The idea of separation from the state and from all participation in civil affairs, was universal among Christians for the first two or three hundred years. That then they began to grow worldly, apostatized from fidelity to God, lost faith in him, formed alliance with the civil power, became supporters of human government and imbibed the spirit of the civil institutions with which they affiliated.

Table of Contents

Preface
Intro
The Relation of the Divine to the Human
Changing the Government of God
What Human Governments Do for Man
The Relation of the Human to the Divine
Wicked Men and Nations, God’s Servants and Ordinances
Tophet, or Hell, Is Ordained of God
Cyrus
Conclusion

Preface

The writer of the following pages was early in life impressed with the idea that God as the Creator, and preserver of the world, was its only rightful law-maker and ruler. And that all the evil that afflicted humanity and the world, had arisen from a failure on the part of man to whom the rule of the earth had been committed by God, to maintain in its purity and sovereignty the authority and dominion of God as the only rule of this world. From the Bible he learned man had sinned against God, that an element of discord and confusion had hence entered into the world, and the world was out of harmonious relations with God and the universe. This being true, it early occurred to his mind, that the one sure and sovereign remedy for these evils, was the absolute submission to God on the part of man, and a restoration of his authority and rule in all the domains of the world. In the study of the Bible, he saw the one purpose of God, as set forth in that book, was to bring man back under his own rule and government so to re-establish his authority and rule on earth, that God’s will “shall be done on earth as it is in Heaven.”

To this end, man’s duty is to learn the will of God, and trustingly do that will, leaving results and events with God. It became a fixed principle with him, that in religion man must in faith do what God has ordained he should do, what he has declared would be well-pleasing to him; and then leave all in the hands of him who overrules the universe.

While I failed to see then as I now see, that religion embraced every duty and every relation of man and moulds every thought, purpose and action of his being, the feeling would creep into my mind that even in political affairs man should do only what God commanded him. Finally the years of sectional strife, war, bloodshed, destruction and desolation swept over our land, and the spectacle was presented, of disciples of the Prince of Peace, with murderous weapons seeking the lives of their fellowmen. Brethren for whom Christ died, children of him who came to heal the broken-hearted, to be a father to the fatherless and a husband to the widow, were found imbruing their hands in the blood of their own brethren in Christ, making their sisters widows and their sisters’ children orphans. It took but little thought to see that this course is abhorrent to the principles of the religion of the Savior, who died that even his enemies might live. He had plainly declared that his children could not fight with carnal weapons even for the establishment of his own Kingdom. Much less could they slay and destroy one another in the contentions and strivings of the kingdoms of this world. It took but little thought to see that Christians cannot fight, cannot slay one another or their fellowmen, at the behest of any earthly ruler, or to establish or maintain any human government. But if he cannot fight himself, can he vote to make another fight? What I lead or influence another to do, I do through that other. The man who votes to put another in a place or position, is in honor, bound to maintain him in that position, and is responsible for all the actions, courses or results that logically and necessarily flow from the occupancy and maintenance of that position. A man who votes to bring about a war, or that votes for that which logically and necessarily brings about war is responsible for that war and for all the necessary and usual attendants and results of that war.

But some may say, It is a Christian’s duty to vote against war and against that which will produce war. Yes, but how can he know which course will, or will not bring about war? Many men voted for secession of the States South, with a view that that was the only way to prevent war. Some thought separation, as between Abraham and Lot’s families, would end the strife that would be interminable within the Union. Others thought, argued and voted, If the Southern States show a united front there will be no war. If we are divided the division will invite war. So voted for secession to avoid war.

With these difficulties, inconsistencies and troubles lying in the way, I determined to take the Bible and as a wholly new question study the origin of human government, its relations to God, to man, to the church of Jesus Christ, and the connection of the Christian therewith and his duty to it. It did not take me long to reach a conclusion, which is given in the following pages. The study and constant review of the subject, the criticisms made of my writing on the subject have strengthened the conclusion, and leave me not a doubt as to its truthfulness.

The substance in this book was published in the GOSPEL ADVOCATE in the years 1866–67 — and again in Christian Quarterly, of current year. With the request that each reader will carefully and prayerfully examine the Scriptures of sacred truth, to see if these things are true, and if true accept the truth and courageously maintain it, the writer commends this volume and those who read it to the God of all grace and love.

David Lipscomb

The Origin, Mission, and Destiny of Civil Government, and the Christian’s Relation to It

We use the term CIVIL GOVERNMENT in this book as synonymous with HUMAN GOVERNMENT, in contradistinction to a government by God, or the DIVINE GOVERNMENT. The design in writing this book is to determine definitely the origin, mission, and destiny of human governments, their relation to God, and the relation the Church and the individual Christian sustain to them.

In the beginning God created the earth and all that therein is. Over the material world and all the lower creation, he gave man control.

“Let us make man in our own image, after our own likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.”
(Gen. 1:26)

“And the Lord God commanded the man.”
(Gen. 2:10)

Without reference to what the command was, this indicates that while God committed the government of the under-creation to man, he reserved to himself the right and prerogative of governing man. God would govern and guide man; man would govern the under-creation, and so the whole world would be held under the government of God, man immediately and the under-creation through man.

But, man refused to be governed by God. First as an individual he violated the specific command of God. “A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump.” This leaven of disobedience wrought the rejection of the Divine government, and was transmitted from the individual to the family, to the tribe, to the race. “While men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way.” When man was off his guard the enemy of God and man implanted the seeds of distrust and disaffection, and the heart, the mind and the life of man became disloyal to God.

“The serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die; for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods knowing good and evil.”
(Gen. 3:4–5)

The act of individual disobedience culminated in the effort of man to organize a government of his own, so that he himself might permanently conduct the affairs of earth, free from the control of God, and independent of God’s government. The first account we have of organized human government, is:

“And Cush begat Nimrod, he began to be a mighty one in the earth. * * * The beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.”
(Gen. 10:8)

Nimrod was the grandson of Ham, and the founder of the first government organized outside of the family institution, ordained by God from the beginning. Nimrod made other families tributary to himself, and established a kingdom of which he was the head. The declaration,

“Let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven, and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the earth,”
(Gen. 11:4)

shows the animus and the spirit of the movement, and that it was intended to resist the purpose of God to govern them and to distribute them over the face of the earth, and to maintain themselves in a government of their own organizing. The effort to unite themselves more closely than God’s rule united them, resulted in the confusion of their language and their division and dispersion. The design and purpose of this beginning of human government on earth was to oppose, counteract, and displace the government of God on earth.

The institution of human government was an act of rebellion and began among those in rebellion against God, with the purpose of superseding the Divine rule with the rule of man. Its founder was Nimrod, the grandson of Ham, whose family was accursed. In accordance with a well-defined principle of God’s over-ruling providence, the family of this founder has been the greatest sufferer by the institution which he originated. Josephus, with whatever credit he may be entitled to in reference to matters so remote, says that “Nimrod, the founder and leader, appealed to them that it was too humiliating and degrading for wise human beings capable of forming governments of their own, to submit to the government of another.” Josephus B. 1 ch. iiii says,

“When they flourished with a numerous youth, God admonished them to send out numerous colonies, but imagining that the prosperity they enjoyed was not derived from the favor of God, did not obey him. Now it was Nimrod who excited them to such affront and contempt of God * * * He also gradually changed the government into tyranny, seeing no other way of turning men from the fear of God, but to bring them into a constant dependence on his own power.”

This is quoted to show the government existed before Nimrod, else he could not CHANGE it. Undoubtedly the government instituted by God – the family government – existed. He changed this by subjugating a number of families and tribes into one government under himself. The quotation, so far as Josephus is authority in the matter, shows that the human government – and dependence upon that government for good – was the means adopted to wean them away from fidelity to God and his government, and it was instituted for the purpose of supplanting God’s government.

It is clear that human government had its origin in the rejection of the authority of God, and that it was intended to supersede the Divine government, and itself constituted the organized rebellion of man against God. This beginning of human government God called BABEL, confusion, strife. It introduced into the world the organized development and embodiment of the spirit of rebellion, strife and confusion among men. God christened it BABEL. It soon grew into the blood-thirsty, hectoring Babylon, and subjugated the surrounding families, tribes and kingdoms to its dominion, and became the first universal empire of the earth, and maintained its sway until the days of Daniel.

When we consider that God and the early inhabitants of the earth named things, persons, and institutions from their chief and distinguishing characteristic, it cannot be doubted that God intended in calling this first government established by man “confusion,” and in so speedily confusing the language of its founders, to foretell that the chief and necessary results flowing from the displacement of the Divine will and the establishment and perpetuation of human government, would be confusion, strife, bloodshed, and perpetual warfare in the world. The results have vindicated the truth of the prophecy couched in the name. The chief occupation of human governments from the beginning have been war. Nine-tenths of the taxes paid by the human family, have gone to preparing for, carrying on, or paying the expenses of war.

All the wars and strifes between tribes, races, nations, from the beginning until now, have been the result of man’s effort to govern himself and the world, rather than to submit to the government of God. I am not intimating in this that human government is not necessary. I believe that it is necessary, and that God has ordained it as a punishment to man for refusing to submit to the government of God, and it must exist so long as the human family, or any considerable portion of it, refuses to submit to the government of God. Human government originated in the rebellion of man against his Maker, and was the organized effort of man to govern himself and to promote his own good and to conduct the affairs of the world independently of the government of God. It was the organized rebellion of man against God and his government. The essential character of this government, as portrayed by God, will be given hereafter.

Babylon, the first universal empire of earth, growing out of this rebellion of man against God, continued until overthrown, displaced and superseded by the Medo-Persian Empire. This Babylonish empire, with all its possessions, conquests, and honors, “was left” to the Medo-Persian. The Medo-Persian exercised universal dominion until overthrown by the Grecian power, to whom it “was left” with all of its glories, honors, and possessions. The Grecian succeeded the Medo-Persian, and continued until subdued by the Roman, to whom “were left” its power and possessions. The Roman continued until broken in pieces by the little stone cut out of the mountain without hands. The fragments of this Roman empire remain until the present day. All the human governments of earth are the broken fragments – or the offshoots of these – of the Roman empire. We emphasize this line of descent of the human or civil governments of earth, because it is usually claimed that the civil governments of this day are successors and offshoots of the Mosaic dispensation, or of the government God ordained among the Jews.

They clearly run back through the Roman, the Grecian, the Medo-Persian, the Babylonian, and for its origin to Babel of Nimrod on the plains of Shinar. The connecting links are few and there can be no doubt as to the line of succession.

On the other hand, God has always kept on earth a government of his own, in contrast and in conflict with these. In Eden the government was direct, individual and personal. God spake directly to man and gave specific commands to be obeyed.

Men multiplied into families. God gave the law to the father and made him the law-giver, the mediator, and priest to his family. When the family of Abraham grew into the proportions of a nation, God gave it laws suited to a national existence. Moses became the law-giver of this nation. He is sometimes called the law-maker. This is a mistake, God was the law-maker. He gave the law to Moses, and Moses gave it to the people. God has never authorized any being or power beneath his own throne to make laws to govern his own people. This is the prerogative he has reserved to himself. God is the only law-maker of his people, the only rightful law-maker of the universe.

This government of God among the children of Israel was corrupted and perverted, but some of the Jews were schooled by it, and trained, as were others, not Jews, by the providence of God, for service in a higher and more perfect kingdom of God. God then took the Jewish national government out of the way, and superseded it with the kingdom of heaven – the Church of God, which was fitted for the service of individuals – few or all – in all nations, and aspires to universal and eternal dominion on earth. It is to embrace all people, all nations, kindreds and tribes, and to mingle and mould them into one universal brotherhood, to break in pieces and destroy all earthly kingdoms and dominions, and fill the whole earth and stand forever. The mission of this Church is to rescue and redeem the earth from the rule and dominion of the human kingdoms, from the rebellion against God, and to reinstate the authority and rule of God on earth through this own kingdom. Through and in it Christ must reign until he shall have “put down all rule, and all authority and all power.” Then will he deliver up the kingdom to God the Father, and himself be subject to God, that God ruling in and through his restored kingdom on earth, may be all and in all, the only ruler of the heavens and of the earth. These two lines of government, the Divine and the human, reaching from the beginning down to the present day, have been kept distinct and separate by God, often commingled and dove-tailed one into the other by men, with what relations and results to each other we will examine.

The Relation of the Divine to the Human

We have called attention to the origin of human government. It originated among the enemies of God, animated by a spirit of rebellion against God. The human and the Divine each passed through the same stages in reaching its culmination. The individual, the family, the nation, the universal dominion. Abraham, first after the flood, was set apart to raise a holy family to God, and so became the father of a people loyal to God, and furnished a people that would maintain the government of God on earth. He was required to separate himself from his own family and kindred, from the land of his nativity, and from the home and friends of his childhood, and to go forth, a stranger among strangers, in a strange land. He was not to affiliate, or his children to inter-marry with the people of this land. He was to start a family that should be a separate, distinct, and peculiar people among the nations of earth, consecrated to the establishment and maintainance of the government of God among and over men. That it might have no family ties to draw it into alliance with the peoples who sustain the human government, Abram married his own sister. Isaac’s wife was the daughter of his mother’s brother who lived in a foreign land. Jacob’s wives were the daughters of his uncle. From these kindred they were widely separated. Jacob left the father of his wives under circumstances that forbade future affiliation. Isaac was the only child of his mother; and while yet youths enmity was engendered between Jacob and Esau that separated their families forever. God was severing natural ties, and overruling blood relations that might militate against the separation and exclusiveness of his people. The family was then cemented together and separated from all other people by four hundred years of a common and cruel slavery, and a forty-years journey through the wilderness in which all persons who were matured at the exodus from Egypt died to free them from all the influences, habits, and love of Egypt. This was done to gain a favorably separated point for starting them on their mission of consecration to the upbuilding of the Divine Government; that in them he might find a people with no love for, and no ties to lead them into affiliation with other peoples, or into the service of the human governments, but that they should be wholly consecrated to the upbuilding and maintainance of the Divine Government. God’s special commission to them was to destroy all the nations inhabiting the land, all the nations with which they came in contact. The mission imposed upon them was perpetual enmity, the work to which they were called was a war of extermination against all people maintaining a human government. This war was waged against the people not as individuals or families, but as members and supporters of human governments. If individuals and families seem to have been special objects of destruction, it was because those families had been especially sinful in maintaining the human government, and were hopeless in their enmity to the rule of God. But at any and every period of time the way was open for these families, and every member of them, to pass out of the families devoted to human government, and for their entrance into the family devoted to the government of God. And whenever one passed from under the human into the Divine, the obligation to destroy was changed into the requirement to protect, nurture, and support as a member of the household and family of God. The law was:

“Thou shalt not be affrighted at them: for the Lord thy God is in the midst of thee, a great God and a terrible. And the Lord thy God will cast out those nations before thee, by little and little: thou mayest not consume them at once, lest the beasts of the field increase upon thee. But the Lord thy God shall deliver them up before thee, and shall discomfit them with a great discomfiture, until they be destroyed. And he shall deliver their kings into thine hand, and thou shalt make their name to perish from under heaven: there shall no man be able to stand before thee, until thou have destroyed them.”
(Deut. vii:21-24)

“When the Lord thy God shall deliver them up before thee, and thou shalt smite them; then thou shalt utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them: neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son.”
(Deut. vii:2,3)

Notwithstanding these fearful denunciations and prohibitions, they took their wives from them from the beginning, and the way was always open for the adoption of any of them into the family of Abraham who might wish to serve and honor the God of Abraham. Rahab was married to an Israelite. She abjured her nation and the human government, and through fear of the Lord God, accepted his rule, and cast her lot with his people Israel. The Scriptures mention as honored among the Israelites, many of them serving in the Temple: Doeg, the Edomite (1 Sam. xxi:7); Uriah, the Hittite (2 Sam. xi:3); Araunah, the Jebusite (2 Sam. xxiv:18); Zelek, the Ammonite (2 Sam. xxiii:37); Ithma, the Moabite (1 Chron. xi:46); and Ruth, the Moabitess, besides many others. A number of these entered into the line from which the Savior sprung. In the days of Solomon, the number of these among the laboring people amounted to over 153,000.

“And Solomon numbered all the strangers that WERE in the land of Israel, after the numbering wherewith David his father had numbered them; and they were found an hundred and fifty thousand and three thousand and six hundred. And he set threescore and ten thousand of them TO BE bearers of burdens, and fourscore thousand TO BE hewers in the mountain, and three thousand and six hundred overseers to set the people at work.”
(2 Chron. ii:17-18)

These examples show that while the law was inexorable in requiring them to destroy the members of these sinful families while upholders of these human governments, yet when any of them entered the family of Abraham to build upon the government of God, the law for their destruction was abrogated with reference to them. This shows, too, that there never was a time when the door of God’s kingdom was closed against any being desiring to serve him. At no time has he been a respecter of persons, but at all times “whosoever feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted of him.” In those days all who obeyed him must identify themselves with his people, the Jews. The true and real aim was to destroy the human governments that stood against God; and the people were destroyed only as the destruction of the governments and punishment for treason against God demanded the destruction of those upholding and wedded to them.

The subjects of his government were clearly forbidden all affinity, affiliation or alliance with the earthly governments, or those sustaining them. Before they entered Canaan, God, through Moses, told them:

“I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and thou shalt drive them out before thee. Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods. They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.”
(Ex. xxiii:31-33)

The same warning and admonition is repeated on almost every occasion of instruction. See Ex. xxiv:12, and Deut. vii:2:

“Thou shalt smite them and utterly destroy them. Thou shalt make no covenant with them: nor show mercy to them.”

When these nations in Canaan had been destroyed, save a remnant, God still admonished them:

“Else if ye do in any wise go back, and cleave unto the remnant of these nations, even these that remain among you, and make marriages with them, and go in unto them, and they to you; know for a certainty that the Lord your God will no more drive these nations from out of your sight; but they shall be a snare and a trap unto you, and a scourge in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off this good land which the Lord your God hath given you.”
(Joshua xxiii:12-13)

These laws and warnings might be quoted to weariness. Solomon violated these laws and married those not desirous of serving God or promoting his government, and who were idolaters. Notwithstanding his wisdom and greatness and favor with God, his heart was turned away from God, and resulted in the rending the kingdom from his family.

“Wherefore the Lord said unto Solomon, forasmuch as this is done of thee, and thou hast not kept my covenant and my statutes, which I have commanded thee, I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to thy servant.”
(1 Kings xi:11)

This shows the difference between marrying one who sought union with the family of Abraham from a desire to serve God and to maintain his government, and marrying strangers who were not servants of God. The one weaned the heart of even Solomon from God; the blood of the other flowed into the veins of the Son of God.

Another example we find in Isaiah xxxix:6. Hezekiah was a true servant of God. He had been sick and had recovered. The king of Babylon sent messengers with presents to congratulate Hezekiah upon his recovery. Hezekiah, flattered by the friendly attentions of this mighty king, in a friendly mood showed these messengers all the wealth of the king’s house, and the wealth and sanctified vessels of the Lord’s house. For this, God said:

“Behold, the days come, that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon; nothing shall be left, saith the Lord. And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”

They were carried captive, as thus foretold; after a long period of slavery, as punishment for their friendly overtures to the king of Babylon, they are disposed to turn to God and serve him as loyal subjects. They had in their captivity married ungodly wives of the people among whom they were living. So inexorable was the law of God, that husband and wife, parent and child, must separate in obedience to its behest, before God would deliver them.

“Now therefore let us make a covenant with our God to put away all the wives, and such as are born of them, according to the counsel of my lord, and of those that tremble at the commandment of our God; and let it be done according to the law.”
(Ezra x:3)

God could not accept or bless them while in affinity or alliance with those not submitting to his government.

Changing the Government of God

Changing the government of God into the likeness of the human was not admissible. The subjects of God’s Government were forbidden all affiliation or alliance with the human governments. It was a still more heinous sin to pattern the Divine after the human, or dovetail the human into the Divine. This changed, corrupted, and perverted the Divine. Even when the appointments and institutions ordained by God to secure justice and maintain righteousness between man and man were perverted into instruments of injustice and oppression, and those selected to administer justice took bribes and perverted judgement, and the elders and children of Israel sought relief in a kingly government which seemed to them to be working well among the nations, and to their “sanctified common sense” seemed good to them, God pronounced it a fearful rebellion against him and his government.

“And it came to pass, when Samuel was old, that he made his sons judges over Israel. And his sons walked not in his ways, but turned aside after lucre, and took bribes, and perverted judgement. Then all the elders of Israel gathered themselves together, and came to Samuel unto Ramah: and they said unto him, Behold, thou art old, and thy sons walk not in thy ways: now make us a king to judge us like all the nations. But the thing displeased Samuel, when they said, Give us a king to judge us. And Samuel prayed unto the Lord. And the Lord said unto Samuel, Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee: for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not be king over them. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt even unto this day, in that they have forsaken me, and served other gods, so do they also unto thee. Now therefore hearken unto their voice: howbeit thou shalt protest solemnly unto them, and shalt show them the manner of the king that shall reign over them.”
(1 Sam. viii:9)

Samuel warned and protested,

“This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: he will take your sons, and appoint them unto him, for his chariots; and he will appoint them unto him for captains of thousands, and captains of fifties; and HE WILL SET SOME to plow his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and the instruments of his chariots. And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants. And he will take your men-servants, and your maid-servants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your flocks; and ye shall be his servants. And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the Lord will not answer you in that day. But the people refused to hearken unto the voice of Samuel; and they said, Nay; but we will have a king over us; that we may also be like all the nations; and that our king may judge us, and go out before us, and fight our battles. And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he rehearsed them in the ears of the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, Hearken unto their voice, and make them a king.”
(1 Sam. viii:11-22)

In this it is clearly taught:

1. To seek to change an appointment of God even when perverted by bad men to wicked ends, is a grievous sin, a rejection of God, a following another God.
2. God ordains for men what they persistently desire, even if it is an institution that displaces his appointments and overthrows his rule.
3. He ordains it as a punishment for rejecting him and his government – as a way through which they are made to “eat the fruit of their own way and be filled with their own devices.”
4. All of God’s ordinances are not necessarily good or desirable for his children, but are good for the end and work for which he appoints them.
5. He ordains one class of institutions through which to bless his obedient servants; he ordains a different class for punishing the disobedient. Each is good for the work for which it is ordained. Each is equally the ordinance of God.

Please remember these.

God ordained the Jews a king, not because he saw it was best for them, or promotive of their good, but to punish them. They rebelled against him, were reckless and persistent in that rebellion, and he ordained the kingdom as a punishment for that rebellion. The king was given as they desired, but God warned them that he would be a burden and a punishment to them for their sin in desiring to change the laws and appointments of God. Their kings, despite an occasional good one, led them further from God, deeper and deeper into sin and rebellion; led them into idolatry, involved them continually in war and strife, brought them into frequent alliances with the rebellious and idolatrous nations of earth that supported human government, all of which brought upon them the desolation of their country, the consuming of their substance, the destruction of their cities, the slaughter of their armies, the captivity and enslavement, in foreign lands, of their people. When these afflictions, instead of driving them back to God and to his institutions, led them farther from him, more and more to forget him, and made them more and more rebellious against him, he took from them their king and country, left them without a head, and destroyed them as a nation. In view of these things, Hosea (xiii:9-11) exclaims:

“O Israel, thou has destroyed thyself; but in me IS thine help. I will be thy king: where is ANY OTHER that may save thee in all thy cities? and thy judges in whom thou saidst, Give me a king and princes? I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took HIM away in my wrath.”

This plainly teaches that to supplant the Divine with the human, to copy after the human, or to add the human to the Divine, was to reject God, to incur his anger and to bring upon themselves the destruction of God’s fierce wrath. He tolerated them for a time so as to give them an opportunity to return to him. When the afflictions brought upon them failed to do this he took from them their earthly head, their king, destroyed them as a nation, and “scattered them among all people, from the one end of the earth even to the other.” They did not cease to worship God. They were still very zealous in that service but they had introduced the human government into the Divine Institution, and divided their fealty between God and the human government. This was their destruction.

God’s dealings with the Jews farther prove that he often ordains and regulates institutions which he does not approve or ordain for the good of his people or for his own glory, but which he tolerates or ordains and directs for the punishment of rebellion and rejection of him, and often out of this while destroying the wicked, he brings good to his faithful children. He so overrules that the ordinance that works evil to the rebellious, brings good to the faithful. But the point before us is, that God neither permitted the subjects of his government to form alliances, or affiliate with the human governments, or consort with their subjects, nor to participate in their affairs to sustain and uphold them; nor did he permit them to introduce the human order into his government. Every alliance with, participation in, or adoption of the human into the divine met with the stern condemnation and punishment of God. Isaiah (xxx:1-4) says:

“Woe to the rebellious children, saith the Lord, that take counsel, but not of me; and that cover with a covering, but not of my spirit, that they may add sin to sin; that walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth; to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to trust in the shadow of Egypt! Therefore, shall the strength of Pharaoh be your shame, and the trust in the shadow of Egypt your confusion.”

And verse 7 reads:

“For Egypt helpeth in vain, and to no purpose; therefore have I called her Rahab that sitteth still.”

That is, whenever God’s children sought the alliance of a human government or institution for help and for good to them, that help became the means of their confusion and the occasion of their shame. It was a distrust of God who proposed to be their strength, their “shield and their exceeding great reward.” And God was a jealous God, and would not permit his children to seek other help than his own, and in and through his own government. The remainder of this chapter and the 31st repeat and enforce this truth so clearly taught, and where God gives no direction, his children should sit still – do nothing. Indeed this lesson is indelibly stamped on every page and chapter of the record of God’s dealings with the Jewish people.

The one great purpose of God’s dealings with the children of Israel was to teach them to serve him in his appointments, to trust him implicitly and faithfully: to have no part nor lot in the kingdoms and institutions of man’s make and build, and that in doing thus the omnipotent strength of the living God was pledged to their defence and success. That when they trusted the institutions and kingdoms of man’s make, they always brought to them confusion and ruin.

What Human Governments Do for Man

In this description given by Samuel of what this human government would be and do to the Jews, God clearly describes what it does and is to all people. Every human government uses the substance, the time, the service of the subjects to enrich, gratify the appetites and lusts, and to promote the grandeur and glory of the rulers. And it is not true that in democratic or any other kind of governments the people themselves are rulers. They choose the rulers, at the instigation of a few interested leaders, then these rulers rule for their own selfish good and glory as other rulers do.

The picture here drawn is not that of the worst and most despotic forms of governments, among the ignorant and degraded, but as it would and did exist among the Jewish people, with the best rulers that could be found. The substance of the people is, under forms of law, taken now for the personal gratification and the display of our rulers just as Samuel told it would be in the Jewish nation. The licentiousness, the lewdness, the wars growing out of rivalry of different aspirants to rule, and of the desolation and bloodshed growing out of national rivalries are not mentioned by Samuel. He gave a picture of the mildest and best human governments as contrasted with the Divine. The rulers of the human oppress the subjects for their own benefit. The ministers of the Divine government deny themselves for the good of the subjects.

Jesus declares this:

“Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them (their subjects) and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you; but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your servant: even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give himself a ransom for many.”
(Matt. xx:25)

Here the inherent distinction between the two governments is marked and emphasized. Man in setting aside the government of God and forming one of his own, cut himself off from the blessing, the service, the strength, the help that God bestows on the subjects of His government, and took on himself the burdens and oppressions and oppressors imposed by the human governments. But it is a decree of the Almighty that when man chooses his own way he shall eat of the fruit of that way.

“Because I called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; but ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof; I will laugh at your calamity, I will mock when your fear cometh; when your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early but they shall not find me: for that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord: they would none of my counsel; they despised all of my reproof. Therefore shall they eat the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices.”
(Prov. i:24)

So long as men refuse the rule of God, God ordains they shall be ruled by their own governments and eat the fruit of their own ways and be filled with their own devices. Showing clearly that when men turn from the government of God to their own inventions and governments, then God ordains these governments as means of punishing them for their rebellion, and while this punishing them, they are God’s ordinances for this work and none should resist them. In doing so they are resisting the ordinance of God.

But it is not in man to form government in which the selfish element will not prevail, and which will not be used to tax and oppress the ruled for the glory and aggrandizement of the rulers.

The Relation of the Human to the Divine

The relation of the human to the Divine, and the destiny of each is presented clearly by Daniel.
Israel was then in captivity in Babylon as a penalty for the sins of Hezekiah for too great affiliation with the messengers of Nebuchadnezzar in showing them all the treasures of the king’s house. The sons of the blood royal and the princes of the house of Israel were servants in the king’s palace, placed there “to be taught the language and learning of Babylon,” that they might teach these to their brethren, that Israel might be led to forget God. The promises of God seem about to fail; his government seems at an end; his people are helpless slaves in a foreign land. The prospect is gloomy. The night is dark.

Often, when to human sight the prospects of the success of God’s people and his cause seem darkest, then to the trust of faith come the clearest revelations, giving the strongest assurance of the fulfillment of all God’s promises. So it was at this time.

Nebuchadnezzar, the great king, saw the vision that proclaimed his downfall and the downfall of all human governments. Daniel, the slave, interpreted the vision for the king, and it was also for the strengthening of the faith of God’s people. The image was that of a man, indicating the human origin of the governments typified by the image, in contrast with the Divine origin of the kingdom typified by the little stone cut out of the mountain without hands.

Daniel interprets: the head of gold represents the kingdom of Babylon of which Nebuchadnezzar was head; the silver, the Medo-Persian; the brass, the Grecian; the iron, the Roman. The little stone cut out of the mountain without hands represents the kingdom of God. It is not originated, shaped, or put into motion, or maintained by human power. It is God’s government.

The lesson taught is that the human governments must, one and all, be destroyed; and in their destruction, one after another, each became the prey of, or “was left” with all its strength, its riches, and its glories to the destroyer. It became the heritage of those who overthrew it. The last kingdom having received the riches, power, and strength of all those preceding it, the little stone cut out of the mountain without hands, smote the iron, but broke in pieces the brass, the silver, and the gold, because the strength and the power of all were transmitted to and concentrated in this last one.

In taking these kingdoms that attained to universal dominion — these mighty kingdoms that seemed to have destroyed all opposition and to have left no power that could possibly come against them or destroy them, but had combined and concentrated all the power of all the earthly human kingdoms in themselves — to show that they must be destroyed, must be left to other people, the God of heaven certainly taught what must be the destiny of all human governments and all institutions of man’s make. One common destruction awaits them all.

“They became like the chaff of the summer threshing floor, and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them. And the stone that smote the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.”
(Dan. ii:35)

In contrast, we read:

“In the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.”
(Dan. ii:44)

Many prophecies, types, and illustrations in this prophecy of Daniel teach that this kingdom of God shall be for a time weak, feeble, and unpromising. It will be prevailed against, overrun, brought to the verge of ruin, to the jaws of death — to the very gates of hell itself — yet it shall never be destroyed.

God gives evidence, clear and unmistakable, of his will and power to overthrow all these mighty kingdoms of earth, even by the weakest of his children, when faithful. The mighty kingdom of Babylon is arrayed against its own slaves, but who are the servants of God. The result of the conflict is told by Nebuchadnezzar:

“I blessed the Most High, and I praised and honored him that liveth forever; for his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom from generation to generation; and all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, what doest thou?”
(Dan. iv:34–35)

In the overthrow of Babylon, Daniel and his fellows, as slaves, passed to the conqueror. The Medo-Persian empire came in contact with the Divine government in the persons of these slaves. God joined issue with each government at the point at which it claimed the greatest strength. The result of the conflict with the Medo-Persian is told by Darius the king:

“I make a decree, that in all the dominion of my kingdom men tremble and fear before the God of Daniel; for he is the living God, and steadfast forever, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed, and his dominion shall be even unto the end.”
(Dan. vi:26)

God, in the darkest hour of his kingdom, when represented only by the slaves in bondage, showed to these kings that had subdued the whole earth, and through them to all nations and peoples for all time, that these human kingdoms must all be destroyed, must come to nought, that the mission of his kingdom is to break in pieces and destroy all these kings and kingdoms of human origin; but that the kingdom that he sets up shall never be destroyed. His kingdom shall not only break in pieces these kingdoms, but it shall consume them — the last vestige of them.

“The judgement shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end. And the kingdom and the dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heavens shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him. Here is the end of the matter.”
(Dan. vii:27)

That is, the end of all the conflicts and strifes of earth will be the complete and final destruction — the utter consuming — of the last vestige of human governments and institutions, and the giving of the dominion, and power, and authority of the whole earth to the people of the saints of the Most High.

Then, and only then, will peace and quiet prevail on earth, and union, harmony, and goodwill reign among men.

God and his people are not to conquer and possess the kingdoms as one human kingdom overthrows and possesses another — that is, to displace the rulers and officers appointed by the human and to rule in and through their organizations. That would be to acknowledge man’s institutions preferable to his own. All these kingdoms are to be broken in pieces, and consumed. They are to be destroyed and supplanted by the kingdom which the God of heaven shall set up. They are to become as the dust of the summer’s threshing-floor, that is driven before the wind, no place is to be found for them, but the little stone cut out of the mountain without hands is to become a great mountain and fill the whole earth.

The mission of the kingdom of God is to break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, take their place, fill the whole earth, and stand forever.

How could the individual citizens of the kingdom of God found, enter into, and become part and parcel of — upbuild, support, and defend — that which God’s kingdom was especially commissioned to destroy?

We find, then, beyond a doubt, that the commission given by God to the Jews to destroy the kingdoms of Canaan, to make no affinity, alliance, or confederation with them, is through Daniel extended to the everlasting kingdom of God, and its commission so widened and enlarged as to break in pieces and consume all the kingdoms of the earth.

God hath a controversy with the nations of the earth:

“A noise shall come even to the end of the earth; for the Lord hath a controversy with the nations, he will plead with all flesh; as for the wicked he will give them to the sword, saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Behold, evil shall go forth from nation to nation, and a great tempest shall be raised up from the uttermost parts of the earth. And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented, neither gathered nor buried; they shall be dung upon the face of the ground.”
(Jer. xxv:31–33)

The conflict between the human and the Divine is irrepressible, eternal, and must continue unto the complete and final destruction of the one, and the universal and final triumph of the other.

Wicked Men and Nations, God’s Servants and Ordinances

We have found that God ordained institutions of evil when his people desired those that he did not approve as good for his people, to punish them for forsaking the institutions that he ordained through which he chose to govern them, and through which he proposed to bring good to them. These institutions, as in the case of the kings ordained in Israel, not only punished them, but often became the means of their deeper corruption, and wider departure from his service.

This is in accord with the principle announced in Isaiah:

“Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations; I also will choose their delusions, and will bring their fears upon them; because when I called, none did answer; when I spake, they did not hear; but they did that which was evil in mine eyes, and chose that wherein I delighted not.”
(Isa. lxvi:3)

Or in Proverbs:

“For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord; they would none of my counsel; they despised all my reproof; therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices.”
(Prov. i:29–31)

In other words, God ordains that men shall have the institutions that they choose in preference to his appointments, and that they shall reap the results of their choosing. The result always is punishment, and if the evil course is persisted in, their final destruction.

But these institutions ordained to punish the sins and iniquities of his children were God’s ordinances for this purpose, and they were good for the end for which they were established — the punishment of rebellion. They were not necessarily good for his children, nor were they, because ordinances of God, necessarily legitimate institutions for the affiliation and fellowship of God’s children.

Because the institutions that were especially ordained for punishing the rebellious are the institutions his subjects were forbidden to use, rely upon, or make alliance with, or participate in. Then God’s children were not permitted to affiliate with, or participate in, use, or rely upon, all the ordinances of God.

Tophet, or Hell, Is Ordained of God

“For a Tophet is ordained of old; yea, for the king it is prepared; he hath made it deep and large; the pile thereof is fire and much wood; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it.”
(Isa. xxx:33)

Whether or not this refers to hell, the Gehenna of everlasting destruction, or to its earthly type, it is true that hell, the vortex of eternal ruin, is an ordinance of God for the final punishment of rebellion.

God ordained institutions for governing, controlling, and blessing his faithful children; with these God’s children could affiliate, could work in and through them. There were also ordinances of God to punish his rebellious children, to destroy his obdurate enemies. Into these God’s children could not enter, affiliate with, could not support or direct, and on them they could not rely for help.

Not only were these evil institutions God’s ordinances, but wicked men who directed them were recognized as his servants. They constituted the constituency or the subjects of these Divine institutions because God used them to accomplish his work of punishing sin, and destroying his enemies. In this sense, God ordained all the institutions of earth, and used the vilest sinners of earth as his servants. He used the rebellious and the wicked to punish his disobedient children, and to destroy others whose measure of wickedness was full; then in turn, he punished the wicked individuals and peoples for doing the very work he had used them to accomplish, because they did it from a wicked, selfish, and cruel spirit.

“The Lord made the wicked for the day of evil.”
(Prov. xvi:4)

Take as an example, the king and kingdom of Babylon and Assyria. Their character as a wicked, rebellious, impious king and nation, has been clearly presented to us. Yet, Isaiah says:

“Ho Assyrian, the rod of mine anger, the staff in their hand is mine indignation! I will send him against an hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. Howbeit he meaneth not so, neither doth his heart think so; but it is in his heart to destroy, and cut off nations not a few. For he saith, Are not my princes all of them kings? Is not Calno as Carchemish? is not Hamath as Arpad? is not Samaria as Damascus? As my hand hath found the kingdoms of the idols, whose graven images did excel them of Jerusalem and of Samaria; shall I not; as I have done unto Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her idols? Wherefore it shall come to pass, then when the Lord hath performed his whole work upon Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks. For he hath said, By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by wisdom; for I am prudent; and have removed the bounds of the peoples and have robbed their treasures, and I brought down as a valiant man them that sit on thrones.”
(Isa. x:5–13)

This clearly reveals these truths:

1. The Jewish people were rebellious.
2. God used the Assyrians, an idolatrous, cruel nation, to punish them.
3. He calls this wicked nation the “rod of mine anger,” the rod which he would use to punish Jerusalem and Judea that needed chastisement.

He calls Judea a hypocritical nation, pretending to serve him, yet not doing it, and says:

I will send him [the Assyrian] against this Judah to punish him.

He was to take the spoil, the prey, and tread them down as the mire in the streets. “Howbeit he meaneth not so.” It is not in his heart to go, because God bids him, nor for the purpose of carrying out the will of God; but he is a blood-thirsty, ambitious tyrant, thinking only to conquer and destroy nations to gratify his own ambition and greed. So far from doing it to please God, he thinks the God of the Jews not so great as the images and idols of other countries that he has conquered. He boasted that of his own wisdom, strength, and valor he had conquered these nations.

So God says:

“When the Lord has performed his whole work upon Mount Zion and Jerusalem, [has fully punished them for their sins], I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks.”

God overrules this proud, cruel, domineering spirit of the wicked nation, to punish his disobedient children, then punishes the nation for doing this work.

He claimed that he would permit only so much punishment on Judea as he purposed, so absolute was this overruling control that he exercised over Nebuchadnezzar, that he speaks of him as an axe or a saw in his hand:

“Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? Shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it?”

Assyria is an axe in the hand of God with which he hews down wicked nations.

These exemplify two other Scripture truths:

“Deliver my soul from the wicked which are thy sword; from men, which are thy hand.”
(Ps. xvii:13)

“Surely the wrath of man shall praise thee: the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain.”
(Ps. lxxvi:10)

That is, God will so overrule the wrath of man as to accomplish his praise; whatever wrath would go beyond this God will restrain. It was to God’s praise that rebellious Jews should be punished; God directed the bitter wrath and cruelty of Assyria so as to punish the Jews just so far as that punishment would reflect honor and praise on God. He restrained the wrath of Assyria, that it should not go beyond that point.

“Hath he smitten him as he smote those that smote him?”
(Isa. xxvii:7)

“For I will make a full end of all the nations whither I have scattered thee, but I will not make a full end of thee; but I will correct thee with judgement, and will in no wise leave thee unpunished.”
(Jer. xxx:11)

But other nations sustaining openly and fully a rival government to his, when there was no hope of their turning to him in subjection to, and support of his government were destroyed unto the end:

“For the nations that will not serve thee shall perish; yea those nations shall be utterly wasted.”
(Isa. lx:12)

When a rebellious nation was for a time exalted and seemed to prosper, it was in order that the destruction might be sudden and marked, to be seen of all men as a warning.

“When the wicked spring as the grass, and all the workers of iniquity do flourish, it is that they may be destroyed forever.”
(Ps. xcii:7)

But as we follow up this history of Assyria and Judah, we find in Jeremiah:

“Because ye have not heard my words, behold, I will send and take all the families of the north saith the Lord, and I will send unto Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against the inhabitants thereof, and against all these nations round about; and I will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and an hissing, and perpetual desolation… And these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. And it shall come to pass, when seventy years are accomplished, that I will punish the king of Babylon, and that nation, saith the Lord, for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans; and I will make it desolate forever… I will recompense them according to their deeds, and according to the work of their hands.”
(Jer. xxv:8–14)

Now, follow this history up to the 50th and 51st chapters of Jeremiah, and read there the terrific appeal God makes to marshal the nations against this Babylon for the crimes committed by Nebuchadnezzar, “my servant”:

“For, lo, I will stir up and cause to come up against Babylon an assembly of great nations from the north country; and they shall set themselves in array against her; from thence she shall be taken… Set yourselves in array against Babylon round about, all ye that bend the bow; shoot at her, spare no arrows; for she hath sinned against the Lord… for it is the vengeance of the Lord; take vengeance upon her; as she hath done, do unto her.”

This was all done because she had been the servant of the Lord in punishing Israel, and in cutting off and destroying nations not a few.

“Howbeit he meaneth not so, neither doth his heart think so; but it is in his heart to cut off and destroy nations not a few.”

The end of this fearful marshalling of the nations to the destruction of Babylon, by this vengeance of the Lord, was:

“Babylon shall become heaps, a dwelling place for dragons, an astonishment, a hissing, without an inhabitant.”
(Jer. li:37)

Yet of all that mighty host of nations, summoned by God to spoil and destroy Babylon, not one knew the Lord God, and each in its turn was doomed to destruction for the cruel, blood-thirsty spirit that led it to war upon Babylon. Yet God said of this cruel horde:

“The Lord hath opened his armory, and hath brought forth the weapons of his indignation; for the Lord, the Lord of hosts hath a work to do in the land of the Chaldeans.”
(Jer. l:25)

This wicked horde of idolatrous and degraded nations constituted the armory of the Lord, from which he drew the weapons that would execute his indignation on those who established governments of their own, in opposition to the government of God. God had a work, a work of destruction to do in the land of the Chaldeans, and he used these wicked people drawn from his armory of rebellious nations, to destroy the Chaldeans.

The end was:

“Therefore the wild beasts of the desert with the wolves shall dwell there, and the ostriches shall dwell therein; and it shall be no more inhabited forever, neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation.”

Cyrus

Cyrus is presented to us as another idolatrous king whom God uses, not to punish his people for their rebellion, but to deliver them from their captivity, and to restore them to their own land. He united the Medes and Persians, and strengthened and so combined and directed the power of weaker nations, as to overthrow and destroy Babylon. He found the Jews in bondage in Babylon, and ordered their freedom and restoration to Judea, and the building of their temple.

God, through Isaiah (xliv:28, and xlv:1–6), says of Cyrus:

“He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure; even saying of Jerusalem, she shall be built; and to the temple, thy foundation shall be laid. Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him, and I will loose the loins of kings to open the doors before him, and the gates shall not be shut; I will go before thee, and make the rugged places plain; I will break in pieces the doors of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron; and I will give thee the treasures of darkness, the hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I am the Lord, which shall call thee by thy name, even the God of Israel… I have surnamed thee though thou hast not known me. I am the Lord, and there is none else; beside me there is no God; I will gird thee though thou hast not known me, that thou may know from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the Lord and there is none else.”

God called Cyrus, “My shepherd, mine anointed,” and told that he led him, called him by name before he was born; told what should be his work and fortune; that by his order his people should return to Judea; that Jerusalem and the temple should be rebuilt; and yet Cyrus knew not God, but was a wicked, idolatrous king. Clearly he did it with no view of honoring God. It was done to make friends of those who were oppressed and enslaved by Babylon. His course was that of a scheming, ambitious king seeking to circumvent and strengthen himself against his enemies. He neither was seeking the good of the Jews, nor the honor of God. He knew not God. Yet God called him, “My shepherd,” because he overruled his wicked ambition to deliver and carry back to Judea his scattered sheep, and his anointed, because through him his temple was rebuilt.

While Cyrus was thus gathering to their own land as a shepherd the scattered flock of God, and ordering the rebuilding of the Temple, God permitted no affinity with his people, or dependence upon his government for help or support. It was at this return to Jerusalem, that they were required to put away their wives and their children, that they had married and begotten in their captivity. When they were on their way back to Judea beset by their enemies, Ezra says (viii:22–23):

“For I was ashamed to ask of the king a band of soldiers and horsemen to help us against the enemy in the way: because we had spoken unto the king, saying, The hand of our God is upon all them that seek him, for good; but his power and his wrath is against all them that forsake him. So we fasted and besought our God for this: and he was entreated of us.”

Clearly indicating that it was a distrust of God to seek or rely for help upon the human government, even when God was overruling the wicked ambition of this ruler to deliver his people, and to bring them back to their land, and to rebuild the Temple of God. The king ordered gold and silver supplies to a certain amount, with all the sacred vessels that had been taken from Jerusalem to be given to them. This was doubtless a return for the spoliation made upon them, when they were taken captive, and as necessary to the accomplishment of his purpose.

This shows that all ordinances of God are not fit to be used by the children of God, and all servants or ministers of God are not his children.

“Who maketh the winds his messengers, his ministers a flaming fire.”

Only those ordinances which are ordained for his children are fitted for the service of his children, and only those servants or ministers who voluntarily seek to do his will because they know him, and in order to honor him, are the accepted and approved servants who will receive his blessing. God clearly overrules the wickedness of men to accomplish his purposes, and in so using their wickedness, he calls them his ministers or servants, his shepherds, or his anointed, according to the work he uses them to do. He overrules this wickedness so as to accomplish his purposes and ends, both with reference to his children, punishing or delivering as they deserve, and in punishing or destroying his enemies according to his purposes, and yet so overruling, that in the end the wicked persons or nations which he uses shall reap the bitterest fruits of their sin and crime.

In illustrating this principle of God’s dealings with men, we have at some length dwelt upon the facts presented in the cases of Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus, as the principle is so clearly set forth in these cases that none need mistake. But the same principle is manifest in his dealings with Pharaoh and Egypt, with the nations in Canaan.

God said in his first promise to drive out the nations before Israel:

“I will send hornets before thee, which will drive out the Hivite, Canaanite and the Hittite from before thee. I will not drive them out from before thee in one year, lest the land become desolate, and the beasts of the field multiply against thee. By little and little I will drive them out before thee, until thou be increased and possess the land.”

These tribes were left to aid the children of Israel by preserving the land in a state of tillage and preventing the country being overrun with wild beasts, until the Jews would so multiply as to fill the land. But the children of Israel intermarried and affiliated with these nations and they became a chief curse to the children of Israel. The children of Israel, instead of destroying them, made them pay tribute, and made alliances and treaties with them. God (Judges ii:2) reminds them that his law was:

“Ye shall make no league with the inhabitants of this land; ye shall throw down their altars, but ye have not obeyed my voice; why have ye done this? Wherefore, I also said, I will not drive them out before you; but they shall be as thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare unto you.”

This proved to be true. The book of Judges is but a recounting of Israel’s sins, they are delivered into the hands of their enemies, to punish them; a deliverer in turn arises to destroy their enemies who punished them.

Hell is an ordinance of God for the punishment of the obdurately rebellious. In punishing the rebellious, it is a terror to evil works and a minister of good to the children of God. It ministers good to them by discouraging sin and weaning them away from sin. In the same sense, the devil is the servant or minister of God to execute wrath and vengeance on the enemies of God. The devil is the chief and leader of all rebels against God. God so overrules his rebellion as to make his domain, his home, a fit place for the punishment of the perversely rebellious. God uses the devil as his servant, his minister to inflict punishment on all those who are finally impenitent. God so overrules the devil while inflicting punishment on other rebels, himself, as the chiefest sinner, suffers the fullest measure, the most excruciating torments of this home of the damned.

Another thought is, God declared he would drive out those nations before Israel, if Israel would be faithful to him as the only governor of the world. He would go before them, send his angel before them, send hornets before them, and drive their enemies out. Many such expressions indicate that had the Jews been faithful to him, the deliverance would have been without suffering or loss to them.

This principle is laid down in Isaiah xxvi:3:

“Open ye the gates that the righteous nations that keepeth the truth may enter in. Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee.”

And Proverbs xvi:7:

“When a man’s ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.”

So in these wars, when the children of Israel pleased the Lord he delivered their enemies into their hands without suffering or loss to them. When they sinned, God imposed war upon them, their victories were at the cost of suffering and bloodshed. When they sinned grievously, when they joined affinity with the human government, defeat and disaster befell them. Continued alliance with and dependence upon human governments, brought captivity and slavery in foreign lands upon them and finally their dispersion and destruction as a nation.

This indicates that the necessity of war and conflict was laid upon them as a punishment for sin and rebellion against God, as a warning and training for a more perfect trust in God. Had they fully trusted God, and had they been faithful to him, God would never have used them as his sword to execute vengeance on his enemies. They were only used to punish others as a punishment to themselves.

It is clear that the influence upon man, that arose from forming and conducting human governments, was to wean man from the government of God, make him feel independent of that government and of his Maker. It inspired his heart with the idea that man is more than a servant. He naturally magnifies his own works and his own institutions, so that but few men give their time and service to the human government, but that they soon come to think the human much more essential to the world’s well-being than the Divine government.

The introduction of human additions into the Divine institution has the same tendency. Men who introduce, operate and support human additions to the government of God, soon come to so magnify these human additions, that they esteem them of more importance to the well-being of the servants of God, than any of the God-ordained appointments of his institution. This is but the working of human nature.

A proper understanding of these principles and manners of God’s working among, and dealings with the world, is essential, in any just understanding of the origin, mission, and destiny of human governments, their relation to God, and of the relation that the Christian and Church of God sustain to them.

We have made this partial summary of the illustrations God gives us of the spirit which originates human governments, and of the dealings with them and their subjects who refuse his government so as to maintain the governments of man. It has been only a partial summary. The examples on each point might be multiplied ten-fold; and the writer does not believe there is an example in the Old Testament that antagonizes the conclusions to which these examples point.

Conclusion

These conclusions may be re-stated as follows:

1. God created man as his own servant, to govern and control him; and in pursuance of this design has at all times kept in existence a government of his own, changing it to suit the changed condition and character of those willing to submit to him, reaching from the beginning until the present time.

2. That institution gave room for no human legislation; God is the sovereign and sole law maker for it and he has ruled in it to guide and bless his children.

3. Man, in the spirit of rebellion against God and with the view of living free from the control of God, and independent of his authority, instituted governments of his own, and those governments in their changing forms have existed from the days of Nimrod to the present time.

4. God, from its beginning, recognized this human government as rebellion against him, and as the organized effort to throw off his authority and to conduct the affairs of the earth free from God’s rule and dominion.

5. Regarding them thus, God always forbade that his subjects should join affinity or affiliate with the subjects of the human government, or that they should make any alliance with, enter into, support, maintain and defend, or appeal to, or depend upon, these human governments for aid or help.

6. That alliances with these human governments or their supporters arose from distrust of, and were sins against, God, and without exception were punished. That these alliances were sources of corruption to the children of God, weaned them from God, from his service, and from fidelity to his appointments, and brought weakness, shame, and disaster, instead of strength, security, and safety.

7. That the copying after the human, or dovetailing it into the Divine government was a rebellion against God, and a rejection of him as their ruler; was the destruction and corruption of his government, a transforming of the Divine into the human.

8. That God ordained the human government to punish those who rebelled against his government by choosing the human, and he used and overruled this human government to punish his rebellious children, and to destroy his enemies. For this purpose God ordained and used it, and for these ends it was the ordinance of God. It was good for the purpose for which he ordained it.

9. The builders, rulers, and supporters of these governments were wicked, rebellious men. God overruled their wickedness to punish the rebellious children, and to destroy his enemies. In this work he called them, “my servants,” “my shepherd,” “mine anointed,” yet when he had used them in accomplishing this work, he so directed that those used by him as his ministers of vengeance, themselves were destroyed for their wicked, revengeful, and rebellious spirit.

10. God’s government was his medium for receiving the service of his loyal children, and was his instrumentality through which he bestowed blessings upon them. While his servants were faithful to him in this government, he permitted no evil to befall them, fought their battles for them, delivered them from their enemies, and kept “in perfect peace those whose heart was stayed on him.”

11. God had two classes of ordinances:

• (1) His own government for the maintainance of his authority, the spread of his kingdom and the promotion of virtue and holiness, and the protection, blessing and salvation of his children.
• (2) Human government, his sword, his battle axe, his armory, to punish his disobedient children, and to execute wrath and vengeance on, and to destroy his enemies.

Corresponding to these were the two classes of servants, his loyal and obedient children, and the wicked spirits who set at defiance his authority, build up institutions to supersede his government, which were overruled by God to punish wickedness, and in turn to be destroyed for their wickedness. In these diverse and contrary senses and characters, heaven and hell, Jesus Christ and the devil are ordinances and servants of God, to accomplish the diverse works.

12. The government of God and those of man were antagonistic and rivals of each other, each contending for the rule and dominion of the world. Between them there was an irrepressible conflict. God especially commissioned his local government to drive out and destroy the human governments and their subjects that inhabited the country they possessed. That this war of extermination was waged against the human governments and their subjects, not against them as individuals or families.

Daniel’s prophecy foretells that God’s government would be extended to the dominion of the whole world just as his local government would be extended to the dominion of the land of Canaan. This prophecy projects the lines of separation, and the conflict between the human and Divine, into the illimitable future, and especially commissions this universal and everlasting kingdom to break in pieces and consume all the kingdoms of earth, all the kingdoms and institutions of man’s make, and to possess and fill the whole earth, and itself to stand forever.

According to this clear prophecy, the conflict will know no cessation, will be unto the end, till one is destroyed and consumed, and the other brings the whole earth into subjection to the King of kings. The end, as foretold by Daniel:

“The kingdom and the dominion and greatness of the kingdom under the whole heavens shall be given to the people of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.”

With this conflict thus projected into the future, we will follow the stream of revelation, and in the New Testament seek to learn the relation of these kingdoms to the perfect kingdom of God, the Christian’s relation to them, and their final destiny.

This is the full text of Chapter 1 of the excellent “Civil Govermnet” by David Lipscomb.