Studies in Eschatology – Zechariah

The Basic Security

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Religious studies

Lesson: 3-15

Genre: Lecture

Track: 141

Dictation Name: RR127B3

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s-1970’s

Our scripture lesson today is the 2nd chapter of Zechariah. Zechariah 2: The Surest Defense.

“2 I lifted up mine eyes again, and looked, and behold a man with a measuring line in his hand.

2 Then said I, Whither goest thou? And he said unto me, To measure Jerusalem, to see what is the breadth thereof, and what is the length thereof.

3 And, behold, the angel that talked with me went forth, and another angel went out to meet him,

4 And said unto him, Run, speak to this young man, saying, Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls for the multitude of men and cattle therein:

5 For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.

6 Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from the land of the north, saith the Lord: for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the heaven, saith the Lord.

7 Deliver thyself, O Zion, that dwellest with the daughter of Babylon.

8 For thus saith the Lord of hosts; After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled you: for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye.

9 For, behold, I will shake mine hand upon them, and they shall be a spoil to their servants: and ye shall know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me.

10 Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion: for, lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the Lord.

11 And many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people: and I will dwell in the midst of thee, and thou shalt know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto thee.

12 And the Lord shall inherit Judah his portion in the holy land, and shall choose Jerusalem again.

13 Be silent, O all flesh, before the Lord: for he is raised up out of his holy habitation.”

In the year 519 BC the prophet Zechariah spoke to the badly discouraged and disheartened remnant that returned to Jerusalem. The land was in ruins, it had reverted to wilderness, and there were only some 40,000 who came by faith to rebuild it, and among those 40,000 there were many opportunists. And the prospect seemed a very discouraging one, especially in view of the fact that the task of rebuilding Jerusalem seemed for the small handful almost an impossibility.

In this situation, God speaking through the prophet Zechariah gave them a vision of the future. So often we tend to read the future in terms of the past, and we look to the past, and to the present to the things we know and we like, and we say: “This is what we want in the future.” Now if we as children had said that we wanted to see the future in terms of the present and of the past, we would no doubt have read our future in terms of our childhood activities and interests. But in the providence of god we grew up. We passed beyond those things, good as they were, and we began to see the future in terms of maturity. And so God was showing to the returning people that the future had to be seen not in terms of Israel, not in terms of the nation and the things in the nation that they prized, but in terms of a broader future. In terms of the true Jerusalem, the City of God, the true Church.

In this vision he sees a man going forth, an angel to survey Jerusalem. Now since Jerusalem was nothing but ruins, and as yet non existent, an actual survey of Jerusalem would have been only of the handful of people that were encamped on its edges. But to begin the vision he is given a picture of the true Jerusalem. A Jerusalem whose builder and maker is God, and of the earth filled with the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea. And he is told that this survey declares that Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls for the multitude of men and cattle therein. And then the picture of Jerusalem spreading out to all four corners of the earth, so that all men, peoples, tribes tongues and nations are included, and that this takes place in that day when God comes to dwell amongst his people, then the beginning of this great flourishing of Jerusalem comes. For it was then with the coming Of Jesus Christ, that the true Jerusalem was opened up and broadcast into the far corners of the earth.

And this true Jerusalem, Zechariah tells them, shall grow. Shall grow in a kind of urban sprawl, even as the city spreads out and overtakes the suburbs and other cities, and grows and grows beyond them, so the true Jerusalem shall not be fenced, it shall not be walled, it cannot be walled because it spreads out into all the world, so that it can have no defense, because how can you build a fence around the entire world? And this will be the extent of the true church.

Moreover, it will be without walls because it will need no defense, because God is the defender thereof. “For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.” So that though it seems to be outwardly defenseless, and undefended, God says: “I will be unto my church, my true people, those who are members of me, a wall of fire round about them.”

Now this does not mean that the people of God are to take no precautions. Very soon thereafter in the next generation as they begin to rebuild the walls, Nehemiah commanded them to build with their armor in hand and a trowel in hand, ready to put down the one in order to defend themselves against the enemy. And although humanly speaking the pitiful remnant that were trying to rebuild the wall could have been easily overwhelmed by the enemy without, yet by grace of God because they did what was necessary to defend themselves, God was their wall of fire, and they were not put to the test, to the necessity of battle.

And God said: “I will be the wall of fire round about, and the glory in the midst of her.” Moreover this vision looks to the ultimate day when Jerusalem, the true people, the true city of god shall be without walls, because Gods order prevails, and the true Jerusalem prevails. “And many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people and I will dwell in the midst of thee, and thou shalt know that the Lord of Hosts has sent me unto thee.”

Thus Zechariah said to these people and he says to us, because this vision is closer to its fulfillment in our time and to us than it was to that handful then, though God was a wall of fire round about them, that we shall see Gods order, and the true church of God shall be a city without walls because it covers the face of the earth, and Gods order prevails everywhere.

But this chapter says even more. In the 8th verse we have a magnificent statement: “For thus saith the Lord of hosts; After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled you:” The glory of God is at stake, and God says that “I have sent my judgement, my negeance out to those who have sought to spoil you, or who have moved against you and have hurt you.”

And in the 9th verse “Behold I will shake mine hand” or my fist, “Upon them. And they shall be a spoil to their servants. And ye shall know that the Lord of hosts has sent me.” God will use the very servants of those who oppress Christ, and His people. Who oppress the true church of God in every generation, to destroy them, and to reestablish His glory in and through his people. “For he that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of His eye.” This is a verse to remember, a verse to treasure. “He that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of His eye.”

Now the eye ball is perhaps the most sensitive thing in a man’s body. The slightest touch, a hair in it, or on it, and the irritation is great, and if someone sticks their finger in your eyeball your reaction is instantly one of hurt and of anger. And God says to us, to His people: ‘He that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of His eye.” And hence the summons to obedience. To faith and obedience. For when we stand in obedience to God, when we move by faith, when we fulfill that which is our duty in our daily walk, then our prayers are heard by God and honored.

God makes it clear to us in His word over and over again, that men have a responsibility to be faithful to their duty and their calling, and to be Godly workmen. Godly Fathers, Godly Husbands. And that wives have a duty to be obedient to their husbands in the Lord. “That,” The scripture declares, “Ye may be heirs together of the grace of life.”

And we are summoned to obedience, “That your prayers be not hindered.” Thus when we walk in terms of obedience, the scripture makes abundantly clear from beginning to end that faith and obedience, to trust and obey, carries with it great blessings. And God then is very jealous of us. “He that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of His eye.”

So we see how vey dearly the welfare of His people concerns the Lord. Because whatever touches the eyeball is felt to be very painful. And hence God chooses this figure. The rash handling of His people. Any movement against us by the world when we obey the Lord pains God, and therefore He moves to protect His people, as a man moves to protect the apple of his eye.

“The Lord shall inherit Judah His portion in the Holy land, and shall choose Jerusalem again.” In this manner through those who are the true people of God, God reestablishes His inheritance. This is a bold and a very striking figure of speech that God uses. God calls us His inheritance. A man jealously guards, he wants to protect, he wants to have in the full sense of the word, his inheritance in its true value. And God declares that His true church, His true people are His inheritance, and He shall establish them, and shall bless and prosper them in terms of His appointing.

Then Zechariah in the concluding verse speaks to those who seem to believe that God is completely indifferent to men, to those who would raise any doubt or objection to what he has revealed, and says: “Be silent, O all flesh, before the Lord: for he is raised up out of his holy habitation.” The whole human race is to have nothing to say to God, it is not to argue or to question God, it has no part, no right to any controversy with God. For it is the duty and the privilege of the whole earth to be silent before the Lord and to obey Him. When he raises himself up from His holy habitation, and speaks to the creatures of His hand.

And so this chapter to the deserted people, as they felt they were, to the discouraged people as they faced the difficult task of rebuilding the temple, and of rebuilding Jerusalem, this word came, declaring unto them: “God is our shield and our reward. He is a wall of fire around us, a sure defense, and he that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of His eye.” Therefore the summons of the entire book of Zechariah is, to do that which God hath appointed us to do, be obedient in our calling and in our station, that we may have this sure security, the security of God. Let us pray.

Almighty God our Heavenly Father, we thank Thee that we who are Thy creatures, made out of nothing, out of the dust of the ground, thou hast called to be Thy people; as dear to Thee as the apple of Thy eye. And Thou hast declared that we are thine inheritance, and has made us to be kings priests and prophets in Jesus Christ unto Thee. Make us mindful of the greatness of our calling, the certainty of our defense, and the necessity that we walk by faith and in obedience. In Jesus name, amen.

Are there any questions now?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] The latter part of Salem means peace; the first part has reference to God, I believe the first syllable, perhaps the peace of God, right now I don’t think I can say, I have forgotten, I did know. I’ll try to remember to check up on that and let you know. Yes?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] It is not true. Very, very frequently the assertion is made that one or another religion had these commandments and we borrowed them apparently, or that Moses derived them from some earlier religion. And we are often told that there were borrowings for example from Manichaeism and these other religions with regard to the concept of a virgin birth and so on. This is nonsense. First of all the documents in which they purportedly find these things are from the Christian era, and as with Manichaeism where they trace back the documents, they found that the more it came to the Christian part of the world the more it picked up Christian ideas, so that the borrowing was the other way. Second, there is nothing in Buddhism that suggests Biblical morality, nothing at all. Because first of all Buddhism is a totally pessimistic religion. It says that there is no meaning to life, that the truth is that there is an ultimate nothingness. We came out of nothing and we return to nothing. So that, it is an ultimate atheism. Now, what is the wise man to do? Since there is no truth, he moves therefore in terms of non-involvement. Don’t get involved in the world. So that, if the Buddhist gives you any council about not stealing, it is not because this is a sin, it is because you are getting involved in property, you are getting involved with people and so on. Thus Buddhism will often have statements that seem to parallel what the Bible teaches, but for entirely different reasons, with no question of any morality because you do not want to sin against God, but: “Don’t get yourself involved. There is not truth, and nothing is worthwhile, why bother?”

Even the golden rule which is supposedly in every religion, means an entirely different thing; in Buddhism, “Do not do unto others has you would not have them do unto you.” Is a rough translation, but the basic meaning is negative. Leave other people alone because you want to be left alone, and don’t get involved with them because you don’t want them involved with you. So, the basic perspective there is: “No person is worth bothering about or getting mixed up in.” Now this is a radically different thing from the Golden Rule as we meet with it in Scripture.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Right, and you have to see a commandment in its context. For example, you can find in almost every religion, something like this: “Thou shalt not steal.” The question is what constitutes stealing? And this is where you get into the very great differences. It may be stealing only if you steal from somebody who is a part of your group. And it may be stealing even more restrictively from that, and it usually is, so that commandment is worthless as it stands, unless it is set in the proper religious context. Yes?

[Audience Member] Did you say that there were not these writings of Buddha? I’ve been reading a book of the religions of the United Nations, and they are trying to bring out the common points of all faiths, and in Buddhism they say that Buddhism has stories like the parables of Jesus, the stories are a little bit different but you recognize them right away, are their not these writings?

[Rushdoony] There are, but first they are translated to make them resemble the Biblical stories. Second, these stories are of late origin, and obviously show that the people knew the Biblical documents.

[Audience Member] I see, so that they were reading it into…

[Rushdoony] Yes, so that after hearing the Biblical documents, they then took these stories and adapted them to Buddhism. For example, you can go into Buddhist countries, now and here the song sung by little children in the Buddhist schools: “Buddha loves me, this I know.” Now, where did they get that? No doubt someone will come along a 100 years from now and say: “Aha, here is an obvious borrowing from Buddhism, here again the Christians are proven to be an unoriginal religion.” But this is the only way, you see, they will read things in other religions. They will not say: “These are borrowed.” No, they are anti Christian. So that, they will insist the borrowing was the other way around, because they have one ax to grind, an anti Christian ax.

[Audience Member] I think that it is real important to bring this up, because all of the churches and everything, this is what they are trying to bring forth, that this is a common faith that we hold.

[Rushdoony] Yes, and there is no such thing as a common faith in all of these religions. Yes?

[Audience Member] One problem that I have in this as a lay person talking to other people and trying to show that this is wrong, these things that they hear, but they have heard them and read them from people that they think are so much smarter than either one of us, that they don’t want to believe and it seems to me that it all narrows down to who are you going to believe?

[Rushdoony] Right. The essence of it is this. We have had for over a 100 years now an anti Christian system of education which has brainwashed people and taught them to believe as history that which is not history, and as a result their whole perspective is warped, and it is not going to change short of a true regeneration and a Christian reeducation, because their whole view of history is polluted, warped, twisted. Now, all you have to do is open a history book and look at the table of contents and you can see how warped the history is because it will first of all divide history into 3 major periods, antiquity, the middle ages, and modern times. Well do you know the meaning to that division? The idea was that when Christianity came into the world it constituted a kind of a recess in history. “This was just a time when things were… stood still. And man didn’t really get underway again until it ended.” So this was a middle period, this vast segment. And only when modern times began with the Enlightenment after the Reformation and had a start in the Renaissance and then took up again with the Enlightenment do you really have history.

Now this period, so called Medieval Period, we are told was proceeded by the dark ages. Why was it dark? Well, because Rome fell. Rome was a vicious, degenerate, socialist order. It deserved to fall. That is the only reason why what followed it is called the dark ages. It was a period of wars and a lot of trouble, but as a man who, one of the very few honest historians, William Carroll Bark of Stanford, a very lonely man at Stanford I might say, has written, and this was one of the seminal periods in Western history, all of our basic ideas and freedom, everything we believe in in our Christian American tradition was laid down in that period by the frontier thinkers, he calls them, the Christian thinkers. And most of the basic inventions were forthcoming at that period, which governed society until the last century. But we call it the Dark Ages, because, well, Christianity triumphed in that time, so that makes it dark. And you even find so called Christians who will, as I did this past week, get really huffy if you tell them they didn’t learnt their history properly, when they insist there was a dark ages. They were not dark. They were troubled in that there were numerous upheavals, but they were tremendous ages of light, intellectually and spiritually and in terms of the growth of society, far, far better than the period which proceeded it. And of course they tell you that serfdom for example was something that originated in the Middle Ages. Well, Serfdom originated in the Roman Empire when it became an Empire, in the 1st century AD. And those who were on the Imperial estates were made serfs, so when Rome fell, Europe was left with an inheritance of Serfdom, and gradually things were changed. But the Serfs were much better in the medieval period than they were in the Roman period.

Now, this is just a fragment of what you find, but the whole point is they are not going to accept it, we have to have a totally new education from the grade schools on up through college, to educate men out of their myths. And of course the beginning point of all these myths is Ancient Greece. “The glories of Ancient Greece.” Go through Greek history and try to find that glorious period, it was a sick culture; but it was totally humanistic, and that is why they glorify it. It was a degenerate society, but they love it. Any other questions? Yes.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Now we have the word of God; that is the thing, yes.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, now we have the word of God in its fullness, and so we don’t need a man to be sent, a prophet, we have this. We need to study it. We need to know it. And we have all that we need to know now given to us in serving the purposes of God and concerning the requirements of God, our duty now is to believe and obey, it is that simple. And we are… What?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Well, that is what we get when we go astray, we pay.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, Christianity will encompass the entire earth. This does not mean that the entire earth is going to be Christian, but the entire world is going to be under the jurisdiction of Christians.

[Audience Member] Do you mean governed by Christian principles?

[Rushdoony] Yes, and by Christians.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] It may not be as far off as we think. History is moving very rapidly.

[Audience Member]Very often there is a question arising among people who are not aware of the Christian (?) it sounds very much as if the Christian is the only person, let us say (left the world unto your son (?) like that, now is there a reasonable …?.... I mean some people for instance …?...

[Rushdoony] Well, according to Scripture “No man comes to the Father but by me.” So that we do not make contact with God until we come through Jesus Christ. So that, while people may believe in God in a vague way, and we are told that the devils in hell believe and tremble, and we may have ideas about God, we truly are not on speaking terms with God, and we have not made contact with Him until we believe.

This is the exclusiveness of Christianity which is an offense to many people.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Now I know, but this is the thing, and we might as well face it openly with people, and this is what in all these one world religion things they say: “Well, Christianity needs to surrender its exclusiveness, these other religions are tolerant, why not Christianity?” and the answer is, you are not tolerant with the truth. Because if 2+2=4, then you cannot be tolerant of 2+2=3 or 2+2=5. To be tolerant with the truth is to deny the truth. So, as Christians we need to say: “Yes, it is this and nothing else.”

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] No, before (?) Christ also. Because, in the Old Testament, you have for example the entire book of Leviticus, as well as from the very beginning a great deal said about sacrifice and the sacrificial system. Now, in all of this the point that is made over and over and over again is, that no man can approach God directly. He has to approach Him through sacrifice. And what was involved through sacrifice? He had to bring an unblemished animal of a particular kind, a kid or a lamb and approach God. Then he had to recognize a substitute first for himself, second for someone God was going to send who was going to die for his sins, because he served to die. So when he brought the animal and offered it for sacrifice he put his hands upon it, and confessed his sin, and declared: “Indeed I do deserve the sentence of death, for I am a sinner. And I thank Thee Lord that Thou hast provided and specified a substitute who is going to take the penalty for me, and I offer this lamb as the chosen representative of that substitute.” So he confessed his sins upon it, so when the animal was slain he died and paid the penalty and went away because he believed that substitute was going to die for his sins.

So you see they were accepting Christ before he came. They were accepting the fact that God was going to send someone to be the appointed sin bearer, and they had many, many declarations that made it clear that this was to be someone who was not only man but also God. It would be the seed of the woman that had bruised the Serpents head and destroyed the power of sin, but it was also to be one who was to be virgin born, who was to be very God of very God, who was to be the everlasting Father, the prince of Peace. So it was spelled out for them. And this was the thing that made the preaching of the apostles and the disciples so very telling in the first century. Every Hebrew was brought up to expect these things, he knew these things, and so when they told them: “Jesus Christ is come, in fulfillment of the Scriptures, He is the one promised by God who should bear the sins of many, who should die as a sacrifice for sin, who would be the everlasting father and the prince of peace, who should be virgin born, who should rise again from the dead, and here are the scriptures.” They believed. Or, they turned angry and could not answer, we are told, they could not stand up to the arguments, because their own scriptures, their own interpretation of those scriptures made it clear that Christ obviously fit the bill.

So after the fall of Jerusalem, what they did, the Rabbi’s, was to go through and destroy as far as possible all the old interpretations, all the old commentaries, and provide a new kind of commentary of scripture, so that for example Isaiah 53 which spoke about the lamb of God who offers up His life as the suffering servant for the salvation of His people, well, they gave all kinds of fanciful interpretations for that, they said that it was fulfilled a long time ago by someone or other, or it is to be fulfilled in the future by the great suffering that Israel is going to experience; and of course the so called massacres of the Jews in World War 2 some have actually said was this fulfillment of suffering, of atonement for the whole world. So they reinterpreted the whole of Scripture or changed the meaning of words, they began to change the meaning of (Almon?) and Isaiah 7:14 from virgin to young woman, because they knew that the scriptures were fulfilled. So in the Old Testament they knew that it wasn’t a direct approach to God, it had to be through the appointed sin bearer who was going to give His life as atonement for their sins.

And every society in the world has in its background two basic rituals which are the appointed ones to set this forth to Israel: circumcision and sacrifice. There is no society in the world that has yet been discovered which somewhere in the background hasn’t shown evidences of these things. Circumcision to make it clear that not generation is the saving of man, man is not saved by birth, or any ability in himself, but in a sense by dying to himself by a symbolic severing of the organ of regeneration, of dying to his hope in himself, that he has hope for the future, and sacrifice that it is through the death not of himself but of an appointed sin bearer who makes atonement for him, that he finds his atonement.

Now, in the background of various religions you find that they did know this but they subverted these things, they made circumcision a kind of initiation rite, and sacrifice as a gift to God whereby you bought protection. But they did know. None of them were without a witness, even in their own midst, and in their own heart, because God has so created every man that the witness is there, and Paul says they hold down, they suppress the truth in unrighteousness, they know in their heart the truth about God, the truth of Scripture, without having seen it or read it, but they suppress it in unrighteousness.

Any other questions? Yes.

[Audience Member] …?... In one of your earlier tapes you mentioned conspiracies and the warning against various conspiracies down through the ages (?) but that we shouldn’t get too involved in worrying about conspiracies because then we end up worshipping Satan.

[Rushdoony] Right.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Well, first, the basic conspiracy scripture tells us, is Satan versus Christ. And the conspiracy is there. But we are not to occupy ourselves with evil, but with righteousness. And many, many people who call themselves conservatives, and some who call themselves Christians as well are endlessly dealing with conspiracies, and spending their time not in studying the scripture of God or knowing the power of God, but all the conspiracies, and they evolve all kinds of nonsense too in the process; and the gist of their perspective is: “Here are these satanic conspiracies behind the scenes and they control things, and they are responsible for all wars that happens, and everything that happens on the stock market, and they manipulate everything behind the scenes completely, and pull the strings in every area. Well, that is Satanism. It is saying that evil is on the throne, Satan is on the throne and governing the universe, and anyone who says that is desperately wicked, because they are taking sovereignty from God and they are giving it to Satan.

We must say: “Indeed there are conspiracies, fearful ones. But God says that he hold them in derision, He laughs because he makes even their conspiracies work together for His glory and His purpose.” Even the wrath of man shall praise Him. the wrath, the hatred of man as it seeks to strike out against His people, to strike out against God, to destroy His order, God makes to work for His praise and His glory.

Now when that is the case, this endless involvement with conspiracies is rubbish, it is Satanism. And you find these people don’t believe that God’s law governs the universe.

Last week someone in another community gave me a book, asked me to read it, some people were urging her to read it and to circulate it, about how the international money powers is behind all World revolution and so on and so forth. But the essence of this book is that there is no law except the law of evil. There is no economic law, just the rule of evil. And it believe of course, very definitely in a funny money policy, social credit money, which is saying man makes his own law. They are Satanists, not only in that they believe in the basic power of evil as governing the universe, but they are also going to subscribe to Satan’s policy: “Ye shall be as Gods, knowing, determining for yourself what is good and evil, what is your own law.” So they are going to set up their own economic laws. They are not going to have Gods laws, they are going to have the government buy out the Federal Reserve and print out its own money as though paper that the government says is worth something thereby becomes worth something. They are fools, and Satanic fools.

[Audience Member] Well what would you say would be a guide line for us to tell the difference between which sides? …?...

[Rushdoony] Such as a book as (Tormet?) so very well said: “All they do is to scare you to death.” They believe not in the power of God, but in the power of Satan. So that you are almost tempted to say: “Since evil, since Satan is so thoroughly on the throne, what use is it all, let us give up and lets surrender to him.” And I do believe that some of these books are put out of this purpose.

[Audience Member] …?... Don’t you think too they can stimulate and cause people to really take, and I’m not (?) revolutionary action at all…

[Rushdoony] Yes, they do lead to that sort of thing

[Audience Member] Really, it should be very careful, I don’t object to people reading them, but I think it is important how well grounded and how well balanced the people are who read those things.

[Rushdoony] Yes, it leads them to think that the answer is violence, the answer is lawlessness, so they turn to the wrong sort of thing, because these people do not believe in God’s law, they are going to ‘save mankind’. They are going to destroy men, they are offering something wicked as the answer.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Oh yes, very often they will claim to represent Christian truth and Christianity as against the wicked conspirators, the wicked Jews and so on, but the only thing they call being a Christian, and I have talked to some of them, is that they are not Jewish. They don’t go near a church. One such man who is quite prominent, and I think virtually everyone here would recognize his name, actually told me, he said: “There isn’t a church I know of that I feel I can attend, they don’t know the truth.” Well I happened to be visiting at that time with one minister who very definitely was proclaiming the word of God. But what was his definition of what constitutes the truth? Knowing the facts about this terrible conspiracy. His gospel was Satan.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Our duty is to know the world of God, to stand in terms of it, and to work for a Christian order. A Christian order. Not because we can see it as possible, but because God has declared it is inevitable. Because God’s order is not going to be subverted. Man is either going to submit to it or he is going to be destroyed by God. It is that simple.

[Audience Member] Does this mean truly believing in the complete sovereignty of God, that this is His world, and that it is His order, and that He does have full control?

[Rushdoony] Absolutely. Well, our time is up and we stand dismissed.