.18 almost says the same thing. He is the head of the church. Um, so it's just it's a it's a common Pauline um thing to say that Christ is the head of uh the church, and that he doesn't give that designation to anybody else uh except for Christ in those three passages.

SPEAKER_03 9:27

Yeah, and it's interesting after he kind of cites his texts here, he says this what the head is to the body, to the human body, Christ is to the church, and as the body cannot have two heads, so the church cannot have two heads, neither Christ and the Pope, nor Christ and the monarch. So he's drawing on this idea of if there's a body and Christ is the head of that body, well, we know that humans have one head, and so the church would only have one head as well, and that's Christ and Christ alone is the head.

SPEAKER_01 10:00

This is a great opportunity to point out that there's a wonderful office of the episode out there. Um, a wonderful episode of the office out there. Did I say that right? Anyway, where they they're gonna promote Jim to co-manager, and there's a there's a talking head with Oscar, and he says, Yeah, you know, every major organization in the world, you know, functions well with two heads. I mean, what would the Catholic Church be without the two popes? Anyway. Um I suppose Oscar had been reading some with a row. Uh he could have benefited for sure. He finishes the whole section uh by pointing out that the consequence for this principle. He says, For as Christ is the head of the church, the members of the church are subject to him, and as we have no way of ascertaining the mind of Christ except through the scriptures, it follows that the affairs of the church are to be managed by those officers whom the Lord Jesus has entrusted with that power and are without interference of any external authority to be regulated according to the mind of God as expressed in his word. And some of that begins to move us towards the application of these things, uh, which we'll get into in future episodes before we before we start to apply them. We're going to use these principles to evaluate the three forms of government that are prevalent in the world around us. But for now,

Are you convinced?

SPEAKER_01 11:09

let's uh let's move on to discussion. I think we've got plenty here to talk about. Uh, I know you guys have some things on your minds, but let's ask the first question that we try to do with these principles. Are you convinced? You know, with Witherow's basic argument, are you convinced that Christ is the king and head of the church?

SPEAKER_03 11:24

Yes. In fact, um, although it's done a bit tongue in cheek, if you attend our worship service in our bulletin, we have a list of, I think it says church staff and leaders, and at the top of that list it says Jesus Christ, head of the church. And then underneath it, it lists the elders, um, the deacons, the musicians, the staff, and all of that sorts of things. Um, yes, it's done a bit tongue in cheek, but it also, I think, is a helpful reminder, even just seeing a print that all of these people are under the head of Christ. And that's a good principle to have. And as we'll get into a little bit of the application here in a minute of why that's important, but it's just good to have that in our minds as we are um going to church and as those of us who are leading churches.

SPEAKER_00 12:08

Well, if the question, going back to the question, are you convinced? I think if you connect this with the previous principle, um, I think it made the case for principle number six before we got here, uh, just talking about the council at Jerusalem and that there was no um apostle that was preeminent there. So once he's once he's listing these texts and everything, he's already convinced me in five that this is true, um, just because you can see the early church functioning and they did not function as if there was a head other than Christ.

SPEAKER_03 12:39

Yeah, for those who might be listening to to talk about, well, whether they're convinced or not, I do think as we were kind of talking before we started recording, um, one of the things that he's presupposing in this chapter and that um in this section and that he's talked about early in this chapter is that you need to be convinced of sola scriptura for this to really come home. Um, because when you look to just the pages of the Bible, in particular the pages of the New Testament, it's gonna be very difficult to draw out any other conclusions than the ones that um we've seen here in these six principles. But um, if you have other sources of authority that are equal and rivaling scripture, then you're gonna say, yeah, I could see how we got to a pope or to a monarch. But if you're committed to solo scriptura, that is, that the Bible alone is the final authority to where we make all our final appeals to, I think you're gonna walk away and go, yeah, we're we're convinced of this. Um and in fact, it's pretty clear that this is what the New Testament is teaching on these principles of church government.

SPEAKER_02 13:41

And it's helpful when you're thinking through that. I one of the resources I valued um heavily in seminary was Dr. Kruger's book, Canon Revisited. And you can see a church's polity by how they believe the scriptures came about. And in the Roman Catholic system or some like it, uh, the church itself determines the scriptures. Um whereas we would have almost the opposite uh approach. Yes, the church receives the scriptures, but we do not ourselves determine the scriptures. The Lord Himself determines the scriptures, and we derive from those scriptures um the truths that Jesus Christ Himself um is the head of the church.

SPEAKER_03 14:17

Yeah, it's a church, we receive and recognize the canon, we don't determine it.

Anything left out?

SPEAKER_01 14:23

Well, is there anything um that we would point to that Witherow left out? Uh maybe you know, he was probably trying to hit a certain word limit or something, uh, I would imagine. Are there other scripture passages that back up this point? Is there any significant thoughts that that we need to include here as we talk about this principle?

SPEAKER_00 14:45

They all work together in terms of um already seeing that there is not just one elder, there's a plurality of elders. You're seeing that there's not just one person that's given authority and that this isn't just pedantic, as like, well, of course, Christ is head of the church, and then there's a there's an underhead, right? So you have to read these all together. And I think it was purposeful for him to leave this as the last one, even though in our BCO it's first. Uh I think it's the difference between inductive and deductive, you know. Once you get here, uh principle six should be easy for you to apply. Um, if you have followed the other five and you understand subordinate authority and you understand the plurality of elders, that Christ is the only head, makes sense of the whole system and in a way that ties it up in a bow.

SPEAKER_03 15:29

Yeah, Colossians 2 makes a similar point that Christ is the head overall. I think another passage that would be interesting to kind of look at, which is picked up on in the New Testament, is Psalm 118, verse 22, where it talks about Christ being the chief cornerstone. Um, and the New Testament of the builders rejected that chief cornerstone, but uh talking about how that kind of architectural analogy helps us understand the position that Christ has in the church elsewhere. Um, it's referred to as foundation and those sorts of things. So I think those are also helpful ways for us to kind of think through how Christ is um bearing his authority in the church.

SPEAKER_02 16:10

You think of Psalm 110 as well, where the Lord said to my Lord, um, where we're thinking both in view of King David and who would be Lord over King David, where David is certainly a monarch, no doubt, um, but there is someone who is over uh King David, and we recognize that in the New Testament as the apostles apply Psalm 110, they believe that Lord is Jesus Himself. And so the Lordship of Christ, I think both recognized in the New Testament, the passage we've seen, is also recognized in the Old Testament as they await the Messiah who would be Lord over all.

SPEAKER_03 16:45

Yeah, I think we might have passed over this point too a little quickly, but just the imagery of the church being the body of Christ, regardless of him talking about it being the head, when we talk about the church being the body of Christ, well, whose body is it? It's Christ's body, it belongs to him. It's his, he has authority and dominion over it. Just as um, you know, we think of our own bodies as kind of we're the ones who who move it and and and put it in places as we want. So too, he's the one who has the authority and dominion over um his body, which is the church, even without the imagery of the head, which I think is a very helpful um imagery as well. But also just when we talk about it being the um body of Christ that the church is at, that really starts to already point us in the direction that he's the one that has supreme dominion and authority

Why is this important?

SPEAKER_03 17:32

over the church.

SPEAKER_01 17:33

What why is this important? I mean, you know, if anybody's been listening to Polity Matters for any length of time, which is about as long as we've been on, is just a very short length of time. Uh, you know, we've covered the first part of the preface of the BCO, which is titled The King and Head of the Church. Uh so we've talked about some of these things, but why is it important to bring this into play here in a discussion about uh applying polity principles to the church in order to be more aligned with scripture? What's the significance of this particular principle in the broader discussion?

SPEAKER_02 18:07

Well, when you think in the time of writing of this, the king, in some regards, they they were in such a way chosen by God, they were representatives of God throughout Europe. Um, and to and so to strike the neck of a king and to kill a king was an act against God Himself. And so there is this very high conflated nature of the monarchy and what the monarchy meant to any society. And of course, we would argue that that the Lord instills and installs governments, um, but there is such a conflated understanding of what would that relationship was that to strike a king is to strike and throw off the authority of God Himself. And so I think it's helpful to remember, even in our own current day and age, um, a better process for understanding the role of monarchs as it relates to the sword that they bear, um, but also their role in society, that they are not the head of the church. Um, they're not over the church in any ecclesiastical way, um, but they serve the common realm uh most explicitly. And so I think that's helpful for us. I mean, we have movements within our own evangelical world that that would perhaps seek to uh go backwards in some regards on this issue, but I think it's helpful to remember where Christ is as it relates to the church and where earthly uh civil leaders are as it relates to the church.

SPEAKER_00 19:32

Yeah, I think the the self-governing of the church is an important principle here, that it's the the church and its officers aren't there just to say uh what does the king tell us to do? Um, they're not just taking orders from them about how what creed to endorse and what uh how to run the church. Um, but you have to kind of apply this in a way that understands the different spheres, the different ways in which Christ is king over all things, and which Christ is particularly king over the church. Um, I mean, the the state can come in and say, hey, look in your building, you can only have this number of people for this space because of the fire martial regulations, right? But they can't tell us, and you can't meet here for worship or you can't affirm this creed. Um, just as the church can call the state uh to abide by moral principles, but is not necessarily going to tell them how to do marginal tax rates. So understanding um there are different realms, the fact that Romans 13 gives certain responsibilities to the state and um the rest of scriptures, the the uh pastoral epistles, um, and even in Hebrews 13, um, there's certain obligations and roles and authority that's given to the church. Um, I think back to the last principle, right? Um in Acts 15, Caesar didn't call the council, right? The the church itself said we need to meet together and decide these matters, and that's who decided those matters in the church. It was the church and it wasn't the state uh coming in from outside.

SPEAKER_02 21:02

So would you say, no, we gotta ask this question of Jared. So would you say then in light of that, that the council of Nicaea was an error because of the role of Constantine in calling the bishops together? Just a curiosity.

SPEAKER_00 21:19

The um if the if the church agreed that it was good for there to be a council, then they can agree with them, but they didn't have to meet. They could have told Constantine, look, that's this is for us to do. Um, it complicates it though. I mean, the that was the the time in which you see the church and the state start uh intermingling, and then you get uh awkward times in which right after that Athanasius is running around uh because um he's he's being chased out by the state uh because the state starts saying maybe Arianism is correct. Who knows? Um so I think it's also a lesson there of um the the problems of the the church and the state intermingling uh too much and not knowing uh their different roles. And for

SPEAKER_02 22:00

Record Jared is an opponent of um the Apostles' Creed and Athanasian Creed. And so I was just thinking if you would also deny the Nicene Creed as well.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

I'm not an opponent of them. I'm just to properly classify it, that the Nicene Creed is an ecumenical creed. The Apostles' Creed and the Athanasian Creed are great creeds, they're true, but they're not ecumenical creeds. Properly speaking.

SPEAKER_02 22:23

I'm a Lutheran at heart, I guess. I that's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_00 22:26

Apparently.

SPEAKER_03 22:29

As we're talking about practical issues here, what one thing I always like to remind people of, and this goes true with any true theology that we're studying, foundationally, one of the practical imports of understanding theology right, understanding the church correctly here in this context, is that it brings glory to God. And that is a huge practical import for our lives, for us to have a right understanding of who God is, what he has done, and how he relates to us, and how he relates to the church. And by bringing him glory in that way, it magnifies him in our lives, in our congregations. As we seek to be lights to the world, we we need to have the glory of God shining that light through scripture through our congregations, through our pulpits, through the ministries of our churches, through our lives into the cities in which we are. So, I mean, just thinking about it and having a right answer to this question, who is head of the church? Just having the answer itself is practical in that it brings glory to God. Um, another huge practical import for it, um, for most of us here who are ministers, are it really puts checks and balances on us as we are seeking to lead and guide God's people. The buck doesn't stop with me. The buck doesn't stop with the elders at my church, the buck stops with Jesus. And I need to um keep that in mind, remember that as I am seeking to shepherd his sheep, to shepherd his flock, his people, his body, his bride. I hope you heard all those his, because that's the emphasis here. It's on him that we're to do that. And as a pastor, that's hugely practical for me. In every decision I make as a pastor, I need to be reminded and remember that the thing that I am caring for, the institution that I am shepherding and seeking to grow in the fear and admonition of the Lord, doesn't belong to me. It belongs to Jesus. And he cares far more deeply for his bride than I ever will as a pastor. And keeping that in mind is hugely practical for us as ministers. And then for people who are attending churches, it helps us to remember who we're submitting to when we are at church and how the authority relates to pastors, as where they only have ministerial authority. That is, they only have the authority that's been given to them by Christ because it's his body and his church. And that members of the church need to recognize where that is and actually submit to that, and then where it's not, and be able to tell ministers, hey, that you need to, you know, as we said earlier, kind of stay in your lane here. Um, you don't need to tell me um which tax policy to vote for. Um, that's that's outside of your lane. We need to stick in your lane, Pastor. Um, and pastors need to be reminded of that as well. And again, that comes back to the fact that principle six is true, Christ alone is head of the church. So I can't preach on a flat tax. I would I would urge you not to. One thing that as we were talking through practicalities here, that that came to my mind that I'd like to throw out to you guys as a kind of a conversation starter, and I've had this happen to me as a pastor. What do you say to the person who kind of comes to you and and says, um, how would you respond to this? That that since Christ is the head of the church, this individual does not have to obey any other spiritual authorities whatsoever, including elders. They would say, I'm I'm part of the um invisible church. Christ is my head, I don't need to be um under your authority here. How how would you respond to that?

SPEAKER_02 26:12

Thinking generally through like um passages like Acts 15, where there is mutual submission from the uh Jerusalem assembly um as it relates to a theological issue in the church. But you see throughout uh you see throughout the New Testament, there are local churches, those local churches have established leaders um in the apostolic tradition. So Jesus himself appoints apostles, then those apostles shepherd leaders locally within various contexts, and those leaders have very real authority as um uh vested from Christ Himself through the apostolic tradition. And when they err, excuse me, when they err, uh that's when Acts 15 happens, um, where there's a dispute and it goes to Jerusalem and they sort out the dispute. Those who are on the wrong end of that repent and they continue on. And so you see, throughout the New Testament, I mean, we have epistles not to regions but to churches. Um, and so because of and in light of that, I'd say that those general principles, those and throughout the rest of the various podcasts we recorded on these subjects, um, seek to establish those ideas. And so you're not permitted. No one in the New Testament worshiped God by themselves because Christ was the head of the church. They gathered together, and you see that throughout Acts, but also throughout the New Testament.

SPEAKER_00 27:35

If if I was feeling playful, I might ask him if he has kids, if his kids tried that argument on him, what would he say? And he would probably say, Well, you're supposed to honor your father and mother, you're supposed to obey them. That's what the scriptures say, and say, Well, the scriptures say the same thing. Um, Hebrews 13, 17, you're to obey uh your leaders, just as in Romans 13, you're to obey those government officials that are put over you. Uh of course, if they command you to do something that um the Lord tells you not to do, then you're not to do those things. But um Christ has subordinate authorities that he uh gives to people. I mean, if um uh we are leaving our kids with a sitter and we say you're supposed to obey them, they can't say you're not my parents, you know, when they tell them to go to bed. They say, No, your parents left me in charge. They gave me this authority, they told me the time limit when you're supposed to go to bed, and um, I have the authority to tell you you're supposed to go to bed now. Um, so uh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:32

I think I would probably go a little further back, even than you guys have gone. Uh, because the the person who's asking this question, um, I maybe maybe we could leverage a little bit and say, okay, if you're all about Jesus and that's that's your thing, well, what did Jesus say about this? And so you to your point earlier, Josh, you might really have to go back to solo scriptura, you know, and Witherow said it at the end of his of his section here, is we have no way of ascertaining the mind of Christ except through the scriptures. So, okay, if you're submitting to Christ, how has Christ decided that he's going to run the church? Um, so you can go to places like Matthew 16 after Peter confesses him, you know, and and and trace it on through the New Testament and see that Christ has decided to rule in a particular way. And so we ought to, like Jared's pointing out, submit to that um in the way that Christ has commanded us to. What'd you say to them, Josh, when they when they came at you with that? Yeah, very much what we've talked about here.

SPEAKER_03 29:26

Um, kind of the the idea, well, if if you're going to say that Christ is your head, what does Christ say for you to do in this regard and walk them through the biblical text? One that's been important, as Jared mentioned, is Hebrews 13, 17. Um, and that they are to obey their spiritual leaders, and I'll ask them, well, well, who is that for you? Who are your spiritual leaders? Um, who are you obeying? Um, do they know that they're your leaders? Have you gone to them, talked with them? Um, not getting into too much into church membership here, but have you have you joined yourself to their church? Um, have you joined yourself to the congregation that they are shepherding and and those sorts of things? So that that would be kind of some of the principles that you would tease out from that, but but go through much of what we've said. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:15

Well, and it's sometimes helpful in a Presbyterian setting too. It's not congregational. And so sometimes I could see how that can be an issue, perhaps in a congregational setting where you're like, uh, I'm called to submit to these men and they're not accountable, uh, you know, obviously accountable to Christ, but there's no accountability outside of just the eternal accountability they have in Christ. And so they might, you know, who do I go to when there's an issue? In Presbyterianism, we have a nice structure that, hey, if my group of guys errs, um, you can go to the Presbytery. If those group of guys err, you can go to another assembly, you can go to the assembly. So there's the buck doesn't stop with me. And so there is not only the vested authority that Christ gives to his shepherds, but there's also accountability to those shepherds for those shepherds as it relates to when they do screw up. And typically people have issues submitting to leaders because they've they felt wronged in some way. Um, you think of those who have struggled who in complementarian settings and become egalitarians, you know, they no longer trust complementarians because they're bad experience. And so I I wouldn't over um I wouldn't discount their own personal history and perhaps the pains they've experienced.

SPEAKER_01 31:29

What else? Is there anything else that comes to y'all's mind as we talk about this the sixth principle?

SPEAKER_00 31:33

I think you can tell Witherow is uh not an Erastian, the idea of the uh the state having authority over the church. But um you have to remember there are Presbyterians who would affirm uh the principle here, they'd affirm the spirituality of the church, but they still might be establishmentarian. Um it's just they would have very clear ideas of what the role of the church is and what the role of the state is. Um, so it can get a lot more complicated, but I think the general principle is is universal that uh the church uh is um submitting to Christ and not to some sort of uh singular earthly authority.

SPEAKER_03 32:10

Yeah, another thing too, going back to the practical question, um, the question that was asked, which church are we to choose? Right? That that's super practical for Christians. Um why do I go to First Baptist Church or First Church of the Holy Cross, Catholic Church, or whatever churches around us are Lutheran church, Presbyterian church? How am I picking these churches? And often the criteria that most modern evangelicals use aren't the greatest criteria to use. One I would suggest and I would encourage evangelicals to use is which one of these churches is structured and governed in the way that the New Testament, in the way that the scriptures, in the way that Christ has told us to structure the church and go seek out one of those churches. So often it's, oh, they have a good youth program, or I like the pastor's jokes, or the music there is so moving. Um, not to discount any of those things or or to say that our music ought not to be dynamic or that we ought not to have kids' ministries, but but uh I think a biblical primary way that the scriptures tell us when we're looking for the church um is to find the one that that that looks like the principles that's implementing the principles that the scriptures put forward on how the church ought to be governed. That's super practical.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

But but secondary to that is that it's still okay for folks to go to Scott's church because they like his jokes, right? I mean, it's it's as long as it's underneath No, that's not okay because his jokes aren't funny. I'm waiting for somebody to bring up Christian nationalism or waiting to see if somebody's gonna bring it up because you threaten to, and I'm just seeing if you will, so that we don't turn this out. I subtly talked about it earlier, um, but I I dared too a little bit. As

Conclusion

SPEAKER_01 33:59

Adam Parker would say, this podcast is over. Thanks for joining us. Be sure to come back next time when we will begin chapter three of the Apostolic Church and start making application of these principles to the three forms of church government that are prevalent throughout the world. If you're interested in learning more about anything that we've mentioned, check out the show notes in your podcast player or at Politymatters.org. If you've enjoyed the show, consider following us on Twitter and Facebook at Polity Matters. Be sure to subscribe in your podcast app of choice. If you have any questions or comments, you can contact us at Politymattersfeedback at gmail.com. A huge thanks to Reverend Walker for joining us today. Dr. Walker, I don't know, Joshua, what do we call you? Thanks for being we uh we're uh we'll make sure to provide links to where on the internet you can find him. Scott is the Minister of Providence, PCA, and Troy, Illinois. You can find him on Twitter at SEDBerg. If you're looking for Jared, he pastors New Life Presbyterian Church. He's on Twitter at Brother Nelson, and I serve as the associate pastor at Covenant Presbyterian Church here in Cleveland, Mississippi, and I'm on Twitter at underscore Ben Ratliff. Thanks again for spending your time with us. Until next time, say goodbye, gentlemen. Goodbye, gentlemen. Farewell. Goodbye, gentlemen. Y'all take care.