Iron Ink

Dear Pastor,

“If you can, off the top of your head, how do postmills interpret 1 Pet 5:8? if we believe that Jesus bound the strong man then how is it that Satan is depicted as walking around like a roaring lion?”

I wasn’t sure how to answer this and so I wrote to Dr. Ken Gentry – postmillennial expert extraordinaire – to see if he could give us a leg up on this question.

Here is Dr. Gentry’s response.

“Rev 20:3 states that Satan is bound for a singular purpose: ‘that he not deceive the “nations” anymore.’ Satan still lives and operates, but he no longer can hold the nations in his sway. In the OT only Israel of the nations of the earth knew the true God. Now, because Satan is bound that he cannot deceive the nations, men from every nation, kindred, tongue, and tribe are being swept into the kingdom of God and out of Satan’s clutches. Thus, 1 Peter 5:8 speaks of our need for personal awareness of the power of Satan, whereas Rev 20:3 speaks of divine constraints upon Satan’s power to hold all nations in his power. We see this at work in Christ’s binding Satan by taking demon possessed people from his power.

“With the doctrine of predestination, Christians were dramatically freed from dependence on church and state. Predestination freed man from the custodial care of institutions. His determination and salvation came from God, not church or state. It is not an accident but an inescapable fact that the decline of the doctrine of predestination had led to statism and to power-hungry churches…. If the doctrine of predestination is weakened, then church and state are exalted and their powers enhanced.”

R. J. Rushdoony
The Great Christian Revolution

“Every consistent teaching of predestined grace inevitably implies a radical and ultimate devaluation of all magical, sacramental, and institutional distribution of grace, in view of God’s sovereign will.”

Max Weber
The Sociology Of Religion

A squat grey building of only thirty-four stories. Over the main entrance the words, Central London Hatchery And Conditioning Centre, and in a shield, the World State’s motto, Community, Identity, Stability…. “We also predestine and condition. We decant our babies as socialized human beings, as Alphas or Epsilons, as future sewage workers or future …” He was going to say “future World Controllers” but correcting himself, said “future Directors of Hatcheries,” instead.

Aldous Huxley
Brave New World

Predestination, in Biblical understanding, is the doctrine by which we confess God’s exhaustive sovereignty that extends from eternity past in the decrees of God to eternity future as seen in the fulfillment of all that God ordained.

What we learn from these quotes is that Predestination is an inescapable category. The question is never whether or not predestination is true but rather the question is what or which predestination we will be predestined with and by. Either we will acknowledge and bow to a supernatural predestination or, denying that we will be governed and controlled by a naturalistic predestination – a governance and control that God predestined for the disobedient who seek to cast Him from their thinking.

Should we deny God’s predestination and function as if it is not true we will not suddenly discover the libertarian freedom that so many assure us will be the result of denying God’s predestination but rather we will find our wills bound, as God predestined, by the predestination of some false idol seeking to ascend to the seat of God.

The reality that naturalistic predestination is a reality in America can be seen in the increase of Statism as the Federal Government seeks to predestine the lives of the citizenry. Wherever we find an dramatic increase in centralized planning there we find a state that is seeking to take on the prerogative of predestination.

Wherever we find the State implementing school to work programs that have as their intent channeling individuals to precise places in the work force there we find an example of naturalistic predestination. The language of the “school to work” legislation reveals that the State is embracing the role of predestinators of the future careers of individual students. As B. K. Eakman notes, “The underlying assumption (of School to Work) appears to be that it is not cost effective to have mere individuals making choices about their own lives, that they must be regimented and controlled for their own good and for the good of society.”

Examples could be multiplied but we must understand the connection between abandoning the truth of supernaturalistic predestination and the rise of naturalistic predestination. Predestination is an inescapable reality that never goes away. One significant implication of this is that when people deny God’s supernatural predestination they do not escape the fact that their wills are conditioned by the will of some other naturalistic predestinating source. Another significant implication of this is that just as God predestines to the end of advancing His Kingdom so naturalistic predestinators predestine to the end of building up their respective Kingdoms. Ironically naturalistic predestination always serves God supernatural predestination.

What we see here then is that whenever man seeks to overthrow God’s predestination so that he may experience full libertarian freedom what happens is that his freedom is constrained by naturalistic predestinating agents.

All of this teaches us that if we are a people who desire political and economic freedom we must be a people who embrace the Biblical teaching of God’s predestination for when the Church loses the high notion of predestination the consequence is the reduction and constraint of individual freedoms in the societal realm.

Finally we should learn from this that proper Biblical notions of predestination do not make men careless, languid or lazy but rather makes them active, vigorous and striving since a proper understanding of predestination means that the Christian understands that if he isn’t, in obedience, actively about ordering the world according to God’s revealed law-word he will instead be himself ordered according to the naturalistic predestined will of the state or some other institution. Predestination then, properly taught, energizes and enlivens God’s people.

It’s this easy.

1.) When the State subsidizes something it gets more of it.

2.) If the State taxes something it gets less of it.

Right now we are on the edge of the State subsidizing health care. If this happens one can look to happen in the realm of health care what has happened in the realm of apartment rentals when renters are subsidized.

With rent controls the prices of apartments are artificially kept low by mandate of the state. This is effectually subsidizing those who rent. The result is fivefold. First, there is an increase in demand since people will always flock to that which is being given to them for a price that is far less then the value of that which they are receiving. Second, there is a decline in available rentals since new rentals are not built since the owners of potential rentals will not be able to recoup their cost of building the rental because of the rent controls. Third, the quality of rentals declines because those who do own rentals are disinclined to invest in repairing their rentals since they know that no amount of repair is going to increase what they can charge for their rental. Fourth, with a increase in demand and a decrease in availability shortages soon follow as there are more people chasing rentals then there are rentals to be found. Fifthly, as a result of all this rentals must be rationed by those who are in charge of the rental controls.

Look for the same phenomena explained above to happen if the state puts on health care controls. With health care controls the prices of health care will be kept artificially kept low by mandate of the state. This is effectually subsidizing those who access health care. First, there will be an increase in demand for health care since people will always flock to that which is being given to them for a price that is far less then the value of that which they are receiving. Because people will not be spending their own money they will take every opportunity to access the subsidized health care.

Second, there will soon enough be a decline in available health care since potential providers of health care services will get out of or not go into the health care industry since the potential providers of health care will not be able to recoup their cost of learning how to be a health care provider since their earning potential will be effectively capped.

Third, the quality of health care will decline because those who do health care will be disinclined to invest in keeping current on new health care practices since they will know that no amount of advancement on the learning curve will increase what they can charge for their health care services.

Fourth, with a increase in demand and a decrease in availability health care shortages soon will follow as there are more people chasing health care then there will be health care to be found. Health care controls will assure long waits for both necessary and elective surgery.

Fifthly, as a result of all this health care must be rationed by those who are in charge of the health care controls. In a market economy health care is rationed by prices but since prices can no longer do the work of rationing due to subsidies some other entity will have to do the work of rationing. That entity will be the state. The state will dictate what health care can be accessed by the patient and what health care will not be accessed by the patient. For you morons out there this is called centralized planning.

When the state enters into health care controls they are subsidizing the consumer (thus assuring more consumers) while at the same time effectively taxing the producer (health care providers) by means of demanding increased work for less reward.

You’ve been told, so don’t come complaining to me when grandpa and grandma die because they couldn’t get the health care they needed because the state didn’t deem them worthy of the expense of what they needed.

The beginning of fixing our health care problems is to be found in,

1.) Getting the government out of health care completely. Allowing the government to regulate health care because it is broke is like allowing the bull in the china shop to run the china shop because some of the China was found broken.

2.) Reconnecting the consumer with the cost of their health care. As it stands now, the consumer, because their health care is considered a benefit that attends their employment, isn’t careful about how they spend their health care dollars since they see no correlation between the cost of the health care and the damage that the cost does to their pocketbook. Health care savings account is an idea whose time is past.

3.) Tort reform. Much of the cost associated with Health care is built into health care expense in order to cover insurance for malpractice that Doctors must carry due to ambulance chasers looking to make a buck. A cap should be put on malpractice cases and those lawyers and clients who bring malpractice cases and lose should be required to split the attorney cost for the defense. But as Lawyers inhabit Washington DC like Demons inhabit hell don’t look for this to happen.

There is a common illustration that the Federal government is serving as the public sow and that countless special interests group, individuals and corporations fight for the opportunity to nestle at the teat of the Governmental sow.

Principled people refuse to be dependent upon the largess of the state but they that follow this principle end up being the ones that feed the pig so that she can feed those that are dependent upon the State – those piglets who go after the milk of the sow.

Principled people are disgusted by those who choose to be dependent upon the state and often refuse to take anything from the state, thinking that to do so is theft, since anything taken from the State only comes to them after the State steals it from somebody else first.

I have been one who has tried to operate by this principle. Recently though I’ve been considering if the goal should be to live in such a way as to show that I have no need of the State or rather if the goal should be to try and exhaust the State’s resources.

If we desire to end the States stealing from the productive sector of society in order to support the unproductive sector and in order to give payback to those mega corporations who support the political campaigns of those demons who possess the state perhaps we, who have turned our back on the State, should go to the State for all we can get hoping to bankrupt the resources of a sick and emaciated state, thus bringing it to its knees and releasing us from its thralldom.

Perhaps the goal of a responsible citizenry should be to bring an end, by the means of taking full advantage of the State’s wealth redistribution program, the capacity of the state to suck the life out of its citizenry.

The Federal government is in hock up to its eyebrows. Could it withstand an assault by the productive segment of society taking full advantage of getting from the state every nickel and dime it could possibly squeeze out of the Federal Government?

We need to keep in mind that the Constitution was a compromise document. Compromise documents can sometimes be dicey texts since the very nature of a Compromise document is to be somewhat fuzzy in its meaning so that it can serve as a document around which people of different persuasions can rally. The Constitution was no different. It was signed by people who were Monarchists (Alexander Hamilton) in their persuasions. It was signed by people who were Nationalists (James Madison) in their persuasions. It was shaped by people who were Federalists (George Mason) in their persuasion. It was inevitable that once the Constitution was signed each party would try to interpret it through their previous commitments. This is the nature of compromise documents.

This tension showed itself immediately in the first Washington administration. Thomas Jefferson, Washington’s Secretary of State, being a Federalist (later to be known as Republicans) desired a strict interpretation of the Constitution. Alexander Hamilton being a Monarchist desired a broad interpretation of the Constitution. These different approaches to the constitution would manifest themselves in different events.

1.) Was a proposed national bank constitutional?

Hamilton insisted that a National Bank was needed. Jefferson insisted that a National Bank had no Constitutional authority. Hamilton appealed to the “necessary and proper” clause of the Constitution to justify the National Bank.

“The Congress shall have Power - To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.”

This clause had been adamantly debated during the the Constitutional convention and during states ratifying conventions. Hamilton argued that that the clauses in Article I, section 8, reflected a mandate to Congress to supervise the National economy. Hamilton creatively argued that the word “necessary” in the article in question did not really mean necessary but it could also mean “helpful,” “useful,” or “convenient.” Hamilton essentially argued that where the ends were constitutional and the means were not prohibited, the means were constitutional. It is an argument from silence.

Jefferson on the other hand simply argued that a national bank was not “necessary” to carry out any of Congress’s enumerated powers.

Don’t miss the differences between the arguments that Jefferson and Hamilton made. Hamilton begins by presupposing that Congress had all the powers that the Constitution did not expressly deny it (in violation of the 10th amendment). Jefferson on the other hand begins by presupposing that Congress had only those powers that were delegated and enumerated to it in the Constitution. Washington signed the Bank Bill into law. The issues of National Banks have remained ever since.