Steve Whinery // Biblical Submission To The Government

just want to again thank you guys for coming out uh it's awesome that you're here how many of you get how many of you are pastors raise your hands okay how many of your leadership that should be the rest of you right okay i'm not gonna i'm not gonna assume anything when i'm going through this but i'm gonna do this pretty quickly because i like you probably uh am more interested in what tracy has to say than what i have to say and so but i just wanted to go through and give you a biblical basis um for specifically what we're doing here at calvary okay so you know the verses so one of the one of the passages is in titus chapter 3 verses 1 through 2 it says this remind them to be subject to rulers and authorities to obey to be ready for every good work to speak evil of no one to be peaceable gentle showing all humility to all men okay that's pretty straightforward right then you have uh first peter 2 13-17 and it says therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the lord's sake that means if it says 55 you go 55 right every ordinance of man for the lord's sake whether to the king is supreme or to governors as to those who are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of those who do good for this is the will of god that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men as free yet not using liberty as a cloak for vice but as bond servants of god honor all people love the brotherhood fear god honor the king okay and that's pretty straightforward right then you go to uh romans chapter 13. i'm only going to do verses one and two i know that obviously there's a uh there's more to it than that but these these are pretty succinct it says let every soul be subject to the governing authorities for there is no authority except from god the authorities that exist are appointed by god therefore whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of god and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves and so the bible is really clear on the fact that we're supposed to be in submission to governing authorities and we're supposed to be good citizens that's that's a that's a very clear thing in scripture um here's where the problems come in uh there's a there's a passage in second corinthians 11 and this is verse verses 23 through 26 and this is paul speaking and he's the guy who wrote titus and he's the guy who wrote romans and this is what he says are they ministers of christ i speak as a fool i am more and labor labor's more abundant and stripes above measure in prisons more frequently what's he in prison for you guys know the book of acts what's he in prison for preaching the gospel starting churches right in prisons more frequently and deaths often from the jews five times i received 40 stripes minus one why is he getting stripes yeah he's preaching the gospel starting churches that's what he's doing uh three times i was beaten with rods once i was stoned three times i was shipwrecked and a night and a day i've been in the deep in journeys often in perils of waters barrels of robbers and perils of my own countrymen and perils of the gentiles and perils in the city in perils in the wilderness and perils in the sea and perils among false brethren and so paul had a pretty rowdy life he was in jail he was beaten up and um most times when he's getting beaten up he's being beaten up by rulers it's not just people it's the it's the governing authorities who are beating this guy and putting him in prison okay so why isn't he obeying romans chapter 13 why isn't he obeying titus chapter chapter three verses one and two um when you go through and you look at these passages just just to show you um acts 13 49-50 this is uh his situation at antioch and again there's there's a large context there but i just want to give you the relevant verses it says the in the word of the lord was being spread throughout all the region but the jews stirred up the devout and prominent women and the chief men of the city those are the rulers raised up persecution against paul and barnabas and expelled them from their region and so it goes from there to iconium when he gets iconium it says the multitude of the city was divided because some jews followed him and and uh basically slandered him but the multitude of the city was divided part-sized with the jews and part with the apostles and when a violent attempt was made by both the gentiles and jews with their rulers to abuse and stone them they became aware of it and fled to lystra and derby cities of like chaonia and to the surrounding region and they were preaching the gospel there okay so again you got rulers involved in the persecution of paul because he's sharing the gospel and literally what apostles did with it was they started churches when you go to uh acts chapter 16 you guys you guys all know you you guys all know acts chapter 16 verses 19 through 24 paul's out preaching the gospel he ends up casting a spirit out of a woman who is a fortune teller verse 19 it says this but when her master saw that their hope of prophet was gone they seized paul and silas dragged them into the marketplace to the authorities and they brought them to the magistrates and said these men being jews exceedingly trouble our city and they teach customs which are not lawful for us being romans to receive or observe then the multitude rose up together against them and the magistrates tore off their clothes and commanded them to be beaten with rods and when they had laid many stripes on them they threw them into prison commanding the jailer to keep them securely having received such a charge he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in stocks and you know that they were down there till midnight singing songs and all of a sudden there's an earthquake the you know the doors are opened and and uh the jailer realizes that probably everybody's left and and so he thinks he's going to be killed for his uh lack of uh um well actually for his failure in keeping these guys and paul ends up leading this guy to the lord not only him but his family right and he's in there because of illegal activity according to the passage um it goes on and in verse 35 through 39 it says and when it was day the magistrates sent the officers saying let those men go so the keeper of the prison reported these words to paul saying the magistrates have sent to you to let you go now therefore depart and go in peace but paul said to them they've beaten us openly uncondemned romans and have thrown us into prison and now do they put us out secretly no indeed let them come themselves and get us out and so you see a little fire there with paul and the officers told these words to the magistrates and they were afraid when they heard that they were romans and you guys know the reason for that you don't beat a roman without a trial right and then they came and pleaded with them and brought them out and asked them to depart from the city so they went out of the prison and entered the house of lydia and when they had seen the brethren they encouraged them and departed and so again you got a situation where paul is doing something that is titularly illegal and he uh ends up getting beaten put in jail for it put in jail for it uh when they want to come and get him out he is not above using the law in the situation to defend himself and the gospel and probably specifically the believers in philippi i believe that's why he did this whole thing putting these guys into a place where they would be afraid to go after the church because what because of what they've done with paul okay you know when when you when you go through and you look at all this stuff you've got to remember that again paul wrote the epistle to titus and he was jailed and he was beaten repeatedly by governing authorities for preaching the gospel publicly and again for starting churches and he along with peter who is the one who um who i quoted from second peter he said where to obey every ordinance of man for the lord's sake disobeyed civil authorities repeatedly when the authorities told them to disobey the command of god when when you have the apostle peter being commanded by his government to disobey the command of christ he said this whether it's right in the sight of god to listen to you more than to god you judge for we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard and when he was commanded a second time to disobey god's word he said we ought to obey god rather than men and so the guy who said you obey every ordinance of man for the lord's sake is the guy who told the god the guys who were telling him to shut up about jesus to stop doing church to to stop doing this stuff he's the one who said to them we ought to obey god rather than man that's acts chapter four and then it's acts chapter five and so you can't you can't take the commandments of the apostles and take them out of the context of their life in the way that they they obeyed those commandments when you when you look at church history the early church assembled for over 300 years even though christianity was declared illegal by the roman government and we all know this and so the the first 300 church years of the church was nothing but persecution 10 clear persecutions during that time and it's you know when you when you go through the bible it's clear in scripture that the assembly of the church is a command it's not optional and it never has been um in fact the word for church the word for for for church in greek is assembly it's ecclesia and it just means the assembly it's hard to be an assembly if you're not assembling right there's a passage that we all know hebrews 10 24-25 it says this let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as is the manner of some but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching is the day approaching yeah so so much the more and when you when you're looking at that that passage obviously uh in greek it's command this is a command it's not something that the bible makes optional there's another passage that i like is in acts 2 42 it says this they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship in the breaking of bread and in prayers those are the two passages that i just read to you are passages that christians in my church are pretty familiar with and they both encourage the assembly of believers the first passage again being a command the assembly of the church or the fellowship is not an option for a christian god tells us that it is something that we are to do it's demanded by the word of god and the command is to be obeyed in the second verse the one that talks about continuing steadfastly the phrase there is defined in the lexicon of the new testament in this way to continue to do something with intense effort with the possible implication of despite difficulty to devote oneself to keep to keep on to persist in and you know it's obvious from these passages that christians are enjoying to participate in corporate worship and that the assembly is to be persisted in with intense effort uh and again these things are clear despite difficulty when you look at the the whole issue of submission submission is always absolute when it relates to god so whatever god says i am to submit to but um it's always conditional when it relates to men and you know this is this is just basic stuff that we live with every day you know i am uh if if i have a job out in in the world in the secular arena i have an employer and the bible says that i'm supposed to treat those who are over me masters as if they're jesus and so i'm i'm to treat my employer like he's christ is he christ no but i'm to treat him that way and one of the things that we would never tell an uh a christian employee is that you have to do what your boss says no matter what he says if he tells you to in you know in you know if if you have a supervisor at work and he tells you to embezzle the company and he's the one who's over you obviously you don't embezzle you don't cheat you don't steal you don't do anything that's going to be contrary to the word of god or what what god clearly commands it's exactly the same thing in a relationship with a cop the cop pulls me over and says you know what i've got authority over you and you know i'm feeling like robbing a bank today and so i want you to be involved with me well okay you're my authority and obviously i'm i'm being facetious with that whole thing but we would not do that there there are points that we take submission to and no far no further and the point that we take submission to is where it in intersects the commands of god if if my submission to mankind becomes something where i am being unsubmissive to the word of god that's where it stops and it doesn't matter if it's a cop and it doesn't matter if it's a boss it doesn't matter if it's a husband it doesn't matter if it's a father or a mother my father or mother tell me to do something ungodly i am not called by god to do the ungodly thing right and so submission in the bible always has when you're dealing with men it's always conditional we never put submission to rulers above our submission to god and so when you're looking at these passages paul was not teaching that we obey governing authorities when they tell us to disobey god the guy didn't live that way um acts 21-28 the whole last section of the book of acts is the history of paul refusing to bow to governmental pressure and using both the jewish and roman legal system to defend himself and his ministry which included preaching teaching and starting churches and that's the last part of the book of acts again the idea that paul would subordinate the command of god to the whim of a ruler is not supported in scripture and again paul didn't live that way when there was a conflict between the command of god and the commands of rulers paul always obeyed god it's why they cut his head off all that is in the context of autocratic rulers all that is in the context of emperors and their representatives all that is in the context of caesar nero all that is in that context and paul you know was executed under caesar nero right now here's the deal in the united states of america we don't live in an empire we we don't have a king we live in a constitutional republic it's not a monarchy and it's certainly not a tyranny and this is one of those things that when i've uh talked to people who uh you know uh people who are in churches and and christians and yeah even some pastors that i know this is something uh that um a lot of guys just didn't learn in civics we don't have a king and so when the bible talks about the fact that we need to submit to the authority that works in so far as the authority is obeying the law and that's where the rub comes in in our form of government the constitution is king in our form of government it's not the president it's not the governor it's the constitution of the united states um i i took an excerpt there's a a paper called the 1776 project and i was just reading it this way because they told me not to and and so i've got an excerpt from this that's that's kind of cool it says this the bedrock upon which the american political system is built is the rule of law the vast difference between tyranny and the rule of law is a central theme of political thinkers back to classical antiquity the idea that the law is superior to rulers is the cornerstone of english constitutional thought as it developed over the centuries the point that's being made there is even under king george it wasn't an absolute monarchy it hadn't been an absolute monarchy since the magna carta this guy was subject to laws right and um it goes on and says the concept was transferred to the american colonies and can be seen expressed through colonial pamphlets and political writings as thomas paine reflected in common sense and this is a quote for as in absolute governments the king is law so in free countries the law ought to be king and there ought to be no other but lest any ill use should afterwards arise let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony be demolished and scattered among the people whose right it is and basically what payne was saying is that if we had anybody who came along and decided that they were going to be a king take the crown off his head you bust it up and you pass it out to the people because that's where rulership belongs not one man it goes on and says to assure such a government americans demanded a written legal document that would create both a structure and a process for securing their rights and liberties and spell out the divisions and limits of the powers of government that legal document must be above ordinary legislation and day-to-day politics that is what the founders meant by constitution and that's why our constitution is the supreme law of the land um the the first amendment and tracy is going to talk more about this says this congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or bridging the freedom of speech or of the press or of the right to peaceably assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances the first amendment was written in the historical context of a country that was started by people who had these freedoms abrogated by governments who didn't care about whether or not they wanted to worship and so what ended up happening was they came to the united states and when they got here um the religious uh they set up the constitution and specifically the whole issue with freedom of speech and freedom of religion freedom to assemble and exercise their religion all of those freedoms are based most likely on the biblical mandate for church assembly and one of the things that hasn't changed because there is a virus here is the first amendment and that's something that the government is beginning to notice the washington state constitution guarantees the same rights and again the arrival of the wuhan virus has not nullified these rights the rights guaranteed by our constitution are god-given according to our documents not granted by the government so they cannot be taken away by the government this is a basic principle and foundation of our founding documents and our republic and governor inslee finally recognized this just before christmas when he changed his mandate on church assembly to a recommendation i don't know if you if you followed that but december 23rd he changed the rulings and so it's not an absolute mandate anymore now it's a recommendation okay and so that's that's where you know whether you're whether you're talking about the biblical standard or whether you're talking about the governmental standard and how we're supposed to look at government uh both those issues in in my reading of the bible um show that what we're supposed to be doing is putting god first in the first place and you don't put anybody above the constitution except for god obviously you don't put any man above the constitution and so that's where that's where we sit and by the way i'm commanded to sing too in scripture so that's all i got for you

Channel: Calvary Chapel Tri-Cities

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Length: 20min 9sec (1209 seconds)

Published: Tue May 04 2021