June 30, 2025 • 42 mins
Pastor Ian Graham looks at Paul's instructions to "be subject to the governing authorities" and when it's time for Christians to disobey in love.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning, ecclesia.
It's good to see you.
Those of you who are new herewelcome.
We're so glad to see you.
Those of you who are here everyweek or every other week or
every once in a while, it'sreally good to see you too.
What an honor to worship Jesustogether.
Paul writes in Romans 13,.
Just an easy one, right, right?
What does it look like to livein regards to what we, as modern
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people, call the state?
How do we, as a people, bearwitness to King Jesus in the
midst of other kingdoms vyingfor our allegiance?
It's important for us toremember the differences in
civics that exist between ourown representative democracy and
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that of the Roman imperialworld.
We have to talk about thisoften because it's important for
us to get in step with theworld of the biblical authors.
I remind you of this frequentlybecause it is so imperative.
When we read the scriptures, weare reading words from people
that spoke in differentlanguages, that had different
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cultural assumptions, differentcultural locations, and we are
trying to, in order to hear God,first, get in step with the
ways that they are speaking.
Paul, obviously, is writingwithin the context of the Roman
Empire, to the center of Romanauthority, that being the church
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at Rome, these Christians wouldhave been familiar with several
of the claims of Rome.
I'm going to look at threetoday.
That it just so happens thatthroughout the story of the
scriptures the people of Godwould speak of what God was
doing in the world in light ofthese terms.
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But also the Roman Empire wouldspeak of what they were doing
in the world in light of theseterms.
The first the Pax Romana.
The Pax Romana, that Rome hadgiven the world the gift of
peace.
It came gift-wrapped withbrutality, might, taxation and
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colonization, both physical andfigurative, but nonetheless Rome
just says to the world we'vegiven you peace, you're welcome.
The second the gospel.
Euangelion is the word that theNew Testament translates good
news, gospel.
This also comes from theprophet Isaiah, especially in
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Isaiah, chapter 40 through 55.
The gospel of Caesar that thegods had appointed the current
Caesar as their emissary in theworld and in some parts of the
empire.
This wasn't true throughout allof the empire, but in some
parts of the empire Caesarwasn't just designated by the
gods as the appointed ruler, hewas divine himself.
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This is especially true in theeastern quadrants of the Roman
Empire and here in the midst ofthese contested places Pax,
euangelion, gospel and I putthrough the fourth one in there
just for fun, because our nameis Ecclesia.
The earliest Christiansidentified their assembly, their
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gathering, their Sunday morning, their expression of that, as
the Ecclesia, the called outones of God.
And here are the Christians, inthe midst of these contested
terms, claiming that theresurrected Christ has given an
eternal and borderless peacethat is both systemic and
personal.
That his peace that he gives tous comes not through conquering
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, not through shedding the bloodof his enemies and the anxious
maintenance of sustaining atenuous empire, but through
allowing himself to be conqueredand pouring out his spirit as
the first fruits of a kingdomthat will never end and creating
a new humanity bound togetherby the blood of Christ.
That, the gospel that theChristians claim, is indeed
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about the ascension of a king toa throne.
But the scale of this king'skingdom and his throne makes
Rome look like a little childwalking throughout the house
announcing to everybody whowould listen that I am a king.
Jesus' kingdom is justpatronizing.
Patting them on the head Sureyou are.
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Jesus demands total allegianceheart, soul, mind and strength.
Thus the earliest Christianscannot participate in the civic
worship of the emperor as divine.
The Pax Romana and the PaxChristus, the gospel of Caesar
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and the gospel of Jesus, theworship of the empire and the
worship of the kingdom.
These three broader areas showhow contested the claims of the
people of Jesus were in the faceof the stories Rome told about
itself.
And it's within that contestedcontext that Paul gives those
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instructions that we startedwith.
Let's read them again Romans 13, verse 1.
Let every person be subject tothe governing authorities, for
there is no authority exceptfrom God, and those authorities
that exist have been institutedby God.
Therefore, whoever resistsauthority resists what God has
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appointed, and those who resistwill incur judgment.
Now, what is Paul doing here?
Because we have so manyquestions that should be
cropping up Now.
In Paul's day, there was nosmall amount of revolutionary
fervor that often would rise upamong the people, one of the key
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historic streams feeding thenecessity of the letter to the
Roman church.
You have to understand again,just as we're talking about a
different cultural world, paultakes to writing this letter
because there are things thatare happening in the church that
he wants to address.
Paul didn't wake up one day inprison and say I'm going to
write scripture to the church inRome.
Paul is hearing about what isplaguing the Christians at Rome.
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He's hearing about what isgoing on in their life together
and he's saying I need to writethem a letter and I'm going to
have one of my emissariesdeliver it and recite it out
loud.
Again, these letters were readas total holes to the church.
Likely, this letter, the letterto the church at Rome, was read
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by Phoebe.
The first words, the firstpeople to speak the words to the
Roman church, a woman that'spretty beautiful.
But Paul undertakes to writethis letter and one of the key
historic streams feeding thenecessity of the letter to the
Roman church was the expulsionof the Jewish people from the
city of Rome by the emperorClaudius and their subsequent
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return to the city following hisdeath sometime in around 54 AD.
Returned to the city followinghis death sometime in around 54
AD.
Now it is likely that Claudiusdeported all of the Jewish
people, citizens andnon-citizens alike, due to what
the Roman historian Suetoniuscalled the Crestus Affair.
This was some sort of civildisturbance and many historians
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believe that Crestus is just amisspelling of Christus, that
really this was about Jesus.
It was an intramural disputebetween ethnically Jewish people
and Jewish Christians andGentiles that were in their wake
and that something happened andClaudius was like I can't deal
with all this.
You guys got to get out of thecity.
And so the Roman church for awhile was almost predominantly
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Gentile.
And then, following Claudius'sdeath in 54 AD, now we have
Jewish Christians returning tothe church and we have this
complexity.
These people are having tofigure out how to live together
all over again.
Revolutionary fervor wouldoften rise up among the people,
and we'll see this in itsstarkest form thousands of miles
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away in Jerusalem, a meredecade and a half later, in
about 70 AD, when Jewishfactions will revolt against
Caesar's rule and will becompletely obliterated, temple
destroyed, as Josephus recordsPastorally.
It seems that Paul here inRomans, chapter 13, is saying to
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this specific church, at thisspecific time and place you can
hate what is evil and love whatis good.
You can trust vengeance to theLord, but revolution is not the
way of the kingdom.
Paul's instructions in Romans12 echo the vision given to the
exiles in Babylon, given by theprophet Jeremiah In Jeremiah 29,
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.
Jeremiah, quoting the Lord,says this Thus says the Lord of
hosts, the God of Israel, to allthe exiles whom I've sent into
exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.
Build houses and live in them,plant gardens and eat what they
produce.
Take wives and have sons anddaughters.
Take wives for your sons andgive your daughters in marriage
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that they may bear sons anddaughters.
Multiply there and do notdecrease, but seek the welfare
of the city where I have sentyou into exile and pray to the
lord on its behalf, for in itswelfare you will find your
welfare, for surely I know theplans I have for you, says
welfare.
You will find your welfare, forsurely I know the plans I have
for you, says the Lord.
Plans for your welfare and notfor your harm, to give you a
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future and a hope.
It seems that Paul is tellingthis Roman church how to exist
in exile.
1 Peter will address theChristians as exiles, as
wanderers, as pilgrims.
And so first we start withPaul's very specific pastoral
point.
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But as we've been talking,romans 13 raises some questions,
doesn't it?
Why does God allow evil rulersto come to power in the first
place, and what are we to doabout it?
Romans 13, verse 1, tells usplainly that the ruling
authorities have been institutedby God.
Paul writes this book mostlikely during the reign of the
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emperor Nero.
Now I don't know what you knowabout Nero, famously upright and
integrous human being.
No, that's not at all what'sgoing on, right, nero?
If you're unfamiliarhistorically, there was a
massive fire that likely hestarted in the city of Rome that
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he then blamed on theChristians.
He would use Christians astorches for his dinner parties
while he dressed as a woman andreveled.
And it's within the context ofthis kind of leader, in the
context of this kind ofgovernment, that Paul is saying
that all authority has beeninstituted by God.
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That's really the kind ofleader that God is appointing.
We couldn't find anyone else.
The Greek word for authoritiesis the word exousia, which is
often used to generalize aboutthe office of authority.
Jesus uses this word upon hisresurrection as he institutes
the great commission.
All authority, all exousia hasbeen given to me in Matthew 28.
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Notice, paul does not say letevery person be subject to Nero
specifically.
Sure, the Old Testament gives usa little warrant for the way
that God guides the rise andfall of individual rulers.
If you read in the book ofDaniel Nebuchadnezzar, you read
in the book of Isaiah, thePersian king, cyrus, but it does
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not necessarily follow that Godis drafting every earthly king,
ruler, governor, to theirappointed position.
That's not what Romans issaying here to their appointed
position.
That's not what Romans issaying here.
And we do well not to just playthe scoreboard and determine
that because a ruler is in power, that they are ordained by God.
Just because a ruler rises topower, whether they take it by
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force or are voted into office,does not demand theologically
that God chose that person.
The book of Revelation takes aquite different vantage point of
the Roman Empire itself, thatthe Roman imperial power has
become a beast that is seekingto devour the faithful Christian
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believers.
And, as Revelation reminds us,they overcome the pretensions of
the beast and its delusions bythe blood of the Lamb and the
word of their testimony.
What is clear here in Romans 13is that God has ordained
government, with all of itsflaws, to curb chaos and promote
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flourishing.
According to verses 4 and 5,earthly governments have been
entrusted with the sword asextensions of the wrath of God.
These institutions are to bestewards, caretakers of truth
and justice, and according toPaul, this exercising of truth
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and justice is possible andavailable even to an idolatrous
regime like the Roman Empire.
It's a stunning claim.
The presence of the sword heredoes not legitimize capital
punishment or state-sponsoredkilling, but merely serves as a
condensed symbol for thepolicing powers of Rome.
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Specifically, esau Macaulay, inhis book Reading While Black,
demonstrates how the Romansoldiers, especially within the
capital city itself, served asthe police force in Rome.
They were the bearers of thesword.
And the point that Paul ismaking here is that government
is instituted by God as a good.
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It has that potential, Just asindividuals are called to
reflect God's goodness in theworld.
We have that potential, but wecan also choose to go ways that
are out of step with God'sdesigns.
It is a good thing for citizenswhen those who seek to do harm,
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to kill, to steal and otherwiseare curbed by punishment from
the state.
Christians have had a profoundimpact in the world on the
treatment of prisoners, onacknowledging that even those
who have committed viciouscrimes still in some way, though
it be marred, bear the image ofGod and are called to that
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vocation.
There's much to be done in thisarea, but Paul is making this
broader statement, thatgovernment itself in all of its
different forms and again we'retalking, we're sort of
straddling two lines here wehave the imperial version of
government, we are speaking fromthe location of a
representative democracy.
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The government can be good andshould be good, but just as this
responsibility can be submittedto the authority of Christ, so
also this authority can beabused or exploited.
Paul writes in verse 3, forrulers are not a terror to good
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conduct, but to bad.
Do you wish to have no fear ofthe authority, then do what is
good and you will receive itsapproval.
This sounds like a proverb.
The only problem with thisstatement is that it is
decidedly not true.
It is not true in Paul's life,it is not true in Jesus's life.
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So what are we going to do then?
Do we just dismiss Paul?
There's a new stream inbiblical theology that just
anytime Paul says something theydisagree with, they're just
like oh, paul didn't know whathe was talking about, he's
misguided.
It's like well, okay, thatdoesn't seem like the answer.
No again, we see here Paul'sspecific pastoral instructions
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to the specific situation in theRoman church.
Paul is not saying that for allof time, everywhere, that those
who are doing good will notencounter terror in the face of
their good conduct, or thatyou'll receive endless
endorsement from the government.
That is clearly not true.
He is saying that in thisspecific time and place in Rome,
and broadly, this is thegeneral way that things work His
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counsel is to live as exiles inthis way.
Doing this is an importantthing for us to acknowledge
because, as our black brothersand sisters can often attest,
there is often fear inencounters with police, even
though they've done nothingwrong, and we could see how a
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surface-level reading of Romans13, though it would have all the
markers of trying to befaithful, could be shallow and
callous.
When we receive the testimonyof our brothers and sisters in
Christ who are black, and theblack population more broadly,
we see there is often much fearin encounters with police
because of the historic andsystemic characterizations of
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those encounters.
This doesn't mean that everypolice officer is bad or racist
Far from it but it does put usinto contact with what Paul will
call the powers, a subject thatwe'll return to in a moment.
Paul then directs the church topay their taxes.
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Dang it, we couldn't havegotten away with that one.
It's like sorry America.
I conscientiously object topaying my taxes.
People have tried this.
In the 1960s, a group ofQuakers lobbied Congress to have
their taxes directed towardsnon-military spending.
This has evolved into anunenshrined bill that sits on
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the desk of Congress, called theReligious Freedom Peace Tax
Fund, where conscientiouscitizens could direct their
taxes towards non-military uses.
Again, great, I think this is anice idea.
But it's kind of naive.
Paul tells the Roman church,with all of the compromises of
the Roman empire, hey, pay yourtaxes Again.
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Paul was not blind to theexcesses of the Roman government
, their brutality in doingthings like crucifying his lord
and savior, their idolatry,demanding the emperor be
worshipped, the inequality thatwas rampant throughout the
empire.
But Paul doesn't overly concernhimself with this because he
recognizes that the authoritythat was rampant throughout the
empire.
But Paul doesn't overly concernhimself with this because he
recognizes that the authoritythat the state exercises is a
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derived authority, it is not theultimate, and that to be a
Christian in the world that hasbeen saved by God but not yet
fully consummated, is to live ina complex world, is to live in
a complex world.
We in our culture are obsessedwith this idea of being on the
right side of history and we cantry to absolve ourselves of any
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entanglements and compromise,and yet we find that we stand on
ethically and morally perilousground.
Nonetheless, this doesn'tbreathe in us a cynicism.
It doesn't cause us to throw upour hands and say what can be
done, but it does put us intouch, first of all, with our
need for confession.
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Throughout most of Canada,assemblies, even some church
services, begin with anacknowledgement of the land, the
historic indigenous citizens ofthe land.
Here in New Jersey we are onthe grounds that are
historically home of the Lenapepeople.
Now you may roll your eyes andsay this is just progressive
mumbo jumbo, but I think it'soften the closest Western
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culture gets to confession.
The story didn't start with us.
There are chapters that are,quite frankly, really ugly and
there's not a lot we can doabout it.
And it's on this morallycompromised ground that we stand
and we acknowledge that we havethis allergy to just telling
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the truth about our history sooften and that's corporate,
that's personal One of thethings that our interactions
with government bring us into isjust this fraught place of what
it means to be human.
None of us is righteous, noneof us stands on our own accord,
and yet God holds us up by hisgrace.
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It also puts us in touch withour limits.
What most of us don't do isdirect the state budget, but
what we can do is follow Romans13, verses 8 through 12 in
Romans 12.
Read Romans 12 on your own time.
I'll read Romans 13 for you now, owe, no one, anything except
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to love one another, for the onewho loves another has fulfilled
the law.
The commandments you shall notcommit adultery, you shall not
murder, you shall not steal, youshall not covet, and any other
commandment are summed up inthis word you shall love your
neighbor as yourself.
Love does no wrong to aneighbor.
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Therefore, love is thefulfilling of the law.
We can do that now, ecclesia.
What that doesn't do is overlypersonalize what the gospel is
bringing forth in us.
No, it means we listen to thetestimony of our neighbor.
So when our neighbor says, yes,there is fear when I encounter
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the police because of the colorof my skin, we don't have to say
well, well, well like, if youdo good, then only good will
come.
No, we as the people of God,can say tell me more about that.
As Romans 12 reminds us weepwith those who weep.
Hate what is evil.
Love what is good, neighbor.
Love is the politic that Jesusinvites us into, and it is an
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effective politic that doesn'toverly individualize our
response to the grace that ispoured out but instead
multiplies exponentially andturns us into the movement, the
people of God, that he hascalled us to be.
Okay, so some wisdom.
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How do we embody Romans 13 inour own politically fraught
times?
First, we subject government andput it in its proper place.
The word used for b subject isthe greek compound word,
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hupotasso comes from hupa, whichmeans under, and tasso, which
means to bring about an order ofthings by arranging them,
putting them in their place.
How many of you are justincredibly type A and you just
like things to be reallyorganized?
Thank you, thank you, we needyou, thank you.
I don't know if type B is athing, but here I am type B,
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organized, order things in theirright place.
We have a staff full of peoplethat are incredibly organized,
and there's good reasons forthat.
When I go in that closet, if Iwere managing the storage of
Ecclesia, it'd be like thosecartoons where they just have to
shove things in there and stufflike bowling balls roll out.
Why is there a bowling ball inthere?
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Nobody knows things in thereand stuff like bowling balls
roll out.
Why is there a bowling ball inthere?
Nobody knows, but when you goin there.
It's order.
God creates order.
The image of a filing system isa useful one that the authority
of government has been filed ina certain place by God, who is
the sovereign and absoluteauthority.
He is the one who standsoutside of the filing cabinet
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putting everything in its rightplace.
And if we talk of a filingsystem, that government has a
proper file that has beenassigned.
And we talk that everyexpression of government has
been designed with certainplaces, certain limits, we
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entrust that God will exercisehis authority and his judgment
upon those that bear the swordand the scriptures talk often of
this that the Lord is sovereign, that he will call the nations
to bear, that he will callrulers to bear, that he will
call teachers and leaders tobear upon his judgment.
That, just as we have beencalled to lead, we have been
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warned and told over and overagain that we will face a severe
judgment from God because ofthe responsibility that we carry
and that exists at alldifferent levels.
And one of the things I find sosad in my life, in my own
personal relationships, is theway that so many Christians have
allowed the filing system thatGod has created just to overflow
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.
It is just completely indisarray.
I have so many friends andcolleagues, left and right alike
, that have allowed thegovernment file to completely
overrun the entire filingcabinet.
I mean, the thing isoverflowing with scrawlings of
conspiracy theories.
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Our hypercharged media enablesthis to completely subsume our
lives, and much of the idolatryand deception that is wrapped up
in the American politicalsystem comes from the way that
Christians have placed so muchmore emphasis on their chosen
political perspectives than thatof Jesus Christ.
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I've been saddened to watch,dear friends and colleagues and
I say this with no superioritycomplex, I say this with no
judgment, but as I've watchedfriends of mine who are wise,
kind and thoughtful essentiallybecome left-wing mouthpieces,
hold that thought I've beensaddened to interact with people
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who have been a part of my life, churches that were deeply
formative for me, who justrattle off right-wing talking
points and it's almost as if youknow what they're going to say
by their chosen politicalposture.
It's like oh, what do you thinkabout this?
Actually, I kind of alreadyknow, because I heard it on.
You know, insert name here.
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I say this again, not forChristians to.
Okay, let's find the middle.
Perfect, it's comfortable here,this is great.
Now we can just stand injudgment of both sides.
This is awesome.
You're welcome.
That's what we're here for.
No, it's because there arethings that on the left that are
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kingdom-oriented and righteous,but not everything, and there
are things on the right that arekingdom-oriented and righteous,
but neither comprises the wholeof the kingdom vision, and both
sides are hopelesslycompromised, because you cannot
have the kingdom of Jesuswithout the king, which means
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that, as Christians, when wemake choices in the political
realm which we are called tomake to exercise wisdom and
authority, we should not betrying to justify them endlessly
, to entrench ourselves in them,to wrap our whole identity up
in our chosen politicalperspective.
Again, the pastoral wisdom I'vebeen counseling for some months
now is make a decision and moveon, or take in new information
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and say you know what, maybe Iwas wrong about that?
Heaven forbid, because there'sambiguity, there's complexity
wrapped up in each choice.
When we subject ourselves togovernment that is properly
subjected to Christ, weacknowledge both our own limits,
in that God has not given usall the agency in the world, all
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the information in the world,and we acknowledge the limits of
government itself.
We bear witness that thegovernment, no matter how
totalitarian in its claims,cannot claim our heart, our soul
, our mind, our strength or whatthe New Testament calls our
allegiance.
And so we put government backin its proper place.
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It is not everything.
And second, we have to discern.
I mentioned the powers earlier.
Elsewhere, in Ephesians,chapter 6, paul speaks of powers
that are behind the power.
He says this, beginning inverse 10, against the
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authorities, against the cosmicpowers of this present darkness,
against the spiritual forces ofevil in the heavenly places.
Paul recognized that Claudiusor Nero were not his enemies,
just as Jesus recognized thatCaiaphas and Pilate were not his
.
And you can insert Americanpolitical figure that you
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despise into the Senate here.
They are not your enemy.
There are powers that asise anddescendants here they are not
your enemy.
There are powers that, asRomans 11 reminds us, these
powers are from God, they arethrough God and to God, that
exist in the world.
These powers are not specificindividuals, but are always
embodied in human agents.
These powers can be individualpeople or institutions, like
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governments, or constructs, likerace, and these powers have all
one and the same, been disarmedby Jesus on the cross.
Look at Colossians, chapter 2,one of my favorite texts.
God made you alive togetherwith him when he forgave us all
our trespasses.
Amen, forgiveness, individualgrace, beautiful, erasing the
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record that stood against uswith its legal demands.
Praise the Lord, he's paid ourdebt.
He set this aside, nailing itto the cross.
Look what he does next.
He disarmed the rulers andauthorities and made a public
example of them triumphing overthem.
I love that Paul mentions apublic example because it gives
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me an excuse to mention that theOklahoma City Thunder won the
NBA championship this pastSunday.
Jesus is parading his defeat ofthese powers.
He's just saying look.
And Paul says elsewhere inCorinthians if the powers that
be would have known what Jesuswas up to, they would not have
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crucified the Lord of glory,that Jesus was doing the deeper
magic that CS Lewis talks about,that Jesus has so thoroughly
disarmed them that, though wewrestle with them, as Paul says,
they have no last word in theface of what Jesus has done.
Paul's response to this, takingRomans 12, 13, and Ephesians 6
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together, is that we are towrestle with these powers.
It is not a new story that welive out as Christians in a
perilous and complex age.
It is our tradition.
We receive this inheritance.
We receive this baton the bookof Hebrews talks about we run
this race fixing our eyes onJesus, the author and perfecter
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of our faith, and there aremultitudes of people that have
faithfully lived this out.
Some we know their names, somewe will not know until the other
side of glory.
They're cheering you on andsaying don't give in.
Don't give in to these smallstories.
You've been given the truestory of the entire world, but
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we struggle against them, not inour own strength.
Paul says there's armor.
You should put it on.
We wrestle with the powers byfulfilling the law in love.
We wrestle with the powersthrough intercessory prayer.
We wrestle with the powers byfulfilling the law in love.
We wrestle with the powersthrough intercessory prayer.
We wrestle with the powers byelecting leaders who have
integrity and courage.
We wrestle with the powers bybeing youth baseball coaches,
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mentors, by being artists, byvisiting prisoners and sharing
life with them, by serving theundocumented in our midst, by
bearing witness to life in thewomb, by coming to the table of
Jesus from every socioeconomic,ethnic, cultural background,
receiving His grace, bylamenting what is broken and sad
in this world and crying outwith all of creation.
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How long, joining with creationin its groans and travails,
anxiously awaiting for the sonsand daughters of God to be
revealed and for creation to bemade new.
Be subject to the rulingauthorities is simply one way
that we bear witness to thelimits of the ruling authorities
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.
And there comes a point wherewe must conscientiously object
and dissent, because we arebearing witness to a higher
authority, to a higher law.
Martin luther king jr and thesouthern christian leadership
conference bear witness to thisauthority with bus boycotts and
sit-ins because they acknowledgethe ruling authorities and laws
(33:34):
of this land were an unjust.
Dj bonhoeffer convenes aseminary at Finkenwald to bear
witness to the injustice ofHitler and his regime and to
raise up a generation ofpreachers who will tell the
truth in the face of deception.
William Wilberforce and theClapham sect prayed and financed
the overhaul of chattel slaveryin England because they
(33:55):
realized the extent to which theslave trade was an idolatrous
capitulation to mammon and acomplete denial of the Christian
faith.
Frederick Douglass ran awayfrom his legal owners because no
man or no woman should be owned.
Perpetua and Felicitas,scrolling way back to church
history, refused to capitulateto the imperial ideology and
(34:17):
bore witness at the cost oftheir lives.
John and Peter, arrested by thegoverning authorities, said hey
, do what you want to us, but wecannot stop speaking in this
name.
It's both Paul and Petertelling us to be subject to the
governing authorities to honorthe emperor that ultimately,
(34:38):
will be executed by that sameimperial system, because they
held on to a better hope, acitizenship in a country without
end, a city whose foundationsare unshakable.
And Jesus?
Jesus told Pilate you wouldhave no power if it were not
given to you from above.
(34:59):
Jesus told the high priest hewould see the Son of man riding
in power on the clouds.
Jesus told the soldiers whocame to arrest him I am he, ego
and me.
And though he constantly andrightfully protested, you arrest
me and yet you bring no chargeagainst me.
He willingly went to the crossto confront and unmask all the
(35:22):
pretensions of the powers, allpowers of government, of
religion, of systemic oppressionand, ultimately, the powers of
sin and death themselves.
He submitted himself to themand overthrew them, and we can
take heart because he hasovercome the world in his life,
(35:44):
his death, his resurrection.
I'm going to invite the worshipteam forward as we transition to
a time of response.
Ecclesia, ecclesia.
This victory that is Christ isthen given to us as the gift of
what the scriptures call grace.
And it works itself out in acouple different ways and we've
(36:06):
sort of talked along two vantagepoints and I want to just name
them as we respond to God'spresence here in our midst.
First of all, there is thecorporate peace, the Pax
Christus, the Shalom, the firstword that Jesus speaks to his
disciples when he appears tothem upon his resurrection.
(36:27):
Peace, my peace, I give to you,my peace I leave with you.
I do not give as the worldgives.
And that peace is not just anice inner feeling for us, it is
the cosmic writing of allthings.
It is all things that arecreated from, through and to
Jesus Christ, recognizing theirtrue Lord and sovereign.
(36:49):
And when that happens, we seethe image in Revelation 21 and
22.
Sin and death are no more.
God wipes every tear from oureyes.
There is no more pain, there isno more distance between us
that is misunderstanding,miscommunication, but love is
truly the distance that isbetween us.
(37:09):
And so we pray in the midst ofthis longing, we pray that God
will bring his peace into ourmidst and that we can be agents
of that peace.
That is the corporate,collective side of this peace,
and we both long for it and wework for it.
But there's another side tothis.
That is the beauty of Jesus'sgospel.
(37:31):
It's not just something that isabout us collectively, it is
something about us individually,that we all stand before God as
the unique person throughoutall the history of the world,
throughout all the eight billionpeople that exist in the world
right now.
You are singular, and that maysound aggrandizing, that may
sound like you're making toomuch of yourself, but I assure
(37:53):
you that is much less than Godmakes of you, and he is calling
you to himself and he's sayingmy peace, I give to you my peace
, I leave with you.
And so this is the invitation,both for us as the people of God
, to endeavor to be this kind ofpeople of peace, by the power
of his spirit, to say yes, lord,come, we want you here.
(38:14):
But then say individually Jesus, I need you.
In the midst of these anxiousmoments that I live, in the
midst of my powerlessness in theface of what I am facing, in
the midst of the sin that is soreadily before me, god, I need
you and the beauty of Jesus.
As we're talking about rulingauthorities and sovereign, he's
(38:38):
a good king, as Tolkien remindsus, the hands of a king are the
hands of a healer, and this iswhat he comes to do to heal and
restore, to make all things new.
We pray, come Holy Spirit, lordJesus, we focus our attention
on your healing hands and I cansee where you are.
(39:02):
I just invite you to just forman image of Jesus stretched out
on the cross.
His hands are pierced throughwith nails, they are wounded,
but, as Isaiah reminds us, byhis wounds we are healed.
(39:23):
And with that vision justsitting in your mind if it's
more of the corporate vantagepoint that you are sort of
sitting with and wrestling with,how is the world as it is?
How are there so many peoplethat lack integrity or courage
or truthfulness Wielding thelevers of power?
(39:44):
I ask, just allow the Spirit ofGod to rise up, a lament in you
.
The Spirit groans with sighsthat are too deep for words,
sighs that are too deep forwords.
And that same groaning meets usin our individual stories and
lives, the places we often cometo dead ends.
(40:06):
Again and again we feelpowerless.
Again and again we find thisprofound need for grace, and
it's not just one time, it's notjust a few times, it is every
day of our lives and ChristJesus have mercy upon me, you
sinner.
(40:30):
We believe the Holy Spirit ishere, that Christ's resurrection
is not just a nice idea, a nicestory that we tell ourselves,
but that he truly poured out hisspirit, that his presence is no
less here with us than it wasin the stories that we read in
the scriptures, that he looks atus without turning away, that
(40:55):
he invites us to touch thewounds in his hands so that we
might believe that he speakswords of peace to us, that he
speaks words that say I see you,I have you, and that he's doing
that here in this place.
And so I just invite you tolisten.
(41:16):
And so I just invite you tolisten.
I'm going to take just a momentin quiet before the worship
team begins to sing.
When they start to sing, youcan stand and respond together,
but I'm afraid on the team.
If you guys would just give usa minute, when you're ready,
just go into the song.
(41:37):
It's a lot of the Holy Spiritjust to have His way in this
place.
We pray come, holy Spirit.
Good morning, ecclesia.
It's good to see you.
Those of you who are new herewelcome.
We're so glad to see you.
Those of you who are here everyweek or every other week or
every once in a while, it'sreally good to see you too.
What an honor to worship Jesustogether.
Paul writes in Romans 13,.
Just an easy one, right, right?
What does it look like to livein regards to what we, as modern
(00:48):
people, call the state?
How do we, as a people, bearwitness to King Jesus in the
midst of other kingdoms vyingfor our allegiance?
It's important for us toremember the differences in
civics that exist between ourown representative democracy and
(01:08):
that of the Roman imperialworld.
We have to talk about thisoften because it's important for
us to get in step with theworld of the biblical authors.
I remind you of this frequentlybecause it is so imperative.
When we read the scriptures, weare reading words from people
that spoke in differentlanguages, that had different
(01:29):
cultural assumptions, differentcultural locations, and we are
trying to, in order to hear God,first, get in step with the
ways that they are speaking.
Paul, obviously, is writingwithin the context of the Roman
Empire, to the center of Romanauthority, that being the church
(01:51):
at Rome, these Christians wouldhave been familiar with several
of the claims of Rome.
I'm going to look at threetoday.
That it just so happens thatthroughout the story of the
scriptures the people of Godwould speak of what God was
doing in the world in light ofthese terms.
(02:12):
But also the Roman Empire wouldspeak of what they were doing
in the world in light of theseterms.
The first the Pax Romana.
The Pax Romana, that Rome hadgiven the world the gift of
peace.
It came gift-wrapped withbrutality, might, taxation and
(02:32):
colonization, both physical andfigurative, but nonetheless Rome
just says to the world we'vegiven you peace, you're welcome.
The second the gospel.
Euangelion is the word that theNew Testament translates good
news, gospel.
This also comes from theprophet Isaiah, especially in
(02:55):
Isaiah, chapter 40 through 55.
The gospel of Caesar that thegods had appointed the current
Caesar as their emissary in theworld and in some parts of the
empire.
This wasn't true throughout allof the empire, but in some
parts of the empire Caesarwasn't just designated by the
gods as the appointed ruler, hewas divine himself.
(03:17):
This is especially true in theeastern quadrants of the Roman
Empire and here in the midst ofthese contested places Pax,
euangelion, gospel and I putthrough the fourth one in there
just for fun, because our nameis Ecclesia.
The earliest Christiansidentified their assembly, their
(03:39):
gathering, their Sunday morning, their expression of that, as
the Ecclesia, the called outones of God.
And here are the Christians, inthe midst of these contested
terms, claiming that theresurrected Christ has given an
eternal and borderless peacethat is both systemic and
personal.
That his peace that he gives tous comes not through conquering
(04:02):
, not through shedding the bloodof his enemies and the anxious
maintenance of sustaining atenuous empire, but through
allowing himself to be conqueredand pouring out his spirit as
the first fruits of a kingdomthat will never end and creating
a new humanity bound togetherby the blood of Christ.
That, the gospel that theChristians claim, is indeed
(04:26):
about the ascension of a king toa throne.
But the scale of this king'skingdom and his throne makes
Rome look like a little childwalking throughout the house
announcing to everybody whowould listen that I am a king.
Jesus' kingdom is justpatronizing.
Patting them on the head Sureyou are.
(04:48):
Jesus demands total allegianceheart, soul, mind and strength.
Thus the earliest Christianscannot participate in the civic
worship of the emperor as divine.
The Pax Romana and the PaxChristus, the gospel of Caesar
(05:10):
and the gospel of Jesus, theworship of the empire and the
worship of the kingdom.
These three broader areas showhow contested the claims of the
people of Jesus were in the faceof the stories Rome told about
itself.
And it's within that contestedcontext that Paul gives those
(05:30):
instructions that we startedwith.
Let's read them again Romans 13, verse 1.
Let every person be subject tothe governing authorities, for
there is no authority exceptfrom God, and those authorities
that exist have been institutedby God.
Therefore, whoever resistsauthority resists what God has
(05:50):
appointed, and those who resistwill incur judgment.
Now, what is Paul doing here?
Because we have so manyquestions that should be
cropping up Now.
In Paul's day, there was nosmall amount of revolutionary
fervor that often would rise upamong the people, one of the key
(06:12):
historic streams feeding thenecessity of the letter to the
Roman church.
You have to understand again,just as we're talking about a
different cultural world, paultakes to writing this letter
because there are things thatare happening in the church that
he wants to address.
Paul didn't wake up one day inprison and say I'm going to
write scripture to the church inRome.
Paul is hearing about what isplaguing the Christians at Rome.
(06:36):
He's hearing about what isgoing on in their life together
and he's saying I need to writethem a letter and I'm going to
have one of my emissariesdeliver it and recite it out
loud.
Again, these letters were readas total holes to the church.
Likely, this letter, the letterto the church at Rome, was read
(06:57):
by Phoebe.
The first words, the firstpeople to speak the words to the
Roman church, a woman that'spretty beautiful.
But Paul undertakes to writethis letter and one of the key
historic streams feeding thenecessity of the letter to the
Roman church was the expulsionof the Jewish people from the
city of Rome by the emperorClaudius and their subsequent
(07:20):
return to the city following hisdeath sometime in around 54 AD.
Returned to the city followinghis death sometime in around 54
AD.
Now it is likely that Claudiusdeported all of the Jewish
people, citizens andnon-citizens alike, due to what
the Roman historian Suetoniuscalled the Crestus Affair.
This was some sort of civildisturbance and many historians
(07:40):
believe that Crestus is just amisspelling of Christus, that
really this was about Jesus.
It was an intramural disputebetween ethnically Jewish people
and Jewish Christians andGentiles that were in their wake
and that something happened andClaudius was like I can't deal
with all this.
You guys got to get out of thecity.
And so the Roman church for awhile was almost predominantly
(08:03):
Gentile.
And then, following Claudius'sdeath in 54 AD, now we have
Jewish Christians returning tothe church and we have this
complexity.
These people are having tofigure out how to live together
all over again.
Revolutionary fervor wouldoften rise up among the people,
and we'll see this in itsstarkest form thousands of miles
(08:27):
away in Jerusalem, a meredecade and a half later, in
about 70 AD, when Jewishfactions will revolt against
Caesar's rule and will becompletely obliterated, temple
destroyed, as Josephus recordsPastorally.
It seems that Paul here inRomans, chapter 13, is saying to
(08:49):
this specific church, at thisspecific time and place you can
hate what is evil and love whatis good.
You can trust vengeance to theLord, but revolution is not the
way of the kingdom.
Paul's instructions in Romans12 echo the vision given to the
exiles in Babylon, given by theprophet Jeremiah In Jeremiah 29,
(09:09):
.
Jeremiah, quoting the Lord,says this Thus says the Lord of
hosts, the God of Israel, to allthe exiles whom I've sent into
exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.
Build houses and live in them,plant gardens and eat what they
produce.
Take wives and have sons anddaughters.
Take wives for your sons andgive your daughters in marriage
(09:29):
that they may bear sons anddaughters.
Multiply there and do notdecrease, but seek the welfare
of the city where I have sentyou into exile and pray to the
lord on its behalf, for in itswelfare you will find your
welfare, for surely I know theplans I have for you, says
welfare.
You will find your welfare, forsurely I know the plans I have
for you, says the Lord.
Plans for your welfare and notfor your harm, to give you a
(09:50):
future and a hope.
It seems that Paul is tellingthis Roman church how to exist
in exile.
1 Peter will address theChristians as exiles, as
wanderers, as pilgrims.
And so first we start withPaul's very specific pastoral
point.
(10:11):
But as we've been talking,romans 13 raises some questions,
doesn't it?
Why does God allow evil rulersto come to power in the first
place, and what are we to doabout it?
Romans 13, verse 1, tells usplainly that the ruling
authorities have been institutedby God.
Paul writes this book mostlikely during the reign of the
(10:36):
emperor Nero.
Now I don't know what you knowabout Nero, famously upright and
integrous human being.
No, that's not at all what'sgoing on, right, nero?
If you're unfamiliarhistorically, there was a
massive fire that likely hestarted in the city of Rome that
(10:58):
he then blamed on theChristians.
He would use Christians astorches for his dinner parties
while he dressed as a woman andreveled.
And it's within the context ofthis kind of leader, in the
context of this kind ofgovernment, that Paul is saying
that all authority has beeninstituted by God.
(11:20):
That's really the kind ofleader that God is appointing.
We couldn't find anyone else.
The Greek word for authoritiesis the word exousia, which is
often used to generalize aboutthe office of authority.
Jesus uses this word upon hisresurrection as he institutes
the great commission.
All authority, all exousia hasbeen given to me in Matthew 28.
(11:45):
Notice, paul does not say letevery person be subject to Nero
specifically.
Sure, the Old Testament gives usa little warrant for the way
that God guides the rise andfall of individual rulers.
If you read in the book ofDaniel Nebuchadnezzar, you read
in the book of Isaiah, thePersian king, cyrus, but it does
(12:05):
not necessarily follow that Godis drafting every earthly king,
ruler, governor, to theirappointed position.
That's not what Romans issaying here to their appointed
position.
That's not what Romans issaying here.
And we do well not to just playthe scoreboard and determine
that because a ruler is in power, that they are ordained by God.
Just because a ruler rises topower, whether they take it by
(12:29):
force or are voted into office,does not demand theologically
that God chose that person.
The book of Revelation takes aquite different vantage point of
the Roman Empire itself, thatthe Roman imperial power has
become a beast that is seekingto devour the faithful Christian
(12:51):
believers.
And, as Revelation reminds us,they overcome the pretensions of
the beast and its delusions bythe blood of the Lamb and the
word of their testimony.
What is clear here in Romans 13is that God has ordained
government, with all of itsflaws, to curb chaos and promote
(13:14):
flourishing.
According to verses 4 and 5,earthly governments have been
entrusted with the sword asextensions of the wrath of God.
These institutions are to bestewards, caretakers of truth
and justice, and according toPaul, this exercising of truth
(13:35):
and justice is possible andavailable even to an idolatrous
regime like the Roman Empire.
It's a stunning claim.
The presence of the sword heredoes not legitimize capital
punishment or state-sponsoredkilling, but merely serves as a
condensed symbol for thepolicing powers of Rome.
(13:55):
Specifically, esau Macaulay, inhis book Reading While Black,
demonstrates how the Romansoldiers, especially within the
capital city itself, served asthe police force in Rome.
They were the bearers of thesword.
And the point that Paul ismaking here is that government
is instituted by God as a good.
(14:17):
It has that potential, Just asindividuals are called to
reflect God's goodness in theworld.
We have that potential, but wecan also choose to go ways that
are out of step with God'sdesigns.
It is a good thing for citizenswhen those who seek to do harm,
(14:38):
to kill, to steal and otherwiseare curbed by punishment from
the state.
Christians have had a profoundimpact in the world on the
treatment of prisoners, onacknowledging that even those
who have committed viciouscrimes still in some way, though
it be marred, bear the image ofGod and are called to that
(15:00):
vocation.
There's much to be done in thisarea, but Paul is making this
broader statement, thatgovernment itself in all of its
different forms and again we'retalking, we're sort of
straddling two lines here wehave the imperial version of
government, we are speaking fromthe location of a
representative democracy.
(15:21):
The government can be good andshould be good, but just as this
responsibility can be submittedto the authority of Christ, so
also this authority can beabused or exploited.
Paul writes in verse 3, forrulers are not a terror to good
(15:41):
conduct, but to bad.
Do you wish to have no fear ofthe authority, then do what is
good and you will receive itsapproval.
This sounds like a proverb.
The only problem with thisstatement is that it is
decidedly not true.
It is not true in Paul's life,it is not true in Jesus's life.
(16:04):
So what are we going to do then?
Do we just dismiss Paul?
There's a new stream inbiblical theology that just
anytime Paul says something theydisagree with, they're just
like oh, paul didn't know whathe was talking about, he's
misguided.
It's like well, okay, thatdoesn't seem like the answer.
No again, we see here Paul'sspecific pastoral instructions
(16:28):
to the specific situation in theRoman church.
Paul is not saying that for allof time, everywhere, that those
who are doing good will notencounter terror in the face of
their good conduct, or thatyou'll receive endless
endorsement from the government.
That is clearly not true.
He is saying that in thisspecific time and place in Rome,
and broadly, this is thegeneral way that things work His
(16:53):
counsel is to live as exiles inthis way.
Doing this is an importantthing for us to acknowledge
because, as our black brothersand sisters can often attest,
there is often fear inencounters with police, even
though they've done nothingwrong, and we could see how a
(17:14):
surface-level reading of Romans13, though it would have all the
markers of trying to befaithful, could be shallow and
callous.
When we receive the testimonyof our brothers and sisters in
Christ who are black, and theblack population more broadly,
we see there is often much fearin encounters with police
because of the historic andsystemic characterizations of
(17:34):
those encounters.
This doesn't mean that everypolice officer is bad or racist
Far from it but it does put usinto contact with what Paul will
call the powers, a subject thatwe'll return to in a moment.
Paul then directs the church topay their taxes.
(17:57):
Dang it, we couldn't havegotten away with that one.
It's like sorry America.
I conscientiously object topaying my taxes.
People have tried this.
In the 1960s, a group ofQuakers lobbied Congress to have
their taxes directed towardsnon-military spending.
This has evolved into anunenshrined bill that sits on
(18:20):
the desk of Congress, called theReligious Freedom Peace Tax
Fund, where conscientiouscitizens could direct their
taxes towards non-military uses.
Again, great, I think this is anice idea.
But it's kind of naive.
Paul tells the Roman church,with all of the compromises of
the Roman empire, hey, pay yourtaxes Again.
(18:42):
Paul was not blind to theexcesses of the Roman government
, their brutality in doingthings like crucifying his lord
and savior, their idolatry,demanding the emperor be
worshipped, the inequality thatwas rampant throughout the
empire.
But Paul doesn't overly concernhimself with this because he
recognizes that the authoritythat was rampant throughout the
empire.
But Paul doesn't overly concernhimself with this because he
recognizes that the authoritythat the state exercises is a
(19:03):
derived authority, it is not theultimate, and that to be a
Christian in the world that hasbeen saved by God but not yet
fully consummated, is to live ina complex world, is to live in
a complex world.
We in our culture are obsessedwith this idea of being on the
right side of history and we cantry to absolve ourselves of any
(19:27):
entanglements and compromise,and yet we find that we stand on
ethically and morally perilousground.
Nonetheless, this doesn'tbreathe in us a cynicism.
It doesn't cause us to throw upour hands and say what can be
done, but it does put us intouch, first of all, with our
need for confession.
(19:47):
Throughout most of Canada,assemblies, even some church
services, begin with anacknowledgement of the land, the
historic indigenous citizens ofthe land.
Here in New Jersey we are onthe grounds that are
historically home of the Lenapepeople.
Now you may roll your eyes andsay this is just progressive
mumbo jumbo, but I think it'soften the closest Western
(20:10):
culture gets to confession.
The story didn't start with us.
There are chapters that are,quite frankly, really ugly and
there's not a lot we can doabout it.
And it's on this morallycompromised ground that we stand
and we acknowledge that we havethis allergy to just telling
(20:33):
the truth about our history sooften and that's corporate,
that's personal One of thethings that our interactions
with government bring us into isjust this fraught place of what
it means to be human.
None of us is righteous, noneof us stands on our own accord,
and yet God holds us up by hisgrace.
(20:55):
It also puts us in touch withour limits.
What most of us don't do isdirect the state budget, but
what we can do is follow Romans13, verses 8 through 12 in
Romans 12.
Read Romans 12 on your own time.
I'll read Romans 13 for you now, owe, no one, anything except
(21:15):
to love one another, for the onewho loves another has fulfilled
the law.
The commandments you shall notcommit adultery, you shall not
murder, you shall not steal, youshall not covet, and any other
commandment are summed up inthis word you shall love your
neighbor as yourself.
Love does no wrong to aneighbor.
(21:36):
Therefore, love is thefulfilling of the law.
We can do that now, ecclesia.
What that doesn't do is overlypersonalize what the gospel is
bringing forth in us.
No, it means we listen to thetestimony of our neighbor.
So when our neighbor says, yes,there is fear when I encounter
(21:58):
the police because of the colorof my skin, we don't have to say
well, well, well like, if youdo good, then only good will
come.
No, we as the people of God,can say tell me more about that.
As Romans 12 reminds us weepwith those who weep.
Hate what is evil.
Love what is good, neighbor.
Love is the politic that Jesusinvites us into, and it is an
(22:22):
effective politic that doesn'toverly individualize our
response to the grace that ispoured out but instead
multiplies exponentially andturns us into the movement, the
people of God, that he hascalled us to be.
Okay, so some wisdom.
(22:45):
How do we embody Romans 13 inour own politically fraught
times?
First, we subject government andput it in its proper place.
The word used for b subject isthe greek compound word,
(23:07):
hupotasso comes from hupa, whichmeans under, and tasso, which
means to bring about an order ofthings by arranging them,
putting them in their place.
How many of you are justincredibly type A and you just
like things to be reallyorganized?
Thank you, thank you, we needyou, thank you.
I don't know if type B is athing, but here I am type B,
(23:33):
organized, order things in theirright place.
We have a staff full of peoplethat are incredibly organized,
and there's good reasons forthat.
When I go in that closet, if Iwere managing the storage of
Ecclesia, it'd be like thosecartoons where they just have to
shove things in there and stufflike bowling balls roll out.
Why is there a bowling ball inthere?
(23:54):
Nobody knows things in thereand stuff like bowling balls
roll out.
Why is there a bowling ball inthere?
Nobody knows, but when you goin there.
It's order.
God creates order.
The image of a filing system isa useful one that the authority
of government has been filed ina certain place by God, who is
the sovereign and absoluteauthority.
He is the one who standsoutside of the filing cabinet
(24:16):
putting everything in its rightplace.
And if we talk of a filingsystem, that government has a
proper file that has beenassigned.
And we talk that everyexpression of government has
been designed with certainplaces, certain limits, we
(24:38):
entrust that God will exercisehis authority and his judgment
upon those that bear the swordand the scriptures talk often of
this that the Lord is sovereign, that he will call the nations
to bear, that he will callrulers to bear, that he will
call teachers and leaders tobear upon his judgment.
That, just as we have beencalled to lead, we have been
(25:03):
warned and told over and overagain that we will face a severe
judgment from God because ofthe responsibility that we carry
and that exists at alldifferent levels.
And one of the things I find sosad in my life, in my own
personal relationships, is theway that so many Christians have
allowed the filing system thatGod has created just to overflow
(25:27):
.
It is just completely indisarray.
I have so many friends andcolleagues, left and right alike
, that have allowed thegovernment file to completely
overrun the entire filingcabinet.
I mean, the thing isoverflowing with scrawlings of
conspiracy theories.
(25:47):
Our hypercharged media enablesthis to completely subsume our
lives, and much of the idolatryand deception that is wrapped up
in the American politicalsystem comes from the way that
Christians have placed so muchmore emphasis on their chosen
political perspectives than thatof Jesus Christ.
(26:08):
I've been saddened to watch,dear friends and colleagues and
I say this with no superioritycomplex, I say this with no
judgment, but as I've watchedfriends of mine who are wise,
kind and thoughtful essentiallybecome left-wing mouthpieces,
hold that thought I've beensaddened to interact with people
(26:29):
who have been a part of my life, churches that were deeply
formative for me, who justrattle off right-wing talking
points and it's almost as if youknow what they're going to say
by their chosen politicalposture.
It's like oh, what do you thinkabout this?
Actually, I kind of alreadyknow, because I heard it on.
You know, insert name here.
(26:50):
I say this again, not forChristians to.
Okay, let's find the middle.
Perfect, it's comfortable here,this is great.
Now we can just stand injudgment of both sides.
This is awesome.
You're welcome.
That's what we're here for.
No, it's because there arethings that on the left that are
(27:13):
kingdom-oriented and righteous,but not everything, and there
are things on the right that arekingdom-oriented and righteous,
but neither comprises the wholeof the kingdom vision, and both
sides are hopelesslycompromised, because you cannot
have the kingdom of Jesuswithout the king, which means
(27:35):
that, as Christians, when wemake choices in the political
realm which we are called tomake to exercise wisdom and
authority, we should not betrying to justify them endlessly
, to entrench ourselves in them,to wrap our whole identity up
in our chosen politicalperspective.
Again, the pastoral wisdom I'vebeen counseling for some months
now is make a decision and moveon, or take in new information
(27:59):
and say you know what, maybe Iwas wrong about that?
Heaven forbid, because there'sambiguity, there's complexity
wrapped up in each choice.
When we subject ourselves togovernment that is properly
subjected to Christ, weacknowledge both our own limits,
in that God has not given usall the agency in the world, all
(28:21):
the information in the world,and we acknowledge the limits of
government itself.
We bear witness that thegovernment, no matter how
totalitarian in its claims,cannot claim our heart, our soul
, our mind, our strength or whatthe New Testament calls our
allegiance.
And so we put government backin its proper place.
(28:41):
It is not everything.
And second, we have to discern.
I mentioned the powers earlier.
Elsewhere, in Ephesians,chapter 6, paul speaks of powers
that are behind the power.
He says this, beginning inverse 10, against the
(29:11):
authorities, against the cosmicpowers of this present darkness,
against the spiritual forces ofevil in the heavenly places.
Paul recognized that Claudiusor Nero were not his enemies,
just as Jesus recognized thatCaiaphas and Pilate were not his
.
And you can insert Americanpolitical figure that you
(29:31):
despise into the Senate here.
They are not your enemy.
There are powers that asise anddescendants here they are not
your enemy.
There are powers that, asRomans 11 reminds us, these
powers are from God, they arethrough God and to God, that
exist in the world.
These powers are not specificindividuals, but are always
embodied in human agents.
These powers can be individualpeople or institutions, like
(29:54):
governments, or constructs, likerace, and these powers have all
one and the same, been disarmedby Jesus on the cross.
Look at Colossians, chapter 2,one of my favorite texts.
God made you alive togetherwith him when he forgave us all
our trespasses.
Amen, forgiveness, individualgrace, beautiful, erasing the
(30:17):
record that stood against uswith its legal demands.
Praise the Lord, he's paid ourdebt.
He set this aside, nailing itto the cross.
Look what he does next.
He disarmed the rulers andauthorities and made a public
example of them triumphing overthem.
I love that Paul mentions apublic example because it gives
(30:38):
me an excuse to mention that theOklahoma City Thunder won the
NBA championship this pastSunday.
Jesus is parading his defeat ofthese powers.
He's just saying look.
And Paul says elsewhere inCorinthians if the powers that
be would have known what Jesuswas up to, they would not have
(30:58):
crucified the Lord of glory,that Jesus was doing the deeper
magic that CS Lewis talks about,that Jesus has so thoroughly
disarmed them that, though wewrestle with them, as Paul says,
they have no last word in theface of what Jesus has done.
Paul's response to this, takingRomans 12, 13, and Ephesians 6
(31:21):
together, is that we are towrestle with these powers.
It is not a new story that welive out as Christians in a
perilous and complex age.
It is our tradition.
We receive this inheritance.
We receive this baton the bookof Hebrews talks about we run
this race fixing our eyes onJesus, the author and perfecter
(31:45):
of our faith, and there aremultitudes of people that have
faithfully lived this out.
Some we know their names, somewe will not know until the other
side of glory.
They're cheering you on andsaying don't give in.
Don't give in to these smallstories.
You've been given the truestory of the entire world, but
(32:07):
we struggle against them, not inour own strength.
Paul says there's armor.
You should put it on.
We wrestle with the powers byfulfilling the law in love.
We wrestle with the powersthrough intercessory prayer.
We wrestle with the powers byfulfilling the law in love.
We wrestle with the powersthrough intercessory prayer.
We wrestle with the powers byelecting leaders who have
integrity and courage.
We wrestle with the powers bybeing youth baseball coaches,
(32:30):
mentors, by being artists, byvisiting prisoners and sharing
life with them, by serving theundocumented in our midst, by
bearing witness to life in thewomb, by coming to the table of
Jesus from every socioeconomic,ethnic, cultural background,
receiving His grace, bylamenting what is broken and sad
in this world and crying outwith all of creation.
(32:53):
How long, joining with creationin its groans and travails,
anxiously awaiting for the sonsand daughters of God to be
revealed and for creation to bemade new.
Be subject to the rulingauthorities is simply one way
that we bear witness to thelimits of the ruling authorities
(33:13):
.
And there comes a point wherewe must conscientiously object
and dissent, because we arebearing witness to a higher
authority, to a higher law.
Martin luther king jr and thesouthern christian leadership
conference bear witness to thisauthority with bus boycotts and
sit-ins because they acknowledgethe ruling authorities and laws
(33:34):
of this land were an unjust.
Dj bonhoeffer convenes aseminary at Finkenwald to bear
witness to the injustice ofHitler and his regime and to
raise up a generation ofpreachers who will tell the
truth in the face of deception.
William Wilberforce and theClapham sect prayed and financed
the overhaul of chattel slaveryin England because they
(33:55):
realized the extent to which theslave trade was an idolatrous
capitulation to mammon and acomplete denial of the Christian
faith.
Frederick Douglass ran awayfrom his legal owners because no
man or no woman should be owned.
Perpetua and Felicitas,scrolling way back to church
history, refused to capitulateto the imperial ideology and
(34:17):
bore witness at the cost oftheir lives.
John and Peter, arrested by thegoverning authorities, said hey
, do what you want to us, but wecannot stop speaking in this
name.
It's both Paul and Petertelling us to be subject to the
governing authorities to honorthe emperor that ultimately,
(34:38):
will be executed by that sameimperial system, because they
held on to a better hope, acitizenship in a country without
end, a city whose foundationsare unshakable.
And Jesus?
Jesus told Pilate you wouldhave no power if it were not
given to you from above.
(34:59):
Jesus told the high priest hewould see the Son of man riding
in power on the clouds.
Jesus told the soldiers whocame to arrest him I am he, ego
and me.
And though he constantly andrightfully protested, you arrest
me and yet you bring no chargeagainst me.
He willingly went to the crossto confront and unmask all the
(35:22):
pretensions of the powers, allpowers of government, of
religion, of systemic oppressionand, ultimately, the powers of
sin and death themselves.
He submitted himself to themand overthrew them, and we can
take heart because he hasovercome the world in his life,
(35:44):
his death, his resurrection.
I'm going to invite the worshipteam forward as we transition to
a time of response.
Ecclesia, ecclesia.
This victory that is Christ isthen given to us as the gift of
what the scriptures call grace.
And it works itself out in acouple different ways and we've
(36:06):
sort of talked along two vantagepoints and I want to just name
them as we respond to God'spresence here in our midst.
First of all, there is thecorporate peace, the Pax
Christus, the Shalom, the firstword that Jesus speaks to his
disciples when he appears tothem upon his resurrection.
(36:27):
Peace, my peace, I give to you,my peace I leave with you.
I do not give as the worldgives.
And that peace is not just anice inner feeling for us, it is
the cosmic writing of allthings.
It is all things that arecreated from, through and to
Jesus Christ, recognizing theirtrue Lord and sovereign.
(36:49):
And when that happens, we seethe image in Revelation 21 and
22.
Sin and death are no more.
God wipes every tear from oureyes.
There is no more pain, there isno more distance between us
that is misunderstanding,miscommunication, but love is
truly the distance that isbetween us.
(37:09):
And so we pray in the midst ofthis longing, we pray that God
will bring his peace into ourmidst and that we can be agents
of that peace.
That is the corporate,collective side of this peace,
and we both long for it and wework for it.
But there's another side tothis.
That is the beauty of Jesus'sgospel.
(37:31):
It's not just something that isabout us collectively, it is
something about us individually,that we all stand before God as
the unique person throughoutall the history of the world,
throughout all the eight billionpeople that exist in the world
right now.
You are singular, and that maysound aggrandizing, that may
sound like you're making toomuch of yourself, but I assure
(37:53):
you that is much less than Godmakes of you, and he is calling
you to himself and he's sayingmy peace, I give to you my peace
, I leave with you.
And so this is the invitation,both for us as the people of God
, to endeavor to be this kind ofpeople of peace, by the power
of his spirit, to say yes, lord,come, we want you here.
(38:14):
But then say individually Jesus, I need you.
In the midst of these anxiousmoments that I live, in the
midst of my powerlessness in theface of what I am facing, in
the midst of the sin that is soreadily before me, god, I need
you and the beauty of Jesus.
As we're talking about rulingauthorities and sovereign, he's
(38:38):
a good king, as Tolkien remindsus, the hands of a king are the
hands of a healer, and this iswhat he comes to do to heal and
restore, to make all things new.
We pray, come Holy Spirit, lordJesus, we focus our attention
on your healing hands and I cansee where you are.
(39:02):
I just invite you to just forman image of Jesus stretched out
on the cross.
His hands are pierced throughwith nails, they are wounded,
but, as Isaiah reminds us, byhis wounds we are healed.
(39:23):
And with that vision justsitting in your mind if it's
more of the corporate vantagepoint that you are sort of
sitting with and wrestling with,how is the world as it is?
How are there so many peoplethat lack integrity or courage
or truthfulness Wielding thelevers of power?
(39:44):
I ask, just allow the Spirit ofGod to rise up, a lament in you
.
The Spirit groans with sighsthat are too deep for words,
sighs that are too deep forwords.
And that same groaning meets usin our individual stories and
lives, the places we often cometo dead ends.
(40:06):
Again and again we feelpowerless.
Again and again we find thisprofound need for grace, and
it's not just one time, it's notjust a few times, it is every
day of our lives and ChristJesus have mercy upon me, you
sinner.
(40:30):
We believe the Holy Spirit ishere, that Christ's resurrection
is not just a nice idea, a nicestory that we tell ourselves,
but that he truly poured out hisspirit, that his presence is no
less here with us than it wasin the stories that we read in
the scriptures, that he looks atus without turning away, that
(40:55):
he invites us to touch thewounds in his hands so that we
might believe that he speakswords of peace to us, that he
speaks words that say I see you,I have you, and that he's doing
that here in this place.
And so I just invite you tolisten.
(41:16):
And so I just invite you tolisten.
I'm going to take just a momentin quiet before the worship
team begins to sing.
When they start to sing, youcan stand and respond together,
but I'm afraid on the team.
If you guys would just give usa minute, when you're ready,
just go into the song.
(41:37):
It's a lot of the Holy Spiritjust to have His way in this
place.
We pray come, holy Spirit.
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