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Bible Facts Newspaper Article (Ian C. Kurylyk)

“And he said unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar's, and unto God the things which be God's” (Luke 20:25). These things were spoken by Jesus to men who tried to trap Him with the words, “Is it lawful for us to give tribute unto Caesar, or no?” (Luke 20:22). If He said yes they would accuse Him of being unfaithful to His Jewish heritage and their rights to the land of Israel. If He said no they would deliver Him over to the ruling Roman authorities. His answer simply commended them to meeting their obligations both to Caesar (the Roman government) and to God.

Further, Jesus’ answer treated the two areas of responsibility as distinct from each other. This is one passage that has been recognized as teaching the seperation on church and state. The church has no place enacting civil laws to impose its will on the country. Neither does the state have any authority to legislate laws controlling the church. Even in Israel of old the worship life of the temple was presided over by the family of Aaron of the tribe of Levi and the nation was ruled by a king from the house of David of the tribe of Judah.

In more recent history, the confusing of the roles of the civil and the religious institutions has always resulted in corruption, oppression, and martyrdom. For hundreds of years Europe languished in the Dark Ages and the terror of the Inquisition because of a failure to keep church and state separate. North America has enjoyed unparalled liberty because of the wisdom of our forebears to refuse to any religious body the place of state church and to refuse to government any power to control the churches.

The present interest in transferring areas of spiritual, religious, and moral life to the control and sovereignty of the state is interesting in light of Bible prophecy. The coming antichrist will not be anti religion. He will simply combine in himself both the power of world ruler and the headship of a new world religion. All the long standing lines between church and state will be renounced and everything put under this enemy of Christ. Not only will he control religion, he will turn it to the worship of himself. “Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God” (II Thessalonians 2:4).

Apparently the world today is gradually being acclimatized to think along these new lines. Prophecy shines a Biblical light on present trends to have the state replace the churches in their traditional role. When a government inacts laws reflecting neither scriptural precepts nor for that matter even the collective coscience of the majority it is clearly taking on the role of an oracle (thus saith the state). If this is accepted it will take on more and more of the place of godlike institution whose place is to instruct and guide the conscience of the populace with absolute authority.

This will of course happen when