A good dictionary defines sovereignty as “the possession or exercise of supreme authority; dominion; sway.” A most important word in that definition is supreme. The English word sovereign is derived from the Latin supremus, which means highest or supreme. In the light of this derivation the less usual spelling soveren is correct. The spelling sovereign seems to have come into use because soverenty usually involves reigning.
God alone is sovereign in the absolute sense, for his authority is truly supreme. He holds unlimited sway over the whole of the universe. “He doeth according to his
will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and no one can stay his hand or say unto him, What doest thou?” (Dan. 4:35).
However, the term sovereignty has also come to be used in a relative sense. The sovereign God has seen fit to lend authority to some of his creatures over others. In consequence, while no creature has an iota of sovereignty in relation to the Creator, certain creatures do possess a measure of sovereignty in relation to other creatures.
Therefore, it is proper to ascribe sovereignty, for example, to the state; and that is commonly done. Much
less frequently are men wont to ascribe sovereignty to
the Christian church, and yet to do that is not a whit less
proper. Its sovereignty is a significant aspect of its glory.
A Restricted Sovereignty
Let us suppose that a certain village has three churches, that each of these churches has a high spire, and that all three of these spires are of
exactly the same height. No matter how high they may be, not one of them is the highest. Manifestly there can never be more than one highest. It follows that there is
but one who is truly sovereign. That one, of course, is God. No matter how great the power and authority of, shall we say, the state or the church may be, God alone is
sovereign.
Therefore, the church has no sovereignty whatever with reference to God. God is sovereign over the church, and that is the entire truth. The church is wholly subject unto God. Its one duty is to obey the law of God, and it has no right to make laws of its own that contradict or even augment the law of God. It may neither allow what God forbids nor forbid what God allows.
As the church is subject to God, so it is subject to its Head and King, Jesus Christ. He reigns over it as its absolute monarch. His word is law for the church, and
the church has no right to amend his law whether by alteration, addition, or subtraction. It is entirely correct to say that the church has no legislative power, for
Christ has given it a perfect law. When it makes certain rules and regulations in the interest of good order, as it often must, these are never to be equated with the law of
Christ.
How clear that the church’s sovereignty is severely restricted. With reference to God and Christ it is simply non-existent.
God has, however, given a measure of authority to the church with reference to men, and that authority may be denominated sovereignty. The question whether
this sovereignty is restricted or unrestricted has been the subject of much contention throughout the church’s history. While Protestantism insists that it is restricted,
the Church of Rome teaches that it is unrestricted. The authority which Rome claims for itself is truly totalitarian. But that claim cannot be substantiated.
The church has no sovereignty whatever with reference to God. God is sovereign over the church, and that is the entire truth.
When God made man in his image, he endowed him with certain inherent rights. By man’s fall into sin that image was severely marred and even largely lost, but not
annihilated. In consequence every human being remains in possession of certain inalienable rights. And in the case of the regenerate, in whom the image of God has
been restored, those rights are accentuated. Freedom of speech and freedom of worship are but two of them. To be sure, in the exercise of these rights each man must
respect the rights of his fellow-men and above all else the law of God, but nobody may seek to deprive him of these rights. Rome has often done precisely that. There
was a time when it forbade not only the reading, but the possessing, of a Bible; and frequently it has inflicted the penalty of death on those who dared to criticize the
teachings and practices of the church. Beyond all doubt, the church’s sovereignty with reference to the individual is restricted.
Both the church and the state are sovereign, each in its own sphere; and each must recognize the other’s sovereignty.
So is the sovereignty of the church with reference to the family restricted. God established the human family in the garden of Eden. He created woman and gave her
to Adam that she might be his wife. He commanded them: “Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth” (Gen. 1:28). Significantly, God, not the church, brought
the family into being, and it antedates the founding of the church. It follows undeniably that the family, like the individual, has certain rights on which the church may
not encroach; It is not the church’s business to stipulate the precise percentage of the family budget that is to be given to the church, nor to prescribe a menu for the family dinner, nor yet to dictate to a bereaved family where it is to bury its dead.
More instances of restrictions on the church’s sovereignty might be named, but in this context the relation of the church to the state deserves special attention.
For centuries two opposite views of the relation of church and state have vied with each other: The Western church, under the leadership of the bishop of Rome, has long taken the position that the church must exercise authority over the state. A certain pope declared that the pope as head of the church “possesses the right, which he properly uses under favorable circumstances; to pass judgment even in civil affairs on the acts of princes and of nations.” Contrariwise, the Eastern church early took the position that the church is but a phase of the state and that it is the state’s duty to appoint the officers of the church, to define its laws, and to support it.
Constantine the Great, who was the first Roman emperor to give official recognition to the Christian church and in 330 moved his capital eastward to the city which he named for himself, Constantinople, was regarded not only as head of the empire but also as head of the church. In later times the Russian czars claimed the same double honor. It is not strange that the churches of the Protestant Reformation, by way of opposition to Rome, adhered in the main to a more or less similar view. Today a large part of Protestantism, American Protestantism in particular, is convinced that the Bible teaches what is commonly—and somewhat loosely—called the separation of church and state. What is meant is that the church may not seek to govern a commonwealth nor interfere with the purely political affairs of the state, and that the state may not seek to govern the church nor interfere with its spiritual affairs. In short, both the church
and the state are sovereign, each in its own sphere; and each must recognize the other’s sovereignty. That is implied in the saying of the Lord Jesus: “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s” (Matt. 22:21), on which Calvin has commented that the Lord here “lays down a clear distinction between spiritual and civil government.” The same truth is implicit in the fact that on Pentecost the church, which had been largely—although not entirely—national, became universal. A universal church must needs transcend the bounds of nationalism. And is it not obvious that neither did the state create the church nor did the church create the state, but God originated both and endowed each with its own specific authority? The conclusion is inescapable that, while the sovereignty of the state with reference to the church is restricted, the sovereignty of the church with reference to the state is also restricted. The church is sovereign only in its own sphere. Its authority is not totalitarian.
A Positive Sovereignty
Let no one infer from the foregoing that the sovereignty of the church amounts to little or nothing. The truth is that it is very real, most actual, and
decidedly positive. Time and again in its history the church has found it necessary to assert its sovereignty over against usurpation
by the state. It is an interesting fact that already under the theocracy of the Old Testament, when church and state were much more closely associated with each other than has been the case since Pentecost, the church on various occasions exercised its sovereignty vigorously in opposition to the encroaching state. King Saul was ready to go to battle against the Philistines. It seems to have been customary for the Israelites before joining battle to bring a sacrifice to God. That was a function of the priests, to be performed in this instance by Samuel. When Samuel was late in coming, Saul became impatient and himself offered the sacrifice. Presently Samuel arrived and informed Saul that because of this sin the kingdom would be taken from him (1 Sam. 13:9–14). King Uzziah once upon a time insisted on burning incense on the altar of incense in the temple. This again was a prerogative of the priests. When the king ignored the vigorous protest of the priests, God smote him with leprosy, and his son
reigned in his stead (2 Chron. 26:16–20). In both of these instances a representative of the state was severely punished for encroaching upon the sovereignty of the church. The New Testament records some striking instances of the same sort of thing. To name but one, when the Sanhedrin, the supreme court of the Jews, forbade the apostles to preach in the name of Jesus, Peter declared boldly: “We ought to obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29); and so they did.
When the emperor Nero bound the Christians in bunches, poured pitch and tar over them, and then set them on fire thus to illuminate the imperial gardens, the
church did not yield but sovereignly proceeded on its way. When the Diet of Worms demanded that Luther recant his supposedly heretical teachings, he sovereignly
uttered the memorable words: “Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise; God help me; Amen.” John Knox sovereignly defied both the tears and the wrath of Queen Mary, and
over his grave Melville spoke: “Here lies one who never feared the face of man.” Said Lord Macaulay of the Puritan: “He bowed himself in the dust before his Maker, but
he set his foot on the neck of his king.” Ours is an age of state totalitarianism. All over the world statism is in the ascendancy. In the second world war three totalitarian states, Germany, Italy and Japan, suffered a crushing defeat, but Russia, another totalitarian state, has since risen to incomparably greater heights of power and influence than ever before. And in the so-called democracies, the United States of America included, there is a strong trend toward statism. In consequence, in many lands the church finds itself utterly at the mercy of a state whose mercy often proves cruelty, while in others the notion is rapidly gaining ground that the church exists and operates by the state’s permission. Now, if ever, is the time for the church to assert its sovereignty over against encroachments by the state. The church is in sacred duty bound to rise up in its God-given majesty and proclaim to the world that it preaches the word of God, not by the grace of human governments, but solely at the command of the sovereign God and its sovereign King seated at God’s right hand. In another respect too the sovereignty of the church is positive indeed. It must sovereignly lay down the law of God to the individual, the family, society and the state.
The church is in sacred duty bound to rise up in its Godgiven majesty and proclaim to the world that it preaches the word of God, not by the grace
of human governments, but solely at the command of the sovereign God and its sovereign King seated at God’s right hand.
No individual has the right to say that his private life is his own to lead and is none of the church’s business. That would be far too sweeping an assertion. The law of
God concerns every aspect of human life, and the church has been charged with the proclamation of that law in all its Scriptural fulness. It must condemn every sin in the
life of the individual. To be sure, there are a number of practices which the law of God neither commands nor forbids. They are commonly called adiaphora or indifferent things. But even such matters are not beyond God’s law. An accurate definition of an adiaphoron is a practice which the law of God allows but does not require. That means that the so-called indifferent things have divine sanction; in themselves they are neither immoral nor amoral, but good although not required. But only then is their performance truly good when they are performed in faith and out of love. While the church must be scrupulously careful not to forbid what God allows, it must also tell men what is the proper use according to the word of God of that which God allows.
Never may the family tell the church defiantly to refrain from meddling with any of its affairs. That would be exceedingly rash. With reference to the family too, the church must sovereignly proclaim the whole law of God. When a husband and his wife are contemplating divorce, they may not bid the church leave them alone. It must acquaint them with the teaching of Scripture on divorce and demand of them that they live accordingly. That church is remiss in the performance of its duty which does not proclaim the teaching of the word of God on “mixed marriages” and “planned parenthood.” And whether parents give their children a truly Christian training is not merely their concern, but the church’s as well. For on that subject, too, God has spoken, and he has done so emphatically.
For many decades now the so-called social gospel has been popular with Modernists. In their righteous indignation with the social gospel of Modernism many Fundamentalists have illogically jumped to the conclusion that the gospel must be presented only on a strictly individual basis. In consequence, conservative churches generally have neglected the social implications of the gospel. But that is a way of saying that these churches have failed to assert their sovereignty in relation to society. For but one example, society is torn today as seldom, if ever, before by conflict between industry and labor, employers and employees. All too often the church is satisfied with the role of a mildly interested, if not altogether disinterested, onlooker. What it should do is to declare boldly to masters and servants alike the sovereignty of the Lord Christ over both of them (Col. 3:22–4:1). For in the recognition of that sovereignty lies the solution of this problem.
It must be admitted to the church’s shame that it has often cowered before the state. It was not ever thus. When David had stolen Bathsheba from her husband Uriah and had then got rid of him by what amounted to murder, the prophet Nathan told him off in utter fearlessness. And when King Ahab had robbed and killed Naboth, the prophet Elijah unflinchingly pronounced upon him and his house the judgments of God. A noble company of God’s servants has followed in the train of these prophets, but that company has never been as large as it should have been. Today it is small indeed. The church of God should lift up its voice with strength against lying and theft and bribery and vice, which are so frightfully rampant in high places. It must proclaim aloud that “righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people” (Prov. 14:34). It is much more than time for the church to call to repentance and, in case of failure to repent, to discipline to the point of excommunication those rulers of the world who are at once members of Christ’s church and putrid politicians. And those power-hungry potentates who neither fear God nor regard man but take counsel together against the Lord and His Anointed, saying: “Let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us,” must be told by the church that He that sits in the heavens will laugh, that the Lord will have them in derision, and that, if they fail to kiss the Son, He will break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel (Ps. 2).
Let the church speak sovereignly for the sovereign God and “the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords” (1 Tim. 6:15).
Coming soon!