99. Total Crown Rights of Christ the King

The Fear of Victory

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Political Science

Lesson: Bringing Back the King

Genre:

Track: 01

Dictation Name: RR191A1

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s-1970’s

[Narrative] It’s a real joy to be able to welcome to this pulpit for the first time Rousas John Rushdoony. I’ve had the privilege of being in correspondence with him and in other conferences in time past, and he comes to this church and its membership is no stranger because of his books having been circulated among you, and the fact that during the months of the school year, those who attend the Tuesday morning Bible study, along with our high school students are studying his institutes of Biblical Law, and afterwards we have fellowship in a cafeteria where we play one of his tapes for further study. Rushdoony is the author of numerous works on various subjects, and these will be made available here at the conference during this week. Also, he is a lecturer who is widely known, and as founder of Chalcedon, he has as his objective, Christian reconstruction in every area of life, pressing the crown rights of Christ totally upon our culture, and we concur with this and rejoice in his work.

I have not only read all of his books, except the last one, The Word of Flux, but I think I’ve listened to the series on history and philosophy six or eight times while driving back and forth to various engagements.

It’s going to be a rich week and we look forward to it. Mr. Rushdoony is speaking this morning on the subject of “The Fear of Victory,” and this evening on the subject of “The Gospel According to St. Ahab.” I encourage you to be here and take advantage of these studies.

For ten years he was a missionary to the Indians. He has served in the pastorate, and now he is devoted to writing and educational work, strong promoter of the Christian school movement, and what little bit I know about Christian education I’ve learned from him. So, Rush, it’s a real privilege to have you in this pulpit and in this conference.

[Rushdoony] Thank you very much.

Hear now the word of God as it is given to us in 2 Kings 13:10 following. “In the thirty and seventh year of Joash king of Judah began Jehoash the son of Jehoahaz to reign over Israel in Samaria, and reigned sixteen years. And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord; he departed not from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel sin: but he walked therein. And the rest of the acts of Joash, and all that he did, and his might wherewith he fought against Amaziah king of Judah, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? And Joash slept with his fathers; and Jeroboam sat upon his throne: and Joash was buried in Samaria with the kings of Israel.

Now Elisha was fallen sick of his sickness whereof he died. And Joash the king of Israel came down unto him, and wept over his face, and said, O my father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof. And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows. And he took unto him bow and arrows. And he said to the king of Israel, Put thine hand upon the bow. And he put his hand upon it: and Elisha put his hands upon the king's hands.

And he said, Open the window eastward. And he opened it. Then Elisha said, Shoot. And he shot. And he said, The arrow of the Lord's deliverance, and the arrow of deliverance from Syria: for thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek, till thou have consumed them. And he said, Take the arrows. And he took them. And he said unto the king of Israel, Smite upon the ground. And he smote thrice, and stayed. And the man of God was wroth with him, and said, Thou shouldest have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou smitten Syria till thou hadst consumed it: whereas now thou shalt smite Syria but thrice. And Elisha died, and they buried him. And the bands of the Moabites invaded the land at the coming in of the year. And it came to pass, as they were burying a man, that, behold, they spied a band of men; and they cast the man into the sepulchre of Elisha: and when the man was let down, and touched the bones of Elisha, he revived, and stood up on his feet.

But Hazael king of Syria oppressed Israel all the days of Jehoahaz. And the Lord was gracious unto them, and had compassion on them, and had respect unto them, because of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and would not destroy them, neither cast he them from his presence as yet. So Hazael king of Syria died; and Benhadad his son reigned in his stead. And Jehoash the son of Jehoahaz took again out of the hand of Benhadad the son of Hazael the cities, which he had taken out of the hand of Jehoahaz his father by war. Three times did Joash beat him, and recovered the cities of Israel.”

A few months ago in California, we had a disastrous event in our state legislature. A bill was introduced to eliminate all legal charges against a variety of sexual offenses from adultery to homosexuality, and to remove from the police files the names of sexual psychopaths. It was not expected that the bill would pass. However, when no opposition developed to it from Christians, it came out of committee with a 15 to one vote. It quickly passed the legislatures, the assembly. Some opposition developed when it reached the Senate, but it passed by one vote. Immediately, a number of Christian laymen, led by State Senator Bill Richardson, formed a coalition of Christian citizens to reestablish that law by referendum initiative. Immediately, large numbers of laymen and women met up and down the state to begin work on the petitions. It seemed as though within a week, the matter would be on the ballot and passed, and the penalties against sexual offenders reestablished. The petitions are now in. It is almost a certainty that they have failed to qualify. Why? When the laymen and women went to their churches, all professing to be Bible-believing churches, almost all the clergy of the State of California opposed them, told them they would not tolerate the circulation of the petitions among the members of the church, declared that it was the social gospel to get involved in such a thing, that they might lose their tax exemption, that it violated the separation of church and state, and many such reasons. This was one episode among a number in various parts of the country where the churches failed, failed drastically, and from friends in politics, I learned that politicians have the word. What is the word? Christians will not fight.

As a matter of fact, a Christian in our state Senate passed on to me a little story that was circulating around the state capitol there and across country about evangelical Christians, an apocryphal story, but all the same, very true in what it represented. According to this story, two Bible-toting Christians rounded a corner and saw a big hoodlum beating up on an innocent man, and they said to one another, “Should we intervene to save that man?” and they said, “No, we had better not intervene. What that hoodlum needs is somebody to witness to him, and if we intervene he will be too angry with us for us to be able to witness to him.” That’s the story that politicians are telling. They have the word. Christians, or supposed Christians, will not fight. Why this problem? What does it mean?

The story of Joash gives us the answer. The Bible says, concerning Joash, who is sometimes listed as Johahash, and other times simply as Joash, that he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord. He departed not from all the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat who made Israel sin, but he walked therein. Surprisingly enough, if you go to some contemporary commentaries on the Book of Kings by evangelical commentators, you will find a disagreement with this verse. J.D. Douglas, for example, an evangelical scholar, tells us that this was true only of Joash when he was a young man, that he became a God-fearing man and a staunch friend of the prophet Elisha, and therefore, we must regard him as a great man of the faith. Now seemingly, Hebrew history supports J.D. Douglas. It gives a good report on Joash. As a matter of fact, we are given to understand by Josephus and others, that Joash, while still a relatively young man, after his early evil days, had a glorious conversion experience, and from them on, became a man of God and a staunch friend of the prophet. Now seemingly this is true. After all, when Elisha, the prophet, was on his death bed, the king came to see him and wept. It’s not every day that we read about a king going to visit a prophet. Now that says something for Joash.

Moreover, he pays Elisha one of the most beautiful and truest compliments ever paid any man. Joash, the king of Israel, came down onto him and wept over his face and said, “O my father, my father. The chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof, my father.” Now, this seems strange to us, but it was once common to call pastors, “Father.” This was a usage right out of the Old Testament. It was common to the Puritans. The Catholics called their priest “mister.” Only after about 1830, when you had a large migration of Catholics from Ireland to this country, when you had a large migration of Catholics from Ireland to this country, and instead of calling their priest, “Mister,” they picked up the American habit and began to call their priests, “Father.” Then the Protestants dropped it. Now it would upset anyone to hear their pastor called “Pastor Griswold,” for example, but it comes right out of the Old Testament. Spiritually, he said to Elisha, “You have been my Father, and you have been the national defense of Israel, the chariot and the horseman thereof.” Very beautiful, very moving, and yet, how are we going to get around the blanket condemnation of Joash? It does not say that this sentence applies to his youth. It declares that God’s judgment on him as evil, applied to his whole life, and it describes him and his burial, so it summarizes his life as evil. [

Now, let’s drop Joash for a moment, and turn to Judea in our Lord’s day. If we go to Jewish scholars of our day, they are very, very bitter about the kind of opinion expressed by Christian scholars about the people of our Lord’s day, and they defend them. Why? Well, to look at it realistically, there seems to be a case for these Jewish scholars.

The Sadducees who were the modernists of the day were a small minority. They were the collaborators with Rome and that’s why they are remembered. Actually, they were not many numerically. The Sadducees subtracted from the word of God. The Pharisees added to it with tradition. The Pharisees also were a minority. The vast bulk of the people believed the scriptures from cover to cover. You can find them talking as you go into the literature of the day and the rabbis of the day, and about sovereign grace, and about election, and about all the doctrines, and it becomes a little bewildering. They did follow our Lord in great throngs. They hailed him on Palm Sunday when he entered Jerusalem. Jerusalem had, some scholars say, a population of two million. At such a time, the Passover, there were millions of pilgrims from all over the world there. The whole city resounded with the praise of Christ, and yet our Lord wept, knowing they would be doomed. Why? Because they did not have the fruits of righteousness. The profession, yes, but not the fruits. A good tree, he said, bringeth forth good fruit, and in that last week, as he passed a fig tree, beautifully leafed out, but without fruit, he cursed it and it withered and died. The fig tree then was a symbol of Israel. You can still find it on the postage stamps, incidentally, of Israel, as a symbol of their country, and our Lord condemned them, because while the bulk of the people professed the right doctrines, it was by mouth only. Faith without works is dead.

Thus, the Jewish scholars are superficially right, but in reality they are wrong, and our Lord put his finger on it when early in his ministry he declared in the Sermon on the Mount, “A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit.” It may profess to be a good tree. It may talk and sound like a man of God, but “by their fruit shall ye know them.” Alright then, let us look at Joash again. He talked like a man of God. He honored the dying Elisha who was on his death bed after sixty-three years of ministry in the Lord’s name, but then it was Elisha who was angry with him and with cause. He commanded him, “Take your bow and an arrow and shoot,” and he put his hand on the hand of Joash, exactly the same measure that we go through in any ordination of a minister to the gospel ministry.

Joash had a problem. Syria was facing him, as an enemy, and beyond Syria was the power of Assyria. Syria was about ready to march on Israel, and what was Joash’s policy? Joash was playing the old game of power politics, exactly what we are playing today. He was following in the footsteps of the very dynasty that his family, the family of Jehu, had overthrown, the dynasty of Omri and Ahab. What had been the policy of Omri and Ahab? Why, simply this. Looking at it practically they had said, “Our great threat is from Assyria. True. Assyria wants to destroy us, absorb us, and use us as a captive people so that it can meet Assyria head on with double strength, but if we, in this battle against Syria, destroy it, even though it is trying to destroy us, then we have no buffer state between ourselves and Assyria, and we will face the greater power of Assyria without somebody between us, so it’s important for us to keep Assyria, however evil, alive so that we have a corridor, a barrier between us.” It was this policy that, in one reign after another, led to the wearing out of the power of Israel, and its ultimate defeat.

Strike, Elisha said. There is no question that Joash knew what it meant. Elisha’s hand upon him meant that God was going to make the wars of Israel and of Joash the wars of God, that whether he fought against Syria or Assyria, he would be God’s man, that God would go with him to victory. He had a quiver full of arrows, the three times he struck and no more, and Elisha the prophet turned on the king who had paid him the greatest compliment any prophet received in the Old Testament from any other man, turned on his with anger, because he knew as the king knew that it was a rejection of the Lord. Why? Why was Joash afraid of victory? God offered it to him. It meant that God would be with him in all his warfare, whether against Syria or Assyria. It meant that destroying Syria and Assyria, the great power in the world, the mightiest nation of the day would be Israel. That’s a great deal to turn down, but Joash rejected it. Joash rejected it. Three times, and no more. Some help Lord, but no more. Be on my side, but don’t command me. In other words, he said, “I do not want the fullness of victory from the Lord, because fullness of victory from the Lord means that it is the Lord who rules, not I. It means then it is sovereign grace that it responsible for whatever I get.” Joash was an Armenian to the core. What Joash was saying was, “I’m going to win this my way. I want God in my corner, yes. I want God to help me when I ask him, yes. I want God behind me as an ally but not before me as the king.” He had a choice, you see. Total victory through sovereign grace, or a hope of victory on his own with some help from God, and he chose the latter. He wanted God when and where he could use him. No more. He wanted God the same way you and I want a spare tire. We don’t want to drive without it, but we certainly hope we’ll never have to use it, and so Joash refused to strike a quiver full of arrows, refused when the hand of the prophet, the hand of God was upon him, to use that opportunity to claim total victory in the Lord.

You see, for Joash, God’s way meant defeat. It meant he would no longer be the master of his fate and the captain of his soul. It meant that God would be sovereign. Joash wanted to plot his own victory, be his own sovereign, with some help from God, but in charge at all times. He was an Armenian to the core. He honored God’s prophet, he sought God’s help to a degree, he saw himself as God’s man to a point, but he balked at God’s sovereignty, at victory through sovereign grace. The sovereign choice had to be his, not the Lord’s, for all his seeming beautiful conversion, the inspired and infallible word of God declares of him that he did that what which was evil in the sight of the Lord. He departed not from all the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who made Israel sin, but he walked therein.

We are told another interesting fact about Joash. Over and over again, the prophets, as a type of sin, refer to Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, and what did Joash do? He named his firstborn son, Jeroboam. That’s telling off God, isn’t it? And that’s telling us a great deal about Joash. It’s like a Christian naming his son, Judas. It meant the same thing, and Jeroboam II, who reigned for 41 years, did take Israel to its greatest power in terms of his family’s power politics policy, but also to its destruction. After him, the deluge, the collapse. In a few short years, after Jeroboam II, Israel was gone.

But God gave Israel and Joash another opportunity. The miracle of Elisha’s bones. In the course of a battle with the Moabites, a man died, apparently a man of note because they did not leave him on the battlefield. They felt that he deserved a decent burial, so he probably was an officer, and so as they went by, they put him into Elisha’s grave, and when the dead man touched, when he was put into the grave, the bones of Elisha, he revived, stood upon his feet and joined his comrades, and this was a witness again to Joash and to Israel, that there was still power if they went back to the sovereign God, if they acknowledge that their only hope of salvation, individually and nationally, was in sovereign grace. The purpose of the miracle was to show them at the eleventh hour that the power of God was still available to his people, but only if he were sovereign. Only if they acknowledged him to be Lord and Savior, King over kings.

But today, by and large, too many Christians and too many churches have the same kind of theology as Joash, spare tire theology. The perfect spare tire, the Lord. Let him stay out of sight, but when we need him he’s got to be there. Our Lord did not take kindly to that kind of dead faith on the part of Jerusalem and Judah in his day. Can we imagine that he takes kindly to it today? Men may talk about their beautiful conversion experiences, and history records the beautiful conversion experience and Joash, but the word of God says “He departed not from all the evil of Jeroboam, son of Nebat, who caused Israel to sin,” and for all his beautiful conversion experience, it classifies him with the unregenerate, with the enemies of God. He wept over God’s prophet, but he did not obey him. He spoke beautifully about God’s prophet, one of the most beautiful sentences in all of scripture, but he did not recognize the prophet’s God as sovereign.

The problem of Joash is the problem of the churches and of America today. This is why we are in trouble. This is why, in spite of the fact that at least 50% of the people of the United States this morning are in church, and most of those are in Bible-believing churches. It doesn’t mean much, because theirs is the theology of Joash, and in the sight of God, it is evil, not just defective. Evil. Evil, because it treats God as a spare time, as a resource to draw upon like a good bank account, when we are in trouble. As a good insurance agent, a fire protection, but not as the Lord and sovereign.

The question, therefore, that faces us as individuals today and every day, is a very real one. Are we going to be blasted as individuals and as a nation? Like that fig tree that was rich in leaves, rich in profession, but barren of fruit? Like Joash who talked like the Lord’s man, and acted as his own Lord? Where do you stand? Where do you stand in this situation? Are you a Joash, or are you a Christian? One who believes and obeys? One who acknowledges the sovereignty of God in all things and marches to the word of the King? Let us pray.

Our Lord and our God, we give thanks unto thee for thy word and for its plain speaking. O Lord, our God, too often we, like Joash, feel that beautiful words will please thee, and like Joash, we want to keep control of our lives, to be in the driver’s seat, to be lord and master over all that we are and possess. Give us grace, our Father, to take hands off our lives and to commit them into thy keeping, to obey thee with all our heart, mind, and being, to be ever faithful in thy service, instant at thy command, joyful at thy word. O Lord, our God, how great and marvelous thou art, and how gracious thou art who, by thy sovereign grace has made us thy people. Make us ever instant in thy service, to the end that the kingdoms of this world might become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ. Grant us this, we beseech thee, in Jesus name. Amen.

End of tape