1 REVERSAL OF FORTUNE: COVENANTAL SANCTIONS He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree. He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away (Luke 1:51-53).
Mary made this eloquent declaration in front of her relative, Elizabeth. Elizabeth had just confessed, "Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb" (v. 42a). Elizabeth had affirmed her faith in the fulfillment of an angelic prophecy to Mary: "And blessed is she that believed: for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord" (v. 45). What had Mary been told by the angel? This: "And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end" (vv. 31-33). The issue here was judicial: Jesus possessed legal title to the throne of David. The issue was also eschatological: His permanent kingdom reign. This was obviously a messianic prophecy. Mary's response to this prophecy was a declaration of God's imposition of sanctions in Israel's history. The supernaturally imposed sanctions of the past testified to God's ability to impose sanctions in the future. Her son would be the sanctions-bringer, the Messiah.
Mary's response to Elizabeth's affirmation appears in the passage that is sometimes called the Magnificat, referring to the first word in the passage in Latin translation: "My soul magnifies (glorifies) the Lord." The passage is itself magnificent. That a young woman could formulate such a profound theological passage with such poetic power as this testifies to the power of the liturgical effects of worship in the synagogue. The power of her language reflects years of exposure to the psalms.
Overturning the Powers That Be Her summary of God's acts in history indicates a challenge to the powers that be. Mary declared that God elevates the powerless and casts down the powerful. He is sovereign over the affairs of men. Her personal experience would be proof of God's power to lift a person out of obscurity into prominence. Mary saw herself as a nobody who was about to become a somebody: "For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed" (v. 48). This would be her personal reversal of fortune.
She also affirmed the existence of a God who had previously intervened in Israel's history to overturn rich and powerful oppressors. "He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree. He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away" (Luke 1:51-53). He did this out of mercy. "And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation" (v. 50). God's mercy in history is beneficial for the downcast and a disaster for those in power.
Why should this be the case? Why should mercy to the poor involve negative sanctions against those in power? Why must there be a reversal of fortune downward as well as upward? The biblical answer is covenantal ethics. Previously prevailing social orders in history have been based on anti-biblical legal principles. By defying God's law, rulers have been able to rule oppressively. God has repeatedly intervened in Israel's history, she declared, to overturn these oppressive regimes.
Mary's declaration pointed to an imminent overturning. It was to be the overturning in Israel's history: the advent of the Messiah. It would involve the overturning of Israel's political order. Ezekiel had announced: "Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because ye have made your iniquity to be remembered, in that your transgressions are discovered, so that in all your doings your sins do appear; because, I say, that ye are come to remembrance, ye shall be taken with the hand. And thou, profane wicked prince of Israel, whose day is come, when iniquity shall have an end, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Remove the diadem, and take off the crown: this shall not be the same: exalt him that is low, and abase him that is high. I will overturn, overturn, overturn, it: and it shall be no more, until he come whose right it is; and I will give it him" (Ezek. 21:24-27). Ezekiel's prophecy looked back to Jacob's prophetic blessing on Judah: "The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be" (Gen. 49:10). Mary's son Jesus would be the fulfillment of both prophecies. He would be the one to overturn the old order in the name of a new order. But this new order would not violate the ethical standards of God's Old Covenant. On the contrary, the new order would fulfill the old order and extend it into the hearts of redeemed people. We read this in Hebrews, which cited Jeremiah's prophecy: "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away" (Heb. 8:10-13).
The Hungry and the Rich The mark of poverty in Israel was hunger. David had declared, "For such as be blessed of him shall inherit the earth; and they that be cursed of him shall be cut off. The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD: and he delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the LORD upholdeth him with his hand. I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread" (Ps. 37:22-25). In his day, David implied, righteousness was sufficiently honored in Israel, so that good men were not reduced to begging for bread. Mary was implying that those days were long gone. God has repeatedly had to intervene to feed the hungry as a sign of His mercy. But God has not left it at that; He has also pulled down the rich. Mary's declaration implied that the hunger of the righteous has been the result of the power of the unrighteous.
Jesus later used this same contrast in His parable of the rich man and Lazarus, the beggar (Luke 16:19-31).(1) He described their reversal of fortune as permanent. The beggar was taken to heaven; the rich man was sent to hell. The rich man cried out to Abraham for relief. The reply was negative. "But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented. And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence" (vv. 25-26).
This theme of the exclusion of rich men from the kingdom of heaven is found repeatedly in Jesus' teaching. Nevertheless, God is pictured repeatedly as a rich man who had gone to a far country, and who then returns to require his servants to give an accounting. The theological issue is therefore not wealth as such, but rather stewardship: the faithful administration of assets that belong to God. He who is rich in history is less likely to be rich in eternity. "For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. And they that heard it said, Who then can be saved? And he said, The things which are impossible with men are possible with God" (Luke 18:25-27).
The truth of Mary's testimony was not limited to eternity. Yet, it is almost certain that she had in mind only history. The twin doctrines of heaven and hell are Jesus' addition to our understanding of covenantal sanctions. The pleasure-pain distinction of the afterlife is not found in the Old Testament. So, Mary would not have been aware of this distinction. Mary declared what God had done in Israel's history. He had intervened to reverse the fortunes of the powerful and the powerless, the rich and the poor.
She and her husband were poor. We know this because they offered two turtledoves at the temple when they presented Jesus, according the law of purification (Luke 2:24). This law required an offering for the temporarily unclean status of the mother of a newborn. She had to bring a lamb and a pigeon or a turtledove (Lev. 12:6). If she could not afford a lamb, she had to offer two turtledoves (Lev. 12:8).(2) Mary saw her own role as a poor girl who would bear the Messiah, who would in turn bring a reversal of fortune to oppressed Israel, just as God had done in the past: "He hath holpen [helped] his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy" (v. 54).
As it turned out, Jesus achieved this by overturning Old Covenant Israel forever. He elevated the spiritual remnant of Israel at the expense of the nation, which was in rebellion against God. He told the religious leaders, "Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof" (Matt. 21:43). The gentiles -- a new covenantal nation -- were to be brought in to worship God alongside the remnant of Israel. The church would become the new Israel, which Paul called "the Israel of God" (Gal. 6:16). God's blessings would be upon it.
Mary's words went beyond politics. They included economics. The hungry had been filled with good things by God. The rich had been sent away empty-handed. Here we see a two-fold reversal of fortune. It was not merely that the hungry had been fed by God; it was that the rich had been stripped of their wealth. The hungry had become filled; the rich had become poor. In this sense, poverty is pictured as a negative sanction, not a condition to be abolished. Her words do not proclaim an egalitarian social order. They proclaim hierarchy, both political and economic. In His dealings with Israel, Mary declared, God's acts have honored the covenantal principle of hierarchy.(3) He has not undermined it; He has instead reversed the hierarchical status of the participants.
Zacharius' Subsequent Confirmation Shortly before the birth of John, his father regained his speech (v. 64) and was filled with the Holy Spirit (v. 67). He announced a two-part prophecy. The first concerned Jesus, who was in the covenant line of Judah through David. "And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David" (v. 69). This could not refer to his son John, who was in the priestly family of Levi.
Like Mary, Zacharius spoke of the God of covenant. "As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began: That we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us; To perform the mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember his holy covenant" (vv. 70-72). The issue was national deliverance, guaranteed by God's covenantal oath to Abraham: "The oath which he sware to our father Abraham, That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear, In holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life" (vv. 73-75). Only after making this declaration of God's covenant rule did Zacharius refer to his own son: "And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways" (v. 76).
These prophetic utterances assumed the continuation of God's covenantal sanctions in history. They assumed the permanence of the covenant. They viewed Jesus' ministry as the fulfillment of David's: the civil enforcement of God's covenant law in Israel. Covenant law undergirds covenant sanctions. In the future, as in the past, the supernatural imposition of God's covenant sanctions would be evidence of the validity of God's covenant law.
Why the Great Reversal? God is not capricious. He honors His covenant. This was what Mary announced in her conclusion: "As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever" (v. 55). So, the heart of the matter was the covenant. Mary did not believe that the Old Covenant's system of sanctions would end with the coming of the Messiah, her son. What God had done in the past to uphold the ethical provisions of His covenant, He would do again.
Mary's declaration assumed that the rich and the poor had achieved their respective positions in terms of a prevailing social order. This social order was in some way antithetical to the covenant. Had this not been the case, God would have had no reason to intervene to reverse the fortunes of many. It was not that wealth is somehow immoral, for God had previously elevated the hungry to the status of wealthy, to enjoy the good things.
Mary did not view her son's role as reversing the biblical covenantal standards that had governed the attainment of both wealth and poverty in Israel. She saw His role as an extension of what God had previously done in history to liberate Israel from bondage (v. 50). She did not see her son as a revolutionary against the covenant, but as a revolutionary against the prevailing social order, in which Israel was in bondage. She saw His role as prophetic: bringing a covenant lawsuit against the rulers of the day in the name of the God of the oppressed. But this role, being prophetic, had to be ethically based. The prophet's message in Israel was always a call to national repentance.
Was her proclamation accurate? Was the prevailing social order reversed by Jesus' ministry? Yes, and the proof of this great reversal came in A.D. 70, when Jerusalem fell to Rome, and the temple was burned, thus ending the Mosaic sacrifices.(4)
Did Jesus replace the covenantal standards of righteous rulership? Did He challenge the rulers of the day in terms of a new covenant or the old? On the contrary, He invoked the standards of the Old Covenant. He challenged the Jewish leaders on behalf of Moses in the latter's prophetic office. This challenge is clearest in John's Gospel. "But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you. I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive. How can ye believe, which receive honour one of another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God only? Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust. For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?" (John 5:42-47).
The great reversal would soon arrive, both in Israel and the gentile world, because of the great continuity of biblical law, including its sanctions. "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:17-19).
Liberation Theology Egalitarianism is an ancient tradition in the history of the church, but it has generally been confined to monastic orders, small and short-lived sects, and heretical movements. In twentieth-century liberal theology, as well as the post-1965 movement known as liberation theology, egalitarianism is assumed to be the biblical ideal. Both movements advocate the use of political coercion to achieve economic equality.(5)
There is no trace in biblical law of the use of State coercion to promote wealth redistribution and economic equality. First, the Mosaic law is not egalitarian. Second, the State is not endowed by biblical law with sufficient power to make egalitarianism possible. A central civil government that extracts as much as ten percent of the people's wealth is seen by God as tyrannical: His judgment on a rebellious nation (I Sam. 8:15, 17). A civil order that extracts less than a tithe is in no position to claim to be egalitarian. It cannot command the resources to achieve such status. This is why theological liberals who promote modern levels of taxation in the name of Jesus regard Samuel's warning as irrelevant. It does not play a role in their speculations regarding the kingdom of God in history. This is because it testifies against them.
Egalitarianism in the New Testament
Evidence for egalitarianism as a recommended voluntary practice in the New Testament is found in John the Baptist's warning to the multitudes to share: "And the people asked him, saying, What shall we do then? He answereth and saith unto them, He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none; and he that hath meat, let him do likewise" (Luke 3:10-11). This was voluntarism. It had nothing to do with politics. It was the recommendation of a prophet in the transition period from the Old Covenant (John's culminating ministry) to the New Covenant (Christ's replacement ministry). John baptized: a New Covenant sign. Those who came out to the wilderness to see John were introduced to the New Covenant's founder-prophet by an Old Covenant prophet. John gave advice to those who asked. Those who asked were a remnant. His ministry was not aimed at civil rulers. He was speaking to people who recognized that some sort of revolutionary transformation was coming. This is why they went into the wilderness to see him.
And when the messengers of John were departed, he began to speak unto the people concerning John, What went ye out into the wilderness for to see? A reed shaken with the wind? But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? Behold, they which are gorgeously apparelled, and live delicately, are in kings' courts. But what went ye out for to see? A prophet? Yea, I say unto you, and much more than a prophet. This is he, of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee. For I say unto you, Among those that are born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist: but he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he (Luke 7:24-28).
John told His listeners to break with the economic practices of the era -- of every era -- in preparation for a new era. Those who followed His advice about giving away their goods would publicly demonstrate their commitment to the idea that the old order was about to be replaced.(6) Faithfulness under these circumstances involved the surrender of any commitment to the old order, including even the family. Jesus said, "I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished! Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division: For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law" (Luke 12:49-53). This represented a fundamental break with the Old Covenant social order. It was in this context that John had recommended voluntary egalitarianism.
The second example of egalitarianism in action is the practice of common property in church in Jerusalem. "And all that believed were together, and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need" (Acts 2:44-45). "And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common" (Acts 4:32). The sale of their real estate and other possessions later enabled them to flee the city without looking back when the persecution began after the stoning of Stephen (Acts 8:1). Never again in the history of the church have all of its members followed this example. This was a one-time event.
The gentile churches founded by Paul and other evangelists did not practice common ownership. Members of gentile churches had never been part of the Old Covenant order. But what about egalitarianism as an ideal? Paul did warn the church at Corinth regarding the need for sacrificial giving in order to aid a distant congregation's impoverishment: the church at Jerusalem. This was a unique historical situation, though his recommendation is legitimate as a model of personal righteousness. Paul said specifically that he was not speaking authoritatively in God's name. He was offering advice, not laying down a law.
I speak not by commandment, but by occasion of the forwardness of others, and to prove the sincerity of your love. For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich. And herein I give my advice: for this is expedient for you, who have begun before, not only to do, but also to be forward a year ago. Now therefore perform the doing of it; that as there was a readiness to will, so there may be a performance also out of that which ye have. For if there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not. For I mean not that other men be eased, and ye burdened: But by an equality, that now at this time your abundance may be a supply for their want, that their abundance also may be a supply for your want: that there may be equality: As it is written, He that had gathered much had nothing over; and he that had gathered little had no lack (II Cor. 8:8-15).
Paul held out the promise of future rewards to those who would give generously. "But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully. Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver" (II Cor. 9:6-7). The motivation to give was personal: to reap bountifully. The mark of obedience was cheerfulness. Charity is not to be a matter of sullen duty. It is to be a matter of joyful self-interest. It is surely not to be a matter of State compulsion.
What Paul recommended to Corinth was voluntary generosity. The members of the church at Corinth had previously promised to give. Now Paul was calling on them to honor their promise. He was not speaking about the civil government, nor was he laying down a new law. "I speak not by commandment" (v. 8).
Charity Does Not Satisfy Liberationists
Liberation theologians are not content with recommending voluntary charity within the church. This would confine their recommended reforms to individual church members. What they want is power -- power for the State and power for those who advise the State. They want politicians and bureaucrats to be able to compel economic equality on threat of civil violence and in the name of God. They seek to empower the modern messianic State in the name of the New Testament's Messiah. By invoking the name of Jesus, they seek to annul Samuel's identification of the messianic State as a high tax State. What Samuel identified as God's negative sanction against rebellious Israel, liberationists see as God's positive sanction on a faithful New Testament political order.
From the beginning, liberation theology was the product of liberal theology and either socialist economic theory or Marxist revolutionary theory. Its humanist origins and goals were deliberately concealed by means of biblical language. The liberationists would select a few passages, such a the jubilee year (Lev. 25), in order to deceive the faithful in the pews.(7) But they refused to invoke all of the Mosaic law to defend their system. This was because the Mosaic law does not support socialism or the welfare State.
Their strategy has failed for two reasons. First, liberation theology suffered a mortal wound with the repeated admissions by Premier Mikhail Gorbachev in 1988-91 that the Soviet Union's economy was bankrupt. He went begging for more Western money, in addition to the tens of billions that the Soviet Union had already received from Western governments. His public embarrassment paralyzed the liberationists' efforts to persuade people that their recommended socialistic reforms would benefit society. They were promoting a visibly bankrupt idea in the name of Jesus. Then came the almost bloodless collapse of the Soviet Union, August 19-21, 1991.(8) Both Marxism and liberation theology became passé overnight. Power religion worships power, and when power departs, so do power religion's adherents, who renew their search for social redemption elsewhere.
Second, Bible-believing Christians in the pews were almost never attracted to liberation theology. They recognized it as foreign to the Bible and the Bible's concept of economic liberty. Only a handful of academics, who had spent their lives in the academic cloisters -- usually tax-supported -- were taken in by liberation theology's deception.
The liberals and liberationists had remained inside the halls of ivy for too long. For too long, they had sought formal certification by the humanist academic system. They had internalized its outlook along with its methodology, a methodology that said, "The Bible has no authority to judge academic learning." The liberals and liberationists justified their adoption of this academic methodology by proving to their humanist peers, to themselves, and to the people in the pews that the New Testament is true because it conforms to the teachings of the campus egalitarians. They allowed a radical form of political humanism to judge the New Testament. As for Samuel's warning, that was based on the Old Testament. The whole Christian world had long since abandoned confidence in the Mosaic law, so the liberationists thought they could afford to ignore Samuel's warning. The man in the pew would not invoke Samuel's authority against their creed, for he, too, had lost faith in the Old Testament's authority. This is why the modern State today extracts four times the tithe or more, yet Christians merely grumble. They do not cry out to God for deliverance. But the man in the pew at least grumbles at the tax burden. The liberals and liberationists grumble because of an insufficient tax burden -- on the rich.
Conclusion Mary's description of God's intervention on behalf of Israel was a declaration of His covenantal authority. She said specifically that God had brought sanctions in history in terms of His covenant with Abraham and his successors. "As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever" (v. 55). God would do so again through her son. She had no doubts in this regard. Her prophecy indicates that the covenant with Abraham was still in force. God's covenantal promises to Abraham would not be annulled by her son. Paul made it clear in his letter to the Galatians that the promises to Abraham were to Mary's son. These promises now extend to the gentiles through the gospel.
Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. Brethren, I speak after the manner of men; Though it be but a man's covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth, or addeth thereto. Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect. For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise: but God gave it to Abraham by promise. Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator (Gal. 3:13-19).
God does not capriciously raise up some men and pull down others. He upholds His covenant in history. He stands behind the humble, the powerless, and the hungry in a covenant-breaking social order because He stands behind His covenant. He opposes the proud, the powerful, and the rich in a covenant-breaking social order because He stands behind His covenant. His covenant is hierarchical. There can and must be individual reversals of fortune within the hierarchy because there cannot be a permanent overturning of God's covenant. There will never be a leveling of the hierarchy.
Footnotes:
1. Chapter 39, below.
2. The King James Version says "turtles." This is a translation error.
3. Ray R. Sutton, That You May Prosper: Dominion By Covenant (2nd ed.; Tyler, Texas: Institute for Christian Economics, 1992), ch. 2.
4. David Chilton, The Days of Vengeance: An Exposition of the Book of Revelation (Ft. Worth, Texas: Dominion Press, 1987).
5. The main publisher of liberation theology materials in English is Orbis Books. The Maryknoll Order of the Roman Catholic Church has been the most vocal group in the intellectual defense of the position.
6. Chapter 2, below.
7. A specific example of such deception was presented to radical political activists by William Peltz, the Midwestern coordinator of the Peoples Bicentennial Commission. At a meeting in Ann Arbor, Michigan, he argued that conservative Christians can be turned into promoters of revolutionary politics by appealing to the Bible. He cited Leviticus 25 as a useful passage. See The Attempt to Steal the Bicentennial, The Peoples Bicentennial Commission, Hearings Before the Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws of the Committee on the Judiciary, 94th Congress, Second Session (March 17 and 18, 1976), p. 36.
8. A total of three men were killed.
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