The United States is a culture of rebels. Our nation’s very conception came in the form of a rebellion. The American Revolution is a story of bold men rising together to fight against the tyrannical hand of the British. This thread still runs deep within our veins. It cries out in the stories we tell. One of the most popular stories of all time, Star Wars, is at its core the story of a small band of rebels. Over 30 years after its release, the Star Wars brand still milks the public for billions of dollars a year. It’s about to get its own theme park, for goodness’ sake. Pop-cultural phenomenon such as The Hunger Games and Divergent are similarly built on the concept of rebellion. They reach inside and touch on something deep inside of every American. We want to rebel.

There is something exciting, empowering, and even uniting about a rebellion. We cheer when Harry Potter stands up to the authority of a malicious teacher like Dolores Umbridge. It feels right, and in so many of our movies the rebels are indeed the ones who end up on the right side of history. No one is going to stand up and support the ideals of Darth Vader or Lord Voldemort.

In the face of a president who has been, shall we say, a less than stellar leader, it is not hard to imagine the kinds of “rebel attitudes” that have begun to rise up within American citizens. In fact, if we zoom out to take a look at various other aspects of society, we can see that this attitude is popular everywhere. Every system is inherently bad simply by nature of the fact that it is a system with authority over me. The teenage rebellion of the 1950s lives on.

I think everyone can agree that there are certain corrupt systems that Christians should be actively working against for the good of society. The slave trade in America or the Nazi ideologies of Germany needed to be taken down. However, anytime a cultural, rather than biblical, ideal is so seamlessly woven into our morality it is worth asking the question: Is this thing truly right? And so, I ask the question, is rebellion a virtue?

I think (and hope) that most Christians would answer “no” when faced so directly with such a question. Unfortunately, though, I think deep down many of us hold to principles much closer to a “yes” than we’d like to admit. We need only look at the Church’s continual cries for “fighting against the system”, whatever “system” that may be, to see that this is the case. The more liberal theological sects of Christianity seem to be built almost exclusively on the merits of simply going against the accepted theologies of Protestant tradition. If you are against the system, you are inherently right—regardless of what the system in question actually stands for.

A brief survey of Church history will quickly reveal that rebellion is nowhere to be found within the attitude of Christ’s earliest followers. Most often, the exact opposite is actually taking place. Silent suffering was most often the stance of Christians. Change was taking place not through outright rebellion, but the teaching of God’s Word, intercession of prayer, and gathering together of the saints. You won’t be finding much support for a rebellious lifestyle in the early Christians.

Similarly, Scripture is rather absent of this kind of call. Instead, we find a much more difficult ethic to which we should strive. Christ commands his disciples to pray for their enemies and bless those who curse them (Matt. 5:44, Lk. 6:28, 1 Pt. 3:9). Our Lord Himself manifests these attitudes throughout His life (1 Pt. 2:23), most stunningly as He hangs on the cross and pleads for the forgiveness of His murderers (Lk. 23:24).

Elsewhere in Scripture, Christians are commanded to live “quiet lives” (2 Thess. 3:10-12) and the book of Proverbs continually warns us to be slow to anger and slow to stirring up conflict (13:10, 15:1, 15:18, 15:28, 29:22). In contrast to the world, the Church is called to be a peacemaker (Matt. 5:9, Rom. 12:18, Js. 3:17-18), at least whenever that is possible without the sacrifice of truth (Rom. 12:1-2, 1 Cor. 15:58, 1 Cor. 16:13).

You may be thinking of Christ’s famous words, “I came not to bring peace, but a sword” (Matt. 10:34). That sounds rather revolutionary, doesn’t it? But of course any verse of Scripture can be twisted to support any philosophy, if merely taken out of context. In this particular instance, we must remember that Christ is not calling his disciples to a political rebellion against Rome. Far from it. This line comes within Jesus’ sending out of the apostles into the world to preach the gospel. The “sword”, in this case, is the gospel. The very gospel that brings peace between God and man is actually going to bring division amongst earthly relationships (Matt. 10:35). The disciples of Christ are called to be so committed to His Kingdom that they will hate their own biological families in comparison to their love for Christ (Matt. 10:37, Lk. 14:26). It is not the pursuit of worldly endeavors that brings division, but the abandonment of them for the sake of Christ.

We naturally like rebels. It’s ingrained within our American psyche. I’m as guilty of this sentiment as anyone. As Christians, though, we cannot allow ourselves to jump immediately to the side of rebellion simply because it feels right. Instead, we must stand on the side of truth, holiness, and grace. It will become continually easier to get caught up in the emotional hoopla of “standing up to the man”, “tearing down authority”, and “taking power”. Rebelling for the sake of rebelling is unbecoming of a follower of Christ, however. We aren’t in the business of tearing down, but building up. We aren’t to be known for everything we angrily attack, but for the things towards which we graciously move. Anytime you find yourself caught up in the rebellion, then, you should stop to ask yourself, “Are both the means and the end of what I’m doing godly, or am I merely being caught up in the whims of cultural values?”

Naturally, you might be wondering if it is ever right for Christians to rebel? Or, perhaps even more problematic, is it ever right for Christians to rebel violently, such as in war? I don’t have an easy answer for either of those questions. To begin sorting out those topics, it would take far more than a blog post. Volumes have already been written discussing the subject, as early as Augustine’s Just War Theory.

My intent is not to enter into these weighty topics. Rather, my hope is simply to remind us that as the culture furiously beats the drums of rebellion, the Church should be taking a step back to think more thoroughly through the issues at hand. No, rebellion is not a virtue. It can, perhaps, be yielded as a tool to work towards the protection and propagation of real virtues. But at the very least, it is a tool that should be used sparingly and with the utmost hesitation by followers of Christ. After all, our battleground is within the realm of the spiritual, not the physical (Eph. 6:12). Our Kingdom, like Christ’s, is of another world (Jn. 18:36).

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“Those who excel in virtue have the best right of all to rebel, but then they are of all men the least inclined to do so.”
– Aristotle

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Mohamed Nohassi