Towards a Biblical/ Agrarian Culture

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Posted by Michael Bunker
editor@lazarusunbound.com

“And all the army of the Chaldees, that were with the captain of the guard, brake down the walls of Jerusalem round about. Now the rest of the people that were left in the city, and the fugitives that fell away to the king of Babylon, with the remnant of the multitude, did Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carry away. But the captain of the guard left of the poor of the land to be vinedressers and husbandmen” (2 Kings 25:10-12).

August 15, 2005 – In earlier portions of this series we have discussed Agrarianism as the central, desirable system that God has decreed for his people.  We discussed Agrarianism as antithetical to the prominent system of urbanism that prevails in the modern antichrist world.  It is important, then, that we discuss Agrarianism in greater detail in order to answer the question I receive the most on this subject:

“So what’s the big deal?  Are you saying we should all be farmers?”

Agrarianism is more than farming, and Christianity is more than just doctrine or theology.

In the modern failed religious system erroneously dubbed “Christianity”, there are two prevailing views, both of which are terrible, unbiblical errors:

1)     Doctrine isn’t important.  What you believe isn’t as important as long as you believe in something; or at the very least you must only believe in a skeleton list of undefined statements.  The details of doctrine only cause division and strife, and since Christianity is about a system of organizations and relationships, we should avoid all talk and dispute over doctrine.

2)     Doctrinal “theory” is everything.  You must believe a very specific list of doctrines.  In this system, there is no understanding or agreement that actually believing those things will inevitably bring about a change in the “everything” of life.  Theology is all there is to Christianity.

In both of these failed systems, the professing “christian” remains in the world and as a part of the world culture.  In both systems the “christian” merely tags new labels on the things he has always done, and calls those things “christian”.  So now we have “Christian” rap music and “Christian” coffee shops and “Christian” icons and paraphernalia; while the command of God concerning this present world system is to “come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you” (2 Cor. 6:17).  It should not be a light thing that the promise here is tied to our obedience.  Let us look at this verse more closely and mark:

1.     To whom it is written:  It is written to “he that believeth” (verse 15), and to “the temple of the living God” (verse 16).

2.     It is conditional:  “Come out”, “be ye separate”, “touch not”… “and I will”.

3.     There is a promise:  “and I will receive you”.  This promise is tied to the statement in the earlier verse, “I will be their God, and they shall be my people”.

We should note that this conditional promise is not a cause and effect promise.  It does not say, “If you will do thus and such, then I will respond by doing thus and such”.  Obedience does not bring the reward of Grace.  Grace is a free gift of God and is not a reward for obedience.  This relationship is a “means/ends” relationship.  Obedience to God is always the result of Grace worked in the heart of the child of God.  Our obedience, then, is the means God uses to call us to Himself and usher us into the Kingdom of God, whereby He receives us and calls us His people.  The Arminian thinker can only see the conditionality of the promise and conclude that God only chooses and saves after we obey, which could not be further from the truth.  They cannot back up one step and look at the conditions required for any obedience to be both real, and accepted by God.  In order to be obedient we must have received Grace in the form of the gifts of faith, belief and repentance.  Only then can obedience be both real and acceptable to God.  So the Arminian system says this:

Obedience causes God to receive us (when He otherwise would not have) whereby we are saved.

The true system says this:

True Grace wrought in the heart causes obedience which is God’s means of calling us to Himself whereby we are shown to be the saved children of God.

So, applying the truth of God’s means/ends system to the verse we are studying here shows us that those who “come out”, “separate”, “touch not” and who have no fellowship with the modern world culture are those who God calls the “temple of the living God”.  A “christianity” that does not result in a vastly different worldview and culture from that of the world is not really Christianity at all, it is practical atheism.  Where is the lesson here and how does it apply to our topic?  Let’s look.

The great Puritan theologian John Owen saw similar worldliness and practical atheism among the professing believers of his own day.  Owen noted that there was a lack of practical Godliness and a proper Christian culture among professors because of the “peace they have in the world and the divisions that they have among themselves” (Works of John Owen, Volume 6 Preface).  If we examine the corporate system called “Christianity” today, we will note that there are some important characteristics of it.  There are multitudes of divisions between different denominations and sects, but they virtually all have one thing in common… they are at peace with and in the world.  Worldliness is the one characteristic that could possibly draw all these groups together because it is the one thing they all share and love.  Now, if we were to distill the characteristics of the “world” (that God condemns but professing “christianity” adores) down to a definable system, that system would be called “The World Culture”.  That culture is known by its traits:

1.     It is industrial.

2.     It is corporate and driven by business.

3.     It is “purpose driven”.

4.     It is urban.

5.     It is guided by secular principles, or secular principles with amorphously religious facepaint.

6.     It encompasses every area of life.

7.     It allows for every worldview and culture except its exact opposite.  It requires assimilation.

In my first Agrarianism article I stated that Agrarianism was the only proper seedbed for Christianity.  Where Christianity has existed in an Agrarian culture, it has thrived and produced ample fruit.  Where it has existed nominally in a non-agrarian culture it has proved to produce no fruit at all except apostasy.  Examples abound.  Christianity was born “outside the camp” in the rural areas of Israel and it found its greatest movement and growth once it was scattered out of urban Jerusalem after the stoning of Stephen.  It has been hunted down and persecuted by the great harlot city of Rome, while it thrived in the valleys and mountains of the Alps.  It found Reformation in Germany, Switzerland, England and Scotland only to suffocate again when it became the state religion in the great cities of those lands.  It fled Europe for the wilds of Puritan America and thrived in the fertile soils of the New World, only to be choked out once again by the stony ground of northern industrialism and the growing urban state.  Christianity is not just theology, and the sooner we realize and accept that, the faster we will grow into maturity.

Biblical Agrarianism is a whole system of life, and it is the only system that is designed by God to be the life-support system of true Christianity.

We looked at the characteristics of the world culture; now let’s look at the characteristics of an Agrarian culture:

1.     It is Agrarian.  It is based on the right and sustainable management of God’s creation to the glory of God.

2.     It is separatist, family driven and conducive of right religion.

3.     It is process driven.

4.     It is rural.

5.     It is guided by truly Christian principles.

6.     It encompasses every area of life.

7.     It condemns every worldview, not in political terms, but by its successful separation and disregard of them.  It does not require assimilation.

I fear that some people, when they read of Agrarianism, have far too limited a view of what that really is.

Let us consider the parable of the sower.  Every parable is both a mystery and a promise.  It is a mystery locked away from those whom God does not will to enlighten; and it is a promise made to all those who will diligently seek God’s wisdom in the matter.  The parable of the sower shows us that the seed of the Gospel will only thrive in proper soil (good ground).  The spiritual truth of this parable unveils the mystery of God’s wonderful salvation.  Only the heart that is made flesh by the sovereign action of God in quickening it, will be able to hear and obey the Gospel.  The heart is the “ground”.  The “way side” heart will never respond at all to the Gospel.  The seed is eaten up by the birds.  The heart of stone may produce a nominal professing “christian”, but it never will produce a true Christian.  The thorny ground heart will receive the seed, but it will receive ANY seed.  In it lies the seed of the Gospel, along with the seed of thorns and briars.  The cares and love of the world, like weeds in a garden, grow faster and stronger and choke out the Gospel in the heart.  Only the good ground… the flesh heart, can receive the seed and produce a crop of fruit from the seed planted by the sower.  The seed remains the same in each case, but it is the ground that determines the crop.

Christianity is preached around the world; in industrialized cities, urban landscapes, businesses, etc.  It may even take root in those places, just as a tree will sometimes take root on a rocky cliff.  But to those hearers, God has said, “Come out from among them and be ye separate”.  We are not trees.  We have legs.  We are called to come out of that culture and to be planted in good soil.  The industrialized world culture is not good ground for Christianity.  The parables of Christianity do not apply there.  The lexicon of Christianity is foreign there.  The lessons of Christianity are moot in that culture.  Agrarianism is the only proper seedbed of Christianity, and it is the only school where we can learn to be what God created us to be in the spiritual world.

Christ called us immediately to enter His Kingdom, while stating that His Kingdom was not of this world.  To the worldly professor, this is an unanswerable paradox.  To the Agrarian Christian, it makes perfect sense.  Just as in the debate between Calvinists and Arminians, we are left with the question, “What did He mean by ‘world’?”  The Arminian argues that whenever you see the word “world”, you must read it to mean the whole world and everything in it.  The Calvinist rightly argues that the meaning of the world is only understood through its context, and through a diligent study of the several meanings of the word in scripture.  However, the worldly, urban, industrialized Calvinist soon finds himself on the Arminian side of the argument when asked to examine what Christ meant when He stated that His Kingdom was not of this world.  The worldly “christian” must rest in paradox, because if he ever comes to the conclusion that the “world” Christ speaks of is the “world culture” in which he lives, moves and has his being, then he will be undone.  Christ called us immediately into His Kingdom.  We were bidden to come unto Him who was slain outside the camp.  We were commanded to come out from among them and be separate.

Agrarianism provides the only stage for Christian happiness.  It is not a dream to think that God has provided a way for His children to exist outside the Antichrist cultural system.  I am not offering Christian Agrarianism as an “option” available for those who profess Christ.  Agrarianism is the only proper seedbed of a Christian life and worldview.  The whole Bible teaches it, and every story and parable re-affirms it.  In an article on Agrarianism by Ted J. Smith III, Ph.D., Mr Smith said,

“Agrarians believe that the best society is one composed largely of farmers who work their own land, local tradesman and independent artisans, bound together in stable, harmonious communities in which citizens know one another as persons, not just roles.  Under a regime of self-government, this arrangement offers the greatest possible scope for the exercise of individual freedom, and the greatest possible incentive to exercise that freedom responsibly.”

Mr. Smith added,

“Agrarian ideals were dominant in America through the end of the 19^th century, and in much of the South, Midwest, and West until well into the 20^th.  But they were gradually forced from the scene by the inexorable spread of industrialism, modernism and the leviathan state.”

Agrarianism is more than farming.  It is art, poetry and music.  It is culture.  It is learning trades and working and surviving with our hands and by the sweat of our brow.  Just as Christianity is far more than doctrine, Agrarianism is far more than just farming.  This is why the world hates it so.  We must realize that it is no coincidence that true Christianity was stomped out of the American north with the advent of industrialism, which brought with it a secular culture.  Nor was it coincidence that the war (both cultural and civil) against the South was not a war against racism or slavery, but at its root it was a war against Agrarianism and the successes of that culture.  Anti-agrarianism meant children in public schools and women in factories.  Anti-agrarianism meant men punching clocks and buying food in stores.  The winners in that war were the agribusiness giants, corporations, merchants and bankers.  The result was feminism and matriarchy, statism, and a debt culture.   In the Agrarian system, there was no room for the Antichrist and his system of culture, economics and politics.  Since Christians, for the most part, did not know they were in a war; or worse than that – they were on the wrong side of that war, the Agrarian culture, in most minds, is no more than a pastoral picture on a wall, or a mythic, utopian memory of a bygone era.  Family farms are now things you might visit with the children or that you just dream about while you remain a cog in a system that itself is concocted to crush that same dream.  Philosophers, Historians and Anthropologists rightly called that war a “culture war”, but they wrongly identified the participants in the battle.  It was not just a war between a secular and a religious worldview.  It was properly a war between Industrialism and Agrarianism, between Antichrist and Christianity.

“And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations” (Rev. 13:7)

Typology and Prophecy

Nebuzaradan was the captain of Nebuchadnezzar’s guard.  When the Babylonian army invaded and destroyed Jerusalem, the rich urbanites that had not fled Jerusalem were carried away into captivity.  Only the poor were left to tend the land.  God has ordered his people to flee the city.  By way of prophecy, and by way of direct command, the people of God have been exhorted to get out while there is still time.  The enemy is now taking men captive at his will, placing them in captivity to the Babylonian system, and making slaves of those who still claim to be the people of God.  But listen closely, for Christ has said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3).  The poor inherit the Kingdom, and are left to work the land as God has commanded.

Agrarianism is more than farming.  Christianity is more than doctrine.  5 years ago it was hard to find right theological doctrine anywhere.  Now, if you look hard enough, you can find it.  But many of its proponents are just as dead as they were before they filled their heads with the Doctrines of Grace.  Their lives remain as they were.  Sure there are cosmetic differences, and they have religious themed music in the CD player, but their culture remains unchanged.

Let us not forget that the product of Grace is obedience, and the promise of obedience is that it will be the means of our coming unto God as His children.  The stakes are no less important than that.

I am your servant in Christ Jesus,

Michael Bunker

 
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