How should Christians think about and react to those in authority?
STOP, pray and read Romans 13:1-7
Some Christians I've met are very pessimistic about the future and will
occasionally say things like, "It's only going to get harder and harder
to be a Christian in this country." They'll mention schools that don't
let Christians in to do assemblies and they use examples of people who
have been in the news sometimes like the nurse who wasn't allowed to wear her
cross necklace. They'll call it persecution. I think they're wrong.
For one thing, the schools I've come across who aren't keen on having
Christians in are the same ones who've had to put up with rubbish ones
going in and saying things like, "Don't bother revising - Just trust
God!" or imposing their beliefs rather than proposing
them. And the nurse in question was given decent offers of compromise
like wearing her cross as a pin rather than on a necklace to avoid
snagging it while she did her job. The point is - sometimes Christians
wind people up unnecessarily. This is not persecution.
And for another thing, persecution in this country (and it does happen),
isn't anything like as bad as it is elsewhere in the world where
Christians are regularly attacked, imprisoned, tortured and killed. Check out the work of Open Doors to find out more about what's going on.
Paul wants Christians to obey the law and respect those in authority.
God is the one who has allowed people to come into those positions after
all, so we don't have to fight them all the time. Are they all good
leaders? No. Are any of them good leaders all the time? No. But God
has allowed them to lead and wants Christians to respect their position
of authority as much as they can. There's nothing wrong with seeking to influence those in positions of
power but it's possible to do this respectfully as well as strongly.
God can draw straight lines with a crooked stick.
If people in authority ever instruct those of us who trust and follow
Jesus to sin, then we should strongly resist them (like in Daniel 3:16-18).
And if they want to prevent us from doing something Jesus has commanded
us to do, then we go ahead and do it anyway (like in Acts 4:18-20).
If there's a clear clash between any human authority and the authority
of Jesus, we should submit to the highest authority.
But Paul's main
idea here is that Christians should make every effort to live under
human authority well. This means they should pay their taxes, obey the
law and respect positions of leadership, even if they don't like the people leading.
So will it get harder for Christians to trust and follow Jesus in our
cultures today? I don't know. Quite possibly. But it shouldn't be
because Christians are annoying, rude or petty. We can do better than
that!
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