Why We’re Not Christian Nationalists

This transcript has been lightly edited from an automated transcription for clarity and readability. While we've worked to preserve each speaker's words faithfully, errors may remain.

1. 00:00

   Dr. David VanDrunen

   But everyone knows that the civil magistrate can't enforce the Tenth Commandment. I mean, can you imagine?

2. 00:05

   Michael Horton

   "Do not covet."

3. 00:05

   Dr. David VanDrunen

   You think government's big and intrusive now? Just wait.

4. 00:08

   Michael Horton

   Well, again, the gospel becomes a means to an end.

5. 00:11

   Pastor Adriel

   That's right.

6. 00:12

   Michael Horton

   In that scenario, who really is following —

7. 00:14

   Dr. David VanDrunen

   the spirit of the world here? Is it those who are calling for humble, peaceful service under the cross of Christ? Are those the people really following the spirit of this world? Or is it those who are saying, "We Christians need to go out and get power"? They weren't going for a mere Christendom — which is what some contemporary folks are calling for. I mean, they were suppressing each other.

8. 00:37

   Michael Horton

   Baptists weren't allowed in Massachusetts.

9. 00:38

   Dr. David VanDrunen

   That's right.

10. 00:39

    Pastor Adriel

    Right, right.

11. 00:40

    Michael Horton

    Even if you thought that the calling of the Westminster Assembly by Parliament was acceptable in the 17th century, how many of us really want this United States Congress to call an ecclesiastical assembly for a new confession?

12. 00:56

    Pastor Adriel

    I think sometimes people say, "You guys just have such a pessimistic outlook." I think — no. We just want to define victory the way the New Testament defines victory.

13. 01:13

    Pastor Adriel

    Hey, Pastor Adriel here. I'm excited for this conversation with two friends of mine: Dr. Michael Horton and Dr. David VanDrunen, both professors at Westminster Seminary California.

14. 01:23

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    [laughs]

15. 01:24

    Pastor Adriel

    I'm hoping for a kind of laid-back dive into some of these issues. I think they're mostly your fault, Dave — the two kingdoms conversations happening out there in the world. But it's something you've written about for years. I know you've touched on it too, Mike. And there's especially a lot of interest right now in political theology, in retrieving Protestant political theology — people going back to the sources and wanting to apply those principles today. You've been talking about that for many years, right, Dave?

16. 01:57

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    It's been many years now. It's true.

17. 02:00

    Pastor Adriel

    Since before I even knew it was a thing. So I feel like there's a bit of a resurgence, especially with younger men. As both of you know, the PCA has a committee they've formed on the question of Christian nationalism. [flag for verification: confirm committee name and current status] This is a conversation that's happening. My hope is to have that conversation with you brothers. I was just thinking — we've got an OPC guy, a PCA guy, and a URC guy here.

18. 02:22

    Michael Horton

    This is ecumenical.

19. 02:23

    Pastor Adriel

    Very ecumenical. And I think we can speak on behalf of our denominations and federations and settle this issue once and for all.

20. Pastor Adriel

    So my sense is — and correct me if I'm wrong — you guys probably don't want to go down in history as "the two kingdoms guys." I know you've both written about all sorts of things. Dave, you're working on a moral theology right now. But why is this an important topic? And maybe, if we could define it simply for someone coming into this conversation for the first time — when we talk about two kingdoms, what are we talking about?

21. 03:02

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    I think it's important, for one thing, because Christians have been thinking about these questions for as long as there have been Christians: What are our responsibilities in this world? What is our place here? How do we live as citizens of heaven while also being responsible citizens of our own societies?

22. 03:19

    Pastor Adriel

    Right.

23. 03:19

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    The two kingdoms doctrine has served a number of purposes over the years. One key purpose is helping us understand our place in this world, and above all, explaining God's rule in this world. How does God carry out his rule?

24. Dr. David VanDrunen

    Before I give the simple explanation you're asking for, it's worth noting that we can discuss Christians in society and Christians in politics using other categories and biblical metaphors besides the two kingdoms. It's not the only way to approach it. I've found over the years that the two kingdoms is a helpful category — it's a historical, Reformed category — and it's useful for thinking through these questions.

25. Dr. David VanDrunen

    The very basic idea is this: God is the ruler of all things. He's the sovereign Lord over everything, but he carries out his rule in two distinct ways. In one way, God is the creator and sustainer of all things. As creator and sustainer, he has ordained human society for all human beings — he has instituted family, civil government, economic life, artistic life, scientific life — and he does that for the good of all creation.

26. 04:16

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    But there's a second way God carries out his rule in this world: as the redeemer of his people through Jesus Christ. As the king who carries out redemption, he has sent his Son and established his church. This is the kingdom that Jesus proclaimed in the Gospels. It is advancing here and now as the church does its work, proclaims the gospel, and gathers in the saints.

27. 05:24

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    And this is the kingdom that will be consummated — brought to everlasting completion in the new creation.

28. Dr. David VanDrunen

    So when we talk about the two kingdoms, the basic idea is thinking about how God carries out this twofold rule, and how we as Christians exist in this world knowing that we are citizens of both kingdoms. Along with unbelievers, we live under God's common rule, carrying out ordinary occupations, participating in our political communities. And yet our dearest love is that redemptive kingdom — that kingdom that cannot be shaken, as Hebrews 12 puts it.

29. Dr. David VanDrunen

    That's the brief version. From there, all sorts of questions arise about application.

30. 06:13

    Pastor Adriel

    When I first heard this concept, it was actually in seminary — probably in your classes. What was really helpful for me was just being able to think through the distinct roles of the church and the civil magistrate. Like, the church does not have the authority to bear the sword. We don't execute people. We do excommunicate people.

31. 06:34

    Pastor Adriel

    So there's a distinct way God is governing his church on earth, different from the role of the civil magistrate. That's a real simple way of seeing it. Mike, would you add anything to Dave's definition?

32. 06:47

    Michael Horton

    Yes — secular officers can't preach or administer the sacraments.

33. Michael Horton

    I also think that when you get to the biblical grounds for this, not many Christians will find themselves disagreeing that we're dual citizens. That term has been used for a long time. It basically acknowledges that there are two kingdoms.

34. Michael Horton

    When Jesus says, "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's," he's distinguishing between two kingdoms. He's saying that unlike the Old Covenant — where the church was a nation, a geopolitical nation, driving out the enemies of God from the holy land in holy war — the New Covenant is different. Jesus says: no regime change.

35. 07:38

    Michael Horton

    That's gone. The Sermon on the Mount. Jesus says this is common space. Pray for your enemies. Turn the other cheek when they come to persecute you for the gospel.

36. Michael Horton

    And finally, in Revelation, the seventh trumpet announces: "The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our God and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever." So that's already distinguishing between the two kingdoms. You have it from the lips of Jesus, you have it from the lips of the apostles.

37. Michael Horton

    The gospel being preached in all the world is the sign of the end.

38. 08:19

    Michael Horton

    That is the sign that Christ's kingdom has conquered the world — not that it's eventually going to control the arts, culture, politics, and economics of the nations. Not the Christianizing of nations.

39. 08:35

    Pastor Adriel

    Whenever I think about dual citizenship, my mind goes to Paul's words in Philippians 3, where he says flat out that we have this heavenly citizenship, and from heaven we're awaiting a Savior who will transform our bodies. Which is obviously not to say that we have no obligation as citizens of the common world we're part of.

40. 08:57

    Michael Horton

    Interesting that Paul says that in 1 Thessalonians, in the very chapter where he treats how you prepare for the coming of the Lord.

41. 09:04

    Pastor Adriel

    Right. I mean, I don't know if we'd want to say he's relativizing our earthly life — but there is this focus on being part of something greater. And I wonder if some of the challenge people face today is exactly that balance. If your theology says we're bringing about the eschaton through our engagement with the world, then a lot of this makes sense. But finding the proper balance — what does it mean to be a good dual citizen, with hope rooted in heaven? So much of the New Testament seems to be pushing the church in that direction, encouraging meditation on the things that are above.

42. 09:54

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    That's true. Think about whether the church's biggest problem throughout most of its history has been being too heavenly minded, or too worldly — too in love with the things of this world. I think the question sort of answers itself, though it's still genuinely difficult.

43. Dr. David VanDrunen

    But I don't think there's any way to escape the fact that the emphasis in the New Testament is on the new creation that awaits us. The very images the New Testament uses — sojourner, exile, stranger, pilgrim — these encourage us to understand that our present societies are not our permanent place of residence.

44. 10:57

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    Think about the end of Hebrews: "Here we have no lasting city. We are awaiting the city to come." I've expended a lot of energy in my research and writing thinking about how Christians can be responsible citizens. I'm genuinely interested in political questions, bioethics, cultural engagement — all of it. And I think that's important. We are called to live in this world, exercise the gifts God has given us, and serve our neighbors as well as we can.

45. 11:45

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    But the New Testament frames all of that against the background of what you were saying, Adriel — our citizenship is in heaven. And that also entails accepting that we are called to be a persecuted people in this world. We are more than conquerors in Christ, but that doesn't mean we'll always see that in the way the world defines conquest. We have to live under the cross the way Christ himself lived under the cross during his earthly ministry. We try to be good, faithful servants — but we do so under the shadow of the cross.

46. 12:19

    Pastor Adriel

    A lot of people bristle against that. Who wants to live under the shadow of the cross? And depending on a person's eschatology, a lot of people define victory for the church as taking control of institutions or Christianizing the nations. And if we want to, we can try to define what that actually means.

47. 12:41

    Michael Horton

    Bearing the cross versus using the cross — yes, I think we have a lot of the latter. Holding the cross up as a symbol to grab worldly power and dominion, to threaten people, is to turn the gospel into law. It's to take the great symbol of Christianity and turn it on its head. We are to follow Christ in his suffering, as Dave said. We are to take up our cross and follow him, even when it's difficult, even when we're opposed.

48. Michael Horton

    And it's interesting — historically, at the times when the church has borne the cross, it has almost unintentionally had an immense influence on the world around it.

49. 13:34

    Michael Horton

    But whenever it then had that success and grasped power at its fingertips, it became corrupt. That story repeats throughout church history.

50. 13:47

    Pastor Adriel

    That's an important point. And I do think it's rooted in the teaching of Scripture. When you read Revelation, the language of victory and conquering comes up again and again — but how does the church conquer? It's cruciform. It's the advancement of the gospel. It's "by the word of their testimony."

51. 14:15

    Pastor Adriel

    Even right up to the very end of Revelation, the nations are gathered against the people of God — not rolling out the red carpet for a Christianized society. I've often wondered how you respond to that. I think, sometimes, people say, "You guys just have such a pessimistic outlook." And I think — no. We just want to define victory the way the New Testament defines victory. It's the proclamation of the gospel.

52. 14:54

    Pastor Adriel

    The word of God is going out. That word is advancing, laying hold of hearts and minds. As we're walking with Christ and being faithful to him, we often do see fruit — but a rosy existence is not promised to us. And what's fascinating is that you read guys like Calvin and Luther, and they say that over and over again. They're very honest about the reality of struggle in this life, and about what our expectations should be as the people of God. That's not saying the gospel isn't advancing.

53. 15:30

    Pastor Adriel

    It is advancing powerfully — but it doesn't look like what we often think victory should look like from a worldly perspective.

54. 15:37

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    The way you put it is exactly right. There is victory for us even in this life — but we need to define it the way the New Testament does. Think about how the Beatitudes begin the Sermon on the Mount. Who are the blessed? The peacemakers. The meek. The mourners. Those who are persecuted. This is not how the world sees blessing. And that's another way of talking about how we define victory and what the Lord's blessing looks like.

55. 16:13

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    When I think about the theocratic views of Christians in society and politics — whether in the form of Christian nationalism or something else — I'm struck by how foreign they are to the New Testament. You would never arrive at these ideas from reading the New Testament. The idea that what matters is gaining political power and exercising it over others — that's explicit in the Christian nationalist literature. Or the idea that it's important for us to live with our own ethnic people in our own land — where would you get that from the New Testament? It's entirely foreign to it. The idea that we're supposed to be taking over governments — where is that in the New Testament?

56. 17:15

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    We find the exact opposite. The apostles go out, gather churches of people from various people groups and languages, and declare: there is no Jew or Greek, no barbarian, Scythian, slave or free. It's just a very different perspective. And in some ways, I find it remarkable that you could construct a Christian political theology that looks nothing like the New Testament and still make a plausible case that it's the Christian perspective.

57. 17:52

    Michael Horton

    For example, who could read Matthew 24 and conclude that all the nations will be Christianized? In the clearest teaching Jesus has on biblical prophecy, he says: first, you're going to be persecuted. There will be natural disasters. Wars and rumors of wars. And you have a lot of people saying, "Oh, that's happening — I just saw it on the news." But Jesus says explicitly: these are only birth pangs.

58. 18:29

    Michael Horton

    Then he says there will be false prophets. Many people will fall away. Again, it all sounds familiar. But Jesus says the end is not yet. And then he says: the gospel will be preached in all nations, and then the end will come.

59. Michael Horton

    So while everyone else is looking for the end in terms of a kingdom bristling with Christianization, or in terms of Armageddon and the Antichrist, they're missing the point. Jesus says: that's the sign. The sign of the end is when the gospel is preached to all nations.

60. 19:10

    Michael Horton

    Simultaneously, the gospel is triumphing over the kingdoms of the world — while the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.

61. 19:20

    Pastor Adriel

    I think what some have to do is say that most of Matthew 24 was fulfilled in 70 AD. You know, the world ended there, and from then on it's resurrection, Christian life, we're taking dominion —

62. 19:33

    Michael Horton

    Well, the gospel wasn't preached to the ends of the earth in 70 AD.

63. 19:38

    Pastor Adriel

    Right. And I also think Revelation 20 is key. But one of the criticisms I hear is, "We can't just conflate everyone — not everybody's a post-millennialist theonomist." Because there are a lot of people, especially more recently, who want to pick up the mantle of two kingdoms and go back to the Reformers. They say, "Well, Calvin argued for a Christian magistrate and was in favor of things like blasphemy laws."

64. Pastor Adriel

    And I think, Dave, one way you're often misrepresented is when people say you've written a ton about two kingdoms and are claiming your view is identical to Calvin's. Anybody who's actually read you knows that's not what you've been saying. You're very clear about where you're critical of Calvin or where you think he was inconsistent. So I want to tell people: you just have not read him, if that's what you think.

65. 20:41

    Pastor Adriel

    But maybe with that — where would you see yourself as distinct from the magisterial reformers in applying this idea? Because I don't think this is a tug-of-war over whose two kingdoms theology is most like Calvin's. I think we're asking how we apply their theology prudently in our current political context.

66. 21:14

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    I've always tried to be very clear about my relationship to the earlier Reformed tradition. What I described at the beginning of our conversation as the basics of two kingdoms doctrine — I don't think anyone can reasonably disagree that's what the early Reformed taught.

67. Dr. David VanDrunen

    But it's also the case that for the first couple of centuries of the Reformed tradition, basically all Reformed theologians were theocratic in a specific sense. They did not believe the civil magistrate should preach the gospel or take on the functions of the church itself — but they did believe the magistrate had a responsibility not just to protect the welfare of the true church, but to promote it at the expense of others. That meant suppressing not only non-Christian religions and assemblies, but the wrong kinds of Christian belief — punishing heresy, punishing blasphemy, calling synods of the church.

68. Dr. David VanDrunen

    This is a continuation of what we call Christendom — the long medieval assumption that we should pursue a unified confessional Christian society in which not only the church, but the magistrate and all other civil institutions, joined together in one confession of Christ.

69. 22:57

    Michael Horton

    Which is also what the Lutherans practiced.

70. 23:00

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    Oh, yes.

71. 23:01

    Michael Horton

    This isn't something unique to the Reformed tradition.

72. 23:03

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    Right. The political situation changed a lot at the Reformation in Europe, but Roman Catholics, Reformed, and Lutherans all thought this way. If you were a Lutheran prince, you enforced Lutheran doctrine and practice in your territory. That's just how everyone thought.

73. Dr. David VanDrunen

    So I've always been very clear: we should not be theocratic. We should not have a theocratic interpretation of the two kingdoms. For those who say, "The early Reformers were theocratic, and I am too, so I'm more like them than VanDrunen" — well, they have a point on that. But I've always argued, with extensive biblical reasoning, that we shouldn't go down that road.

74. 23:55

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    Historically, though, there's something really important to say here — especially for American Presbyterians, which is you and me, Adriel. And this applies to Mike's tradition in the United Reformed Churches as well. The Dutch Reformed tradition in the United States has made similar doctrinal changes on this point.

75. Dr. David VanDrunen

    In the early American Presbyterian experience of the 1700s, the American Presbyterians — most of them — actually changed the Westminster Standards to remove the theocratic language and affirm a view much more like what we've been describing: one consistent with the American experiment and its commitments to freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and freedom of assembly.

76. Dr. David VanDrunen

    I brought my copy of the Westminster Standards, because I thought this might come up. I'm referring to the American revisions — which, to be clear, is what the PCA and OPC confess. We don't confess the original theocratic statements. We took those out.

77. 25:20

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    We took those out about two and a half centuries ago. Westminster Confession 23:3, in the second part of a long statement, says — and I'm paraphrasing here — that Jesus Christ has appointed a regular government and discipline in his church, and no law of any commonwealth should interfere with or hinder the due exercise of that among the voluntary members of any denomination of Christians according to their own profession and belief.

78. Dr. David VanDrunen

    Just pause there. In the earlier Christendom vision — in the views of those very early Reformed theologians — they weren't going for a mere Christendom of the kind some contemporary folks are calling for. I mean, they were suppressing each other.

79. 26:08

    Pastor Adriel

    Right.

80. 26:09

    Michael Horton

    Baptists weren't allowed in Massachusetts.

81. 26:11

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    That's right. If you were Baptist, you weren't allowed anywhere. If you were a Protestant, you might suppress — or even kill — Roman Catholics. They certainly wouldn't let you worship freely. Protestant groups suppressed other Protestant groups.

82. 26:29

    Pastor Adriel

    It's remarkable that anyone looks back at that and says, "Those were the days."

83. 26:32

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    And then the confession goes on — and this is even more striking. It says it is the duty of civil magistrates to protect the person and good name of all their people. All their people — not just those who make the right profession, not just those of the right ethnic background. The duty is that no person be allowed, "either upon pretense of religion or infidelity, to offer any indignity, violence, abuse, or injury to any other person whatsoever." And to take order that all religious and ecclesiastical assemblies be held without molestation or disturbance. All religious assemblies — not just ecclesiastical ones.

84. 27:18

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    The magistrate is to protect all of them. I'm sorry — I'm almost jumping out of my seat here. When I hear people say, "If you're really Reformed, look at these theocratic statements from 16th or 17th-century figures" — we American Presbyterians rejected that two and a half centuries ago and inscribed it in our standards. And you know how hard it is to change doctrinal standards if you're a Presbyterian. And yet we did it. It's essentially the only place we've done it.

85. 27:52

    Michael Horton

    Only place. Yes.

86. 27:53

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    I need to catch my breath.

87. 27:58

    Michael Horton

    Rest your case, counselor.

88. Michael Horton

    So one of the things that really gets me about this debate — especially the argument of Christian nationalists — is the cherry-picking of quotes, without giving due attention to very obvious statements by Luther, Calvin, the Reformed Orthodox, and the Westminster divines on two kingdoms.

89. Michael Horton

    But there's also a real lack of historical sensibility. In a Christendom context, the Reformers actually look like liberals. They were genuinely moving away from the punishment of dissenters to the extent that Christendom had pursued for centuries. They weren't liberals in the sense of liberal democrats, but they were on a trajectory.

90. 29:04

    Michael Horton

    They were on a trajectory. So it's not simply that VanDrunen and Sanchez and Horton are so shaped by political liberalism and the democratic experiment that we're jettisoning Reformed orthodoxy. For one thing, you can say the Reformers didn't apply their own principles properly. The burning of Servetus is a good example. Calvin's defense of that burning is reprehensible — and we can say so, because people in his own day said so.

91. Michael Horton

    Philip Melanchthon on the Lutheran side is actually one of the reasons Calvin went forward with it. Melanchthon told Calvin: "You have to do this, or we're not part of Christendom." All of Christendom condemned those who denied the Trinity to the flames. And even then, Calvin didn't personally execute him — he was a witness in court, not the decision-maker.

92. Michael Horton

    But let me just ask: raise your hand if you want the United States Congress to call a general assembly of a national church, revise a pre-existing confession, and determine what the worship, doctrine, and confession of the church will be in the United States of America. Even if you thought the calling of the Westminster Assembly by Parliament was acceptable in the 17th century — how many of us actually want this United States Congress to call an ecclesiastical assembly for a new confession?

93. 31:00

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    I'd put it a little differently — do you really want Donald Trump or Joe Biden or Barack Obama determining who the true church is? Because if you put the power there, and then you lose the next election — it sounds great if you win. I'm not sure what the prospects are for a confessional Presbyterian Congress anytime soon, but even if you did win, you've now put that power somewhere. And then someone else is going to wield it.

94. Dr. David VanDrunen

    This goes back to what you were raising, Adriel — the accusation that contemporary two kingdoms advocates are just overly influenced by classical liberalism or the American democratic experiment. But actually, for Reformed people, a lot of American Presbyterians were the ones arguing that we need to move in this direction.

95. 32:11

    Michael Horton

    The American experiment is in part our product.

96. 32:15

    Dr. David VanDrunen

    It's actually our experiment as much as anyone's.

97. Dr. David VanDrunen

    But I want to return to: who really is following the spirit of the world here? Is it those calling for humble, peaceful service under the cross of Christ? Or is it those who say, "We Christians need to go out and get power and exercise power"? Is there any real question what the spirit of the world is? That's what woke progressives want to do — go out, get power, impose their ideology on everyone else. And we say: that's terrible. How does Vladimir Putin conduct his affairs? How does Chairman Xi? By gaining power, wielding power, lording it over others. And I think Jesus had something to say about not being like the earthly magistrates who lord it over others.

98. Dr. David VanDrunen

    So I'd put this challenge to Christian nationalists and others tempted in a theocratic direction: if you're going to accuse us of following the spirit of the world — really?

99. 33:29

    Michael Horton

    Just briefly — James Madison, the chief architect of the Constitution, said the government will be given a foot in the door to determine what a true church is whenever the church fails to maintain proper distinctions. He says: don't we ever learn from church history? Every time, from Constantine on, when the church has benefited from the privileges and patronage of Caesar, it has become corrupt. And every time the church has had to rely solely on its Lord and its means of grace, it has prospered.

100. Michael Horton

     And of course, Madison studied under John Witherspoon, who signed the Declaration of Independence and trained many of the leaders of the new Republic. Witherspoon was a Presbyterian pastor and president of Princeton. And Madison said he got his doctrine of two kingdoms — he actually calls it that, "doctrine of two kingdoms" — from John Witherspoon. So this is not some fringe idea that came out of nowhere.

101. 34:39

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     Right.

102. 34:40

     Pastor Adriel

     I appreciate both of those points. And thinking as someone who might be on the other side listening — in response to your question about whether we really want the current president determining doctrine for the church — I think what they would say is: "Of course not. We have imaginations. We're thinking incrementally, down the road." And so it seems like a lot of people want to recover not just the political theology of Calvin and the blasphemy laws, but the broader cultural context as well. They're highly critical of liberalism.

103. Pastor Adriel

     I don't think anyone would actually say, "We want Paula White determining what a true church is." Well — you never know.

104. 35:40

     Michael Horton

     But I think that's arbitrary. If you're going to argue for this, when exactly do you have the right group in power? Because in this present evil age — and it wasn't Augustine who first said it, it was Jesus and Paul — even the church is a mess. You're never going to have a group of Christians with enough purity, doctrinal clarity, and certainty about how God wants our tax structure set up. Even if you think the New Testament gives you principles for that — which I don't — even if you think it provides a blueprint for running a society the way the Old Covenant did, the church is not perfected until Christ returns.

105. 36:38

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     You're right. None of the people on the other side really want Trump or Biden as the arbiter of ecclesiastical orthodoxy. But there's a problem with saying, "This is the ideal political structure — for when we get our guy in." That's totally unprincipled in a way. We don't think about the church that way — "Here's how the pastor should function, when we finally get the pastor we really want." You have to ask the principled question: what are the qualifications for civil magistrate, and what are their responsibilities?

106. Dr. David VanDrunen

     And I would say — where in Scripture, outside of the Mosaic law and the covenantal Israelite king — where is there any text about a gentile nation where the requirements for the magistrate are put in theological terms, or where the magistrate is given the qualifications to make those kinds of determinations?

107. 37:44

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     Think about how carefully the New Testament addresses qualifications in 1 Timothy 3 for those called to church office — and how hard it is for those of us ordained to office to do that work well. There is no indication that civil magistrates have those qualifications to be making those kinds of judgments. And I think that's a principled problem.

108. 38:06

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     Pastor Adriel) — Trying to anticipate what people on the other side would say — Dave, you've written quite a bit about natural law and the role the magistrate has in upholding principles that are in some sense ingrained in us. One of the things that comes up constantly today is: what about the first table of the law? What does it mean for the civil magistrate to apply that?

109. Dr. David VanDrunen

     We do see that in the Reformed tradition — early on, reformers made a case that it was the magistrate's job to uphold the first table by punishing blasphemy and so forth. And I've seen people try to argue from Romans 13 and other places that by good and necessary consequence, the civil magistrate should be doing this or that. But I think that's near one of the key points of dispute.

110. Dr. David VanDrunen

     What's interesting to me is that everyone still has to agree: you can't coerce faith and worship. So when people talk about applying the first table of the law — you think of the Larger Catechism's treatment of the decalogue — the magistrate isn't doing that. They're thinking maybe in terms of labor laws or something similar. Are they really applying the first table? But there are plenty of people arguing for this and saying what we need is a magistrate upholding Christian worship or promoting it — not coercing people, but creating an environment. I sometimes think of it as political friendship in service of evangelism: creating the conditions for people to become followers of Jesus.

111. 39:53

     Pastor Adriel

     And personally, as a pastor — I get it in one sense, but in another, I just think people are spinning their wheels trying to create that environment instead of just actually doing evangelism. I mean, I see a lot of arguments about how great things would be if we just had Sabbath laws. And it's like — you can go to your neighbor's house right now and invite them to church.

112. 40:12

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     If I could get to the natural law question — this is a long tradition in Christianity, predating the Reformation by a long time: the idea that the Ten Commandments are a kind of summary of the natural law.

113. 40:31

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     So there are those who argue: if the civil magistrate is in some way under the natural law, and all of the decalogue is a summary of the natural law, therefore the magistrate ought to be enforcing the first table. It has a surface logic to it. But I think it's really important to note that just because the civil magistrate is under the natural law, that does not mean he is supposed to be enforcing every single thing in the natural law.

114. Dr. David VanDrunen

     Take the Tenth Commandment, for example. The Tenth Commandment is part of the decalogue; it's part of the natural law. But everyone knows the civil magistrate can't enforce the Tenth Commandment.

115. 41:22

     Michael Horton

     "Do not covet."

116. 41:24

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     That would be something. You think government is big and intrusive now? Just wait. The Christian tradition has always been quite nuanced on this. You find it in Calvin, you find it in Thomas Aquinas: government can't simply go in and impose the same things in every society. It requires much more thought in terms of application in a civil legal context.

117. Dr. David VanDrunen

     So just because "you shall have no other gods before me" is part of the natural law does not necessarily mean the civil magistrate has the responsibility to enforce that. That requires further argument. And I think there are very good reasons to say the magistrate ought not try to enforce that. Should he enforce "do not murder"? Yes — but even that takes argument.

118. 42:21

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     You can't just say, "It's part of the natural law, therefore enforce it." That's far too simplistic.

119. 42:26

     Pastor Adriel

     It gets a little iffy in terms of what "enforce" actually means — because if you're not a theonomist, you're not saying "if you don't go to church, you go to prison." We realize faith and worship can't be coerced. So it's almost this middle ground: by upholding the first table, what we mean is creating a favorable context — maybe suppressing other forms of false religion, or closing down shops so people are free to attend worship. I think that's the idea. But it's fair to ask: is that really enforcing the first table of the law, or is that just a kind of watered-down hat tip to —

120. 43:14

     Michael Horton

     People sometimes go too far with this. But Jesus really did shift the focus from external obedience to the law toward interior obedience to God's law. Nobody can deny that shift of attention. It's not about touching or tasting, about what goes into the mouth. It's out of the heart that defilements come, Jesus says. Emphasizing that kind of thing is like rewinding the movie — going back, as many seem to want to do.

121. 43:56

     Michael Horton

     Going back to Old Covenant theocracy. Just as many medieval popes quoted Old Testament holy war passages to justify the Crusades. What you're doing there is genuinely retrograde in terms of the history of redemption.

122. 44:18

     Pastor Adriel

     And it's tough to paint with a broad brush, because there are a lot of different players in this conversation. Not all Christian nationalists are post-millennialists. Some are amillennial. Not all are theonomists. My best read is that they're honest about the fact that what they want is not something achievable right now. And sometimes they'll say, "It will come through faithful preaching, teaching, and discipleship." And I say — welcome to the club.

123. 44:51

     Pastor Adriel

     That's where we're at, too. And you alluded to this earlier, Mike — when the church has been faithful in those things, there's been remarkable fruit. Think of the early church in the first few centuries. The impact Christianity had on the wider world, through people who were suffering and dying for neighbors sick with the plague. What's unfortunate is that a lot of the present Christian nationalism movement doesn't seem to have that orientation toward the outside world. It's less about what the early church looked like — and more about how we regain power.

124. Pastor Adriel

     And you talked about the confusion of law and gospel. In one sense, we're turning the gospel into law. If the focus is "how do we regain power so we can institute Christian law in the land, so that maybe there's a better context for the gospel" —

125. 45:50

     Michael Horton

     The gospel becomes a means to an end.

126. 45:54

     Pastor Adriel

     Is the goal of the gospel the establishment of Christianized laws over society?

127. 46:02

     Michael Horton

     And that seems to be assumed — the "yes" answer seems to be the working assumption when they read the Great Commission. Jesus says, "Go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." And I think a lot of the groups you're talking about, despite their diversity, converge on reading that as —

128. 46:27

     Pastor Adriel

     The Christianization of nations as political bodies.

129. 46:27

     Michael Horton

     Yes.

130. 46:31

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     I find it helpful to focus the question on whether the church is supposed to be pursuing a theocratic government and society as part of its goal. And by theocratic, I mean specifically: a Christian magistrate, a confessional society in which the magistrate actively suppresses non-Christian religions or the wrong kind of Christian religion. There are different varieties of that — a Christian nationalist version, a theonomic version — and not all who hold one hold the other.

131. 47:22

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     But what we're saying here is: no. The church should not be seeking a theocratic sort of society or government. That is at least one of the key issues we need to address.

132. 47:41

     Michael Horton

     We can't baptize a nation.

133. 47:42

     Pastor Adriel

     How do you —

134. 47:46

     Michael Horton

     How do you get a whole nation into —

135. 47:46

     Pastor Adriel

     I want to bring in a specific scenario, because I'm trying to anticipate what people would say. What about when the president converts? The church is doing her job faithfully — preaching the gospel, and people are turning. There's a real revival, the work of the Holy Spirit, coming through the means of grace. I've heard people point to Psalm 2, the call to the nations and the rulers of the nations to bow, to kiss the Son. Obviously, as Paul tells Timothy in 1 Timothy 2, we're praying for civil leaders to come to faith. We want them to believe in Jesus. We want all people to believe in Jesus.

136. 48:26

     Michael Horton

     All people to come to faith.

137. 48:27

     Pastor Adriel

     Yes — but that's different from saying, "Great, now we want to establish a Christian theocracy. That's the goal."

138. 48:39

     Michael Horton

     Well, again, the gospel becomes a means to an end in that scenario. Instead of praising the Lord for this enemy of the faith who was converted by grace and is now our brother or sister, we're using that conversion as a launching point for our strategy. A beachhead for our agenda.

139. 49:04

     Pastor Adriel

     I've really appreciated this conversation. I know it gets fiery at points, but it's because we're passionate about the gospel and applying God's word well.

140. Pastor Adriel

     You brought up the Great Commission and how Matthew 28 is often used to support this idea — "Jesus said, go baptize the nations." And there are different ways of reading nations there: are we thinking about governments and institutions, or about the gentile inclusion? How is that passage used — and maybe misused — in these conversations?

141. 49:45

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     When you read the Great Commission at the end of Matthew, there are two immediately plausible interpretations. One: Jesus is talking about nations as nations — you're going to go out and convert the nations themselves. Two: Jesus is saying people from all nations.

142. Dr. David VanDrunen

     Just looking at those words — "make disciples of all nations" — you're not sure which it is from the words alone. But from the immediate context and the broader New Testament, it has to be the second. It has to be people from all nations. Even from the immediate context — how do you baptize a nation as a nation? You don't. You baptize individuals. You baptize people from all nations.

143. 50:38

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     And then Jesus says, "teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you." How many commands did Jesus give about nations as nations?

144. 51:02

     Pastor Adriel

     The Sermon on the Mount would be hard to apply to a nation-state.

145. 51:04

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     Exactly. He's talking about people from all nations. And then you turn to Acts. How did the disciples who heard the Great Commission interpret it? How did they put it into practice?

146. 51:22

     Michael Horton

     They went baptizing Turkey and Syria? [laughs]

147. 51:26

     Pastor Adriel

     That's a great question.

148. 51:27

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     There's absolutely zero interest in nations as nations in the Book of Acts — but there's an enormous interest in preaching the gospel to people from all nations and joining them into one church.

149. Dr. David VanDrunen

     And in Revelation — you've made some references to Revelation, Adriel — there's a lot about "the nations" in that book. Sometimes people will point to the final vision of the heavenly Jerusalem, with the nations coming in. But you have to read all of Revelation. How many times do you find phrases like, "all the nations were getting drunk on the wine of the harlot Babylon"? All the nations. So: are all the nations coming into the new Jerusalem, or are all the nations falling under God's judgment of the great harlot?

150. 52:31

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     Those questions are completely resolved —

151. 52:34

     Pastor Adriel

     Right.

152. 52:34

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     If you read "the nations" as people from all nations. In Revelation 5:9, it says — how does it go? Tribes, nations, peoples —

153. 52:45

     Michael Horton

     "Purchased for God with his blood, men from every tribe, kindred, and tongue, and people" — and made them, plural, to be a singular kingdom.

154. 52:56

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     That's nice.

155. 52:57

     Pastor Adriel

     There it is. Our view is the biblical view.

156. 53:01

     Michael Horton

     Well, it always is.

157. 53:02

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     That's right.

158. 53:03

     Pastor Adriel

     I genuinely love going to Revelation 5:9 on this, because Scripture really is its own best interpreter. And Calvin in his commentary on Matthew 28 reads it as a gentile inclusion — Jesus has not been going to the Gentiles, and now he's saying: go to the Gentiles, invite the nations in.

159. 53:25

     Pastor Adriel

     Revelation 5:9 — the saints singing: "Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God." Then John gives us this partitive genitive: "from every tribe and language and people and nation." And as you said, Mike: "and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth."

160. 53:42

     Pastor Adriel

     We've covered a lot of ground. One of my goals was to address some of the criticisms. Dave, I mentioned earlier that one common misrepresentation is the claim that you're saying your view of two kingdoms is identical to Calvin's. Anybody who's read you knows that's not what you've been saying at all. We need to be more careful in trying to apply their thought to our context today — and to think through some of these bigger questions with nuance.

161. Pastor Adriel

     We didn't get to go as deep as we might have liked — but I really appreciate your time.

162. Pastor Adriel

     My hope is that as people think about their earthly citizenship and their heavenly citizenship, they take comfort in the fact that Jesus is giving us a kingdom. We're not bringing it down. We're not building it from the ground up. Christ himself is giving us a kingdom that cannot be shaken, through the proclamation of the gospel. And that kingdom is advancing.

163. 55:16

     Pastor Adriel

     Sometimes, as that message goes out, the church is in a difficult place — suffering, persecution. Sometimes she enjoys more freedom. We have enjoyed extraordinary freedoms here in the United States, for which we should give thanks to God. But God does not owe us any of it. There is a lost world to reach, and he has given us a gospel — good news to proclaim to that world.

164. Pastor Adriel

     Grateful to get to do this alongside you brothers. Thank you for your time.

165. 55:27

     Dr. David VanDrunen

     Thanks, Adriel.