An Interview with Jay Grimstead

Transcribed and edited by Jay Rogers

Jay Grimstead is the founder and president of Coalition on Revival (COR), a national Christian think-tank comprised of leading conservative thinkers. COR created several foundational documents for the Church: The Essentials of a Christian World View (a generic statement of faith); The 25 Articles on the Kingdom of God (a historically orthodox view of the kingdom of God); A Manifesto for the Christian Church (where the Church should stand and what it should do) and The 17 Worldview Documents (stating how to apply the Bible to every field of life). COR gave birth to a Church Council Committee of 60 theologians and other leaders. The goal is to convene a global Church Council in the years 2003, 2005, 2007 to discuss 21 position paper topics. COR works through the National Think Tank which is endeavoring to establish spiritual armies in the major cities of 36 states which organize themselves to rebuild civilization upon the principles of the Bible. COR’s vision is to see Christians everywhere doing all they can to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ (2 Cor. 10:5).

Coalition on Revival
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DVD

God's Law and Society

Sixteen noted Christian leaders and scholars apply the Ten Commandments to American life.

God’s Law and Society powerfully presents a comprehensive worldview based upon the ethical system found in the Law of God.

Speakers include: R.J. Rushdoony, George Grant, Howard Phillips, R.C. Sproul Jr., Ken Gentry, Gary DeMar, Jay Grimstead, Steven Schlissel, Andrew Sandlin, Eric Holmberg, and more!

Sixteen Christian leaders and scholars answer some of the most common questions and misconceptions related to this volatile issue:

Are we under Law or under Grace?
Does the Old Testament Law apply today?
Can we legislate morality?
What are the biblical foundations of government?
Was America founded as a Christian nation?
What about the separation of Church and State?
Is neutrality a myth?
What about non-Christians and the Law of God?
Would there be “freedom” in a Christian republic?
What would a “Christian America” look like?

Perfect for group instruction as well as personal Bible study.

Video: An Interview with Jay Grimstead — An Interview with Jay Grimstead
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*Question:*— Was the New Testament Church really a “New Testament” Church as we think of it today? In what ways was their situation different from ours?

Jay Grimstead: Jesus asked His disciples to pray: “Our Father who art in heaven hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” What we know is that Jesus could not have meant, “None of this is supposed to happen for 2000 years until I come. You are supposed to pray this prayer for 2000 years but expect none of it to happen until I come!” Nobody in their right theological mind would claim that that is what He meant. We know that He had to mean that very year. That century, they were supposed to try to start getting the Roman Empire become a realm where God’s name was honored, His will was done and His kingdom was coming. They pulled it off almost by accident. They actually did it! They came a long direction from being a persecuted minority under a one world government where they were killing them to actually running the Roman Empire.

Augustus Caesar was considered “The Son of God and the Savior of the World” according to Roman statements. There was a coin that the Sanhedrin were used to seeing. It had an image of Augustus Caesar on one side. On the back it said, “There is salvation in none other than Augustus and there is no other name given among men by which they may be saved. “ That was a direct quote from a Roman coin that Peter was giving them in Acts 4:12. He was essentially saying, “Gentlemen, what we are trying to tell you is there is a new world Emperor on earth now — a political, legal Emperor — that your Caesar must bow to or He is out of touch with reality.”

*Question:*— Wouldn’t a Christian Republic run according to God’s Law become oppressive to non-Christians?

Jay Grimstead: God has given great wisdom to all mankind on how to run life; how to families; how to run governments; how to have just courts and just laws — in the Bible. The Bible is the Owner’s Manual that comes with the machine. He certainly knows better than all of us put together what makes us run well and what would make a good society and what could make a prosperous joyful, peaceful, orderly society. We believe that He has given us these laws in the Bible. We also can prove from looking at history that this already worked marvelously wherever they seriously attempted it. It worked in Geneva, in Scotland and to a certain degree in England. It worked marvelously here in America in the 1600s, 1700s and even into the early 1800s.

When saying that America did a great job, I don’t mean that there were not problems. It’s not that we want to duplicate everything they did. We would want to eliminate slavery right from the beginning. It should have been done at the Constitution. It was our very bad mistake. There is no excuse for that. It needs to be repented of. But compared with any other society in history, there has never been such freedom for blacks, whites or women in the world as we had here. The Biblically thinking women, blacks, Indians, Chinese, Jews — anybody who would be considered an ethnic group — say the same thing. It’s not the clear thinking biblical people in those groups who would have trouble with this.

*Question:*— What can Christians begin to do from a practical standpoint to begin to rebuild their nation according to the standard of the Law of God? What would a Christian nation look like?

Jay Grimstead: God allowed our Coalition on Revival organization to bring theologians together from different theologies and sweep through 2000 years of Church theology and boil it down into a beaker — into a fine white powder at the bottom. We came up with the 42 Articles On Christian Worldview. They are marvelous. It’s a generic statement of faith for all denominations. We sent these 42 Articles to every denomination where we could get a central address. We received nothing but rave notices about how wonderful and, how comprehensive this is, and how it fits their denomination — Lutheran, Episcopalian, Assemblies of God, Baptist, Presbyterian, and Independents. We left out areas like eschatology, baptism, church government, and modes of worship. We did not intentionally speak about those things.

What I am telling you is there is far more doctrinal unity potential than in every city than anybody knows about because of the 42 Articles. Everywhere I go, it blows people away because they didn’t know they had so much in common with the Lutherans or the Assemblies of God or the Baptists.

You start with a group of serious Christians who are obedient and who are willing to die for the cause — to die for Jesus, the brethren and the Truth. If we don’t have that, we can’t make headway in any century, but particularly at a crisis point in history like we have now — the coming collision course between Christian philosophy and anti-Christian philosophy. We must have people willing for martyrdom and holy living.

Then there needs to be a number of committees in each city for the Christians involved in the arts, communications, law, economics, family counseling, medicine, etc. They must connect into a united spiritual army of Christians in every city. I am proposing that we find people to run for office and attempt — systematically, professionally and constitutionally — to capture the majority of seats in every state legislature, city council, county board of supervisors, the U.S. Congress, and then take the mayor, sheriff and governor seats.

We must be about the business of rebuilding civilization on the principles of the Bible. That would be our restatement of the Great Commission.