Why Christians Should Obey the Government...(Part 1)

Today I will be sharing with you some reasons for the Christian to obey the government. Every person has to deal with the government in one way or the other. We each must decide what attitude and response we will have towards government in general, weather local, state, or national, and towards the government’s leaders and government rules (taxes, jury duty, traffic laws, building codes, business laws, criminal and civil laws, etc.) Sometimes we’re inclined to be disrespectful to certain government leaders because we believe that they’re not worthy of respect or because we do not accept the legitimacy of their authority.

Sometimes we’re inclined to disobey or ignore certain laws and rules of government because they seem ludicrous or unfair to us or simply because these particular rules would be very difficult for us to keep. Some people go even further than disobeying or ignoring the government’s laws and actually fight against the government through various means, including terrorism. As Christians though, we’re not free to deal with the government, or its laws and leaders, as we choose. We have a God-given mandate to respond to the governing authorities in a specific way. We are to "submit to the governing authorities." The word "submit" means to recognize the authority of the government and to yield to that authority. In practice it means to obey the person or institution we’re submitting to. It is important understand that one cannot truthfully claim to be adhering to this biblical injunction of submission if they are at the same time actively disobeying the laws or leaders of the land.

Obey the government because it is the right thing to do.

Paul tells us who should obey the governing authority, and why this is the right thing for the Christian to do. First he says that "Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities." Everyone means everyone! There is no one who has an exemption from this command.

Some religious people of Paul’s day felt that they were the exception. They felt that, since they were God’s people, they didn’t have to listen to the government. They were saying that they did not have to obey the government because they recognized no authority except God’s. Some so-called "Christian militias" still propose such ideas, but the Bible is clear, everyone is commanded by God to obey the governing authorities. Paul then goes on to explain why it is the right thing to do for Christians to obey the government. He says, "There is no authority except that which God has established."

The attitude of many people both past and present is that some governments and government leaders are evil or illegitimate, so they do not have to be obeyed, and that some laws do not apply because either the laws are stupid and selectively enforced or because the laws were established by atheistic, unbelieving, or evil government’s. The Bible will allow no such excuses or reasoning. According to God’s own word, there is no government that was not established by him. This includes democracies, monarchies, Communist governments, and dictatorships. This means we are to obey the governing authorities whether they are Democratic or Republican, moral or immoral, Christian, Buddhist or Atheists, homosexual or heterosexual, etc... Obeying the government is the right thing to do because these authorities are established by God.

Does this mean that everything various governments do is approved by God? No! Many times the government, which is composed a sinful men, will do the wrong thing. Does this principle mean that we’re to obey the governing authorities if they tell us to do something that God in his word tell us not to do? No, we’re to obey authority, but the highest authority is God. His commands supersede the governments in the same way that national law supersedes state law. In Acts 5:29 Peter refused to obey the Sanhedrin’s command to stop speaking about Jesus. He said "We must obey God rather than men." There are a few other examples of when believers rightfully disobeyed the government, such as when the Israelite midwives refused to kill the male children, or when Daniel refused to pray to King Darius and was thrown in the lions’ den. Having noted that we can sometimes be right in disobeying the government, we should be careful not to use this as an excuse to disobey government leaders and laws that do not directly conflict with the clear word of God. 99% of the time, obeying the government’s laws will not require us to disobey God! This means we should obey the government in matters such as taxes, business and building codes, traffic and criminal laws, gun control, prohibition against publicly led prayer in public schools, etc...

Do you always obey?