In many ways I view John MacArthur much like I do Charles Spurgeon. They are both great Baptist preachers whom I am respect and admire. And while Spurgeon went on to be with the Lord more than a century ago, John MacArthur is still with us fighting the good fight.
To be sure, I disagree with both Spurgeon and MacArthur on their Calvinist theology which touches almost every sermon these two men have preached. In another upcoming article I will deal with something MacArthur has recently stated that I disagree with him on. But in this article, I want to express my complete solidarity with John MacArthur and his Church’s stand against the unlawful edicts of Los Angeles County as well as the State of California.
On July 24th, the Elders of Grace Community in Sun Valley, California where John MacArthur is Pastor, issued a declaration entitled “A Biblical Case for the Church’s Duty to Remain Open”. In this declaration they made the following key statements:
“Christ is Lord of all. He is the one true head of the church (Ephesians 1:22; 5:23; Colossians 1:18). He is also King of kings—sovereign over every earthly authority (1 Timothy 6:15; Revelation 17:14; 19:16). Grace Community Church has always stood immovably on those biblical principles. As His people, we are subject to His will and commands as revealed in Scripture. Therefore we cannot and will not acquiesce to a government-imposed moratorium on our weekly congregational worship or other regular corporate gatherings. Compliance would be disobedience to our Lord’s clear commands.
Some will think such a firm statement is inexorably in conflict with the command to be subject to governing authorities laid out in Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2. Scripture does mandate careful, conscientious obedience to all governing authority, including kings, governors, employers, and their agents (in Peter’s words, “not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable” [1 Peter 2:18]). Insofar as government authorities do not attempt to assert ecclesiastical authority or issue orders that forbid our obedience to God’s law, their authority is to be obeyed whether we agree with their rulings or not. In other words, Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2 still bind the consciences of individual Christians. We are to obey our civil authorities as powers that God Himself has ordained.”
And then comes my favorite part of the declaration. In this next part, pay careful attention as the elders of Grace Community church, including their head pastor John MacArthur, put on what I can only describe as a “clinic” on the three spheres of human authority which God has established:
“However, while civil government is invested with divine authority to rule the state, neither of those texts (nor any other) grants civic rulers jurisdiction over the church. God has established three institutions within human society: the family, the state, and the church. Each institution has a sphere of authority with jurisdictional limits that must be respected. A father’s authority is limited to his own family. Church leaders’ authority (which is delegated to them by Christ) is limited to church matters. And government is specifically tasked with the oversight and protection of civic peace and well-being within the boundaries of a nation or community. God has not granted civic rulers authority over the doctrine, practice, or polity of the church. The biblical framework limits the authority of each institution to its specific jurisdiction. The church does not have the right to meddle in the affairs of individual families and ignore parental authority. Parents do not have authority to manage civil matters while circumventing government officials. And similarly, government officials have no right to interfere in ecclesiastical matters in a way that undermines or disregards the God-given authority of pastors and elders.
When any one of the three institutions exceeds the bounds of its jurisdiction it is the duty of the other institutions to curtail that overreach. Therefore, when any government official issues orders regulating worship (such as bans on singing, caps on attendance, or prohibitions against gatherings and services), he steps outside the legitimate bounds of his God-ordained authority as a civic official and arrogates to himself authority that God expressly grants only to the Lord Jesus Christ as sovereign over His Kingdom, which is the church. His rule is mediated to local churches through those pastors and elders who teach His Word (Matthew 16:18–19; 2 Timothy 3:16–4:2).”
This is something I teach on this site. God as established three human spheres of authority, a husband and father’s authority over his family, a pastor’s authority over the local church and the civil government. None of these spheres may exceed their authority by intruding into authority God has given to another sphere.
The declaration continues with Grace Community asserting not only its right, but its responsibility under God’s law to practice civil disobedience under the current circumstances:
“Therefore, in response to the recent state order requiring churches in California to limit or suspend all meetings indefinitely, we, the pastors and elders of Grace Community Church, respectfully inform our civic leaders that they have exceeded their legitimate jurisdiction, and faithfulness to Christ prohibits us from observing the restrictions they want to impose on our corporate worship services.
Said another way, it has never been the prerogative of civil government to order, modify, forbid, or mandate worship. When, how, and how often the church worships is not subject to Caesar. Caesar himself is subject to God. Jesus affirmed that principle when He told Pilate, “You would have no authority over Me, unless it had been given you from above” (John 19:11). And because Christ is head of the church, ecclesiastical matters pertain to His Kingdom, not Caesar’s. Jesus drew a stark distinction between those two kingdoms when He said, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Mark 12:17). Our Lord Himself always rendered to Caesar what was Caesar’s, but He never offered to Caesar what belongs solely to God.”
The elders of Grace Community church are exactly right that Los Angeles County and the State of California have exceeded their God given authority.
The declaration continues with a blistering attack on pastors and preachers today who wrongly ceded their authority over their churches to the civil government:
“As pastors and elders, we cannot hand over to earthly authorities any privilege or power that belongs solely to Christ as head of His church. Pastors and elders are the ones to whom Christ has given the duty and the right to exercise His spiritual authority in the church (1 Peter 5:1–4; Hebrews 13:7, 17)—and Scripture alone defines how and whom they are to serve (1 Corinthians 4:1–4). They have no duty to follow orders from a civil government attempting to regulate the worship or governance of the church. In fact, pastors who cede their Christ-delegated authority in the church to a civil ruler have abdicated their responsibility before their Lord and violated the God-ordained spheres of authority as much as the secular official who illegitimately imposes his authority upon the church.”
Amen and Amen. Many pastors around this nation have in fact abdicated their God given authority and responsibility over their local churches in recent months.
Humanist Christian pastors of course, have no problem with this. Because they believe in unlimited civil government power, a concept which the Bible does not teach. But when we remember that many of these pastors are the same ones who change other doctrines to appease the humanist society around them, it should not surprise us that when the government says “jump” to them, they say “how high?”.
The declaration continues with the Elder’s making clear they are not basing their argument on the U.S. Constitution and the rights given there in, but on the God, who gave us certain inalienable rights:
“Notice that we are not making a constitutional argument, even though the First Amendment of the United States Constitution expressly affirms this principle in its opening words: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The right we are appealing to was not created by the Constitution. It is one of those unalienable rights granted solely by God, who ordained human government and establishes both the extent and the limitations of the state’s authority (Romans 13:1–7). Our argument therefore is purposely not grounded in the First Amendment; it is based on the same biblical principles that the Amendment itself is founded upon. The exercise of true religion is a divine duty given to men and women created in God’s image (Genesis 1:26–27; Acts 4:18–20; 5:29; cf. Matthew 22:16–22). In other words, freedom of worship is a command of God, not a privilege granted by the state.”
Wow, that last statement is powerful – “freedom of worship is a command of God, not a privilege granted by the state”.
To the Leftists reading this declaration, these words make no sense because for them the state is the highest authority (except when they are practicing civil disobedience against the government for their leftist causes). But to us who know there is a higher authority, one who established and is over the civil authority, these words make perfect sense.
In addendum section added to this declaration, the elders address why they initially followed the lockdown orders and then decided they had a God given duty to disobey them as they continued:
“When the devastating lockdown began, it was supposed to be a short-term stopgap measure, with the goal to “flatten the curve”—meaning they wanted to slow the rate of infection to ensure that hospitals weren’t overwhelmed. And there were horrific projections of death. In light of those factors, our pastors supported the measures by observing the guidelines that were issued for churches.
But we did not yield our spiritual authority to the secular government. We said from the very start that our voluntary compliance was subject to change if the restrictions dragged on beyond the stated goal, or politicians unduly intruded into church affairs, or if health officials added restrictions that would attempt to undermine the church’s mission. We made every decision with our own burden of responsibility in mind. We simply took the early opportunity to support the concerns of health officials and accommodate the same concerns among our church members, out of a desire to act in an abundance of care and reasonableness (Philippians 4:5).
But we are now more than twenty weeks into the unrelieved restrictions. It is apparent that those original projections of death were wrong and the virus is nowhere near as dangerous as originally feared.”
And this is right. The mortality on rate for Covid-19 has turned out to be tiny fraction of what they first thought it would be. Initially these restrictions were said to be temporary to allow hospitals and medical equipment to be ramped up to meet the demand to take care of patients. But then government authorities moved the goal posts. No longer was it about making sure our hospital systems were not overrun, but instead it became about keeping deaths down. Then when death rates began to flatten it became about keeping cases down.
In the end, Covid-19 and 2020 is going to turn out to be nothing more than a bad flu year. And for this bad flu, many civil governments in America are mounting an assault on our God given right to assemble together and worship.
We must stand in solidarity with Grace Community church. And all the local churches around the nation must rise up and practice civil disobedience against this overreach of our state and local governments. For as the Scriptures say in Acts 5:29 “We ought to obey God rather than men”.
Here is the latest update as of Tuesday, August 25th from World:
“After a monthlong tug of war, John MacArthur’s Grace Community Church likely will meet indoors and in person again on Sunday after a judge refused to enforce Los Angeles County’s gathering ban by court order—at least for now…
In his five-page order issued on Tuesday, California Superior Court Judge Mitchell L. Beckloff ruled the county’s request for a temporary restraining order was defective, noting officials haven’t cited the Grace Community for violating its health restrictions related to the coronavirus pandemic. He did not strike down the gathering ban, which will allow Los Angeles County to fine the church…
At a hearing on Thursday, Beckloff declined to hold MacArthur and Grace Community in contempt for continuing to meet. The judge said no court order prohibited the church from gathering in person, only state and county bans. He reiterated that stance in Tuesday’s ruling. A full hearing on the matter is scheduled for Sept. 4…
MacArthur said on Fox News on Friday that authorities at the local police department told him “there is no scenario that they can even imagine in which they would come and close down Grace Community Church and put anybody in jail because they enforce the law, and health mandates and governors’ mandates don’t constitute law.”