Jesus: The First Libertarian?

Got this one this morning from the folks at Christian Newswire:

The Lord Jesus Christ The First, True Libertarian

I'm kinda ready for 2007 to end.

 The Lord Jesus Christ The First, True Libertarian; His Coming Most Important 'Political' Event in History

MEDIA ADVISORY,   Dec. 24

/Christian Newswire/ -- The following statement has been issued by John Lofton, Recovering Republican; Editor, TheAmericanView.com; co-host of "The American View" radio show with Michael Anthony Peroutka, the Constitution Party's 2004 Presidential candidate. You may hear a radio show on this subject by clicking on http://www.theamericanview.com/index.php? id=965.

"And Jesus answering said unto them, Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's. And they marvelled at him." -- Mark 12:17.

The religious significance of the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is well known. But, what is not so well known and understood is that our Lord's birth is "the most important single political event in history," as Dr. R.J. Rushdoony says in his book "The Foundations Of Social Order: Studies In The Creeds And Councils Of The Early Church" (1968). He says the coming of God in the flesh "handed Statism its major defeat in man's history" because it established God as "the true sovereign and the true source of law."

Dr. Rushdoony notes: "Western liberty began when the claim of the State to be man's savior was denied. The State then, according to Scripture, was made the ministry of justice. But, wherever Christ ceases to be man's Savior, there liberty perishes as the State again asserts its messianic claims. Man is in trouble, and history is the record of his attempt to find salvation. Man needs a savior, and the question is simply one of choice: Christ or the State? No man can choose one without denying the other, and all attempts at compromise are a delusion.

"Thus, the key issue of our time is lordship or sovereignty: Who is the lord or sovereign, Christ or the State? Christmas reminds us once again of the birth of this world's only true Lord or Sovereign. We will either acknowledge Him or be judged by Him."

Amen!

Thus, all talk about "freedom" and "liberty," as if either may be obtained apart from the rule of King Jesus, is a lie. As God's Word tells us it is only when His Son sets us free that we are "free indeed" (John 8:36), free from the power of sin which is the Christian definition "freedom/liberty," a definition radically different from the modern definition which sees "freedom/liberty" as merely an absence of all restraints - which is license and not true liberty. See also II Corinthians 3:17 where God tells us that "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."

A footnote: All those candidates who say there should be no "religious test" by voters for public office are saying, in effect, that Jesus Christ is irrelevant to politics. They are engaging in Christ-denial. They are refusing to confess Christ before men which means that He will deny them before His Father (Matthew 10:32-33).

Comments

[Ben]

What an awful intepretation of an isolated verse.

Jesus has been made into a liberal, a conservative, and everything in between. I think a compelling answer came from the neo-orthodox theologian Karl Barth, who said that Christ stands as a "No!" to all human ideologies. In fact, he stands in judgment over them all, refusing divine sanction to any.

One Christmas note: Christianity is so pervasive in our culture that we forget how scandalous the message of Christmas is: Godself, as a screaming baby, in a cattle trough, in a nowhere town, where almost no one paid any attention. There is something subversive in that image, no matter what history and the church have done with it.

Merry Christmas, Xarkers (and visitors searching for "Santa Porn."

[Daniel]

Ben, you are Da Man.

[Janet]

The "render unto Caesar" verse was used in my Catholic schooling as an example of Jesus' message about the separation of church and state, the divine and the earthly.

[Daniel]

Speaking of Santa Porn: More than 1,300 on Xmas Eve, more than 1,100 Xmas day.