Jesus and the Powers (Wright and Bird)

How should Christians engage with the politics of our day? N. T. Wright and Michael Bird help us face this challenging question in Jesus and the Powers: Christian Political Witness in an Age of Totalitarian Terror and Dysfunctional Democracies (Zondervan, 2024).

I loved this book. Even when I disagreed, it felt like a stimulating conversation with friends, discussing things that matter:
In this book, we have attempted to do a number of things related to the topics of political theology, public discipleship, Christian testimony in the face of tyranny, and debates over Church and State relationships. (page 175)

They’ll stretch you to consider a wide range of Christian scholarship and political systems, current and past. From ancient kingdoms to anarchy, from communism to liberal democracy, it’s all on the table. From Caesar to Constantine, from Augustine to Aquinas, from Luther to the Anabaptists, from Putin to Trump — it’s all there. You won’t always agree, but you will hear all those voices.

What I loved

Christians cannot avoid politics, for God’s sovereignty is not limited to the spiritual dimension. We’re living in the story of God rescuing the earth. That gives perspective:
The early church inherited the anti-pagan and anti-imperial perspective of its Jewish heritage. The kingship of God, and his Messiah, was set up against the empires of the world. (page 22)

How do empire and Christianity mix? That’s the question we’ve faced since Constantine:
Do we regard the Church’s association with empire as a marriage of providential convenience or an act of spiritual adultery? Did Christ defeat Caesar or did we merely turn Christ into Caesar? (page 34)

The church cannot withdraw from people’s physical suffering, because Jesus did not:
Jesus is the crucified and risen king who calls us to kingdom-allegiance and kingdom-deeds that are humbly cruciform and positively bursting with the life of the new creation. (page 83)

At the same time, engaging with the power systems of the world is fraught with danger.
We can end up gaming the system rather than bettering the system. (page 90)
Augustine’s city of God never reforms or redeems the city of man. Rather, it resists it in order to outlast it. (page 96)

Turning to specific political systems of our day, Wright and Bird address totalitarian systems such as dictatorships and communism, as well as kingdoms and liberal democracies. They warn against treating the political system as Christ’s authority:

When such leaders are venerated with religious adulation, the result inevitably is that any critique of them, no matter how valid, is treated as either treason or blasphemy. … Remember that the Scriptures have a special title for someone who claims to possess kingly and religious authority, who is both presidential and priestly: the word is ‘Antichrist’. … Christ alone is both messianic King and the Great High Priest. (page 131)

It is misplaced faith to trust political systems to save us:
‘History is Christ written large, not Xi Jinping written large.’ (page 129, attributed to Wang Yi)
Christian nationalism is impoverished as it seeks a kingdom without a cross. (page 136)

At the same time, “civic totalism” seeks to control what beliefs are acceptable in society: Many political progressives see Christianity as the number-one enemy (page 138).

Overturning existing powers?

Our authors recognize how the abuse of power devastates God’s world. That was true among the nations, and within Israel where God called prophets to speak truth to power. Jesus confronted the temple authorities. His apostles resisted human authorities whose edicts clashed with God’s (Acts 4:19).

On this basis, our authors call Christians to oppose the brutal systems of this world:

Our evangelical convictions about God putting the world to rights are only as strong as the evils we tolerate. …
As Christians, we stand against Fascists and Communists; we must show solidarity with oppressed people, such as the brave Hongkongers and Ukrainians … Against Christian nationalism, we must stand against political movements in the USA or elsewhere that take the name of Christ in vain. (pages 147–148)

The authors call us to join in the fight for liberal democracy:

‘Democracy should be an aspirational feature of political order for Christians.’ (attributed to Luke Bretherton) …
We must defend our democracies from external interference. …
It [oppression] can happen to us if we are not alert and do not vigilantly guard our democracies. For, as Timothy Snyder writes, ‘If none of us is prepared to die for freedom, then all of us will die under tyranny.’ (pages 168–169)

Do you see a problem with where this is headed? Sure, there are times when followers of God’s anointed king must refuse to follow the decrees of other rulers. But that’s very different from calling Christians to actively oppose and undermine other forms of government, or to promote the form we live under. That’s misguided and parochial.

Snyder is wrong to present human resistance is the only saving force. How did God form Israel? Did God call them to fight Pharaoh’s tyranny? What kind of stand did Jesus make against Rome’s tyranny? Sure, he opposed the temple leaders who misrepresented God’s authority, but he asked his followers to carry the soldier’s pack a second mile and not fight their oppressors. Jesus did not call us to save ourselves; he trusted the decree of the heavenly sovereign, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.” (Psalm 110:1)

The gospel is God’s declaration that he has installed his Christ as our Lord by raising him from the dead. This gospel does not instantly free everyone from the dark dominion because that’s not how God uses his power. In the gospel, God calls all humanity to recognize his Christ as our Lord. One day every knee will bow and every tongue acknowledge him. We proclaim and embody that message, as the present expression of the kingdom that recognizes the heaven-installed king over the earth.

Human rulers come and go. They have a God-given role, and some are better than others. A Pharoah may listen to a Joseph so many lives are saved. But that’s never our hope: we know another Pharaoh will rise and oppress God’s people for the sake of his power (Exodus 1:10). Daniel may try to show the tyrant who destroyed Jerusalem who is the Lord of kings (Daniel 2:47), but eventually Daniel sees that the rulers of the kingdoms are all beasts whom heaven must replace with someone human-like (Daniel 7).

The suffering-servant gospel does not support the view that our evangelical convictions about God putting the world to rights are only as strong as the evils we tolerate (page 147). That was not Jesus’ view as he faced the cross, believing God would raise him up. He gave us a cross to absorb the suffering of the world and bear it away, not a sword to fight oppression and evil rulers.

Christians can and should be involved in practically caring for oppressed people in our societies. We may have personal preferences for one form of government over another. But our faith calls us to stand together around the Christ as our heaven-appointed leader for all the peoples of the earth, not to divide over our support for one particular form of government and our opposition against others.

The church has wasted too much effort trying to fix the present system instead of promoting the only God-appointed king whose reign can rescue creation. Let’s focus our faith and our resources on the one that really counts, serving the leader God has appointed for the earth.

Energized by the world’s true hope

T. S. Eliot was right:
‘To identify any particular form of government with Christianity is a dangerous error for it confounds the permanent with the transitory, the absolute with the contingent.’ (quoted on page 167)

Lee C. Camp was right:
‘The faith of the Christian is the last great hope of earth.’ (quoted on page 173)

The gospel calls us neither to abandon people who are suffering under present political systems nor to rely on politics to save us. It calls us to follow the servant-king, embodying his reign by caring for suffering people, trusting Christ’s reign to restore all things, ‘always excelling in the work of the Lord, because you know that in the Lord your labour is not in vain.’ (1 Corinthians 15:58 quoted on page 173).

This is exactly right:

Christians must seek to serve, not dominate. That is because cross and kingdom go together. Christ is the ultimate power, yet he became a servant. He made the ultimate sacrifice; though he was in the form of God, he willingly died the death of a slave. Our lives, individually and corporately, should mirror sacrifice and service, as that is the best way to demonstrate what the kingdom of God will look like in all its fullness. (page 177)

In practical terms, that is what the gospel calls us to do. Trust in Christ is credible when his community embodies his kingship.

Conclusion

This is an important book. God calls us neither to withdraw from the suffering world nor to place our trust in present rulers as they fight for power. This book helps us navigate the path between these extremes, even though it sometimes places too much trust in the present systems.

There will be a day when politics is no more, when all things are subject to ‘the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Messiah’ (Revelation 12:10). Before then, we need wisdom, for the Church has much work to do to prepare for such a day. (page xvi)

We have just one good news announcement to make and embody, one leader to trust for the rescue God’s world.

Related posts

• God’s kingdom and politics
• Activism: confronting the powers
• Why doesn’t the Bible condemn bad rulers? (Eph 6:12)
• Why democracy is not our message
• How should we treat the rulers of this world?

Related podcasts:

• You are the Christ (Mark 8:27-35)
• What is Church?
• The world is God’s kingdom (Genesis 1–11)
• Joseph: servant of the king (Gen 37–50)
• Daniel: Who’s running the world?