No Soldier Gets Entangled in Civilian Pursuits
This is the seventh chapter of a book in progress, with the working title “Be Not Afraid of Their Terror.” The first chapter is here:
When I speak to a fellow American Christian about the current state of our nation, though they’ll often make a brief statement of how we’ve lost our way spiritually, most times their view of the situation and what should be done is exclusively political. If only the government would stop (or start) doing [something] or elect [person] our nation would have a chance to cease circling the societal drain. There is almost always something, or someone, they believe to be an existential threat to the proper order. Just as it is with secular America, it’s been hard to find a politically interested Christian, since the 2016 election, who thinks that the other side is worth engaging in good faith. Ironically, if there’s one thing we can agree on, its that we all used to be more civil, but it seems nobody wants to be the first to let their guard down and interact with those on the other side of the political aisle. We’re more interested in a nondescript lamentation over the loss of civility, while avoiding any personal responsibility.
One must ask then, when we’re supposed to be conspicuously unique (1 Peter 2:9), what makes the average American Christian, both liberal and conservative, different from his secular neighbor in the realm of the political, beyond holding to a particular configuration of policy positions? Professing Christians on the far-left, in their theological liberalism, have long embraced a worldview known as the “social gospel,” the notion that the primary call of Christ is not to place one’s ultimate faith in His finished work on the cross and to share that good news as spiritual reality—many deny the Gospels’ account of His death and resurrection as literal truth. Instead, they see His life as an “invitation” for us to participate in worldly social action that conspicuously aligns with whatever the zeitgeist of popular sociology and economics happens to be. For its most ardent adherents, the social gospel can function as a literal universalism and works-based salvation.
Not to be outdone, those to the political right of the average conservative American Christian are increasingly embracing their own type of social gospel, one of seizing and wielding political power for the purpose of “punishing their enemies and rewarding their friends”1 with the end goal of a civil government that not only favors the Christian religion, but that “suppress[es] the things that hinder man in achieving his full humanity.”2 Advocates can argue for a range of policies, from outlawing the public practice of non-Christian religion to the potential execution of “arch-heretics” and promoters of false religion.3 From this governmental takeover they believe the faith will be given the optimum conditions to spread, though, if you pay attention to how these men speak of the faith, the Person and work of Jesus Christ is rarely mentioned, and far more weight is given to law than gospel.
Compare both of these movements to how Timothy was instructed by Paul to behave within a society that was so hostile to the faith that it had imprisoned him, and would eventually execute him, for nothing more than preaching the gospel and declaring Christ is Lord over all.
You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything.
—2 Timothy 2:1-7
Let’s break this down, sentence by sentence:
You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. Timothy is to set his eyes upon Christ and, in his role as an elder in Ephesus, he is to make his primary goal the preaching of the gospel and finding men whom he can trust to share that primary goal with him. There is nothing more important for him to do. There’s no instruction to use the gospel as a means to work towards overall societal change outside of the church, nor to assign men for any other action than to also preach the gospel and to disciple other Christians. The gospel and the body of Christ is everything.
Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. Timothy is to accept the blessing of being persecuted for the gospel, not to build an alternate Christian economic and societal infrastructure that can resist persecution, nor to shape the government of Ephesus into one that does the work of the church. At no point in the New Testament is anyone instructed to take political steps to lessen their share of peacefully suffering in the name of Christ (Matthew 5:11-12). The juxtaposition of suffering to being a soldier may seem out of place to some, but anyone who’s had a combat role in the military knows what it means to “embrace the suck,” to know that there will be long periods of physical and mental toil, but to also know that you have the intestinal fortitude to power through it without grumbling. There were men I served with whom I could barely stand to be around, but, because we shared this experience of mutual suffering for a cause, I trusted them with my life. I think Paul knew this, and his analogizing of Christians to a cadre of soldiers is more apt than most recognize.
No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. A soldier minds his primary duty to his military affairs and must eschew many civilian distractions. Though living in the world, Timothy, as a spiritual soldier of Christ, is to not preoccupy himself with worldly troubles, but to set his mind to his higher obligations. As the 18th-century English Baptist pastor and theologian John Gill said of this verse, “… by this the apostle suggests that Christ's people, his soldiers, and especially his ministers, should not be involved and implicated in worldly affairs and cares… but should wholly give up themselves to the work and service to which they are called.”4 Few among us who genuinely ask themselves if they are wholly dedicated to their calling as a disciple of Jesus Christ will be satisfied with the answer. Think about those moments when you have consciously rededicated yourself to this calling. Was the first thing you felt compelled to do a political action or an interpersonal one?
An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. Just as a competitor who has been penalized for breaking the rules argues with the referee, there will be many people at the Judgment who will attempt to justify their worldly-obsessed actions, in which they claimed the name of Christ, who will find their appeals falling on unsympathetic ears (Matthew 7:22-23). All of Scripture proclaims that we are to glorify God, to trust Him above ourselves, and to be servants of all. That commandment is most succinctly described by Christ Himself, when he said, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). When we excuse ourselves from that commandment (as every one of us does, to some degree, daily) we are directly working against our chief end of glorifying God. When Christians center the majority of their public “Christian” action around their own designs for utilizing worldly political power they are egregiously sinning.
It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. Paul reminds Timothy that the treasure we labor for is not earthly, but heavenly. Again, the primary mode of action for Christians in this life is to seek the good of others above themselves, not to force others to join them in moralistic endeavors, which would itself be a violation of the directive (2 Timothy 2:24-26). Just as a farmer scatters seed, knowing that it will grow and produce a crop, though he doesn’t know every minute detail of how that happens, we are to spread gospel seeds and trust that God will bring them to fruition in His time, not our own (Mark 4:26-29).
Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything. Timothy is again reminded of in Whom he is to place his trust and from Whom the path forward will come. The temptation to rely on our own understanding to solve worldly issues is often overwhelming, and, in the 21st century, there is no lack of pundits attempting to entice Christians into adopting this mindset. For example, some professing Christians have begun using their media platforms to justify willful deception as a legitimate tactic for Christians to achieve the goal of an explicitly Christian nation,5 but Paul reminds us that this is not the way of the disciple. We play by the rules and trust that God works all things to His good pleasure. We don’t worry about tomorrow (Matthew 6:34), instead we trust the Spirit to place us where He wants and to give us the necessary understanding for each task as it is received.
This, of course, doesn’t mean that we should have no concern for politics whatsoever, or that we should shy away from any and all political action, but the Christian who rightly sets his eyes upon Christ knows that these are decidedly secondary concerns. Anything we do that does not first pass through our primary duty to God is idolatry. When we give more effort to political action than gospel action, when we look for political solutions above gospel solutions, we make an idol out of politics. That is a violation of the First and Second Commandments and a sin. When we rationalize purely human political action as being the will of God, we compound that sin with a Third Commandment violation.
As previously mentioned, no decidedly “Christian” action in the realm of civil government should be political, because our morals are pre-political. There is much room to use the political realm to seek the material well being of our neighbors—pre-political action within the political realm can itself be an expression of the gospel—but one cannot force people to be moral. Though civil law acts as a deterrent towards immoral behavior, its primary function is to enact after-the-fact justice for people who have been the victims of immoral behavior. Only the Law written on people’s hearts will cause them to genuinely desire to behave morally (Romans 2:15), therefore, if you want a moral society, you should be like Timothy and dedicate the vast majority of your public action to peacefully preaching and living the gospel. That’s the only way that people will receive the Spirit and have that Law illuminated within them.
Andrew Torba, “The Point of Politics Is To Punish Enemies and Reward Friends,” Gab News, June 3, 2024, https://news.gab.com/2024/06/the-point-of-politics-is-to-punish-enemies-and-reward-friends/.
Wolfe, The Case for Christian Nationalism, 89.
Wolfe, 89, 391–92.
John Gill's Exposition of the Bible [on 2 Timothy 2:4]
Ben R. Crenshaw, “Nietzscheans in Negative World,” American Reformer (blog), May 18, 2024, https://americanreformer.org/2024/05/nietzscheans-in-negative-world/; Timon Cline, “Good Deceit,” American Reformer (blog), June 1, 2024, https://americanreformer.org/2024/06/good-deceit/.