Barmen Declaration: Understanding of Church and State

From the Barmen Declaration drafted on May 29, 1934 in Barmen, Germany by 139 delegates that formed what would be called the Confessing Church, members within the German Evangelical Church who would stand against Adolf Hitler’s policies:

The Bible tells us that according to divine arrangement the state has the responsibility to provide for justice and peace in the yet unredeemed world, in which the church also stands…

We repudiate the false teaching that the state can and should expand beyond its special responsibility to become the single and total order of human life, and also thereby fulfill the commission of the church.

We repudiate the false teaching that the church can and should expand beyond its special responsibilities to take on the characteristics, functions and dignities of the state, and thereby become itself an organ of the state.

The commission of the church, in which her freedom is founded, consists of this: in place of Christ and thus in the service of His own word and work, to extend through word and sacrament the message of the free grace of God to all people.

Source: God & Government by Chuck Colson