Dominion Theology

To rule or not to rule?

ver. : 25 December 2007

• Dominion Theology
• the Prosperity Gospel

"Manifest Sons of God" and Dominion Theology

Dominion theology is the belief that Christians have a divine right to fill, and if necessary seize positions of power in the society and government. For most of them, in the end times (which, they believe, we are in or on the brink of), God will create special leaders who will overcome the world, destroy the enemies of Christ and attain ruling power ('dominion') throughout the world, ushering in the Kingdom of God. Some of the leading Pentecostalist preachers use elements of dominionist ideas when praching, and use terms inferring that such leaders will come from their own ranks. Dominion teachings are a feature of Latter Rain, Christian Nationalist, and many other end-times-oriented movements, and have been around in many forms for a long, long time. It's sometimes referred to as "Kingdom Now" or "Christian Reconstructionism" (though the latter term is sometimes used for earlier and less strict movements that have little to do with today's dominion thinking.)

Modern Dominion believers envision a future where the "manifest sons of God" (sometimes known as 'Joel's Army'), a spiritually-empowered elite, will be armed with supernatural power for the purpose of wresting control of the world from the hands of Satan's slaves. Their predecessors today are the "mighty men of God" who, while not quite of the same level of power, are nonetheless the ones faithful Christians are to take their marching orders from. They are to exercise "heavenly" dominion over whatever aspets of life they can. In some versions of this concept, the manifest children will already have perfected new Kingdom-bodies, and they will be able to stride across the earth with the power of gods. The manifest sons will have a "Joshua Generation" or "Caleb generation" as followers, the faithful few whom God will greatly empower. The manifest sons and Joshua generation would exercise dominion over society, establish the Kingdom, complete the Church, and (a few even whisper) perhaps even complete Jesus, who up until their success is a head without a Body. The organized bodies of Christianity (denominations, seminaries, interchurch agencies, most parachurch groups, and most especially the Roman Catholic Church), so dominion theory goes, are controlled by the spirit of the Anti-Christ and thus will be among the first to be vanquished by the new order.

Do I really need to ask if dominion theology is a remaking of the imagery of Revelation into the image of fascism?

• No matter how much we read in the Bible about how Christ and the early church were totally unconcerned with getting control and power over the world or the nation or even their own villages, we can't get this conquest stuff out of our heads. Power and control are the stuff of the worship of Ba'al or Mars, not of the God who died at our hands. The word 'dominion' has the same root as 'domineer', 'dominate' and 'domination'. Granted, it's thrilling to dominate others. But Christ's followers were not called to seek dominion, they were called to serve and love.
• No matter how much we're called to freely share the only key to spiritual power (the gospel of Jesus Christ), we want to believe there's insider stuff that matters, and that we are among the good few who know.
• No matter how many signposts of the Kingdom God puts into the daily life and the other people around us, and no matter how much the New Testament teaches us to have a spirit of forgiveness and grace, too many of us want to damn those 'others' around us and push them out of public discourse and eternal life.
• No matter how much Jesus and Paul speak of being servants, we keep getting sucked into to the magnetic idea of being in the master class.
• No matter how much it is clear that God only sends real, flawed humans like us to lead the Church, and calls on them to be servant-leaders instead of masters, we keep wanting to have flawless superheroes and übermensch.

Can't you just feel the testosterone rush behind these ideas? I wonder if there'll be any women über-apostles? Or are they just supposed to shut up and follow? Isn't it strange that the 'manifest sons' exercise dominion in a way directly rejected by Jesus? Also, the bit about the existing structures being run by the anti-Christ is a magnetic temptation to those who have had to deal with frustrating church bureaucrats pushing their own agendas without regard to Christ. But there's no anti-Christ pulling supernatural strings on his slave bureaucrats or seminary profs, there's only typical humans spreading typically-human buffalo-chips that should be seen and handled for what they are.

There is simply no real basis for Dominion theology anywhere in the New Testament. It is, in fact, vigorously anti-Christian in the power-obsessed attitude it breeds. It just isn't the way God operates in the Scriptures.

A 2007 post-script : On four places on-line I've come across a new conspiracy theory. It labels the charismatic movement, various parachurch organizations, and a wide array of 'mainline renewal' groups as the well-disguised leading edges of a Dominionist camp which runs the Assemblies of God, and which seeks control over all of Christianity. This theory appears to have started with folks who were hurt in the disintegration of several United Church of Christ congregations - disintegration that involved some members who followed the lead of this 'conspiracy'. As someone who's been part of splitting congregations, I feel their hurt, but the theory is about 90% bunk. Worse, it tells flat-out lies about many people who are acting out of a justifiable concern about the direction of their denominations. Don't get me wrong : I'm very concerned about Dominion Theology. It's worse than mere heresy because of how it amplifies the thirst for power, and Americans in particular fall easy prey to it. Dominionists play dirty and they aim to win. But this particular conspiracy theory is baseless rant.
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