Will Democracies Save the Nations?

It concerns me that our political leaders seem intent on getting us into further wars in the mid-east. As far as I can discern there is no conflict too far away nor too far removed from our national interest to make our politico’s ‘just say no.’ The barbiturate of expanding power and control over world events and history is never enough.

In high school I remember reading about Woodrow Wilson and the 1^st World War. He assured the nation in glorious terms that we were fighting the ‘war to end all wars’ as he called it. We were fighting to, ‘make the world safe for democracy’. These were such heady terms. Looking back they appear almost naïve and massively presumptuous. And yet, here we are almost a century later with the armies marching, the ships sailing, and millions of men carrying forward a similar vision of nation building.

For a century now we have been laboring to reorganize and restructure the nations of the world to create ‘democracies’ like ours where the people, presumably, would be civilized and free, like us. We are supposedly imposing happiness and prosperity wherever our armies turn their attention. I read that we have spent a billion dollars on the Libya war. Syria is in our sights now, Hillary is making pronouncements, diplomats are hustling to and fro. Our recent Egyptian involvement is already being forgotten. Mubaarak is on trial, the violent Muslim Brotherhood is rising to power, and we are basking in our victory over another tyrant. The news moves on.

Yet, disappointingly, in all our military achievements, the world councils, multi-nation task forces and all the rest of it we have been unable to secure the peace and prosperity we have sought so diligently for the surrounding world. The victories always seem to vanish in the smoke. A nation is saved from one disastrous government only to set up another that is just as bad or worse. It reminds me of the Biblical injunction that they, ‘shall cry peace, peace, but there is no peace’. We are them—there is no peace—and the nations grind out futures like that of their past. But, in the midst of all this there is good hope.

Our national behavior, our mind, in all these interventions has been not only a false hope but it is a humanistic imitation of the Christian determination to disciple the nations. That is what Jesus instructed after all. He prescribed us (Matthew 28) to, ‘make disciples of all nations teaching them to do all that I commanded you’. Given that He has through His word ‘commanded us’ concerning every aspect of life, (economics, governance, labor, money, morals, worship etc.) our God given task is to build what our forefathers called Christendom and what Jesus called The Kingdom of God. This is a mighty task and by His design fills all our attention when obeyed with any vigor. Ours is a nation building task that has real hope. The humanists try to disciple the nations with armies in their befuddled imitation of Christ (or anti-Christ I am not sure which). Our goal is to press forward in this earth, the crown rights of Jesus. His kingdom is ubiquitous and is advancing on every front as He gives growth. Our mission then is not one of hopeless trudging toward a false vision as is the humanist’s . Ours is a confident building of the nation of God (‘You are a chosen race, royal priesthood, a holy nation’ – 1 Peter 2:9). The borders of our nation are the entire earth and Christ’s kingdom is forever. This surpasses the grandest vision of any progressive or neo-con nation builder. It is the hope of the church and it will not fail. Let’s bring the armies home and send real missionaries.

For Christian Culture,

Don Schanzenbach