Lust for power, craving access to the inner circle, never satisfies, but always enslaves. The corrective words of John prove just as potent and important today as they did in the first century: “Little children, keep yourself from idols.” We MUST render to Caesar the things that are his; worship is NOT one of those things. The State is a servant, not a savior. Let’s stop acting as if it were the latter.

Sins flow from sin; and sin fundamentally stems from idolatry, worshipping the creation instead of the Creator.^[1] This dynamic is no less true in the realm of political governance. Let’s get to the gist.

Idolatry and its Forms

Paul is explicit: the taint infecting creation stems from the Imago Dei worshipping creation instead of God, the Creator.^[2] As a result, man seeks to “be like God.”^[3] When this occurs as the truth is exchanged for the lie, worship tends to gravitate toward and settle upon two objects: The individual (the Self) or the collective (the State).^[4] History records trends vacillating between both—expressive individualism, as well as Statist totalitarianism.^[5]

The Swinging Idolatrous Pendulum

Decades ago, some thoughtful Christians understood how pietism and dualism undermined the faith and allowed evil to proliferate. Francis Schaeffer sounded the alarm, calling Christians to thoughtfully and faithfully engage the public square to expose, oppose, and foreclose evils such as abortion and political tyranny.^[6] And, Christians of various theological stripes began to “grow up” and see their collective responsibility to engage the culture and act publicly like salt and light.^[7] Pietism began to wane. Fast forward.

Met with some political successes coupled with the rise of the New Right, engagement came to mean: obtain power, that is, the levers of the State, in order to “reward friends and punish enemies.”^[8] And the manner for doing so signaled that some folks, including Christians, had placed an “expiration date” on the fruit of Spirit. This takes a page from Pharoah’s playbook. Winning—and only winning—matters; the means of doing so not so much. Denizens of the New Right, including so-called Christian Nationalists, rationalized this ethical shift because “they [supposedly] know what time it is.”^[9] This move embraces a crass lust for State power and little more. The State, under this construct, is increasingly conceptualized as a savior instead of a servant, as Paul designates it.^[10] That calculus is not simply mistaken; it is theologically dangerous. The State didn’t die for sins, nor atone for them, and therefore cannot be savior. Christ is the one and only savior.^[11]

While many Christians would never profess such a crude precept that the State saves, they sadly are increasingly operating in terms of it, especially given the rise of the New Right which proposes Statist political solutions.^[12] This comprises rank idolatry in most cases and should be resisted and repudiated by every faithful Christian. Yet this temptation is not new and periodically recirculates; and it’s like a bad odor that hangs in the refrigerator even after its moldy source has been trashed.

The New-Old Problem

Recall that God’s people yearned to be like other nations, rejecting God’s prophet and instead installing a political redeemer, a potent king:

Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said to him, “Behold, you are old and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now appoint for 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 to the LORD.^[13]

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