Is the City of God Meant to be an Alternative Civilization?

There is no doubt the city of God is an alternative civilization birthed by Jesus Christ; one that is based upon His very image.

There is an important question to answer in conjunction with that reality, and it is this: since the city of God is another civilization that is an alternative to the worldy civilization, what are the practical implications of that truth?

If you struggle with the idea of the city of God being a new and alternative civilization, think in terms of the fact that our experience of salvation is called a new creation, and when talking of the corporate universal body of Christ, it’s identified as New Jerusalem.

As for what this means practically, I want to throw out a few ideas that are appropriate for the times we live in, specifically in how it relates to the attack on Christians and their way of life, with our enemies attempting to force to agree with their lies and comply with their wishes, or be deplatformed, and pressured to be fired from our jobs or decapitalized from weaponized lawsuits.

While I’m convinced the scriptures below were fulfilled in the times of the early church, the strategies and tactics of Satan and his followers remain the same. For that reason, I see much of the attempt to disenfranchise and attack our very means of making a living, our reputations, and reality itself, as an ancillary offshoot of the principles listed below.

Revelation 13:16-18

16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:

17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.

18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.

While I believe this has already been historically fulfilled, the major point here is that our enemies are attempting to restrict and limit our ability to engage in the economy by trying to keep us from participating in daily human action that allows us to live out our lives. In other words, even though it was fulfilled in the early church, the principles of conflict remain in place. Our enemies will always try to restrict us in regard to our everyday activities if we allow them to. We must fight back as an alternative civilization birthed by Jesus Christ.

The purpose of our enemies is to keep us from declaring the gospel of Jesus Christ, including the command of Jesus in the Great Commission to teach the nations everything He commanded us to obey. That’s the core issue. Attempting to limit what we speak is the strategy being deployed, as well as the accompanying, in many cases, loss of jobs and the means of providing for ourselves and our families.

A tactic used if being fired doesn’t work, is to engage in the use of the legal system to decapitalize us. This in many cases has been done to Christian business owners.

The city of God

This brings me to the topic at hand, which is the practical outworking of the kingdom of God on earth based upon the revelation in the Holy Scriptures and implemented via the working of the Holy Spirit within His people.

My insight and view is that we should work to develop alternative means of sustenance and economics operating within the Christian community by first understanding this is exactly what the early church did as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. In other words, within the confines of those that have faith in Jesus Christ.

In the early church the example they set was to work with their own hands so they had enough for their own families, and extra left over to give to those in need. And in the case of the believers in Jerusalem, Christians from other parts of the world gathered up a significant offering and sent it via Paul to be distributed among the brethren in need there.

This is far more than simply helping the poor in some indiscriminate way, it was based upon the realization they were to operate in a manner that their capital was circulated in a variety of ways amongst one another. Or to put it another way, they realized they were a new civilization that were to adhere to economic guidelines as revealed in the Bible. Those guidelines were based upon the knowledge they were a new civilization birthed by Jesus Christ Himself.

Also of interest, was the Scriptures set forth guidelines for widows. They identified what widows were by definition and within the parameters of their personal lives. Within those guidelines, the church was to take care of them if they were qualified widows. That is a civilizational mandate. Today there is a growing trend to euthanize them.

Implications

The implications of being an alternative civilization are staggering. Let’s look at a few of them.

There is no way we can infiltrate Hollywood on the entertainment side of life that would change it for the better. Some are wrongly attempting to do that, and are wasting their time.

What’s vastly superior to that would be to build an entertainment industry of our own, and put standards in place that would be a great blessing to Christians and to the world. Not only that, but putting the infrastructure in place to make that a reality would be a game changer. It should and will be done.

Other vital areas to do this in would be education, the church, economics, banking, and family, among other aspects of life.

In education, it’s my conclusion that home schooling, while extremely important at this time, won’t be enough to turn the tide of the culture. It is extremely important to maintain a core of young people that can help guide the future, but it won’t be enough to permeate the overall culture. That can only be accomplished by the corporate people of God at the local level across the world.

For that reason I see the need for more Christian schools that are Biblically based and require the adherence to Scriptural standards that are put in place and enforced by management and the faculty.

There obviously are some of these already in place, but we need a lot more in order to help destroy the effect of the public school system on the children of the world, and bring them back to the foundations of the faith. Another vital change that needs to take place is to teach students that the Bible has the answers to all the challenges of life, and show them how to apply those answers to their specific interests and callings.

As for the church, I think it really has to be challenged as to the current model that simply doesn’t work on a comprehensive level; the decadent culture around us proves that point.

When I say the church needs to be challenged, I’m not only talking about what is being taught, as important as that is, but also the very way church is being done today.

After all, what is left over after paying for the church leaders, building mortgage, and utilities and other expenses? What can be used to build the kingdom of God on earth if that’s where all the money is going?

It may be wiser to rent a building or room in a facility that can accomadate church members, than it is to buy land, build a structure, pay leaders, and have nothing left over to expand the kingdom.

For most Christians this is almost unthinkable to them because of the way they view what the church is, but the early church shook the world and had none of these things, outside of paying for part of the salaries of their leaders.

Another thing to consider is the fact the kingdom of God goes far beyond what we consider to be the church. I believe in the years ahead those churches that don’t teach and encourage the people to look for ways to serve and impact the culture, won’t survive; at least in any meaningful way as having any value to God or being a light to the lost.

We must learn to embrace the entirety of the Scriptures and work on applying the truths and revelation to all areas of life. People need to learn that God has answers for us in our daily endeavors, and when they are not only taught that in general, but then shown how it relates to them practically on a daily basis, it’ll be a very attractive way of life for them to embrace and live out.

A word about the Internet

The Internet is a very important tool that has been made available to us, and with the attack on our way of lives, it can easily be circumvented by our enemies that are endlessly scouring the Internet and other means of communication to find ways to deplatform us.

For that reason, it’s imperative we start to build our own alternatives to social networks, payment fulfillment, streaming services, and other parts of the Internet that allow us to get our message out.

It’s not enough to whine and complain about deplatforming when we already know the game is stacked against us, and it’s only a matter of time before the SJWs find us and swarm us to the point of those in control are pressured to remove us from various platforms.

This is true with crowdfunding sites and payment fulfillment businesses as well. They will attempt to control our way of life and message if we want to use their services. That’s why there are so many false Christians and compromisers giving out anti-Christian messages, while siding with our enemies.

They think being nice will placate the left, when in fact it’s far past the point of having a point of contact with them. It’s either stop living and teaching the truth, or we’ll punish you. The biggest means of punishment is using the Internet and its associated social networks and businesses as a weapon against us.

All these people are doing is putting themselves closer to the end of the line; eventually they’ll come for them too.

The point is we must build out our own platforms and digital infrastructure ourselves, or find friendly jurisdictions that want our business and don’t care about what the SJWs think. In those cases, most of the options aren’t located in the West, just to give you some direction.

Conclusion

We as Christians need to start thinking about the fact we are a new creation, a city of God that was birthed upon His very image being revealed in His people.

We need to think in terms of being an alternative civilization as talked about throughout the Scriptures. Not only that, we need to not just accept that at the macro level, but find ways to live that out in the world.

I think it’s going to get worse before it gets better, and for that reason we must prioritize starting to live our lives as a community of believers, building out various forms of infrastructure and platforms that cater to our worldview and bypass the gatekeepers.

This will undermine and destroy their attempt to control us, and provide a light in a world full of darkness, to the point it starts to heal the world in the Biblical way God has meant us to.

It won’t be through globalism, socialism, the state, or primarily through politics. It’ll be through millions of Christians engaged in human action based upon the world view and commands revealed in the Bible.

We can overwhelm the darkness through a multitude of holy brush fires we start around the world, which they are incapable of dealing with. To do this, we must understand and embrace the reality that Jesus Christ, in His people, has birthed a new civilization of light, that is one that will ultimately be the dominant influence and culture in the world.