State Capture Or Prophetic Recapture? The Church Must Decide

There is almost universal agreement that President Cyril Ramaphosa missed a unique opportunity to decisively tackle South Africa’s most critical issues in his 4^th State of the Nation Address on 13 February 2020. Although his honesty about the dismal state of the economy was refreshing, Mr Ramaphosa skirted several issues on corruption and chose to placate the ANC and its allies with populist policies that have little chance of success.

Mr Ramaphosa is aware of the radical changes the country needs to ensure its survival – but he chose the ANC over the nation. Populist policies like the National Health Insurance (NHI), Expropriation without Compensation, a state bank, a sovereign wealth fund and a smart city in Lanseria are not what investors are demanding and will certainly not rescue the economy.

What will revive the economy, stabilise SOE’s and attract desperately needed investment into the country is the swift prosecution and imprisonment of those implicated in the massive theft of public funds and the crippling of state institutions, both within the ANC and the private sector. Also needed are courageous moves to privatise failing SOE’s that have bankrupted the country.

Tragically, therefore, while the ANC remains in power – none of this is possible. The ruling party has clearly demonstrated its contempt for struggling citizens as it shields the corrupt within its ranks and manipulates state resources for cadre-enrichment. More ominous is governments hostility to the Bible-believing Church.

RW Johnson writes, “The ANC feeding frenzy has consumed the state and the SOE’s and it’s not finished yet.”

The ANC ruled government increasingly rejects the valid concerns and Biblical convictions of Bible-believing Christian citizens – I stress Bible-believing Christians because there is a sector of the “church” that appears to be captured by government to aid and abet its godless policy roll-out.

Governments appalling treatment of Christian leaders at the CSE meeting in Pretoria recently and its unwavering commitment to the global abortion and LGBTQ agenda means United Nations (UN) policies will almost certainly overrule the will of South African citizens.

What is of greater concern however is that the Church appears to have abandoned its moral authority and provide government free reign to determine the social moral conscience through public policy. The state usurps Biblical morality by legislating the non-sanctity of human life, the redefinition of marriage and the family and the acceptable limits and extent of human sexuality. 

In addition, the continued mismanagement of the country’s financial resources including its state-owned institutions, the state protection of brazen criminals and governments alliance with the global sexual rights movement means South Africa will not fulfil its real potential until the true Church of Jesus Christ recaptures its prophetic mandate.

US civil rights leader, Dr Martin Luther King Jr said, “The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool. If the church does not recapture its prophetic zeal, it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority.” (A Knock at Midnight, June 11, 1967)

Most Christian citizens are losing hope. Not only because of rampant state corruption but also the discernable decline of spiritual and moral authority that has set the nation on a downward spiral of state-sanctioned looting of public funds, the devaluation of marriage and the family, rampant crime, unaccountable public servants, economic decline, spiralling unemployment, deepening health and educational crisis, sexual indoctrination of children, widespread women and child abuse and the steady erosion of free speech and religious freedoms to specifically undermine Biblical values to elevate sexual rights as morally superior.

Government, the media and a growing number of Christians view the Christian Church as an irrelevant social club lacking moral and spiritual authority. A senior government official recently spoke of “the state’s religious sector.” That is, those religious leaders aligned to the ANC (Not Jesus Christ and His Word), who’s task is to sanctify and advance government policies regardless of whether it violates Scripture.

Significantly, however, there is a righteous remnant in South Africa that refuse to break covenant with the Lord Jesus for a temporary place at the king’s table. South Africa’s future depends on the actions of this remnant. But it will require courageous and visionary leadership to steer the nation toward its God-given destiny. 

The Church was a moral and spiritual force during the battle against apartheid. It can be so once again. Though we face different challenges today, the battle for righteousness, truth and justice remains a core responsibility of the Christian Church. For without it we become that irrelevant social club lacking moral and spiritual authority Dr King so eloquently warned about.