What does this tell you about government and governing, especially vs. 16?

1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.

2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.

3 Nations will come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your dawn.

4 "Lift up your eyes and look about you:
All assemble and come to you;
your sons come from afar,
and your daughters are carried on the arm.

5 Then you will look and be radiant,
your heart will throb and swell with joy;
the wealth on the seas will be brought to you,
to you the riches of the nations will come.

6 Herds of camels will cover your land,
young camels of Midian and Ephah.
And all from Sheba will come,
bearing gold and incense
and proclaiming the praise of the LORD.

7 All Kedar's flocks will be gathered to you,
the rams of Nebaioth will serve you;
they will be accepted as offerings on my altar,
and I will adorn my glorious temple.

8 "Who are these that fly along like clouds,
like doves to their nests?

9 Surely the islands look to me;
in the lead are the ships of Tarshish, ^[a]
bringing your sons from afar,
with their silver and gold,
to the honor of the LORD your God,
the Holy One of Israel,
for he has endowed you with splendor.

10 "Foreigners will rebuild your walls,
and their kings will serve you.
Though in anger I struck you,
in favor I will show you compassion.

11 Your gates will always stand open,
they will never be shut, day or night,
so that men may bring you the wealth of the nations—
their kings led in triumphal procession.

12 For the nation or kingdom that will not serve you will perish;
it will be utterly ruined.

13 "The glory of Lebanon will come to you,
the pine, the fir and the cypress together,
to adorn the place of my sanctuary;
and I will glorify the place of my feet.

14 The sons of your oppressors will come bowing before you;
all who despise you will bow down at your feet
and will call you the City of the LORD,
Zion of the Holy One of Israel.

15 "Although you have been forsaken and hated,
with no one traveling through,
I will make you the everlasting pride
and the joy of all generations.

16 You will drink the milk of nations
and be nursed at royal breasts.
Then you will know that I, the LORD, am your Savior,
your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.

17 Instead of bronze I will bring you gold,
and silver in place of iron.
Instead of wood I will bring you bronze,
and iron in place of stones.
I will make peace your governor
and righteousness your ruler.

18 No longer will violence be heard in your land,
nor ruin or destruction within your borders,
but you will call your walls Salvation
and your gates Praise.

19 The sun will no more be your light by day,
nor will the brightness of the moon shine on you,
for the LORD will be your everlasting light,
and your God will be your glory.

20 Your sun will never set again,
and your moon will wane no more;
the LORD will be your everlasting light,
and your days of sorrow will end.

21 Then will all your people be righteous
and they will possess the land forever.
They are the shoot I have planted,
the work of my hands,
for the display of my splendor.

22 The least of you will become a thousand,
the smallest a mighty nation.
I am the LORD;

Post Edited (Similtude) : 7/20/2008 2:37:20 PM (GMT-5)

First, I don’t question that God cannot use “donkeys, figs, Greek, a cross, blind men, clay, a tent, and the sinful acts of men.” The question is, in what sense does it mean to be “nursed at royal breasts?” Doesn’t this imply some sort of NURTURING element? How are Kings said to be able to nurse and thus to nurture?

Heres the point I was wanting to make. I think this passage shows that there will one day be a settling of accounts in Zion. A day of reckoning. As Martina McBride sings,

Let freedom ring
Let the white dove sing
Let the whole world know that today is the day of a reckoning
Let the weak be strong
Let the right be wrong
Roll the stone away
Let the guilty pay
It's Independence Day

Now, Christians throughout the ages have thought about this day quite a bit in terms of political vindication, not merely personal vindication. Interestingly, some Christians who have been satisfied with the political status quo have thought of the afterlife in almost apolitical terms. But there are obvious political dimensions in Zion and in the afterlife. For example:

Vs 3 Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn.

Vs 10 Foreigners will rebuild your walls, and their kings will serve you. Though in anger I struck you, in favor I will show you compassion.

Vs 11 Your gates will always stand open, they will never be shut, day or night, so that men may bring you the wealth of the nations— their kings led in triumphal procession.

Now some think that these are “saved” kings and the interpretations follow two lines of thinking. For now, those are neither here nor there for the point I want to make. Regardless of what one thinks, it seems that this passage tells us that there will be a gathering of human cultural “filling” or “fulness.”

Both this passage and Rev 21:23-25 both speak of this:

So there is a linking of the entering into the city with the “wealth of the nations.”

Now check this out. Political rulers back in those days? They ruled EXTENSIVELY. As you know, we ought to try to be aware of our own cultural readings on to the text. A King back in da day? Would rule WELL BEYOND the political realm. Because the office of kingship evolved out of the even still more ancient roles of clan leader, tribal chief, leader of the hunt, etc, they had many more functions to perform than simply that of political leader. Basically, they were the primary authorities over the broad patterns of the cultural lives of their nations. When they stood over against other nations, they were the bearers and the representatives of their respective cultures.

Now, there were times when the kings in Israel were anointed by God to promote righteousness and peace from Ps 72. But there were also many times of disillusionment such that even non-kingly offices, especially that of the prophet would assess the political performances from an independent covenantal standpoint. God’s people began to hope that someday there would come a time when these lapses or disappointments would no longer exist which eventually came into being of strong eschatological character i.e. Is 9:6-7

6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, ^[b] Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

In effect what you have is Israel going from having a divine king to having a human king BACK to having a divine king. And the thing is, we are not simply looking at returning to the pre-human king hope, but to a POST-human king hope. It is not a mere return to a theocracy. The “desire for the-king-greater-than-David” is not merely the “desire for the-king-before-Saul.” So the historical process and development needs to be brought into focus here. God is not going to simply send another ruler and leave it there. Part of the establishing of everlasting justice and righteousness is that there must be a day of reckoning--a day of political accounting--a day of a gathering in of political authority.

Is 14:2 They will make captives of their captors and rule over their oppressors.

Is 60:14 The sons of your oppressors will come bowing before you;

and Is 2:4 says, He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore.

I heard Kirk Franklin quote that last one. ;-)

Well anyway, the idea is that political power will be HANDED BACK to God. We see it in Paul’s writings Phil 2:11 and Col 2:15 and so the political power that was misused in history must be handed back to its proper source--it cannot be left unchecked and according to text it will be public. A similar expectation is found in Rev 6:9-11:

Christians who suffered political persecution are not wrong to expect some sort of accounting. By all indications, it seems that this will be done in front of their accusers, 1 Peter 2:12. Now this doesn’t seem to be done simply between Christians and non-Christians but also between non-Christians and non-Christians. And by that I mean that even those Christian rulers who have oppressed will have to give an account. All of this is for God’s glorification that he alone is the righteous judge who will decide on that final day of reckoning. And it seems that, according to the text, this will be episodic. It won’t last forever. It will be a closing off of sinful-history. A kind of mopping-up process at the end of which will be followed by a new order of life. However, this does not mean that it should be characterized as “apolitical.” It doesn’t lead to an elimination of politics but rather for a new kind of politics--a political TRANSFORMATION.

Is 1:24-26

Is 60:17

Not only will the best of the political past be restored, but political authority will be healed and sanctified. The leaves of the tree that stands in the City will bring about “the healing of the nations” which there is no reason to think that political healing will not be included.

Now, coming back to the vs. 16 and government nurturing, we can see that the patterns of political authority will be different in an unfallen world as opposed to those that emerge under sinful conditions. In a fallen condition, restraining sin via introducing order will mean that governments “minister” to us. But not only are they a response to sin, but they are also affected by sin. Even when they maintain “law and order?” they can commit injustice, unrighteousness and oppression. When they do this, they are no longer “ministers” of the Lord. Which is to say the opposite. When a government doesn’t act in this way, they serve and nurture their citizens which seems to me is what is implied in vs. 16.

Now think of this in terms of gender issues. The language of authority and rule is slated towards “male” and “military.” Strong patriarchal imagery shows this. But here in this passage there is this idea, surprise, surprise of kings who have their own breast milk to offer. God who is a nurturer and king, will at the end of time bring milk from “the breast of kings.” Politics, in other words, will become a force for the giving of life. “King-mothers” will feed the people of God.

So when the people of God became disillusioned with political rulers and political reality they began to hope for a divine ruler characterized by unfailing justice, righteousness and peace i.e. “Wonderful Counselor.” Jesus is the King who like a mother hen gathers her chicks under her wings. A Shepard-ruler who carries lambs in his bosom and gently leads the young.

Though this is a new political order in which Kings are transformed into nurturers and ministers, there is also the idea of a specific ruler--a specific ruler who is a banner. A banner for a new regime (talk about warfare language. “Disciple” a Christian rock group has a song called, “Regime Change” by the way). This regime change began with Christ when he appeared in human flesh in which the political order takes the shape of obedience to the rule of Christ. Christ gave some political instructions in Matt 20:25-28:

So Jesus has begun the transformation process of the patterns of human authority. To cast our lot with the lowly is to anticipate the coming political vindication when

vs. 22, The least of you will become a thousand, the smallest a mighty nation. I am the LORD;”

Political sanctification means that our present day deeds will count toward the day of reckoning that will occur in Zion so much so that we should not be politically passive. Our conduct will count on that day 1 Peter 2:12. So we must learn to live effectively in political conformity to the norms and patterns of the Kingdom. This means we won’t give blind submission to rulers, but HONOUR. Why? Because we recognize that they perform an important ministry. And we can honour our political leaders by realizing that sin affects government and governmental structures and calling them to perform the ministry that God requires of them.

Post Edited (Sahid) : 7/23/2008 12:52:38 AM (GMT-5)

Post Edited (Similtude) : 7/25/2008 6:52:07 AM (GMT-5)

Indeed, Tom. I would go so far as to say that one christian could serve in Iraq under the view that, now that the war was inititated, we are a stabilizing police force there, and another christian could refuse to CONTINUE to serve under the view that the congression "declaration of war" is no longer valid insomuch as it doesn't authorize the particular military actions now in force--and BOTH could be right. I.e., the former could be right because our presence is preventing civil war, and the latter could be right because it is a legally accurate position and can serve as a small resistance to future usurpation and legally unaccountable government.

But for Greg to be consistent, he will have to adopt Zach's view that the flood, exodous, conquest, torah punishments, providentially aided war in the days of the Judges all the way up through David, at least, etc. are all allegorical and give no support to the idea that God is involved in killing/punishing/judging (But even then, how can that even make sense since God supposedly can create humans with immortal bodies and yet has chose NOT to? Clearly, He IS for death under certain circumstances. Not necessarily because He prefers it absolutely, but because He prefers it conditionally.). To my mind, such an approach is not only radically non-textual (in a plausible sense), but it undermines even the most conservative notion of God's omnipotence.

It solves nothing, epistemologically, to posit the notion that God can be compelled into a covenant that somehow "obligates" what were, theretofore, purely relativistic humans (i.e., humans who are not intrinsically obligated to their creator by virtue of being created TO voluntarily fulfill divine ends.) Any ethical system that does not have as a first principle that humans are designed FOR certain voluntary choices can not generate a non-relativisitic ethic aposteriori. It is logically impossible.

Besides, such an assumption is a counter-intuitive, ad-hoc assumption made to save some modicum of historicity in the gospels. No historian, qua historian, believing or unbelieving, that I'm aware of even takes such an approach seriously. How could they? For the minute we posit counter-intuitive, ad-hoc assumptions to salvage a modicum of gospel historicity that could warrant coherent inferrences about God's will from Christ's message, we are contradicting ourselves.

For historicity must be inferrable independent of ad-hoc assumptions. Which means that the historicity of the gospels that render Christ's message intelligible and non-contradictory must be inferrable from those texts taken as non-singularities. I.e., they must be texts like OTHER texts, susceptible to normal inductive methods of inference. To say they are singularities and yet inferrably historical in a way that Christ is speaking non-contradictory is, itself, a contradiction. They can only be known to be historical AND theologically consistent by induction or divine revelation. And I don't think Greg is arguing for the latter.

And yet, something like such an ad-hoc assumption is absolutely necessary to even salvage the coherent, intelligibility of Christ's message in the gospels themselves once one is dedicated to supposing love can do no harm for long range good. And yet, that one premise is all that is necessary to render the OT texts consistent with the NT once post-mortem effects are allowed.

But if post-mortem effects are not allowed, then the NT is just as void of the theodicy Greg is seeking as the OT is. But if post-mortem effects ARE legitimately positable, then UR is just as coherent (I would say more so) as other post-mortem "chances" non-inferrable from prophetic texts. IOW, post-mortem "chances/events" that are posited beyond what the texts say are posited because divine love supposedly REQUIRES them to be true. But if so, why not universalism? What texts do we have that rule out universalism but not other "deduced" post-mortem events implied by divine love?

Post Edited (Similtude) : 7/27/2008 9:43:51 PM (GMT-5)