Fight the Powers

What the Bible Says About the Relationship Between Spiritual Forces and Human Governments

By: Cody Cook

Narrated by: Brian P. Craig

Length: 2 hrs and 22 mins

Publisher's summary

When Satan claimed to have authority over the kingdoms of the world and said he could give them to whomever he chose, why did Jesus not contradict him? Why instead did Jesus go on to describe Satan as the "god of this world?" If Satan is the spiritual head over the world's governments, can there be such a thing as a Christian nation?

In Fight the Powers, Cody Cook compiles the relevant biblical data which draws connections between political power and spiritual forces, seeking to answer the question of how Christians ought to relate to the state in light of these connections.

©2018 Cody Cook (P)2022 Cody Cook

Good primer on Divine Council Worldview

Provides a good introduction to the Divine Council Worldview and how the Bible, Dead Sea Scrolls and Pseudepigraphal texts explain how the gods of the nations came to be opposed to God/YHWH the creator and God of God's.

Consice Consolidation

Appreciate the the consice way Cody pulls the threads of God's supernatural narrative together and the balanced correlation and impact on today's society

For those who believe in the Divine Council

Those who are aware of Mike Heiser’s work on the Divine Council will find this book as a deeper look into who the Divine Council may work through governments and powers in the world.

Divine Council versus Christian nations

The author's main viewpoint is the Divine Council view as popularized by Michael Heiser. If you like that, or study that, this is focusing more on the national and governmental aspect and application of that belief.

Pros:
One star for the great reading and performance of the voice actor. There were no audio issues. Top notch.
Two stars for the research done. Statements were mostly cited from varied sources. It was also balanced in treatment of many things. However, not all things, as I will explain in the Cons.
Three stars for the amount of information and content. It was short enough to digest, but applicable.
Cons:

One star off for some missing yet important comparisons and imbalance by neglecting some sources that contradict the idea. For example, the Romans 13 section did not refer to I Peter 2 parallel passage about the same subject where at least the surface reading disproves and sheds light more on the chapter.

There is also an obvious bias against the idea of a "Christian nation" from the beginning, without actually defining what that is, often conflating contradictory ideas about kingdoms and nations. The reader (or listener of the audio book) seems to be expected to know what a "Christian nation" is by instinct. And the working assumption seems to be that a Christian nation is any combination of the church and state, and presumes that is America's idea of what a Christian nation is. Time spent on actually defining this idea of what the book is fighting against would be good, because not everyone defines "Christian nation" as the author defines it, definitely not the so-called founding founders, who postulated that "Christian nation" simply meant a nation made up incidentally of moral people and individuals that derived their values from the Bible, not church and state together in an organized institution in a theonomic manner. This bias is heavy on the imbalance.

Another star off is the disconnect with the disconnect between the main thrust of the view, the Divine Council, and the application, which is inherent from all Divine Council literature trying to make a practical application. The application is not so different from what you hear from other Christian works decrying the idea of union of church and state with no Divine Council view. There is no specifically Divine Council informed application apart from the generic "the devil/demons controls governments even while God is ultimately over them", which others already postulate.

As a comparison, Divine Council works that identify, say, Resheph as the god of plagues, and show history of exorcist prayers such as Psalms 91 against said demon turn around and say not to use Psalms 91 as an exorcism poem, as Michael Heiser himself says this is an abuse of the view and advocates that the Psalm 91 is just showing victory over the supernatural darkness. But... that is what was already advocated by non-Divine Council interpretations of the passage. That's the type of disconnect that is present here.

If you already have a bias against a generic, vague idea plus you follow the Divine Council methodology, then this is for you.

As a disclaimer, just because I go in detail about something, does not mean I explicitly endorse said something. I only went through the audio book once, and thus if I have missed something that the review says wasn't there, that is entirely my fault.

Interesting Discussion

I found the topic/discussion interesting and plan to give it another listen. I would have liked more content but I believe another book is forthcoming.