Dispensationalists & Christian Nationalism

Philip All right, welcome to All Are Yours. My name is Philip.

Sean I’m Sean.

Philip And we’re back with another episode. And this one has been lingering in the background for a while. It’s been stewing. We’ve actually teased this topic here before.

Sean Because — do we know enough to talk about this?

Philip We do not. Absolutely not.

Sean Which — in our most recent discussion about whether we should then have a discussion about it, we’re like, well, nobody else seems to really understand it either. So —

Philip Yes.

Sean We’re right where we belong.

Philip Yeah, that’s what Sean used to effectively persuade me to talk about this here.

Because this topic gets tangled up and lost in not just the definitions, but the applications and the different positions. And who knows, maybe even Sean and I don’t fully agree with all the definitions.

Sean It’s very possible. Like, I’m trying to think: is there any person that I can think of that has written about this or talked about it that I could fully agree with? And no.

Philip Right.

Sean And I’m limited, so it’s not like I have exhaustive podcast listening experience, or have read all the books or blog posts about it. But I can’t think — there is a person that I’m probably closer to, maybe, than anybody else, and I fundamentally disagree with why he actually says most of what he says.

Philip Right.

Sean Even though I like it.

Philip Right, exactly right. And so, because we can’t find somebody we fully agree with, we thought we could at least listen to our own episode and then we could agree with at least the majority of what we say.

Sean Because it is a conversation. And when we finally say the label — you know, we’re continuing the tease, right? — but it is way out there. And we want our own people to also be able to think about it, have some categories in which to place the different things that they hear. Not that they would listen to any other podcast than All Are Yours.

Philip Yes. This one comes first.

Sean But since all are yours, I guess we have to allow for all those other ones, and YouTube videos, and books that are being written about it, et cetera. Because most of the people who listen to this podcast — greetings, and thank you.

Philip Hello.

Sean We’re not even telling you to like and subscribe, because you already have.

Philip That’s right.

Sean But most of the people who listen to us — the ones, or dozens, maybe tens of people who listen to us —

Philip There are high two-digit numbers.

Sean High two digits, good.

Yeah. We actually do care, and are interested in being able to have conversations among us. So here’s one attempt, or one draft, of talking through some of these things.

Philip Right. This is a journey.

Well, and also, the person who published the book, who authored the book with this title, does have a position. And he tweets this position a lot, where pastors and elders should more or less stay out of this conversation.

Sean Until they do the reading.

Philip Well, no, not even until they do the reading.

Sean Oh.

Philip Like, stay out of political teaching, or even teaching of economics, or that sort of thing, where they should stay with shepherding the souls of their people. And —

Sean Because he is more of a dualist than most dispensationalists.

Philip Right. He is consistent in his covenantalism.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Yes. And so —

Sean Amillennial governmentalism.

Philip Yes. Amil, yes.

Well, where we do think that as shepherds, as pastors — and I can now put myself in that category —

Sean There you go.

Philip — that the job is to equip the saints for the ministry. And so that equipping the saints is actually not just well-rounded, but it’s pointing in all the directions and going as deep as we can in all the directions. And so, in order to equip our people well, it is a responsibility, we think, of the shepherd, the pastor, the elder, to care about all the things.

Sean Sure. Like, having a good defense for the hope that is in them, even when it comes to political, United States-type discussions. Like, why do they still have hope in the midst of all those things?

It’s not ostrich Christianity, where we’re not actually trying to bury our heads in the sand and ignore all those other things. Or trying to get up in the clouds and be above all those things. We are trying to have our eyes open, pay attention, engage in the conversation, and have hope in the middle of it — which does require then knowing what’s happening.

Philip Right. And I think I at least heard this from you the first time — I don’t know if you maybe read it somewhere, or it was original. But you did identify the sphere of the church, or maybe the burden of the pastor, to be people’s joy. Like, that is what the pastor is after. He’s after cultivating, stimulating, leading joy.

Sean At least in the Philippians 1 way, like where Paul said, I’d like to depart and be with Christ, for that would be better, but I am convinced I will remain for your progress and joy in the faith. So at least in terms of following that apostolic injunction.

Philip You heard the T.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Apostolic.

Sean Yeah.

Philip It’s not “apostolic.”

And so, yeah, again, in our time when our former president — who, I don’t know, seems to me at least, I mean I’m young, but seems to me like has one of the highest levels of energetic followers, and wounded, and gets up with courage repeating the word “fight.” Right, so that happens.

We have our current president, who — who knows if he’s alive, or his recording is AI, or he’s a machine. He’s the Head from —

Sean That Hideous Strength.

Philip Right. Or — what’s the guy’s name, who was like a ghost basically?

Sean Yeah.

Philip Wither. Wither, that’s right.

Sean Ironic.

Philip Yes.

Sean Wither.

Philip That’s right. Withers away.

And so, in that context, it is difficult to have joy. It is reasonable to have discouragement. It is reasonable to have anger. But to make progress in joy takes work. And so we do believe that it is our responsibility to continue cultivating and leading our people to make progress in that joy.

Sean Amen.

Philip So, the topic — which you already know, because you’ve read the title — it is a dispy approach to Christian nationalism. So there you go.

Sean Not a dispy approach to Christian assassination.

Philip Correct.

Sean Or a dispy approach to Christian puppeteering.

Philip Correct. Yes. Withering away.

Sean Yes.

Philip But this is a big topic from a lot of different angles and perspectives. And I have — oh, go ahead, you’re —

Sean I was just going to say: and you hate it.

Philip I hate it, yes.

Sean You hate the name.

Philip I hate both names.

Sean So, this is a good question. Do you hate dispensationalism as a label? Or — I know that you hate it, but I’m setting up the contrast. Do you hate that more, or do you hate Christian nationalist as a label more? If you had to keep one, which one would you keep and which one would you get rid of?

Philip Man. Yeah, if I had to keep — that’s difficult. I don’t like getting cornered or boxed in. So I would maybe temporarily agree to holding on to dispensationalism, and then work toward changing the label. But nationalism is difficult for me.

Sean I know that you have another made-up, in-your-own-words version of dispensationalism: biblical covenantal.

Philip Correct, yes.

Sean Which, if you search for that in AI, it would give you nothing specific. It would give you — currently, at least. We’ll say currently.

Philip Yes.

Sean No specific — like, sure, we all agree that we’re biblical, and there are covenants.

But I don’t remember if you said that you have an alternative to Christian nationalism.

Philip I do not.

Sean Okay.

Philip No, I do not. I’ve thought about it.

Sean So you hate the name.

Philip I like the Christian part of the name.

Sean And I’m not actually picking on you. I understand the reasons that you don’t like nationalism, which we can chat about, obviously.

Philip Right.

Sean That’s why we’re here.

Philip That’s right.

Sean Nobody’s shooting at us in any way.

Philip Yes.

Sean So we have a platform to get to chat about it. But you don’t like the name — you like Christian, but then that seems like maybe you’re going to need to work on that.

Philip That’s correct, yes. And that’s why I wasn’t ready to talk about it all the way yet. Not all my thoughts are figured out. But maybe this will help me figure some stuff out. And because also I do know that our people are listening to all the conversations and all the things — at least some of them are listening to some of them.

Sean It’s interesting, because even while you say you don’t have a new name or a new label yet — which is fine, you can work on that — that does actually remind me that I am much more satisfied with trying to recover, or at least stipulate, the definitions of terms that I want to use. So I have been for a while much more comfortable with: oh, that’s not what that word actually means.

Philip Right.

Sean Even a couple Sundays ago, when you were preaching and you did the liturgy, and you brought up the Eucharist. Okay, that’s actually a really fantastic name for what we’re doing at communion, because Jesus gave thanks twice. Eucharistō means “I give thanks.” So Eucharist is a Thanksgiving meal, and Jesus gave thanks twice explicitly on the night when he was betrayed — for the bread and for the wine.

So Eucharist is a name we should take back. We should make sure people know what it means. And if we need to have it be lowercase-e eucharist compared to Eastern Orthodox or Roman Catholicism — awesome, but great, that’s our word. Don’t get to take it.

And I do feel that way about a variety of words, including — I don’t hate the term dispensationalism in the same way.

Philip Right.

Sean And potentially even related to Christian nationalism. I hate the way some people hold it. And maybe I’m less concerned about the name.

Same way with another word that is related to the conversation, which is theonomy. There are definitely ways that capital T Theonomy is used that I would reject. But also I kind of like lowercase-t theonomy. In fact, I think lowercase-t theonomy, where there is a God who has a law, is inescapable. So it doesn’t do us any good to not even use that word.

Philip Right. And I like the word theonomy.

Sean You do like that one.

Philip Well, and so — yes, totally agree with you about taking back the words or the terms. Like, don’t give them the authority over the dictionary, right?

And at least from my brief reading, dispensationalism as a word was not a term that the group itself came up with.

Sean Yeah.

Philip It was thrown at them, and it ended up sticking.

Sean It seems like — yeah, right. It was a derogatory term.

Philip Right.

Sean Just like, I think, chiliasts — meaning millennial, people who believed in a premillennial eschatology — I think it’s possible that chiliast was also derogatory at the beginning.

Philip Right. And derogatory may be okay, maybe not. But I just think that the word dispensationalism, dispensations, does a poor job explaining the worldview, the hermeneutic, the overall life. What is it — Weltanschauung? What is the —

Sean Weltanschauung.

Philip Yeah. It talks about one little piece of everything that that position, that Weltanschauung, has to offer. And so I think it’s too weak. You end up having to explain too much.

Sean Yeah.

Philip And then same thing with nationalism.

Sean And you have good reason to have baggage with the idea of nationalism, from your own heritage, and then from reading some of who take the name Christian nationalist and what appears to be some of the things that they’re trying to smuggle in.

Philip Right, exactly. And then nationalism, just as the word — when I looked it up, it’s a nineteenth century word. During the rise of Nietzsche and all of that thought that eventually led to World War I. Like, World War I was nationalism put into practice, apart from family feuds with all the kings. But a lot of that sense of our nation’s superiority over other nations is difficult.

Sean You — I’m just making this up — you wouldn’t, I’m guessing, have any problem saying we want a Christian nation.

Philip Yeah, absolutely not. That I like. And so that is a whole other part of the conversation, where a lot of people don’t like that.

Sean Right. So, as usual, it’s the ism.

Philip Right.

Sean It’s what gets stuck under the ism that makes a big problem.

Philip That’s right. Yeah, and so, the Christian nation — we want that. We want people explicitly acknowledging the lordship of Christ in the public sphere, in our constitution. Like, I would be very much so pro the name of Jesus explicitly mentioned in the Constitution as our authority. So, that as a parenthesis-dispensationalist, for now at least.

Sean Which — it does seem like most of our dispensational brothers online, and probably historically even, who have identified that way —

Philip Right.

Sean — would argue that the gospel is above nations and politics. Which, in a sense, it is. But they would state it in a way that then says, so we should get out of those discussions, and certainly not spend our energy and effort not just talking about them, but then trying to do anything to make it a Christian nation.

Philip Exactly.

Sean Because we just need to be evangelizing people.

Philip Right.

So that’s kind of one dichotomy, or opposition: of the group that wants to publicly acknowledge and submit to the authority of Christ over the state, and then the group that is maybe commingled with respectable Christianity, and then also with the sort of bunker mentality, escapist Christianity of, this world is not — or, Christ’s kingdom is not of this world, and so we should not be interested, or actively, like you said, working to bring things about in this world that are honoring to Christ.

And so that distinction, I think, is important. And most dispensationalists do land on that other side, like you’re saying, of escapist, or bunker mentality: we have nothing to do with what’s going on here.

Sean Right. Which is ironic — and I feel like we have talked about this particular part in general at least before — but if we are reading the Bible and seeing what God cares about, it’s really hard to say that God doesn’t care about nations. And it’s really hard to say God doesn’t care about nations even in their governments, their kings, explicitly worshiping him.

Philip Right.

Sean And following either law — whether Mosaic law, or just his word — of acknowledging him and praising him.

I remember reading Empires of Dirt, which is a book by Doug Wilson, and he gives a three-bullet-point option kind of discussion. Something to the effect of: option number one is God cares about kings and presidents honoring him, and therefore we should care about it. Number two, God cares about kings and presidents not honoring him, and so we better stop them from doing it. Or, God is okay with them honoring him, and we can choose whether we want to or not.

Philip So, leave me alone with my decision.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Yeah.

Sean And Wilson’s number one point was, first of all, two of the three of those are getting God acknowledged in the public square.

Philip Right.

Sean We’re either allowed to or we’re required to. The only other option is God says don’t do it. And then his point is, well, that is not found anywhere in Scripture.

Philip Right.

Sean That God is telling kings, do not talk about me.

Philip Right. Do not acknowledge me.

Sean Right. This is not your business.

Philip Right.

And, again, let’s be provocative: I do think that it is ironic that Christian nationalists are predominantly covenantalists. And that many dispensationalists are opposed to Christian nationalism — most of them are opposed to it.

Sean Would you say that, from your observation, most dispensationalists are opposed to a Christian nation? So if we took the ism off, they’re definitely still fighting bitterly.

Philip Yeah. I don’t think that the dispensationalists who are fighting Christian nationalism are fighting the ism part of it. I think they’re fighting the Christian nation part of it.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Like, they’re not even thinking about all the blood guilt of nationalism when they’re opposing it. Their argument is theological, maybe, to the point of the Christian nation.

Sean Yeah, they are actually saying, if it’s not evangelism, it is not okay.

Philip Right, exactly. And that’s what I’m saying is ironic. Because the big disagreement of dispies and covies is the nation of Israel. And so dispensationalists are the ones who are holding on to the point that it’s an actual identified people group. It is a nation — like, with borders and bloodlines and DNA, right? It’s the covenantalists who are smearing it all into allegory, or that the nation of Israel wasn’t really referring to the nation, it was referring to the church, or the promises apply now into the spiritual realm.

And so, it seems like, if covenantalists were more consistent with their foundation, than caring about Christian nations, the nation part of it — doesn’t seem like there’s much of a foundation for that. Where the dispensationalist does care about nations. These are actual identified people groups that we should care about.

Sean Yeah. If the hermeneutic is spiritualizing things, then it should be the case for Christian churchism.

Philip Right.

Sean I mean, that’s not the right word, but — we care about the church, period. And I guess then they have to get the church to be the boss of all the things.

Philip Right.

Sean But that seems like that would be more consistent.

Philip Right.

Sean Even historic premillennialists are less interested in Israel as a nation being the boss nation in the millennial kingdom. The church is the boss — even in that actual thousand years on earth.

Philip Right.

Sean So the premil dispies —

Philip Yeah.

Sean — are like the only ones —

Philip — who get to care about Christian nations. And we’ll let all those other guys play with us. We could use them too.

Sean Like and subscribe.

Philip That’s right.

So, yes, we’re in that situation of public acknowledgment, lordship of Christ. We want his name in the Constitution, and we think that the world is better off for it.

Sean Yeah.

Philip But then — I guess, what about, our work here as Christians is not to do that; it is to evangelize, or it is to build up the spiritual kingdom? We’re dispensationalists; a lot of them are arguing for that. What do you say to that?

Sean Yeah. I say, what does Jesus Christ the Lord care about?

And I definitely spent a good portion of my life, not just as a Christian, but even once I decided that I thought God wanted me to be a pastor and pursued that — I believed, did I believe it? I at least heard a lot, it was shoved down my throat, that the only reason that God leaves us here on earth, once you profess faith, the only reason that God leaves us here on earth is for the sake of evangelism.

Philip Right.

Sean And again, I’ve heard that a lot, and I am not really sure if I always bought that. But I guess in my behavior, I definitely thought that God cared about spiritual things more than he cared about earthly and physical things.

And just over and over again — what God cares about, and then answering the question, why does he leave us here — includes a lot of temporal, physical things. We are to live, obviously, in the Spirit, and we’re to live by faith, so we’re not to live by sight; but in the flesh, living by faith, we are actually supposed to acknowledge him in many of the good gifts that he gives us.

And even thinking about the parable of the talents, and the resources that God gives, that he expects to be not just invested but to be then made a profit from. Well, those are not just dollars. Those are intangible privileges and blessings as well.

Which, like, for us in our country, we have political privileges. So, in fact, as a country we’re probably the country that’s got five talents.

Philip Right.

Sean We got the most.

Philip Yeah.

Sean And we’re going to be responsible for what we did with those. So those aren’t the only privileges that he’s given us — we have lots of blessings.

But yeah, part of my answer back to people who say, well, all we’re supposed to do is just be preaching the gospel, is that, well, part of the work of the gospel is that then we would obey everything that Christ commanded, and that we would then live as his disciples with the blessings that he’s given us, that we’re going to be accountable for. Which is the gospel proper, but then also lives that embody that, wherever we’re at, with whatever opportunities we have.

So that is part of the reason why dispies are bad at teaching about families.

Philip Right.

Sean They are not seeing grandkids as strategic blessings. It’s part of the reason that dispies are bad on education. I mean, if it’s not just direct Bible college, Bible study, then — dispies are not producing world-class economists. They’re not producing world-class teachers, really. They’re not producing world-class businessmen, because —

Philip They do have world-class expositors. So that’s —

Sean Potentially, except for the fact that those expositors are dualists. And therefore, is that truly understanding the word? Great irony —

Philip Correct.

Sean — in that the Bible people are missing those parts of the Bible.

Philip Right.

Sean And I was one of them. I have done that. So that required repentance from, again, not paying attention to what God cares about, what God says is good, and what God says is a blessing that should be then invested — and our political interests, where then we are honoring the Lord Jesus Christ. And doing that in public, and having our governors do that.

Like, does God want that to happen? Does God want a nation’s and a city’s laws to explicitly recognize him and be consistent with what he has revealed in his word, for the sake of honoring him and the flourishing of those people in those kinds of communities? If God does care about that, or thinks that it’s good — again, even if it’s just allowable —

Philip Right.

Sean — and it’s a way that it could be good, then it seems to me that we have enough motivation.

Philip Right.

Sean And I would actually say it’s not just permission, it is actually a responsibility that we have.

Is everybody going to spend the same amount of minutes doing the same things? No. But nobody in the body of Christ, in the church, has giftedness to do the exact same thing with the exact amount of time either. So there’s lots of flexibility. What there isn’t freedom to do is be okay in not caring.

Philip Right.

Sean And dispies have actually made people feel guilty for caring, and that’s wrong. Whereas some of the Christian nationalism promoters should feel more guilty for some of the things that they’re trying to include.

Philip Right. Throw in there, right?

Sean And what that means, yeah.

Philip Well, I think that a lot of the conversation leads to disagreement in reference to what the kingdom of God is. And, you know, specifically with premillennialism, postmillennialism — and amillennialism too. But, what is the kingdom of God that is referenced in the Bible?

We hear about the kingdom of God’s servant, the Messiah, in the Old Testament, looking forward. Jesus is referring to the kingdom of God. We hear about it in the epistles too. And then we see it in the book of Revelation as well. So, at least kingdom language, right?

And so I do think that a lot of the confusion is in the definition of what is the kingdom. And knowing that leads to a lot of the disagreement.

So the postmillennial position has: the kingdom of God is here, right? And so it is flourishing and growing. And so anytime we see “kingdom of God” in the Bible, it’s talking about one thing, and that started post-ascension. “All authority has been given to me,” Matthew 28. And so everything in the Bible refers to this time period of the kingdom of God.

Amillennialism talks about it as something that is happening in heaven, in the spiritual realm. This is the kingdom of God. And so that kingdom is the kingdom of the saints, both here and then specifically even in heaven.

And most dispensationalists, premillennialists, refer to the kingdom as the millennial kingdom. And so they’re talking about it: well, it’s not here, so we can’t try to crown Jesus prematurely. That’s not what’s happening.

And I do think that understanding even the kingdom of God as referring to different things depending on the context in the Bible, right? So when the book of Psalms is talking about God as king, when the prophets referred to him as king — in that time, over the nations, during that actual context, not just the future context — that’s different than talking about the millennial kingdom, when Jesus will rule from the throne of David.

And so throwing it all into one group, “kingdom of God,” I think makes it confusing, when people start arguing, is the kingdom now or is it not now?

But understanding an approach where — and this is where Kuyper helped me, helped us, see — that all spheres submit to Christ as Lord, unmediated; directly, Jesus is Lord over every thumb’s width, right? Whether that be church, whether that be politics, or art, or science, all of it, Jesus is Lord over.

And, I mean, again, he would throw the chiliasts under the bus. But I can hold that and say amen, and still be thinking about a different sort of kingdom in the millennial kingdom, when he sits on the throne of David.

So the King of Britain — at least was the King of Britain, the Emperor of India, right? He has these multiple titles overlapping. Christ has some of those titles, and he also will have other titles later.

Sean Sure. Yeah, and I don’t remember if you said the explicit phrase that lots of our kind of people argue, that when Jesus says, my kingdom is not of this world —

Philip Right.

Sean — and that ends up being then what they think is a mic drop.

Philip Right.

Sean That’s how they act.

Philip Right.

Sean My kingdom is not of this world, and therefore we don’t care about this world. When the nature of the kind of kingdom Jesus has — its motivations, its values, its priorities, its law — that actually can be different, and it still be right here.

Philip Right.

Sean So —

Philip Yeah, it’s like, it’s not of this world. But he is in some sense bringing it. Or even when we’re living, we’re living out everything that you just listed out: the motivations, the laws, the principles of it all.

So with that, then, maybe that next dichotomy, the next grouping — since we all agree on the first one — is that word of God’s law, right? So, theonomy. And so that is, even within the Christian nationalist conversation, there’s disagreement there.

So there are theonomists, where they want to explicitly apply God’s law to nations. And then there are maybe Thomists, right, or those who hold to a natural law type of vision, where it’s not God’s prescriptive word that the state is submitting to, but it’s natural revelation, so to speak. And so, I mean, even some of the big names —

Sean It’s nature.

Philip Right.

Sean But yeah, you have to have the Spirit to be able to recognize — “grace perfects nature” is like a phrase that then gets used. So you have to have grace to see the nature, but you don’t bring your Bible with you to do the politics. Which, that’s weird.

And then you have an additional confusing part, which is then people who fail to make a distinction between theonomy and theocracy.

Philip Right, yep.

Sean And that one actually frustrates me as much as any of them.

Philip Right. Yeah, so, just some of the bigger names in this conversation, right? So Doug Wilson would call himself a theonomist, or a general equity theonomist. Stephen Wolfe, the guy who wrote The Case for Christian Nationalism, who also thinks we should not be talking about this right now, because we’re pastors —

Sean Whoops.

Philip — but so he would be opposed to a theonomy approach. He is more of that Thomist natural law — that seems like that’s his position.

Sean Yeah.

Philip And so that’s where they disagree.

So even like Wilson, for example — he says this a lot, where politics is not our savior, but politics needs a savior, right? He says things like that, where our politics needs to bow the knee under Christ, our governor, our president, whatever. So that’s what he’s calling to.

And he’s saying, until we have a good majority of Christians within the nation that are driving toward godliness, toward righteousness, we can’t expect our politics to be reformed. So this is Wilson’s verbalized position: that his solution is not to start with politics.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Where Wolfe’s position is very much so: no, the start could be, if not should be, politics.

Sean Top down, as opposed to bottom up, which is Wilson’s way to describe what he’s referring to.

Philip Exactly right. So, when Wilson talks about that — this is a quote from Stephen Wolfe. He says, “This is where Doug Wilson and I seem to disagree. The solution to America is in part political. We should not use revivalism or political theology to escape politics. Christian nationalism is a political project, not simply a call for ministers to preach the gospel.”

And so that is a difference between maybe Wilsonian and Wolfian Christian nationalism.

Sean Which — I mean, that is actually an understated criticism that Wolfe is making of Wilson. Because Wilson actually would allow — “allow” is the wrong word, but — he would be in favor, I’m pretty sure, of there being a Christian president who’s trying to make Christian laws, even if not everybody, or the majority. Like, if we got a Christian president: make Christian laws.

Philip Right, yeah.

Sean And let that have its influence on other people, even who are not Christians. But we’re not going to get that.

Philip Right.

Sean He’s saying, strategically, or more than likely, apart from there being enough Christians to vote for that — and how do you get Christians? Well, you get Christians through the preaching of the gospel.

So Wolfe is not actually balanced. Whereas Wilson is not only saying we can’t have a Christian nation until we have revival — but it definitely does seem like we probably need revival before we’re going to have enough mojo to make progress there.

Philip Yeah, I think Wilson said something like this before Wolfe did, where, yeah, if I could press a button and tomorrow all abortion in America is illegal, I would do it.

Sean Yeah.

Philip So it’s like, yes, we’re not waiting for a consensus in order to enact God-honoring laws. Whatever laws we can enact that honor God, that’s what we want to do.

But yeah, so Wolfe has this kind of maybe Reformed two kingdom — that’s a word, a category, that people use. Where, again, Wolfe is amillennial, and amillennialists have this kind of two kingdom. And again the conversation comes to the kingdom of Christ, kingdom of God. Where there’s the spiritual realm and the physical realm, and Jesus is Lord over the spiritual realm, or king, and here the delegated authority is to the Christian prince, or to the state. And so we don’t need to — we maybe shouldn’t push for God’s explicit law to be over the prince.

Sean Right. So, one of the — and I agree — rules of debate is you should be able to state your opponent’s position in the debate, not like enemy, but your opponent’s position, so that he would recognize his own position, be able to agree that you are understanding what he is saying, before then you try to disagree or debate that point.

So Mr. Wolfe is not here to defend himself, or to agree that we are describing his position accurately or not. But I am interested — I was reading his book and genuinely trying to understand what he was describing, to get help. Not reading it just to immediately pull it down, like many dispies seem to approach that.

But the reason, from what I understand in reading Wolfe himself, the reason for his two kingdom is not just because of what seventeenth century reformers wrote — though that is definitely a thing that he seems to have found as a really glad authority in his life, that he likes mocking everybody else who disagrees with him, who claims to be Reformed. Because he’s like, well, if you read the seventeenth century reformers, you would see that I’m Reformed and you’re not.

Philip A lot of amillennialists are like that.

Sean Yeah. And I have genuine questions about why that got to be the golden age of reformers.

Philip You’re not allowed to ask those questions.

Sean Yeah.

But it does actually seem like — before that, and he would use some of those seventeenth century reformers to argue for this case — is that before the fall, so before the need for redeeming, saving, special grace, or even special revelation in God’s law, whether we say that generally or we say the Mosaic law. So, before we had any of those things, Wolfe is trying to imagine forward what the earth would have looked like had Eve not been deceived and Adam not disobeyed; if there had not been sin, and they would have been fulfilling the cultural mandate to be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, take dominion and subdue it.

Wolfe argues that if there had not been sin, at some point people would have started moving, because in order to be obedient they would have had to fill the earth. So they would have had — centuries, if not millennia later, there would have been people living in different parts of the world. And some of them would have been coastal people, and some of them would have been more desert people, and some of them would have been more mountain-y people.

And after, again, generations — still all without sin, in this envisioned future without sin — those people would have, Wolfe is arguing, naturally come up with different laws. And maybe “laws” isn’t even the right word, but they would have come up with, naturally, no need for redeeming, saving grace, they would have come up with their own ways of doing things, that could have then been different. Not just based on their geography, but based off of culture, cultural traditions, that might have come up that wouldn’t be sinful but that would have been different.

And, ruling — there would have naturally, again, according to Wolfe, there would have naturally been then some who were leaders and others who were followers. And those leaders would have come up with things that then they could pass down. And whether they would be called nations or not — after a while, there would have been a bunch of people then on earth living differently, living without sin, but following different rules. At least lowercase-r rules, because if nobody was sinning, nobody was disobeying those, so there wouldn’t have been punishments per se.

But all of that — and this gets back to the kingdom — all of that would have come about naturally. Through natural law, rather than requiring a divine word.

Philip Revelation, right.

Sean And therefore, because that could have happened — or maybe he would go so far as to say that would have happened, it was inescapable —

Philip Right.

Sean — that that is what we’re trying to get back to today. We just need the people to be saved, so that then they can do what is actually natural to humans apart from sin.

Philip Right.

Sean But therefore you should keep separate the cultic from the cultural. You should keep separate the sacrifices and the supernatural parts of salvation — keep that separate from then the natural, which Thomas Aquinas — natural law, natural theology. And so that’s the Thomist part. And therefore we should really be keeping them separate.

And, again, I have really tried. I’m not saying other people haven’t tried, but I have personally tried to figure out how this isn’t just based off of a Genesis 2 assumption before Genesis 3. And I really struggle finding how that is the basis for what our political practice should be today, and why we should work so hard to keep it separate from the church informing it, or from explicitly God’s special revelation informing it.

Philip Right.

Sean I cannot see how that is the right solution. I can see how people disagree on how special revelation applies to politics or government or whatever. I cannot see a Christian case for keeping them separate.

Philip Yeah. And so there’s at least three general positions in that conversation, right? So it’s not just theonomists versus Thomists. It’s theonomist, Thomist, and then the dispies on the sidelines. And so —

Sean We’re always on the sidelines, people. Come on.

Philip Go get the ball. Yeah. That pattern needs to break.

Right. So, when Christian nationalists are all lumped together — okay, that’s fine. And we could get back to this later, but when “Christian nationalist” is thrown around as a derogatory term by the left —

Sean MSNBC.

Philip Yeah, we’re all Christian nationalists. Like, in that case, anybody — I think it was Wilson who said anybody to the right of Mitt Romney is a Christian nationalist.

Sean Yeah.

Philip For sure. But even in the people who actually write books about this, or write blogs about it, there’s a difference. There’s a difference between guys like Doug Wilson and Stephen Wolfe — this kind of Wilsonian, Wolfian, theonomist approach, and Thomist approach, to Christian nationalism. And their starting points are a bit different as well.

Sean Yeah.

Philip And so, it seems like, keeping the two kingdoms separate, special revelation and natural revelation separate, not imposing God’s law onto the state, which Wolfe is arguing for — doesn’t it seem like Wilson argues against that? Like, his whole point is we want everything to bow the knee.

Sean Which seems like the spheres category. Which, from what I have paid attention to, seems like Kuyper actually is the one who really at least clarified or solidified that as a good category to talk about things. Not that nobody was referring to different spheres before that. But Kuyper was not a Thomist. He was not a radical two kingdom.

While acknowledging that the church is one sphere that has authority, and the government is another sphere that has authority, and the family is another sphere that has authority, and then, as they move out from there, like you mentioned earlier, a variety of other spheres — but that is different than the two kingdom approach.

Philip Right.

Sean Which could be summarized as two different spheres. But that is separating what Kuyper — at least, what seems like God — is putting all together.

Philip Kuyper slash God.

Sean Yeah. Kuyper helpfully describing what is in God’s word.

Philip Right.

Sean I think that the Wolfe sort of Thomistic approach is separating what God has put together.

Philip Right, yes. Breaking it up, right.

Yeah, so the theonomist could be a Kuyperian approach, like you said as well. So I think we’ve maybe at least hinted at, surface-level touched at, where we would disagree with Wolfe regarding the two kingdom, regarding the starting point for Christian nationalism.

Why would you agree with a theonomist, being a dispensationalist? Why would you not just allow a theonomist approach, but you even had a talk called “Theonomy/Theonoyou,” or something, right? And where you were advocating for a theonomistic approach to our involvement in the public life. And you’re a radical dispy.

Sean I’m so —

Philip Radical.

Sean Yep.

Yeah. I realize that theonomy as a word has a lot of baggage with it. And I am totally fine — “fine” maybe is the wrong word, but I’m happy to admit in the discussion that it needs definition.

In its most basic level, you have theos at the front, which is God, and then nomos, which is law. So, God-law, God’s law.

And now I can’t remember who said that if there is no God above the state, then the state is God. I mean, that to me is an accurate statement. It’s not a verse — Dispensationalism 3:5, you know, whatever. No, it’s not a verse. But it seems real.

And even in Scripture, kings — I actually can’t think of a lot of examples of purely humanistic kings. They all at least were recognizing some god, even if then they started to play a god or tried to make themselves a god. They saw that there was a God. There’s always a God.

Philip Right.

Sean Even if it’s you.

So in terms of nomos, and the law part — well, again, what law? How codified does that law need to be? Are we talking about the fact that God has commandments? Are we talking about the Ten Commandments? Are we talking about specifically the Mosaic law?

And so it does seem like there are some capital T Theonomists who think that the church has basically — I get that they fuss about saying it’s replacing. Fulfilling.

Philip Superseded it.

Sean Right. So the church today is spiritual Israel, and therefore we should use all of the Mosaic law as our guide — not just as our guidelines, but as law.

Philip Mm-hmm.

Sean And inevitably they end up trying to make then distinctions in the law between different categories, like ceremonial, civic, moral. And those are also debatable.

But so, again, I get that some theonomists are actually really trying to say we should do everything Israel did, or at least a bunch of it, because that’s God’s law. I don’t actually think that, for a bunch of reasons — including being a dispensationalist, thinking that the church and Israel are not the same.

Philip Radical.

Sean Yeah. So, how biblical covenantal radical dispensationalists —

Philip I do have a better name for dispensationalists, and so —

Sean Yeah.

But I like — there are some basic axioms of logic that, you know, there’s not a vacuum here. So there is somebody’s law that’s going to get imposed.

Philip Right.

Sean And it’s going to be somebody who thinks that they’re at the top, whether they are God, or they explicitly think they’re God, or they’re doing it on behalf of their god. Their god is humanism, other humans, secularism; their god is the nation, whatever it is; their god is some idol, their god is the moon, whatever.

Like, everybody has some kind of god in their system. And that system has some kind of rules that go with it, that presumably then are for everybody’s benefit — that are for the betterment of civilization, a city, a nation.

So I have actually then submitted to the lowercase-t theonomy of, well, laws are good, and we want them to be honoring and acknowledging the true God.

Philip Mm-hmm.

Sean And I haven’t been compelled to not call that theonomy.

Philip Right.

Sean So that’s my answer to the question. It seems like — maybe it needs that five-minute background of why we should use the word. But I can’t think of a better starting point than, yeah, we do want to honor Jesus Christ as Lord and do that in our laws. That seems like God-law explicit connection.

Philip Right.

Sean Yeah. And you said you’re good with the theonomy? How would you answer? What would you supplement to that?

Philip Yeah, exactly that. And I would distinguish theonomy from a theocracy.

Sean Yeah.

Philip And, yeah, again, those words also get used interchangeably by some groups. And so, semantics, right? And so I could be charitable and give people the benefit of the doubt. Where a theocracy is that, explicitly, God unmediatedly, maybe, is ruling a nation.

Sean And see, I think — my understanding of the distinction between theonomy and theocracy includes ruling through a priest sort of class. The religious leaders are the governmental leaders, are the boss.

Philip Right.

Sean So, even like before Israel had a king, the theocracy — it was direct, but ruled, and the laws given, through the priests. And so a theocracy these days would then be where the church is the boss of all the things.

Philip Right.

Sean So the church has the police department, the church has the military, the church has a national budget. And so I guess you would maybe have pastors — they’d all be elders or pastors.

Philip Right.

Sean Maybe, I guess, they’d be doing different jobs. But, like, I —

Philip You have a state church where the king is also the head of the church.

Sean Yeah.

Philip In that sense. And so I was, I guess, trying to distinguish that theocracy from a Kuyperian sphere sovereignty approach, where every sphere reports to God directly. As opposed to —

Sean I’m nodding my head vigorously. You can’t see that on our non-video podcast, but yes.

Philip That’s right. And so, where a theocracy is: the spheres all have to go through, I guess what you’re saying in that sense, the religious leaders, in order to get to God in that way.

Sean So, the question about the relationship of those spheres seems like an endless one. But, is the state above the church? Is the church above the state? Is the family above any of them? I mean, it depends on what sort of spheres a person is working with. But theocracy answers that with: the church, or the priest class —

Philip Right.

Sean — is the boss.

Philip Right.

Sean And, again, even the priest class is the state.

Philip Right.

Sean And this is actually an argument that even among our own people has come up a few different times, where to say that we should care about politics has been heard as some people saying, so the church should be the boss.

Philip Right. Especially if the elders are saying it.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Right.

Sean And I agree — there’s no way that’s not what we want either.

Philip Exactly.

Sean So, do I want a Christian president? I would absolutely love, work for, vote for, promote the idea of a Christian president. But that is a separate assignment.

So, should that Christian president be going to church and worshiping God?

Philip And submitting to his elders.

Sean Submitting to his elders, yeah. Could that Christian president get counsel from his pastor on a tricky issue?

Philip He should.

Sean Sure.

Philip Yeah.

Sean That is not the same as then the nation’s laws are under the authority of the pastor. Or —

Philip Exactly right.

Sean Or every pastor combined.

Philip Yep, right. And where that is different from theonomy, right, in that sense of: God actually does have something to say to the prince, to the president. He does have something to say to these different spheres. He cares about what they’re doing, and how their actions and their laws, their legislative actions, are honoring or dishonoring him.

Sean And someday Jesus is going to judge all of those — not Christian; he’s going to judge the non-Christian princes and non-Christian governors and kings — for failing to have already acknowledged him.

Philip Exactly right.

Sean And that’s Psalm 2. They will continue to band against him, thinking that they can be apart from his lordship, not needing to submit to him. And they will be judged for that — not because they didn’t go to church. They’ll be judged for using their political authority in opposition to Jesus’ political authority.

Philip Right. And we see this even pre-incarnation of Jesus, right? So in the Old Testament, God judges the nations for what they’re doing as nations. So he is demonstrating his authority over them even though they’re not Israel.

Sean Yeah. It is interesting to read Isaiah and Jeremiah, where the prophets do address Israel and Judah, and then they go ahead and talk about a bunch of other nations and kings.

Philip Right, exactly right.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Yep. So it’s not just Israel. And that’s where, even as dispensationalists — what I mean by, it is ironic, that they have a problem with Christian nations, or even the identity of a nation and us caring about it, because we see that in the Bible, in the Old Testament. Not just within Israel, but with other identified people groups.

Sean And those other people were not guilty of disobeying the Mosaic covenant.

Philip Right.

Sean They were guilty of disobeying God’s broader law — the need for God to be recognized and worshiped and followed. Again, which is bigger than, or outside of, the explicit Mosaic covenant, which was only for Israel.

Philip Right. And that comes out of his creational order. He has that authority to demand acknowledgment and worship, so to speak, because he created them all — not just because he made a covenant with the nation of Israel.

Sean And unlike what Wolfe is arguing, that’s not because it would have been natural.

Philip Right.

Sean It is natural in the sense that, because God created nature and God created humans, there is a natural obligation to him. But it’s not like you don’t need salvation and his word to mess with that, or to define it.

Philip Right. So, yeah, when somebody like Doug Wilson talks about general equity theonomy, I typically agree with everything he’s saying.

Sean Okay.

Philip Even though I might not agree with some of the fundamentals underlying it all.

Sean Because he got that phrase from the Westminster Confession.

Philip Right, that’s right. Which we cannot fully sign — it’d be cool if we did, but —

Sean Yeah.

Philip Okay, and so the third grouping. And this is maybe just a little bit, we could touch on this.

So we talked about the acknowledgment of the lordship of Christ, of the Christian nation, versus maybe a secular nation. Then that distinction of theonomy versus natural law, versus anti both of those things. And the third one would be nationalism versus not nationalism. Right, whatever that is.

And so I don’t remember the gentleman’s full name, but — Yoram, some Jewish PhD-educated academic guy that Wilson was also —

Sean Because you didn’t remember his name, you’re probably going to be called an antisemite by somebody.

Philip Or a Christian nationalist.

Sean Or that.

Philip But I did listen to the interview discussion that they had, where he talks about the three maybe approaches, or distinctions, of: well, you either have tribalism, you have globalism, or you have nationalism. And so you have either a more local approach to government, where there’s a lot of infighting with all these tribes; you have a globalist, imperialistic approach, maybe, that people have tried to do; or then your only other option is nationalism, which is a nation, right?

And so, identifying it in that way, as, yes, we organize as nations — I have no problem with. Right? So that makes sense. And organization-wise, yes.

But nationalism as a concept, I think, is more than that. And there’s a lot more baggage that comes with that term. And that’s kind of where I personally take a little bit of issue — at least maybe a little bit of issue, and a lot of caution, enough to not be so quick to call myself a nationalist.

So, we do see that kind of superiority of nations in history, specifically the nineteenth century leading into the beginning of the twentieth. Right, that is World War I, that is World War II. We see that kind of blood guilt in history because of that. And so I get —

Sean Keep saying more — because, like we talked about earlier, the ism part of it, the ist part of it —

Philip Right.

Sean — are, at least for some, seeming to be used to smuggle in actually anti-Christian —

Philip Right.

Sean — so, you can’t be a Christian anti-Christian person. But there are some attitudes, you know, ethnic vainglory.

Philip Right.

Sean Don’t want to say racism, because now —

Philip It doesn’t mean anything.

Sean We’re an explicit podcast.

Philip Yes.

Sean Something like that.

Philip Yes.

Sean But yes, so —

Philip Yeah.

Sean I’m not trying to make you be the bad cop here, but say more about why the ism of the nationalism, and the ist part. I mean, you started to relate it to those kinds of mindsets around World War I, but say some more.

Philip And so, it’s interesting that even America as a nation was more or less outside of that issue, that problem. Like, they came in later into World War I. They were outside of that ethnocentric, maybe monoethnic vainglory between Germany and France and Britain and all of that.

What I think is unique about America is that, where in other nations there is an application of maybe the fifth commandment, of honoring your father and mother — in America, our application maybe is more “love your neighbor as yourself.” And so we don’t have direct lines of honoring your father and mother as a nation in America, the way that European, or maybe any other nation, has.

And so, what you see there is that kind of ethnic vainglory. And you see that throughout all of history. You know, you’re reading early history of Rome — this was very localized, this is tribalism, that kind of ethnic vainglory as well.

And so I understand, I get, and I even sympathize with, maybe even support, a certain kind of honoring your father and mother, where, yes, I want to honor the cultural distinctives of my Russian heritage — the language, the food, the culture, the people group, right? And there’s a certain kind of even loyalty to that, which makes sense to me. I don’t think that is vainglory or sin in any way.

But coming at it from ethnic superiority, national superiority — at least in my mind, it is difficult to categorize, to comprehend, how as Christians we could do that.

And so even in America — so a lot of these Christian nationalists do bring this into the word nationalism, which I think is accurate to the word. I think these people understand nationalism as it’s meant to be understood, and bring with it what belongs with it. So, even in America, as a white Western culture, and so we should work for and fight for that kind of ethnic — I don’t want to say cleansing, but purity, maybe, right? And so in general, that’s what we should have is white Christian nationalism. And then we could have some fugitives, or people living within that, but the majority of it should be honoring. And they make a biblical case for honoring your father and mother.

So in my mind that is different. And because nationalism, at least in my understanding, does bring with it all of that baggage, the project for Christian nations ends up dying by the death of a thousand qualifications. Because we keep having to define, oh, we don’t mean that with nationalism, we don’t mean this with it — it ends up confusing the entire Christendom project.

So that’s, I guess, where my concern is with nationalism proper, nationalism explicit.

Sean Yeah. Seems like some of those guys are also big into the distinction between whether the United States, or America, was an idea or not. And so they argue that it wasn’t, because — at least I have heard that it was an idea.

Philip Right. And that’s what I mean by, in America, the application of loving your neighbor seems to be more prevalent than honoring your father and mother. And these guys would maybe disagree with that.

Sean Yeah. Because they seem to want to argue that, well, this is our land, and this is ours.

Philip Right.

Sean So, our nation is where we live. And, like, well, I mean, that is true. But it seems like making it be either/or is also unnecessary.

Without trying to just say, oh, well, it’s complex, so therefore throw our hands up in the air and we can’t do anything about it — that’s not going to help anybody. But is the problem in the United States that we have white Russians and white British people, generations down? Like, who was allowed? I mean, because some of the Russians presumably then came later than some of the British people. Or people from Holland, or some French people, whatever. All of those people have white skin.

Philip Right.

Sean So, was there a lot of Anglo-Saxon light-skinned people?

Philip Right.

Sean Sure. But is that what makes America great?

Philip Hmm. Careful.

Sean I don’t think so. And I don’t think that the fact that America has let other people in, immigrated, who are not white Anglo-Saxon —

I had not heard of the WASPs, the White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, until the book that I read a few months ago.

Philip Which Woodrow Wilson was.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Yeah.

Sean And I like WASPs better than how some of the Christian nationalists talk about being nationalists. But it seems to me like the most important part of it is the Protestant part.

Philip Right.

Sean Because not needing to kill each other because we disagree isn’t a Hindu idea.

Philip Right.

Sean It’s not Chinese Eastern mysticism. It’s definitely not Muslim.

Philip Right.

Sean It’s not a principle of the Quran and Islam. So it’s a Christian — it’s a Protestant in particular — Christian thing.

Philip Right.

Sean Not every Protestant, clearly. Going back to the Inquisition, and to whatever degree we had Roman Catholics — so obviously there are a variety of things. Not all Catholics and Protestants have shown the right kind of Christian tolerance that they should have.

Philip Right.

Sean But the Protestant Christian peace is huge, even if not everybody was a Christian — totally acknowledging that.

But what used to happen, it seemed like, is that immigrants wanted to be a part of this kind of culture. So they were actually giving up at least some of their other, their foreign, culture to actually acclimate into the culture that the United States has. Which was driven by more Christian laws.

Philip Right.

Sean By a kind of theonomy.

Philip Right.

Sean Even if they weren’t using that phrase.

Philip Right.

Sean So the problem was when we stopped acknowledging that we were going to worship Jesus Christ as Lord. And actually, we don’t as much care about what your skin color is.

Philip Right.

Sean Or how long you’ve been here. We do care about whether you’re going to live by honoring Jesus Christ as Lord.

Philip Right.

Sean And if we can’t say that — and I’m not disagreeing with your observations — but if that is not what it means to be a Christian nationalist, then I can’t be one. Other than in those situations like you said.

Philip Right, you’re just thrown into the lump.

Sean Yeah, where the liberals are criticizing everybody who’s to the conservative side of them.

Philip And that’s where I would very much distinguish between multiethnicity and multiculturalism. So I’m not for multiculturalism, in the sense of thinking that that is a smart way to let in immigrants, right? So, like, I am all for assimilation. And assimilation not just to Christian principles, Christian ideas, to God’s law, but assimilation to the culture of America.

So, yes, we should speak English here, right? Like, I think it is — I don’t know, “embarrassing” or “shameful” is maybe too weak of a word — where our government agencies have other languages, like at very big font in the very front of the building, or on the community buses, right? It’s like, well, what are we doing? We are fighting against assimilation. That’s not good.

And so, yes, you want to come here, you should be joining in not just with the Christian ideals, but everything that those Christian ideals brought about. So, the fruit of that Christian worldview, including even our language. A lot of the Western culture is so intertwined with the Christian culture that it is impossible to break it up, to divide it. And so when we’re talking about Christian ideals, we want them to assimilate into our Western culture. So yes, I’m all for that.

Which is different than the monoethnic culture, monoethnic people group. Because then also, if you — when, where do we stop? Where do we draw the line? How far back do we go to really get our monoethnicity?

Sean I’m sure we could let Putin talk about that with Carlson. He can tell us the history.

Philip That’s right.

Sean Seven hundred years back — is that how far back he went?

Philip Maybe more, yeah. I don’t know. But he’s almost done. Don’t interrupt.

Sean Yeah.

Philip Right. So, I mean, yeah — you read, again, early history of Rome. You had these local tribes fighting because they believed they were superior, ethnically superior.

You had the history of the kings of Britain, where the Scots and the Picts and the Irish and the British, and then the Saxons, and then the Angles, right, all came. This was all — this group now gets all lumped into one group as white Anglo-Saxons. But a thousand, fifteen hundred years ago, they were all infighting, because they had their monoethnicity that they were trying to protect, their superiority that they were trying to uphold.

So how far back do we go? Where do we draw the line? Where can we actually allow people in or not? I think that is a project that kills itself before it starts.

Sean Yeah. So we’re not opposed to actual immigration policy.

Philip Right.

Sean That a Christian comes up with.

Philip Right, yes.

Sean And that allows for people who are not even Christians, under some sort of agreement — like, maybe to come early on, on their way into being assimilated into a Christian culture. But, I mean, we’ve abandoned — who’s even thinking about that?

Philip Mm-hmm.

Sean And the Christian nationalists who are more like, well, the way to solve this is to recognize that the white people —

Philip Right.

Sean — need to defend their land.

Philip Right.

Sean Well, like — when the United States actually collapses, like all nations have, and we want to move to Africa —

Philip Right.

Sean — to seek asylum. On what appeal are we going to be able to say, please let us in as refugees?

Philip Right, we’ll come there with our guns.

Sean I guess. But if our guns couldn’t protect what we have here, then how — we’re going to go, maybe, Canada.

Philip Mm. Yeah. They just have horses. No guns there.

Yes. So there you go. That’s, I don’t know, at least some categories to think about.

So there is: lordship of Christ in the public sphere versus secularism. There’s theonomy versus natural law versus whatever the dispies think they hold to — which they should hold to —

Sean Ostrich.

Philip That’s right. Ostrich, right.

And then nationalism versus whatever other term we’re trying to come up with. So, give us the term.

So, yeah — any parting shots?

Sean I mean, I think that we should keep working, and we should work local. I get that the current news cycle is just so inflammatory all the time and makes us want to be anxious. But it does seem like we are allowed to be more informed than less, and we’re allowed to be more involved than less.

And I get that just podcasts about it aren’t sufficient. But also, there’s so many people that are in our circle who are the kind who are not really even sure they’re allowed to be talking about it. I mean, our church has made significant progress in “this is allowable.”

Philip Right. This is good.

Sean Yeah. But, okay — so do really do something. Like, voting is good, fine. But run for an office. And most people probably should not, but we need some people who are going to do it. And, again, do more than just talk.

But in the meantime, if we can promote that part of it, then that’s also good. And point out that it is better to submit to Jesus Christ out in public than pride parades, and what secularism is giving us, which is demonic gods. So —

Philip We’re going to have one.

Sean There’s God, or gods. And ours is the only one who claims wisdom, truth, grace, love, and offers forgiveness at his own cost.

So, repent from your sins and actually submit yourself to Jesus Christ, and then follow him regardless of the cost, and do that where other people then know about it. And that seems like a really good way to honor him.

Philip Right.

Sean And we need more honoring of him by individuals and then even collectively. And that’s part of what we’re trying to do in our lives and at TEC. So, let’s do more of that, not less.

You know, I think maybe even in that message on theonomy I gave, I might have said something like: I think that the Lord would find that we care too little for politics.

Philip Right.

Sean Not that we care too much.

Philip Right.

Sean We could care wrongly. But I’m not actually sure that we care too much. We need to care some more.

Philip Right. So, if you’re going to be a Christian, you might as well be one.

Sean That’d be a good tweet.

Philip There you go. All right. Out.