The Kingdom of God And Civil Society Mobilisation

There is no doubt that the party political system of the 21^st century is constantly failing humanity in terms of effecting real human development on the ground. The politics of black suites and red ties has become a deficient system that only operates on a level of analysing the problems of communities without bringing any real solution. To use Jude’s words, party political systems have become like ‘clouds without rain’ (Jude 1:12). Africa is without doubt, a victim in this process, because although party political systems may have led and coordinated the struggle against colonisation, they have tended to lose vision when it comes to effecting development. This necessitates for our searching of a new political model or system that must produce more effective governance for 21^st century humanity. We have got to rise as philosophers and architects to lead that process of searching, defining and advocating this new political framework.

What does party political system mean? It means a process by which political parties get voted into government by the electorate (the citizens). Party political system is therefore an expression of representative democracy but has a tendency to project itself as ‘government by the people’ when in actual fact it is ‘government on behalf of the people’. The reality is that in a party political system, people on the ground do not have real meaningful participation in the political process, where such participation by people does exist; it exists only as confessed principle and not as an actualised reality. The only other participation you see is when people vote after every five years. And I suppose for the masses of poor people, such a voting is not an exercise of one’s executive political right, it is more of an act of begging for help. So therefore party political systems have produced an unhealthy situation where the citizen delegates political responsibility to the ‘politician’. And the politician is seen as one who has deep interest in the political conditions of a nation – in a sense; politics becomes something of a career. This careerism in politics leaves out masses of people in the political process and also leads to political apathy by masses who think that politics is for ‘politicians’. Political apathy in turn, results in an unaccountable politician. Not only so but what we see party political systems producing is petty political games between the so called ‘politicians’, where these politicians fight for power, positions and by implication, for political status.

Now as party political systems still try to find their space in the 21^st century, the citizen, the civilian on the ground is suffering. This is a reality that prophet Jeremiah captured in his prophecy in Jer 31:15, which is quoted in Mathew chapter 2 when Herod gets crazy and decides to issue a decree to kill all boys under the age of 2.

Mat 2:18  "A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more."

This great prophecy by prophet Jeremiah really captures the condition of the civilian in a day when political leadership gets crazy and greedy for power. ‘Rachel’ represents the hopeless outcry of the civilian on the ground as the political-legislative framework gets more and more hostile against the citizens.

The story of Matt 2: Identifying Parallels for 21^st Century Humanity:

• The birthing of baby Jesus (Matt 2:1) – this for us, represents the restoration of a kingdom thrust back into the church. This is currently being established through the Apostolic Reformation that continues to invade the corridors of church in the same way that the Reformation move of Martin Luther blasted the Roman Catholic Church in 1500BC. The birthing of baby Jesus represented the manifestation of the Divine Nature in time & space – ‘the Word that was in the beginning became flesh’ (John 1:1,2&14). Immortality incarnated itself into mortality, and our brother John says, ‘we have seen His glory, the glory of the One & only’ (John 1:14). This is the issue about the church configured by the kingdom of God – it goes beyond meaningless religion to download divine patterns that are out of sight of humanity and bring them to bear – so that men can once again see the nature & the wisdom of God (Isa 2:1-4, Eph 3:10).
• The announcement of the birthing of baby Jesus by the Magi (the Wise Men): these wise men (Magi) represent apostles – apostles are wise men (1 Cor 3:10, Matt 23:34). Apostles are wise men who come to announce the birthing of the kingdom of God. We know very well that since the 1990s, God has been restoring the apostolic dimension back into the operations of the church.
• The star – represents not only Christ (Rev 21:16) but the Spirit of Revelation (2 Pet 1:19, Eph 1:17) rising in our hearts (as apostle Peter says). We are in a day of divine guidance, divine regulation & divine wisdom. The Sun and Moon shall not be the source of our light (Isa 60:19&20, Rev 21:23), meaning that all natural sources of illumination are becoming more and more inferior as humanity progresses forward e.g. look at the state of educational institutions today; thick darkness is over the peoples (Isa 60:2).
• Herod – represents greedy and corrupt politicians that we see mushrooming in this 21^st century. Just as Herod changed the legislative framework in order to fortify himself as a political leader, so are we seeing 21^st century politicians doing all in their power - manipulating the legislative framework in order to hold on to power. We have to see the connection between the birthing of baby Jesus (the birthing of the kingdom of God) and the subsequent activities of Herod. There is something about the kingdom of God that affects the political landscape in a real way (Prophet Daniel captures this in Dan 2:31-45). This can only mean that the scope and agenda of the Christ and His kingdom cannot be limited to the four walls of church buildings, nor can it be limited to Sunday – it has got to affect all areas of humanity in a very real way. And so therefore to be part of Christ is not just about ‘churching’ – this implies that we need to constantly rethink the faith and church.
• The conference of Herod and the Chief Priests – gives us an indication that the corrupt politician is using all of the resources at his disposal to fortify himself. This conference reveals that intelligence systems are being stretched as the corrupt politician wants to know precise details concerning anything that threatens his power.

All of the conditions listed in the above 5 points are real issues affecting the state of the civilian (Rachel) in the 21^st century – and perhaps in this context we are focusing more on the reality of the ‘Herod’ like political leadership. All you have to do is to simply open your eyes to see these things. The civilian is therefore in a state of hopelessness (‘she is refusing to be comforted’).

John the Baptist and Civil Society Mobilisation - Reformers Are activators of Societies

This is the context within which the Kingdom of God manifests. The kingdom comes not only to empower the church but to also empower the civilian on the ground. Remember that the kingdom of God is not a ceremonial entity that gets experienced on Sunday morning (during our ceremonies) – it may be proclaimed on Sunday morning but is actualized in the day to day activities of men. The finger of the kingdom is on shaping the nature of human existence; it is not on merely bringing a people to a ceremonial encounter – this means we have to continue to rethink the church.

Luk 3:1  In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar--when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, Herod tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and Traconitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene--

Luk 3:2  during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the desert.

Luk 3:3  He went into all the country around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

Mat 3:1  In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the Desert of Judea

Mat 3:2  and saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near."

Luke 3 describes for us the context within which the word of the Lord came to John the Baptist. It was a day of Institutional Supremacy (Luke 3:1) – all institutions were in place and in tact and yet the conditions on the ground were hostile to the civilian. Remember again the macro context – that this was a day of imperialism, where the Roman Empire had extended itself over other geo-political territories and so the Jewish nation found itself under oppression. The zealots (Jewish freedom fighters) were in constant revolt against the Roman oppression. It was a terrible day, exactly what we see happening in the 21^st century – nations extending themselves over the territories of other nations (economically, politically and socially). This was the context within which John downloaded a word from God. When John received the word, he then engaged in what we call kingdom advocacy, proclaiming, ‘repent, for the kingdom of God is near’ – the same mandate we now have from Christ (Matt 24:14).

The message of John carried with it the following components:

• ‘Repent’ (‘metanoeo’ in Greek, meaning: ‘change your minds’): John therefore advocated a philosophical revolution. He sought to bring a new system of thought to the civilian.
• John told the people - ‘if you have two tunics, share with the one who does not have’ (Luke 3:10&11): and so therefore John advocated a socio-economic revolution. He established new economic models that would effect societal change on the ground. He revealed to the people that the primary oppression was not the Roman Empire but was Individualistic Self-Indulgent, Capitalistic mindset that had invaded societies. While people were complaining against deficient corrupt institutions (e.g. greedy tax collectors & Roman Soldiers) John brought to their attention that the first culprit was their own lack of solidarity. John therefore empowered the people to establish their own socio-economic models based on the principle of equity – under John’s advocacy, people were empowered to define and build their own socio-economic models.
• John also confronted the institutions of the day (tax collectors and Roman soldiers – Luke 3:12-14) and redefined the value system that would facilitate their operations. Evidently, tax collectors and Roman Soldiers were themselves very greedy and corrupt – they represent for us public institutions (public service) that are enforcing law on behalf of governments. To tax collectors and Roman Soldiers, John advocated systemic integrity – what we may today call corporate governance.

These 3 components of John’s advocacy were all directed to the civilian.

…the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the desert… He went into all the country around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

John initially did not try to establish a platform or appointment with Herod, although he did engage Herod later (Luke 3:19&20). The main audience of John was civil society; this is where his message found expression. John therefore led a civil society movement (what we may call, disciples of John). And within this civil society movement, John was able to reconcile sectors of society that were irreconcilable e.g. within John’s disciples (or civil society movement), you would find tax collectors (of the Roman Empire) at peace with Jewish citizens. So therefore John literally established a new platform upon which civil society would exist. By stabling new philosophy, new economic models and new value system for institutions, John deactivated the very thing that people were complaining about i.e. Roman Oppression.

This therefore means that kingdom politics emphasizes the need to empower the civilian on the ground, so that the civilian can in turn take hold of his/her destiny. There is no question that party politics only leads to institutionalism & institutional supremacy, it disregards the priority to empower citizens so that these (citizens) can define and pursue their own destiny. It is quite obvious that party political system has generally failed the civilian – under this party political system, human civilisation has come to a stand still. Party politics delivers only on projects (e.g. infrastructure) and not on the development of humanity (or human civilisation). This Party political System has certainly failed Africa in terms of pushing beyond the frontier of liberation & independence.

Kingdom Politics must establish Civilian Governance

Gen 1:26  Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground."

Gen 1:27  So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

Gen 1:28  God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."

Gen 1:29  Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.

Gen 1:30  And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground--everything that has the breath of life in it--I give every green plant for food." And it was so.

Gen 2:8  Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed.

Gen 2:15  The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

The word ‘man’ used in Gen 1:26 is the Hebrew word ‘adam and it means both a human being and mankind. In Gen 1:26 God used the word ‘man’ in a plural sense: ‘let us make man or mankind in our image and let them rule’. This means that governance of humanity can never be looked at in an individualistic sense as liberalism suggests (i.e. individual human rights at the expense of the rights of humanity as a collective). The word ‘man’ is in fact a synonym of the word Adam. The word ‘Adam’ appeared for the first time only in Gen 2:20 as a name of the first man that God created.

‘…but for Adam no suitable helper was found’ (Gen 2:20).

The word ‘Adam’ (in Gen 2:20) means exactly what the word ‘man’ (in Gen 1:26) means. So therefore the man Adam represented all of humanity. It is in this context that the fall of Adam meant the fall of all humanity – because God works by the principle of representation (there is a world of God’s patterns, principle & system of thought that we need to understand if we are to understand how God works). In Adam, God was seeing all of humanity – the name ‘Adam’ represented also the principle of the first man who would become a seed for all of humanity. Acts 17:26 says, from one man God made all nations – i.e. Adam was to be a template for the formation of successive generations. So therefore in principle, if the seed was corrupted, if the template was wrong, then all of humanity would be corrupted (Rom 5:12,15-19). But now remember again that Jesus Christ is the Last Adam (1 Cor 15:45). So Jesus (as Adam) is the first man of the new redeemed humanity (2 Cor 5:17). In this sense Jesus presents before God a good representation, a representation of perfected humanity. Hence Paul says, ‘just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life to all men’; for just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be righteous’ (Rom 5:18&19).

Here is the issue – sometimes we are quick to complain that it was unfair that we fell into chaos because of one man’s sin, and we forget that God uses the same principle when it comes to redemption, ‘the obedience of one man makes many righteous’. In other words, God lives in the world of representation. Not only so, the principle of representation is in fact a reality in day to day operations of human life. E.g. how many companies have fallen into chaos because of one man’s misconduct (CEO), how many families have fallen into chaos because of one man’s misconduct (father). How many families have experienced stability and good life because of one man’s discipline, sacrifice and hard work (good father). The principle of representation is not only a theological principle; it is in fact a general principle that governs human life. The reality is that if I were to decide to get into a mess, there is a whole lot of people that would be affected by my decision; in the same way that my hard work, sacrifice, discipline are all creating a platform for a stable life in the future.

Now, we are on the issue of civilian governance. We are saying that representative democracy of part politics has failed humanity. We are saying that ‘Rachel’ is crying in a state of hopelessness, that democracy is truly not ‘government by the people’ but ‘government on behalf of the people’. We are saying that conditions of humanity are getting worse under party political systems. The politics of red carpet, black suites and red ties is inherently limited and incapable of serving the true interests of humanity. We are therefore saying that just as it took mass mobilisation of people, beyond party politics, to liberate Africa – our development and the development of the world will demand that we see a mass mobilisation of people, collectively holding the baton of governance.

Discerning the Political System of God – unlocking the future architecture of politics!

• The first thing to realise (in Gen 1) is that God already represents Supreme Governance. The big principle therefore that the 21^st century politician must realise is that God, who is Divine, still finds interest in forming the Adam and delegating governance to the Adam. So that governance was not just in the hands of God but also in the hand of humanity. This means that God has a plural approach to governance.
• So therefore God does take an initiate to form the man, the adam, or humanity – in the image of God. What does this say to 21^st century governments – the first and foremost thing for any government is to define the kind of civilian they want in their country and seek to form such a civilian through an effective education system. The formation of the citizenry should be the number one priority of any President. Because such an empowered citizenry can only mean less responsibility for governments. The problem with the 21^st century politician is that he lives to describe a non-existent unattainable world and therefore keep the people in a state of false hope. With time, what eventually happens is that such a people get disappointed and cry like Rachel, a hopeless cry. The 21^st century politician wants to present him or herself as some Father Christmas who has solutions for everything, you see this clearly in the manifestos around elections. This makes politicians to be like clouds without water (i.e. they have the power to keep you hoping); autumn trees without fruit; shepherds who feed only themselves (Jude 1:12).
• Emphasis on forming the adam (the civilian) implies the need for human development and therefore the need for effective educational systems that seek to produce first and foremost citizens before producing Human Resources for the Corporate World. This further means that nations must be positioned as civilisations that exist in geo-political territories. Let me state this again, that the formation of the adam by God speaks to us about the need to develop the civilians and societies before we produce Human Resource entities for the Corporate World.
• God has a plural approach to governance – but He firstly defined and designed the civilian (the adam) and then He delegated responsibility to the civilian. He gave the responsibility to rule over to humanity and not to the politician. The human God created was inherently political, in that world, there was no career in politics – but politics was the corporate duty of all men. Now we have delegated this duty to few men and women, I suppose so that we can also be about the business of self indulgence, ‘the woman saw that the fruit was good for food & pleasing to the eye & desirable for gaining wisdom’ (Gen 3:6) – this process of Eve outlined in Gen 3:6 describes again the state of the civilian that must be confronted through proper education.
• God said, ‘let them rule’ – and so God took governance from His hands and gave it to civilians. Let me say again, that party politics only leads to the supremacy of institutions (institutionalism) and centralized power. There must be a new political framework or model, that takes the responsibility to govern down to the civilian – and I don’t mean the current municipal model of governance or federalism, because these too are still locked up in the deficiencies of party politics.
• What this means is that governance must become a civilian responsibility and not only a party political responsibility – this must be the future of politics. Now here is how God did it: the LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it (Gen 2:15). This means nothing but the partitioning of the national space into small manageable civilian spheres so that there can be effective execution of civilian governance in those small civilian jurisdictions. On one level, God speaks to all of humanity about ruling the entire earth (the global space) but then He takes the man, the first human and allocates him a small civilian jurisdiction (represented by the garden) in which he (the man) would fulfill his mandate to rule. This means that there has got to be an emergence of communities that begin to establish their own civilian initiatives & systems to take care of their own developmental agenda in a much more localized & specialised context.
• Therefore, unless you see in the future, the formation of small civilian jurisdictions and societies that are empowered in every way to look after themselves, with national governments playing largely the role of oversight – then the problems of humanity will only worsen. John the Baptist empowered societies so that whereas before they’d thought the problem was the Roman Empire, they were made to realise (through John’s advocacy) that the problem was lack of self-mobilisation, the problem was lack of (societal) solidarity, the problem was individualism and capitalistic mindsets (see Luke 3:10&11). People in these small civilian jurisdictions must take the responsibility to educate their kids, to build viable local economies that are environmentally friendly, to design customized political solutions to their local challenges etc. This is the future architecture of politics – party politics has become obsolete! ‘In that He calls this covenant (or this system of human existence) new, He has made the first one obsolete, and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear’ (Heb 8:13).

Unlocking the future Architecture of Politics – Seeing through the Christ!

The Christ does not only represent the manifestation of divine principles, nature & system of thought of God (as seen in John 1:1,2&14) but He also represented humanity in its perfected state. And so through Him we see how the adam – how humanity must be designed. Remember, nations are formed through one man, Adam (Acts 17:26). This means that nations have a second chance (through Christ) to leave the template of humanity as defined in the first fallen Adam and embrace the template of humanity as defined in the last perfected Adam (Christ). E.g. issues of race and all other forms of human intolerance are characteristic of the template of the first fallen Adam. The fallen Adam lives in the realm of cosmetic consciousness and so skin pigmentation becomes the basis of identity (this can only tell you that human politics has, over the past centuries been defined by the framework of the first Adam) – the last Adam lives in the realm of spiritual consciousness and so colour of skin does not define human identity (see Gal 3:27&28) but an internal value system is what defines identity. It is in this context that within the framework of the Last Adam, we pursue the formation of one new man (Eph 2:14-18).

Well of course the problem is that until we see the Bible as a template for human civilisation, we will always relate with the Book wrongly.

• Christ is our Passover Lamb (1 Cor 5:7), i.e. Passover is neither a date nor a religious event, it is an experience - this is crucial to understand as we approach March and April. Let us leave events of Passover to the Religious and the Capitalist. Now, Passover was established by God Himself in Ex 12 as a principle of administering exodus out of Egyptian oppression by the nation of Israel. So therefore this experience of the Jews in Ex 12 becomes a reference point for all nations and not an exclusive privilege of the Jews (see 1 Cor 10:6&11). E.g. South Africa experienced her political-institutional Passover in 1994 and must continue to have Passover to implement socio-political transformation until we are truly transformed as a nation. The Passover of the Christ (through the crucifixion) broke the system of Moses and old Covenant of Law and established a new Covenant (a new system for human existence). What kind of a system was that of Moses? There are many things we can mention about the system of Moses, I will mention just one that finds relevance in this subject: The priesthood in the temple of Moses was only limited to one tribe, Levitical tribe (see Numbers 3 & Heb 9:6&7) out of the 12 tribes of Israel. This means that only 8% of the population was responsible for the spiritual governance of Israel. The death of Christ which represents Passover, facilitated for the destruction of this system – how do we know this? Because the curtain in the temple was torn (Matt 27:51, Heb 10:19&20) and so the system was stripped naked. It lost its dignity.
  When God was destroying the system of Moses, this was not just an event for the Jews in Middle East, God was (among other things) breaking all philosophies in the world that tend to limit humanity from having meaningful participation on issues of human governance (remember, Jesus is the Lamb that takes away the sin of the world and not only of the Jews – John 1:29). This would however be realised progressively over time as world consciousness would progressively change to reflect the changes God established through the death of Christ. Remember Solomon says, ‘as a man thinks in his heart so is he’ (footnote of Prov 23:7); meaning that the state of the world is nothing but a reflection of world consciousness. Man fell in his consciousness (Gen 3:6-8); Christ comes to redeem the consciousness of man (2 Cor 5:17). E.g. Africa’s Wave of Independence from Colonisation represented a change in the consciousness of Africa.
  So therefore the system of Moses, the Old Covenant of Law was representative of (among other things) human governance that becomes a privilege of the few; and so the destruction of the system of Moses was also representative – i.e. it represented destruction of all world philosophies that said only a few could govern on behalf of the many.

• Christ is the Lamb given to the world (John 1:29) and so His death represented a celebration of a global Passover, an establishment of a global system of transformation. The world is undoubtedly experiencing this Passover but in a progressive way.

• This means that the death of Christ established a new framework of human existence. What is that framework? It is the decentralization of the responsibility of governance. Whereas in the system of Moses, priesthood (or spiritual governance) was a privilege of the few (the Levitical tribe), in the New Covenant priesthood is decentralized and becomes the responsibility of all believers. Peter declares that all believers are priests (1 Pet 2:9) and Jesus is the High Priest (Heb 4:14). Now, obviously this is a spiritual principle, but we know that the spiritual becomes a metaphor and a prototype for human life (see Heb 11:3). We must read spiritual designs or political systems of God to understand how human life must be administered. So clearly within the principle of the priesthood of all believers, with Jesus being the High Priest, it is wrong to talk of the ‘politician’ as someone who is exclusively interested in politics – you have got to activate the people so that having party political systems does not become a point of deactivating masses of people from having real meaningful participation in the political process. The spiritual principle of the priesthood of all believers indicates to us that all citizens have a political duty to play; hence we are saying that there must be a creation of small manageable civilian jurisdictions where communities begin to own their developmental agenda, with national, provincial and municipal governments largely playing an oversight role, perhaps at most, providing basic services to the citizens. People must take ownership of the developmental agenda, define and design their own local systems (educational), design their own local economies and begin to enter into trade activities with other civilian jurisdictions. Unless this happens, development will not take off. Such communities existing in these civilian jurisdictions must not engage party politics but must appoint local leadership and approach politics as a social developmental imperative.

• We do also see God giving a command to man (Gen 2:16&17). The word ‘command’ is the Hebrew word ‘tsavah’ which means ‘to constitute’. So therefore the man, the civilian in this civilian jurisdiction (represented by the garden) existed within a certain constitutional framework given by God. What does this tell us in terms of the role of national governments? The role of these governments does therefore extend to providing a constitutional-legislative framework for these civilian jurisdictions.

Such a political framework is truly civilianistic in its approach and emphasis – it is true civilianism – it puts priority on the developmental agenda that is defined, administered and owned by people on the ground. It allows for local leadership to emerge in a social developmental context and not in a party political context. Such a leadership shares in the likeness of its community (Heb 2:17, Heb 4:15, Gal 4:4&5), is intimately involved with and is accountable to the people. Such must be the future of politics, an emergence of civilianistic states whose developmental agenda is administered by the civilians (local citizens) on the ground.