Brief Thoughts on the Lay of the Land

It’s been obvious to all but the most panicked and fearful that the foolishness of the last couple of years has worn itself out. Even apologists for the government’s authoritarian actions earlier in the shamdemic are critiquing the validity of mandates in an omicron environment while still sanctimoniously congratulating themselves on having supported the control health measures, and ‘loved their neighbour’ through their support of state coercion of citizens to be vaccinated. They rest in the self-righteous knowledge that they have helped save New Zealand.

Except that they haven’t. Sure people weren’t dying of covid when we were all locked in our homes for weeks on end and refusing to let people visit our island nation. But what’s happened since the arrival of omicron? Their god the state through its Messiah figure Ardern promised salvation from covid damnation through the sacraments of masks and vaccination. But like all false gods, this one has failed miserably, much to the mirth of the true God (Psalm 2). Only the truly naive and self-deceived can believe that this has all been worth it. Rampant inflation is one of many signs that God is not mocked. Idolatry always ends badly.

But more to the point, what have these insufferable know-it-alls managed to achieve? Despite our high vaccination rate, we have had many deaths with covid. The vaccination and masks seem to make next to no difference whatsoever. In fact as time goes by, they seem more and more useless. But nobody seems worried about this anymore. There are deaths every day, the very scare tactic that the ‘elites’ used to panic the populace into accepting intrusions on civic freedoms for two years. Now the nation has changed its mind. Shutting down the country is no longer worth it. Let’s declare victory and ignore the deaths. Are the deaths with or because of covid? Who knows? Who cares? We’ve adjusted to these deaths quite quickly. Just as we have always known that part of the fallen human condition is death and common afflictions like influenza carry off hundreds of New Zealanders each year, we have become used to covid deaths.

Some on the side of freedom and justice have claimed victory over the tyranny of Ardern, the governing class and their media enablers. This is misguided. Mandates remain in place for corrections workers and health workers and they remain in Jacinda’s back pocket as a tool for the future. A compliant and idolatrous populous has in principle acknowledged their Lord States’ total ownership of them, body and soul, and the State has jumped at the opportunity to exercise this newly minted power. The path we have gone down has set a precedent. The Bill of Rights has no teeth. You are not free. You are a ward of the state. Nothing short of a momentous change in the hearts of the population will prevent a repeat of the debacle of the last two years.

Without heart change wrought by Jesus Christ, fearful citizens will turn to the state as Saviour should a new terror arise. There is no area of neutrality. All men will worship. The only question is what or whom they will worship. It seems likely to me that it would not take much for most New Zealanders to accept more stringent rules from the state once again should conditions render fear the prevailing emotion of the country.

And so, we are in an uneasy stalemate. Exhaustion from the battle has taken hold. Jacinda and the idolatrous state-worshippers have let up for fear of losing power at the next election. Her foolish actions have surely been responsible for the inflationary situation we are now suffering under. Many devout worshippers are beginning to question if their worship is directed wrongly.

Those Christians who have awoken in the past two years and seen for the first time the idolatry of state are cheering the removal of the state’s control in the form of vaccine passports, mandates and rules about gatherings. We are tired of fighting. We want to get on with life. But this is precisely the wrong thing to do. If we have won a small battle (and I’m not sure I would even describe what’s happened as a victory), then we must push on against the idolatry that has led us into this mess.

We must start with those in the church. First, we as individual Christians must repent of our own idolatry. We have tacitly acknowledged that it is the State and not the Lord who is our Shepherd. This has been done over generations and in so many different ways. We have given our children over to be brainwashed in their child indoctrination centres public schools. We have allowed them access and eventual control in realms of society which God never gave them jurisdiction over and justified this by arguing that if the state won’t step in our nation will not be blessed. We have forgotten that blessing comes from obedience to God and dependence on Him.

So many of our leaders and pastors, steeped in secularism, have embraced a dualistic approach to the faith and narrowed its purview to personal salvation and ‘spiritual’ things, failing to recognise Christ’s Lordship over absolutely everything. Many have acknowledged the State’s Lordship of the church and decisions regarding whether it should meet and under what conditions. Pastors who have courageously stood firm and proclaimed Christ’s lordship even over the Church, let alone the State have been maligned by other Christian leaders for giving Christians a bad name.

Christian leaders who have failed through this covid era should be delivered a strong rebuke. For some public confession of failure and a lack of courage is essential. Others should step down from leadership because they have shown themselves not to have the requisite character demanded by our Lord. Christ is Lord, not the State. Romans 13 does not give the state authority over the gathering of the Church. It does not give the state carte blanche to do as it pleases. The willingness to embrace these self-serving interpretations of Romans 13 have highlighted a lack of ballsy leadership. Once, Christians, both leaders and laity would face lions because they refused to say Caesar is Lord, now we have effeminate men leading us whose only retort to Caesar’s command “Jump!” is “How high?” Naturally, there has been a sifting, and many committed Christians have found their leadership unable or unwilling to protect the flock and have moved to shepherds who take their orders from the Great Shepherd rather than meekly submitting to a wicked government.

Next, we must approach those outside our churches whose idol has failed them. Some will be softened by what has happened. They may have trusted the ‘experts’ and suffered an adverse reaction to the vaccination. They may have been unable to farewell a loved one because of the State’s rules, or perhaps they have had loved ones lose their livelihoods or businesses. They tire of slavery and long for freedom. They are ready to hear of the ruler whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light. They are ready to hear of a different sort of king: one who bleeds for his people rather than bleeds the people. These people may be ready to repent of their trust in a false deity and turn to the true and living God and the king he has installed. This king brings individual and societal freedom. Those whom the Son sets free are free indeed. The physical reality will reflect the inward spiritual reality.

Then there are those who continue to rebelliously believe in the State as god and their prophets the media and ‘experts’. These include fearful old women masked up watching the six o’clock news and afraid to visit the shops as well as nasty nags who attack with vitriol those who won’t wear a symbol of subjection mask, and who refuse to see family members and friends because they are unvaccinated. These deserve patience and pity.

But this group also includes the so-called and self-proclaimed ‘intelligentsia’ from the science community and medical profession who in their hubris, lust for a world controlled by the wise (themselves obviously) where all the stupid common people (those that want to live lives free from their meddling) do what they are told. What do we do with these people? We can take a leaf out of the prophet Elijah’s book. We mock them mercilessly. Elijah mocked the prophets of Baal, wondering out loud whether Baal was busy musing about something, or maybe stuck on the loo, or perhaps travelling or asleep (1 Kings 18:27). These people want us to think highly of them and listen to them. Their worst nightmare is being ignored or laughed at. So let’s laugh. Laugh at their unreliable and wildly inaccurate predictions. We can laugh at their poor models, and we can point out how wrong they have been since the very start of the pandemic about absolutely everything. We can certainly ridicule their embarrassing attempts at a music video promoting the vaccine and dance moves at the ‘vaxathon’ as well as their strangely creepy obsession with sticking sharp objections into strangers. We can deride their child-like religious faith in masks and their irrational fear of a flu-like illness. For all the letters after their own names, they can’t read the writing on the wall. They are irrelevant and the facts have proved it.

So there’s lots to do. The battle is not over. Christ must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet (1 Corinthians 15:25). Christ will not hand over the kingdom to God the Father until after He has destroyed all dominion, authority, and power that is opposed to his own (1 Corinthians 15:24). As his disciples, we are called to the Great Commission. Christ has all authority in heaven and on earth and with this authority he has called us to make disciples of all nations. One of those nations is New Zealand. At the moment, she is a poor disciple. She is rebellious and will not kiss the Son. For that, she suffers.

So let’s get busy and share the good news. There is a king who reigns. Salvation is found in Him alone. Turn from statist idolatry to the freedom that comes from the true king Christ.