The First Freedom
On July 4th, we celebrate freedom. Freedom from what though? According to the Declaration of Independence ratified by the Continental Congress on July 4th, 1776, what would become the United States of America was birthed out of a desire to be free from tyranny. The Declaration says, in part, “When a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.”
The framers of the Declaration were declaring their freedom from the tyranny of the King of England. A free people should be free to govern themselves. Free to elect their leaders. Free to own property. Free to speak. Free to assemble. Free to bear arms. Free to a fair trial by jury.
But what did our Founders consider our first and most fundamental freedom? The first line of the first amendment to the Constitution tells us: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Religious freedom is the first and most fundamental freedom. No government should coerce or restrict it. Our Founders believer it was one of the “certain unalienable rights” that God gives to all people everywhere.
Are Religious Liberty and the Exclusiveness of the Gospel Incompatible?
Some people minimize or seem to reject this “first freedom.” One well-known preacher recently said this, “I don’t even support religious freedom. Religious freedom is what sends people to hell. To say I support religious freedom is to say I support idolatry, it’s to say I support lies, I support hell, I support the kingdom of darkness. You can’t say that. No Christian with half a brain would say, ‘We support religious freedom.’ We support the truth!”
It’s good and right to support the exclusiveness of the gospel. We must stand on truth, but we must do so with grace, and with patience and persuasion. Paul says, “Knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others” (2 Cor. 5:11).
Of all people, those who hold to the exclusive claims of the gospel should have a quiet confidence that the truth will triumph. This gives us the ability to evangelize without any need for coercion. We trust that God himself is the only ultimate and adequate judge. So our confidence in the gospel doesn’t undermine, but rather compels, our pursuit of religious liberty.
Baptists and Religious Liberty
Christians should love, cherish, and seek to promote the spread of religious liberty around the world. As Baptists, we especially have a passion for this, as many of our forefathers and mothers died for it. Let me give you a little bit of this background.
In the 16th century in Zurich, Switzerland, Ulrich Zwingli began reforming the church. But some individuals were frustrated with the pace of the reform. They thought it was too slow. They argued that Luther and Zwingli relied on the government too much. These individuals wanted separation, and many of them rejected the practice of infant baptism. They were denounced and called, “Re-baptizers.” These “Anabaptists” were heavily persecuted and even executed by some of the Reformers and others.
In the next century, in 1607, a group of Christians led by John Smyth (1565-1612), a preacher in England, fled England and went to Amsterdam to escape persecution and establish a pure church. A few years later, Thomas Helwys (1550-1616) took several people with him back to England and founded the first Baptist church in England in 1612. His theology was less eccentric than Smyths, but his commitment to religious liberty was just as strong. He was imprisoned in 1615 for his views and died in 1616.
The first Baptist church in America was established in 1639 by Roger Williams. He came to the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1631. He argued that the Puritans had no right to take Indian land. He felt it wrong for magistrates to enforce church attendance and other spiritual duties. In April 1636, he founded Providence, in what’s now Rhode Island.
The American Baptists developed the idea their English forefathers had touched on: religious freedom and freedom of conscience. Baptists across the colonies began to raise questions about the wisdom of the church-state establishment.
At this time, the U. S. was not a place of pure religious freedom. The exceptions were Pennsylvania and Rhode Island. Baptist and other groups were often persecuted by other Protestants! Baptists were leaders in advocating for the idea that the church is an entity ordained by God and used to his ends, mainly the worship of his name and the proclamation of his gospel. The church is not a state entity. The state has no authority over it.
In the Puritan Northeast and Anglican South, Baptists and other outsiders were regularly persecuted. In Anglican Virginia, you had to have a license to preach if not Anglican. Baptist preachers were imprisoned and whipped. Mobs broke up worship services and magistrates shut down churches.
A Baptist named John Leland (1754–1841) was friends with James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. He fought for the disestablishment of religion through the Bill of Rights. In many ways, it was Baptists who birthed the notion of religious liberty, who brought it into the public discourse and public policy of the West. We largely have Baptists to thank for why there’s not an Anglican Virginia, Catholic Louisiana, or Mormon Utah. We of all people, even if we only have half a brain, love the truth and have worked hard to promote its free propagation.
Only God Gives Religious Liberty
But we don’t believe in religious liberty just because we’re Baptists, or just because it’s in the Constitution. We believe in it because we believe it’s based on principles found in the Bible. Baptists promote it, the Constitution protects it, but only God provides it.
To be clear, there’s no Bible verse that clearly commands religious liberty for all. But its reality as a fundamental human right is based on all the major doctrines found in the Bible. Let’s go through these one at a time.
The Doctrine of God and Religious Liberty
First, religious liberty is rooted in the doctrine of God. The principle of religious liberty is rooted in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” Because God created everything, God is sovereign over everything. The United States didn’t create everything, God did. Religious liberty begins with God as the Creator and Ruler over all things.
The first sentence of Article 17 in our church’s Statement of Faith, the Baptist Faith and Message, says, “God alone is Lord of the conscience, and He has left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are contrary to His Word or not contained in it.” The first line of the article, “God alone is Lord of the conscience,” means that a state shouldn’t set itself up as lord or God over the conscience. Only God is God. No other authority has the right to bind our consciences except him.
This principle is echoed in the first command of the Ten Commandments. Exodus 20:3, “You shall have no other gods before me.” Nothing should set itself up as God that isn’t God. God is ultimate, thus it’s wrong to set up a government as ultimate. Professor Andrew Walker says it like this, “A government shouldn’t tell a citizen who God is or how God wants to be worshipped…A government is designed to see that laws are followed and that citizens are protected. The government isn’t designed to tell you or me what the meaning of baptism is.”
The Doctrine of Man and Religious Liberty
Second, religious liberty is rooted in the doctrine of man. In the first chapter of the Bible we learn that “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Gen. 1:27). Because all people are made in the image of God, all people are fundamentally the same, having equal dignity, value, and worth. This means that there’s no inherent spiritual superiority among men, which means that no one has the authority to suppress someone else’s spiritual freedom. All people have equal spiritual status before God.
I thought of two practical applications of this for our current cultural context. First, the state should not tell Christians what they should believe. This is why it’s wrong, for example, for the state to punish churches or Christians for not serving same-sex couples who’re seeking marriage. Christians believe that same-sex unions are wrong because the Bible makes that clear. The state, therefore, shouldn’t force Christians, through threat or punishment, to believe something that Christians don’t believe, and have never believed.
A recent well-known example of the state trying to coerce a Christian’s conscience was the Hobby Lobby case from several years ago. The government mandated that Hobby Lobby provide their employees with insurance that included access to forms of birth control that could potentially cause an abortion. Hobby Lobby sued the government because the government was keeping them from living out their values and beliefs in how they ran their business. Thankfully, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby, thus preserving their freedom of conscience.
Second, because God is Lord of the conscience, people should be free to worship as their conscience dictates. We may disagree with how a person chooses to worship, but we must allow them the right to seek God for themselves. Every person is made in the image of God and is therefore created with a conscience. Christians should respect the consciences of those who come to different conclusions about who God is.
Andrew Walker is again helpful on this point. He says, “We don’t have to like that others claim religious truth aside from the Bible. We don’t have to like that other religions contend for adherents. But we cannot coerce people’s minds away from what they perceive as true. What must occur is the art of persuasion and evangelism – not forcing someone to agree with us.”
This means that we should support the right of Muslims to build their mosques, Jews to build their synagogues, and Hindu and Buddhists to build their temples. Our job is not to fight them for living out their religion, but to engage them with the love and truth of the gospel. We should defend their right to freely express their religion, just as we’d want them to do for us. This doesn’t mean we agree with their religion. It means that we think that, as image bearers of God, they have a right to express it. If they don’t, then neither do we.
The Doctrine of Sin and Religious Liberty
Third, religious liberty is rooted in the doctrine of sin. The reality of the fall and original sin, the fact that sin has touched and tainted everyone and everything, means that no person and no government is capable of knowing and applying the will of God perfectly for all people. Sin means that no person and no government is capable of enforcing spiritual standards properly.
Some Christians say that this is why we need to make the law of God the law of the land, that God’s word should seamlessly rule the church and the state. This is called Christian reconstructionism or dominion theology. All just laws, of course, will be based on the word of God. Whether or not the Bible actually commands this notwithstanding, thinking that we or any government actually has the ability to apply the law of God perfectly to all people is naïve at best, and dangerous and deadly at worst.
The prophet Jeremiah says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (17:9) We barely understand the wickedness in our own hearts, so how could we perfectly apply God’s word to an entire society? The reality and pervasiveness of sin means that we shouldn’t absolutize authority, religious or otherwise.
The Doctrine of Christ and Religious Liberty
Fourth, religious liberty is rooted in the doctrine of Christ. Jesus came as a servant, not a king. He said, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mk. 10:45). One day he will come as a conquering King. But the first time he came, he came as a servant, and those who follow him are supposed to be like him.
Jesus pointed people to God, but he never coerced faith in God. He grieved over the unbelief of the Jews (Lk. 13:34), but in response he didn’t force belief.
The favorite passage of the Anabaptists for defending religious liberty was Jesus’ parable in Matthew 13:24-30. Jesus says to let the weeds and wheat grow together. We aren’t supposed to remove by coercion what’s sown by the enemy. We can warn of impending judgment, when the reapers will come and the weeds will be thrown into the fire and the wheat gathered into the Master’s barn.
The night Jesus was arrested, Peter drew his sword and cut off one of the soldiers ears. Jesus responded by saying, “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?” (Jn. 18:11). Jesus forbade Peter’s use of coercive means. He consistently resisted the use of force because he was committed to his Father’s plan, and because he was confident that his Father would one day judge perfectly and accurately. Jesus was against coercion in matters of religious belief.
The Doctrine of Salvation and Religious Liberty
Fifth, religious liberty is rooted in the doctrine of salvation. Salvation is an inward, spiritual event, not an outward, physical event. As Jesus said in John 3:3, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” God hasn’t delegated his authority over people’s souls. Only his Spirit can save. Jesus again, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (v. 5).
This means that people should be left free to respond to the Spirit’s call through God’s word. They shouldn’t be required to respond, as in a State Church, or restricted from responding, as in an oppressive government. John Piper says it this way, “It belongs to the very nature of Christianity that genuine faith in God, genuine allegiance to Jesus, genuine Christ-exalting obedience to God’s Word is only possible if it is uncoerced and free.”
The Doctrine of the Church and Religious Liberty
And sixth, religious liberty is rooted in the doctrine of the church. The Bible teaches that the church is a spiritual organization with spiritual purposes. 1 Peter 2:5, “You yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”
The church is given authority over its members, but not over those outside the church. 1 Corinthians 5:11-13, “But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler – not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. ‘Purge the evil person from among you.’” The church has no authority over “those outside.” Only God does.
Separation of Church and State
This brings up the issue of the separation of church and state. As I said earlier, Baptists led the charge for this to be part of the Constitution, but were men like John Leland right to insist on this separation? I hope that our survey of six central doctrines of Christianity has shown you that, yes, Leland was right to insist on this.
The only way for Christians to argue that the State can and should enforce the church’s doctrines and practices is to apply to the church Old Testament teachings intended for Israel. But most Christians understand that, though there’s continuity between Israel and the church, there’s also a fundamental discontinuity. Israel was a theocracy, a religious nation-state ruled by God. The church is also ruled by God, but the church is made up of all nations and is called to submit to the governments they’re under. Therefore, it’s not appropriate to apply the religious state model to the church or to the state. The church and state are two separate entities, two kingdoms. They may support each other, but each is given its own unique work. This is why Jesus said, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Mt. 22:21).
“Separation of church and state” is misused all the time in political discourse. This doesn’t mean that religious belief should have no bearing on the state. It means that the church should be free from the state and that there should be no state church.
Anytime a religious group attempts to establish or control a state, this principle is violated. There are cults who’ve tried to set up their own governments on their own land ruled by their own laws. There are Islamic Republics where the clerics rule the country. These “church states” do not allow individuals to follow their consciences, but rather force people into a mold of thinking, believing, and behaving. Even if they’re Christian in name, this compromises the true nature and mission of the church. Why? Because it obscures the spiritual nature of salvation. States cannot save. Only God can save.
“Love the Religion as Much as the Liberty”
Religious freedom is grounded in the great truths of the gospel. It’s not a right from man, but a gift from God. Let me close with an exhortation from Russell Moore, from an essay he wrote almost fifteen years ago:
“If we’re to be a church that maintains religious liberty, we need to love the religion as much as the liberty – indeed more so. And that means we’ll be increasingly odd in American culture. And we may have less and less in common with libertarian Republicans and libertine Democrats. If the outside culture pronounces this anathema, so be it; it always has. And if Caesar decides to add his sword to the disapproval of the culture, so be it; he’s done it before. The church still stands. We will claim our mantle of dissent not simply by standing in the public square demanding our rights – though we must sometimes do that. We claim it first of all by being an alternative community, the people of Christ.”
As Christians, especially as Baptists, we do not support coercion of any kind, religious or secular. We don’t persecute those with whom we disagree. We don’t manipulate, bribe, or force people to agree with us. Our only weapons are the Spirit and the Word. So we give ourselves to proclamation, persuasion, and prayer.
The Lord’s Supper
The main purpose of all true religion is seeking to reconcile sinners with a holy God. Government has no role to play in this work. Only through the Word of God and by the Spirit of God is a sinner brought to repentance and faith. The church relies on the Sword of the Spirit, not the sword of Caesar, as it seeks the conversion of souls.
It’s instructive for us to remember that the symbol of Christianity, the cross, reminds us that the only role the state played in the gospel story was the executing authority in the crucifixion of Jesus. This fact foreshadows the tension between church and state even today. The state does not like people who say that something other than the state is Lord.
But while the state may see something treasonous in the cross, we see a treasure. We’ve come to see the beauty and power and wisdom of God in a bloodied carpenter hanging on that piece of wood while many laughed at him. We’ve come to live in the freedom that Christ purchased for us, a freedom greater and grander than any government could give us. The cross is our freedom.
Those who’ve trusted in Jesus and repented of their sins remember what Jesus did for them by taking the Lord’s Supper. This means that the Lord’s Supper is for Christians, for baptized believers who belong to a church. If you’re not yet a baptized follower of Jesus who’s part of a church, we’re glad you’re here, but we’d encourage you to refrain from taking the Supper. If you’re a visitor with us and you’ve been baptized as a believer and you’re a member in good standing at another gospel-preaching church, you’re welcome to observe the Supper with us.
- The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for you, preserves your body and soul for everlasting life. Drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for you, and drink on him in your heart by faith, and be thankful. (take the juice)
- Let’s stand and sing “King of Kings”