Three Kinds of Worldliness

True Faith Must Always Be The Hope For Our Nation

The recent American Reformer piece on the theology of Preston Sprinkle reminded me of the ongoing Ryan Turnipseed affair in my own Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS). One of Turnipseed’s main accusers, an LCMS layman, believes that desires for homosexual activity, prostitution, and even bestiality are not sinful in themselves. The other main accuser, a purported conservative Lutheran pastor, believes that Jesus himself was tempted to homosexual activity.

As shocking as I found these claims to be, it also reminds me of certain theologians that have the ear of very prominent leaders in the LCMS. In recent years the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) theologian Steve Paulson, a prominent disciple of the late Gerhard Forde, has written for a number of publications for the LCMS’s publisher, Concordia Publishing House, including the edition of Luther’s Large Catechism that Turnipseed criticized. Paulson, whose influence in LCMS seminaries cannot be denied, follows Forde in denying that the Ten Commandments are eternal and that sanctification is progressive. He also states that Jesus Christ committed his own personal sin.

And what about the Christian nationalism espoused by men like Turnipseed? If God says He is going to judge the nations, shouldn’t they be Christian? For many, this can’t even be considered. According to a conservative Lutheran pastor I know, Christian nationalism must simply be equated with “Progressive Critical Social Theories,” called evil, and repudiated in the strongest possible terms. My online friend would likely answer a question like the following in the affirmative: “Will God judge a country like America for being insincere; for essentially ‘using Christianity’ for its own temporal ends?”

This man’s view also reminds me of men like Russel Moore, no friend of Christian nationalism himself. In comments that in retrospect can be seen to foreshadow his current views, Moore in 2011 went so far as to say that the belief that a life without temptation would be better “entails surrender to each of the temptations [Jesus faced] – to provide for my own needs, to protect myself from danger, to exalt myself as lord.”¹ 

Moore’s simplistic thinking has bewitched many. And my sense is that all the bad theology discussed above is largely driven not just by timidity in confronting the world but by a desire to be accepted by.

Fundamentally, men like Moore are incorrect: a life without temptation will be better. For example, the Psalmist prays that those who do evil would not be permitted to molest and entice Israel – and even that they would be finally removed from her presence (Psalm 125, note also Luke 22:40, John 17:15, 2. Thes. 3:3, and Rom. 14:13)! This does not contradict, but goes hand-in-hand with a deep awareness of one’s own sin. So, contra Moore, we should, confident in the hope of eternal life and in the Spirit’s power, unashamedly look to provide for ours and others’ earthly needs (I Tim. 5:8, Prov. 13:22, I Thes. 4:12), to protect ourselves and those under our care from danger (Exod. 22:2, Neh. 4:18, Luke 11:21), and to seek to guide and rule wisely with godly power as we are given the responsibility and authority to do so (note Joseph, Daniel, and passages like Luke 19:17!).

God will not necessarily judge a country for “using Christianity” for its own temporal ends. After all, even as Christians cry out to God for their salvation in the life to come on the basis of His certain promise, those such as Jacob and the Canaanite woman also wrestled with Him on behalf of their own peoples’ well-being in this life. Applied to matters of good earthly governance, the real temptation of Christians is not to put their trust in men per se – for God’s people rightly did so with Moses (Exodus 14:31). On the contrary, the danger is to be under the sway of leaders energized by one kind of worldliness or another. These leaders are those the Apostle Paul speaks of in 1 Corinthians 10, who “set [their] hearts on evil things”, who practice idolatry and sexual immorality, and lead us down paths of destruction, subtly or not. It is in this specific context we are told that God will not give us more than we can bear! With that in mind, let’s take a look at three kinds of worldliness we must not be led into.

Knowing Our Enemies Within and Without: Three Kinds of Worldliness

The first kind of worldliness seems content with the outward forms and practices of the Christian religion or its theistic competitors. 

Here the commands of the Creator God are followed apart from faith in Jesus Christ, with social conformity that results in success and comfort – and sometimes good order – being primary concerns. Hence, this external conformance to the commandments’ moral and ceremonial aspects is ultimately a seeking of one’s own well-earned status: respect, honor, and glory in this world, among those one cares to please, apart from the divine love. In Colossians 2:20, the Apostle Paul shows impatience for Christians who, as though they still belonged to the world, lose sight of the fact that  “[they] died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world.” Here the ‘elemental spiritual forces’ should be understood as the first principles of all natural religion in the best sense, the ABCs of the “enchanted world” so to speak. Again, this would mean they are practicing conformity to the signs of God’s created order and the corresponding religious impulses of man yet apart from Christ (or at least the real Christ; see 2 Corinthians 11), and hence without true faith in God (Romans 14). Here, heaven is basically an afterthought – though less so where Scriptural influence remains strong – and assumed to be a reward for one’s powers and works. We can call this first group, more widespread in the past but remaining present in certain pockets today, the Christ-Haunted.

The second kind of worldliness is that of the New Natural Lawyers, and theirs is similar to the first, although it need not appear outwardly religious at all. 

These will for the most part follow the second table of the Ten Commandments, at least in their personal life. Due to their suppression of the first table of God’s law many will waffle regarding issues like abortion and homosexual practice even if some of them, like Paul Gottfried presumably, will not:

“No decent, human society can survive that does not accept certain moral foundations. These principles we must assume are universally valid and can be known through moral reasoning. The alternative to such assumptions is doing what our political, educational, and media masters are now doing: e.g., forbidding the public to use gender-specific pronouns to refer to biologically distinct genders, operating on children to change their genders, and treating homosexual unions as the preferred conjugal state.”

Regardless, such men will tend to show some appreciation for those who take their religion and its practices seriously. In addition, in spite of inconsistencies, they for the most part respond positively to the ideas of permanence in nature, natural limits, hierarchy, severe skepticism of man’s goodness, and the idea of the Divine – even if this is associated with gods that are understood to be far weaker than the biblical God, assuming they have any real personal qualities at all. Ultimately, they will respect tradition, perhaps even religious ceremony, insofar as they believe it will help them – and the freedom-conscious ones they identify with – to attain a successful and comfortable life in this world. Nevertheless, without the true God or even the external trappings of the true religion most all of this kind of pragmatically-oriented group ends up, culturally and politically, being “controlled opposition” to the final group.

The final group can be identified with what we today associate with the Woke, which draws heavily from the Platonic, Gnostic, and Hegelian traditions, and this is the one that is most rapidly growing in the apostatizing Western nations today. 

These Woke Idealists, ever increasingly represented among leaders in politics, media, and academia, are those who are willing to more or less completely shun both tables of God’s law in favor of their own idealistic principles born of their feelings-directed and Hegelian-dialectic-oriented fever dreams. Many will hold to their principles tightly, religiously even, and these tend to be formed in accordance with what they believe to be evolving norms in accordance with “the right side of history”. For them, things like words and art function primarily as power tools, and it is not so much that knowledge is power but power itself is knowledge. Gnostic at its core, these also have less respect for the value of the body and the entire created order (even as they too cannot ultimately escape the importance of hierarchy). As this movement is not only directly opposed to the created order and classical Christianity but any notion at all that there is persisting truth across the ages, it must ultimately, ironically, demand complete universal conformity to what often appear to be the seemingly arbitrary commands that its relentless Zeitgeist issues. These disruptions will ultimately only serve a few, those who aim to control the chaotic fires they can fan into flames in the fireplaces of their own making. In this way, human hope will reach fulfillment, with real unity and harmony on earth being a realistic goal.² The Bible says that “if possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” And yet, given the powerful anti-Christian and even anti-creation religious impulse at work here, how can that be done?

Like Aaron Renn’s three worlds framework, I simply consider these categories a helpful tool. These appear to be the main system approaches that we find ourselves facing and being tempted by in such a time as this.

Lutherans and Other Protestants Have the Resources to Fight This

In truth, each of these systems of worldliness discussed above has at the very least been influenced by Christianity and is hence Christ-Haunted. Christians, with an eye to God’s glory, must rise above this hauntedness, fully embracing not only God’s commandments but the true Reason or Logos behind them – Christ! For all genuine Christian thinking about good society and politics must exist side-by-side with the truth that it is faith in Jesus Christ which overcomes the world (1 John 5:4; Galatians 6:14).³, including the visible church. Those who do not believe in Christ as their only Savior are only part of the kingdom of the world, even if they are part of the visible church. They are—and must be—ruled by the law with its threats and promises to preserve outward peace. By contrast, those who believe in Christ are and remain in the kingdom of Christ, even as they discharge their duties in their worldly occupations as pastors, congregants, parents, children, citizens, and government officials for the benefit of their neighbor. AE 45:93-94.” Found here: https://lutheranpress.com/products/living-as-christians-in-a-fallen-world-in-love-and-equity]

The Bible assures us that men become increasingly evil, having the nerve to assert that there is no God, calling good evil and evil good, and not even being able to detect their sin. The apostle Paul also informs us that some sins are so particularly heinous that they should not even be mentioned among the people of God (Ephesians 5:12). Even if one thinks America is already beyond saving, can we continually allow our country to do this to itself? Must a strong, fatherly kind of love not be shown to our neighbors?!

It must, and the contemporary Lutherans I mentioned above are simply not being faithful to their own tradition, which offers us good help! They indeed have the theological resources to fight these ever-present and increasingly strong worldly temptations that continue to penetrate our spaces and places. Faithful Lutherans have always upheld God’s law as eternal, vigorously encouraged the pursuit of sanctification, and also contributed much to Christian political thought, for example, in the 1550 Magdeburg Confession. Let’s quickly look at each of these things in turn. 

Even if some known as the Radical Lutherans insist that Martin Luther defined the law by its effect, maintaining that the “essence of the law” is that it accuses of sin, Luther in fact maintained that the law of God is eternal and applies to all men throughout all eras. Moreover, following another part of Romans 13, the fulfillment of the law and true love, that is love in line with God’s own character, go hand in hand (see here and here for more). Attempting to resist the encroaching liberalism of the 1960s, theological fighters like John Warwick Montgomery re-affirmed this, stating that speaking of love was of little help unless that love had a specific form.

Going along with how God’s commands do not change, a man I follow on “X” recently made the following statement: “Be careful you don’t idolize marriage. [Y]our country. [Y]our family. [Y]our job. [Y]our vocations. The introspection that results makes people think their natural desires are evil. They worry that desiring anything pertaining to this life is wrong. It leads to quietism and nihilism.” His statement prompted me to respond in the following way: “Yes, just because our every desire is infected by sin doesn’t mean that a desire itself, its form, is evil…” In other words, again, before we talk about the fatal infection of our desires by sin, we must say that these desires, in accordance with God’s good gifts, are by nature good. Both love and desire are meant to have a specific form!

Indeed, even though Martin Luther never tired of pointing out the imperfection of our works in this life, he also was clear that  “…It is said improperly, that is, not rightly and not fittingly, that we are obliged to do what is impossible by the law….” This is why the 1580 Lutheran Formula of Concord, in its article on the “Third Use of the Law”, asserts that our “imperfect and impure” good works are acceptable to God through Christ.⁴ In this way Christians are not under the Law, but under grace, because by faith in Christ the persons are freed from the curse and condemnation of the Law; and because their good works, although they are still imperfect and impure, are acceptable to God through Christ; moreover, because so far as they have been born anew according to the inner man, they do what is pleasing to God, not by coercion of the Law, but by the renewing of the Holy Ghost, voluntarily and spontaneously from their hearts.”

“Spontaneously” here should not be understood to mean without effort, but rather be seen as the normal “working out” of a Christian piety that has been trained up in habits of godliness. As Matt Cochran puts it, …’spontaneously’ does not mean ‘without effort’ for a creature whose God-given nature is to work. Naturally does not mean ‘without instruction’ for a creature whose God-given nature is to learn…”]  

Relatedly, when it comes to these matters of spurring the Christian on to sanctification, Martin Luther himself was certainly not shy about admonishing and exhorting Christians to embrace the lives they had been given in Christ, namely, to “make duty a pleasure”. C.F.W. Walther, the founder of the LCMS, encouraged the pastors he trained this way: “…all true Christians are of such a nature that one can accomplish all kinds of things in them through urgent exhortation. So many preachers accomplish so little… because they do not exhort, but rather demand, command, threaten and rebuke.”⁵ 

And for Lutherans of the earliest times, all of this eagerness for God’s law to go forth carried over into the civil realm as well. Martin Luther asserted that “God intends the secular Regiment to be a model of… the kingdom of heaven”. The “second Martin”, Martin Chemnitz, the primary author of the Formula of Concord, said that [t]he first duty of a ruler is to care for those who are subject to him, so that they may ‘live in godliness,’ that is, this first concern must be for their religion.” 

In between Martin Luther and Martin Chemnitz, other Lutherans were responsible for making what is arguably the first defense for what would later be termed “the Doctrine of the Lesser Magistrate”. When the faithful Lutheran city of Magdeburg was being besieged by the Holy Roman Emperor, they looked not to Romans 13, but Acts 5: “We must obey God, not men.” Is the head who murders his subjects really doing so as God-appointed and God-approved ruler? No government should especially think that it can prevent Christians from giving God the worship that honors Him! The 1550 Magdeburg Confession speaks of the disobedience of the Hebrew midwives towards Pharaoh and cites other biblical examples as well, noting that the government that God establishes is always meant to honor those who do good and punish those who do evil!

These Lutherans, to be sure, were not quietists! Rather, in the midst of great tribulation and temptation, they made a most valuable contribution to the history of Protestant political thought.

Conclusion

The world is tempting Christians with satanic evil like never before. As Aaron Renn points out, we are no longer, to say the least, a high trust society. That does not mean, however, that Christians cannot fight the temptation to fear the world – the Christ-Haunted, the New Natural Lawyers, and this generation’s cadre of particularly rabid Woke Idealists – and strive to create spaces and places where trust in the Providence and goodness of God abounds, spilling over the walls of the church into their wider communities! 

The Lamb of God has taken away our sins, freeing us from its power, death, and the devil! Christians are those who know that they have been buried with Christ in baptism and raised to a new life, a life of true freedom, in Him. So let we who are fathers begin in our own homes, in our own kingdoms, teaching our children to treasure the life we now have as the gift that it is – something worth fighting and dying for! Cry out to Him! Do so for the godly preservation of all His earthly gifts, just like Jacob and the Canaanite woman did! In this way we will, in these last days when the love of many will grow cold, bring the love of God that fulfills His commandments into the hearts and minds of men.

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