Leaving Egypt Ministries, Obadiah D. Morris 

Even though the pages of scripture drip of such a message, to say that the State is a false god and enemy of Jesus the King is unfortunately a radical statement in a world where many men idolize the State and its personas as gods and saviors. Most people start kicking and screaming upon hearing such an assertion as this (angered precisely because the State is their god). They see nothing wrong with finding themselves in the contradictory position of “Christian statism.” I can already see them flipping open their Bibles to Romans 13 and “render unto Caesar” in an attempt to defend their false god, seemingly more anxiously than to show that true Christians are those (as the Apostles were) who are charged with “defying Caesar’s decrees, saying that there is another king, named Jesus!” (Acts 17:7).

The State as a false god 

But this idea—the State as a false god and enemy of Christ—is really the essence of the scriptures, which show that Christ is the only Lord, Savior, and King — that God is the only real Sovereign and all other claims to “sovereignty” are false. The scriptures have always explained how these man-kings were false gods and were seeking to exist in the place of God. As God had the prophet Ezekiel say to the King of Tyre, 

“Your heart is proud, and you have said, ‘I am a god; I sit in the seat of gods in the heart of the sea'” (Ezekiel 23:2).

The prophet’s purpose was to refute the king’s claim to godhead. 

“Yet you are a man and not a god, though you have regarded your heart as that of a god” (Ezekiel 23:2). 

Since state rulers believe they are gods, the true God in heaven destroys them, sending other, equally-evil statist regimes to topple their supposedly divine regimes. 

“Because you regard your heart as the heart of a god, behold, I will bring foreigners against you, the most ruthless of nations. They will draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom and will defile your splendor. They will bring you down to the Pit, and you will die a violent death in the heart of the seas” (Ezekiel 28:6-8). 

Then, the rulers should see that they are not gods. 

“Will you still say, ‘I am a god,’ in the presence of those who slay you? You will be only a man, not a god, in the hands of those who wound you. You will die the death of the uncircumcised at the hands of foreigners. For I have spoken, declares the Lord GOD” (Ezekiel 28:9-10). 

Identifying the State and political ambitions with the quest for godhead is shown all throughout the scriptures. In part of a song that men were to sing against the king of Babylon, which seems to also reveal the satanic nature of political godhead in it (among other scriptures), another prophet explains, 

“How you have fallen from heaven, O day star, son of the dawn! You have been cut down to the ground, O destroyer of nations. You said in your heart: ‘I will ascend to the heavens; I will raise my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the mount of assembly, in the far reaches of the north. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High” (Isaiah 14:12-14). 

Again, showing how foolish these false gods are for pretending to be “like the Most High,” the prophets always pronounced judgment on these kingdoms, too (Isa. 14:15-23). 

Despite the millions of Americans who worship the State, its military, police, etc., the scriptures show that God brings these false lords down to size. God wants foolish statists to understand that “the Egyptians are men, not God; their horses are flesh, not spirit” (Isaiah 31:3). 

Christianity and Romanism

The way that Christians today excitedly cite “render unto Caesar” seems to suggest that they believe it’s perfectly fine to have a ‘spiritual lord’ (Jesus) and an earthly one. They see no problem with worshiping at the altars of the false-god State, in a way because the State has layered false idols—the ‘Republic’ or the ‘Constitution’—on top of itself, making men believe such ignorant phrases like “we are the government” or “the government’s job is to serve the people.” The modern State’s subtlety of its claims as a (false) god—they don’t come right out and say it anymore—has allowed for tens of millions of professing “Christians” to find themselves worshiping it. Probably tens of millions of “Christian” Americans have rooted for Trump to be their next Caesar, all while claiming they are servants of Christ. Could you imagine a first-century Christian hanging a flag of Caesar up in their front yard as men do today?

Yet this is what our people are doing. Sadly, many of them pretend that they are “Christians,” when the earliest Christians would have never dreamed of giving into these great evils. As David Chilton said of their experience under the Roman Empire, “Christians were persecuted precisely because they refused to join in this idolatrous Emperor-cult” (Chilton, Paradise Restored, p. 177). It seems most “Christians” today have little to no distinction between their faith in God and the empire-cult — between their alleged love of the Lord and their idolatry for flags, pharaohs, officers who enforce the decrees of pharaohs, etc. They will put a cross symbol right on top a “back the blue” flag.

But as we see, States are, in every way, attempted substitutes for God — in their claim to being “Sovereign,” their sacrament of voting, their efforts to “protect” men with police and military, to “save” them from hunger, and to sneak into our lives as the providers for all things that God says we find in Him only. 

And this has always been the case with States, which anyone should have been able to see from the New Testament alone. As Chilton wrote, 

“[The Caesars] asserted their own divinity, displaying their titles of deity in temples and on coins, particularly in the cities of Asia. Octavian changed his name to Augustus, a title of supreme majesty, dignity and reverence. He was called the Son of God, and as the divine-human mediator between heaven and earth he offered sacrifices to the gods. He was widely proclaimed as the Savior of the world, and the inscriptions on his coins were quite frankly messianic” (Chilton, Paradise Restored, pp. 160-161). 

As Ethelbert Stauffer wrote, a religious principle of the Roman Empire was that “salvation is to be found in none other save Augustus, and there is no other name given to men in which they can be saved” (Christ and the Caesars, p. 88). To claim Jesus was the Savior was not merely a religious statement; it was a subversive political profession that necessarily conflicted with the statist order.

The State is not just some benign organization that men can venerate in addition to their Christianity, as “God and country” Americans have fooled themselves into thinking. It is a competing claim to the godhead. As Chilton went on, 

“This pose [of the ruler as divine] was common to all the Caesars. Caesar was God; Caesar was Savior; Caesar was the only Lord. And they claimed not only the titles but the rights of deity as well. They taxed and confiscated property at will, took citizens’ wives (and husbands) for their own pleasure, caused food shortages, exercised the power of life and death over their subjects, and generally attempted to rule every aspect of reality throughout the Empire. The philosophy of the Caesars can be summed up in one phrase which was used increasingly as the age progressed: Caesar is Lord!” (Chilton, Paradise Restored, p. 161).

The Roman-worshiping Christians of today have been entirely fooled to think Rome and Jerusalem, Caesar and Christ, can be reconciled; they are completely at odds with one another and cannot be unified. To place faith in the State at all is to accept it as a god. But many have forgotten these Christian roots, or never knew them because their pledge-of-allegiance-to-America pastor was just another blind man himself. But as Chilton added,

“This was the main issue between Rome and the Christians: Who is Lord?” (p. 161). 

It’s easy to see how regarding Christ as your King is a threat to the State when we see that the State is a false god making the competing claim to kingship. As Francis Schaeffer once explained, showing just how foolish modern-day “Christians” are for their infatuation with the State, 

“Let us not forget why the Christians were killed. They were not killed because they worshiped Jesus…nobody cared who worshiped whom so long as the worshiper did not disrupt the unity of the state, centered in the formal worship of Caesar. The reason the Christians were killed was because they were rebels…they worshiped Jesus as God and they worshiped the infinite personal God only. The Caesars would not tolerate this worshiping of the one God only. It was counted as treason” (Schaeffer, How Shall We Then Live?, p. 24).

It wasn’t merely about killing people for not worshiping “the right gods,” e.g., the pagan pantheon of gods of the Romans; it was about making people worship the false god State. Again, as Chilton said,

“The Christians were persecuted precisely because they refused to join in this idolatrous Emperor-cult” (p. 177).

Thus, Rome and Jerusalem, Caesar or Christ, are (so to speak) enemy philosophies, antagonistic religions, competing ideas about who one’s “god” is — despite those who casually say “render unto Caesar” as if Caesar is also a god. This was the conflict between early Christians and the Roman State. Early Christians took this distinction seriously, unlike our “God, Guns, and Trump” neighbors today. As Chilton explained further, 

“Jesus was not ‘God’ in some upper-story, irrelevant sense; He was the only God, complete Sovereign in every area. No aspect of reality could be exempt from His demands. Nothing was neutral. The Church confronted Rome with the inflexible claim of Christ’s imperial authority: Jesus is the only-begotten Son; Jesus is God; Jesus is King; Jesus is Savior; Jesus is Lord. Here were two Empires, both attempting absolute world domination; and they were implacably at war” (Chilton, Paradise Restored, p. 162).

The Americans today who support their political gods alongside their false profession of Jesus as Lord are the same people who, when faced with a one-way choice between the two, say that “we have no king but Caesar” (John 19:15). As Paul Maitrejean recently wrote,

“I have no doubt that if, God forbid, I were to walk into a modern “conservative” church and blaspheme Christ, the reaction would be far less vitriolic than if I were to walk into that same church and speak ill of Donald Trump.”

Christ as King

To believe in human-gods—presidents, politicians, police officers, soldiers, veterans, etc—is to be against Christian monotheism. The Christian position, as stated by the Apostle Paul, is that 

“There is no God but one. For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as there are many so-called gods and lords), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we exist. And there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we exist” (1 Corinthians 8:4-6).

It is not possible to hold both Caesars and Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, notwithstanding the tens of millions of Americans who see no conflict here. The Christian cannot be a statist. For the State is a false god, falsely posing as the lords and saviors. As Chilton explained, in the episode between Rome and the early Christians, 

“Faith in Jesus Christ requires absolute submission to His Lordship, at every point, with no compromise. The confession of Christ meant conflict with statism, particularly in the provinces where official worship of Caesar was required for the transaction of everyday affairs. Failure to acknowledge the claims of the State would result in economic hardship and ruin, and often imprisonment, torture and death” (Chilton, Paradise Restored, p. 163). 

The distinction that many modern-day “Christians” are willing to make (assuming God doesn’t provide protection) between Christ as their sort of spiritual lord, while men and their “governments” are their earthly lords, is illegitimate. These people, as Chilton said mocking this position of compromise with the State-gods, say, 

“‘Sure, Jesus is God. I worship Him at church and in private devotions. But I can still keep my job and my union status, even though they require me to give technical homage to pagan deities. It’s a mere detail: after all, I still believe in Jesus in my heart.’ But Christ’s Lordship is universal, and the Bible makes no distinction between heart and conduct. Jesus is Lord of all. To acknowledge Him truly as Lord, we must serve Him everywhere” (Chilton, Paradise Restored, p. 163).

If anyone is willing to truly stand by the claim, No King But Christ, they must give up their old false gods, represented more than anywhere else in the State. As Leo Tolstoy once said, in his essay on “Church and State” (1886),

“The acceptance of Christianity without the repudiation of power is a mockery and perversion of Christianity. The consecration of governmental power by Christianity is blasphemy, is the doom of Christianity.”