[This is part 21 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, nineteen, twenty, twenty two, twenty three, twenty four]

Leaving Egypt Ministries, Obadiah D. Morris

In our continued study of various Biblical words expressing the general idea of people living contrary to the ways of the Lord, we come to the idea of rebellion, or of a rebellious people. If you asked most professing Christians today what man’s great rebellion against God has been, it would entirely escape them that the essence of man’s revolt has been political: men have sinfully sought to be ruled by systems of human government rather than by the Lord alone in an anarchist society. In fact, most of them would call anarchism to be a revolt against God, all while a society without human rulers, where God alone is King, is the natural order God intended men to live under and from which they strayed in their quest for human kings. This is how reprobate and rebellious the majority of so-called Christians are today: mankind’s statist political revolt against the Kingdom of God, where men pursue systems of authoritarian government, is said to be God’s prescribed system of government, and the anarchistic Kingdom of God, which we are to be seeking to the abolition of human government, is called rebellion! Truly, they are the people of the Bible who call good (God’s anarchy) “evil” and evil (man’s political systems) “good.” 

Since the Gospel of the Kingdom of God, and all of Scripture, is a political message of salvation under another King and Kingdom, we see how backward and rebellious the majority of professing Christians are today precisely when it comes to political ideology. Though they often treat politics as something separate from one’s “religious” convictions, it is at this point—where a man will truly place his trust—that we have a dividing line between those who obey God and those who live in rebellion to Him.

Though most so-called Christians today see no trouble in pledging allegiance to both God’s Kingdom and man’s kingdoms, they do so because they do not understand Christianity and the gospel as a political message of salvation under another Kingdom. Instead, they treat it as merely a spiritual faith with no bearing on their earthly deeds or political ideology. Yet it is here that we truly separate the sheep of God’s Kingdom from the rebels who chase after worldly kingdoms.

Notwithstanding the common idea among so-called Christians today that politics is wholly separate from their “religious faith,” the choice that men must make between which king and kingdom they will serve—whether the Lord our God in an anarchist society or the worldly kingdoms of false gods—is the decision which truly determines whether they are children of God, or children of the devil who rebelliously work to advance and support the man-made political systems of the world. Only those who repent of statism and seek God’s Kingdom are godly men; all statists are rebels against the Kingdom of God and stand as His enemies. To seek the Kingdom of God requires abandoning the kingdoms of the world, which are raised up in man’s rebellion against God’s Kingdom. It is never possible to pursue both together. Men pursue the Kingdom of God or the kingdoms of men at the expense of the other, whichever they choose. The two kingdom models are antagonistic and can never coexist, in theory or in practice. God’s Kingdom is not a “reformed” version of the kingdoms of the world with a “Christian” veneer, but a separate political order altogether. It is a wholly different and distinct political community that does not operate on violence, theft, or murder, but rather through mutual service, voluntary charity, and ministers who do not rule over others.

As with other words that get translated into evil, wicked, iniquity, error, guilt, or sin, it is not difficult to trace instances of rebellion in scripture to the political acts of men, whose adultery against God is characterized by their lust for human rulers, soldiers, and police officers to rule over them — an idolatry that is not coincidentally found in our ungodly society today: for statism is the primary evidence of a people who have turned away from God. 

Of course, the professing Christian masses will reject to these conclusions; they are guilty of these very sins after all and have a psychological conflict of interest against acknowledging their guilt. Nevertheless, we must continue to pursue these conclusions that have astonishingly escaped most people who claim to be men who know the Lord throughout the history of the earth. Though the false converts of today see no contradiction between “God and country” and have never once thought there to be any evil in slogans like “God bless our troops,” the main rebellion of mankind in the eyes of God has always been to trust in human rulers and their armies to protect them rather than have the Lord alone as their protector. Though men today do not believe that their statism—their ideological or physical support for human government—is sinful and evil, the ideas and practices of statism are actually the main way the men rebel against God and His Kingdom order. There is no greater manifestation of man’s rebellion against God than that which is found in the existence of a State.

The rebellious people in Ezekiel

The rebellious people spoke of in Ezekiel 2, where God warns the prophet of the type of people he is up against in his divine commission, provides a good starting point for connecting statism and rebellion, or vice versa. The Hebrew word is מָרַד (Strong’s H4775), which gets transliterated into marad. It is a verb describing the action of “to rebel, to revolt.”

The people who have always been in rebellion to God and who have always been revolting against His anarchist order are the statist idolaters of the world, who whore themselves out to human rulers for protection and bread, only to find themselves living as captives to these worldly kingdoms for their sin of raising up these wicked systems of human government. When Scripture speaks of a “rebellious people,” both the rulers and their idolatrous supporters (i.e., the statists of the world) should come to mind. For the history of mankind’s rebellion against God and His Kingdom has been characterized and defined by a people who raise up systems of human civil government in the place of God’s anarchist order. The rebellion here is not in the mere version or style of human civil government, such that a “socialist government” or a “democracy” is sinful but a “constitutional republic” is exempt from the charge. Rather, the rebellion is in human civil government itself, as distinct from godly civil government. These political systems of men, which rebels trust in to provide for their needs, operate on violence, forced offerings, authority, and the legal decrees of men, in stark contrast to God’s Kingdom order, which operates on service, freewill offerings, freely appointed ministers who do not rule over other men, and the perfect law of liberty. The rebels of both Scripture and history have always been the statists of the world who long to be served by Pharaohs, armies, the officers of these man-made systems of law, and the thousands of other authoritarians who preside over this ungodly system of government. It was always a statist scene that the prophets had come upon that demonstrated the people to be rebellious. It was always the corrupt, political orders of men that made the people rebels against the Kingdom of God and who existed as threats to anyone who would rebuke them for their evil ways. Hence the assignment given to the prophet Ezekiel by God.

“‘Son of man,’ He said to me, ‘I am sending you to the Israelites, to a rebellious nation that has rebelled against Me. To this very day they and their fathers have rebelled against Me. They are obstinate and stubborn children. I am sending you to them, and you are to say to them, ‘This is what the Lord GOD says.’ And whether they listen or refuse to listen—for they are a rebellious house—they will know that a prophet has been among them. But you, son of man, do not be afraid of them or their words. Do not be afraid, though briers and thorns surround you, and you dwell among scorpions. Do not be afraid of their words or dismayed by their presence, though they are a rebellious house. But speak My words to them, whether they listen or refuse to listen, for they are rebellious” (Ezekiel 2:3-7).

Another similar Hebrew word that gets translated into “rebellious” is מְרִי (Strong’s H4805), which gets transliterated into meri or mriy (pronounced meh-ree). This is a noun used to describe a rebellious man, used alongside marad (transliterated) in Ezekiel 2 to describe the people themselves. It comes from the Hebrew root word מָרָה (Strong’s H4784), which is transliterated as marah (pronounced mah-rah). This is a verb describing “to rebel, be disobedient, be contentious.” Men contend with God when they chase after the kingdoms of men for their bread and protection, when God has always wanted to be the sole provider for free men in an anarchist society. Men disobey God when they raise up false gods to rule over them. They rebel against the Kingdom of God through their wicked pursuit of the governments of man. 

The very rebels the Biblical prophets were up against are same ones we are are still up against today as we work to bring the Gospel of the Kingdom of God to the people of our time: the reprobate statist rebels of the world, whose idolatry for human rulers and their systems of government blinds them to the truth of God’s word, calling them away from these systems and to seek His Kingdom alone. It is statists who are the hardheaded people of the earth, who refuse to acknowledge their worldly ideology as sinful and likewise refuse to repent of this sin and turn back to the Lord’s ways. It is the statists of the world who reject the rebuke of God’s prophets—Biblical and contemporary—calling them to turn away from worldly politics and seek the Kingdom of Heaven exclusively. 

We see shortly into the Book of Ezekiel that the charges God was bringing against the people are the same as always, from the days of the Biblical prophets to ours: men had gone whoring after the kingdoms of the world to “protect and serve” them and “fight for our freedom.” They trusted in Pharaohs, soldiers, and police to give them what only God can provide. They rebelled against God by trusting in men to provide for them instead. God’s people were always to be a people set apart from the statist masses of the world—a people who lived as citizens of another Kingdom altogether that was not of this world and its authoritarian political systems and man-made legal decrees. But they had decided rather to turn their backs on God and turn their noses up to His Law and fall into idolatry and the statist political practices of the people of the world instead. 

“Thus says the Lord God: This is Jerusalem; I have set her in the center of the nations, with countries all around her. But she has rebelled against my ordinances and my statutes, becoming more wicked than the nations and the countries all around her, rejecting my ordinances and not following my statutes. Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because you are more turbulent than the nations that are all around you, and have not followed my statutes or kept my ordinances, but have acted according to the ordinances of the nations that are all around you; therefore thus says the Lord God: I, I myself, am coming against you; I will execute judgments among you in the sight of the nations. And because of all your abominations, I will do to you what I have never yet done, and the like of which I will never do again” (Ezekiel 5:5-9, NRSV). 

Anytime people fall under divine judgment, it is always necessarily because they refused to live as an anarchist people with the Lord alone as their King—because they rejected Godarchism and replaced it with human archism instead. The charges brought against a people were never just over some vague idea of sin and idolatry where the people turned away from God in some undefinable sense, but were always for the actual wicked deeds and practices found in all statist societies. Thus, before pronouncing judgment, God said that “the land is full of bloody crimes” and “the city is full of violence” (Ezekiel 7:23). 

Man’s political rebellion 

The primary way that men rebel against God is not merely through a refusal to believe in Him, but by setting up and supporting systems of human civil government that exist as rival kingdoms to His anarchist society. The chief rebellion of mankind, from the days of Cain who immediately went after his own city-state to Nimrod after him, was always a political one. It is by erecting and furthering man-made systems of government that men have rebelled against the Kingdom of God, from the dawn of time to the present day revolt. Man’s rebellion against God is never just a loosely conceived lack of faith or belief in God, although all systems of human government are founded by men who lack faith and are devoid of trust in the Lord. It was always, more specifically, a failure to trust in God to provide for them in an anarchist society, which inevitably led men to long to go back to Egypt. 

The appearance of the word marad, translated into “rebel” in the episode of the Israelites groaning in the wilderness after leaving Egypt, further supports the case that statism is sin and that statists are the rebels of Scripture and history. They are men who place their trust in systems of human government rather than in God alone, whose anarchist society has long remained unknown and unexplored, considering that it requires a faith in God and courage to pursue it that men have often been too afraid to take up. Just before Joshua had counseled the Israelites to trust in the Lord to make their way and provide for them, telling them “only do not rebel against the Lord” (Numbers 14:9), they were already setting their eyes back on the statist systems from which God had delivered them from. They wanted to go backwards, rather than forwards (Jer 7:24), saying to each other, “Let us appoint a leader and return to Egypt” (Numbers 14:4). They were not ready to actually leave behind their political bondage and trust in the Lord to secure them, and instead wanted to return to their enslavement under Pharaohs and live as captives of the Egyptians for the perceived benefits provided by these systems of bondage. Instead of trusting the Lord to feed and protect them, they were thinking the rebellious thoughts of all statists: “Would it not be better off for us to go back to Egypt” (Numbers 14:3)?

One problem we face today in showing men that their belief in human rulers and worldly political practices, such as voting men into office or taking their benefits, amounts to sin and rebellion is that they are already living in these worldly ways and do not want to be told that they are not living right before the Lord or walking the righteous path. Such statist rebels, who long to be under the enslaving “care” of Pharaohs and their officers, hate to be told to place their trust exclusively in the Lord so much that they will threaten to kill those who call them to walk on this path of divine providence (Num 14:10). Yet it is the role of all prophets of God to tell statists that they are idolaters and call upon them to repent of their political rebellion and seek the Kingdom of God alone. 

The statist rebels 

Though we do have explicit references of rebellion as involving the specific acts of statism, such as longing after human rulers which God called a “rejection” of His kingship (1 Samuel 8), in other instances we can infer as much even from more general descriptions of rebellion as turning away from God’s Law, which forbids men from having others gods than the Lord and which, therefore, describes the acts of a people who are necessarily going after other gods to serve them. When Scripture thus refers to people who “were disobedient and rebelled against You” and who “flung Your law behind their backs” (Nehemiah 9:26), we can say that such acts necessarily refer to episodes of human king-seeking, like that which is recorded in 1 Samuel 8. It is the statist acts of mankind, whether not trusting in the Lord and longing to go back to Egypt or explicitly seeking kings for their protection, that scripture can speak of such rebels as these who were constantly under judgment for these acts: 

“You admonished them to turn back to Your law, but they were arrogant and disobeyed Your commandments. They sinned against Your ordinances, by which a man will live if he practices them. They turned a stubborn shoulder; they stiffened their necks and would not obey” (Nehemiah 9:29). 

When we look at the word meri, which is the noun describing a rebellious man, we continue to see that the very rebellious people of scripture and history have always been statists. Here we have another devastating case against the statists. The very people who the prophet Isaiah calls a “rebellious people, deceitful children, children unwilling to obey the LORD’s instruction” (Isaiah 30:9) comes directly in the context of people seeking alliances with worldly governments to protect, serve, and save them. 

“‘Woe to the rebellious children,’ declares the LORD, ‘to those who carry out a plan that is not Mine, who form an alliance, but against My will, heaping up sin upon sin. They set out to go down to Egypt without asking My advice, to seek shelter under Pharaoh’s protection and take refuge in Egypt’s shade. But Pharaoh’s protection will become your shame, and the refuge of Egypt’s shade your disgrace” (Isaiah 30:1-3). 

The rebellious children of the world have always been those men who seek protection in presidents, their soldiers, their lawmakers, and their police forces, rather than to trust in the Lord alone to provide for all their needs. They are the people who “trust in oppression” (Isaiah 30:12) rather than trust in God’s anarchy.

If a Biblical hermeneutic is to analyze the context of preceding and following chapters, then we must also cite Isaiah 31 for further evidence that the rebellious people as spoken of in Scripture are statists. As the prophet went on, 

“Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who rely on horses, who trust in their abundance of chariots and in their multitude of horsemen. They do not look to the Holy One of Israel; they do not seek the LORD. Yet He too is wise and brings disaster; He does not call back His words. He will rise up against the house of the wicked and against the allies of evildoers. But the Egyptians are men, not God; their horses are flesh, not spirit. When the LORD stretches out His hand, the helper will stumble, and the one he helps will fall; both will perish together” (Isaiah 31:1-3). 

The rebels of God and His anarchist Kingdom have always been those statists of the world who seek protection and aid from human rulers. Those who revolt against God have always been the men who believe “the troops fight for our freedom,” or that “the police work to uphold law and order and public safety.” In other words, all those false Christians who repeat such slogans like “support the troops” and “back the blue” are the very rebellious people of Scripture who God sees as men who have turned away from trusting in Him. 

The Hebrew word used to describe the “rebellious children” in Isaiah 30:1 is סָרַר (Strong’s H5637), which gets transliterated into sarar (pronounced sah-RAHR). This word most often gets translated into “stubborn” or “rebellious.” It means “to turn away” or “to be stubborn, to rebel, to be obstinate.” Obviously, it is another damning case against the statists, considering that the rebellion spoken of here is explicitly one of making alliances with human systems of government for protection and aid, which is the very sin and evil that men fall under when they don’t trust the Lord to protect them in a godly anarchist society (1 Sam 8).

State rulers as rebels 

As a further indictment against the statist rebels of the world, the prophet Isaiah uses this word sarar against the political rulers themselves too, showing how state rulers, as much as their idolatrous supporters among the population, are an essential part of the rebellion against God, working directly to further such ungodly political systems that stand as enemies of God’s Kingdom. 

“Your rulers are rebels, friends of thieves. They all love bribes and chasing after rewards. They do not defend the fatherless, and the plea of the widow never comes before them” (Isaiah 1:23). 

Not only has God never permitted men to rule over other men from a system of authoritarian government, but exercising authority over others is expressly forbidden among men who seek to be servants of the Lord (Mark 10:42-45). God gave dominion to men over the land and its resources, but never to men over other men, which He reserved for Himself. As David Lipscomb put it,

“While God committed the government of the under-creation to man, he reserved to himself the right and prerogative of governing man. God would govern and guide man; man would govern the under-creation, and so the whole world would be held under the government of God, man immediately and the under-creation through man. But, man refused to be governed by God…This act of disobedience culminated in the effort of man to organize a government of his own, so that he might permanently conduct the affairs of earth, free from the control of God, and independent of God’s government” (Lipscomb, On Civil Government, pp. 7-8).

It is in the human systems of government that the rebellion and revolt of mankind—the chief manifestation of sin in the world—is most evident. All systems of human civil government have been raised up in defiance of the commands and Law of God, by sinners seeking to subvert the natural order and substitute their own devices for the ways of the Lord. As Lipscomb went on to say,

“The institution of human government was an act of rebellion and began among those in rebellion against God, with the purpose of superseding the Divine rule with the rule of man” (Lipscomb, On Civil Government, p. 9).

Those who rule over other men are rebels against God, as are those who support their existence and raise them up into office against the express commands of the Lord to have no other gods before Him. Human rulers are false gods who, with the help of a rebellious people among the populace, have exalted themselves to positions of power that God never commanded men to take and which were always formed and furthered in a wicked usurpation of God’s kingship and rule.