Gang, what follows are going to be a close reading of a chunk of text. Let’s get to it.
Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from G-d, and those that exist have been instituted by G-d. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what G-d 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 G-d’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 G-d, an avenger who carries out G-d’s wrath on the wrongdoer. Romans 13:1-4
Class Is In Session
We have had people as tone-deaf as Jeff Sessions that have recently told us that we are to obey Romans 13. We have seen people in pulpits tell us that those who are elected rule over us.
However, there is a real sticking point here; namely, when someone that has been elected to SERVE and has been vested with STEWARDSHIP of the government machine, and they speak in their elected office to this sort of text, telling us to obey them, for me, that lands like the very summation of lorded authority of the Gentiles against which our L-rd Himself cautioned.
“I am in authority and you better listen to me.”
That sort of stuff butters my bacon.
Now, to what the text seems to mean.
Exegesis
“Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.”
Submit to those people who are actually in authority.
“The authorities that exist have been instituted by G-d.”
G-d puts people into authority. The mechanism can differ from place to place, but the King puts people into places where they are given legitimate authority.
I am under the impression that G-d respects the mindset and design of a given population. He knows if that country is going to set up a democracy, a republic, a dictatorship, a monarchy, or some other form, and He sets stipulations on the nature of that authority. And He works within the framework of that nation.
And, because of that, He knows where those people are going to set up the framework of authority and works with those frameworks if given the opportunity, for He is an opportunist indeed.
Meaning, I am of the take that He knows the framework of a republic and respects their drive to liberty, and in the case of us specifically, He works with THE SPECIFIC framework that is in place, in our case, a constitutional republic, in order to ensure maximum liberty and minimal control. Given the Exodus, and the preceding
For He is viciously committed to liberty over control.
Critical to the fabric of this nation, the United States, are the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, which guarantee Natural Law (and for those of us who are or have been connected to Sapphire Leadership Group, the natural law in Arthur Burk’s delineation refers to three levels of principles, universal, non-optional, cause-and-effect relationships: and those three levels are the priniciples that govern the relationship between Man and Matter; Man and Man, and Man and the Spirit Realm), which is necessitated by the reality of our humanity, remains a safeguard to us.
The Natural Law is therefore designed “to be a beast on the throat of the legislator to restrain him from writing any law and regulating any behavior and taxing any event, and transferring any wealth.”
In other words, it is designed to be a built-in backstop agains those precise excesses that would eventually subjugate us if taken to logical end.
Natural Law is part of the fabric of reality, and in Prophet Nations like the United States, principles and ideology and Natural Law in all three of its manifestations (the relationships between man and matter; man and man; and man and the spirit realm) lie closer to the surface of reality than in other nations. More than for even the Roman Republic, which was Redemptive Gift of Exhorter, we were designed to be a nation of laws. Equal rights before the law and equal accountability for violating the law.
And as a result of this reality, it is not a subset of us that rule us, as a substitute for the King, but the People themselves, the Electorate, that governs in part through the ballot box and in part through the application of Universal, Non-Optional, Cause-And-Effect Relationships, among other dynamics.
And if we govern to good and moral ends, according to the roots at our foundation, safeguarding the vulnerable and building something that is useful and beautiful and good (καλός), then we will reap the benefit of that and that form of governance will yield to the benefit of all. And if we fail in that enterprise, it will be to the detriment of all.
In all cases of political institutions, they have been endowed, elected, put in place, set up, or coronated, in order to be SERVANTS…..
MINISTERS….
EXECUTORS of the will of G-d. Protectors of the vulnerable and ensurors of the liberties given to us by our Creator, as articulated the wisdom of that beautiful Redemptive Gift Teacher, Thomas Jefferson, in both his first draft and final copy of the Declaration of Independence.
For those that question Jefferson on the slave issue, it is curious that in his first draft of the Declaration of Independence, he wrote the following as a challege to George III:
Next point.
“Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what G-d 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 G-d’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain.”
Resisting true authority resists the will of G-d PRECISELY BECAUSE THEY ARE DESIGNED TO BE NOT A TERROR TO GOOD CONDUCT BUT TO BAD.
Period….
Do not come at me with “muh Nero”, “muh Nero”, “Paul wrote this while being subjected to one of the worst dictators in history, so you have to take that into account when reading this text”.
No, Paul is speaking to principles for the PROPER execution of government not with respect to his own political context, except to skillfully rebuke said context.
THE CONTEXT FOR ROMANS 13: THE PROPER AND BEST WORK OF THE EXHORTER
Romans 13, and, indeed, all of Romans, was written by the Exhorter Paul.
Note, I did not discuss his fivefold office. Rather I spoke in terms of his Redemptive Gift, which is tied to his design.
Back to the Redemptive Gift of Exhorter, for those who need a crash course of their core….
Exhorters, this is all you, more than the other six.
Exhorters WERE DESIGNED for solids in the following:
1) Because they might have a propensity below their best toward denial, G-d intends them to skillfully break BREAK DENIAL. They have an active imagination, and they usually have one single message that predominates throughout the course of their life. And that imagination was made to break the denial of a culture that cannot stay away from non-reality in terms of politics, communication, media, corporate behavior, government behavior, and the way Christ designed us to function as a redemptive body.
2) Because they can get wonky with being all over the place due to their social butterfly nature, G-d intends them for spiritual ASTROREGULATION, namely to bring the steadiness of regulation to those big-spirited people in their constellation. For the Exhorter, given the context of the Fourth Day with its focus on the rotating, revolving, and regularity of the Sun, Moon, and Stars, nay, all the galactic bodies, G-d intends them to be the most regular, and the most steady of the gifts when it comes to flow of horizontal relationships. Too many Exhorters run to their capacity to influence people to do their agenda, often at the risk of people’s stability, but the design is that the Exhorter help provide a safe place in time and in the context of the broad horizontal frame of their human relationships to have something steady, a Northern Star of sorts, on which they can count when everything else fails. Like the eclipses and the celestial phenomenon are among the most regular and predictable, and therefore worst prophetic timepieces in existence to calculate eschatological phenomenon, so also the Exhorter is MADE for predictability and reliability, if they will get their time under control and discipline themselves with the principles of time stewardship, so others can have that friend who is skilled and capable at helping to unpack the needful dynamics pertaining to human relationships.
3) Contrary to how many Exhorters function, flying by the seat of their pants and having very little under self-control when it comes to their schedule, G-d intends the Exhorter to TO USE TIME WELL (see Jesus’ usage of his time during His earthly ministry in the Gospels). Maria Woodworth-Etter had it wrong when she said, “Better to wear out for Jesus than rust out.” Jesus never meant for us to embrace that false dichotomy. We were never designed to wear out. No, we were designed to approach each day and complete each day with a mindset that we have left it all on the field of play, but not to the point of beyond exhaustion. Worn-out is not kingdom. Well-used is.
4). Finally, the Exhorter, with their many words, was made to COMMUNICATE THE CONCEPTS OF THE SPIRIT IN THE LANGUAGE OF THE SOUL, AND SHOW CAUSE AND EFFECT.
5) The Exhorter was made to speak in such a way that emphasizes the nature of G-d, most particularly as articulated in the person, work, and actions of Jesus.
In the context of Romans 13, Paul is not sharing principles based on what he saw in the empire of the time, nor any other political model. Rather, He was revealing the nature of leadership as found in the King of Kings. And he was laying out prerequisites and principles for how ultimately legitimate leadership functions.
BACK TO THE TEXT
Given this context, consider the following. My interpretation:
Translation: If an authority is terrorizing good conduct, G-d did not set that authority in place, and they will ultimately reap the consequences of their actions. And you are under no obligation to follow their edicts.
There are a variety of ways to respond to those edicts. You must learn the skill of developing creativity when responding to the behavior of tyrants.
Further, when leaders are tyrannically behaving, G-d will provide correctives.
Paging Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Dr. Bonhoeffer, your nation needs action.
AUTHORITY
ἐξουσία is the legal right to act that precedes the event of acting, and Paul’s usage here of ἐξουσία throughout Romans 13 refers to the legitimacy to issue decisions. It is the common word for “authority”, meaning the word “authority” is the most common way to translate that word.
And all authority is derived or given. Given by G-d the Father through Jesus Christ to us, and we are responsible to steward that authority well. As are those in government. And those of us who are in leadership. In this nation, We The People were vested with strong authority, and we are designed to walk in that authority well, whether or not we actually act on that design.
If a governing authority uses the authority given to them for wicked purposes, for curtailing people’s capacity to speak up or advocate for those things they believe, then their authority may legitimately be called into question, and should be disagreed with, and resisted.
Either that person is G-d’s servant to you FOR GOOD, in which case he or she should be listened to and hearkened unto, or he IS NOT that sort of godly servant and should be corrected, called to account, or ignored.
We have too many people that read Romans 13:1-2 and ignore the limiting factor of verses 3 and 4. Conditionally, authorities set in place by G-d are set up precisely in order to terrorize bad conduct, not good conduct. They are not designed to control the law-abiding. Rather, they are designed to liberate the law-abiding.
FOR THOSE WHO WANT TO ARGUE ABOUT RIGHTS VERSUS RESPONSIBILITIES
Now, before someone starts talking about rights vs. responsibilities, which is a legitimate concern, we need to ask the question, “did they impose legitimate responsiblities with care WHILE ALSO respecting our rights?”
Did they honor the dynamic tension between rights and responsibilities? Are the rights and responsibilities both present and in right proportion according to the L-rd’s design?
Had our rights been curtailed for the sake of imposing legitimate responsibilities, then that would be one thing. In the case of our current institutions, I would contend that they have not legitimately curtailed a number of our rights (see, for example, the debacle surrounding the curtailing of civil liberties and the forced injection of untested foreign substances during the proliferation of the Wuhan Coronavirus), and they have imposed responsibilities that are also illegitimate (masks and injections don’t work, and things that do work, when we used those, we were gaslit repeatedly to a place of fear and intimidation).
They (after the fashion of Bushelbritches, the Honorable Sheriff of Nottingham from Disney’s Robin Hood, taxed the heart and soul out of the citizenry, regardless of social or economic status, while crowing about “fair share”, and have further used the revenues from taxation fraudulently, earning the reaping of certain curses, of whose current status we might be unaware.
Repeatedly, they have shown themselves other than properly aligned for our good, and rather against us.
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 G-d’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 G-d, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer. -Romans 13:3-4 ESV-
If you do wrong, be afraid…..What are these elected officials afraid of? If they are currently not experiencing the consequences of the L-rd’s judgment, then something in the system of justice is broken, and I suggest that perhaps someone is engaging in the violations that would lead to at least two particular curses, which I will discuss at a later point: the Aramean Curse and the Canaanite Curse.
If you insist on lying and refusing to walk in the execution of the truth, then be afraid of those who have authority over you.
For they will become increasingly less charitable and merciful and will seek to execute justice and judgment. They will decide concerning you, and not necessarily in a merciful fashion.
For the kings of the nation do not bear the sword in vain. The sword could be construed as a literal sword or weapon, as in modern-day case, a firearm, or it could be symbolic of some type of authority that stops tyranny, spiritual or otherwise, by which those who are ruled are corrected.
In our nation, given the 1st and the 2nd Amendment, and given we are a constitutional republic, and given I think the L-rd respects unique forms of government, I am of the interpretation that that is a reference to us. We do not carry the authority we have been given through natural law in vain. And given we have been given the right to speak up when abuse is happening, we also have the responsibility to correct it in a multitude of ways.
Freedom of Speech, Freedom to Assemble, Freedom to Petition for Redress, and if need be, the Right to vote them out, among other things.
Ultimately, what this boils down to is we are responsible in this nation to see to it that the government is so managable, and power is kept in such check and these elected officials are held in such accountability through the execution of the natural law, that they should be afraid of the consequences of attempting to violate that law and abusing us.
And submission to someone who is committed to your best and highest level of liberty, and committed to your good no matter what should be no difficult thing.
The problem is, we have never truly seen what “the good” and “the King’s best” truly look like.
Just some thoughts.
