What is the Proper Response to Tyranny?

Gary responds to a recent radio program by Todd Friel about God’s law and its application to society.

When we explore what the Bible teaches about the character of God, the salvation accomplished by Christ, the work of the Holy Spirit in making us holy in heart and conduct, or the nature of God’s covenantal dealings with men, we see why the believer should take a positive attitude toward the commandments of God, even as revealed in the Old Testament. Indeed, the Bible teaches that we should presume continuity between the ethical standards of the New Testament and those of the Old, rather than abbreviating the validity of God’s, law according to some preconceived and artificial limit.

Because He did not come to abrogate the Old Testament, and because not one stroke of the law will become invalid until the end of the world, Jesus declared: “Therefore, whosoever breaks one of these least commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:17-19). Given this instruction, our attitude must be that all Old Testament laws are presently our obligation unless further revelation from the Lawgiver shows that some change has been made.

The methodological point, then, is that we presume our obligation to obey any Old Testament commandment unless the New Testament indicates otherwise. We must assume continuity with the Old Testament rather than discontinuity. This is not to say that there are no changes from Old to New Testament. Indeed, there are—important ones. However, the word of God must be the standard which defines precisely what those changes are for us; we cannot take it upon ourselves to assume such changes or read them into the New Testament. God’s word, His direction to us, must be taken as continuing in its authority until God Himself reveals otherwise. This is, in a sense, the heart of “covenant theology” over against a dispensational understanding of the relation between Old and New Testaments.

To this methodological point we can add the substantive conclusion that the New Testament does not teach any radical change in God’s law regarding the standards of socio-political morality. God’s law as it touches upon the duty of civil magistrates has not been altered in any systematic or fundamental way in the New Testament.

Gary responds to a recent radio program by Todd Friel about God’s law and its application to society. Friel mentions NAR (New Apostolic Reformation), Christian Nationalism, and Christian Reconstruction, among others. While he admits that differences exist, he seems to be suspicious of all of them, while also condemning some who diverge from historic Christian morality.

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