David Holwick
First Baptist Church
West Lafayette, Ohio
March 31, 1985
Palm Sunday
The Two Kingdoms
John 18:33-37
Jesus has always been hard to figure out. Some aspects are easy enough: Everyone believes he was a Jewish male who lived nineteen centuries ago. Even much of his teaching is not contested. When he says we should forgive one another, we figure that means we shouldn't hold a grudge against Aunt Gertrude. It's when you apply his principles to the broader areas of life that you run into problems.
Last week I preached on non-retaliation. Jesus said we should turn the other cheek, which means we don't try to "get even" when someone insults or strikes us. On an individual level, in some circumstances, most of us would agree that this is the Christian thing to do. But how does Jesus' teaching apply on a national level?
In Germany today there are several million people who believe that allowing nuclear weapons on their soil would be a contradiction of the Sermon on the Mount. Here in our own country Reverend Jerry Falwell believes Christians should support the production of nuclear weapons because they are the only way to protect democracy from Communism. Then again, you have the Amish who don't believe in any weapons at all (well, not exactly - they are avid hunters).
If Jesus were here today, what would he tell us to do?
Different opinions go back all the way to the New Testament. The original Palm Sunday event highlights it. Turn in your Bible to Luke 19. Verse 11 shows what the average person was expecting:
"And as they heard these things, Jesus added and spoke a parable, because he was near to Jerusalem and because they thought that the kingdom of God should immediately appear."
In other words, the Jews thought the millennium was just around the corner, perhaps only a few days away. Over in verse 35, Jesus enters Jerusalem like a king. They put him on a donkey, which was an animal for royalty, and laid clothes and palm branches in the road. In verse 38 they cry out:
"Blessed be the King, that cometh in the name of the Lord, peace in heaven and glory in the highest."
As the scripture from John shows, Jesus is a king but not in the normal sense. John 19:36 contains a stunning phrase:
"Jesus answered; my kingdom is not of this world, if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight:"
Every other government in history has relied on force to get its way. Even the United States does. If you break the law, Jay Fortune [the local policeman] will come after you. Escape from the county jail and the state police will follow. Break enough laws and the FBI enters the picture. If you are really bad there's always the Marines.
Each step of the way force will be brought to bear against you, even if it is only implied. Jesus seems to be saying that his kingdom will have nothing to do with force. Since Christians are citizens of the Kingdom of God, should we also reject all use of force?
Many Christians have come to this conclusion. A famous example is the nineteenth-century Russian novelist, Leo Tolstoy. In his biography he describes how he became deeply perplexed about the meaning of life. He took his Bible and secluded himself to find the answers. As he read and re-read the Sermon on the Mount, he came to see that the church had been wrong for 2000 years. He says,
"I understood that Christ says just what he says, in particular his command, "Resist not evil." These words, understood in their direct meaning, were for me a key opening everything else."
Tolstoy came to reject all forms of physical violence and anything associated with them. He wrote:
"It is impossible at one and the same time to confess that Christ is God, the basis of whose teaching is non-resistance to people who are evil, and then to calmly work for the establishment of property, law courts, government and military forces."
Tolstoy believed that when the commands of Jesus are at last obeyed, all men will be brothers, everyone will be at peace and the Kingdom of God will have come. Some people have suggested that Tolstoy is a little naïve. He countered this by saying that humans are essentially good. Even criminals have a sense of right and wrong.
One person who was deeply influenced by Tolstoy was Gandhi. Even though he was a Hindu, Gandhi read the Sermon on the Mount as a young man and was impressed by it. A short time later he read Tolstoy's interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount and decided to put it into practice. Gandhi gathered millions of followers and eventually brought independence to India through non-violent demonstrations.
The movie "Gandhi" dramatized his life. In one memorable scene, the Indians tried to take control of a salt factory which was guarded by British soldiers. Gandhi lined up hundreds of followers and sent them up 4 by 4 against the soldiers, who clobbered them with bamboo poles. As one group collapsed, another marched forward. They did not fight or resist - they just let the stuffing get beat out of them. Due to the resulting publicity the British gave in and turned over the salt factory.
To many modern people, Gandhi truly lived the Sermon on the Mount. He did exactly what Jesus would do and western Christians are hypocrites by comparison.
I admire Gandhi and his sincerity but I have doubts about how realistic his policies were. Gandhi told the Jews to voluntarily surrender to Hitler to show they were no threat to him. They didn't but Hitler slaughtered them anyway. He told the British to give in to the Nazis and assured them that his non-violent principles were scientific and had never failed. The British didn't take him up on it.
One scholar has argued that Gandhi was so successful in India because he was dealing with the British, who see themselves as a Christian nation. But the scholar adds that the situation would have been different in Russia or Nazi Germany. After a few days Gandhi would have been arrested and never heard from again.
However, the main disagreement with Tolstoy and Gandhi is not that their views are unrealistic but that they are unbiblical. If you take Jesus' command to "Resist not evil" as an absolute prohibition of force, you are saying the Bible contradicts itself. For the best example, turn to Romans 13. Paul is talking about human governments and in verses 3 and 4 he says:
"For rulers are not a terror to good works but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good and thou shalt have praise of the same. For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil; be afraid, for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, an avenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil."
The kingdom of Jesus does not use violence but this does not mean human governments are therefore out of the will of God. God has established human governments to keep order by rewarding good people and punishing evil ones. When government does this, Paul says it is acting as a minister of God. The Bible also teaches that government can abuse its use of force, especially when it comes to war. Nevertheless, God allows governments to use force to keep order in the world until Jesus returns.
The point I am trying to make is that the duties of the state are different from those of individuals. The duty of Christians is to forgive and not retaliate. The duty of the state is to establish justice which may require retaliation.
One of the greatest dangers facing Christians today is the temptation to oversimplify the Gospel. In our hearts we all want to do away with war and violence. But cutting national defense or weapons systems will not necessarily guarantee this.
Until Jesus returns Christians have to live under tension. As far as it's possible we have to obey the instructions of Jesus in our own lives. But we also have to realize that sin is entrenched in the world and God has made provisions for it.
One of the greatest promises of the Bible is that one day the tension will disappear. On that day Jesus will not only be King in heaven but also on earth. All war and violence will cease. Every potential movement has tried to produce this and failed. Jesus will be the one who finally succeeds.
Have you accepted Jesus as your Lord?...
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Typed on February 19, 2005, by Sharon Lesko of Ledgewood Baptist Church, New Jersey
Copyright © 2024 by Rev. David Holwick
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