Grace Economics (2) (4)
“When you come to the land which the LORD your God is giving you, and possess it and dwell in it, and say, ‘I will set a king over me like all the nations that are around me,’ you shall surely set a king over you whom the LORD your God chooses; one from among your brethren you shall set as king over you; you may not set a foreigner over you, who is not your brother.” Deuteronomy 17.14, 15
The role of the king
There is certainly a role for national government in the Kingdom economy outlined in God’s Law. But only as long as that government acknowledges and pursues a grace agenda as its operating framework.
That is, only as that government—national government and all forms civil government—does its work as a servant of God for good.
A national government is important for such areas as national defense, maintaining a sound currency, facilitating transportation and commerce, and serving as a final bar of appeal as required in questions of justice. God allowed Israel to select a king because He understood the important role of strong national leadership in creating and sustaining an economy of grace.
The primary roles of Israel’s king were two: First, he was to provide leadership for the nation in just wars against enemies, when these threatened the safety and security of the nation. Second, the king was to provide leadership by example in following the teachings of God’s Law. Each Israelite king was responsible to write out a copy of God’s Law in his own hand, to have his copy approved by the priests, and to read and meditate in God’s Law daily, that he might understand and practice the tenets of justice required by the economy of God’s Law.
We probably can’t imagine our national government today doing anything like that. But this is more likely to be the case if, at the individual, familial, congregational, and communal level, people are discovering the power of grace through the medium of God’s Law to change their greedy and selfish ways and make them more considerate of one another.
Purpose of our national government
The objective of America’s national government, as expressed in the preamble to our Constitution, is “to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common Defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity…”
Here there is no direct mention of material wealth. The objectives outlined in the United States Constitution are appropriate to the limited role of national government which the Founders envisioned, and much more in line with an economics of justice and freedom than an economics of material prosperity. The Constitution was drafted not to spread the wealth around, but to maintain a national framework of justice and opportunity against all threats, domestic and international, a framework where each person exercised responsible choices, cared for his neighbor, contributed to his community, and practiced the rights and privileges with which he had been endowed by his Creator.
And it is not insignificant that, on the outer frieze of our nation’s highest court, the Law of God is the central and highest image. But our government, as Christopher Caldwell and others have shown, has steadily drifted from its legal moorings into a maelstrom of clashing forces.
Effects of increased national government
Would we say that our national government today has brought us to “a more perfect Union”? Given the fact that our society is riven along so many lines—economic, political, racial, and generational—it’s clear that self-interest and economic advantage are more the norm and aspiration of the American people than justice and neighbor love. The stronger our central government grows, and the more it refuses to look to the wisdom of God’s Law, the more the national fabric unravels.
The nation is divided against itself in a struggle for material and political advantage. Would we say that this government is primarily concerned to “establish Justice” when, in fact, no working definition of justice is agreed upon by the different political factions?
Our government works to “insure domestic Tranquility,” but such peace and peace of mind seems a pipe dream to most Americans.
The national government has done a good job in working to “provide for the common defence” of the republic, although our international relations too often reflect the demands of material prosperity over those of grace and truth, and military misadventures have discredited the government’s ability to perform its defensive duty.
Increasingly, national government takes a far too aggressive view of what it means “to promote the general Welfare.” The reams and reams of regulations, codes, and other forms of public policy by which the national government seeks to spread the wealth around are more a hindrance to “the Blessings of Liberty” than a help.
And as for “our Posterity”—the future of the nation—the government sponsors one of the least effective programs of education in the developed world, plunders the inheritances of heirs, permits the wanton sacrifice of unborn generations, turns a blind eye to unhealthy excesses, and routinely puts the overall wellbeing of the financial economy in doubt by its policies of taxation and regulation.
We need a national government, to be sure, and in the grace economy of God’s Law, national governments are no less important than local governments. However, we need a government more like that envisioned in God’s Law and established by the Founders of this nation, and less like the one that presently is devoting the majority of its efforts to ensure that material prosperity is the privilege and possession of those who are friendly or useful to partisan agendas.
Grace in our natural government is slipping away, and this is reason for concern.
For reflection
1. What were the two primary roles of a king in ancient Israel? Read Deuteronomy 17.14-20. What warnings did God set forth for central governments?
2. What is the Christian’s role in working to help shape the course of the government at all levels of society? What can we do?
3. Suggest some ways that a local church can help to equip its members for more responsible Kingdom living with respect to our political responsibilities.
Next steps—Conversation: Are governments a reflection of the people they serve, or are the people they serve a reflection of the government that rules them? How would you answer this question? Talk with a friend about it.
T. M. Moore
If you have found this meditation helpful, take a moment and give thanks to God. Then share what you learned with a friend. This is how the grace of God spreads (2 Cor. 4.15).
Other columns of interest this week: In our Scriptorium series on Ephesians we will work through chapter 3. Our Read Moorepodcast takes up the question of what it means to “know” Jesus. Do we really know Him? This week our Crosfigell teaching lettertraces the beginnings of Brigit’s ministry in 6th-century Ireland. Click here to see all the other columns and writers available to you.
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Except as indicated, all Scriptures are taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
