00:01: You're not the boss of me.
00:03: How many of you have heard that saying before?
00:07: Right?
00:07: Yeah, you're Americans, you've heard this, right?
00:09: You're not the boss of me.
00:11: It's a very common saying.
00:13: And I looked it up, it goes back to the late 1800s, though it's been more widely used in the last few decades.
00:20: One of the distinctives of American culture, in contrast to many cultures around the world, presently and historically, is that Americans tend to rebel against authority.
00:34: We tend to say, I'm independent, I'm autonomous, I'm going to do my own thing, stay out of my way.
00:40: The default American posture towards authority tends to be no.
00:49: You've probably seen this in your children, and I say probably meaning every parent has seen this in your children at some time or another.
00:59: Often children's first word is no.
01:02: Comes pretty close on the heels of mom, dad, mama, no.
01:09: Right?
01:10: Partly because we need to be told no, and partly because we want to rebel against what we are told.
01:15: But if the American posture towards authority is rebellion, rejection of authority, we need to recognize that the biblical posture towards authority is something quite different altogether.
01:30: If we are really Christians, meaning if we are really Christ followers, then we need to recognize where culture and Christianity diverge and choose the road of following Jesus.
01:45: Submission to authorities is part and parcel of Christianity.
01:50: Ephesians 5.21 is a key verse that I've heard quoted out of context far more often than I've heard it quoted in context.
02:00: It says, Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
02:05: And then immediately from there, if you look into Ephesians chapter 5, you'll find the Apostle Paul's teaching on marriage and about wives submitting to their husbands.
02:15: And I've heard people say, Well, look, look, the previous verse says submit to one another.
02:18: So God's design for marriage is identicalness between male and female, husband and wife.
02:23: And I've always struggled with like, Okay, that is the previous verse, but man, there's nothing about this passage that reads that way.
02:32: In context, the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 5.21 is setting the stage for teaching on not just marriage, but three topics that involve Christians submitting to authorities.
02:44: Wives and husbands, children and parents, bond servants and masters.
02:49: Three areas of life where even for Christians, authority and submission play out.
02:55: We find the same trio of authority and submission in Colossians chapter 3.
03:01: In 1 Peter 3, we find the Apostle Peter applying the same issue of submission within the context of marriage.
03:08: We heard the scripture reading this morning from 1 Peter 2, where we're told to submit to every human institution.
03:15: And Hebrews 13 applies the same principle to church members and church leadership.
03:23: This morning, as we dig into Romans chapter 13, we find the Apostle Paul explaining to his Christian audience that submission is key to how the Christian relates to government.
03:37: We've been studying in Romans.
03:41: We're at chapter 13, and Paul digs into how then shall the Christian relate to the government.
03:49: Follow along in your own Bibles, verses 1 through 7.
03:51: Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
03:57: For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.
04:03: Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.
04:11: For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.
04:15: Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority?
04:18: Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval.
04:22: He is God's servant for your good.
04:26: But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain.
04:30: For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.
04:38: Therefore, one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath, but also for the sake of conscience.
04:45: For because of this, you also pay taxes.
04:49: For the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing.
04:53: Pay to all what is owed to them.
04:55: Taxes to whom taxes are owed.
04:57: Revenue to whom revenue is owed.
04:59: Respect to whom respect is owed.
05:01: Honor to whom honor is owed.
05:05: There's a lot in this passage that is worthy of our careful consideration.
05:09: And there are aspects to the Bible's teaching on our relationship to government that exceed the scope of this passage.
05:17: This morning, I'm not going to get into all the cross-references and all the other passages of Scripture that speak to this.
05:24: Instead, we're going to lay out the core teaching of this passage and recognize those core teachings for what they are.
05:32: Revolutionary and counter-cultural commands of God to us.
05:36: Which fits exactly what Paul has been talking about.
05:41: Remember, at the beginning of chapter 12, Paul began to switch gears from theology more directly into more of an application.
05:50: He told us in chapter 12, verse 1, that we cannot afford to be conformed to this world.
05:57: We can't be pushed into the mold of all the people around us who don't know God.
06:00: But rather, verse 2, that we need to be transformed by the renewal of our mind.
06:07: That by testing, you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
06:14: And we're going to see that play out in our passage.
06:17: Now, next week, we're going to dig into the same passage again, going deeper, looking at cross-references, saying, are there nuances to this?
06:25: Are there exceptions to the rule?
06:27: And so on.
06:27: What about civil disobedience?
06:29: Is there a place for that in the Christian life?
06:31: Et cetera.
06:32: But before we can go there, we need to address the basic default posture of a Christian to government, which is submission or subjection or willing surrender to.
06:46: First thing we need to notice is found in verse 1.
06:51: Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
06:55: Reading through the rest of the passage, it becomes very clear that he's talking about governmental authorities.
07:01: In our context, we might say something like the federal government, the state government, even city government, you know, county government.
07:08: We're not talking about church leadership here.
07:10: That becomes incredibly obvious as we look at authorities that bear the sword.
07:16: The church does not bear the sword, biblically.
07:18: And about requiring taxes, verses 4 and 7.
07:23: That's government.
07:24: That's not the church.
07:26: And the core imperative of this passage is for Christians to be in submission to the government.
07:35: Now, that's not a command probably any of us are excited about.
07:39: How many of you are like, ooh, I was hoping God would tell me to submit to my government?
07:42: Not a hand, in case you're wondering.
07:46: That does not meet us where we're at in terms of our default preference.
07:51: But it's the biblical teaching.
07:53: I don't know how you can be more clear than let every person be subject to the governing authorities.
07:58: And we saw basically the same thing in our cross-reference passage, 1 Peter 2, every human institution be subject to.
08:05: We live in an incredibly politically polarized time.
08:12: The nation in which we live is split with deep fissures.
08:18: And whatever your political leanings and persuasions might be, I can guarantee you that not everyone in this country agrees with you.
08:26: I'll go further.
08:28: Not every Christian agrees with you.
08:31: And not every Christian in this church agrees with you.
08:35: There are a variety of perspectives on all manner of political matters.
08:41: But whatever you might think of any given president, any given governor, any given governmental authority over you, presently, or previous administration or administrations, or the next one to come, or so on, the core call of God on us as believers is to submit.
09:02: To be subject to these authorities over us.
09:05: Why?
09:07: I think it's really helpful if we look at the why.
09:10: Not only because the passage does, which is always a good idea to go in the direction of the passage, but because it helps us understand why God says some of these things.
09:19: Well, why is this important to God?
09:21: Why does God want us to do this?
09:23: When you're a parent and you're dealing with a one-year-old, you don't explain why, because the kid's not thinking at that level.
09:30: But when you get to a teenager, you better be prepared to negotiate with that kid and help them understand why this is the path that you're insisting upon.
09:40: Why?
09:40: There are at least four reasons in this passage for why we are called to submit to governing authorities.
09:46: The first and greatest reason is found in verse one.
09:50: For there is no authority except from God.
09:54: And those that exist have been instituted by God.
09:58: The governmental authorities over you, over me, over everyone everywhere have been put there by God.
10:08: There is no exception to that.
10:10: Whether it's a good government or a bad government, whether it's a monarchy or an aristocracy or a democracy or some other form, every governmental authority has been put there by God.
10:23: And in fact, we're not going to look at it this week, but next week I can show you from Scripture the places where God explicitly says, I put this bad person in control for this purpose.
10:34: God has purpose even in putting bad people into authority for a time.
10:42: We believe that Jesus is Lord of Lords and King of Kings, right?
10:47: We have that up on our walls and we see this week after week.
10:50: That's not generic praise.
10:52: It means we believe that Jesus is an authority that he has authority over every other person or being in any measure of authority.
11:05: That plays out in government as well.
11:09: He is the one in control.
11:14: Governmental leaders are under the authority of God and they bear a derivative authority from God.
11:21: If the government over us is there by God's authority, then what would it mean if we rebelled against government and that the God-given authority that God has given government?
11:32: Wouldn't that actually be a rebellion against God?
11:35: That's exactly where the text goes.
11:37: Verse 2.
11:38: Therefore, whomever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed and those who resist will incur judgment.
11:44: If you or I rebel against governmental authorities, again, general principle, I'm not looking at exceptions right now, we are rebelling against God.
11:57: That's a big deal.
12:00: Here's a picture that works in my mind.
12:01: See if this helps you.
12:03: When my kids were little, we couldn't leave them at home if Carrie and I wanted to go out and do something.
12:08: So if we were going to have a date night or go to something, just the two of us, we had to hire a babysitter.
12:12: And that babysitter had authority over the kids while he or she was babysitting for us.
12:17: It was a derivative authority, right?
12:20: We put that person in a position of authority over our kids and our kids were expected to obey the babysitter and if they disobeyed the babysitter, they were in effect disobeying us, right?
12:32: Similarly, God has put government over us in authority and so if we rebel against the government, we're ultimately by extension rebelling against God.
12:41: Verse four tells us that he, the person in authority, is God's servant.
12:47: He is doing for God the job that God has given him to do.
12:51: Verse six, the authorities are ministers of God, very similarly.
12:55: Now, it seems hard at times to think about government being God's servants and God's ministers, but there's absolutely a sense in which that's true.
13:03: So, submitting to the governor or president or congress or so on isn't about whether or not you like whoever is in office at the present moment.
13:19: It's not about whether you like or dislike, agree or disagree with their present policies or with a given specific issue at hand.
13:28: I think it would be a phenomenally stupid law to say everyone has to paint your house blaze orange.
13:36: Man, make everyone's eyes bleed if every house out there was that blaze orange, hunter orange color.
13:42: But if that was the law that was passed, I would paint my house, sadly, blaze orange.
13:48: Because I can do that without sinning against Jesus and painting it orange would be an expression between me and the Lord, expression from me to the Lord of, I will submit to you, Jesus.
14:02: It doesn't mean I have to think it's a great law.
14:04: I can think it's phenomenally stupid to require everyone to paint their house blaze orange, but I do it, not because I like it.
14:12: I would happily write my representatives and say, please overturn this.
14:17: But I would submit as an extension of my submission to God.
14:23: And we need to recognize that this really is first and foremost about us and God.
14:29: Because it changes how we see it radically.
14:33: Now the second reason this passage gives us why we should submit to governing authorities is that the government exists for our good.
14:39: You see this in verse four.
14:40: He, the person in authority, is God's servant for your good.
14:45: It's good that there be order and accountability rather than anarchy.
14:49: Why do we have speed limits?
14:52: Well, for safety.
14:53: Because people cannot be trusted to consistently drive at safe speeds without there being some rules, without there being some enforcement of those rules.
15:01: Why do we have laws against burglary?
15:03: Because if there's no punishment for taking things, people, at least some, are going to steal.
15:08: Right?
15:09: It reduces the amount of that happening.
15:13: And so on.
15:13: It's good that there is a system to hold people's worst bents and worst sinful inclinations somewhat in check.
15:23: And I don't mean just to hold other people's worst inclinations in check.
15:27: I mean all of us.
15:29: All of us would cross the line at various points if not for government.
15:35: But it's not just the negative stuff.
15:37: It's positive as well.
15:38: Well, probably everyone here this morning drove here in a vehicle using roads.
15:45: How did those get there?
15:46: Well, your taxes paid for those things.
15:49: The government organized it, said you're going to pay a certain amount of money, we're going to use that, and we're going to put up roads.
15:55: Right?
15:56: The police who enforce the law are paid by our collective taxes.
16:00: There are many good things that government facilitates for us, and this is under the hand and purpose of God.
16:10: Interestingly, verses 6 and 7 both speak to the issue of taxation and says, yeah, you've got to pay your taxes.
16:18: In the original context, this was written in the context of the Roman Empire.
16:22: Paul is writing to the church in Rome.
16:24: The Roman Empire is in authority.
16:27: The Jewish people hated the fact that Rome was reigning over them, and even Christians more broadly, whether Gentile Christians or Jewish Christians were not the biggest fans of the Roman government.
16:39: In fact, at the time that he wrote this, it was almost certain that Nero was the emperor, and he was a very, very bad dude and very anti-Christians.
16:49: Okay?
16:50: And Paul says, you've still got to pay your taxes.
16:54: One of the things that you find in the Gospels is people trying to bait Jesus into political messes with should we pay taxes to Caesar or not, right?
17:05: There's this desire to get him caught up into a political thing so that they can get him in trouble and put him at odds with the government, and Jesus doesn't play that game, doesn't get trapped in that way.
17:17: Biblically, according to this passage, taxes are a legitimate thing for the government to require, and Christians cannot simultaneously submit to God's word and refuse to pay taxes.
17:32: That doesn't mean that the taxes are going to get used to pay exclusively things you like.
17:37: Wasn't true then.
17:38: It's not true now.
17:40: But we have to submit with taxes nonetheless.
17:45: I used to do my own taxes when I was a young guy.
17:49: Very simple.
17:49: 1040 easy.
17:50: You go to the library.
17:52: You get your paper form.
17:53: You fill it out.
17:54: They'd mail me a couple hundred bucks for reimbursement.
17:56: It was great.
17:57: And then I became a pastor, and I lost all ability to do my own taxes.
18:01: There's so many weird things about pastor taxes.
18:04: Forget it.
18:04: I can't do it.
18:05: So I go to a guy, and he rattles off question after question.
18:09: One of the things he asked me is, do you have any income not listed on your W-2?
18:16: If I say no, ain't nobody going to bust me.
18:20: There's no way for the government to know.
18:23: There's no way for my tax guy to know.
18:25: But here's the deal.
18:27: I know.
18:28: And God knows.
18:30: And so if I get an honorarium for, say, a wedding or a funeral or some such thing, that doesn't show up on my W-2, but I'm supposed to claim that legally on my taxes.
18:41: And so I do.
18:43: Not because I'm like, ooh, I want to pay some extra taxes, but out of the extension of my submission to Jesus.
18:51: This is a me following Jesus reality when I sit before the tax man.
18:57: I will admit to all the income that I'm aware of and agree to be taxed on it because I follow Jesus.
19:05: It's that simple.
19:06: Third reason.
19:11: Third reason to submit to government is to avoid being punished.
19:14: Verse 4.
19:16: He, the one in authority, is God's servant for your good.
19:19: But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain.
19:23: For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out wrath on the wrongdoer.
19:28: In our day, it's not a sword, right?
19:30: Might be a taser, or a gun, or a nightstick, or pepper spray, or a fine, right?
19:37: Or a speeding ticket, or what have you.
19:40: The government has those tools for a legitimate reason.
19:45: And when government uses its power to punish wrongdoers, that's a good and right thing, according to this passage, in line with God's will.
19:54: In fact, sometimes, God is punishing people in this life for their wrongdoing.
20:01: He is the servant of God, verse 4.
20:03: He is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.
20:09: We've seen this, right?
20:10: Somebody who does something bad, a murderer, a kidnapper, a rapist, a embezzler, whatever.
20:17: They get caught, they go through the justice system, and they're punished.
20:21: That's a good thing.
20:22: And it's not only a good thing in the generic sense, it is part of God's plan for how the world runs in this fallen world.
20:31: Now, it says that he does not bear the sword in vain.
20:36: What do you do with a sword?
20:39: A sword is not for spanking or knuckle slapping.
20:42: A sword is for killing.
20:45: And, as Romans chapter 8, verses 35 and 36 makes clear, that's exactly what happens often.
20:54: I saw a quote from the current pope just the other day where he said that people who were anti-abortion but pro-death penalty were not actually pro-life.
21:05: Well, the pope doesn't know the Bible.
21:08: It wouldn't be the first time in history that religious leaders were not as familiar with the word of God as they ought to be.
21:17: God's word doesn't say that there's never a time to take a life.
21:21: It's against the taking of innocent life.
21:26: There's a big difference there.
21:29: In this passage, we see an example, not the only example, of God's word affirming that government can even implement capital punishment at times.
21:41: Now, I'm not going to argue of exactly when that time is and isn't.
21:44: I'm not defending our current system of government and saying that the justice system gets it always right.
21:49: I'm not going to those places.
21:50: I'm simply saying that there is a legitimate biblical place for capital punishment and that's not contrary to being pro-life.
22:02: Now, the government can legitimately punish wrongdoing and sometimes even the means that God uses to bring his punishment upon people.
22:09: So let me throw a scenario at you.
22:11: You're driving.
22:12: You're going down the road and you're tempted to speed.
22:15: Speed limit is such and such.
22:17: You're tempted to go 10, 15 miles beyond that.
22:21: Which of the following things should be going through your mind?
22:24: Should you, as a Christian, seek to obey the speed limit out of submission to God?
22:30: Hey, I'm following this earthly rule out of submission to God.
22:34: Or, should you as a Christian obey the speed limit out of a desire to behave in a way that contributes to the well-being of everyone, the safety of everyone on the road?
22:43: Or, should you be like, I don't want to get a speeding ticket.
22:47: I don't want to get points on my license.
22:48: I don't want to pay the unnecessary fine.
22:50: And the answer is yes.
22:52: All of these motivations are legitimate factors.
22:56: All of these kinds of reasons are articulated in this passage.
23:00: You don't have to choose between them.
23:01: They all go together.
23:02: Let me give you one more reason.
23:07: The authority that God gives government has to do with the government's obligation to deal with what is moral and immoral, what is right and what is wrong.
23:15: Now, I don't mean what culture says at the moment is right or wrong.
23:20: And I don't mean Christian nationalism, which I mentioned last week, meaning using government to impose Christianity on everyone.
23:29: It is good, I believe, for Christians to influence the culture around us, including at times through government.
23:38: I absolutely believe it's appropriate for Christians to vote their biblical values.
23:42: I don't believe it's appropriate for there to be a fusion between our faith and government, to blend them together so they become one and the same.
23:53: That's not appropriate.
23:54: Our loyalty is to Jesus, period.
23:58: And our loyalty and submission to government is a derivative thing only.
24:07: Government has a responsibility to deal with right and wrong.
24:13: Notice verses 3 and 4.
24:17: Rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.
24:23: Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority?
24:25: Then do what is good and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good.
24:30: But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain, for he is the servant of God in a venture who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.
24:41: I've heard people say it's not the government's place to impose morality or to legislate morality.
24:46: I disagree.
24:47: I don't know what the point of laws are if they aren't doing something with what's right or wrong.
24:52: Absolutely.
24:55: We have laws against theft because we all understand that taking something that somebody else is is wrong.
25:02: Well, we have laws against harming others, at least in any kind of normal circumstance, because we understand that harming others is wrong.
25:11: We have laws of all sorts that are intended to help get fallen, sinful, self-obsessed people to not behave as bad as they otherwise would.
25:24: And if we behave ourselves properly, living the way God calls us to, we shouldn't need to fear our government.
25:33: Now, we'll come back to that with some nuances and so on next week.
25:41: This, I understand, is probably not your favorite passage in the Bible.
25:45: Bible.
25:47: If I were writing the Bible, I don't think I would put this in here.
25:53: But God knows better than I do.
25:55: And he knows better than you do.
25:57: And it is in there, and it's rightly in there, and God wants us to get this and receive this and embrace this.
26:04: Now, again, I'm not dealing with the nuances and the exceptions to the rules and all those kinds of things that we'll look at next week.
26:10: But if you find in yourself a strong resistance to government and a strong bent away from submission to governing authorities, let me bring you back to God's word.
26:23: First, I want to challenge you to think about this differently than you have in the past.
26:27: Remember, 12.2 talked about a different way of thinking, being transformed by the renewal of our minds.
26:35: We need to recognize at times that this is how the world thinks about this.
26:41: This is how Christ followers think about this, and I need to move more and more from that first group into that second group.
26:47: I need to let God's word shape how I think about these things.
26:52: Secondly, I want to challenge you to see your relationship to government primarily through the lens of your relationship to Jesus because that's the core command here.
27:07: Let it be about that, not about political parties, specific politicians, specific policies.
27:15: It's not about any of those things.
27:16: He doesn't deal with any of those things in this passage.
27:20: It's about following Jesus.
27:24: Begin to think of it that way so that your default posture towards government increasingly becomes, I will be subject to the authority over me because I follow God.
27:35: Christians should be among the least rebellious people on the planet because we follow God.
27:44: Again, I'm not talking about the exceptions.
27:47: We'll come back to that.
27:48: I keep saying that because I know some people get real riled up like, what about this?
27:51: What about that?
27:52: We'll deal with what abouts next week.
27:54: But the default posture is this.
27:57: There's an exception to the rule sometimes, right?
27:59: But before you can know when the exception to the rule is, you've got to know what the rule is.
28:03: You've got to know what the default thing is, right?
28:06: I didn't want my little kids playing with the phone when they were kids.
28:10: An exception to the rule is if you need to call 911, right?
28:13: But you've got to first know the rule before you learn the exception to the rule.
28:23: Back in the very first pages of scripture, we read about Satan drawing mankind away from God and in effect saying, you don't need to submit to God.
28:39: You can do your own thing and you'll be better off for it.
28:42: That same heartbeat continues to be at work in our thinking and values to this day.
28:49: I want to be my own boss.
28:51: I want to do my own thing.
28:52: I don't want people to be an authority over me.
28:55: But people are an authority over us and that is not the result of the fall.
29:02: It is God's good design.
29:05: And so we need to embrace that in all the ways that God calls us to.
29:12: Submission is at the heart of what changes between us and God when we start following Jesus, when we receive his grace and kindness toward us.
29:22: And it plays out in lots of different ways and lots of different areas in life.
29:26: Submission is a very positive word in the ears of a well-sanctified believer in Jesus Christ.
29:38: Let's pray.
29:40: God, would you help us to increasingly trust that you know what you're doing.
29:46: You accomplish your will even through imperfect people and human institutions.
29:53: that you are the one who works all things according to the counsel of your will.
29:59: And let us increasingly view things in light of your design and your control and your authority and leave these matters in your hands.
30:14: May we reflect you well as your image bearers in how we relate to the authorities over us, including but not limited to government.
30:24: We pray these things in Jesus' name.
30:27: Amen.