Professor: Rushdoony Dr. R.J.R.

Subject: Systematic Theology

Genre: Speech

Lesson: 9 of 19

Track: #09

Year:

Dictation Name: 09 Authority and Ministry

[Rushdoony] Let us begin with prayer. Our help is in the name of Lord who made heaven and earth. Oh come let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker for He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand. Oh God our Father whose holiness fills all heaven and earth and whose glory lightens our days. Give us grace so to walk that we might know indeed that heaven and earth are filled with Thy glory. That Thy word is truth and Thy word shall prevail, that every knee shall bow unto Thee and every tongue confess Thee before Thy work on earth is finished. Therefore we praise Thee Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and we come into Thy presence with joy and Thanksgiving knowing that this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Our God we praise Thee, in Jesus name, amen.

Our Scripture this morning is from the gospel of Saint Matthew, the twentieth chapter verses twenty-five through twenty-eight. Matthew 20:25-28 and our subject Authority and Ministry.

“25 But Jesus called them unto him, and said, ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them.

26 But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister;

27 And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant:

28 Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.” 

The occasion of these comments by our Lord was when the mother of James and John, two of the disciples, came to Him to ask for enthroned places for her sons in Christ’s kingdom. Now the mother of James and John whose name was Salome was our Lord’s aunt. As a result she felt that she had a privileged position and therefore could ask for privileges for her sons. Our Lord had denied Salome her request, but when the other disciples heard what she had done they were indignant. Our Lord called the disciples together to speak to them and verses 25-28 give us His words. Now the word that our Lord uses in verse twenty-five when He says “Ye know that the princes of the gentiles exercise dominion over them.” That word dominion is a particular word for a particular type of dominion. It is used in the New Testament only in an evil sense. For example in Acts nineteen verse sixteen it refers to the power of demons over men. In First Peter 5:3 it refers to evil elders, lording it over others, over Christ’s people. And it is a combination of two words; “kyrios” – Lord or dominion, and Kata – which means down, intensively so. So the meaning is “Lording it over someone.” So what our Lord is saying, “Ye know that the princes of the gentiles love to Lord it over them, and that they that are great exercise authority upon them.” Now again the word authority is different from the usual word for authority because here again instead of just ousia there is the prefix kata; so it means the authority to put down. It refers to something other than the Godly exercise of authority; it refers to putting down people. So here we have the usage of two words, not normally used for dominion and authority, which indicate lording it over others and putting them down and this, our Lord says, is what ungodly authority is all about. At the same time our Lord says “it shall not be so among you but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister.” The word minister is diakonos, our word deacon, a servant, one called to minister. However in the next verse he says “whosoever will be chief among you let him be your servant – doulos,” which means slave. You make it your life to minister under God to these people. Then in the twenty-eighth verse when he says the son of man came not to ministered unto but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many he again uses the word diakonos, forms of it. 

Thus our Lord differentiates between two kinds of authority; first gentile or ungodly authority and dominion which is a putting down of people. It is a striving for power for one purpose, to Lord it over others. It’s the kind of thing Orwell was talking about in 1984 when he described the goal of the totalitarian state, a boot stamping on a human face forever. Orwell caught the meaning of the words our Lord was here using without knowing about them. No this evil is all around us, authority is equated with the power to put down people. And our Lord is clear, all ungodly authority and dominion means putting down people, not ministering to them. In the triune God authority and power are inseparable. Authority in the Bible is hierarchical but ungodly authority is elitist, grounded in humanist considerations. In fallen man authority and power are not united as they are in God, the more Godly we are the closer we bring them together. But in the ungodly they are often far apart, in fact men can hold Godly authority in ungodly ways and on alien premises.

We had a visitor last week to illustrate this premise; he was a man who was an authority figure in the Benedictine order. He was described by Otto after the meaning as the rudest man he had ever met and without a trace of courtesy. As usual Otto was being very kindly. [Laughter] Very early he, although the meeting was primarily to discuss a forth coming book with David Rose who is working on it, a very excellent thesis, he let us know that he regarded Aquinas as the greatest disaster in the church. Then he let us know a little later that Saint Paul did not know what he was talking about, this he said three times. When I cited Saint John on the definition of sin in his first epistle he waved that aside and said he didn’t know whether there was such a thing as sin, only ignorance. However when I asked him if he were a universalist he denied it and it became apparent that he was ready to put churchmen into hell but no-one else; because he was ready to vindicate the French Revolution as necessary judgment on the church. He was ready to vindicate the Russian revolution and in fact said he felt that Lenin was probably in heaven together with Hitler but not Sir Nicholas the II. He by the way let us know that we, he called us Calvinist Jansenists, were responsible for abortion in this country and much, much more. Now I cite this man because he had institutional but not theological authority. He had not even read the Bible by his own admission. 

Now this is the separation of authority that is common place. Just yesterday I finished reading a book by a very prominent Lutheran scholar, and again dealing with a critical issue of our time never once invoked any Godly authority, any Biblical premise. From beginning to end his book was essentially pragmatic. Now this separation of authority from God and its reduction to a purely institutional authority is very common place, and it leads to the kind of gentile lording common to every area of life; to the academic world, the ecclesiastical sphere, the political, the scientific, and so on. Such men hold position and power, but they lack Godly authority. They are pre-eminent only because our culture and our churches see authority in the same terms. Men resent being on the receiving end of such authority, but they want it for themselves. Otto Scott was citing the other night his Irish grandmother’s proverb “put a beggar on horseback and he’ll ride you down.” There are a great many beggar’s on horseback all around us. 

Long before Orwell and his description of power as a boot stamping on a human face forever, Genghis Kahn spoke in the same way about what he liked to do. At one time he said for example, concerning his greatest joy, and I quote “the greatest pleasure is to vanquish your enemies and chase them before you. To rob them of their wealth and see those dear to them bathed in tears. To ride their horses and clasp to you your bosom their wives and daughters.” Now that was the goal for Genghis Kahn and for his men. It’s not surprising that the mongrels made no positive contribution to civilization. They brought economic ruin and disaster wherever they went; because they epitomized the gentile conception of power, lording it over others. And the modern state is increasingly manifesting with a growing nakedness that same ideal. The Soviet Union and Red China most certainly manifest it, and every modern state as it gains in power gains correspondingly in its lust to Lord it over others. The gentile doctrine of power, lording it over others, is thus common to history. The lust for power is present oriented; it is not interested in ministering but in using others. 

Then second our Lord says that Christian greatness is in ministering to others, in being members one of another as Saint Paul put it. Such a doctrine is neither self-centered nor present oriented. Our Lord says “seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, or justice.” One seminary scholar, J.J. Davis, has commented with regard to South Korea which is predominately a Christian country. And he says, and I quote “when Kim Kyung Quan {?} Secretary General to South Korea’s President was asked about the reasons for his country’s progress he replied ‘it’s the culture of discipline and postponing immediate satisfaction for the future, even for posterity’ Such character traits have encouraged a national investment rate of twenty-five to thirty-give percent of the gross national product, twice the U.S. rate.’” Did you catch that emphasis? That was once very, very common to this country, postponing immediate satisfaction for