“For from him and through him and to him are all things…” Romans 11:36
Premise: Science may inform public policy, but not set it. The reason America is confused as to the correct balance between public safety and civil rights is because we’ve forgotten that only God is ultimate. This has led to an “authority vacuum”.
As I write this, America is basically shut down – save for those businesses considered essential. As with all such events, things have unraveled fast and there’s a feeling in the midst of it all as though we’re all in a car barreling down the road with no brakes.
As Christians it’s incumbent upon us – indeed, it’s a command – that we think biblically. It’s for this reason that I believe the response to COVID-19 is not just wrongheaded, but sinful. And not just a little sinful, but gravely so. The government in many places has commanded Christians not to worship together, nor work. Both of these – worship and labor – are biblical commandments. The Lord says, “be still and know that I am Lord.” The state has now upended that, under the pretext of keeping us safe, and says the same thing.
Allow me to explain as I understand how vexing this issue is for many of us. It is certainly right for the government to protect its citizens from crime. That is, be sure, its biblical mandate. But the state has a derivative authority and can’t, even in the name of safety, usurp God’s authority. Precautions against COVID-19 are certainly in order and we should take them but closing churches and telling them how to worship (online only) and closing businesses indefinitely seriously exceeds the state’s authority. This has happened because no one bothers to ask the question of “by what authority?” anymore.
Over the years I’ve had many people resist my presentation of the gospel. When I ask them what they believe in, they reply, “I believe in science.” This has been a very popular fall back position for many and they utter it with the confidence that assumes the matter settled. They say it and look at me squarely. People, you see, are often uncomfortable talking about God. They shift, they squirm. They look away and watch the walls. But this, dear reader…this is rendered with a sure finality.
Science.
Ah! Yes. The new god has spoken. Everyone must bend the knee and bow the head in sober reflection.
Well, it’s this that’s at the center of the COIVD-19 debacle for America. Some experts have spoken. Their models have predicted millions of deaths and the people of our country have bowed the knee to do what ought not to be done – which is close their churches for personal worship and stop working. But the Scripture is abundantly clear on both cases that personal worship and work are commandments of the Lord. That Christians have so eagerly violated these commandments is a dark stain upon the health and faith of the church. They should know better.
To the atheist that has said this to me (that they believe in science) I’ve often replied with a happy smile. I congratulate them on the courage of putting their flag down, so to say (one of the marks of atheism is prevarication, never wanting to get pinned down) and then I ask a simple question. “That’s great. And what does science say about ethics?”
You can imagine the awkward silence.
“And what does it say about art? We can avoid, at least for now, what science has to teach us about epistemology, but I’d really like to know how your god, science, informs ethics and beauty.”
You see, this is the heart of the idolatry, which is science as religion. Science is operational. It tells us what works and how it works. In this way – and here’s the allure – science is ethically neutral. But knowing how something works isn’t philosophy or theology. Science produces things like antibiotics and mustard gas, brain surgery and nuclear bombs. But it’s ethics that tells us what to do with these things and we can’t think ethically without God’s word. It’s really that simple. The placing of science on the throne, using it as the final arbiter of right and wrong is both idolatry and intellectually vacuous. It’s vacuous because knowing what something is doesn’t inform us of what to do about it. Science, to be clear, isn’t ethics. To say that one believes in science is to say that one believes in the discovery of what things are and how they operate.
But this isn’t science anymore. Do you see that? It’s actually theology and philosophy. That’s the lie at the heart of it. The question is, what is the final standard of truth? How do we know anything? Why is life important? What does life mean? These and other questions always subsume every single fact of life. There are no exceptions. The proof of that is in your response. If you deny this assertion, you affirm it because it obviously means something and you’re applying a standard of truth to it. Infectious disease specialists have arrived at and informed us of certain facts about COVID-19. That’s their calling. What to do with that information requires ethical, political, social and economic considerations that infectious disease experts can’t speak to. Even the charge that none of those concerns matter compared to the potential of lost lives is itself an ethical – and therefore theological – matter. How do we know that life matters except through theology?
In this way, atheists are brazenly hypocritical. They’re borrowing Christian premises in order to abuse civil rights and the church, hence the contradiction. If scientific materialism is indeed true, then personhood and life aren’t of any higher meaning than any other fact of reality.
Christians should push back on this and consult Scripture for guidance as to what to do about the scientific reality of COVID-19. The infectious disease specialists are not the final arbiters of truth in regard to ethics, economics, civil rights and so on. We’re pretending that they are and that’s the same as saying to God that his Word is null and void.
When we command what the Bible forbids, we must turn back and check our premises.
To be clear, the authority of the specialists is to tell us what COVID-19 is. They can make projections based on their models after that but these models are only as good as the information they put into them. After that, society must consider a broad array of variables in order to figure out what to do with this information and recommendations. Since no man or specialist can possibly discern everything – from the diversity of the economy, to individual liberty and civil rights – we must defer to biblical principles and apply those principles. To violate biblical principles is to invite judgment.
“Oh that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes! Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments.” Psalm 119:5-6
As with all sin, one of God’s judgments is to give people over to the consequences – the rational outworking – of that particular sin. In this case, claiming to be wise because of science, the world has taken projections of COVID-19 and used those projections to send itself into economic turmoil and civil rights abuses. But real science is both repeatable and falsifiable. Projections and models are only as good as the data used to arrive at them. Even the experts in this case admit that they have scant data upon which to truly project what will happen. So, instead of proceeding with caution, calling on businesses and citizens to avoid handshakes and all that, to practice social-distancing, and rush to shore up the medical facilities in case the worst case scenarios began to play out, politicians rushed to unprecedented totalitarian measures. But the medical expert errs when he/she presumes to set public policy.
The reason for this mistake is that the modern world is operating on the false belief that “for from science and to science and for science are all things…praise be to science.” And this has happened because we’ve all become convinced that God’s Word isn’t efficacious and authoritative over our affairs. We’ve been bamboozled into accepting the horrible lie that God hasn’t spoken truth to our economic affairs, civil rights, and the nature and authority of government. This has left a dangerous vacuum.
As Chesterton said, though, the man that doesn’t believe in God doesn’t believe in something else – he believes in anything. And this belief is always idolatrous, which is the placing of anything other than God on the throne of ultimacy.
This is clearly the work of idolatry because it has spread across domains over which it has no authority. Only God has unlimited authority. When asked how one explains the unbiblical and unconstitutional demand to stop personal worship (thankfully, not in every state, but in enough) and work, the answer is “to save lives.” But that’s an ethical answer, not a scientific one. Do you see the problem? People are arguing in an ethical vacuum because they have insisted upon the mind of man as the final standard of truth rather than God’s word. But this insistence of using one’s own mind as the standard of truth destroys the possibility of it because God is truth and this is his world. Central to the Christian philosophy is the understanding of the complete sovereignty of God and our consequent/necessary analogical reasoning. This fact makes the Bible central to all thought. And as far as ethics are concerned – that is, what we’re supposed to do with the facts of reality as we come to discover them – the reality of sin and man’s rebellion over against God’s perfection must always be kept in mind.
Science is, properly, man’s working toward true knowledge of the world around him, which is a mystery for the very reason that he’s a rebel against God. Lack of knowledge is a direct result of sin and man’s separation from God. The attempt to use knowledge gained from our investigations (science in particular) without reference to God is only repeating the ultimate error of trying to live in God’s moral universe without reference to him. It’s because of this that I’m arguing that our response to COVID-19 is so wrongheaded and sinful. To say that we should do this or that thing is to say that there’s right and wrong. And there’s no way for men and women to understand right and wrong without reference to God.
This attempt to make science into God – that is, the ethical standard – has led us to gross civil rights violations. Millions of Americans have been thrown out of work by government dictate. No one has bothered to consider how the government has such a power over private property that it can essentially drive millions into bankruptcy in the name of safety. Nor does it seem to bother many that if the standard is simply “saving lives” that’s to be used, then literally any crisis is now sufficient to abuse civil rights.
Christians should obey Scripture because only in it is God to be fully known. Christians know that “from him and through him and to him are all things.” To that end, they must bring every thought and fact captive (2 Corinthians 10:5) – including scientific facts – to the context of biblical truth. Assessing any fact outside of God’s Word is to say that God isn’t really God. But with Abraham Kuyper Christians rejoice and say that “there’s not a single part of the universe over which the Lord Jesus Christ doesn’t say, ‘Mine!’”
Amen.
The path to dealing with COVID-19 must not include sin.
Part Two of this will address the particular sins of banning personal worship and work in more detail. Part Three will illustrate how the state’s economic response – money printing – is especially sinful and will cause far greater damage to America than COVID-19.
Recent Comments