In this essay, I wish to present the case and reasons for community living. I have touched on the themes of Christian communities, Christian societies, and Christian social systems and culture, but have not developed or laid out these out further. To begin, we will consider the great need for such, by presenting a situation report, to borrow a term from author Raymond Simmons.
The Situation Report
It is obvious to all that Christians have lost the culture war or are at least doomed to do so in the near future. Indeed, if any proof of this is needed, one need to look no further than the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges. For the first time Christians are beginning to talk about strategic relocation. Already we are seeing battle lines being drawn, as conservatives flee blue states and migrate to red ones or flee liberal cities and move out to rural conservative areas or smaller towns. What is happening in such cases is that after years of trying to reform their states and cities with biblical principles of government and social theory, conservative Christians are in many cases, realizing the utter hopelessness of the task, as they are simply outnumbered by the pagans, and any attempt to make real concrete change at the polls will be simply be defeated by sheer weight of numbers. In addition, the work of the church seems to be failing nationwide, both in evangelism, as less and less Americans adhere to Christianity, and discipleship, as the church is losing its young people from Christian homes in staggering numbers. And the efforts of Christians to effect reformation in the political, social and cultural spheres, are largely coming to naught, and have not been very effective. Though the American church awoke from decades of pietistic slumber during the Reagan Revolution, and became politically, socially and culturally active, the past forty years have not seen a gradual return to Christian values, or even to the Christian-influenced, though still secular, ones of the 1950s, but rather, American society is far more liberal, and its civil governments more socialistic and tyrannical, than forty years ago.
Although the Republican party wins continues to win elections at all levels, yet no political check on tyranny and erosion of Christian moral values occurs. Instead, the republican party and “conservatives” slide ever leftward, at first fighting vigorously against the new liberalism, and then accepting it over time. An example of this can be seen in the response of the “conservatives” to sodomy. At first, they were against the legalization of sodomy but when the Supreme Court legalized this in Lawrence v. Texas, in 2003, they accepted this and moved to opposing same-sex marriage. When the Supreme Court legalized this in 2015, they accepted it, and moved on to supporting “religious liberty.” With prophetic insight, Robert Lewis Dabney, the great Southern Presbyterian theologian, remarked on the conservatives of his day in words that apply equally well to those of our day:
This is a party which never conserves anything. Its history has been that it demurs to each aggression of the progressive party, and aims to save its credit by a respectable amount of growling, but always acquiesces at last in the innovation. What was the resisted novelty of yesterday is today of the accepted principles of conservatism; it is now conservative only in affecting to resist the next innovation, which will tomorrow, be forced upon its timidity and will be adopted by some third revolution, to be denounced and then adopted in its turn. American conservatism is merely the shadow the follows Radicalism as it moves forward toward perdition. It remains behind it, but never retards it, and always advances near its leader. This pretended salt has utterly lost its savor: wherewith shall it be salted? Its impotency is not hard, indeed, to explain. It is worthless because it is the conservatism of expediency only, and not of sturdy principle. It intends to risk nothing serious for the sake of the truth, and has no idea of being guilty of the folly of martyrdom. It always – when about to enter a protest—very blandly informs the wild beast whose path it essays to stop, that its “bark is worse than its bite,” and that it only to means to save its manners by enacting its decent role of resistance. The only practical purpose which it now subserves in American politics is to give enough exercise to Radicalism to keep it “in wind,” and to prevent its becoming pursy and lazy from having nothing to whip.”[1]
In this way, liberalism advances, gaining more and more ground, while political conservatism always fights a defensive campaign, one in which, like Lee at Petersburg, defeat is certain and merely a matter of time. Add to this the fact that modern culture, as shaped by public education, mass media, social media, and Hollywood is diametrically opposed to Christianity and its cultural effects, and undermines it at every turn, proclaiming contrary cultural and moral values and inculcating the nation at large to its way of thinking, so that even those Christians which retain their faith think like humanists, so that only 6 % of Americans currently hold to a Christian worldview.
The Solution: Community Living and Deliberate Christian Settlements
I do not pretend to advocate that community living is the ultimate end all solution to the problems outlined above. Indeed, to fix these problems, more solutions, besides strategic relocation to Christian communities will have to be implemented, and some of the reasons for the dismal state of things mentioned above would not be fixed by community living. Nevertheless, it is my thesis that community living, and the gradual building of an accompanying Christian culture, while not easy, and coming with its own set of challenges, would fix many of these problems outlined above over the passage of time, and that this practice, along with the adoption of others, would fix much of the movement’s problems. In this essay I will lay out the advantages of community living and why I recommend the practice as the only realistic hope of social reformation in this present age.
The advantages of Community Living
The advantages of community living are myriad. In regard to the ecclesiastical state of the movement:
First, it will permanently fix the problem of the lack of sound biblical conservative churches.
A concern of many Christian families committed to Christian home education, and a mindset of rebuilding the broken foundations of our society, is the lack of a good church. This is particularly acute for Christian homeschooling families of the patriarchal variety, who would like to be part of a homeschooling family integrated assembly. Such churches are few and far between. Many families wish to be part of a church where controversial, yet biblical stands, are taken on such things as modesty in apparel during church meetings, a lack of overly emotional and sometimes heterodox worship music, and an unhealthy interest in being “relevant” and “hip.” They would like to be a part of churches where the leadership is entirely male, and does not kowtow to the demands of feminism, and ones that do not quit meeting in defiance of governmental tyranny. They would like to be a part of churches with expository preaching and the singing of hymns, and without dimmed lights, strobe lights, excessive emotionalism, and rock bands. Most of all, they would like to be a part of churches where the preaching is relevant (in other words, the pastors are not afraid to apply the word of God to the cultural and social issues of the day), and biblically faithful, and where fidelity to the plain teaching of the Scriptures is found. But such churches are rare and hard to find. Although many families wish to be part of a biblically ordered and governed (and often family-integrated) church, many live too far from one. Many others live too far from other like-minded families to start a new church. As a result, we are seeing the families giving up and adopting the practices of either “having church with just their families,” or settling for mediocre assemblies nearer to where they live, churches, which sadly, do not support their desire to rebuild Western Civilization according to biblical blueprints.
However, if a number of biblically faithful homeschooling “remnant” families live within walking distance of one another, they have formed the nucleus of a local family integrated church. By settling near one another in community, there should be little problem with gathering together in covenant as a local church under the oversight of biblically qualified elders. And in a community of twenty-five or thirty families, there will be doubtless several men qualified to be elected elders over the church. Indeed, a community can be considered a parish of the church to which its member families belong. If the conservative homeschooling and Christian reconstruction movements adopt community living, on a movement wide level, then we will see the great problem of homeschooling families, particularly those of a Patriarchal flavor, not united to family integrated churches simply disappear, as families settle together in community and worship with those with whom they dwell in community in weekly worship.
Second, it will restore accountability and the power of church discipline to the church.
The family integrated church movement, generally speaking, has strongly stressed the importance of intimacy between the members of the congregation, a practice which is facilitated by the practice of fellowship meals and church suppers, as well as in some cases, congregational participation in the worship service. In addition, a revival of the practice of church covenanting, and church discipline has led to an increased sense of commitment to the local church among homeschooling families. However, for many churches, these noble goals and practices are nullified by the fact that the member families live so far away from one another. In the family integrated churches, I have attended, it was a common practice to drive thirty or forty minutes, or an hour to church. Under such conditions, there can be no accountability. If one brother is getting drunk every night, he can continue in sin largely unobserved by his fellow church members. Because the rest of his congregation lives in another city, if not another county, there is no danger that they will pass his car parked in front of Joe’s bar every night, or that he comes out of a bookstore toting lewd books. He can live like the world every day of the week, and just make sure to act as he should on Sunday, and no one from his church will be any the wiser.
Not only can there be no accountability under that system, but there will be little to no power to enforce church discipline. All an excommunicated member must do is simply stop attending the meetings of his church. Because he will not see his fellow church members except on Sunday, his life will be little altered. And then he can find a new church less restrictive on his “freedom.” Thus, being placed under church discipline will have little to no effect on his life. However, if a man is a member of a community whose local church excommunicates him, he will feel the effects. For he will see his fellow church members and talk to them every day of the week, and to be placed under church discipline in such a system will likely drive him to repentance. Remember, in such a system, he is not merely losing his “church” to which, like most Americans, he has little commitment or accountability to, since the practice of church hopping is so ingrained in many. Rather, he is losing his friends, his business partners, and if multiple generations have passed since a community’s founding, his extended family as well. He may well be losing a church he has grown up in and has attended his entire life. Such a man will have no choice, but to repent, or to leave his home, house, extended family, friends, business partners, entire way of life and his personal ties to the land and community which will run quite deep. Such discipline will be exacerbated by the fact that not will such a man lose social relationships, but social standing as well. For instance, an excommunicated man may well be fired from his job, having proved by failure to submit to ecclesiastical authority, that he cannot be entrusted to submit to business authority either. In addition, such a man will suffer a loss of social relationships, for an excommunicated man will no longer be invited to go hunting, dancing, or socializing, with the members of the community.
In this system, those with whom one attends church will not be simply those that one sees on Sunday, but those with whom one fellowships with during the week. In addition, the practice of community living will help end the petty fights and squabbles in the church between believers. Believers will be far less likely to engage in ruthless personal attacks and feuds if they know that they will have to share life, and not just the pew one day a week, together with those with whom they violently disagree. They will be far more likely to peacefully resolve their differences, and better yet not start fights in the first place.
Third, it will enable the family integrated church to adopt more fully the discipleship model. How can elders be an example to their flocks if the only time they interact with them is on Sunday? How can those in need of discipleship truly be discipled, if they are only seeing their elders on Sunday? How can an elder counsel a family if he lives two hours from the family he is trying to counsel? Discipleship, biblically speaking, is not lecturing people in a class, (although this can be part of it), but rather, mentoring someone as disciple and teacher share life together. This approach necessarily involves spending lots of time with the other person. In community living, elders would actually be able to teach people via the discipleship setting. They could make the home a center for discipleship, a hard thing to do when the disciple lives an hour from the home of the teacher. Elders could thus teach Christian living to their congregations during the week, holding them accountable in such a way that the practice of many conservative Christian families worshiping great distances from where they actually live cannot facilitate. Older women could better fulfill their Titus 2 responsibilities if they were able to daily interact with those with whom they wished to disciple.
In regard to the social advantages of the practice:
Fourth, it will provide fellowship and encouragement to patriarchal families.
The more conservative and different from surrounding culture the Christian family is, the harder it is for them to stand fast in their convictions. I have stated elsewhere that I believe the gradual attrition rate of conservative homeschooling families is due to the fact of of living so far from one another.
Because they are spending weeks and months apart from others of like mind, they are becoming spiritually vulnerable. Bombarded by the tremendous pressure from the world and compromised church to simply give up and fit in, many families are simply growing weary of the battle and are simply capitulating to the world. Constantly fighting on the defensive against the broader culture, many such families weary of the task and become burned out. Their women return to the workforce, and their children are placed back into public school. This is not surprising since they are lacking the fellowship and close friendship with other like-minded families that would enable one to better stand in the day of adversity. But if like-minded families are living together in community, then they will be providing each other with the fellowship they need on almost a daily basis. To simply share life together will be a tremendous aid to families mutually seeking to live raise their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and free from the destructive influences of pop culture, social media, and a general love for the world.
Fifth, it will help temper a spirit of independence and better facilitate a multi-generational way of life. When like-minded families are living together in community, it will be infinitely easier to pass on a family-oriented way of life onto one’s children. If they form close attachments to one’s like-minded extended family, and to one’s friends and local church family, it will not be as easy to simply pack up and move across the country when one’s gets a higher paying job, or a promotion at their current one, as the world does. There should be, in community living, a strong attachment to the home and land on which one lives, the people with whom one dwells in community, and to the life shared with these people. In addition, it will allow extended family, especially grandparents, to have more of an influence upon their descendants. Today, many grandparents live across the country from their descendants. But in a community, grandparents would be able to personally engage in face-to-face discipleship of their grandchildren and descendants. Of course, we are not advocating a pagan patriarchy wherein grandfathers run roughshod over their descendants, but we are advocating the better facilitation of grandparental discipleship of the younger generations, rather than discipleship by peers. It would also be easier for a family to exercise care for their elderly parents as well. Christian eldercare will be much easier if Christian elders are living in the same town, if not on the same family land, and family home, as their descendants. Relatives living together in the same community and local geographic area can better form the support networks necessary to reclaim areas of life that properly fall under the jurisdiction of the family from the control of the state. For example, multiple Christian nuclear families and individuals living in the same geographic area and in constant touch with each other can be better able to provide welfare, (and accountability) to a down on his luck (we would say providence) individual who is in need of financial or social help.
In addition, the problems that often create such problems would be drastically lessened. For instance, the fear of social consequences will help keep young women from fornicating (and becoming single mothers), while fear of social consequences and loss of social standing will help keep a man from fornicating with her in the first place, of if married, from abandoning his wife and family.
Sixth, the Christian culture formed by the family will extend out of the family into the broader community, providing a better opportunity to inculcate this into children. We have before stated that culture is “religion externalized.” As such, culture is simply the expression of our Christianity in our everyday life. The way we talk, dress, look, act, our sense of art and aesthetics, should all express our Christianity. In the home, therefore, Christian parents should make sure that the culture of their home reflects Christianity. As an example, Christian parents might want to make sure that the use of hip phrases and slang is not used in their home, because they do not want their home language to conform to the vernacular of an ungodly subculture. It may be considered “cool” in some quarters to treat parents with disrespect, but in a Christian culture, honor toward one’s elders would be cultivated and expressed, and honor shown to parents and elders in the mannerisms, speech, manners, and expressions of youth. A Christian family culture would seek to unite parents and children in a common culture, rather than dividing family members up along cultural lines. Thus, for example, Christian parents would probably make sure that all music listened to in the home does not belong to a particular subculture of ungodliness but is one in which the generations are united. Families would listen to music together. They would make sure that this Christian family culture is reinforced in the books, magazines and conversation in the home, and even extends even to its decoration.
For example, a Christian family culture would probably make sure that posters of models in seductive or immodest poses would not be allowed to be displayed on the walls of girl’s bedrooms. The decoration of one’s room should not glorify values antithetical to a Christian view of the family, in this case, the glorification of immodesty, outer beauty at the expense of the inner, vanity, and a sense of success in life apart from the calling to be a keeper at home. The same would apply to books and magazines brought into the home. In architecture, too, a Christian culture would stress order and symmetry, and this is opposed to the disorder and lack of symmetry present in much modern architecture.
The strength of community living is that the values of community would reinforce the values of the Christian family. Although it cannot be expected that everyone in the community would agree with the conviction, perhaps held by some, to banish television from the home, all would or should agree, as Christian reformers with strong family values, that families should eat meals together.
In it incumbent on the Family Reformation Movement to make a conscious effort to form its own subculture. To this extent this has happened, it is an excellent beginning. But far more is needed. Community living would enhance greatly the effect at building a Christian family subculture, as well as a Christian subculture in general. The Christian family culture formed by the families in their homes would thus spill into the church, and into the community. Honor toward parents, and maturity and sober mindedness would be displayed for young men by the other young men with whom he came into contact outside in the home in everyday life, while modesty, and femininity would be displayed for young women by the other young women with whom she came into contact with when outside the home in everyday life. The subject of Christian culture is an important one for the Family Reformation Movement, yet it is one which is usually attacked as legalistic by the world. Scripture does not give us an extensive list of commands for every area of life. It does, however, give us a few broad principles that can be applied to all areas of life. Of necessity, therefore, we must make extrabiblical rules as we seek to apply these Christian principles to all of life.
For example, it used to be commonplace in our culture, for a young woman to not travel alone without a male guardian. If she was alone, it would be the practice of any gentleman to offer to provide guardianship until she reached her destination, or at least as long as they were traveling together. Put simply this is not a biblical rule in the sense that it is found in the Scripture. Nor can it “by good and necessary consequence, be deduced by Scripture.”
Nevertheless, the rule is a good one. It is simply an application of the biblical concept of chivalry and protection of women and children to society and its customs. To claim that we may not manufacture a cultural custom that chivalry, or by implication, male headship, to a particular area of life because such a custom is neither given as a command in Scripture, nor a principle, is not to stand upon Christian liberty against legalism, but to deny outright the sufficiency of Scripture! Scripture does not reference every area of life, but this does not mean that it is not sufficient for every area of life.
The principles of Scripture are sufficient to apply to every area of life, and it is incumbent upon us to bid no one the right to disagree. The existence of extrabiblical cultural customs such as these must not be allowed to be branded as legalistic. For if they are, simply because they are not found in the Scripture, then we are left with the antinomian conclusion that Christian culture is an impossibility, and that no rules of conduct may be imposed upon anyone by anyone else, as regards the application of Christian doctrine. Noteworthy are the attacks sometimes leveled against the church. For example, some have criticized “purity culture” of the church for various reasons. However, if one disdains purity culture, then one is left with only one alternative, impurity culture. Indeed, if one attacks any aspect of “purity culture” as legalistic or counterproductive, then what they are in effect advocating is the replacement of purity by impurity in regard to that aspect of culture, if they do not advocate a replacement custom to replace the one they are critiquing. One may not like all the applications of sexual purity to culture made by the purity culture movement, but that applications must be made, and a “purity culture” formed, is inescapable. But of course, those who make this argument usually believe, at least in effect, that culture is religiously neutral, rather than an external manifestation of religion. This is to deny the plain truth otherwise.
Many families in the Christian church committed to family reformation are being negatively influenced by the ungodly culture. Community living would change this, making their primary influence, Christian family culture. In this arrangement, the biblical doctrine of the family would be applied to every facet of family life. In this arrangement, too, the passing on down of Christian family culture down generation to generation would be far easier, because the same cultural values would be taught, portrayed, and modeled by the rest of the people in the community and in the culture of their homes, businesses, and lives.
The Benefits of Community Living in regards to being salt and light in the world: One of the criticisms commonly leveled against community living is that it is inherently self-focused, and a philosophy of retreat; in effect, a modern form of monasticism. I believe that, to some extent, this misconception is due to the examples of the conservative anabaptists, who while generally successful in passing down a lifestyle of separation from the world, and counter-cultural beliefs and practices, as we wish to do, are nevertheless rabidly pietistic in their view of the world, and especially of the state, which they believe is off limits to Christian participation, at least in regards to offices requiring the use of force.
However, that is not our view. God’s people have been given the dominion mandate, and to this end, and as an institution of God, the state is a legitimate object of biblical dominion and reformation by the people of God. In regard to the pietistic view of the world, we believe that the difference between us and the Anababtists, is that we seek to inculcate the Christian family culture I have spoken of above, not just within the confines of Christian community, but in all the world as well! Unlike them, we seek to do more than establish Christian families and churches, but to establish Christian states and cultures as well. We aim for the establishment of a Christian culture for a whole Christian society. We aim for the practice of deliberate Christian settlements. This is much broader than a gated Christian neighborhood in the middle of a pagan town and society, as good an idea as that is, but to an entire Christian society in microcosm.
Seventh, Community Living would increase the impact and ability for evangelism. One of the problems with conservative evangelicals, and especially conservative Christian homeschoolers is that our ability to evangelize is greatly hampered. The world meets and sees many Christians, but these usually dress, act and speak as the world, which turns many off to the Gospel. The conservative adherents by acting differently than the world, in their speech, mannerisms, customs, and ways of life, can better display a consistent Christian witness before the world. Though this can occur through the witness of a single family, it will be far more of an impact if many more families are located together to impact a community for the Gospel. The influence that only one family will have will necessarily be smaller than that of thirty of forty. Thus, if we seek to be more successful in our evangelism of the world, I think it will be wiser to concentrate greater numbers of conservative Christian families in one locality, so that the exposure an unbeliever will have to them will be greater, and they will have the opportunity to observe true Christian behavior lived out before them, as these families go about their business in the community.
Such relationships would have to be carefully monitored, so that adverse influences are not cultivated, but relationships with unbelievers and compromised Christians could be allowed to exist. By displaying love to unbelievers and compromised Christians, two things could happen. First, we could send a message, that despite our community living, we are not spiritual snobs who are only interested in ourselves. This would be good because it would break down the natural inhibition that it is usually formed by the practice of community living; people tend to regard such people as cultic, and with suspicion and wariness, because they are different from everyone else.
Second, the general view of Christians in society, perpetuated by pop culture and mass media, is that Christians are hypocrites. When unbelievers are forced to interact with Christians day in and day out, they can start to realize that serious Christians are genuine in their faith after all.[2]
Third, by showing love to unbelievers with our time and concern in their lives, we could perhaps persuade them to become Christians, and adopt our counter-cultural lifestyles, requiring and enabling them, to give their children a Christian education, shepherd their sons and daughters properly, take care of elderly relatives, and not take welfare from the state. They will see that despite our great differences with them, we are not unloving to them. The same would apply to compromised Christians. By showing love to them, and becoming somewhat involved in their lives, we could perhaps persuade them to join our way of life. Indeed, this would be the goal of the relationship. Thus, the movement could grow, not only from our descendants, but from converts as well.
Eighth, Community Living would increase our ability to reform civil government. Many Christian homeschool and “remnant” families desire to do their part to reform America’s civil government back to its biblical and constitutional foundations. Again, however, their effect is limited by being spread out. The impact of many current family integrated churches upon the civil governments of their communities is nullified by the fact that their members all live in different counties and legislative districts. Most compromised churches are able to have more of an impact because all of their members belong to the same town, and therefore, the same political entity. However, while the compromised church has more of an impact for this reason, it is sometimes a bad influence. Many Christians simply vote only for Presidential and Congressional candidates and take no interest in local politics.
Others vote for local politicians on less then biblical and conservative grounds. For many, Christian politics simply mean voting Republican. I am a republican myself, but an allegiance to the Republican party cannot be deduced from Scripture. The Scriptures teach that government is to be small, decentralized, and limited, and that it is to protect life, liberty, and property. In addition, they are to submit to the Lordship of Christ over them, and not maintain any false pretense of religious neutrality. The state is to be as Christian as the church and family. The Republican party as a whole does not hold completely to this Christian view of the state; therefore, three options are open to Christians. One, reform the Republican party to a biblical view of the state, two, start a Christian political party with a platform that reflects Scripture’s teaching on the state, and three, run as an independent candidate.
In all three of these options, involvement at the local level in politics is essential. This is not surprising; the biblical teaching is that government is to be decentralized and local in orientation. However, most Christians have no idea of God’s teaching on the state. For many, abortion is the only political issue worth fighting about, even though God’s teaching on the state is far more expansive than just the duty of the state to protect life. This is partly due to the influence of pietism in the church. Churches have long since stopped preaching election and artillery sermons, and many churches are afraid to endorse one political candidate over another for fear of losing their tax-exempt status, which only places the church under the state’s thumb.
What the Christian cannot be is the typical “big government” republican, who merely wants to tweak a few aspects of civil government, but not to drastically reduce it in size and scope. Most adherents to Christian reconstruction and social reformation are not big government republicans. They hold to a Christian view of the functions and roles of the state. However, because they are spread out over so many political jurisdictions, their influence is largely nullified. By concentrating conservative homeschooling families with a Christian view of the state in one locality, we can greatly increase our ability to reform the state. This is especially important when we recognize that the turnout for local elections is very low.
If an entire community of Christian homeschooling families is involved in local politics and actively votes for Godly men who meet the biblical qualifications for civil office, they will have an influence on civil government, such that will probably ensure that the candidates that they support will clinch the election every time. They could thus hold a political gridlock on local political offices. Even better, their political strength will grow over time, as their numbers should increase fourfold or more with each generation. By the multiplication of such communities across our land over time, we could see America’s civil government reformed to its biblical and constitutional foundations at the local level, and we would then have the numerical and political strength to influence state and national elections in a decisive manner. In the meantime, the presence of Christian populations settling together in local geographic areas at the county level allow a rallying point for people against tyranny and provides ample opportunity for lesser magistrates to interpose against unjust laws and civil rulers. Such things as abortion, gun control, the judicial and legal imposition of sexual perversion, etc., can perhaps successfully be nullified.
Ninth, community living allows conservative Christians to take over existing cultural institutions or to start new ones.
Mass media has long been the dredge of those wishing to promote Christian values in and to society. The extreme leftward political and social bent of those in journalism, news, and entertainment has long been known and recognized by conservatives. Despite this, however, until recently, no serious efforts have been made to do anything about this until recently.[3] The opinions of the politically uninvolved and clueless is often shaped exclusively by the mass media, and this allows the leftists the opportunity to influence vast numbers of people and enable even political moderates to think like liberals in many respects. Indeed, such people’s view of reality is often formed by what the media reports. For example, how many Americans went around wearing masks during the Covid-19 pandemic between some guy in a white coat on television said it was the right thing to do, and because the media stoked the flames of a national hysteria. Journalism was not impartial in this case but was used to push a certain political and social agenda, not only contrary to the accepted science, but also completely opposed by conservatives, who have generally not accepted the reported Covid numbers and rejected the radical “solutions” and governmental encroachments of liberty that were supposedly necessary to keep the virus in check. This type of behavior by leftist journalists and its effects is not new; such tactics were used in the Vietnam War to shape public opinion in favor of the Left and the Communists. However, only very recently, have conservatives seemingly resolved to try to combat this.
The practice of Christians concentrating on winning smaller geographic areas offers them the opportunity to do something about this. For example, small geographic areas have their own local news and radio stations, and their own newspapers. By starting or taking over local television news stations, Christians can insure their whole smaller geographic area gets their news from a Christian perspective. Granted, this can be done subtly, but with enough influence, there will be no reason for this. Unless the FCC were to get involved, this author cannot see any reason why the local news cannot provide a distinctively Christian commentary on news, or why weathermen would not be able to explicitly give credit to Divine Providence and to Jesus Christ himself, for the changes in weather live and on air! And there is no reason why Christians cannot do the same with radio stations, using them to influence public opinion in favor of Christ and kingdom, or with newspapers. This author is of course not the first one to urge Christian influence in society; that has been urged for half a century by various individuals and organizations in the religious right. But what is new is the idea of doing this as part of an effort to Christians to move en masse into small geographic areas, live around each other, and put their efforts to taking over their local influential institutions. Also important is the starting of Christian businesses. This is essential in order to combat the woke ideology that is being imposed top down through big companies and businesses. An important point in regard to business is that it is incumbent upon such to pay their workers a livable wage. It has often been alleged that stay-at-home motherhood is impracticable because families cannot make enough money on one income. It is possible for families to make it on one income, by scrimping and saving, and sacrificing a higher economic standard of living. However, negative economic repercussions should not be necessary, if only Christians could take control of businesses or start new ones and pay men in high enough wages that they could support a large family on a single income, and yet keep them in the middle-class bracket. This is imperative because stay at home motherhood is indispensable not only to the health of families, but to the health of society as well.
Speaking of money, it would be well for Christians in such a situation to invest and deal in precious metals such as gold, considering the declining value of the American dollar, and the eventual and inevitable financial collapse. Eventually the Federal Reserve note will have no more use but to be burned for fuel as the German mark was in Weimar Republic Germany, but a precious mineral like gold shall always retain its value no matter the financial condition of the nation at large.
Tenth, community living provides a means to achieve all of society confessionalism and get America out from under land curses.
All of society confessionalism occurs when all three institutions of society, family, church, and state corporately acknowledge the Lordship of Christ and submit to his Law. It is in this way that society achieves its fully divine potential. For God has established three covenantal institutions: family, church, and state, and some form of imbalance and tyranny is inevitable in society, even a small one, until the situation is rectified by submission to God’s law on the part of all three of these institutions. Indeed, because the institutions complement each other. For example, if families do not train their members to submit to the law, not only will the state be affected in having to deal with the increase in lawlessness, but the church will suffer from the increase in lawlessness that affects her mission and calling. If the family and church are right with God, but the state is not, it will tyrannize the other two institutions and fail to perform its duties, to the suffering of those institutions. Hence, we see that all three institutions must be in alignment with God’s Word in order to reap fully the blessings of Christian society, whether on a local or national level.
Furthermore, America is under land curses, as Raymond Simmons points out in his book, The Confessional County, for shedding innocent blood through the killing of the innocent, sexual immorality, sabbath-breaking, and idolatry.[4] These curses affect national prosperity and severely limit the blessing that can occur from faithfulness in spheres other than the national and corporate social one. Individual Christian families, operating as the remnant, in sufficient number, can stay God’s hand of national judgment, (Genesis 18:16-32), but nevertheless, the nation will not remove the curses that affect its national standing before God until there is repentance on a national scale. However, Christians can get out from under the land curses that have befallen America by making their smaller geographic area a Christian one and keeping God’s law to the extent of their ability as a small society. He points out:
Since land curses come to societies and their areas, someone may ask, “Can I move out into the country and get out of land curses?” I see this mindset often – perhaps you have too – that people are going to “get out of Dodge” and hunker down somewhere safer. There is support in the Bible for fleeing to avoid impending judgment. (Luke 21:21); however, the countryside is not an entity unto itself. It is not free from covenantal obligations. Deuteronomy 28:16 says, “Cursed shall thou be in the city and cursed thou shalt be in the field.” God still considers the surrounding countryside to be tied to its parent city (Deut. 21:1-3, Jer. 19:10), to its civil society and magistrate. That is why it’s important to find a location where you can have a righteous county seat. Just moving into the country surrounding a cursed city, for example, will not get your family out of the curse of that city according to the Bible.[5]
Thus, for the reasons I have given above, I support community living as the only realistic way to complete the reformation of family, church, state, and society. I realize that Many families committed to Christian social reformation cannot pack up and move to a community. Fine. All I would ask is that the movement make a deliberate conscious effort to pass on the vision for Christian communities to the next generation. By getting out of debt and preparing for this eventual goal, they could ensure that the second or third generations are equipped and ready for the goal of forming Christian communities. The most likely spot for a community would be in a rural county with a small population (so that our evangelistic and political influence will be greater), and so that every man can own large amounts of land which we can parcel off and leave as an inheritance to his children. As the community grows, and new churches are formed, new land for homesteads and farms will need to be available. Of course, land prices and property taxes will have to be low, as will the chance of future development of the land and thus eminent domain.
The homeschooling, Biblical Patriarchy, and Christian Reconstruction movements are one of the greatest developments of the last half century. They have the potential to bring lasting reformation to the family, church and state. Let us do what we can to pass on a Christian vision and way of life to our children. as we seek to raise up the foundation of many generations. Sola Scriptura! To Jesus Christ be the honor and the Glory, Amen!
[1] Douglas W. Phillips (ed.) Robert Lewis Dabney The Prophet Speaks: (San Antonio, Texas: The Vision Forum Inc. 2002) pp. 17-18
[2] It should also be admitted that the view of Christians in society, perpetuated by mass media and pop culture, is that Christians are hateful and bigoted toward sodomites, and the transgender people, and wish to force their beliefs on everyone else. While we deny the accusations of bigotry and hatred, we nevertheless regard sodomy and transvestitism as social evils that should be purged from the community by societal disapproval and by the coercive arm of the civil magistrate, as well as by the evangelization of such people.
[3] Conservatives have had their magazines and newsletters for well over a half a century, but until recently, no serious effort has been made to provide a politically conservative alternative to leftist mass media, at least in television.
[4] Raymond Simmons The Confessional County: Realizing the Kingdom Through Local Christendom (New Dunedin Press, 2021) pp. 22-26
[5] Ibid p. 28