A Kentucky Court Clerk and Romans 13

            So, there’s this court clerk in Kentucky who is refusing to issue marriage licenses because she, as a Christian, doesn’t believe she can have her name stamped on a marriage license for a gay couple.  It’s doubtful that this blog is the first that you’ve heard about this.  She’s gone about this the right way, I believe.  She’s made her stand in love for one thing.  No hateful diatribes, no screaming matches with anybody (as far as I’ve read in the news anyways).  She even went out and gave a bottle of water to one of her LGBT opponents sitting in the heat outside.  Speak the truth but in love (Ephesians 4:15).  Also, she’s not discriminating.  The Supreme Court says the government can’t discriminate in handing out marriage licenses.  So she’s stopped handing out any. Gay or straight.

            It’s a losing battle of course. Which is a shame.  Sure, the law is the law, but if she can risk her job and everything that she’s worked for, then so could that judge who jailed her today. And then the politicians could have gotten behind him.  It could have been a snowballing effect of people standing for truth.  But it isn’t and it won’t be.  Ultimately she will stand alone with only you and me to cheer her from the sidelines.  It’s a losing battle, yet she fights.  Why?  Because any battle fought for Christ, even if a losing battle in the temporal short-term, is always a winning battle in the Kingdom of God.  Her reward will be greater than mine for all she’s going through (2 Corinthians 4:17).  Few of us can imagine the stress she’s under.  Personally, I applaud her. 

            But this all raises a very interesting issue, which has been brought out by most media outlets: the tension between being a person of faith, and being a public servant.  This tension is not new in American democracy, although with the secularization of our society the tension has been more visible; more palpable.  One article I read pointed out that Romans 13 commands Christians to be obedient to the laws of civil government.  This, the article claimed, was another example of Christian hypocrisy as we pick and choose which parts of the Bible to follow.  This is a powerful argument against the stand this clerk is taking.  How does it square with the Christian values she has espoused?  How does it square with the sermon from Sunday?

            Well, let’s look at it like this: if we take this passage in Romans like that article claimed we should, and always be completely obedient to civil government, than what of the Boston tea partiers?  Surely they considered themselves devout Christians, even as they protested tea taxes by dumping tea in the harbor.  For that matter what about George Washington, Paul Revere, or any other of the thousands of Christians who rebelled against their civil government during the American Revolution.  How about the many Christian women who defied government in support of women’s suffrage?  Or how about the civil rights movement?  Was Dr. King - himself a minister - violating Scripture when he fought for equal rights?  Do we honestly believe that the African American community should have just silently and obediently suffered oppression indefinitely?  Do we believe that God would have preferred that?  I, for one, do not believe that.  Nor do I believe that any of these past patriots violated Biblical teaching in making their stands against the injustices of their societies and their government.  So how do we square it?  We do so by looking at all of Scripture, not just a single passage.

            We won’t point out everything, since this blog is already getting long and we still have a ways to go yet; so we’ll just point out a few of the more prominent examples.  There’s Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego who refused to worship the golden image and were thrown into the fiery furnace.  Daniel ignored a law not to pray to anyone but the Emperor and was thrown into the lion’s den for it.  Peter and John were told by the religious government to stop preaching in the name of Jesus and were flogged for ignoring it.  All of these examples are held up as examples of Godly behavior and courage.  Every credible commentator understands Paul’s injunction in Romans 13 (Paul was martyred for ignoring Roman laws against Christianity, by the way) as applying only so long as those laws do not conflict with Gods law.  When Government law has been contrary to God’s law, Believers have been expected to stand firm in their opposition. 

           However, the more specific question here is about participating in government.  It’s one thing to be outside government and standing up to it.  It’s another thing to be in government and participating in it by virtue of your job description.  Does a person have to choose between their faith and a job in government?  As freedom loving Americans we are loath to say yes.  Those who think this clerk should “just do her job” should ask just how freedom loving they are.  Unfortunately, the answer may in fact be yes.  Not because I believe it should be that way; but because I believe that that is simply the way it’s become.  For example, while a Muslim who would have to shut down a government office five times a day for prayer would be likely be accommodated, the exact same accommodation would not be given to a Christian without a media firestorm (if Christianity required that, that is).  (It should be noted that many counties are trying to find ways to accommodate the law while allowing objecting clerks to opt out.  But many lawyers say that even this will eventually run up against the legal system).  The plain fact is this:  Christianity is no longer an acceptable religion to our culture or to many in our government.  The time may be fast approaching when Christians can no longer participate in our government through certain government positions, such as a county clerk, or a justice of the peace for example.  And that list is sure to grow.

             But if we don’t participate, then how can we hope to change things?  Well, we still have the vote, for one thing.  But let’s look again at the example of the early church.  Because they were persecuted, and living in a pagan culture with a pagan government, Christians tended to stay out of government almost completely.  There were a few here and there, and maybe more who didn’t admit their faith.  But for the most part you would have been hard pressed to find many Christians in a government job in the first 300 years of the Church.  They simply didn’t feel that such a job was compatible with their faith, and they choose to stay out of them.  And then came Constantine, the first Christian emperor who declared Christianity mainstream.  You know what Christians did to help make that happen? Absolutely nothing.  God did that without our participation and he can do it again here.  (Disclaimer: prayer was undoubtedly involved).  Although, if you believe we are living in the last days then nothing is going to change it. 

            Should she have just resigned?  I’m not sure I have that answer.  Perhaps she should have, but perhaps God has told her to make this stand so as to be a public witness for Him.  You’d be surprised how a Christian standing against long odds for their faith can influence people.  When people see that someone else has found something worth fighting and dying for it makes them curious.  And people’s opinions can be changed when they see someone going through what this clerk is going through.  When they see someone calmly standing up, despite severe opposition.  It’s been noted by historians that people’s feelings about the civil rights movement began to change when they saw marchers being pelted with stones and blasted with fire hoses.  So perhaps God is using this as an opportunity for something.  Perhaps she was going to resign - wants to resign – but God has commanded her otherwise and she is being obedient.

            And we must be obedient.  Obedient to continue in prayer for our nation and its leaders.  For our state and its leaders.  Our city and its leaders.  And we must come together in prayer for this clerk; for the judicial system she’ll be interacting with; for the politicians who have an opportunity to stand behind her.  And (brace yourself) that God would count each of us worthy to suffer for our Lord (Acts 5:41; Philippians 1:29; 3:10).  If we think we’re up to it. 

Is Biblical Marriage What You Think?

In her April 30^th article, Biblical Marriage is not What You Think, Rebecca Todd Peters brings up some very interesting points about how marriage is depicted in the Bible.  Points that might have some readers nodding their heads and wondering what the Christian answer might be to such things, if indeed there are answers.  Well there are answers, and in the interest of informed conversation it's important for readers to have those answers.  (You can read Ms. Peters’s post here).  There are a number of very serious flaws in Ms. Peters’s article that need to be explored.

            The first problem is the definition of “Biblical” that underlies Ms. Peters’s thesis.  She seems to define something as “Biblical” simply by it being in the Bible.  But this is not what Christians mean when they say that something is, or is not, “Biblical” (when using it in the sense of moral acceptability).  A more accurate definition would be to say that something is Biblical if it can be shown to have God’s approval.  Ms. Peters cites several examples of essentially negative expressions of marriage throughout the Old Testament but without regard to whether or not God has given these expressions His approval. 

            She's correct when she says that Christians use the example of Adam and Eve as proof that marriage is between one man and one woman.  She then makes the following statement: “Unfortunately, these folks must have stopped reading their Bibles at the end of Genesis, chapter two. Even a cursory reading of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament demonstrates that marriage was not understood or practiced in any way related to the modern idealism we have superimposed on this text.”  Her next paragraph is a list of all the ways that marriage was understood by people in the Old Testament.  Really, none of these assertions are false.  But how these folks understood and expressed marriage does not equate to approval by God.  Remember, God doesn't always smite or verbally admonish everybody who acts in a way he doesn't care for, and just because we don't see Him doing that, doesn't necessarily imply His approval.

            The first thing to understand is that Christian theology sees a fundamental shift in human nature after the garden.  While in the garden man and woman enjoyed a perfect existence, with everything functioning just as God had intended.  But after Adam and Eve’s disobedience sin entered into the equation of human nature.  Humankind now did things the way they wanted, rather than the way God wanted.  This is why Christians will point to Adam and Eve as an example of Biblical marriage; because at this point in the Biblical narrative things are still operating according to God’s principles.  Each of Ms. Peters’s examples comes after sin has entered world.  In the garden, God made one man and one woman and joined them in marriage.  He did not make one man and two, three or more women, or vice versa.  In the Garden there were no politics or any property rights to be had.  The sole purpose of marriage was companionship and partnership.

            Moving on from there we come to Lamech in Genesis 4:19-24.  This is not mentioned in Ms. Peters’s article but we mention it here because it is the first example of Polygamy in the Bible.  It is significant to our point because Lamech was not a nice man.  He is a murderer without remorse; we can hardly take him as a positive example.

            Ms. Peters does use the example of Abraham who, by the suggestion of Sarah, his wife, consorted with Sarah’s maidservant in order to finally have a child.  Whether or not this was culturally acceptable is irrelevant to whether or not this is an example of “Biblical” marriage.  What is relevant is whether or not it has God’s approval, which it clearly doesn’t.  While the union does produce a child it also produces discord among the household (which is not an indication of blessing), God does not make Ishmael the child of the promise but keeps that status for whom it was intended (Isaac), and after this it is 13 years before Abraham hears from God again.

            It is surprising that Ms. Peters does not cite Jacob.  Would not a Biblical patriarch make the perfect example?  Not always.  Even the Patriarchs did things displeasing to God and the Bible is faithful to not gloss over their mistakes.  There is no indication that entering into marriage with two women was something God had intended.  An important contrast is that when Abraham’s servant goes to seek a wife for Isaac he prays for God to lead him to the right woman (singular, by the way), whereas Jacob does no such thing.  And if we look at children as indications of blessing in this narrative it certainly seems that God is blessing the first wife – the first marriage.

            Ms. Peters does reference the marriage of a Levitical priest and the horrendous events in Judges 19.  I would simply point out again that this is Humankind in their fallen state, and add that this takes place during a period when Israel was falling away from God.  Evidence of that is the priest himself who, rather than performing his duties where he was supposed to, was going around hiring himself out as a private priest to whatever family was willing to pay him.  Hardly an example of “Biblical” marriage – or anything else “Biblical” for that matter.

            Solomon is another example Ms. Peters uses.  Certainly a much stronger example than she has used previously.  After all, God blessed the kingdom under his rule and blessed Solomon with great wisdom.  However, he is really just another example of a lack of divine approval for his (many) expressions of marriage.  His wives pulled him away from his devotion to God, and the blessings of the kingdom only continued because of God’s promise to Solomon’s father, rather than because of anything about Solomon. 

            What is most interesting is that, while her post is directed at Christians, Ms. Peters makes no mention of New Testament passages, other than a brief summary of some words from Jesus (which we will deal with shortly).  After all, it is the belief in these texts as authoritative that distinguish Christians as Christians.  Jesus, for example, emphasizes the importance of marriage when he tightens the restrictions on divorce in Matthew 5.  And whenever he talks about marriage the words used always indicate one man and one women.  He never talks about the proper relationship between a man and his wives.  

            And let’s not forget Paul.  1 Corinthians 7:2-4 teaches that marriage is to be monogamous, heterosexual and with an equality between husband and wife.  So, even if we were to grant that Ms. Peters’s Old Testament interpretations were correct (which they aren’t), we see here that Christians are being given different set of marital ethics, since Jesus calls Humankind to live how God really intended rather than by how they had lived previously.

            In 1 Timothy 3:2 Paul teaches that leaders in the church, because they are an example to others, must “be the husband of one wife…”  Anything that is considered an example is considered something to emulate.  So if this is the standard for leaders it is the standard for the rest of us.

            Now, as to Ms. Peters’s summary of Jesus’s words, she says, in part: “He encouraged people to leave their wives, children, parents and families in order to follow him (Lk 18:28-30); encouraged followers to reject their families (Lk 14:26); and challenged conventional notions of family (Mt 10:34-39).   First of all, her reference to Matthew 10 has nothing to do with challenging conventional marriage.  It is basically saying the same thing as the two passages she mentions from Luke.  And what Ms. Peters fails to understand is that Jesus is using Hyperbole.  Hyperbole is an exaggeration (without deceit) to drive home a point.  What Jesus is emphasizing here is that our central relationship needs to be with him; that the strength of all our other relationships comes from that centrality.  Leaving our families, and setting one member against another both speaks to that centrality and provides a warning that accepting Christ, in some families, will cause problems; but we are to hold fast to our relationship with Christ. That is how these verses have been interpreted since he said them.  It is Ironic that Ms. Peters offers a prayer against literalists, since throughout her article, and certainly here, she has interpreted Scripture in exactly the literal way she claims to detest.  In reality, a proper “literal” interpretation means that passages are interpreted in light of both the genre and communication device being used (such as hyperbole), and in context.  Ms. Peters ignores all of those, choosing to interpret with a form of literalism rarely seen outside circles of extreme fundamentalism.

            One would have expected that this article was written by someone unreligious, using only anecdotal knowledge of Scripture.  But given Ms. Peters’s extensive academic background and impressive resume in the area of Biblical studies, it is unfathomable how she could use such clearly flawed exegesis in her arguments.  Even chalking it up to differences of conservatism and liberalism in our respective approaches cannot account for this.  One has to wonder why, if she is so disgusted by Jesus teachings, that she would chose to label herself as a Christian social ethicist.

            Ms. Peters is correct when she says that the truth of the Bible is its “message of justice and love as moral norms for humankind…”  Let us just be thankful that it is God’s Justice, love, and moral norms, and not Ms. Peters’s.