In light of the recent chasm between authority and some folks, it is time to examine what Scripture says about submission and how to properly exposit the verses.

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Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval,for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience. For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed. - Romans 13: 1-7 (ESV)

There are sometimes points of confusion is Scripture. Things that remain unsettled. Things that reasonable people can reasonably disagree about. Mind you, there is one correct interpretation. God is not the author of confusion. Amidst that one correct interpretation there may be multiple applications for our lives but God meant one thing when He wrote it. The fact that we cannot agree what that one thing is does not change to inerrancy of Scripture. It just makes for some great theological discussions. For me, one such area deals with the key verses today addressing our submission to authorities. Recently this subject has come up with the disagreements between law enforcement and the public. I have had some Christian friends favorable to the side of law enforcement in these matters turn to the key Scriptures as a vindication. To them and many others, this issue is black and white but within the monochrome they fail to see their own inconsistencies with applying these verses. As we look deeper let us make sure we cover all angles of these verses; starting with the direct context. Who was Paul writing to?

Paul was writing to the fledgling church in Rome at the time. New converts to Christianity they were facing great persecution. There was great unrest in the kingdom of Rome and the Christians were not viewed favorably at all. Claudius had just cast the church out of the city and Paul was trying to help them rebuild. There had been riots between Christian converts and Jews. The Jews had a sect of Zealots who advocated the overthrow of the Roman government. Why is this crucial to understanding our key verses? Because the context reveals the purpose behind what Paul is saying. He was taking a stand with the current power structure. Not defending what they do but trying to restore order to what our role as believers ought to be. Paul realized that the fragility of the new church in Rome stood no chance if it was seen in constant rebellion against the instituted powers. In some ways this was a step up from the seeming indifference Jesus showed during His ministry years whenever Rome came up:

Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words. And they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, "Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone's opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances.Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?" But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, "Why put me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin for the tax." And they brought him a denarius.And Jesus said to them, "Whose likeness and inscription is this?" They said, "Caesar's." Then he said to them, "Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." - Matthew 22: 15-21 (ESV)

Paul however was upping the ante. Perhaps because of how dire the situation was becoming in Rome. Now that being said, Scripture still can be prescriptive in nature. This is not an historical narrative and God is always divinely inspiring the author. For the purposes of expositing the text, let's break it into three sections, starting with the premise:

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.

Remember the context. Jewish Zealots were plotting to overthrow the Roman government. Paul was trying to help rebuild a church that had just been thrown out of the city. Delicate and fragile times. Let us deal with these verses individually. Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. Well that sounds simple enough. God certainly does not advocate for anarchy or chaos. He is a God of order. For there is no authority except from God and those that exist have been instituted by God. The Bible confirms this:

Daniel answered and said: "Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, to whom belong wisdom and might.He changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings; he gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding; - Daniel 2: 20-21 (ESV)

We serve an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent God. He is sovereign over His entire creation. Whether it be through His decretive will or His permissive will, everyone comes to power through Him and He uses all to accomplish His goals and His will. Therefore it stands to reason that if you resist against the authorities then you are essentially resisting against what God has either instituted or allowed. The judgment that might be incurred could be referring to either temporal punishment as meted out by society and/or eternal punishment as meted out by God. Think of someone who has committed murder and is convicted and sentenced to die by the state. They will suffer a temporal punishment of death and unless converted like the thief on the cross, they will face an eternal punishment as well. So far so good but as we head back to the key verses things become cloudier:

For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval,for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.

There is no arguing that Paul is making a blanket assumption about the powers he is referring to. That assumption is that they are always a force for good so therefore you should never fear them. In a perfect world that might be true but given the fallen and depraved nature of man, this is simply an unsupported assumption. I present first to you, Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

"Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act." - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Seems that Mr. Bonhoeffer did not apply Romans 13 the way many do today. You see he was active against Adolf Hitler and the rising Nazi regime. He saw the atrocities committed against the Jewish people and he did not let himself be subject to the governing authorities. He was a Christian dissident who would be captured, sent to a concentration camp, and be hung just weeks before the end of the war. What of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.? Faced with the atrocities perpetrated against African Americans in this country he led a movement of civil disobedience against the ruling authorities because the ruling authorities were wrong. They were not just. They were not "good." Peaceful or not, disobedience is still disobedience, no? Segregation was the law of the land yet one cannot argue it was righteous. Slavery was once the law as well and that was equally wrong. According to the monochrome view of these verses, Bonhoeffer and King were wrong. They were clearly rebelling against the authorities of their day. To say they resisted would be an understatement. What of today's social issues? Abortion is the law of the land yet the same Christians that would focus myopically upon the key verses would also think nothing of protesting against the abortion laws. They would think nothing of picking and choosing which governing authorities to obey and which ones not to and the rationale is always the same. We only have to obey authorities that are in agreement with the Word of God.

While I do not necessarily disagree with this notion, it throws out the monochrome view of the key verses. You cannot have it both ways. Either the key verses describe an unyielding set of principles we must obey as believers or there is much grey area for discussion and disagreement. No beloved, the reality is that most who cling to the key verses as some panacea for all to obey refuse to see their own hypocrisy when applying it to all areas of life. It is not longer "we must obey all authorities." Instead, what it really means is "you must obey all the authorities that I agree with." The inherent problem there of course is we get into all of our pre-bias and prejudices. We are sinners by nature and the Bible says our hearts are wickedly deceptive above all else. Not exactly the mix you want when doling out justice. Remember what the Lord requires:

He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? - Micah 6: 8 (ESV)

We are to love kindness and walk humbly but note that we are to DO justice. Not our justice but the Lords. I am not sure what utopia Paul was writing about in the key verses but throughout history up until today we only have had imperfect systems run by imperfect men. None of which serve the cause of Christ. The notion that the key verses advocate for a police state where we lay down and allow whatever the authorities want is simply not supported within the local context or the canon of Scripture as a whole. The concluding context however might provide some more insight:

Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath but also for the sake of conscience. For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed. - Romans 13: 1-7 (ESV)

Note the example Paul gives here. It is not the military authorities he speaks power to. It is not the police state he speaks power to. It is the civil authorities. He speaks about taxes! He is saying - you live as part of the society, so don't try and cheat it! Also note however here that Paul gives qualifiers for everyone else. Revenue is one thing but honor and respect are "owed." They are earned beloved. There were plenty who had the badge of the state in Nazi Germany who were not owed honor and respect simply because they found themselves in authority. I doubt anyone would make a biblical argument that those that carried the badge enforcing segregation were anymore "due honor and respect" because they happened to find themselves in power. At some point in these end times the state will demand that all take the mark of the beast to conduct business. Are we to apply Romans 13 to mean we should? Of course not.

Which leaves us with the same questions we had when we started. How do we apply Romans 13 when it comes to living as Christians in the world? For starters I think it is crucial that we drop our myopic view of Scripture. Where we use the Bible to prop up our carnal beliefs or maybe even our hidden hatreds. That said we also need to use the remainder of the Word of God as our guide, starting with God's desire for peace:

If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord." To the contrary, "if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head." Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. - Romans 12: 18-21 (ESV)

Not coincidentally, these verses immediately precede the key verses. As far as we are concerned we are to try and live peaceably with all. We do not overcome evil with evil. None of these commands however alter the fact that we are not called to blindly submit to any authority simply based upon Romans 13. When the three Hebrew boys were told by the King to bow down to the golden statue they had no problem saying no. God may allow the rise of all kings, rulers, and authorities but that hardly means they are doing His will. We have to discern as Christians. The defense many Nazis wanted to use at the Nuremberg Trials was that they were just following orders. Exterminating an entire race of people? Just following orders. Genocide? Just following orders. Make no mistake about it beloved. Just as they could not use that defense, neither will we when we stand before Christ. We will not be able to say we were just obeying the authorities while ignoring whether the authorities were obeying God.

Please, we are talking about major issues. Nazi Germany and the days of the Civil Right movement are outliers. In our day to day mundane lives the authorities are there for a reason which is what Paul is trying to say in the key verses. We should not be trying to actively undermine them or overthrow them for minor disagreement or offense. Likewise, we should not blindly accept everything carnal authority says and does. Everything must be measured up against the plumb line of the Word of God. Lastly however, we must recognize that not all Scripture is resolved. We need to leave Scriptural myopia behind and have a frank and honest discussion about our faith and what God really is saying.

Reverend Anthony Wade - December 16, 2014

Authors Bio:
Credentialed Minister of the Gospel for the Assemblies of God. Owner and founder of 828 ministries. Vice President for Goodwill Industries. Always remember that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.