I found a very perceptive piece from David McGrogan on how the current globalist juggernaut is rooted in dependence.
He refers to Machiavelli’s book The Prince as the first solid glimpse into the very nature of the secular state, something being born at that time. His world was transitioning from Medieval feudalism, with it’s ruling kings holding their domains as personal property given by God, and moving toward an impersonal rule that was wholly rooted in this world.
The key to feudalism was the dire need of individuals to have protection from hostile powers. Some small landholder with very limited defensive resources would submit to a more powerful domain holder to avoid losses from violence. It was a bargain of sorts: Surrender some power and resources to someone who is supposed to care about your welfare, in exchange for avoiding more tragic losses from someone who hates you. The petty noble could always change his mind and choose a better offer. That was the core of what feudalism was.
The state reduces everyone to the status of peasants; there can be no nobility to own defensive means. The state has no need to negotiate feudal loyalty. But the populace could resist and waste resources, so the state had to create the same sense of fear that feudal petty nobles had. However, the state would create a far more overwhelming sense of fear, making everyone totally dependent on the state.
Anything that gives the peasants a sense of control over any portion of their destiny is forbidden by the state. But since this is part of the human psyche, the state must take control over the media, academia and arts to insure that people focus on gaining control of things that don’t matter to the state, things that cannot actually make the populace independent in any way. The key is dependency; everyone must have a sense of need for the state’s protection against threats lurking somewhere “out there”. Thus, we are each compartmentalized, dividing our attention across countless tribal identities, any number of concerns that don’t threaten the control of the state.
McGrogan goes on to point out how the primary justification for the state to exist (raison de e’tat) is extrapolated into an even stronger mandate for global government (raison du monde).
Meanwhile, any tribal identity that actually addresses our needs is condemned and vilified. This would include something like the Red Pill Men’s movement. It’s one thing to have the false chivalry torn down and women taken off the pedestal of false worship; the proximate result is that men could get better at manipulating women to sate their fleshly desires. It worked so well because it’s what women want, whether they consciously know it or not. But when some men of faith began to notice that this lore could help them find a the doorway to rediscover their biblical path of manhood and being a lot less needy of the state and society at large, it came under massive attack. Not least among the attackers were mainstream churches, which have long stood by their bargain with the state.
Biblical headship and patriarchy is a threat to the state (and churches), which in turn threatens the perception of safety everyone draws from the state.
The initial attraction of the Red Pill Men’s lore has faded, as the social context has changed so much that the PUA tricks just don’t work that well any more. The sexual market is so very tight that only a small percentage of men with real talent can pull it off, and they never needed PUA training in the first place. The forums and blogs have closed down, and very few still carry the discussion forward. What keeps these few alive? It’s no longer a question of getting some; it’s a question of being a man as God intended. The motivation has little to do with chasing tail and dominating in the bedroom. What keeps the discussion alive is what it points to: men being men as God intended in all the domains of their lives.
Nor is the answer rebelling against the state, at least not in any obvious way. It’s not about breaking down the state, but living in a different realm that the state cannot touch. The Word calls us to a higher realm. The power of biblical manhood is just how very impractical it can be. It makes no real sense; it won’t work in the flesh. You can’t do it without divine power. The entire gamut of Biblical Law rests on the community of miracles. God’s miracles come with the Covenant, and are generally unavailable without it. The covenant people don’t come together in community because it makes sense. Indeed, you end up being commanded by the Word to love people your flesh would hardly notice in the first place. There is no earthly reason for most communities, but the shared commitment of faith overcomes all of that.
If we propose the standards of Biblical Law for the world, it cannot work for them. Then again, nothing else will, either. Social and political turmoil is built into our human existence. This is a fallen world under Satan’s authority. Obeying the Law superficially will never work. You must first establish the communion between you and God, and then a community with His other children.
McGrogan recommends measures of independence from the state and from the globalist mandate. We are not seeking independence; we are moving our loyalty to Christ in a higher realm. However, neither the state nor the globalist mandate recognizes Him, nor His spiritual realm, as real. To them, it registers as an attack to seek biblical manhood. How you balance it out is between you and the Lord, but we must obey Him at all costs. This is something that justifies study in a community of faith.
As someone else has noted, we have not yet begun to resist sin far enough to shed blood, but we are getting closer.
NT Doctrine — Acts 16
Paul and Silas passed through the Cilician Taurus Mountains and went directly to Derbe on the plain beyond. Next was Lystra, the pagan Phrygian town where Jews were too few to have a synagogue, but thanks to Paul, they had a church. By this time a young man named Timothy had risen as a major figure in the church there. His mother was Jewish, but his father was a well-known pagan Gentile. The Jews in that region knew Timothy as a pagan, but to the pagans, he was regarded as a Jew. So to settle the issue, Paul sponsored his full conversion to Judaism with circumcision. This placed him on par with Paul and Silas as far as Jews were concerned, and he joined their company. They continued visiting the church plants in the area.
This trio passed through the church plants from the previous journey of Paul and Barnabas, sharing the letter from the Jerusalem Council. As with Timothy, this gave the churches a much clearer identity that distinguished them from pagans and Jews both. The trio were hoping to plant more churches in Asia Minor, but the Lord restricted them from going either into the southwest or anywhere near the north coast of modern Turkey. They split the difference and ended up in Troas, near the site of ancient Troy. It was there they were joined by Luke, who now includes himself in the narrative as part of “we”.
The Lord revealed in a dream that they should head across the Aegean Sea into Macedonia. So the next morning, they sailed at the first opportunity and landed in Neapolis, directly across the bay from the island of Thasos. The land here is mountainous, with few flat areas. Thus, Neapolis (modern Kavala) sat on a narrow shelf near a faint pass through a ridge of mountains that otherwise ran down to the sea all along the coast. Through that pass ran the Egnatian Way, and it crossed one of the few open flat areas, skirting a large swamp. The Roman highway led them mostly northward to Philippi.
Today the ruins of Philippi sit at the southern tip of a great rocky hump of a hill, rather elongated north to south, and connected to some mountains on the north end. Just to the east now stands the City of Krinides, which had been the original name of Philippi. Once the Romans conquered Greece, this ancient city was renamed after one of the emperors. It was made into a Roman colony, populated mostly by Roman army veterans and offering all the privileges of their home city of Rome, with all the officials and Roman habits. Indeed, it was built up to look somewhat like a miniature of Rome.
On both sides of this elongated hump above the city ran a small watercourse. It’s impossible to know for sure which is the one Luke refers to as the meeting place of women who had converted to Judaism, but it was only a short walk either direction from the city. As was customary in Jewish synagogue services, Paul sat down to teach. Among the women was one who resided in Philippi selling the expensive purple dyed fabrics produced in her hometown of Thyatira, back over in Asia Minor where the men had just left. A Roman colony like Philippi would require a certain amount of this dyed fabric for official uses, among other things. The city also had plenty of rich folks who would wear that kind of stuff.
Anyone who traded in that purple fabric would be rather well off, too. The woman was named for the region whence she came, Lydia. She was baptized and persuaded the rest of her household family and servants to join her in baptism, confessing Christ. The trio had no good reason to turn away her offer to be their sponsor in the city, and her house became their home base.
I’ll insert here a paragraph from my previously published commentary: One young female slave in Philippi was able to cast fortunes by her demon, certainly with sufficient accuracy to bring in quite a big profit to her masters. There’s no doubt they knew it was the work of a foul spirit haunting her life. When she began following Paul and Silas around town, she spoke the truth. She used the standard pagan term for the Jewish God and said the men knew the way of spiritual security. The problem is that when demons speak the truth they do so without the power of the Holy Spirit, so it becomes a form of blasphemy, gutting the power of Truth. This grated on Paul’s nerves, and he felt compelled to deliver the girl from the demon, if only to end the blasphemy. Sadly, a good thing for her was bad for her masters’ business.
The owners of this slave took these men as Jews, whose religion was just barely tolerated under Roman law. They publicly charged these men with interfering in the religion of others, having driven out a pagan spirit from their slave. They added in common complaints about Jews disrupting Roman social order. A mob was stirred up and the local magistrates didn’t bother with any kind of hearing, but ordered them stripped and beaten by with the rods normally wrapped around the standard Roman symbolic axes carried by the guards escorting these magistrates. Then the trio were turned over to the jailer, a retired army veteran himself.
Since the custody order included ensuring they would be present for further court action the next day, the jailer put their feet in stocks, which meant a very uncomfortable posture, neither quite sitting nor lying down overnight. Nearing midnight, the trio sang a hymn, which triggered an earthquake. It’s for sure any other prisoners would have made that association, and Paul managed to convince them all to stay put when the prison didn’t quite collapse, but all the internal fixtures, including the stocks and doors, came open.
For the jailer’s superiors, it wouldn’t matter the cause. Losing custody of his prisoners would mean a humiliating public execution. The jailer lived in the same building; upon a cursory examination of the facility, he prepared to take his own life to avoid the shame. Paul expected this and called out for him to wait, as none of the prisoners had fled. So he came to where they stood and asked the same question any pagan man would: How does one find the spiritual security all men sought?
Now it became clear why the Lord had allowed Paul, Silas and Timothy to suffer this awful experience in the first place. The man was baptized along with everyone in his household. He treated the three as honored guests, dressing their wounds and feeding them. They passed the rest of the night in teaching and celebration. The jailer could do as he wished with his prisoners, as long as they were still in custody.
At dawn the lictors arrived to call for the trio to be released. Paul objected. His point was not to shame the magistrates, but to impress upon them that they were honorable men as Christians, not trouble-making Jews. This was the best way to gain a permissive attitude, if not respect, from the city government. What they had done in summarily beating these three men was flatly forbidden, as they were Roman citizens. Had Paul wanted to file a complaint with the regional officials, the magistrates would be very lucky if they were only dismissed, turned out of office. They could have been publicly beaten in the same manner, or worse.
They hurried and came to beg the men to leave town quietly, and may have even offered a bribe. But they couldn’t order them to leave town, and having gotten their attention, Paul decided to stay just a little longer and depart when it was convenient for them to move on. They left behind a church with a wealthy sponsor and a government official as member.