[This is part 19 in an article series on Sin, Repentance, Salvation, and Revival. See part one. two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, twenty, twenty one, twenty two, twenty three, twenty four]

Leaving Egypt Ministries, Obadiah D. Morris

Though we will eventually explore the idea of repentance as having to do with far more than some mere verbal profession that we “repent of our sins” in some vague sense or even more than something that only describes a mere abstention from evildoing (which, to be sure, is a necessary prerequisite to getting on the righteous path of seeking the Kingdom of God in repentance), let us make some comments on repentance as entailing much more than simply turning away from the wrong or wicked path of the world, which men walk down primarily by turning to the man-made kingdoms of the world for their protection, law, justice, welfare, or in other words their salvation. True repentance—generally speaking, to turn around and go another way—involves much more than just turning away from one’s evil deeds; it necessitates that we positively take up the good work and obligation to seek the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. A man is known not merely by his lack of wicked works, which again is a necessary requisite to getting on the right path, but also by bearing good fruit as the proof of his repentance.

The problem we face today is that it is extremely difficult to find even one professing Christian who will commit to the negative plan of repenting for their idolatry for human government, much less the positive obligation of building up their neighbors and seeking a Kingdom that is not of this world and its political systems. Most of them are still whoring themselves out to the Egyptians for a perceived freedom, protection, security, and prosperity that these men cannot provide and which does not even exist. They actively defend Pharaohs and their lawmakers and law enforcers as the source of their alleged “peace” and “law and order,” not realizing that their statist ideology, which raised up and furthered human governments, has only brought them under judgment to these men who have perverted and corrupted the very “law and order” these sinners believe these men to provide.

Notwithstanding the popular notion among men today that mere professions of faith are proof of repentance or that authoritarian rulers quoting Bible verses is evidence for revival, we see how truly far we are from these things once we find in our own evangelism and agitation for the anarchist Kingdom of God that you cannot even get most so-called Christians today to take up the negative side of the coin and stop putting their hands and feet to the evil work of upbuilding and advancing the wicked systems of human government, much less get them to commit to the positive side of the coin of upbuilding and advancing the politics of God’s Kingdom as part of their repentance and turn from the wicked path.

Repentance as turning toward the good 

As much as turning from evils like supporting the kingdoms of men is a necessary first step in one’s repentance, which again is something you cannot even get most professing Christians to agree with, true repentance involves actually turning around another way and not merely getting off the wrong path and sitting by idly. True repentance is not merely to get off the wicked road of statism that leads to a people’s destruction, but to get on the road of righteousness—the narrow way of God’s Kingdom—that leads to life.

As much as we must indeed abandon this great sin and rebellion of mankind that is manifest in man’s adultery with the kingdoms of the world, it is never good enough that we merely stop doing this evil. We must go one further and commit our hearts, minds, and hands and feet, to the upbuilding of the Kingdom of God. It is never good enough that we merely lay down Caesar’s flag and stop staking his campaign signs in our yards, which must also be done, but that we pick up a cross in their place and begin doing the Lord’s work as the true evidence that we have turned from our worldly-statist ways. We do not leave behind the whoredom with the kingdoms of the world and their politics to hide in a cave and forsake all our earthly duties, but rather to seek the Kingdom of God in the place of these authoritarian institutions that have proliferated under the idolatry and slothfulness of men. It is never good enough that we merely stop taking the benefits of false gods who rule over the kingdoms of men and fund their schemes by robbing our neighbors — a negative act of not partaking in theft and covetousness that is already too much to ask of the idolaters of the world who are hooked on government welfare, military and police pensions, old age retirement packages, and other socialist benefits paid for at their neighbor’s expense. This alone is not actually getting on the righteous path; it is simply getting off the wicked one that one must indeed remove their feet from before they can get on the righteous path. 

For true repentance to occur, we must not only turn from the evil road of statism, but toward the righteous road of seeking God’s Kingdom. We must not only turn from the evildoing inherent to the politics and ideology of man’s kingdoms, but we must turn toward the positive work of actually setting the Lord’s table by seeking to freely gather with our neighbors for the express purpose of practicing pure religion and building each other up and looking after each other’s welfare and well-being in a way that keeps our people unspotted from the world and its welfare schemes, which men turn toward for aid and assistance when they have been slothful in setting up an alternative charitable network that a godly people were to maintain on their own if they wanted to be free from the snares and traps of Egypt. We must, in short, become doers of the word of God and not hearers only. We must actually feed the sheep of God’s Kingdom, whether as ministers of the non-authoritarian government of God or as members of a congregation that freely gives their charity to the ministers to redistribute to those in need. When we speak of repentance, we should be sure to point out that we are not just speaking of avoiding certain sin, such as turning from idolatry and support for the kingdoms of the world, which is already too much to ask for of men who claim Christ today. Repentance means to repent unto righteousness, to take up the positive work and deeds of the Lord—namely to seek His Kingdom by gathering our neighbors together for mutual service in a network of charity that exists as an alternative, decentralized, anarchistic society that is substituted for the authoritarian kingdoms of the world. 

Yet the problem today is that men—professing Christians among them—have not even made the connection between statism and sin, such that they could even know the things that they must stop doing at the very least. How much less can a statist people see that they must take up the positive work of seeking the Kingdom of God in repentance from the wicked path! Though men today have not even begun to identify their statism—their ideological and physical pursuit of Egypt—as the very essence of a sinful people who are on the wicked path of the world, let us nevertheless emphasize that true repentance involves seeking the literal Kingdom of God after coming to that absolute minimum conclusion. 

The Gospel of the Kingdom of God

There is no reason for professing Christians today to have delayed Jesus’s call to “believe the gospel” and seek the literal Kingdom of God, such that they have remained citizens of the world who maintain some idea of “dual citizenship” or shared allegiance to God and the kingdoms of false gods. These are irreconcilable kingdom models that contradict one another and that men must choose between. The whole Gospel message of Jesus was not only a political message of the promise of salvation—that is, freedom, peace, prosperity, and security—under another King and Kingdom than those statist systems of the world, but it was also a call for those hearers to embrace it at once and repent from believing in the gospels of worldly politicians who promise the same thing under their rule. When Jesus called people to repent and seek the Kingdom of God, this was a call to immediately and urgently turn away from the statist institutions of the world, not to delay and split one’s allegiance between two kingdoms. When Jesus called upon men to “believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15), this implied to accept the political promises of the Lord our God, as directly contrasted with the gospels of false gods who promise to save men in their kingdoms, i.e., to provide peace, freedom, and prosperity through trusting in their presidents, soldiers, lawmakers, and law enforcers, under a willingness to covet your neighbors’ property in a socialist system of tax-funded public goods. This is the essence of the Gospel of the Kingdom of God: a political message of salvation unto another King and Kingdom than the Caesars and Romes and Americas of the world. The whole idea of the Gospel of God’s Kingdom is that men are to be converted upon hearing it to becoming dedicated to seeking God’s Kingdom exclusively—that men would now, upon embracing this gospel, work to further the Kingdom of God alone, wholly outside of and apart from the kingdoms of the world that they are now turning away from. There is no such thing as seeking God’s Kingdom or believing in its gospel in addition to furthering the existence of the kingdoms of the world. These are mutually exclusive gospels and kingdoms and one must always decide which one they will further: God’s or man’s. All those who work to further human governments are enemies of God’s Kingdom, and all those who work to further God’s Kingdom are enemies of man’s kingdoms — hence the persecution that has always come against those who have done it, including Jesus himself, His direct disciples, and the prophets before them. Anyone who has not become transformed in this way—into an anarchist who seeks only the Kingdom of God—has not heard this Gospel; they are still buying into the gospels of false gods and their political kingdoms (e.g., “Make America Great Again”).

The only reason that professing Christians today believe they can be statists while saying they have “believed the gospel” is that what they call the gospel has never been understood by them to mean a political message of salvation unto another Kingdom, which forbids those who embrace this gospel from holding onto any allegiance or faith they may have had in the kingdoms of man. “The gospel” message in their minds has been thought of as nothing more than assenting to the biographical facts of Jesus’s life, such that one could remain a supporter of Caesar, so long as they said they believed in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which dealt a definitive blow to the kingdoms of the world.

Yet the word “believe,” which Jesus used in relation to the Gospel, conveys a deeper meaning than commonly attributed to it by modern Christians, who have a tendency to water down and spiritualize everything, which they must necessarily do to excuse their ongoing idolatry for human governments. In the modern Christian world, “believe” means simply to agree that Jesus the Christ walked the earth, that His story was true, or that He was a real historical person. The modern idea of belief hardly has anything to do with reorienting one’s trust and faith back to the Lord as their only King and Savior. This word for “believe” in the Greek is pisteuete, which comes from the transliteration of the word pistis, which gets translated as faith. It has to do with actually entrusting a new savior, and turning away one’s trust in presidents, legislators, police and soldiers, and other human archists. 

The diluted meaning of repentance today

In order to remain in all their sin and idolatry, statists who profess the Lord’s name in vain had no choice but to dilute and distort all the major concepts in Christianity (such as sin itself, repentance, salvation, and the gospel message) in a way that they would not force them to abandon their sinful flirtation and support for the kingdoms of the world. They have made all these ideas into loose professions of faith and a vague idea of belief that have not forced them to renounce their trust and allegiance to the kingdoms of the world. They have never had the faith needed to turn them away from trusting in Egypts to provide for their security and aid.

Yet to repent means not just to feel sorry for your sins and weep all day that you have been part of God’s seemingly cursed creation in a “fallen world,” but to actually undergo a complete transformation from your old ways, like walking on the statist political path of the world, to being born again as a servant and seeker of God’s literal Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. Moreover, to repent is not only to confess one’s sins and do nothing to change thereafter, but to actively reorient your life toward seeking God’s Kingdom and advancing another political community to the abolition of the authoritarian ones you once raised up when you were still lost in the world.

Though the statist idolaters of the world will naturally object to these conclusions, given that they want to continue supporting systems of human government in their sin, if one still remains a statist, a voter, or a man who runs for political office themselves or takes up employment in the Egyptian kingdoms of the world, they are still unrepentant men. There is no greater proof of a man living in a state of unrepentance than a man who still whores himself out to the kingdoms of the world for his welfare and provision of goods and services. Repentant men don’t do this; they seek God’s Kingdom exclusively. Repentant men don’t prostitute themselves out to Romes and Americas; they have one Father who is in heaven.

Repenting of worldly allegiances 

As much as we must lead men to taking up the positive work of seeking the Kingdom of God in repentance, we should always be sure to tell them that they must repent of their worldly-statist ideology (i.e., their belief in human rulers) and their worldly political practices (i.e., voting for rulers) before they can even do this. As much as we seek to make the case here that true repentance goes much farther than simply getting off the wicked path, to be sure, it will never happen so long as men are still walking on it. There is no genuine repentance in a man who has not turned away from his worldly allegiances and faith in human government. For such a faith in worldly rulers to protect, serve, and save a people is the very proof of overt and unashamed sin. It is to walk in exactly the opposite direction than one needs to be walking. Anyone who is still pledging allegiance to a flag or voting for rulers who wield the sword has not repented, but is still engaged in the very sins that Jesus calls us to forsake in preaching His gospel. 

Though we cannot count inaction and escapism as true repentance, and certainly not one that will bring about any social change, anyone who has not repented of their statism has not even arrived at the bare minimum conclusions that men must come to in order to even begin turning back to the righteous path. All statists are on the wicked, unrepentant path of the world and cannot even begin to truly repent until they get off of it. Whether in their ideological belief in human government or their practice of raising up rulers or occupying positions in these systems, all statists are but people who prove themselves to be Babylonians and Egyptians rather than Christians.

Trusting in the Lord’s salvation 

Nowhere is a lack of faith in God more evident than in a man’s fear of anarchism. For the anarchist society—an earth without human rulers—is the natural order of God, where men are provided for by making the Lord alone their King. Men raise up human rulers when they do not believe that the Lord will provide for those who serve Him alone. To trust that one’s needs will be met without a State requires that one trust in God to provide for them in the absence of human rulers acting as their civil fathers, who sinners confide in for defense, justice, law, and society in general. The widespread fear among men of all the alleged evils that would abound in an anarchist society is the best proof we have that a people have no faith in God to save them. It is no surprise that the vast majority of men today instantly raise objections against anarchism of all the alleged lawlessness, injustices, and insecurity that would exist in an anarchist society, which is to say a society of people who trusted in the Lord alone as their King: they are people who hate God and have no faith in Him. All those who reject an anarchist society, where the Lord God is a people’s only King, are people who do not fear the Lord and do not know Him. If they did know the Lord, they would know that the only way to keep their enemies away is precisely to trust in God alone, not a State.

The statist idolaters of the world, however, invent many excuses as to why they should not repent from their worldly allegiances and citizenship under man’s kingdoms and seek God’s Kingdom instead. For one, they do not even recognize the statist road as a sinful one. They believe that it is their “Christian duty” to further the politics of worldly kingdoms in their many false dichotomies between heaven and earth or politics and religion, rather than live like citizens of God’s Kingdom on earth today and reject the politics of the world. Furthermore, they conceive of salvation as merely being saved from hell in the afterlife when we are shipped up to heaven when we die. For earthly salvation, they say, we must confide in Romes and Babylons to save us from our enemies; God is assumed to not operate in this area. They do not regard the Lord as their King who keeps their enemies away too, in the same way the Israelites had sought a human king to “fight our battles for us” (1 Sam 8:20) when God wanted to fulfill this role, too. 

All these excuses that men give today for not turning away from the statist path of the world and seeking God’s Kingdom—whether by saying it isn’t sin to seek man’s, that we are “citizens of two kingdoms,” or that our hope is a purely heavenly one—are refuted by Jesus saying that this Kingdom of God which He was preaching was “at hand” (Matthew 3:2). This was an announcement that God’s reign was accessible right then, that men should begin to seek it immediately upon hearing this message and turn from their worldly political ways at once, such as pledging allegiance to Rome and accepting their benefits to go into bondage. The gospel message of Jesus was not “live like a Roman in the meantime and I’ll save you when you die,” but rather, “repent from being a Roman right now and all the things you need will be added unto you.” When Jesus said that the Kingdom of God was “at hand,” He was telling men that it was being inaugurated in His time and not postponed to a later date, which might permit men to think they may remain in the worldly ways until then. It was not merely a distant heaven or some entirely spiritualized idea of a heavenly kingdom of the afterlife, but a literal Kingdom on earth that men who believed this Gospel were to seek right away. The Gospel of the Kingdom of God, which was the central teaching of Jesus’s whole ministry, was not just one of Jesus saying to “believe in” Him in some loose sense of the term where He will take you to heaven when you die; this would not have invited the persecution that He received for having indeed preached a rival kingdom to those political systems of the world. Rather, this Gospel was a subversive alternative to the kingdoms of the world. It was a competing gospel that preached a rival kingdom to Rome and any and all statist institutions that existed at the time or would come after it, like the “United States” that millions of false converts believe they can support today. Jesus’s message was inherently political: repent of your allegiances and faith in human governments, where you have sinfully placed your trust before you heard this gospel, and turn instead to the Kingdom of God as the only true way of obtaining the peace, freedom, prosperity, justice, and law that sinners seek in the human governments of the world. 

The need for a fear of the Lord 

One reason men refuse to repent and seek the Kingdom of God, besides their theological excuses as to why it is not their obligation on earth or at the present time, is that they still lack the fear of the Lord that’s needed to supply them with the faith to trust in the providential provision that would come to those who sought God’s anarchist society alone. Any theological or eschatological excuse, such that we’re just waiting to be raptured into the sky, is more or less just a justification for their own fears of what would come of them if they actually obeyed the Lord and sought to live out His ways. It is not that men actually believe that Scripture imposes on them nothing more than a call to sit around and wait that they avoid their responsibility to seek the Kingdom of God, but rather that they refuse to seek the Kingdom of God that they seek to come up with a Biblical case after the fact for not doing it. It is never that men actually believe that the Bible approves of their statism or commands them to be statists that they adopt this political position, but rather that they adopt this alleged political theology because they are already statists who hate God and need to invent a Biblical excuse for why they should remain in the ungodly politics of the world. Men do not buy into statism because they believe it’s the politics of Jesus Christ, but rather attempt to paint Jesus as a statist because they are one of these worldly idolaters and need to make it appear as the Christian position. Men do not reject anarchism because they think Scripture tells them to; the whole of Scripture is an anarchist manifesto against the kingdoms of the world. Rather, men reject anarchism because they do not believe that God will provide for them in a free society; that is why they seek security and sustenance from false gods in a statist society. 

Much of the excuses we hear today among professing Christians as to why they do not need to repent from statism and seek the literal Kingdom of God have more to do with their own lack of faith and fear of the Lord than they have to do with some genuine theological belief that it isn’t their duty. They have fallen into the statist traps of the world and have become the captives of human rulers because they did not want to be ruled by God alone in an anarchist society, which they deemed to be a lawless, unjust, chaotic, and disorderly one where men would supposedly not be provided for without socialist benefactors who exercise authority over them and dole-out bread to the needy and crack men over the head with batons who do not obey their orders. When men don’t fear the Lord, i.e., when they do not trust in Him alone to provide for them, they will inevitably fear men and place their faith in human governments to save them. All systems of human government are founded on a fundamental lack of faith in the Lord. Every one of them are raised up by sinners who don’t believe that God would serve them if only they would make the Lord their God. 

The problem we have today is that many people are still too afraid of what will happen if they let go of their worldly ways, despite Jesus teaching that all other things—that is everything you could ever need—would be added unto those who went after His ways alone (Matt 6:33). All statist ideology, which says that human rulers are necessary for social order, comes from men who have never believed in the words of the Lord, which promise that all will go well with a man if only he will abide in God’s ways. All those men who believe presidents, lawmakers, soldiers, or police officers are needed for peace, prosperity, law, security, or order are men who have never known the word of God, saying, “Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart” (Psalm 37:4). All those who reject anarchism and say that it is necessary to raise up men to save them have never known the words of the Lord, saying, “He fulfills the desires of those who fear Him; He hears their cry and saves them” (Psalm 145:19). Those who know the Lord do not worry about how they will be provided for if they began to serve Him, but rather see that their first line of business is getting right with the Lord and trusting in Him to take care of the rest. Godly men do not question whether or not it’s worth it to serve the Lord and seek His Kingdom to the exclusion of the man-made kingdoms of the world that they have trusted in when they were still lost in sin, but they know rather that they will be provided for if only they will seek God’s ways again. They know the words of the Lord, saying, “If you remain in Me and My words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you” (John 15:7). Godly men do not ask how they would have X, Y, and Z without thieves who call themselves the “government” providing it for them. They heed the words of the Lord to “not worry about tomorrow” (Matthew 6:34).

Abandoning the wicked path of statism 

Those statists who falsely profess to be Christians today have made every excuse in the world for why they have not repented from walking on the wicked, statist path of the world and sought the righteous path of God’s anarchist Kingdom in repentance, up to suggesting that it is not even possible for men to seek righteousness! Those who say they cannot abandon the statist path of the world and turn away from the voting booths of Babylon effectively argue that it is not worth it to stop sinning! They argue that God would not reward their obedience, that walking in His ways would not bring blessings, and that turning aside from the words of God would not bring curses nor invite judgment upon them! Though God says He blesses righteousness and obedience, these worldly idolaters tell us that “the pagans” or “the democrats” will take over if we stop our evildoing and abandon Egypt’s elections to the people of the world. They tell us, effectively, that it is not worth it to repent and that we must keep doing evil if we want to avoid disaster — the exact opposite of Biblical instruction and causality. Statists are the people from the Bible who were duped by false prophets who “have lied about the LORD and said: ‘He will not do anything; harm will not come to us; we will not see sword or famine’” (Jeremiah 5:12). They not only think that repenting will do them no good, but believe that their continued evil doing will not invite divine justice upon them! They are the same hardheaded fools from Scripture who said, “Disaster will never draw near or confront us” (Amos 9:10).

Though the people of the world, who are characterized by their wicked support and idolatry for the kingdoms of the world, reason that they must continue to partake in the sins of Egypt by throwing themselves into Pharaoh’s voting booths, political offices, or recruiting stations so long as they exist, or even worse that they should continue to take benefits from these systems so long as they are paying taxes to them, scripture calls us to find our blessings on the straight and narrow path of righteousness and to not be tempted by the apparent successes of those whose wickedness appears to pay off. Rather, we are called to turn back to the Lord in our repentance, to become anarchists who seek the Kingdom of God alone and regard the kingdoms of the world as finished and slated for destruction for all the evils they have produced in the world. Men of God would never do evil that good may come, but know that the only way out of Egypt is to begin trusting in the Lord alone to deliver those who seek His righteousness. Men of God would never look at the Egyptians around them and think that they must become statists too if they want to do something about them, but rather would always know that God would take care of them if only we will do as He says.

“Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity. For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb. Trust in the LORD, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass. And he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday. Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in any wise to do evil. For evildoers shall be cut off: but those that wait upon the LORD, they shall inherit the earth. For yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be: yea, thou shalt diligently consider his place, and it shall not be. But the meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace. The wicked plotteth against the just, and gnasheth upon him with his teeth. The Lord shall laugh at him: for he seeth that his day is coming. The wicked have drawn out the sword, and have bent their bow, to cast down the poor and needy, and to slay such as be of upright conversation.  Their sword shall enter into their own heart, and their bows shall be broken. A little that a righteous man hath is better than the riches of many wicked. For the arms of the wicked shall be broken: but the LORD upholdeth the righteous. The LORD knoweth the days of the upright: and their inheritance shall be for ever. They shall not be ashamed in the evil time: and in the days of famine they shall be satisfied. But the wicked shall perish, and the enemies of the LORD shall be as the fat of lambs: they shall consume; into smoke shall they consume away” (Psalm 37:1-20). 

The godly man never sees statists around him and fears them so much that he reasons he must become one himself. He would never think anything else other than sticking to the righteous path, knowing that in due time the Lord will cut these wicked men down and exalt the righteous. He would never reason that the only path to success is walking down the statist road of the world himself, but will instead commit his ways to the Lord and trust that He will make our paths straight. He would never think that in order to be fed or protected that he must become an Egyptian and raise up socialist welfare offices or standing armies and defense bureaucracies to provide for him, but will instead know that the Lord shall satisfy those who obey His Law. 

Will you seek the Kingdom of God exclusively today? Will you repent of the sins of raising up false gods in Egyptian voting booths? Will you admit that you have not rested in the Lord in seeking to raise up men to protect you? Will you see that you have not yet committed your ways to the Lord so long as you choose to walk like an Egyptian? Will you acknowledge that you have not trusted Him so long as you trust in presidents and congressmen to “save America” for you?