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"For the mouth of the LORD of hosts has spoken.
Though all the peoples walk
Each in the name of his god,
As for us, we will walk
In the Name of the LORD our God forever and ever."
Micah 4:5
Citizens of Babylon do not accept the Bible as their standard nor its God as theirs. Prophets of the Old Age attempt to pressure the Christian to drop the Bible as his standard. The world tells him that transitory sexual exploitation is a "fulfilling alternative" and that his marriage is "repressed Victorianism." Merchants of the Harlot-Empire entice the Christian to leave his family, mortgage his inheritance for a cell near the City of Tinsel and Glitter, from thence to commute, day in, day out, to ruthlessly compete for its plastic trophies.
Christian personalism has been replaced by impersonal social Darwinism. The responsibilities of decentralized relationships have lost out to urban anonymity.
In the face of domestic violence, neighborhoods torn by gangs, thousands of deaths by handguns, and a national faith in materialism instead of God, Christians seem to offer as an alternative Ozzie and Harriet.
The Christian Patriarch stands on the shoulders of a great "cloud of witnesses," who have battled not against blood and flesh, but against the now-defeated principalities and powers.
The Spiritual man sees through the claims of the old world; he sees its ugly oppression and selfishness; he clings to the Word of God, for a friend of the system is an enemy of God (James 4:4).
Living in harmony with others, committed to maintaining relationships, the Christian Patriarch extends his world beyond a wife and 1.8 children. In a Community of Saints he withstands the pressure of his former peers and walks in the Way of the Lord. He opens his home to the weak and "illegal." He converts his home into a neighborhood center, and sends the Word of Reconciliation to the ends of the earth. His home is a ministry of encouragement, reassuring those who wish to obey the Scriptures that obedience is the right course. By seeing the blessings of the Way of Christ and the brutality of man the would-be-god, the Christian Patriarch is encouraged in his efforts to walk in the Spirit, and better able to resist the powers of darkness. These Spiritual abilities are passed on to subsequent generations.
Having seen the ugliness of the once-deified State, many are now suggesting that the task of Christian Reconstruction must be entrusted to the State redivivus: the institutional church. Overlooking the priority of the Family, the remedial and temporary character of the Old Testament Priesthood, and the temptation of power, the new priests abandon the Patriarchal vision of the Apostles of the New Covenant.
But the sheep hear the voice of the True Shepherd. They are answering His call to Patriarchal service and are rejecting the quagmire of institutionalization.
The Christmas Conspiracy: Adoption, Community, Perseverance, Reconstruction
Patriarchy Resists the Accuser
On the priority of the Family, see Theses 13, 21, 27. [Back]
On the temporary character of Old Covenant Mediators, see Theses 26, 28, 29, 30, 32, 33. [Back]
On the Patriarchal vision of the New Testament, see Theses 65, 66, 67, 69, 70, 71. [Back]
On the NT rejection of political power, see Theses 74, 75, 81, 88. [Back]
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