I just read something in the Foreword to John Howard Yoder’s book , The Christian Witness to the State,  that seems apropos here (in light of a discussion in the past few posts about nationalism and idolatry):

In continuity with Israel the church is the bearer of the inner meaning of history. It is that community whose only sovereign is God.  Where other structures or powers, like the nation state, declare themselves worthy of worship, the church opposes their idolatry.

This is John Rempel of the Mennonite Central Committee (2001). He points out how Yoder rejects “the mythological explanation of democracy as a fundamentally new kind of social order”. 

I’ve just opened this book after “rediscovering” it practically hidden (by virtue of its being only 70 pages,  and thus very thin and easy to escape notice alongside thicker books).  But I look forward to some very bloggable morsels.