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Schaeffer on Confronting the
State
"The civil government, as all of life, stands
under the Law of God. In this fallen world God has given us certain
offices to protect us from the chaos which is the natural result of
that fallenness. But when any office commands that which is contrary
to the Word of God, those who hold that office abrogate their
authority and they are not to be obeyed. And that includes the
state. ... God has ordained the stat3e as a delegated authority; it
is not autonomous. The state is to be an agent of justice, to
restrain evil by punishing the wrongdoer, and to protect the good in
society. When it does the reverse, it has no proper authority. It is
then a usurped authority and as such it becomes lawless and is
tyranny. ... But what is to be done when the state does that which
violates its legitimate function? The early Christians died because
they would not obey the state in a civil matter. People often say to
us that the early church did not show any civil disobedience. They
do not know church history. Why were the Christians in the Roman
Empire thrown to the lions? ... You had to worship Caesar as a sign
of your loyalty to the state. The Christians said they would not
worship Caesar, anybody, or anything, but the living God. Thus to
the Roman Empire they were rebels, and it was civil disobedience.
That is why they were thrown to the lions. ... (p. 92)
"The State must be made to feel the presence
of the Christian community. ... We must make people aware that this
is not a political game, but totally crucial and serious. And we
must also demonstrate to people that there is indeed a proper bottom
line. To repeat: the bottom line is that at a certain point there is
not only the right, but the duty, to disobey the state. ... We must
make definite that we are in no way talking about any kind of a
theocracy. ... In the Old Testament there was a theocracy commanded
by God. In the New Testament, with the church being made up of Jews
and Gentiles, and spreading over all the known world from India to
Spain in one generation the church was its own entity. There is no
New Testament basis for a linking of church state until Christ, the
King returns. ... We must not confuse the Kingdom of God with our
country. To say it another way: 'We should not wrap Christianity in
our national flag.' ... (120-1)
"If there is no final place for civil
disobedience, then the government has been put in the place of the
Living God, because then you are to obey it even when it tells you
in its own way at that time to worship Caesar. And that point is
exactly where the early Christians performed their acts of civil
disobedience even when it cost them their lives." (130
Francis A. Schaeffer, A Christian Manifesto,
Crossway Books, 1981.
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