[This is part 1 in a series on the “King of kings.” See part two, three, four, five].

Leaving Egypt Ministries, Obadiah D. Morris

An unfortunately common idea among professing Christians has long been that the kingdoms of men—the evil statist systems of the world that they can’t even recognize as Babylonian societies—are somehow God’s perfect will on earth, that our statist society of human rulers is the administration of God’s system of law, order, and justice.

Whether having been misled by errant pastors, or false prophets, or are just forsaking God on their own, our shepherdless people have been led to believe that the kingdoms of men are representative of God’s kingdom, and they see little to no antagonism between the way of the Lord and the “law” systems of men. Many men even reconcile joining them, e.g., strapping on boots for Pharaoh and becoming an enforcer of these man-made “law” systems, with their professed Christianity and devotion to God’s Law.

Go to almost any church long enough and you might hear our Egyptian political system—euphemistically called the “civil government”—extolled as a “divinely ordained” institution handed down to us as a blessing from God, rather than a curse. And you might even see the flag of the Egyptian gods hanging high out front and even in the sanctuary.

This view is common even despite the very well-known scriptures that “God is our God” (Psalm 48:14), that He’s the “Lord of lords” (Deuteronomy 10:17), or that “the Lord is our King” (Isaiah 33:22). In fact, as I have recently come across, these scriptures—meant precisely to tear down the earthly status of self-exalted human-kings—are invoked regularly in a defense of the greatness of the kingdoms of men! 

Some men, therefore, are even conscious of having other “gods” than the Lord and see no trouble in taking the “King of kings” passages to mean that the other kings are legitimate and sent by God to protect us and save us. They think they can have man-gods and the Lord God. 

They see no contradiction in combining such concepts as “God and country.” And such oft-repeated and widely-accepted cultural slogans are there to help reinforce the error. At least “atheists,” who have not really abandoned “religion” in their usual adoption of statism, are actually rather consistent in having made the State their substitute god in their rejection of the Lord; this is what we would expect of men without God. The conservative idolaters, however, can’t even see their contradiction and think that their Babylonian society (which they can’t even recognize) is “the land of the free.”

Most of our people are still very lost when it comes to understanding the States of the world as a conspiracy against God. As such, neither of these people—the state-worshiping “Christian” or the “atheist” whose “god” is the State—can see the great sin in chasing after these violent, man-made systems of social control. To see the State as sinful requires that one knows the Lord as their King. Men are lost when they don’t understand the difference between God’s kingdom and the kingdoms of men, when they don’t understand the nature of God as the Lord of lords. 

“The Lord of lords”

While a forthcoming part of this article will elaborate further, let us briefly explain the “Lord of lords” scripture, since such confused thinking as interpreting the human-gods—kings, presidents, politicians, police officers—as legitimate and divinely ordained agents of God’s kingdom on earth prevents men from seeing the sinful nature of these kingdoms of men. 

In the scriptures we’re told that God is the “Lord of all lords, King of all kings” (Revelation 17:14, 19:16), that “Jesus Christ [is] the ruler of the kings of the earth” (Revelation 1:5). (Both of these passages come, mind you, in the final prophetic book of scripture foretelling an inevitable destruction of all man-made statist systems which are nothing more than Babylonian evils pretending to be “governments of the people” and “gods,” and their replacement by the heavenly throne of Christ). 

The most familiar reference to this is probably in these New Testament books, though this monotheistic and political concept, which surely serves to keep us from having other man-gods, is introduced early in the scriptures. 

“The Lord your God is the God of gods and the Lord of lords.” ~ Deuteronomy 10:17

As they see it

Understanding what this means—the Lord as the King of kings—is vital given the recent use of these scriptures to argue against the claim that the kingdoms of men are rooted in sin and evil. 

In response to my claim that the kingdoms of men are based in sin, a Babylonian invoked these “King of kings” scriptures to conceive of the false kings of the world as being God’s perfect will emanating from His heavenly throne. Rather than using it to demonstrate the false god nature of human kings and refute their thrones, he used it to defend the idea that the kings of the world (as his sinful heart surely wanted them to be) are all in power under the “divine right of the Lord” and are some sort of providential community of men supposedly ordained by God to uphold society and carry out His will on earth.

Against the great lesson of these scriptures that the “kings” of our world are not even kings at all when compared to the Lord, but false kings pretending to be gods, men have mistakenly (or sinfully) believed that they can have two kings: A soul-saver in Heaven, who is their capital-k King or “King of kings,” and a human king on earth, their small-k king who is supposedly needed to keep away their enemies (as if God doesn’t provide in the department of protection).

Men have thought that “Lord of lords” means that the Lord in heaven is simply the Lord of their earthly king-lords —  the “gods” whom they don’t think they have to give up (so long as they recognize Christ as the King of their local guy who calls himself a king). The “Lord of lords,” as they see it, is the top king among other still-legitimate kings (albeit lesser kings than God).

But is it true if Christ is our King that we can have other “kings,” too? Does “King of kings” mean that the kingdoms of men are all good and well, albeit (slightly) under God? Or does it mean that they have illegitimately risen in the place of God? That no other person going by the name of “king” should be considered legitimate or godly?

What it really means

It is a mistake to think that the other “gods” and “lords” are legitimate, but just subordinate to God in some sort of system of earthly administration of the Kingdom through the political means of violence. It doesn’t mean there is “one God here,” and “another god” over there. It doesn’t mean men can have two gods, their heavenly (and supposedly inactive) Lord and earthly one.

The “King of kings” means the earthly kings are false kings, that human kings are not gods, that God is the only real God, and that all other man-gods are false gods.

God’s kingdom vs. the kingdoms of men

While it seems safe to say the kingdoms of men have risen up against God, I want to focus on an even more specific claim: That king-seeking (beyond the Lord as King) is sinful. 

In this recent argument I found myself in against a few of Pharaoh’s prophets claiming to be servants of Christ the King (yet holding to both God and man-gods that are no gods), someone responded in disagreement to my submission that supporting man-kings sinful, even more specifically saying that it wasn’t scriptural. 

While more on the false god nature of kings and the judgment that comes against them (for this reason) will come in another part of this series, let us more specifically focus on a brief scriptural defense of the sinfulness and wickedness in chasing after and/or becoming pretend-god, human-kings. Especially considering that one of king Nebuchadnezzar’s wisemen just claimed that, “Nowhere in the scriptures does it say supporting kings is sinful.” 

The sinful kingdoms of men

If the stories of God smashing kingdoms weren’t good enough, it is almost as if God had the foresight to make sure that no one could claim king-seeking isn’t sinful by making His references to such behavior very explicit. 

We need not even speculate that kings are sinful or infer it from some lone passages, or even the destruction that God brings upon man’s kingdoms in the books of the prophets; a scriptural defense of the claim that seeking kings is sinful is even more specific and clear than this. 

What, after many years after having been taken out of Egypt and at the hands of the Pharaoh-kings, was the evil of the Israelites that made God so angry? Was it just some non-political concept of sin like lying to their grandparents? Or maybe lighting up a joint? Did everyone pick up smoking? Were they just rejecting God as such? What does it mean to reject God? 

Despite all the things commonly listed as sins, God apparently thinks that seeking man-kings is at the top of the list of evils.

“Your wickedness is great, which ye have done in the sight of the Lord, in asking for a king” (Samuel 12:17).

It is astonishing that state worshiping is never mentioned as a sin among Christians, because it is not even just a sin among sins, but it is explicitly mentioned. King-worshiping is man’s “great wickedness.” Perhaps more than anywhere else, man’s sin is manifest in the lust they have for the political systems of the world, hence the inability of so many millions of men to keep from displaying their idolatry (for flags, politicians, etc) on the front of their house, their vehicles, or their clothing.

It is asking for human kings—a blatant distrust in God to provide all things for us—that disappoints God. 

But even if seeking man-kings or thrones yourself isn’t the chief sin (though it’s more or less all the prophets talk about), it certainly still is a sin and, at the very least, a sin among others. As the chapter goes on, 

“We have added unto all our sins this evil, to ask for a king” (1 Samuel 12:19).

Asking for human kings (i.e., state rulers) or trying to become them is sinful and evil, period.

The kingdoms of men—the alleged need for Pharaoh’s horsemen and chariots—are founded in sin. They are a perversion of God’s natural order. The worst thing a man can do to God is to make a man his “god.” There is really no greater denial of the Lord as God than to make man-gods for oneself, as one’s (false) “saviors” (who don’t save). Men are the “gods” that are false.

And that’s exactly what men have always done throughout history. They chose “kings,” “presidents,” “politicians,” “police,” or “the troops,” “ABC agency, “”the department of X, Y, and Z,”  over our God in heaven. Amen. 

Far from the “King of kings” meaning that the kings of the earth are among some earthly community of saints carrying out God’s perfect will, to make the Lord our King—this has been the secret to liberty all along—is to do away with the human kings who have done nothing but plunder and oppress us forever. We get rid of Egypt when we make God our God, rather than men. Amen. 

Conclusion

We see that seeking kings other than Christ our King is clearly sinful. It is not only a general narrative of the scriptures, where men rebel against God by seeking to build their own statist societies, but explicitly mentioned as sin and evil (1 Sam 12:17, 19).

But the discerning Christian should have known this already. We should have never doubted whether to trust in human rulers or not.

“It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in princes” (Psalm 118:8-9).

It is not hard—relying on the spirit, righteous discernment, and the word of God—to know that the man-gods of this world are false kings. It is basically all God talks about in the Old Testament scriptures, and of course evident in the evils of the man-kings of the world. 

But, men often argue: Not all kings are bad. Well if it’s supposedly a generalization to submit that all of the kings of earth are demonic plunderers who have set out against God to rule over men, rob them, and kill them if they resist, as we’re taught throughout the word of God, then I’d love for someone to answer which States today (or ever) are not ungodly ones? Which ones would not be sinful for us to get behind? 

Prayer

O Lord God, be with us in these times. Be with everyone who is reading this, and give them eyes to see if they do not have them already. Exalt your righteous remnant to lead the way for the lost sheep. Make us all better all the time. Help us to be a light to those in darkness. The people who say they follow You have made for themselves kings who are but men and not gods. Exalt yourself, O God. Let my enemies and Yours know that thou art the King of kings, the Lord of lords. Lord, You’re the only King and we will praise You instead of men. We do not recognize these men as gods. I will “give thanks to the God of gods, the Lord of lords” (Psalm 136:2-3). We will “Sing praises to God, sing praises; Sing praises to our King, sing praises, for God is the King of all the earth; Sing praises with a skillful psalm” (Psalm 47:6-7). We know that one day you will remove these detestable human idols called “kings” from our sight and show everyone who’s the Lord of lords. “The God of the whole earth shall he be called” (Isaiah 54:5). Lord, show our people that these man-made kingdoms are not your will. “My people do not understand” (Isaiah 1:3). Our people have still not learned this basic truth: “The Egyptians are men, and not God” (Isaiah 31:3).