One nation before God

Andrew Cameron

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1 July 1997

“God's own country”.

So declared the recent front-page headline of our local newspaper, over a colour picture of a lone figure on a beautiful dusk-coloured beach. While I have often heard people refer to this area by that phrase, as front-page news it somehow feels official now: God lives in Sutherland Shire, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

The story actually reported how this year's figure for new citizens making their home in “the Shire” has already equalled last year's total of 612. The area has always generated strong regional loyalty; but since the point of taking Australian citizenship is to become a member of Australia, the story's focus on the Shire seemed ironic.

Human beings are great ‘groupers’. After defining ourselves against the rest of the world as a nation, we swiftly establish smaller sub-groups on our near horizons. These can appear quite arbitrary to an outside observer, but to the group's insiders, loyalty is generally self-evident and unquestionable. A primary question for the disciple of Christ then becomes—how right are any of these sub-groupings of humanity that we label ourselves with?

Perhaps a more practical and pressing issue is—what are we to make of this first and largest of people-groupings, called ‘countries’ or ‘nations’? Unquestioning allegiance to this grouping is labelled as ‘patriotism’ or ‘nationalism and, for many, patriotism is a high virtue.

In a recent documentary on the Vietnam War, I was astounded to hear a U.S. citizens state that until they saw the full horror of that war, their assessment had been that the fighting must have been right, since ‘my country’ had chosen to fight there! Noticing flawed and misplaced patriotic trust in others is easy. But when I consider my own group, my allegiance to which easily goes unquestioned, it is harder to know if patriotic feelings are right.

Part of Australian national identity is not to think too hard about such matters! But suddenly Australians have to, as recent events have forced us to assess what it is to be ‘One Nation’.¹

The Bible is helpful in this respect, because it comes to me from outside my group, to buffet me and to pinpoint what I value. If Bible writers do not give wholehearted endorsement to my patriotism, maybe I need to realign my values. If Bible writers do not affirm my anarchic individualism, maybe I need to change what I want. I may even discover a new way of conceiving the world that is more appropriate for God's person.

So which do the Bible writers do? My first thought was of the scene in Revelation 7:9-10:

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After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!”
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This glimpse of heaven has always fascinated me for a few reasons. For a start, the list of people groupings—nation, tribe, people, language—is so radically comprehensive. Some people think primarily in terms of their nation. Others feel a prior affinity to their family, their clan or tribe. Skin colour may be the defining point of allegiance for us, while others defend and adhere to their linguistic heritage. But whichever way you carve it, says John, whichever method you use to divide up the world, heaven subsumes them all.

Yet heaven does not erase these features of humanity! That John could identify the great multitude as he has, suggests that the national, tribal, racial and linguistic origins of each person remain somehow visible in heaven. God has not seen fit to rub out these features of people. This is a powerful statement that God affirms and accepts the fact of difference between people. And the gathered multitude accepts these differences in each other.

What has changed for this crowd is their point of primary allegiance. They share great new commonalities. They are all focussed on a throne and a Lamb, and their excitement about this figure is expressed in musical unison. And each wears a white robe, for each has needed cleansing and each has received it (v. 14). If John were to ask each “which group are you from?”, any one of them would respond “from the Lamb's people.” When it comes to the way they see themselves, some powerful shift has occurred at their core.

This scene is not just a one-off, either. In Revelation 21:24 “the nations” walk by the light provided by the Lamb and “the kings of the earth” bring “their glory” into the heavenly city. While people wonder what this “glory” might be (works of fine art? believers in their realm? good aspects of their culture? their personal reputation?), the main point is clear: regardless of origins, first allegiance is now to the heavenly city and its Lamb, even though the origins of its members remain on view.

This observation is even more surprising after the frightening imagery of Revelation 19:17f, where the “great supper” of judgement has included “the flesh of kings” and other mighty persons. This fitting end is for that nationalism which opposes “the king of kings”, who can and will “strike down the nations” with a word from his mouth, if God's wrath so demands (Rev 19:11-16).

So the final common ground that nations will find is either in fellowship with the Lamb, or under his judgement. Of course, this understanding of their end just culminates the Bible's previous developments. Other articles in this Briefing show that what comes to fruition in the New Testament started unfolding very early in the Old.

God's prior kingship over his world meant that the OT has consistently stopped short of endorsing national Israelite chauvinism. Thus when Jesus briefs Paul (Acts 9:15; 22:21; 26:17) to become “apostle to the Gentiles” (or perhaps better, to ‘the nations’), the vision of God smashing down the barriers that divide people is just a magnified version of what was always there. Romans 1-2 emphasises God's judgement coming against Jew and Gentile equally since “God shows no partiality” (Rom 2:11), and Romans is there partly to say that God's grace comes to Jew and Gentile alike. Thus in Galatians 3:27-28 Paul can declare that:

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As many of you as were baptised into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.
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When I turn to Christ and am “baptised into Christ”, my primary allegiance is changed. When “clothed in Christ”, I am then defined by who Christ is, rather than by my own whims and attitudes. When this is true for both you and me there is now nothing to divide us, even if once we hated each other. So in Galatians 3:28, the walls are crumbling, and groups of people who once banded against each other to hurt each other are blended to become “one in Christ Jesus”.

The same statement is powerfully made in Colossians 3:10-11, where “[you] have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!” In this respect, Ephesians 2:14-20 also deserves close study. There Christ breaks down a wall of hostility to make peace between Jew and nations (i.e. “Gentiles”), so creating in himself “one new humanity”. He is the “cornerstone” to this new “household”. For the disciple of Christ, then, the only people grouping that should appropriately gain our primary allegiance is this “one new humanity”.

But this is no refuge for budding Unabombers. In the subversive and ingenious manner of the Bible, it also posits that Christians cultivate a basic respect and co-operation with their neighbours.

In Mark 12:13f, Jesus' enemies find some ardent secular imperialists (the Herodians), and some radical fundamentalists for whom a spiritual Israel, and allegiance to God, are the only valid points of self-definition (the Pharisees). In a stunning pincer movement, these are sent against Jesus as a united bloc, to ask him the famous question “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?” The trap, of course, is that whichever way Jesus answers this closed question, both groups will have the grounds to execute him. When Jesus points to the head on a coin instead, the effect is to say, “Who gave you your infrastructure? Who gave you the roads and good order to do business, and the very coins and currency to trade with?” A coin is found instantly among them, and all meekly agree that it is Caesar's head; and suddenly it is clear that the Herodian, the Pharisee and Jesus have all been using common coinage, and so all are benefiting from Caesar's infrastructure. Giving coins back to Caesar, says Jesus, just maintains what Caesar has given you, and in no way infringes upon your prior commitment to God.

For Jesus, it is a given that one's primary allegiance is to God. But this does not necessarily put one in opposition to one's neighbour. In fact, Jesus' two great commandments show that love for God with heart, soul, mind and strength is not expressed as radical opposition to one's neighbour, but in part by a more intense love for them! And the Samaritan parable has already gelignited the concept of ‘neighbour’ way over the national border, into what was previously regarded as enemy territory.

Since the value of people surrounding the Christian is enhanced, respect and co-operation with governments that benefit others becomes basic for the Christian. Even Caesar's dictatorial government brought benefits that Christians were to affirm. Thus Jesus' legendary answer does not just side-step the trap. It opens up a whole new perspective on citizenship.

Based on this, later New Testament writers speak with one voice. Paul's instruction along these lines in Romans 13:1-7 is well known, but perhaps we do not properly grapple with the way he grounds this in love for one's neighbour in verses 8-10. The whole section reflects Jesus' teaching.

1 Peter 2:13f speaks of emperors and governors just as human inventions (the NIV is less accurate than the NRSV's “every human institution”). But even so, submitting to them “for the Lord's sake” is loving and right, because in verse 17, “honour” to the emperor and his subjects is bracketed with love for the believers as much as with fear of God. And incredibly, just moments before Christians are called “aliens and exiles” (2:11) and “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people” (2:9). Here is the same basic revolution in primary allegiance (and in verse 15, when “foolish” people read subversive intent into this changed allegiance, right conduct will show their fears to have be groundless). But somehow it produces an enhanced respect, borne of love, for the humans and their institutions that surround us.

I suppose biblically literate people are familiar with these contours. But these very contours are what make it hard to know how to respond to the agendas of those around us. As always, the total Bible picture leaves us uneasy about simple positional solutions. Militant hostility to national groupings and government is out of the question for Christians, just as total and primary allegiance to these groupings is badly misguided. There may be much to endorse and much to attack in any nation-state we find ourselves in.

This can been seen in the classic dilemma for the Christian about warfare. Should I fight for my country? Not insofar as it demands my total allegiance, and certainly never because the enemy is deemed accursed or sub-human. But perhaps yes, insofar as my countrymen have done much to keep me alive and well. If now they are in danger, it may be an extension of the love-principle to honour them by helping to protect them. (Let us not forget to pray against having to answer this dilemma in real life.)

But there are now more immediate dilemmas. Should I back patriotic political parties? Surely yes, if they stand on a platform that endorses love and honour between the citizens of the nation. Surely no, if they demand an allegiance to some concept of nation that is exclusive of others.

This leads me back to God's Own Country. There is a problem with the impulse to define ourselves nationally, because where does it end? If an area the size of my Shire can take precedence in my mind over the nation that contains it, what next? My suburb? My street? My household? Myself?

This deep-seated human tendency to identify with units of ever-decreasing size, reminds me of the absurd scene in Monty Python's film, Life of Brian, where after years of factionalism and in-fighting, the “People's Front of Judea” has become one man sitting on a bench. A group of a thousand will fragment into smaller groups if you let it, until in the final analysis all you are left with are a thousand ‘groups’ of one. In this light, vehement allegiance to national people-groupings is seen for what it is: paradoxically, it is just the logical extension of selfish, lonely, greedy individualism.

We have something better. Our shift in allegiance to the Lamb and his throne, and to the people around that throne, might first cause our countrymen to suspect that we are not for them. But oddly, what the Lamb teaches us of love means we may be more for them than they are for each other. Perhaps more confronting is this corollary: when we are living for the Lamb, we will always strenuously love whoever they are agreeing to hate.