Who Moved My Keys?
by R.C. Spoul Jr.

God knows what He's doing. And He knows how He is doing it. One of the most frequent questions thrown up at those of us who are Reformed is why means are necessary when God has already determined the ends. Why pray when it's already decided? Why evangelize when the elect are already determined? The answer is simple enough—because God has ordained the means. Which is another way of saying that while God is a powerful enough tool for any job, He delights to use other tools. And He only uses the best… for His purposes. If God's only goal, for instance, was to ensure that every man, woman and child should hear the gospel, all He need do is shout it from the heavens. But it pleases Him to use the foolishness of preaching. It magnifies His glory.

For the exercise of some aspects of earthly justice, God could again do it on His own. It is not beyond God to Himself smite every smiter the instant the smiting took place. (Or for that matter, the instant the intent to smite became criminal.) But God instead has chosen the sword. Or better yet, God has chosen to place that sword in the hand of man. He calls this, "government." Of course there are other governments, and other tools. Individuals have consciences. Families have rods, and churches have keys. That we forget this to our peril doesn't make it not so. But my task here is to tisk the state.

The distinctions among these governments, however, go beyond the tools of enforcement. In fact, the distinctions in the tools get us at the distinctions in goal. The rod is not just the rod, but is the rod of correction. We use this not to even the scales of justice, but to train our children up in righteousness. It is, for this goal, the perfect tool.

Every time I teach on these different tools, I feel a tension as to the order I should put them in. I always start with the individual and then move to the family. But should the state or the church be next? The more natural, at least in our day, inclination is to leave the state for last, as the grand poobah of governments. They, after all, in bearing the sword, can actually kill us. But I think the more biblical inclination is to put the church and her keys last. For that is where the real power is. Fear not, after all, those who can kill the body, but Him who can kill body and soul by casting it into hell.

I have, however, still some sympathy for the first view. Excommunication is indeed far more dreadful than mere execution. But it is far less permanent. Isn't it interesting that the only specific historical recipient of the grace of excommunication in the Bible comes to repentance before the story ends. Paul excoriates the Corinthians for not expelling the man married to his father's wife from the church, and then does so, without so much as a trial, himself, via mail. But in II Corinthians, Paul again lambasts the Corinthians for keeping the guy out, after he repents. Excommunication is the perfect means for three vital ends. It protects the flock from the sinner. It protects the flock from the sin. And it is powerful for bringing the sinner unto repentance. We don't, because the incestuous Corinthian repented, think it was wrong of Paul to have excommunicated him. Rather we think it was exactly the right thing to do. In short, while the keys can lock and unlock, the sword can only kill.

Which is exactly how God designed it. If God wanted the state to be in the business of bringing people to repentance, He would not have given them the sword. Like arrows, once the sword is employed, it can't be taken back. That God designed the state for this limited role, however, doesn't mean they have stayed home. It is the sin and pride of the Leviathan that it seeks waters not its own. It is imperialistic, and so, dissatisfied with just the sword, it has sought also the keys. That is, it no longer sees its calling as the execution of justice. Now it wants to restore souls. It wants to lead us to repentance. It no longer is satisfied to punish us. Now it wants to sanctify us.

A hundred years ago, criminals, while not following the true biblical pattern of either restitution or corporal punishment, were sent to penal institutions. There they presumably "paid their debt to society." The sword enforced the social contract, making those who owed pay, and pay through punishment. Today, we not only don't send criminals to penal institutions, we have no criminals. Instead, we send "offenders" off to "correctional" or "rehabilitative" facilities. And we call this progress, the humanitarian approach.

C.S. Lewis calls this bushwah, barnyard substance. In his brilliant essay, The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment (found in his brilliant collection of essays, God in the Dock) Lewis explains the great state power grab here. There is a limit to debts. The sword can only exact so much. But penance is another matter altogether. How broken and contrite must one's spirit be, to satisfy the god of the state? The god of the state decides. The priest caste here, of course, is the parole board. Worse still, this view makes of men not responsible human agents, but, as the great Anthony Burgess saw it, clockwork oranges, creatures that appear to have life, and vitality, but are in truth merely machines.

We think we are more humane when we seek to coax the sword of the state back into its sheath. Which in turn means that we think we are smarter, and more pious than God. God, we can be assured, will not be mocked. And using a sword for keys is about as useful as using keys in a sword fight. But therein is the root of the problem. The state is not terribly interested in being effective. It doesn't much care to rule well. Its passion is to rule more. How well the power is exercised is far less important than that it is exercised. In fact, from the perspective of the state, that is all that power is good for—to acquire more power, and to maintain what it has. The church, however, carries not only the keys, but the prophetic mantle. May we use it with passion in calling Leviathan to repent.