Oliver Cromwell: Where Are You
When We Really Need You?

History – specifically the history of Oliver Cromwell -- teaches us that desperate times call for desperate action. Ministers of the gospel wield the sword of the Spirit—teaching and preaching of the whole council of God (Acts 20:27).

Ministers of justice wield the sword of steel—acting and responding as God’s council of justice (Rom. 13:3-4). These statements succinctly define the duties of each in his respective office.

Oliver Cromwell

History also teaches us that man’s fallen nature often leads him to abuse these ministerial offices. These abuses take many forms—anything from dereliction of duty to tyrannical decisions.

When elders of the church fail to discipline unruly conduct and correct errors in doctrine, they are neglecting their duties as ministers of God. The other extreme is to impose rules on members where the Bible is silent and create unbiblical, authoritative church offices. This is ecclesiastical tyranny.

When civil officers fail to enforce just laws and correct erroneous laws, they are neglecting their duties as ministers of God. The other extreme is to impose lawlessness in opposition to biblical civil law and create offices to impose draconian measures on citizens. This is civil tyranny.

The answer to both kinds of tyranny is the biblical doctrine of interposition—lower authorities like Oliver Cromwell taking the lead against tyrants. We see historical examples of orderly revolt in both realms, ecclesiastical and civil.

Although both realms (Biblically speaking) are administratively separated from each other, they are both under the federal headship of the One to whom all authority in heaven and earth has been given, the Lord Jesus Christ (Matt. 28:18). He is the One to whom every knee must bow (Phil. 2:10)—ecclesiastical and civil. He is both the Head of the church (Col. 1:18) and the King of kings (Rev. 19:16).

Righteous Ecclesiastical Revolt

The apostles Peter and John’s revolt against the wishes of the religious leaders of Jerusalem was not out of disrespect for them or their offices, but rather out of obedience and loyalty to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Head of the church, when they declared, “Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19-20).

An Augustinian monk named Martin Luther could not recant his position. As he stood before the Diet of Worms, he declared, “…my conscience is taken captive by God's word, I cannot and will not recant anything, for to act against our conscience is neither safe for us, nor open to us. On this I take my stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen.” These revolts were not motivated by mob rule as was the case with Theudas of Judah or the Anabaptists of Munster, but by godly conviction.

Righteous Civil Revolt

Likewise, ancient Israel kept falling into idolatry and consequently into oppression by the Canaanites. Upon repentance, God would always raise up a leader in the person of a judge of Israel not by a mob uprising.

Centuries later, God’s prophets commanded the Israelites to yield to their Babylonian oppressors until the time of deliverance and prophesied restoration to their homeland. That restoration came in the person of Cyrus of Persia.

About two millennia later we come to a situation closely resembling our own times. His Majesty, King Charles I of England (1600-1649), was becoming a more oppressive tyrant with each passing year since his coronation in 1626. He had the power to assemble Parliament or disassemble them at his own whim.

The struggle between kings and lesser magistrates had begun in earnest 400 years earlier with the Magna Charta. Charles, now in full control of Parliament, was spending the nation into bankruptcy with his wild schemes.

This tyrant was overthrown by lesser magistrates in the English Civil War (1642-1646). Oliver Cromwell, Puritan, soldier, statesman (1599-1658) played a major role in the cause of freedom. He raised and trained an army for Parliament and became Lieutenant-General.

King Charles was captured and eventually tried for treason, having parleyed with foreign leaders to bring armies against England’s freemen who were resisting his oppression. Charles received a death sentence by beheading in 1649. Oliver Cromwell was the third to sign the death warrant.

When Parliament offered him the crown, he refused. Oliver Cromwell became Lord Protector of the English republic in 1653 and held this position until he died in 1658. Though the monarchy was eventually restored, England was never again the same.

When we try to analyze Seventeenth Century actions through twenty-first Century eyes we encounter a disconnect. The struggle for freedom cannot be separated from the struggle for righteousness in the civil realm. This battle is not for the squeamish and certain awesome phases of it do not fit all callings and personalities.

Oliver Cromwell was one in a million. So was King David, whom god did not allow to build the temple because of the blood on his sword. He was a man of war, but he was also a man after God’s own heart.

King Charles I

We must also remember that the death of King Charles I was not an assassination; it was a lawful execution after due process of law in accordance with the doctrine of interposition. History bears out that visions of grandeur often cause one to fly too close to the sun. His wings melt. He falls to the earth in a useless heap.

The Bible refutes the notion of the divine right of kings, and thus also did Oliver Cromwell. They are not above the law. “And it shall be, when he sitteth upon the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write him a copy of this law in a book out of that which is before the priests the Levites: And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life: that he may learn to fear the LORD his God, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them: That his heart be not lifted up above his brethren, and that he turn not aside from the commandment, to the right hand, or to the left: to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he and his children, in the midst of Israel” (Deuteronomy 17:18-20).

Christians have a duty to think Biblically and act Biblically. And we also have a duty to call on lower magistrates to do the same. When wicked politicians usurp power, they mock God and must be called to task before they entrench themselves and their little Tsars so deeply in their draconian bunkers that they are nearly impossible to remove when there is no more freedom of speech or freedom of the press. Ministers of the gospel and ministers of justice, where are you? Laymen and citizens, where are you?

Patriotism has its place, but it is not nearly enough. The battle for lasting freedom is a battle for God’s law under the crown rights of King Jesus—the only King with divine rights. We can only conclude by repeating the question with which we began: “Oliver Cromwell, where are you when we really need you?”

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